There IS a significant difference between Champ and BM gear concerning the different mods placed on them, excluding the Expertise. For instance, BM gear gives a little better bonus to one's Cunning than Champ gear. Also, there IS a significant difference between gear with Expertise and gear without - it's called Expertise - the point I was making. I don't think you understand exactly what you are talking about here. And as far as PvPers just simply getting epics and then steamrolling PvE content... that's exactly what is happening right now. The Expertise literally did nothing to stop that from happening. What it DID do, however, is prevent people who PvE from owning face in PvP... because they didn't "earn" it or whatever. Expertise was to appease the elitists who need validation from inside the game that they are "special". And they have that... except it breaks the game. I now have to work my @ss off to get the same gear that they exploited to get, which was EASIER for them to get in the first place because they didn't have to worry about people in BM gear messing up their groove, just so I can have fun - not to win - but to have fun. Sometimes losing can be fun, if you realize you were just outplayed. Being floor-stomped because of ridiculous gear bonuses is NOT being "outplayed." It might as well be cheating... Also, even if they kept Expertise - there's no reason for it to apply a Damage Bonus, a Damage Reduction Bonus, AND a Healing bonus - there's just no point in it. One of those will suffice for a Set. Not to mention, it would be far less of a hassle and a lot less game-breaking if they just gave you set bonuses and nothing else.

I have no idea. Probably Sorcerers... I mean, I'm just spit-balling when I say that, but everything else they do is total BS - why not one more thing? I'm not kidding - I have literally been knocked around 3-4 times in a row and ended up being knocked off the bridge or into the green goo on huttball... it pisses me off. Considering the amount of people who play Sorcerers, and the frequency on my server that I often times end up playing a group of nothing but... it wouldn't surprise me.

Happens to me all the time. I have literally cycled through 3 different guys nowhere near me, off-screen, and TAB REFUSED to target the guy standing right in front of me. I've died a lot because of this. Granted, I could have just clicked on the dude... but I'm sure you understand that upon the second time you hit TAB, you're already pissed about the situation that you just continue pressing it out of principle.

I think a lot of the confusion comes in how the abilities actually work. I could be wrong about it, but I know that I am constantly knocked around like a damn ragdoll. Doesn't matter if I have 0 Resolve or I'm in "Stun Immunity". There might be something in your attack that constitutes it as a Knock Down instead of a Knock Back. Some Knock-backs have built in Knock-Downs, and those WILL generate Resolve.

I agree with this. The whole class is messed up and needs a complete and total overhaul. Nerf aside - the other two trees that weren't affected already performed rather poorly compared to every other AC Tree in the game. And not by a little, either. As it stands... Scoundrel is "okay". You can play it... but you're never going to be exceptional with it, and you will always be out-shined by any other class. It really offers absolutely nothing that isn't already done - better. It has nothing to do with your Gear or any of that. The design of the class simply has too many one-trick pony tactics that are easily exploited by all of the other ACs.

We only have 1 Interrupt and we have to be in Melee Range to use it. Knockbacks DO affect you with a full Resolve - happens all the time - and they do not produce Resolve. I have literally been knocked between players 4 times in a row before, only to be knocked off the bridge in Voidstar. KnockDOWNS, however, DO produce Resolve. This is why the Knockdown affect on KO for Scoundrels was such a big deal.

What's bad is I can't even interrupt unless I'm in Melee Range lol.

As a Scrapper, I have several builds to choose from that will give me a myriad of different Stuns/Roots/Snares options. I also have Stealth at my disposal. All of these stuns and snares and roots can only be used in Melee Range. A simply Knockback (which all Ranged Classes have) pretty much mandates that I will not be using these abilities. Stealth is an interesting one, though. Of course, since I'm stealthed... I'm not doing anything anyway... unless I'm in Melee Range.... by which point my stealth breaks on my first attack. Which makes that person subsequently use a Knockback and then snare/root... none of which affects my Resolve. If I can't attack the target, then I might as well be Stunned. All this stuff does is allow the Ranged class to get away with some free Stuns on top of their actual Stuns. It's borked. I also don't have a Gap Closer.

Here's what I think: They need to ditch Expertise altogether. I still have not heard a valid reason to have it. It simply does not make any sense to give players added bonuses onto gear that is already better. Keep the BM, Champ, Cent gear exactly like it is. Keep the current Bag/Comm ratios. I don't care. BM's aren't owning face because their gear is THAT much better than Champ gear. What makes it better, and what gives them "I win" function, is the Expertise. Ditch it. All of these other problems will literally take care of themselves.

