I am torn between biochem and armormech for my trooper

[Finrok]

Is it close or does one win by a longshot? I notice vic gets +5 crit to armormech and droid +5 crit to scavange.

[Cavadus]

Don't be torn; armormech is 100% worthless and Biochem is the only crafting profession which offers stuff that can't be out-done by looted or comm gear.

[Lhorian]

Don't be torn; armormech is 100% worthless and Biochem is the only crafting profession which offers stuff that can't be out-done by looted or comm gear.

 

*looks at his Rakata Bracers and Belt with Augment Slot* Totally worthless? Guess again, buddy.

[Cavadus]

*looks at his Rakata Bracers and Belt with Augment Slot* Totally worthless? Guess again, buddy.

 

*looks at your Rakata Bracers and Belt with Augment Slot* Yeah, totally worthless.

 

You realize you can get better than rakata stats on moddable bracers and belts, right?

Edited February 16, 2012 by Cavadus

[Raani]

Unless you have access to a top-of-the-line armoring and mod, moddable bracers aren't better than Rakata with an augment slot.

 

Also, depending on spec/your current gear/where you are with regards to stat caps, secondary stats can have higher stat weights than primary stats or be very close, so the Rakatas might be better even with great mods.

 

At this point, Biochem offers zero benefit in terms of extra stats. All it does is save you money. If you PvP a lot, the savings on adrenals alone would be substantial.

 

If you're willing to wait about a month, you could just stick with gathering professions now, buy some BoEs, and see what happens in the next major patch. Undoubtedly, they know that professions aren't very balanced, and they promised some changes. If the PTR goes up and Armormech isn't getting anything special, you might as well go with Biochem for the reusables.

[Ossos]

Cybertech...you need the CCs...everything else can be purchased.

 

Armormech is worthless, Bio simply saves money.

[Rhinzual]

Cybertech...you need the CCs...everything else can be purchased.

 

Armormech is worthless, Bio simply saves money.

 

Biomech also has very strong medpacs and great stims. Sure as a Commando/Vanguard and Dorne, the chances of HP getting too low are rare, but still possible. The surgeon units are great to heal yourself and Dorne if a nasty aoe hits you both, since she'll otherwise spend her time healing herself.

 

As someone with a Shield Tech, I regret going Armormech, especially whevener I RE a Blue and see 'You already know this schematic'.

 

Biochem saves you money because if you RE a big enough stack, you'll automatically get the next schematic, and that saves you money from mission skills. I honestly think each crafting skill should be able to craft the mods that go with the orange pieces and eventually be able to craft the best gear in the game for that, but the schematics would only drop in NM Ops off bosses.

 

Cybertech should just get all kinds of awesome goodies in compensation, and I've gone off-topic again, figures.

 

If you have the patience for it, Armormech can be useful if you can't always get a group for dailies and FPs, but overall Biochem is friendlier, sad fact.

[BMBender]

I did both 400 bioch 400 bio ana 400 scav on main;

400 UT 400 Diplo, 400 armmech on alt luven it

Edited February 16, 2012 by BMBender

[Rhinzual]

I did both 400 bioch 400 bio ana 400 scav on main;

400 UT 400 Diplo, 400 armmech on alt luven it

 

What the **** is that supposed to be?

[Eihnlazer]

Theres a post on the commando forum that explains exactly what is our best pvp gear settup. Rakata wrists and belt are part of that.

[Kheldras]

I leveled Biolame to 200 on my Vanguard.. you know Heals, Forum says is great... etc.. but it dosnt really create stuff except Crap out of Goo... Now im Armourmech. I build stuff people buy, I build cool looking armours for people who level and companions.

 

At least, when BE allows to change mods from hilevel Armours in build Orange armours i have my look.

Edited February 16, 2012 by Kheldras

[Rhinzual]

I leveled Biolame to 200 on my Vanguard.. you know Heals, Forum says is great... etc.. but it dosnt really create stuff except Crap out of Goo... Now im Armourmech. I build stuff people buy, I build cool looking armours for people who level and companions.

 

At least, when BE allows to change mods from hilevel Armours in build Orange armours i have my look.

 

I prefer running FPs/Heroics for orange armor that I can keep updated when it comes to myself and my companions, specifically to avoid using the GTN and it's horrible interface as much as possible.

[va_wanderer]

On the other hand, there's some orange armors that can only be made by Synthweaving/Armortech- I end up getting schematics for those from UT on a fairly regular basis.

 

When they allow for moddable purple armors, things will get a lot more interesting.

[Falkanos]

i enjoy armormech and have crafted a majority of gear for myself and companions. I realy have fun Re'ing and being able to craft purple items and sell them or get stuff set up for guildies. so It can be annoying or worthless to others ,but I find it useful myself.

[CaliJoe]

I picked armstech for my trooper.No brainer.Commandos need big guns.

[bunglermoose]

Personally, I dig Biochem. My commando's gone through a few squishy phases in the early levels, and there have been times where the crafted biochem items have outright saved my butt...particularly on bad (or careless) pulls.

[livewood]

biochem is without per the best prof every other prof you can think of ultimately is worthless while biochem stays consistently useful all the way through that said once you have your reusables crafted I would and have droped diplomacy for slicing as at high levels everywhere I go I seem to find nodes for it. Vendor bought stims do not compare to crafted they are far better.

