It's not overpowered...the spec that abused it on PvP is overpowered. PvP is only one aspect of the game...they changed a skill for PvP purposes that had a big impact on PvE. I do NOT play PvP, and this one change turned smash from an enjoyable skill to a clunky and irritating one. it removed it from being an enjoyable part of my juggs rotation, and made it an irritating but necessary part of it. it is honestly one of the worst changes they have made to a single skill, to date, in the game. Bio needs to stop changing PvE in negative ways to make up for PvP balance issues, or just get rid of PvP entirely. they could EASILY set the game up so that each skill can or does have a different effect in PvP. they're lazyness causes both PvP players and PvE players a huge amount of frustration. This isn't hate on PvP. if they made this change to ONLY affect players in PvP settings then we'd be fine. they chose to adjust the skill across the board for all players, hence why this thread is in existence in the first place. The change is horrid. no balance issue in PvP is worth this change IMO. my AoE attacks on ALL MY OTHER CLASSES DO NOT HAVE THESE LIMITATIONS, my sage and sorc can spam their AoE's all day long. my merc can do burst AoE that makes my jugg sick thinking about it. And none of them have this limitation. period. it needs to be reverted, and Bio honestly needs to re-think the lolsmash tree. it's simply stupid to break a skill that 3 different specs use just because they can't balance a single spec decently.

you do bring up a good point. He didn't specify if he meant Ops or Hm FP's. I think most of us looked at the stats and assumed he meant FP's. To the OP: Yes, your gear is fine for starting HM Flashpoints or Tactical FP's, but I would not hop into any HM Ops at your gear level. even a few SM Ops I would initially avoid...especially PuG's. Many PuG's don't even like taking DPS with less then 29-30k health. TfB being an exception, as it's really easy to do, especially the 16m. And yes, health is a "poor" way to judge someones gear level, especially a tank. But as long as people aren't itemizing their gear horribly, there are certain health levels that can tell you how the player is set up as a baseline. in all honestly, there's not much more you can see about a toon when your on fleet and their over on ziost, or even on another planet. until you get close to them and inspect that is. But even if you just buy comm gear and slap it on, your stats will usually be solid enough for most SM Ops, and plenty for HM FP's. itemization really is only crucial for HM Op's and beyond. The best thing to do OP is to take a look at the gear level requirements for what your trying to do. it's usually listed in the quest description. then prioritize mitigation stats over health, and you'll be fine. FYI...defense rating is always a challenge with us. just get as many lvl 55 blue or purple augments that you can with defense rating on them and you'll be golden.

I've found that once or twice it's quite normal to see/percieve things out of whonk. There are simply far too many variables in the environments we play in to be able to troubleshoot stuff like this when it only happens one run, or one or two situations. I rack it up to reality weirdness and move on. now...if you could isolate it and repeat it at will, then its worth checking out. I'm not that well geared as a tank (well, 168-180 mix), and ill have runs where i feel unstoppable, and groups where i wonder if im actually running nekked...or if my healer is healing at all.

They're both really fun stories, for different reasons, but both worth leveling a toon to enjoy them. beyond that, its preference for playstyle that should direct you here. Inquisitor is going to either zap lightning (from range or melee), fart dark clouds of force, or smack things with a double saber. has a nice speed boost, but mobility is a bit more limited then the warrior. Warrior is all about melee. no ranged options. very little zappy zappy, mostly pounding stuff with a saber. can Tank or DPS (Unless your a Mara, then you just Dips). Personally, my favorite (been since early release) is the jugg. got 3 of them. On the flip side, i have 2 inquisitors as well (one is actually a sage on repub side). pick your poison.

Honestly, you can't go bad choosing either. They are both "reasonably" melee focused, Jugg moreso then PT. PT has more 10ft abilities, and a few full range abilities in advantage over the jugg, but the jugg has far better mobility (unless you are a full tank spec with the Pt, and even at that, jugg leap ability in solo play is amazing). PT's still feel a bit more like a "ranged" class though, in spite of their mostly melee status. I think it comes from the fact that your still shooting a gun (flamethrower, etc.) at the target rather then literally hitting them...but this is personal thoughts on how the class feels. Both do good enough DPS that you won't be "shelved" for anything in the game. Both Jugg's and PT's are welcome in every aspect of the game, for both tanking and DPS. It really boils down to a personal preference on playstyle. In the end, i have 3 juggs, and 2 PT's (working on my second) in addition to eveyr other class in the game. So that should convince you that both are enjoyable. play one, and if you get bored, hop over to the other! you may suprise yourself...early on jugg's feel a bit slow (they mature later in the game). But in their 40's they are a blast. Pt's felt very smooth the entire leveling curve...quite powerful early on, and tapering off a bit to a comfortable power level later on. Worth it to keep both IMO.

