<Textbook Execution> is looking for raiders interested in progression through MM Gods from the Machine. We are a guild whose core has been raiding together since the release of Terror from Beyond in 1.4. We have cleared all content at the highest level of difficulty when they were relevant. We are currently looking raiders to round out our roster. We are looking for any role, as we are able to shuffle the roster if needed. At least some experience with NiM level operations is required. Experience in HM Gods is preferred, but not necessary. Most importantly, we are looking for players who possess a strong growth mindset and who are dedicated students of the game. If you're interested PM me (Bart) on Discord @Philo#1648 or Thorazine @thor#0527.

K cool. thx

Does anyone know how to edit the raid notes overlay on Star Parse?

Thanks for the help, guys.

Sometimes Tyth will switch aggro, and the reasons are inexplicable to me. He will switch aggro 10-15 seconds after the Ignore debuff has worn off on everyone, and he will switch even though he has no taunt debuff on him. For context, I am taunting him during the Inversion cast and proceeding with normal rotation. Any explanations are appreciated.

I used to have names like Raskolnikov, Yossarian, and Leopold Bloom, but apparently people in this game don't like to read, so I changed the names to fit their average intelligence.

Since you mentioned pugs, feel free to friend me in game. I can't commit to anything beyond my raid night with Textbook, but I might be able to help out if I happen to be free and you guys are looking for a sub. - Bart

There has been little to no incentive for serious raiders to do flashpoints since 2.0, since gear from flashpoints became irrelevant for progression raiding, and Lost Island was the last flashpoint released that was actually challenging for serious raiders. There is even less incentive now, since there is no gear requirement to do SM operations. So, I'm not sure who the OP is addressing. I'll occasionally form HM pugs that are not EV/KP and will take on inexperienced players. My policy is simple. If you are willing to use voice chat and parser, then I'll work with you. If not, ****.

Organizing pugs for any SM and HM EV/KP is fine. Trying to organize a pug for anything more difficult requires individuals that are at least willing to put in the effort to achieve some moderate level of class competency. Based on my own limited experience and the experience of those I know that have also tried to teach others, such an audience of willing students seems largely absent from the game.

Thanks for the vid and the tips!

If you are using the Marisi/Fascinate rotation, then here's a helpful rule of thumb to stay heat positive while dummy parsing. Check your heat after Unload. If your heat is around 15 or greater, then replace Thermal Detonator with Rapid Shots. During a parse, you should only have to do this once after heat ramping and before TSO comes back. Also, I generally try to use Supercharged Gas after Serrated Shot, but don't be afraid to use it at any other time if you see your heat rising past 20. Use Supercharged Gas as primarily a heat management tool in IO.

I've already read a few threads giving tips about how to survive as a Sage/Sorc dps during Ruugar. And I've read Zorz's recommendations on Dulfy. Just wondering if there is any additional feedback out there. Are you a Sage or Sorc in a group that cleared Cora? Were you in a group that cleared Cora with a Sage or Sorc dps? Did you find the fight difficult relative to other group comps? Was it no different from having other ranged classes in terms of difficulty in surviving? Any other tips on how to deal with mouse droids? What do you do if you get targeted by mouse droids twice in a row? Or if you get targeted with both mouse droids and Ruugar's Jet Charge? Any help would be most apprciated.

Some of this advice may no longer apply since you've started your own guild. 1. Raid with guilds/groups that communicate primarily through voice chat. People tend to be bigger ***** (myself included) when they hide behind ops chat. Hopping into a guild's Teamspeak/Mumble/Ventrilo server affords them the opportunity to get to know you better. People are more likely to bring a person along in a raid if they like said person. Also, teaching raid mechanics is significantly easier over voice chat, to the point that there is an incentive against bringing newbs along for a raid if instructions have to be typed out. 2. Know your class You are correct in pointing out that there is a bias against including people with no raid experience in PUGs. One partial explanation for this bias is that there is a perception that people with no raid experience are also bad at their classes. Thus, not only do these individuals have to learn mechanics, but they also have to be taught their rotations as well. Experienced raiders see people like this as being irresponsible, since you don't have to participate in operations to learn how to play your class. If you are a tank, know about threat management and the two-roll mitigation system that this game uses. If you are dps, then know what rotations are maximally effective in both single target and AoE situations. If you are a healer, then know what heals are optimal in different situation. Of course, mere knowledge is insufficient. Execution is also necessary. Practice on the combat dummy or in flashpoints. 3. Have the appropriate third party software downloaded and installed As a corollary to the above two points, be sure to have the following programs downloaded and installed: TeamSpeak, Mumble, Ventrilo, Parsec, and StarParse. Know how to use voice chat software and parsers. Parsers are extremely effective tools that provide combat log data. 4. Do old operations Not quite sure how much operations experience you have prior to 3.0 content, but if you don't have much, then I suggest that you go and do the old ops. There are several good reasons why. First, since you are overleveled, older operations are much more forgiving and can be done with a partial operations group. Second, raid mechanics only come in so many varieties (e.g. stacking debuff that requires tank swap, cleansable DoT/debuff, cleaves/conals, AoE reticles, add management, target switching, etc). The more of the older content you do, the more of these kinds of mechanics you'll get exposure to, and the easier it will be to recognize mechanics in newer content.

