I think the tre community might have a problem with this

Xer'enia/ Shadow/ Wildcard/ Reublic

This is why I defend on my assassin and don't call Inc's greater than 2. Or attack the off node, which is basically defending cause I very rarely lose

Still maining the sin but my sniper is coming close to my favorite which is odd since I hate ranged classes for the most part

Let's also not forget that ap has no problem being kited, in fact it is the one kiting, while it's very difficult to stay on target for deception. Op is probably just crying cause he lost to an assassin on his pt

If a wz is competitive it means that people of equal skill are fighting ech other, ie not a farm fest. This doesn't mean everyone is a tier 1 ranked player, but if the dps are inexperience then the healers and tanks are as well. So, if you have good healers and want competitive then you have good dps as well, and a good dps can sit on a healer. It's true that some dps are better for it (OP says ap but the true anti heals is deception) but if you can put out a decent amount of dps and know how to use cc and interrupts properly, a healer goes from healing his team to healing himself. So the stagnant matches you are talking about are when both teams are good but in respect to the dps, the healers are more skilled. Or people are just farming for dps. In a match where everyone is playing objectively it comes a lot more to luck and dps comp

Xytania \ Assassin \ Deception \ Empire

1 dps can't kill a healer (most of the time) by himself but he can force the healer to focus on healing himself, which is just as good. If you time your stuns and interrupts properly he'll have a hard time living through it. This allows the rest of your team to kill everyone else, then you have up to six more dps fighting him, and if any of them are able to dps a little youre gonna kill him

Check out kreas build. I believe he is running tank set bonus with high endurance power mods and power crit enhancements with fortitude augments. Nets you 90k health with a nice damage boost and decent survivability.

I did what you did as well. I main a deception sin and play concealment a lot and used my insta 60 on a sniper. Since I haven't really ever played sniper I'm leveling to 65 through pvp and after the last week and a half I have to say that marksman is the best suited if you like the big burst play style. I played engineering and got pretty good with it but the only problem is that it takes a lot of ramp up to get your burst going. The overall damage is great, plus the extra stun from emp discharge is good too, but I can't get away from marksman. I also plan on trying out ranked on this too in the future, and for that marksman is definitely the way to go

There have been a million threads about people wanting to have arena removed from regs and yolols to be removed but that's because the people who don't enjoy them are the only ones posting. I enjoy arenas in regs, and I enjoy solo ranked (although I think that g ranked should at least get better rewards since it is the best measure of skill).

Bolster would appear to be bugged so the best you can do is 1936. The 190 stuff an instant 60 has at the start should get you that.

I think it's cause in 4v4 people group for cleaves a lot more often. In 8v8 it's usually a lot more spread out, especially since you're more likely to get more ranged dps on the enemy team. That combined with what you said about 4v4 healing being better, it might make a difference? That said, I've always wanted to sync a Q in 8v8 with 8 healers on one team and 8 dps on the other, then have a dps/hps farm to see what's possible in all the maps. That would be very interesting...

Both storylines are very similar. They start as a hunt for relics and knowledge stuff, like consular and inquisitor do, there are some developments that make your life harder, you fight stuff, it heats up toward the end, you kill stuff, blah blah blah. I enjoyed consular more (strange enough) because it was fun to be super contradictory in my character. If you've already done inquisitor, go for consular because it really is enjoyable. The only thing that I can think would affect your choice is faction imbalance but you didn't specify that as an issue so why not shadow? (Plus psychokinetic blast is cooler than ball lightning to me for some reason)

Be that as it may, the only class that has anything close to the survivability of deception is Mara and jug which is a very far cry. Buffing burst would be nice but anything too much and we start a hatred situation

Just know concelaments tools and when to use them. Evasion is for white damage, shield probe for all damage, take root break on aggro dump (forget the name lol), keep your koto probes on, stealth + sap + heal, flashbang + heal, sever tendon root (utility) and crippling slice, and most importantly roll away damage predictively. Really the only thing you should look for is undying rage, which you can flashbang the entire thing and heal yourself through. Be creative with los and roots. Just practice and you'll get it, I got good at 1v1s by always assaulting the off node in wz on my operative, at first you're gonna lose a lot but if you stick with it you'll be happy you did

All I can say bfj is I hope we start seeing some funny stories like the group finder thread out of you anyway, here's my recommendation. Don't wear any gear over 162 to fix your bolster (even level 50 greens are better than 180s), and after that totally ignore chat. Just figure out the zones layouts and stuff, then start worrying about objectives. Try to find someone that's good and follow them around the whole time (unless they're a stealth going to the off node or somewhere else to defend). Pvp healing and pve healing are a lot different, you have to prioritize you're heals on people that need and DESERVE them. A Mara that jumps straight in the middle of 6 people is a scrub and doesn't need your heals. Anyway, unless you really want to heal in pvp start off as a dps. Stealth specs are your best bet to figure things out with, specifically deception assassin and concealment op, because you get to choose most of your fights. More than anything just stick with it and you'll figure things out, and probably start to enjoy it

Yolos pop enough on JC imo at least. Not enough to be top 3 but enough to farm 1600 on more than one toon, I know cause people do it. If you want more pops, Harb is the place to be but I don't think it's east coast iirc. If you're staying east coast, POT5 is dead from what I hear and everyone from Shadow lands is on Harb now so JC is the place to be

Something to make the match making system better, in my oppinion, would be implement a system similar to what it is for flash points and ops group finder. You could queue for whatever role your class could fulfill and you'd have to have 2018 expertise when you queue. Then once there is a full team on both sides, it pops. If you get queued for something other than what you're specced it alows you to change for 1 minutes then click ready. Once everybody is ready, then you can enter the match. By doing this more people can queue as different roles, and it would allow solo ranked to use the trinity system more, instead of just 4dps matches over and over again. This also prevents matches where someone leaves the queue when it pops, and a dps gets back filled in. Just today I had two matches where one window licking tank queued and didn't take the pop, resulting in dps fill in. Anyway, thoughts?

I agree its necessary to get a perfect or almost perfect first 10 to get top 3 for your class but it's not necessarily true for breaking 1600 to be considered a high ranked player. I went 6-4 my first 10 this season and ended up with a lot of bad queues till I was at 1200 even. After taking a break I came back and I'm up to 1415 now, and I will probably be able to hit 1600. It's gonna take a lot of games yea but the more I play the more tokens I get so I'm ok with that. Could be better, but it could also be a lot worse

Being a jc player and knowing the guilds mentioned, it was more than likely a medal farming match. I've witnessed it before, heck I've even participated in it, and if it was pub vs 3 of the better pvp guilds of jc then you're almost begging for it

Ugh all my slots on jc are taken lol. I could join you on my shadow once you get into midbie bracket though. Then level a scoundrel to catch up once I'm 60

If you're looking for an eighth still I have an ap vanguard that I could join you with...just gotta level him up

Stock up on ranked comms if you're Valor 40. Otherwise buy med pack and adrenals, basics if you need gear, or if you just sit on fleet you can buy the weapons and keep refreshing the two hour refund timer till you're 60

If you look the set bonus applies both to madness and lightNing but the lightning skills come first in the description. I believe it's called force masters and the 6 piece bonus causes force leech or thundering blast to give you increased critical chance or something like that