[Lammio]

choose whatever you want.

I took armormech,since all those skills go with +crit bonusses.

 

You shouldnt care if Armormech isnt viable yet, its so much fun to craft new gear for you and your companions.

[Erevan_Kindelar]

Unless you have a particular desire to learn Armormech, like for role-playing reasons or because you like producing armor, then Biochem is the clear winner in the "Armormech vs Biochem" argument. Biochem can make you money, but Armormech is generally a time and credit sink with minimal returns.

Cybertech would be another option worth looking at, but if you take into account the time and effort involved in getting to 400 in any of the crafting skills, Biochem and Cybertech are the only two that are generally considered to be viable at the moment.

[hadoken]

If you care about min/maxing then, armormech is superior because you can get augment slots on rakata gear you craft. You can buy the same power meds from other players/vendors. The rakata gear isn't replaced until you're doing Nightmare operations, and the mats come from flashpoints.

[Spero-Mcgee]

If you care about min/maxing then, armormech is superior because you can get augment slots on rakata gear you craft. You can buy the same power meds from other players/vendors. The rakata gear isn't replaced until you're doing Nightmare operations, and the mats come from flashpoints.

 

This ^. Its also more efficient for crafting biochem on a jediknight because the companion doc which you get on balmora is the only one with crit on biochem, all the others are just efficieny which lowers the time spent only. Craft critting for biochem is pretty important just because of that you have a higher chance on making double medpacs stims and such and better chances on getting augments on the implants when crafting with doc.

If you ever decide to get really serious with crafting pick classes with the companions that can crit on the crafts youre interested in. Considering BW aim is also to get you to reroll the other adv.classes getting all the crafts for yourself personally is np, only thing is that it's time intensive to lvl all the adv.classes to at least around lvl 49 because this is when you can deploy max 5 companions.

However since kira carsen is also the only crit syntweaver, you'll have to decide whether you want biochem or synthweaving on your jediknight, unless youre lvling the other adv. class as well. But those 2 crafts are best suited on the jedi knight.

Edited February 17, 2012 by Spero-Mcgee

[Falkanos]

another thing though,if you have scavange you can craft low to mid grade items all day long by picking up salvage everywhere and just sell the stuff to a vendor for some extra creds when you need it.

[GoldSquadGirl]

As a Cybertech with gobs of unnecessary purple recipes I wish I hadn't learned (because it turns out the ones you loot or get from PVP vendors are way better).

 

The grenades are worth it in the PVP endgame.

 

The ship upgrades will make your leveling guildies happy, if you are lucky enough to have guildies who ask for them.

 

And as an assault speced commando, I find having more "burning" DoTs onhand is a uniquely valuable bonus.

[Ontos]

Armstech and Armormech are less useful then Biochem. Unless Raktaka auto crits that augment slot, standard green armor when crafted doesn't always have augment slots. Plus, I can run 15 jobs with three companions and maybe only crit 2 if I am lucky...

 

Then augments come from splicing, which in and of itself was nerfed into oblivion and with orange mod armor / GTN quick pick up of green/blue gear from NPC...not everyone needs player armor when another alternative is available much more easily. The lockboxes are not always worth the amount of credits put in, for 30+ minutes that companion is gone I can kill normal NPC and make more, so not only is the lockboxes not worth it for credits but the augments not worth it as well since so few need player armor / weapons (splicing as a whole needs a buff again...maybe revamp it to at least get Tech companion gifts ).

 

Upsides for biochecm: At level 8 you can get a med pack that heals 3x the amount of the ones you can find, the stims you can make are twice the amount of +Stat and add power. Yeah, they are not reusable for the standard crafted ones....but they are just so easy to obtain they might as well be considered reusable.

 

I would say Biochem followed by Cybertech are the most useful. Aside from +health and +stats, Cyber lets you fill 2 mod slots while it requires an Armstech / Artificier / Synthweaver to fill a barrel/hilt/enhancement slot plus fill in the ear slot.

 

A good buff for Armstech and Armormech / Synthweaving is allowing it to make +mod pieces that are better then Cybertech, but only go into that item. Say Cybertech makes a +10 gunning mod +8 endurance green mod....same level Armstech would make a +12 cunning +9 endurance + 3 power green mod by "customizing" that mod made by Cybertech and that mod can only be put into a gun (reverse, a Cybertech can buff a barrel made by the armstech)

[TripleDaddy]

A lot of it comes down to how you play. I imagine a PvP'er will get more utility out of Bio than Armor, but as a solo quester I come down on the Armormech side of the argument. Since all of Havoc Squad (minus Fourex) wear exactly the same thing, gearing your team becomes cake. Then you get to gear up the companions of your alts (that's a total of 2 toons and 14 companions for hvy and med armor). Want money? Consider that your crafted gear is going to be better than any looted or rewarded green, and most blues if you're over-leveling the quests. Greens get sold to vendors, blues go to the GTN. I spent most of the game actively hunting for elites with my Commando, something I never would've done with my far-squisher Sniper.

 

To me, armormech has far more long-term functionality for the solo player.