Tested out the changes with various lvl 65 characters of all classes using rank 216 armor and offhand weapon/focus/shield, rank 208 weapon, implants and earpieces and rank 186 artifact Ruusan relics. Most of my companions that I used had their influence in 20-30 range, with highest being Lana Beniko with influece rank 30. The testing was conducted in heroic 2 weekly missions on vanilla planets + Makeb, and old daily missions on Oricon, Yavin and CZ-198, with special attention on heroic missions on those planets. Only Imperial characters and planet versions were used so far. Star Fortress wasn't tested, neither solo nor heroic version. Healing appears to be relatively fine in heroic 2 missions on planets up to Hoth. I didn't encounter any significant increase in the difficulty of content at this point. Though the amount of healing was way lower than before, it was adequate to clear the content without dying or having to constantly use cooldowns. I did make frequent use of my cc abilities, as well as those of my companion, In the higher level range heroics (Hoth to Makeb) the healing became problematic. While my character managed to clear the content, I noticed that my health kept dropping throughout the fight and not once did it rise by even a tiny bit. The companion constantly failed to outheal the incoming damage, even though it wasn't being attacked itself, cc'd or otherwise interrupted. Even when I was interrupting special attacks and crowd controlling enemies, the amount of damage coming my way was more than the companion could handle. Especially problematic were enemies with high attack speed (rakghouls) or those that can stack multiple damage over time effects. Throughout the fight, the best my companion could do was cleanse some of those effects and reduce the damage that was coming my way. It never managed to actually heal through it. This experience repeated itself on Oricon, Yavin and CZ-198. While my companions had no trouble healing through the damage there pre -4.0 with Yavin weekly rewards companions sets and influence rank 9 but now, at influence 30, their heals are simply too weak to deal with incoming damage. Conclusion: Healing in 4.0.2 is worse than it's been before Knights of the Fallen Empire launched. While it's certainly unrealistic to expect the companions to be as overpowered as to make the content trivial, their current level of power simply isn't up to the challenge. This makes using companions in healing role useless, since other 2 roles give better results.

You're free to think whatever you want about them, but they're paying customers, same as you. At the end of the day, Bioware won't care which side in this argument is "in the right". All they'll care about is how much revenue they lost by players cancelling their subs and leaving. If the number turns out to be significant, they'll buff the companions again. Not to the same level they were in 4.0, but enough that people consider them useful again and possibly return to the game. And if Bioware doesn't, I guarantee EA will. Those guys don't give a rats *** about something being overpowered as long as it results in increase of customers and, therefore, income.

If you're reffering to my post above, then no, I had no trouble doing the heroics I mentioned. Didn't die once or had to use defensive cd's. The problem is that my companions didn't really contribute anything and I may as well have been playing without one for all the good it did. I get comps were overpowered and needed to be brought in line, but now they may as well be walking, talking decorations considering how utterly ineffective they've become.

Server population for Red Eclipse is showing as standard atm (7 pm in Europe, so practically prime game time). After KoFE launched it would vary between heavy and very heavy but hardly ever fall below that. In the morning it was light which I can't remember ever happening before. Either a whole lot of people are having issues with downloading the patch or there's a massive boycott of SWTOR due to companion changes.

I'd like to add my experience to this. Been doing heroics on Belsavis and Voss with my deception assassin in mostly 216 gear with 208 weapon, offhand, bracers, belt, implants and earpiece. Was using influence 23 Lana as a healer. First heroic was the Republic generators on Belsavis. Pulled the first group of 3 strong mobs and 2 standard mobs. Had no trouble killing them, but health dropped to 70% during the fight and failed to raise up even slightly. Figured I missed one strong mob who must have been beating up Lana, so she prioritized healing herself over me. Next group was 2 elites, 2 strong and 2 standard mobs. Cc'd one elite and Lana cc'd one strong, though that somehow got broken during the fight. Made sure all the mobs were focused on me so Lana could heal without any interuptions. Killed everything but 1 elite and again noticed that my health wasn't rising up. I made sure there was no spike damage by interrupting special abilities, but it still didn't seem like i was getting any healing. So, I allowed the remaining elite to keep auto attacking me and payed attention to what Lana was doing. Well, she was healing but none of her heals could outdo the damage I was taking from a single elite mob. In short my healer went from actually healing me to simply reducing the damage I take by a bit. The best part came after the fight when Lana tried to heal me back to full health and it took her 5-6 healing abilities to raise my health from about 40% to 90%. In short, post 4.0.2., Influence 23 Lana is a worse healer than influence 9 Talos Drellik was pre 4.0, with basic coms gear.

