Endgame content in general in this game (whether it be HM Flashpoints or Operations) are melee unfriendly. There's a reason why most of the nightmare mode guilds are stacking ranged dps. So to answer your question: yes, Soa is melee unfriendly. I wouldn't be surprised if Bioware retuned some of the content later on in regards to it when more of the playerbase reaches 50 and starts plugging away at operations / HM flashpoints. As it stands, I'm having fun getting pushed back, knocked back, hit by secondary attacks that only hit melee, running out of fight mechanics (causing me to lose DPS time while ranged don't even have to worry about it), and generally having a jolly time getting instant knocked back on "certain" bosses when I try to force leap to build focus. The only reason I'm even getting into raids is because I run mine and entice my ranged dps with the thoughts of "but you'll get Inspiration during the burn phase..." as my excuse for not rerolling to a Gunslinger.

I had no idea people were even having problems with this guy. All I remember was him falling over like a sack of potatoes (I used Kira) like every other elite trash mob.

Assuming you're talking about the Ilum questline:

Your memory fails you. I was actually there; hit 60 a week or so after launch and was doing 40man UBRS clears by the 1st or 2nd week of December 2004. We started doing both Molten Core and Onyxia before new years. WoW released with the same amount of endgame raids (operations) as SWTOR: Molten Core (a full and complete raid) and Onyxia (a small raid with only 1 raid boss) vs Eternity Vault (a full and complete raid) and Karagga's Palace (a small raid with only 1 raid boss). To be fair, BW is adding two new flashpoints and 3-4 new bosses in Karagga with the upcoming 1.1 patch which is already bigger than the mini content patch that Blizzard put out a month after its MMO launch (Maraudon - 1 instance). When it comes to individual instances/flashpoints, WoW released with a lot more content in that regard. However, one could make the argument that Bioware's flashpoints took more effort to create due to the nature of implementing voice acting. In any case, most of the problems that are currently plaguing endgame can all easily be fixed within a few weeks worth of patches (perhaps less). The biggest hurdle that I foresee Bioware overcoming will be playing "catch up"; there are many modern MMO features that are simply not present at the moment, most noticeably: * a combat log, which is huge. Forget damage meters, forget threat meters. Without a combat log, you're losing so much vital information. Combat logs would also make offsite parsing and logging available, another boon to endgame min-max players. * addons/macros - this has been a hotly debated topic that I won't go too much into but in my opinion, it's a modern feature that a good amount of players just "expect" to be there when they come into a new MMO. *LFD system - yet another hotly debated topic. The people against it clamor that it would destroy the community and claim that it only takes "5-10 minutes" to manually form a group when all other evidence seems to contradict this. I simply cannot think of a reason not to put this sytem in ASAP; make it draw players from your own server only if the developers fear it'll destroy the server community (which, I might add, is already fairly fragile due to the lack of server forums - another potential blunder by Bioware). People always come up with the term "WoW clone" when it comes to SWTOR but in all honesty I could give a rat's *** about what copied what. When it all comes down to it, a game is a game and the only thing I truly care about is that it's an enjoyable, bugless one with modern MMO features.

Sentinels do extremely high damage when played well (correct priority system, good focus management, not clipping Cauterize, etc) but the problem is that they're ultimately a melee class, which automatically makes their survivability worse than ranged, especially in SWTOR where almost every boss (even trash mob packs) have built in anti-melee mechanics. The best example I can show for this is the 2nd boss on Battle for Ilum, who puts up a reflection shield whenever he spawns adds. If any melee swings at him while this shield is up, they take massive damage (enough to kill you outright if you're under 12k HP) while ranged DPS is completely unaffected by it. So, are they viable? Sure. Are they optimal? Not really. However, I'm sure many operations groups will probably still take 1 at minimum just so they have Inspiration. And no one knows for sure which class does more damage than another at this point (most are just eyeballing damage), and we won't know until a combat log is released which will enable offsite parsing.

Heh. Bioware operations developer mindset: Make every encounter melee unfriendly. If the endgame for this game really kicks off, you're going to see stacked raids of entirely ranged dps with maybe a token Sentinel for Inspiration.

It's a confirmed bug that's going to be fixed in the future.

I play a Sentinel as well and unless something changes from HM to Nightmare, I simply just run through him and go behind him (or just keep running away from him if I don't think I'll have enough time to run through him) if he's on me and getting ready to cleave/swipe. I don't think I've ever gotten hit by that mechanic. You just need to make sure you're at max melee range when you're standing behind him. It's so obvious when he's getting ready to swipe even with the lack of ToT since he pauses for 3+ seconds.