Bump. Still looking for a DPS or healer. Raid times are Mondays and Wednesdays at 7 pm server.

Dysfunctional is still looking for a talented DPS or healer. We are currently 4/5 in Ravagers, 4/5 in Temple of Sacrifice, and progressing on Coratanni. Apply at our website if you're interested. http://textbookexecution.enjin.com/recruitment

Thanks for writing this guide. While we may quibble over details, any attempt at trying to improve the raiding ability of the community is always welcome. I take it that this is intended to be a primer on raiding. So, I'm not sure if my comments are pertinent, or if they might belong to more "intermediate" or "advanced" discussions. First, a guildie posted this essay on raid awareness. Although it's written in the context of playing WoW, almost all of it translates directly to SWTOR. It's an excellent read and some of what I say draws from the article. User Interface Being a proficient raider requires that you be able to multitask well, i.e. track and respond to simultaneous events and respond accordingly. For instance, if you are tanking Unit 1 during the Sword Squadron fight, you will need to keep up your rotation in order hold threat while responding to the Rapid Fire, Ground Burst Missile, and Mega Blast mechanic. Furthermore, you have to keep track of Unit 2's changes in aggro in order to properly execute the tank swap. Each event imposes a cognitive tax. There is obviously a limit to how much any person can multitask. One thing that we can control, at least to some degree, is how easily we can track certain events. The easier it is to track an event, the less of a cognitive tax that event imposes. This is where user interface comes in. Most beginning raiders will just play with the default user interface, but this set up is not ideal. For instance, the target of target window is not enabled, information text on the target is not enabled, etc. It's crucial to set up your user interface so that it becomes easier to track events, thereby imposing a smaller cognitive tax. For example, healers can enlarge debuffs on the ops frames, making it easier to track cleansable debuffs and to respond quickly. (I remember before we had the ability to resize debuff icons. Cleansing the Writhing Horror debuff was such a pain in the ***.). The idea here is that less your eyes have to move across the screen or squint to get information, the more likely it is that you will respond to mechanics in a timely manner. TL;DR Customize your user interface so that it becomes much easier to get important information quickly. Here are some other points that deal with raid awareness, but are not directly UI related. Camera zoom: During most encounters, your camera should be zoomed back to 100%. You can even zoom your camera back further than 100%. I generally keep my camera at 130%. Having your camera zoomed back means that there is more information available for your to see, and thus can increase your raid awareness. Cooldown text: This is not part of your User Interface customization, but is essentially the same thing. If you go to Preferences > User Interface, you have the option to enable and modify your cooldown text. This is extremely useful for executing a rotation well and anticipating the use of cooldowns. Parsing Parsing, if beginners are aware of it at all, is usually associated with dps and epeen contests. This is an extremely naive view about parsing. Parsing provides a wealth of information to all three roles. As someone who primarily tanks, parsing provides me with damage profiles of each boss fight, so that I know which defensive cooldowns are effective against which boss abilities. Combat logs tell you how a fight transpired, and why members of the raid group were killed. Parsing not only gives you your dps, but atso tells you your dtps (damage taken per second) which is just as important a metric as dps for damage dealers. It also provides healing and effective healing metrics, as well as a profile of healing done by ability and target, all of which is useful information for healers. Moreover, parsers like Parsec and StarParse provide combat timers, which alert you to relevant events occurring in game. This is a tremendous tool that allows players even more power to anticipate and respond to raid mechanics. Another point about dtps. People always ask about what a good dps should be for a certain fight. I stated that all players should also be keeping track of their dtps. Here's a general rule of thumb about dtps. For most fights, dps and healers should be taking less than 1000 dtps. Appropriately geared tanks should be taking less than 2000 dtps for most fights. If you are taking more than this, and you are not in some exceptional circumstance (e.g. 5th dps off tanking Torque), then it is likely that you are either taking avoidable damage or not using your defensive cds effectively. TL;DR Anyone who is serious about raiding uses a parser. Download and learn to use Parsec or StarParse. VOIP I don't have to spend too much on this one. If you want to join a serious progression group, then it almost certain that you will have to use either TeamSpeak, Mumble, or Ventrilo. Download all three and have them set up. Being able to communicate aurally during boss encounters increases raid awareness and is vital for raid coordination. This is especially true of fights that are coordination checks, such as HM Blaster, HM Coratanni, HM Revan, as well as Draxus, Calphayus, Operator IX, etc. Okay, here are some smaller points about what the OP said initially. Tanking To elaborate on what the OP said about cooldowns, the difference between a good tank and an average tank is that a good tank uses defensive cooldowns proactively, whereas an average tank uses them reactively. This is what I mean. An average tank will generally pop a defensive cooldown when they see their health get too low. Basically, this is the "oh crap!" method of using cooldowns. A good tank knows when the big hits in a fight will occur, what kind of damage that hit will be (melee/range or force/tech and kinetic/energy or internal/elemental), and will anticipate those by popping the appropriate cooldown just before those hits arrive. For instance, in the HM Bulo fight, a good tank will know when Scatterblast and Exonium Carts will occur and will save their cooldowns for those events. A good tank will also have cooldown ready for kiting adds to blue circles. This point about anticipating and playing proactively generalizes to all three roles. All boss fights have at least some RNG elements in them. Having said that, the same boss fights are largely predictable. Doing a raid is analogous to playing in an orchestra. You'll play better if you know what to expect, rather than having to react every time you pull. Good raiders will know when to expect certain mechanics and will tune their rotation, offensive, and defensive cooldowns accordingly. A little pro tip for Vanguard/Powertech tanking that is an exception to the "don't open with a taunt rule." If you have the 192/198 four piece set bonus, then it is actually better if you open with a taunt. With that set bonus,, and with a talent that procs your Stockstrike/Rocket Punch off its cooldown, you can shave up to 6 seconds off your single target taunt cooldown if you open with a taunt and use Stockstrike/Rocket Punch every time it's available. This means that if you space your taunts correctly, you will have 18 straight seconds of guaranteed aggro. That should be plenty of time to secure threat. Healing Just a small point here, since I don't want to dog pile the OP on his comments regarding healing. While it is true that overhealing is generally undesirable, some amount of overhealing is needed for Scoundrel/Operative healing. Scondrel/Operative healing has always been about managing HoTs. You have to keep your HoTs up in anticipation of incoming damage, so that your HoTs will heal your target while he/she is taking damage. Applying HoTs after a target has taken significant damage can often be too little, too late. As such, keeping HoTs up will result in some inevitable overhealing. I want to reiterate the point that I made earlier about anticipation. Good healers, just like any other role, will know the fight and know when to expect incoming burst damage, and will plan their heals accordingly. Good healers always play proactively in this sense.

