So you never visit the fleet? You never get on your ship? You never come across one of the numerous bank nodes spread across leveling planets? Why not send smaller stacks to each character so that none have more than one unit space full of them in their inventory? I don't care if they increase the stack size or not but if you don't want them taking up space TRY USING THEM. Buy credit boxes with your coms and use the medpaks you have. Things that can be solved with common sense don't need to take up dev time.

You're not an elitist, if you think 1 dps can shut down a healer and make him worthless to his team you have no idea what you are talking about. Ranked premade teams that know how to focus, interrupt, CC and isolate are having tons of trouble taking them down.

For pug games I love being a dps scoundrel or assassin in any node capture game. Most players don't want to be the dude defending so you end up with a single defender at a node which is where you can have fun and win the game for your team. Even 1v2 is doable is neither of them are healers. Stealth in, CC them if they look sturdy, kill them if they look squishy and cap away. For example on my merc the other day I got left alone at a node when an shadow and scoundrel had been attacking throughout the game. I tried to let my team know that leaving an arsenal merc on his own to defend against stealthies was just an awful idea, but no one came to help me defend. I got attacked, killed, they capped and I got blamed even though I both warned them and called out. Basically, being on the other side of that is fun. Ranked games...yeah I get your frustration.

Voidstar needs to be redesigned. I like your thinking OP but I'm not a fan of "capping" a door in the first place. Rather, I would prefer something using different mechanics where players would be able to progressively damage a door. The more time they are free to "cast" whatever it is that damages the door the more the door's health will drop until eventually blowing up. This way it works sort of like Novare in that you don't have to kill the defenders, but allows for an active defense to put up a good fight. I'd say as a way to reward the defense, the door could slowly repair itself or something when not being attacked though the goal of changing it is so that doors will actually explode. This way priority for defenders is still keeping people off the door but attackers actually have a chance in games where people aren't dying. This would lead to more games being decided by the 2nd and 3rd sets of doors as opposed to kills. It would be like Novare node capping except that the defending team can't just "reset" all your progress if they wipe you out. The door is still damaged and you can continue the assault where you left off (though again some sort of door healing mechanic could work as long as it's not too powerful). Bridge and force fields could stay the same.

Merc can be played just as simple. Power shot power shot all mobs dead. Strong or elite? Send your companion in to attack it and then... Having more options is not a bad thing. After a little time using sticky it becomes second nature, you know who to hit with it, where they will land and how to utilize it best. Mercs and mandos are far and away the strongest class at early levels when speaking of questing. This thread isn't about later on. Smash doesn't get that powerful until later on. If we're talking generally though mercs have a spammable aoe as well as 4 others that are easy to use and can be rotated from mob to mob in addition to strong, cheap single target skills. They are strong enough to take out leveling mobs with ease. Even if you overheat a bit by the time you reach the next group you don't need to worry about that any more than a sorc spamming storm does. You can be a healing merc and easily get through groups in no time with your aoe. Mercs have it so much better than other classes early on, even if it does even out later.

Would love 1 or 2 more huttball maps. The first characters I pvped on in this game way back when was a PT and assassin tank. Naturally I feel in love with huttball. On my assassin I leveled with a healing sorc friend and before the 50 brackets were put in we never lost a single huttball with that combo playing about 5 a day (all we got back then was huttball). Wouldn't happen now since most people know about the classes and basic concept of huttball but this was back when people thought assassins and marauders were crap classes so yeah, not enough was known I guess. Anyway I had so much fun in huttball back then and it is still my favorite by far, but I'd love to see something new with it.