Honestly the biggest reason I go light side with empire toons is that the dark side options are just silly. They remind me far too much of a horribly made Horror flick or bad guy movie...the light side options are interesting and provoke a more in depth character IMO. Repub side it's very similar motivations, and i usually end up a mix of light and dark over there. my decisions are made more along the lines of what I perceive my characters personality to be rather then whether Im "dark" or "light" That and half the time I don't agree with their options for choices...sometimes what I think is actually good or "light" choice they have tagged as dark points, and vice versa. again, more to the characters personality then point driven.

I agree. But i think thats why he mentioned the 3 tiers of Ops: SM, HM, and Nim. again, you need a spread of different options to cater to a larger, more varied audience. Now while a new Op would be fun, at the same time I spend most my time in solo and small group content (time limitations, and lack of desire to put energy into larger scale stuff), so a casual FP or HM is my cup of tea. On the flip side, they missed the original reasons the 'tactical' FP's were initially popular. they not only had HM versions, but they were part of a weekly quest series that rewarded critical GEAR TOKENS. This was the primary reason people ran them....especially the SM ones. the blue gear was laughable at best (unless you really weren't buying your starter blue/purple gear off the AH). If they make an HM verssion, and add a weekly reward to doing them, people will probably run them more often. They key as a previous poster mentioned...is the carrot. No matter how interesting content is, if it has to viable reward, people will run it a few times max.

Scrapper suffers from energy management right now, but its not so horrible that you can't fill a DPS slot. dirty fighting tends to produce the better numbers, but I'm a scrapper fan. actually, in my solo play (and leveing) I run a hybrid. enough scrapper to get energy return on my flying fists, and the rest in sawbones so i can get energy return on my scan, and an extra stack of upper hand. very versatile solo build. can heal just about anything prior to level cap, and can dish out solid damage against solo mobs. and still feels like a scrapper (the only skill you are really missing isn't even a skill as much as a buff on your sneaky skills) Scrappers biggest challenge is it's positional requirements for higher levels of damage. not a big deal in a boss fight since your behind them usually, but it ends up being a pain in solo play, so you don't get to use your high tier skills as often as I'd like. but its definitely doable.

Interestingly enough, I found the smugg story to be one of my favorites. The idea of treasure hunting in earl part was great IMO. a fin alternative to all the other repub stories (Oh look, im going to save the galaxy as a jedi...how suprising...not). then it switches direction suddenly, and yet has a unique smuggler flavor to it. Another note on ch.1. it has quite the suprise ending, didn't expect that at all. So I enjoyed it. but like any other story out there...you get out of it what you put into it . many people thought the consular ch.1 was boring, yet I found it interesting.

Just to reiterate what previous posters said, play what you want. if you go browse tor-parse, you'll realize that the Vigilance/Vengeance spec is right in the middle of the pack. commandos edge them by a bit, and of course sents and gunslingers top everyone. Part of this is most likely the RNG. but I don't want you to walk away thinking the spec is gimped or broke. if were broke, then sages, shadows, scoundrels, and vanguards are in really poor shape, because overall they are below a vigilance guard. So all this really means is that in spite of the RNG factor (which 3/4 of the DPS classes deal with btw...its not something solely guards deal with), we can put out enough DPS over a long fight to fill a DPS slot. period. world first group with a vigilance guard? not sure how much more convincing you need. This is aside from those things we would like to see changed in our spec. the issue with our RNG is it's a very big part of our rotation. but the numbers still show that overall, in longer fights, even with the RNG, we do enough DPS. If you want to tank that's totally cool...but i was getting the feeling that you were going defense because you felt that vigilance is broke. it aint. well, it isn't any more broke then half the other DPS AC's out there. and Ops groups are still taking vigilance guards. so make your choice based on what you want to play.

Hardly. It is still a fun class to play. Unless you solely play PvP...but I would highly recommend that people not join this game just for the PvP. OP, I myself am a guard/jugg player for a long time. Been vengeance since early launch, and loved it back then. I was NOT happy when they made the change. they did it for a variety of reasons, complexity being one of them, PvP being another. But I got used to the changes, and now i hardly notice the difference what we lost in smooth flow we got in up front pressure. this helps in both PvE and PvP. i regret the loss of my nice steady rhythm, but I don't notice its loss anymore. You'll adapt...give yourself time. I did, and i was an anti-2.0 guy myself. Is it exactly what we want? no. But it's not going to change. the guard/jugg is what it is now. but I think you'll enjoy it once you get past the adaptation curve.