These are my choices from among the NiM bosses. Favorite: 1. Operator IX By far my favorite fight. It presents coordination challenges and challenges for all three roles. I've spend many sleepless nights thinking about the best way to assign the four colors to the raid group. Different assignments can lead to very different strategies, which makes the fight interesting in different ways. 2. Warlord Kephess. This fight holds a special place in my heart. I consider it my first major accomplishment in this game, having cleared it in two different groups just before 2.0 was released (mdps in one and rdps in the other). The fight has many phases, even in story mode. It was probably the most satisfying kill I've had in this game. Least favorite 1. Colonel Vorgath Due to the Overload mechanic from the Demolitions Drone, all groups proceed in this fight by simply moving up the side of the map (usually the left side). This effectively removes the puzzle part of what was supposed to be a puzzle fight. Highly disappointing. 2. Nefra First bosses of raids don't have to be easy. In fact, Nefra is exceptional in being uninterestingly easy. Consider Zorn & Toth, Writhing Horror, Dash'Roode, and Bestia. All of those fights are interesting and require at least some coordination and effort on the part of the raid group members. Nefra was such a joke, further compounded by the exploit and subsequent farming.

What do you mean by "majority?" If by "majority" you mean that greater than 50% of subscribed players both do operations AND are not enjoying operations, then I am highly skeptical of your claim. Do you have any evidence to back your assertion?

My suspicion is that this claim is false. There are three types of players in this game: 1. Players who don't do ops 2. Players who do ops and are frustrated by the difficulty 3. Players who do ops and enjoy the difficulty. From a financial standpoint, group 1 is not relevant to this discussion, since they are not affected. Group 3 is probably larger than group 2. Why do I think this? Well, EA is funding this game, and I'm sure they are very interested in who is actually paying to play. Bioware going in this direction seems to indicate that they believe they will make more money this way, and that would only be the case if group 3 is larger, or potentially larger, than group 2.

Suppose that you purchase a jigsaw puzzle and find that you are unable to complete it. Does the maker of the puzzle owe you an easier version of the puzzle? If so, why? If not, then reason by analogy to 3.0 operations. If you think the inference fails, then point out the relevant disanalogy.