Essentially what you hate about pvp is that it's pvp? If you want fair, honorable duels then ask for duels. Don't go into a warzone expecting even volleys of attacks that are fair for both sides. So what if a level 17 killed you a bunch. Your level doesn't mean anything except you have more abilities. A level 10 can still wipe the floor with a level 29 through sheer damage. A level 30 can dominate a 54. That's bolster for you. I'm assuming he was an operative or sniper? Their job is to pick out the targets that they can take down fast and do it. They are supposed to terrify you, it's their job. Unfortunately for you being a sage you are often going to be high on their list. If you have a sniper harassing you use line of sight. That is a sniper's worst enemy. You will either make him get up and chase you (bad move on his part if you have reinforcements with you) or he will have to switch targets. If it's an operative once you know you have a stealth stalker (will happen often when playing a sage) you can take measures to counter them. Don't leave your back wide open. You can stand against pillars so that he can't get ideal positioning. Be aware of your map and ways you can ditch them or things to push them off of and into You'll at least have a chance to see him coming (doubtful) if he's not in your character's blind spot as well. You also want to make sure you're standing somewhere that your team can see you. Why? because if you're lucky you have people that immediately take measures to ruin a stealthy's opener as soon as they see them attacking someone. Nothing is worse for them than drawing the attention of your team. If you make yourself a dangerous target through your teammates they will look for someone else to harass. If you don't enjoy pvp that's perfectly fine, but if you hate getting killed that much why were you pvping in the first place?

1. Why is your PVE automatically more important than someone else's PVP? 2. It doesn't have to effect PvE at all. There are many ways through bolster or expertise changes that could balance things out. PVP stats don't have effect PVE. Why should PVP players not deserve balance just because you have no faith in the developers? That's not the problem or fault of the player. 3. There are tons of people that play both PVE and PVP, don't assume just because someone PVPs that they don't care about PVE at all.

You can't shut down good healers easily. 2 dps on each healer would be nice if not for the fact that their team is keeping those dps off them. They are getting guards, taunts, cross healing and peels. 2 dps won't be enough. Right now people die in voidstar because attackers go all out with 5-6 people focusing on one target where the other team is outnumbered. And yet it can still take significant time to actually kill them even in that "zerg fest" plus more and more teams are starting to turtle with tank/healer (as many as possible) to defend and prevent deaths. People die in huttball because they get left behind for the greater good, are forced to improvise to make a play or get cheesed by fire, healers may be busy keeping the ball carrier alive and have to let a dps die, and LoS can be a pain on that map given it's more movement oriented game style. The problem is the other 3 maps (voidstar too but at least deaths are a bit more common there). Teams get split between nodes into smaller squads which result in stalemates. It's not like every game in rated results in no deaths on either side, but it may as well because the actual objectives cannot be completed in all but huttball in "competitive" games. That would be fine if these were intended to be death matches. But you can't play it as an objective game and a death match at the same time. It's not death match when your team has to split up and both teams rather than focusing on killing are focused on just not dying and giving up positions. The games themselves are not able to be properly played because you simply cannot kill the other team fast enough to accomplish them. You have to crowd control to get anything done. There is nothing fundamentally wrong with that except that it's become the ONLY way. Wiping out the enemy team just doesn't happen unless one team is vastly superior or hopelessly disorganized, but that's not the situation things should be balanced around Things are like this because heals are so powerful at the moment, and one healer is just too difficult to kill. Basically right now to kill a scoundrel healer you need to surprise them with burst when they don't have a guard on, push their tank away and CC him, CC anyone that can CC you and keep the other healer if there is one from healing and cleansing them. It's not easy when the other team is taking measures to make sure something like that doesn't happen. Once all of that happens you better hope you can actually catch the thing. If you don't have an electro net on your team he's going to roll away. Even if he doesn't he's going to mez you, stun you, use defensive CDs, consumables and all the while his heals are still rolling on himself then vanish when applicable. By now his team is back in the battle assuming they were all stuck in CC prior. Electro net is such a nice skill right now because it's really the most stand out way to counter scoundrels. But even with it, it requires clever set up and a bit of good fortune going your way with no guarantee you will manage to kill them still. Any healer should be tough to kill when they are properly supported, but it's kind of insane how difficult it is to kill an operative.

Yes, I'm talking about organized play where balance is most needed and noticed. PUGs have way too many random factors to ever actually balance around. Casual pvp is fine in this game, always has been. A few changes to balance around premades isn't going to change that.