I would think, given the nature of the fact that the OP asserts they are the most powerful, that a good Marauder is effective against anyone, regardless of whether or not that person is a good or bad player. I really get tired of this "Learn to Play" mentality that is so often thrown around on these forums. Between the Gear, the exploits, the obvious OP abilities that are obvious, the lag, the gank squads, Biochem, and a whole slew of other factors... player Skill plays a very minor role in whether or not you are winning. It's not like people are purposely not using the confirmed effective builds and rotations of their class.

Actually... the classes were pretty spot on from day 1. What WASN'T spot on, was the Critical Damage - Surge. This Surge Nerf should have been the very first thing they did - I mean number one, first priority. The classes that were OP (Scoundrel/Op for instance) wouldn't have been with a Surge nerf. These Healing classes that are currently going nuts - again, Surge. Juggernaughts/Guardians doing their 9k AoE? Again... Surge. You can pretty much take v1 of TOR, and look at all the balance issues in PvP (animations aside), and they will all be connected to Surge Stacking. Even Biochem. Do you know what people were after when they went Biochem? Surge Adrenals and Stimulants. The Critical Warfare in this game was absolutely absurd. None of the classes needed a nerf. None of them. Not even Scoundrels/Operatives.

LOS is not a reliable way to avoid taking a hit and is not a very good argument against the problems with Snares/Roots. LOS does not protect you against DoT. LOS does not protect you when you need to heal, but can't heal while you are moving. LOS does not allow you to win a fight, because you need to see your opponent to kill them. LOS does not help the Melee fighter. It only helps other Ranged fighters. LOS does not help Melee Fighters who do not have a gap closer - Scoundrels/Operatives. LOS does not help you when you are taking damage and are Snared - because you can't get to it. LOS does not bother a Ranged Class unless YOU are a Ranged class - because if you aren't a Ranged class... you simply will not hurt them. Everyone should be immune to Roots and Snares when they are on Resolve Cooldown. The only people who do not want this, are Ranged Classes, because for them... it doesn't matter. This sort of change will only effect Melee Fighters - who more or less are at the mercy of Ranged classes because of this very reason. It is not the nature of the MMO that Melee Fighters are at the mercy of the Ranged Fighters, because not every MMO has a jacked up Class system where Ranged classes can be Tanks, Healers, and Nukers all in one build. Usually, this is not as big a problem, because the Ranged classes are ALWAYS squishy. This simply is not the case in TOR.

Alright... genius. Let's look at this - we won't go too far into this... simply because I don't need to. Dirty Kick - 4s Stun. I use this so I can maneuver around to use Back Blast. Op uses a mirror ability that does the same thing. I use it - suddenly, I can't move because I am 1s rooted until the animation is finished. They can move, because they don't have to wait for an animation. They're already a second ahead of me... 1s is up, I maneuver around - Ops has already used their Back Blast mirror. I am just now using it. I use it (assuming they didn't use an Escape.) I'm rooted again because of the animation. Ops is about to finish their third attack by now, and I am halfway through my second one. The reason the GCD argument doesn't matter, is because their GCD starts BEFORE ours, because we can't USE our ability until AFTER the animation root, and AFTER we have positioned ourselves, by which time the Op is already moving to the third attack. The animation cancelling does not effect all animations. It simply doesn't. Also, stop making assumptions. Did I say anything about me losing to Ops because of this? No - I didn't. I don't need to be a "whiner" to state an observable fact. There was a question asked. It was answered. I agreed with the poster who answered it. It has nothing to do with me not knowing my class. Point in fact, it is BECAUSE I know my class, that I know how it works vs its mirror. You need to settle down and get off your high horse. No one here cares about your ego.

You're probably just used to the more powerful/higher level Scoundrel game play. They haven't done anything to the class except for Flechette Round and KO, which until you hit lvl 40 - you will simply not be effected by it, and ONLY if you level Scrapper. Scoundrel is a hard class to play at early levels anyway. That's just how it is. The reason for this is because each of our trees are sort of one trick ponies, and we don't get the really good abilities until late. Essentially, the usefulness of each tree is in the latter part, whereas the other classes - its in the early part. So if you're leveling all of the classes to 20, and then realize Scoundrel is under-par... well... it's always been like that.

This is about right. I've been in fights with an Op and there is simply no denying it. They CAN and DO attack faster. It's not a matter of skill... there are a lot of fishy logistics involved, but none of it matters. They simply produce more attacks than we do within a given amount of time. Also, they have absolutely no movement restrictions. We have them all over the place. The Dirty Kick is a prime example of this. We lose an entire second on a 4 second stun, simply because of the animation. All the Imp classes are like this against their mirrors though. All of them. There is not a single example of where a Rep class has a "curiously suspicious" advantage over its Imp mirror. And... it's not like you can refute it. It's plain as day. Yet these go ignored, which makes me think it was by design.... which sucks.