And again....this is 3-5% of the overall game. probably less. your advice only matters if your guild is pushing edge content, and every person on the team is optimizing in the same way. only about 5% of the players in the game will be able to optimize to that level. so a person who, say, lost 1-2% Physical DR will probably have a dozen other places they can shore up as well. either way, your average player wont need that level of min/max. so for most players....it's OK. if you need to get that 2%, your probably not the kind of player that is worried about your overall look that that degree, so it's a moot point.

It is a it more challenging. Vigilance is highly dependent on Master Strike procs. Over time the damage averages out, but having bad streaks can really feel sucky. it just takes a bit of time to get used ot the rotation. been playing Vigilance and Vengeance (its mirror on sith side) since early launch. its simplified a bit since 2.0 if you can believe that. used to be one of the hardest DPS specs to optimize.

I think the dearth of Leth Ops are due to 1) more challenging playstyle. timing has to be tight and you have to be aware. 2) perception. many still are mentally in the dark ages and don't actually follow current parsing. 3) Ops are just too darned good at healing. if its one thing Op's probably do better then DPS, it's healing. really attractive option for many.

I've found that treek is quite powerful early on, moreso then most comps. but as you get higher the gap closes. Haven't used her much as a tank spec at cap, but heals at cap are as good or better then my standard comps. currently have her on 4 different classes atm. I enjoy her the most because her AoE abilities as a healing comp end up helping me kill stuff faster then my normal healing comp. the best part of her AoE's (and this is a clincher for me) is it's smart...even in tank spec it wont break CC. so no more needing to LoS or CC a mob at the edge of the group or turn off her AoE's when your CC"ing...she plows through it all and CC sits there happy as a lark. so if your a class that uses CC allot, she is probably the best comp to have...if you don't want the higher damage of a damage comp. after all, she IS a tank/healer, so I wouldn't expect her to outperform the DPS comps (especially if you're used to HK)

I think you got the point about the armor OP. In all honesty...having one or two items medium won't kill you. won't kill the raid. unless your in a hard nosed progresion group that is vying for server firsts. doesn't sound like you are, so who cares, wear a few medium pieces. But yeah...its like a healer picking up armor over alacrity. 95% of the game it doesn't matter. but if that last 5% of the game is important to you, better switch out to heavy.

I disagree. it makes class vs. class balance more visible. Pve balance is a different beast...and unfortunately, in the games I've played in the past with things like this. PvE ends up taking a backseat due to the pressure of this "balancing act". WoW is perfect proof of this. I agree wholeheartedly. as a matter of fact. PvE and PvP cannot exist together in the same game without one affecting the other...unless they are isolated. Which is why im set against arenas. to take this idea further (i support this point), Bio should realize that they aren't any better then blizz...or the dozens of companies that have tried this before in the past. they need to isolated each game separately, or one will eventually turn the other into a shade of what it was originally. I honestly think that arenas are the worst thing they could do to this game. you want a truly balanced arena? halo and modern warfare are thataway. but if y'all are game for turning SWtOR into a first person shooter with homogenized classes and no freedom of choice (or severely limited), then I guess were in the right place.

I hope they never do too. But the OP wasn't asking for that. he was asking for the ability to have a list of names, similar to how we have our guild names, but with all the characters in our legacy on it (including opposite fraction) so we wouldn't have to manually type them in all the time. But I agree....being able to send mail to multiple recipients outside of your guild (guild mail is different) would be abused by the spammers. don't need that. we just need a few small QoL upgrades is all.

thats only a partial resolution, and not what the OP is looking for. we know we can add friends. the suggestion is simple to add. it's not rocket science, and it would go a long ways towards smoothing out mail between alts. I'd also add to that a few mail features...totally escapes me why they don't have these in the game already. 1) Re-iterate the need for a memory function. last 10, last 12, whatever. autofills when you hit tab/enter/whatever. 2) AUTOMATICALLY place the cursor in the name field. can't tell you how many times i've misclicked trying to put the cursor in the field, start typing, and next thing I know, my toons hopping up and down and casting stuff and I have 10 windows open. It's actually caused me more frustration then I would have imagined. very simple fix. 3) in the same vein, PLEASE LEAVE US IN THE MAIL WINDOW WHEN WE CLICK THE SEND BUTTON. again, it is very irritating when you send multiple mails to have to click the send tab EVERY TIME you want to send a new mail. defaulting back to the inbox is silly since we will have probably already read the mail in there, or don't want to. keep us in the tab we choose until we select another. its simply wasted time, and a very easy fix. So far they've done a great job with improving the little qualities of life. these are simply a few others that would go a huge ways towards that for many of us serious Alt'ers/crafters.