Not sure you guys are getting the context of my posts. I know what you're supposed to do to take down a healer, I was responding to people that act like it's simple and easy when it's not anymore. And I'm not asking for the sake of under geared pugs, that's why I exclude them. Balance isn't done around 1v1 random pugs that probably don't have their gear and lack the teammates to complement their strengths. Team play balance is what matters. Stalemates are not that rare anymore, that's the thing. You CAN make the argument that only under geared pugs have trouble taking down healers, but you'd be wrong. People die a lot less in ranked games. It's a lot harder to kill a healer there. The point is, knowing HOW to take down a healer doesn't mean it's going to happen. You have to coordinate kills with your entire squad and even then most of the time the healer will get away if it's an op or smuggler. So I ask, for these people claiming it's easy to kill and lock down healers, what is this magic tactic they are using? Just stating the basics of "interrupt, stun, dps" is about the equivalent of saying "me hit with stick". It's implying a simplicity that does not translate to actual gameplay at higher levels. These things are givens that everyone in ranked games knows and yet healers don't die. See the problem? My post isn't about whining, it's not like I want healers to die instantly and I think they should be tough to kill. I just think there is a problem when healing is so dominant and people don't die in pvp because of it. I solo kill lesser healers all the time in pug games. That doesn't mean things are balanced when it comes to high level play.

Lets hear your strategies oh wise one. And not talking about random under geared pugs. Have you seen a rated game lately? When two good teams meet hardly anyone dies at all, and if they do it's not usually the agent/smuggler healer. Everyone knows the basics of stopping a healer, but any smuggler that lets himself be shut down with simple tactics isn't very good or is very under geared vs his/her opponents. I'm not even whining, it's a reality right now that people don't die because healing is so good and the healers in question don't have many weaknesses when it comes to survival. I have a scoundrel healer, played it for a long time. It was easy to survive pre 2.0 and easier now. So lets hear it, you come across a GEARED scoundrel that is being protected by their team. Lets hear how you go in there and shut them down.

Always wondered why so many people spend money and time on something they don't like.

As soon as I come across a scoundrel that doesn't try to run away, has a bugged resolve bar, actually casts something, doesn't use their own CCs and has no team mates around to peel/protect for him/her I'm sure this will work wonderfully.

No thanks, good teams already know what they have to do. Bad teams are just going to cuss each other out and blame everyone. They aren't going to start passing or running ahead after a 30 second half time, they won't stop filling the ball carriers resolve in 3 seconds and they won't understand the difference between controlling an area and tunnel vision killing.

Yes, but then in the case of voidstar it works. There are only two nodes and at the beginning of the game is when the enemy team is the most split up, so if you can get a one person advantage by forcing at least 2 of them to defend one side you give yourselves an extra man on the other door. Obviously if they already have 2 defenders there that aren't moving you don't need to do this. If you do though they may call out that you're attacking and send way too many reinforcements though due to panic, giving an opportunity for the real target to be bombed. It's situational but to say it's never worth it is wrong. There is always value in deception but the person acting needs to be aware of the big picture. You don't even need to do it over and over and over again once they are too scared to leave a single defender.

Some of the "bad" things in here are also ways to win games. The one I really need to defend though is this. 1 guy running into 2-4 over and over again isn't actually stupid. (save for AH). If you can use 1 person to distract 2-4 of them at another node you are winning the numbers game at the node that matters. This is not stupid, it's incredibly useful. It's arguable whether doing this against 2 people will be worth it depending on the situation, buy any time you can hold up 3-4 of them you are making life so much easier than it could be for your team. In this case stupid is the team that lets themselves be baited.

It's always been this way and has been well known.

It's not that hard to kill higher levels... they have more abilities sure but it's not like you can't dominate games at level 20 or 30 or 40 in the current brackets.