I just want my stock class back like we had it before 1.1.1. That's all I want - nothing more, nothing less. I learned to live without Knock Backs and Closers. I actually loved not having to deal with them. With the nerf to Surge - all I want is my old Spec back exactly how it was. This class will be perfect after that. People won't die in 6s, and I don't have to worry about not being able to kill stuff.

I brought all of this stuff up into my thread I wrote. I spoke about this VERY thing - Critical Damage. I was right on point with it. No one listened. Now they are seeing the bigger picture, because Surge (Critical Amplifier) is also effecting Healing - which is a massive problem. Our job as Scrappers was to take those guys out. Once they nerfed us, we were no longer able to keep healing in check. So everyone is going nuts with it. They should have nerfed Surge before they did ANYTHING. Now, you have 2 mirror AC's that were nerfed for no reason (we all knew it, and shame on those people who said we needed it - you know who you are) and 2 more mirror ACs that got buffed, and didn't need it. They're going to have to undo all of that. There's no way around it. The problem with Heals is going to be somewhat reduced because the other AC's will be able to deal with it... but we will literally be hosed. We're already the worst class... this is going to put us in the coffin. I'm pretty sure BW is coming around though... they've caught the real problem. They'll have to buff us. Let's hope they do the right thing.

Sorry... but this entire response of yours is total BS. This is the same kind of "defense argument" that Scoundrels/Ops used when we said we weren't OP. No one listened to us then, and we aren't going to listen to you now. The fact of the matter is this - Surge/Crit: It applies to both heals and DPS. BW should have nerfed Surge from the very beginning. Nothing was wrong with any of the DPS AC's and nothing is wrong with Healing AC's. The problem is the Critical Mass of product based off of ridiculous measures of Surge. I wrote about it. No one listened. Now in 1.1.3 - they're doing what they should have done from day 1 - Nerf Surge. As far as I'm concerned, they need to reevalute every single nerf they've put on each class, and go back to pre-1.1.1 with Surge Nerf intact. This is going to solve a lot of problems that nerfing and buffing individual abilities in various AC's couldn't fix. Healing IS Op, currently - because of Surge. "Extremely well placed CC" and "appropriate timing" mean the same thing. You can hardly tell when someone is using a Heal - half the time they're doing it while they move. Scoundrel/Ops heals happen instantly, and it's spammable - for example. Interrupts only last for roughly 4 seconds and are on at least three times as long CD, in which case every Healing Class has more than one ability to hold them for those 4 seconds. 1. Nerf Surge 2. Reverse all nerfs and buffs in 1.1.1 and 1.1.2 3. Reapply new buffs and nerfs to individual AC's as needed while taking Surge nerf into account. 4. Run a balance pass on PvE mobs to account for Burst/Sustained damage and Healing decrease. 5. PvP will take care of itself. 6. People will start to love this game like they did at launch and during Beta. 7. Profit. After this... move on to more important issues like WZ exploits and fine tuning Crew Skills.

I would just like to point something out, if I may... Remember in 1.1.1 - Scrappers/Ops got nerfed because we were "killing faster than intended"? I wrote a lengthy post about how the Nerf to KO and Flechette Round was completely unneeded because it didn't address the problem. All the people who were mad at Scrapper/Ops hated the post. Anyone who knew anything about the game loved it. I even wrote a little section about how nerfing Scrapper/Op was not solving anything, and was going to transfer the hate from us, onto some other class. What exactly happened in 1.1.2? A couple of key classes got Buffed, and as a result - Heals were out of control. Suddenly everyone hated classes that Heal. So... it appears after all 40 pages, I was actually correct. 1.1.1 Did not solve the problems with Scrapper/Op, and it did nothing but break the class. The problem was not the Stun. The problem was not the Armor Penetration. The problem was our Critical Damage. Lo and behold, roughly 2 1/2 weeks, 2 patches later - what does Bioware do? They nerf Surge. What does Surge do? It increases Critical Damage. Dear Bioware, I would like my AC back now. Thanks. Sincerely, Raice

Congratulations on being for the solution that broke the game!

