sadly, everything had been going much better until level 40. once I got Doc, I felt like I was doing much better and didn't really feel like I was going to have much issue anymore. then I got to Quesh, and while I haven't died yet I've noticed that just fighting strong enemies, not even elites, my health drops in like 20-25% chunks at a time and Doc isn't even really doing much to help with that. I haven't upgraded my gear much in a few levels I suppose, but I also just spent all of my money on the level 40 speeder/skill. I've only just finally gotten myself back up to close to 100k (money doesn't seem to come easy to me in this game) and I feel like I may be in a bit of trouble with getting new mods for my gear. I'm kind of worried. game/forums are about to go down for maintenance, I'll have to figure this out tomorrow. also, to the poster who mentioned speccing focus at 40, that sounds interesting...do you have a good spec to share with me?

curious, what's the magic of these abilities? I almost never seem to get to use them since they have the requirements. every once in awhile I'll get to use the one with the yellow icon (I forget which it is) after I've used Sweep, other than that I almost never get to use them. also, great advice everyone else. I've just been sticking with Vigilance and using T7 as a tank and trying to keep my gear upgraded (sadly almost entirely through buying stuff on the GTN) and things have been a little better I suppose. but I'm still quite a bit higher than everything I'm fighting (I'm about to hit 37 and my story enemies are like 32). I haven't even started Balmora yet, to be honest.

thanks again for all the advice. I did some massive equipment upgrades last night at 31 and have yet to go out and field test it yet, so I'll find out today just how much of a difference it made.

the sad part is, they're actually like 4-5 levels lower than me. but thanks everyone for the advice, so far I've done a little tiny bit of gear upgrading and haven't seen a difference, but we'll see what happens. this is very frustrating lol. also keep in mind that I'm still DPS spec, idk if everyone was assuming that I'd switched back to to tank or something.

neither my companions or my own gear are good and up-to-date per se, but I really don't know how to get anything better. like I said, I take quest rewards and buy stuff with commendations, what more is there? and no, there are no disabled abilities and she's definitely set to a stance (the DOT, I believe).

the droid and Kira Carsen are all I have so far.

I'm currently level 29 doing missions in Tattoine (I've completed all other planets prior so I'm a bit high to be just starting out Tattoine, but I didn't want to miss out on anything). I had been spec'd tank up until about 28 and just wasn't enjoying it, everything took forever to kill and I was still getting beaten half to death anyway. so I respec'd to DPS and things are just as awful, if not worse. I'm 29, the enemies I'm fighting are 25 or less, and I'm just getting obliterated. not dying, but at the end of every fight my tank droid is pretty near death, and I just fought a 25 elite for a solo quest and my droid was dead in seconds and I had to bubble and use a medkit to stay alive. I'm not sure if I'm playing the class wrong, am just terribly geared, or the class really is that bad. as for gear, I take whatever upgrades I can from missions and I save up commendations and get what I can. is there more I should be doing? because this is just downright awful and I feel like I need to try out a different class or something.