If they have the AoE mez ready and your team falls into their trap then good on them countering your net and bad on you guys for grouping up for that.. Catching a low hp healer with the net and coordinating with your team to at least CC their tank away from the healer and the cross healer if there is one WILL often result in a kill. I'm sorry if you don't get these results, like everything else in rated it requires teamwork and planning. Preventing rolling and vanishing on a scoundrel makes it very difficult for them to escape in a dire moment. I feel like you are just really underestimating how effective EN can be. Like I said it's no auto-kill but effective use of it can allow you to take out a target that would otherwise slip away. I can tell you more mercs have earned a spot due to EN than HSM. There's a reason for that. Now, whether the class as a whole is worth taking just because of EN is another question, but that doesn't change the fact that if we're looking at individual skills that one is right at the top when it comes to value in pvp. Anyway - we'll just have to disagree on it. We've sort of derailed things.

In pugs sure. In rateds between guard switches, cross healing and a team that actually peels for their healer an agent healer is nearly impossible to kill. You have to pretty much CC their entire team and attempt to focus them hoping they don't get many with their mez as you do (should save it till after they use that). If they don't have it up, unless you net them they are just going to vanish or roll away a few times before you can get them, buying time for their team to wake back up. When your focus team is being slowed, taunted, guarded and healed against it's a LOT harder to kill any healer let alone an agent. If their team is doing a good job you can barely touch them without good coordination, and you have to wait for the planets to align to take one down. As for tanks, nerfing guard kills the spec in pvp. Getting rid of it makes it meaningless. Unless you're willing to give tanks real damage in return. A tanks job needs to be to protect, not just run huttballs and be a time soak at a node. DPS hurts people Healers recover people Tanks protect people Take away the large majority of protection they do and there is no point in playing one.

You're under the assumption that the team using the net hasn't set up a plan to stop cross healing and guard. The same way you coordinate CC to cap a node you can do so to eliminate a key player. Ranked matches are all about CONTROL. You're adding these downsides that do not exist if you use it right. Why would the other team kill my dps again? What about netting makes it so my team can no longer heal and protect? When they are CC'd and one of them is being focused with no way of escaping, how exactly do the both protect their netted friend and take out my dps? Focusing is not the same as mindless tunnel vision. Yes, they can protect a netted target and it happens plenty. But a well set up trap involving the net can take out those pesky smugglers better than anything else. There is no such thing as an automatic kill skill, I'm not saying that. Net has counters, but every counter also has a counter. TTK is so slow right now that really the only way to kill people is to control the battle, not burst through it. Net is your most useful skill. Not your highest dps or your best defensive measure. Getting kills is about coordination and timing, not who can get the biggest HSM crit.

How exactly is it not working? It's doing what it's supposed to for me.

To me railshot is a thousand times better. I love the look and sound of it. I love using it as a final move, especially on a knocked down opponent. There's just something satisfying about standing over someone and finishing them off with a railshot to the head. HIB to me feels like my gun is spitting goo at them. Not a fan. I love commando cannons but HIB and grav round vs rail and tracer is just not even close. Of course that's just my opinion. Commando skills are just way less flashy than merc which some people will prefer. I feel the same way about the flames vs shocks. filling the screen with fire is just so much more pleasing.

Can never go wrong with biochem for the adrenals, cybertech is nice in pvp for stunning. Mercs are in a really nice spot right now in pve and a lot better in pvp post 2.0 as arsenal. Bodyguard is better as well, still more strict with heat management but in PvE if you get used to it it's doable in all content, and mercs complement other healers really well. I especially love sorc/merc healing. In pvp you need a good team as you are less likely to escape as often than the other healers. That said when you have to, you can face tank for a bit. Ultimately having a good team will make you feel like an invincible healing machine, having a bad team will make you question why you bothered to attempt a heal. (I say attempt because if you're in a pug vs a premade as a merc healer and the pug is especially bad you will barely get any casts off). Pyro is... not really worth using at all unless you just really like the style. Though honestly arsenal is a lot more fluid and allows for more movement than it used to, which was the main strength of pyro over arsenal imo. Now when it comes to a DPS spec it's just really hard to argue against arsenal be it pve or pvp.