This is exactly right on. (Not directed to you Ashes) Look - people. You have to realize, a very important piece to this flow of PvP has been castrated. Scoundrels/Operatives Sawbones - Okay Heals, Okay DPS These guys are the "Bards" of the game. They aren't there to devastate anything. They are there to accompany another player who has a more defined Role. If someone needs a little more HP because of some random Burst - they are there to relieve the main Healer so they don't burn through their juice so fast. If someone is having a hard time taking a dude out... here comes Sawbones to give you that little bit of extra umph to get the job done. These guys sacrifice specific strengths and particular focus so they can weave in and out of any situation. Dirty Fighting - DoT Damage DPS variable Range These guys were there to take on the Heavies if needed, but Primarily the Nukes. You'll notice that they use DoTs... it's what the tree is all about - it's because it bypasses everything. It's internal damage. The problem is, it's too slow to affect a Healer. Scrapper - VERY High DPS minimal Defense You can always tell what your target is by looking at what your strengths and weaknesses are. Who on the battlefield has minimal offense and LOTS of HP - so much HP, they can pass it around like candy? HEALERS! You'll notice... Healers now run rampant. Why? Because we can't do our job. 1.1.1 threw everything completely out of whack. And it was all because of a simple little ol' 3s Stun and a reduction in Armor Penetration (which by the way... was so we could deal with the Heavy Armor Healers. You know... those guys who spam Tracer Missile? Funny... they can't spam those on people they can't see.) Oh... I KNOW we made you mad. I know it! It's because you were always being killed by us. Always, always, always. It's because we were doing our job. The reason it became such a problem was because there were a lot of people who played those very specific AC's. I rest my case people. There is nothing anyone can say that can refute this. It's written all over the wall. Not that it matters... it will never be fixed. It will forever stay in this perpetual motion of nerf. As soon as Healers get nerfed (and they will)... the very next thing that will get nerfed is the Nukes, and then the Tanks right after.

No. A Healer healing himself should NOT be able to heal himself (or herself) indefinitely 1v1. The objective in any scenario is to win. How do you win? By killing the other person. How do you kill the other person? By applying damage. A Healer's strength is not to have the capacity to keep someone alive. Their strength is in keep that person afloat long enough for someone else to kill the person attacking the thing being healed. Look - if this were a game where the focus revolved around the patterns of 1v1 combat, then it would be different. But it's not. Every AC in the game had more than 1 function - except for two (which I will get to in a moment.) It revolves around a team scenario. A Healer's job is to keep people alive long enough to score/win.... long enough to keep the upper hand in their favor. If they could keep heals up indefinitely... then no one would ever achieve the objective. This is precisely why they can do other things too - like Attack. If they were 100% guaranteed to be able to sustain life indefinitely, then they wouldn't need to attack - and they shouldn't. But, most games make this error: give them Godly heals, and then decent attacks (because they have to be able to kill stuff in order to win) and then you have what is called a Tank Mage. Because of what 1.1.1 did to Scoundrels/Ops... this game is now soaked with them. Now, back to those people who didn't have more than one function: Scoundrels/Ops. Have you ever heard the "myth" that we only do one thing? "If you take this away, you have to give us something else, because we HAVE nothing else." We said this because it was 100% true. It wasn't a myth. The Main PvP spec was Scrapper/Concealment. We had one job - one: kill the healer. Why? Because once we did that, our team could capture the objective. We couldn't do it on our own - we were just a cog in the wheel. And you know what? We needed them too - because once we did our job... we were immediately focus fired. Without help... it were dead.. period. And rightly so - we died easily, because it directly mirrored our ability to kill easily. Ever wonder why the Healer Scoundrel/Ops were the worst healers in the game? It's because we also had the potential to produce some of the best DPS in the game amongst healers. Sure, we were still Melee... but even without the nifty tricks of the Scrapper Line - we were still able to put some hurt on someone in quick fashion. This is why our healing (by measure) sort of sucks. Scoundrels/Ops don't have closers and very reliable escapes, because we killed so efficiently. It was quick - professional - clean. Get in, get out. Healers that are very good at what they do, have to have defficiencies in their design too.... and they did - they were weak against us. But no longer. And now... those Tank Mages do not have a counter-weight to keep them in balance. Man... this game pisses me off....