It really doesn't bother me at all if they "nerf" it, simply because I'll just powerlevel the next most viable crew skill to 400. It's not like leveling tradeskills in this game is difficult, especially when you can earn credits at such an alarmingly fast pace even if you only just do the dailies. If anything, the other crew skills need a buff so that it's on par with Biochem. There's a reason why everyone that's serious about their character (whether it be endgame operations players or PvPers) is doing the swap. That alone should be sending a message to Bioware.

Biochem is the best crew skill in the game. Give me a convincing argument as to why I shouldn't drop Synthweaving after making my Rakata belt/bracers in favor of Biochem's Adrenal, re-useable stims, or re-useable medkit.

You would figure that in an age where FTL travel is possible, there would be a way to check your mail while on the go rather than having to travel to some stationary mailbox.

Well, there's not really any stress involved creditwise since money is so easy to come by at max level. I still have over 3 million credits even after doing what I did (with nothing to really spend it on, I might add). I'll still be pretty sad if they add a requirement in the future but who knows. Biochem's stims and stuff for some reason have a requirement, which is what pushed me to make this thread since I was wondering if this was intended or not.

No, I'm still able to use the belt and bracers even after dropping Synthweaving. One of my guildies who swapped from Cybertech to Biochem says that he can still use his grenades too.

So, is anyone else wondering how long it takes until Bioware adds a restriction to these items (e.g. requires 400 Cybertech to use the grenades)? I leveled Synthweaving to 400, made the Rakata belt/bracers then immediately dropped it and powerleveled Biochem to 400 and made the Adrenal/Stims/Medkit. While it's pretty awesome, I'm left wondering if this is an unintended oversight. What do you guys think?

Not really fair to judge it right now since the difficulty is completely skewered when it comes to SWTOR's Operations due to how buggy nearly every single fight is.

Level Synthweaving to max, learn the purple schematics, make your belt, drop Synweathing, then go Biochem. That's pretty much what I did and it's worked out great so far. The Rakata belts are 4 rating higher than even the Columi belts so it's essentially best in slot currently. Another guildy leveled Cybertech to max, made all of the re-usable grenades and then dropped it for Biochem.

Infernals in EV = Columi Boots. I'm pretty sure the belt (possibly mainhand as well) will drop from the new bosses in the upcoming Karagga's expansion, maybe the new flashpoints in hard mode as well.

Sentinel as a class is fine. It has some issues simply because it's a melee class, since Bioware seems to have made it their mission to make any kind of melee player hate the game. Stuff like every single strong or elite mob with a gun having a spammable knockback (complete with built in snare), secondary attacks, or other random but annoying anti-melee abilities that ranged DPS simply won't ever have to deal with. This is especially easy to see in endgame HM Flashpoints and Eternity Vault, where you lose so much DPS time running in and out of mechanics that only melee have to worry about whereas Ranged DPS can stand back and free cast without a care in the world the entire fight. If anything, Sentinel isn't underpowered, it's just that Bioware needs to tweak encounters to not be so anti-melee.

Honestly, I love how this class plays and how it has a higher learning curve than the other AC's. I just REALLY wish they would fix the abiltiy delay since it seems to affect Marauders/Sentinels far more than any other class simply because of the amount of instants and abilities that do special animations, e.g Overload Saber, Inspiration, and Cauterize all tend to bug out and eat my GCD yet nothing will happen.

I actually like the enrage timers since it pushes DPS to play their hardest and best rather than relying on the tank and healer to carry them through a flashpoint. It also tends to make the more self improvement driven DPS to examine their rotation/priorities and optimize it to increase their damage output, which is always a good thing.

Probably missing a mechanic? Here's a kill video from Irae AoD, one of the top WoW raiding guilds that migrated over to SWTOR: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=D66Fy3s6WA8

I'm personally not having much trouble keeping up with all the procs and cooldown at 50 (and watching dots on mobs so I don't clip Cauterize), maybe it's because I'm just used to it after playing WoW for over half a decade. In any case, my only real beef with this class is how the infamous ability delay just seems so much worse since every single lost GCD that you suffer from this bug is a huge blow to your DPS.

I run with a static group of 4 and we clear every HM FP in around 3 hours on a daily basis. Having to gather up a bunch of random players every day to do flashpoints would make me want to kill myself especially without a dungeon finder in place.

Republic FPs: Esseles - Bracers Taral V - Gloves Maelstrom - Boots