Let me give a bit more information on this. I was the Vanguard running Ion (tank stance), and my spec was specific for the fight because it had great synergy with the other Vanguard's burn dots. There were only a total of six teams, (no snipers or gunslingers participated), and I believe there were only 2 or 3 players who were ranged DPS as well, the rest melee. One must also must consider the skill level of players can vary, giving mixed results in a small sample size, especially considering I know there are several really good players on our server that did not compete. Combined with the fact that an arena setting is very unexplored in this game, I wouldn't say this is a good enough sample to make any sweeping generalizations, but it is a start for sure. The strat we had was stupidly easy to pull off. I don't think any single heal team can survive a coordinated attack against two Vanguard/Powertech's absurd cooldowns, with our without guard. Only classes that can pop near-immunity type cooldowns have much of a chance to survive this. But one thing this event did highlight is just how incredibly terrible tab targeting is. You'll see competitors shoot, and even leap into the crowd. I believe I shot the crowd once and I'm quite sure they were either barely on my screen or weren't at all.

I'm sure one of the main reasons Bioware even implemented medals was as an anti-AFK measure. Unless you participate, you won't get medals. I've played more Warzones than I'd bother to divulge, but in all my time I have only seen a couple players AFK (and I would even doubt they intended to do so, but rather something IRL came up), and I believe medals is one of the largest reasons. As a result, I really like this system. Players going AFK in battelgrounds in WoW was a massive problem that wasn't fixed for...I don't even know if it was fixed since I quit shortly after Wrath. Medals is one of those things Bioware did right (short of balance among classes as far as medals you can get). The four medal change appears to be a quick fix to blaance medal gains for all roles. The best solution would be to balance medals, as this quick fix will certainly result in players going AFK after they reach their 4 medal quota. They did say they are adding a ton of more medals though, which will replace this quick fix probably. I guess they just don't have the resources to put in those medal changes now. The medal system and changes to it actually seem completely correct, unlike other systems in this game like the PvP bag system. Granted that's probably not the only reason there is a lack of players going AFK. Winning being directly tied to reward is another big reason.

Apparently you are: None of those claims can be possible for all players. Several players who are skilled enjoy playing more with friends, and especially enjoy when the opposing team is a premade. When a game is a premade vs a premade, there is by no means, at all, a guaranteed win. Heck I was in a premade yesterday who lost a Civil War match to a PuG. Opposing team had a total of two kills the entire match. I learned something there, for sure. For the second claim, I have no doubts at all that players, skilled or not, like to be rewarded for their efforts in some fashion. I'd say skilled players would like to be rewarded even more since they believe that because they have more skill (not time played, etc.) they deserve more rewards. The reason is not to stomp people in lesser gear; it's mostly prestige, or desire of progression. That, and they don't believe gear matters because any PvP they really care about will be Premade vs Premade, where everyone has the same top gear. Well I can't make that claim for every single player in the same sense you did (I'm sure there are some players out there that want good gear just to beat lesser geared players), but to use your claim of "Skilled players want a challenge", I'll just say they want a challenge in group PvP while still being rewarded. I won't deny that many players would be fine with something like titles either. Players desire different things, regardless of skill, and that's my point. The last claim assumes that all players' desires are directly related to their skill as a player, this case being gear as the desire. This is a poor assumption, as there is no cause/effect relationship here. Having no desire of character progression does not apply to all players (Period). I would even think that the majority of players desire character pgression, but that's an opinion/speculation. I actually agree that players who solo in WZs develop additional skills that those who only run premades lack. But the same can go the other way too. Solo players will lack the teamwork required to compete well in a premade vs premade setting. I also agree in the idea that losing means learning. I find it quite amazing that you have points that I agree with so solidly, but others that I see as flawed beyond belief.

You're missing two very good tricks in Voidstar. I may even regret revealing these: Consulars/Inquisitors can force speed across the gap in the middle of Voidstar. This nearly always gets the jump on the other team if no bridge is up, plus you can grab the speed powerup at the other side to arm the wall faster. Two of these classes being stealth classes is just further icing on this trick (not sure if it can be done while stealth, the jump isn't easy). Classes with pulls (Powertech/Vanguard and tank specced Shadows/Assassins) can pull people to their doom at the bridges in Voidstar. To do this, jump diagonally over the pit and pull someone. They will be pulled to your position (mid air over the gap) and fall to their death. This is very difficult to do, but nets a free kill if you can "pull" it off.

This is highly dependent on the situation and spec. Naturally, the DPS specializations should be running with Aim most of the time, while the tank specializes run with either Aim or Endurance (Endurance is usually better for Hutball, if you have a dedicated healer, or are in a situation where surviving is more important than killing, like defending an Alderaan node against superior numbers with a healer). This only really gets complicated when you are Biochem and you can swap stims on the fly. If you are DPS, Aim is still usually the best to go with in most cases. However, if you decide to carry the ball, run Ion Cell to guard a healer, or are defending a node (Alderaan / Voidstar defense) you can swap to the endurance stim. As a tank, you pretty much do the same thing, but favor endurance when you're outmanned in almost all situations. Also note that the endurance stim will increase the effect of Adrenaline Rush and the Warzone Medpac, so if you really wanted to, you could switch to an endurance stim before you use those. But it still costs a GCD, so this would be a rare occurrence (like if you were setting yourself up to receive a Hutball pass, you'd pop the endurance stim then heal yourself up). For both, if you really want to maximize yourself in PvP, you could run with endurance until you get hit, then switch to aim. This way you get the affect of both stims (if you aren't healed) at the cost of one GCD. In my opinion though, that cost is too high in most situations in PvP, so I don't normally bother. On a side note, in my opinion, they need to do something about this stim switching. Yet another unfair advantage for Biochem.