Wrong. Shield Rating and Absorption have absolutely nothing to do with Tech Abilities. But Armor does, because they are still considered energy/kinetic damage, which has nothing to do with Absorption and Shield. Heavies wear Heavy Armor which protects against our Base Damage. Pre-nerf, a Scrap/Conceal had an ability (Flechette Round/Acid Blade) which allowed us to penetrate 50% of their armor. This was important, because it allowed our Base Damage to be effective against their armor. Critical Hits are an entirely different matter. None of the Critical Damage falls under any sort of energy/kinetic/force descriptive. All Critical Damage is exactly the same from all Classes and Specs. This is what Absorption and Shield Rating was for. This is how it worked: Suppose the following - I am a Scrapper fighting a Powertech - My Accuracy rolls against their Defense which is a combination of different things: Their Level, Armor Rating, and a few other things. If I lose the Roll, I apply Base Damage and nothing else. Because Heavies have such a high Armor Value (maximum in the game is 75%, achievable only by Heavy Armor), it directly influences and negates a particular amount of my Base Damage. If unchecked, it could be quite large - most of my Burst Rotation can produce about 1.5k Damage per hit, which is roughly 4-6 attacks. That alone is a lot, I agree. When you reduce that damage with the Armor Value (a reasonable number would be about 50%) then we suddenly have produced nothing. This is why we needed 50% Armor Penetration. The Armor Penetration did not mean that they received 50% more damage from me. It meant that their Armor Value was reduced by 50%. So their 50% Armor Value, which cut my Base Damage by 50%, was reduced to 25%, which meant that 75% of my Base Damage was directly affecting their HP total. This is always happening against everyone, unless the Attack Specifically says it is Internal Damage (a DoT) or bypasses armor completely. Our Opener (Shoot First, and I forget the Op equivilant) was important, because when conjoined with Flechette Round/Acid Blade, it applied an Internal DoT which was not mitigated. The actual attack itself was - it was nothing. The DoT is what made our Rotation work in conjunction with our 3 Point Skill in the 4th Tier which gives us 3% Extra Damage to ALL Attacks when the target is Bleeding. Nothing else in our Rotation was a DoT - it was all standard Base Attack Stuff. You'll notice, none of that had anything to do with Critical Hits. That's because we lost the Acc vs Def Roll. If we WIN the Acc vs Def roll, it goes into phase 2. In Phase 2, a second roll is made; one between our Critical Chance (or Critical Rating if you prefer) and their Shield Rating. If the Shield Rating wins the roll, then how much ever Critical Damage we produce (which is Base + (Base * .5) + Surge%) is automatically reduced by their Absorption Rating. Effectively, it's an entirely different system that works exactly like Armor Value... except specifically for Critical Damage. This same system augments ALL Critical Damage, regardless of who it comes from. Even Attacks that bypass armor altogether - if they produce Critical Damage (which they do) then the Critical Damage is mitigated in this manner. If we WIN the Critical Rating vs Shield Rating roll... then we apply 100% of our Critical Damage - again, this is ALL Critical Damage, regardless of the AC. Shield Rating is the most important thing for a Tank against Concealment/Scrapper. When they were specced correctly, it was the very reason they were harder for us to kill. In the later levels, with equal geared opponents, the Tanks who were properly Specced and wore the proper equipment, were the bane of the Concealers. You can ask any of them and they'll tell you. We simply did not mess with them, because they would ruin us every day, and twice on Fridays. The reason the Tanks could do this, was for one simple item that every single one of the Heavy Armor Specs are allowed to wear: The Shield Generator. If they did not wear it (which Troopers and BH's could opt to wear a Power Generator instead) then they effectively were cut off to this very vital piece of equipment that literally stopped us in our footsteps. Healers/Squishies... were different. Why? Simple - they didn't have Shield Generators. They had Magic Bubbles which... well... they didn't do much against us, but they did a LOT against everyone else. The only people left are the other concealers. And usually... concealers just did not worry about other concealers. Why? Because we never ran into one another. It's just that simple. We're all Stealthed - we don't see one another but for a split second on the off-chance we pass one another by. We certainly weren't looking for one another... it's just a waste of time. And even then, the fight usually boiled down to who got the first hit. Look... this is how the game was designed. It was actually one of the most well thought out designs ever. And now... it's all borked, because the people responsible for keeping the healers/nukers in check are no longer able to do that. It shouldn't take 2-3 people to take out one guy. That was MY job. I specialized in 1v1 combat for that very reason alone - to take out 1 dude at a time that could wreck and disable an entire team. My function is lost, and now these guys are running amok. This is not balance.

Neither do you. All we can do is observe the evidence and come to a conclusion. Mine makes more sense , however, because it factors in the probability of someone just making a bad call after a number of people apply pressure. I'll take the data collected over years of focus testing with data backing up the original design over a few weeks of anger fueled complaints any day of the week. But go ahead - continue to think it's just "confirmation bias." The data and the facts are actually on my side with this one, though.

So the years of Design Testing, Alpha Testing, and Beta Testing - all of it filled with scientific metrics and even closer focused observation was suddenly completely different after a few weeks of Live? You trying to tell me that over half the population playing Sage/Sorcs crying for a nerf, which stated the direct opposite of what all those years of metric based focus testing had confirmed time and time again, had nothing to do with their knee-jerk reaction of a hack-job on that nerf? Sure... what world are you living in?