The contention that SM fights are melee unfriendly is false. Sword Squadron The only time you have to move (if you're not the bomb runner) is either to dodge Ground Burst Missile (red circles), if you get Huge Grenade (big white circle), or to switch between walkers. Dodging red circles only requires that you shift several meters. Basically, getting the white circle is the only thing that constitutes a potential dps loss, but everyone has a chance of getting it and it will result in a dps loss even if you're ranged dps. If you are running around like crazy, then you are doing the fight incorrectly. It's better that you actually observe the fight, as the mechanics are very predictable. Underlurker There is no reason why a melee dps can't perform well in story mode. The only disadvantage here is that melee can take more damage from the Lurklings if they have aggro. However, this is not the melee dps's problem. Tanks can taunt off adds, which eliminates the problem of extra damage. It is your responsibility to kill adds as quickly as possible. If you take unavoidable damage in doing so, then it is not your fault. If you find your group failing at this boss, then it's because someone is not doing enough dps. That's a problem with their not knowing how to play their class, not with the boss fight itself. Everyone who has either subscribed has access to the content. Access doesn't equate to accomplishment. Arguing that content should be made easier on the basis of money paid for it is basically arguing that you should pay to win. Furthermore, you are basically asking that the content be changed to suit your needs when other people are enjoying it as is. Doesn't that sound selfish to you? People who enjoy the difficulty of operations don't demand that the other content be made harder. What gives you the right to demand that operations be made easier? How does your $20 give you more say than their $20?

At this point there really shouldn't be any problem with nerfing the SM raids to the ground. All serious progression groups have long since moved past these raids and are only doing them to gear their 3rd or 4th alt. The raids have already been nerfed and will likely be nerfed again. To the casuals out there complaining, what's the big deal? If these raids are too hard for you, then there are are SEVEN other raids available that are well within your grasp. Occupy your time with those until Bioware sufficiently nerfs Rav and ToS to match your playing ability. What I'm basically hearing is this: "I paid $20 of my hard earned money to get the expansion, so I want to be able to clear the content NAO." This just reeks of consumerist entitlement. It follows the formula, "I paid x amount of money, so I am entitled to have whatever unreasonable demand satisfied." People that follow this formula are the ones that make life miserable for those that work in retail. I think Bioware's approach of nerfing by degrees is the right one. The subscribing population is one divided into various tiers of playing ability. Since SM is a gear gateway into HM, it should be sufficiently hard to prepare more serious raiders for HM content. Once the hardcore raiders have moved on, casuals can also see the content at a lower level of difficulty. It makes no sense to reverse this formula and start with the SM raids being easier. People talk about how they pay money to be able to see the content without having to work. There is also a non-trivial number of people who pay money to experience a challenge. While there are some casuals that are subscribers, all, or almost all hardcore raiders are subscribers. Casuals threaten to leave the game because it is too hard. Whether or not a significant number of these players have actually left the game due to its difficulty is unclear. However, every progression raider can tell you of at least a few people who have unsubscribed because the game is too easy. Bioware has given plenty of things for casuals to do in this game: leveling, dailies, bounties, GSI, Dread Seed missions, datacrons, world bosses, conquest, world events, space missions, strongholds, flashpoints, etc, etc, etc. We hardcore raiders only have our raids. Please don't take that away from us.

Continuing from my point, here's a suggestion that seems relatively feasible. In addition to dailies, side quests, and heroic missions, why not add mini games that are designed to improve PvE or PvP gameplay? These sorts of things already exist in game in the form of challenges in the Raptus fight. These mini games can take various forms, like killing a target while avoiding circles and conals, healing multiple targets through burst and sustained damage, holding threat on multiple targets while using cooldowns to survive. These missions would be optional, so people can't really complain, and they can be peppered throughout the leveling process, as well as being available as dailies. These can fit easily within the narrative framework of any class, since everyone loves training montages in action movies.

One problem that's probably been stated multiple times in various threads is that the leveling process is only loosely connected to end game PvE. Mission objectives invariably come down to either killing x number of enemies or clicking on y number of things. So, healing or tanking plays little, if any role in leveling. Furthermore, dps requirements are almost non-existent. You could probably finish most quests using only your auto attack. Where there are boss fights, mechanics, if there are any, are usually trivial and can be ignored. It would have been better if Bioware designed the leveling process to function more as an extended tutorial for end game PvE and PvP. Since they didn't, it should surprise no one that we have a player base the majority of which have no knowledge of how to raid. Basically, instead of looking at the problem as a gap between two groups of players, it may be more constructive to look at the problem as a gap between two kinds of game content.

Have the dps in your raid group do a 1.5 million health parse on the combat dummy. If they cannot sustain at least 3K dps over the entirety of the parse, then it is quite likely that they will not have the dps for Underlurker.