I remember way back before SWTOR was released that companion entries on holonet had awesome concept art, rather than in game screenshots. Any chance we could get that concept art released a wall decorations for our strongholds, like you did with rakghoul art? I love to decorate my stronghold with pictures of my love interest and favorite companions.

And that's fine by me. However, there's a world of difference between making content too easy so that it no longer presents any kind of a challenge and making it so difficult that you can no longer do it in a way that's always been intended. Before you had the choice of doing heroic 2 missions alone with your companion or doing them with another player. After 4.0.2 nerf the first option is no longer valid for a number of players even though the devs confirmed that this isn't their intention. My issue isn't with the fact that something that was clearly over performing is being brought in line. The issue is that Bioware took things to the opposite extreme and now the companions are weaker than they have ever been.

You're free to feel that way. The devs, however, have openly said that's not the case. Quote: Originally Posted by AdarnVote View Post "just one question then eric: for those of us who like to play solo like me, will I still be able to go through with my healing companion and do the weekly heroics to build our influence/alliance? because right now that's all I've got to work with solo wise." Absolutely! It certainly may be a bit more challenging than before but you can complete them. The intent is that you can complete any [Heroic 2] with your Companion counting as one of the two. If you find this isn't true for any Heroics tomorrow, let us know. -eric Here is the link to the original topic so you can check it out for yourself. http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=8622573#post8622573

It IS a problem since Eric Musco himself told the community that heroic 2 missions were designed to be done by a player+companion or 2 players working together if they so choose. Therefore, you aren't required to group for that kind of content, since your companion is supposed to be able to fill in the spot of another player. If the nerf resulted in companions no longer being able to fulfill that role, then the system itself is no longer working as intended and needs to be addressed. Outside of flashpoints, operations and world bosses there is no content in SWTOR that should not be soloable if they player so chooses.

Unsubbed for the first time since launch. Now it's time to start playing all those games that I didn't get around to because of KoFE. Hello Witcher 3 and Fallout 4.

I'm aware of that. Heck, I've soloed them myself a few times. What I'm saying is that we've yet to see how the nerf will effect players who are trying to solo it post 4.0.2.

Eric was talking about the weekly heroic 2+ missions where you grind Alliance crates. So far nothing has been said on how this nerf to companions will impact the ability to solo heroic version of Star Fortress. Guess we'll find out tomorrow once the patch goes live.

So what exactly is the benefit of getting the influence with all 4 specialists to rank 20? Does their rank have an effect on anything, besides letting you use their buffs in heroic Star Fortress?

When you first encounter them, they're wearing a new set of gear. However, once they join you and you summon them, they'll be wearing the same gear your gave them prior to KoFE. When my Inquisitor met Talos Drellik, he was wearing a new set. Once I had him back as my companion he was wearing the Yavin gear he had before KoFE.

Except nobody wants to waste their time engaging you in pvp. Especially since you don't get anything by doing so. If they actually added features like achievements or unique gear or decorations that you can earn by killing players in open world pvp, that would motivate people to take part in it. But right now, having a couple of Empire player running around Tython and desperately looking for others to kill servers no purpose other than comedy potential. Fact is, Bioware gave up on open world pvp in SWTOR a long time ago, and allowing you to visit opposing factions homeworlds won't change that.