Thanks for the clarification. I was probably simplifying the discussion a bit from that blog. you are correct though..at it's best PvP is hard to balance completely in the MMO world. PvP is a game designed around the need for less variables in the game, not more...and MMO's tend to celebrate the exact same variables that PvP does not thrive in. The downside to this is either way, change for PvP will always impact PvE. And vice versa. I agree. I think I was also responding in general to the thread, rather then your specific response. thanks for pointing that out. To a degree. but if you notice, many ex-wow players are starting to understand that WoW was an anomoly. it was the imperfect game with the perfect timing. And they always had a knack for giving you just enough to keep you playing, mechanic issues non-withstanding (this is from a 7 year wow veteran, though I didn't start with WoW). but I also think that the number of people who played other PvP games that actually did it well (GW/GW2, Aion, DAoC, Eve) recognize that the WoW PvP was only a hybrid that had enough to attract the masses. Arena was a very innovative concept in the MMO PvP genre at the time....but it's implementation destroyed the PvE aspect of the game. I could see Arena thriving in a game designed specifically for it...but WoW was a PvE game from the start. they're decision to forgo PvE focus for PvP wasn't a success in the MMO field...it was a lab experiment that failed IMO. And they so much as admitted it. even if they dinicated they should have "designed it differently", as you stated, after the fact it's always 20/20 vision. but they never indicated they knew HOW they could have designed it differently. And I honestly think that the MMO industry has proven that it can't be done. Honestly, if they deploy arena in this game it may be a hinge upon which I decide if I will continue playing. though many people liked Arenas in WoW, it also drastically affected the PvE Game in a negative way (IMO). again, it all goes back to the simple fact that PvP and PvE don't mix. (this is outside your personally comments btw...probably more directed towards the thread in general)

Some excellent points Chu. the real resolution is something they "don't want to do" unfortunately, they are creating they're own nightmare in the process. the real solution to PvP and PvE existing decently in the same game is to separate the two. either by creating a separate set of skills for each, or creating a neutral environment for the players to fight, like LOtRO did. it all boils down to being able to accept that PvE and PvP don't mix well. the games that do a good job with this are the ones that see this fact, and design accordingly. the games that don't sit in a weird limbo, where one is supported over the other, and they turn a blind eye to the suffering of the neglected child. It makes me feel bad for both PvP players and PvE players, as eventually both suffer in the long run.

It's interesting that WoW is brought up in this thread, as a while ago Ghostcrawler had posted a blog wherein he said that he and the other devs admitted that after years of hard work, they came to the realization that arena broke the game, and they could never balance PvP and PvE in the game together without one impacting the other. Moral of the story is....PvP and PvE cannot exist in the same game without one being sidelined, or at best, being the followup to the one with the most focus. in this game. the primary is PvE. Im not going to disregard the idea that many like it....many do. but it is by design that it takes second pony to PvE. and I don't consider that a bad thing, as there are games out there that do the polar opposite (GW2 and Eve.). Not suggesting that you go play those games. just reiterating the important point that this is a PvE game first and foremost, and the OP needs to realize that the bulk of the players and Bio are not going to jump all over each other in an effort to please him just because he plays....PVP........roll out the red carpets folks, a REAL PVP player is back in the game! Of course, we probably had thousands of PvE players return with the recent changes (like myself)...but we couldn't be as important as him and his 3 FRIENDS (sarcasm off).

I personally think the OP just wanted to gripe. give us a difficult encounter on the targets...now that takes skill to execute. Standing in line? hmm...no difficulty there. imagine if this were a movie...then i guess the quality of the movie would be determined by how long you had to stand in line to get the tickets? No thank you. I'm glad they made this change. If they actually wanted to make it more interesting, then they should give us a puzzle to solve. or clues (real clues, not just a quest objective saying "you found a clue") now that stuff is interesting. but waiting in line spam clicking for an NPC and then dying because your lvl25 and the player who won the spam clicking event was 55...I'll pass.

I prefer a madness/balance build for leveling OP. balance has the most long range damage skills we have in the AC, and the best AoE skill we have. It is more DoT based, but my killtime isn't any less in madness then it is in deception. plus madness has a bit higher mitigations and self heals when specced into it. both work fine though. deception is more single target, and madness is a mix of AoE and medium-long sustained damage (doesn't impact its short term killing speed tho). Tanking is an option. its simply a slower overall killing speed when playing solo. getting and buffing a DPS companion helps out a great deal, but you don't get those comps until later in the story (late 20's for your first). but tanking is OK to level with, but it's not necessary. TLDR : pick what you enjoy. there isn't any spec that you can't finish the game with and have fun on. I prefer madness, but to each his own.