The idea is that by the time many players have full Battlemaster gear, new content will be released, and the cycle continues. It's how these games work, like it or not. As for the select few hardcore players who hit it very quickly, well those are hardcore players. They'll probably come back once new content comes out. I'll use WoW Arenas as an example: there are seasons and rankings, just like professional sports, and new gear is released each time (content in this case). Not sure how SWTOR plans on doing this though. The arena was about being the best with rankings, so even if you had the top gear of the season, you would still play to "win" essentially. SWTOR doesn't have an equivalent of this, but it's apparently in the works (probably by the time many players get Battlemaster gear!). Not saying WoW's style of progression is the best, it's just an example. On a side note, why can't any crafters make expertise gear? This could also help remedy the problem of fresh 50s being uncompetitive. EDIT: On a personal note, I too became a bit bored of PvP after a while. Then I starting trying and experimenting with all the skill trees (usually one week for each different spec) and I've honestly done several warzones just for the fun of it with no reward to gain. Just a suggestion if you're looking to have a bit more fun.

You're playing the wrong game genre if you think that, or you desire a complete revolution in how all PvP is conducted, pretty much breaking away from this "MMORPG genre". Your suggestion appears to be to remove all character progression entirely. This isn't feasible unless you replace it with something else to give character progression, such as skill rankings, etc. Even then, the idea that your character becomes more powerful is something that has time and time again proven to be very popular for keeping players playing games. I don't think this can be changed since almost all players expect to become more powerful as they play when getting into an MMO. This could work for a new game, but making this switch in SWTOR is too dangerous, I would say even mass exodus dangerous. That said, I nor anyone has all the ideas. There could very well be a solution out there that works after removing all gear progression, so toss out constructive ideas. Personally, I think this game just needs a few tweaks and it'll be pretty solid (PvP progression wise, I could rant on other problems this game has of course!) Also I believe that the the difference between Champion and Battlemaster is near perfect (short of all this mass accuracy on Battlemaster). Any Champion has a good chance at any Battlemaster. The difference is that Battlemasters are usually far more skilled due to putting more time in, and they have a *slight* advantage. Also, considering complaints are happening now, most battlemasters people see only have like 1-2 pieces, tops. VERY few players have full battlemaster. The title right now mostly just shows they've spent a ton of time on their character and in warzones, so beware. Also Champion gear is already pretty easy to get, probably too easy if Centurion gear was easy to get. Like I said in my first post, I don't really see a huge problem here other than feeling a bit powerless for a two-three weeks while you stockpile champ bags. After this, PvP is quite balance gear wise.

It could be, but this is the inferior option of splitting PvE and PvP progression. Aesthetics are also completely opinionated, so this solution could even result in people who want to PvP doing PvE (which they don't like) in order to get gear. Several players also do not care about aesthetics. Does it need to be expertise exactly? No, but PvP players should become better or the best by PvPing. The question here is should Top Raider Guy be just as viable as Top PvP Guy in PvP? The answer is no, mostly because this removes an entire path of character progression (Read: time players play the game). So the reason why it's inferior is that it could remove nearly half of the time players spend playing the game and progressing their character. No one wants this, not even the players. Of course, with so many people quitting or rerolling, that may not be an issue, but that's irrelevant because I'm speaking on terms of a working system, not a broken one. What I proposed is that it's easy to get entry level gear, but hard to get the top gear (which isn't *that* much better). This keeps it a bit more fair, and keeps progression pretty much the same. Also the random loot system is stupid. I'd much rather spend 3 hours PvPing and progressing to another battlemaster piece (Say 1/4 the way) rather than looking back and saying "Oh hey, no battlemaster commendations again, I just wasted 3 hours of my time". Too frustrating for players, and some are quitting because of this.

I don't really see a huge problem here, but that's probably because I was one of the first players on the server to get lots of expertise gear at 50. If the problem is that new 50s are getting stomped in warzones, then the fix is pretty easy: make Centurion gear much easier to obtain (as of now, it would be way harder to get a full Centurion set compared to Champion). I'm talking reduce the price of these pieces by 80% or maybe more to allow players who PvP for a week or two to have nearly a full set. This set is inferior to people who have been playing a ton already, but Centurion is still perfectly able to compete in warzones. And if people are still way too upset about spending a week of feeling powerless in warzones, make Tionese commendations and Centurion commendations the same thing, allowing PvP and PvE to get each others starting sets with ease. That way, if a player wanted, they could get the entry level PvP gear via PvE, which I doubt anyone who PvP's seriously would complain about. A side effect there is that tionese gear would be easy to obtain, but I'd say that's fine too since that gear is in the same boat as Centurion: It's harder to obtain than Columi for most pieces. Just recolor these pieces blue and people won't complain that "Bioware is making epics too easy to get!", plus it gives a better sense of character progression to the player. Removing expertise, or gear in general in PvP is a huge mistake. Without character progression in PvP (be it rankings, gear, or what-have-you) players will get bored and leave. Character progression is a requirement in a subscription based MMO. I really cannot stress how removing expertise is a really, really bad idea. People who suggest this desire a game where there is no progression, but skill vs skill only. As I said before, this cannot happen in an subscription based MMORPG structured like WoW or similar games. PvE geared players dominating PvP also is a terrible side effect that isn't desired.

Just facepalms. Used to be a UE3 licensee myself. UE3 is not a good engine for an MMO, and that's that. I even remember an unprog thread about using UE3 for MMOs. I think the idea was that it was sort of feasible for the client only, requiring the developers to mutilate the network code and write all of the server code (hint: this is the hard part of making an MMO engine, may as well make your own engine at that point in time).

I can confirm this.