I was just pointing out that you still get something out of the proc. I think the free cast part is very important as well as it turns HIB into a ammo regeneration tool as much as our main damaging attack. Without that free HIB and 1 ammo regeneration the spec would be insanely ammo inefficient. But I do agree with ya. Getting a proc currently when you're off CD is annoying but with a 6 second internal CD it'll.. Well.. Not make the player a happy camper.. Let's leave it at that

That is indeed the case for Commandos and HIB. At least on live and I highly doubt this would've changed for PTS as it really isn't a bug. And if it's true for Commandos, by logic it should be true for Vanguards Remember that HIB becomes free with the proc so even if it procs while HIB is off the CD you get the free part. As a sidenote, Reserve Powercell (next cast is free) is consumed when firing an already free HIB (either through the proc or the 4-piece PvE set bonus with a Gunnery spec). Beyond the laughter you can also see a red shield circling your character when it procs.

For DPS Commandos he's the worst. Really any tanking companion is the worst. Elara for soloing 4-man champions and heroics or Aric/Yuun for killing mobs superfast.

I've been thinking of this myself. If you plan on doing lots of Charged Bolts (with the talent Muzzled Fluting) then yes I think it's worth it. 6% extra damage on only Inc Round though is kinda meh. Might put 33 points in AS instead, or if you ain't running with a pocket healer in PvP go for 7 points in Combat Medic (taking Steady Hands).

First.. It's very late and my thoughts are racing all over the place.. I'm playing a lvl 50 Commando with a 37 Scoundrel on the side. Loving the Trooper armours! Except for the unnecessary spiky PvP sets. What I first noticed when I started questing was how odd the ligh/dark side choices were in Ord Mantell. Light side was all about saving every single person you came in contact with. I specifically remember two quests right at the start. First quest: Getting medicine back from a thief. I went to the thief and she said she took it for the civilians but that seperatists had taken 'em now. OK so I went out and slaughtered Seps and got the medicine. When I return I find out that I would get dark side points for returning 'em to the rightful owner, the Republic Army. The very same army who are out there fighting and dying to protect the civilians. Giving the medicine to the thief gave LS. I get that the civilians are between a rock and a hard place. But what about the greater good? If the troops lose their medicine they'll start dying and we'll end up losing the planet. How is it EVIL to not want that? And to add salt to the wound I was playing a Trooper and would naturally want my buddies not to die. Wanting to save your friends is considered evil? Second quest: A refugee asks me to try to find a priceless heirloom she'd lost while fleeing her home. Sure I said, I'll go there right now. In her house I find another guy going through her stuff. He claims he is Republic Security but doesn't show a badge or let me confirm his identity in any way. He starts telling a sobstory about how the refugee is an Imperial spy and that the heirloom is a communicator. The result.. DS for not believing this guy who's identity I can't clerify. LS for believing what obviously looks like a looter who gave me a decent lie. To point out though. That guy apperantly is with RepSec since he sent an email thanking me. Still no confirmation of identity though. Generally on the Republic side LS seems to be about doing the obviously good thing. You get DS for being greedy (you heard it here first! BW has confirmed it, greedy people are evil down to the very last bone). Another thing that gives you DS is thinking of the greater good. Let's take the numerous flashpoint DS/LS moment. They usually consists of like blowing up the Imperials (who are trying to blow us up) in a very quick way against letting 'em go so we can go shoot 'em full of bullets, throw rocks in their faces, stab 'em in the gut, etc. A really good example is.. Was it Taral V? Can't remember exactly. But you get the option to shoot a rocket at the moon or the Imperial Fleet that's in orbit and hellbent on killing you, your friends, your friends' friends, and you pet dog Archie. LS for shooting at the moon and DS for doing our job in the war, destroying the enemy. That fleet would cause countless destruction and deaths if we don't destroy it. So again, why is it DS for saving the lives of everyone you know and love? I've been tampering with the Empire as well. From what I've experienced there (Sith Warrior and Imperial Agent) is that the DS choices are mostly self-serving, violent, torture, ****, murder for fun and stuff like that. Things we generally can agree on being evil. The LS however seem to be more about compassion. What I've taken away from both sides is that on the Empire side LS/DS are about morality and what lines your character wants to cross. Republic are about being ubergood (LS) or greedy/thinking of the greater good (DS). Another observation. As a Sith you feel like a god. People fear and respect you. As a Jedi you're constantly told what not to do and to never take direct action but rather sit and meditate on it for a few hours. Last notes. I did wanna play Empire at first but my friends convinced me to go Republic. So I did and I've met a lot of great people. But I generally find the storylines to be a bit dull. Some are good while others are pretty bland (looking at you Consular/Knight who I can't make myself level higher than 19 cause they bore me to tears with their hate for love and constantly being treated as children by their peers). I do have a huge bone to pick with the Smuggler story! LOVED it for the first 30 levels. Then chapter 1 ended and I was forcefully drafted into the Republic army as a .. Dunno exactly what I am.. A special Agent? Isn't that what the SIS are for? Now instead of being a spacer out in the galaxy finding trouble I'm more or less ordered around by these Generals. That was not what I signed up for when I created the character....... So to end my rant.. I do think Empire has better stories than the Republic. And there really is only one man in the world we can blame for this, George Lucas. That man has systematically destroyed all that was good with the original movies. BW aren't allowed to make changes to existing stories or anything for that matter. Jedi are according to Lucas castrated warrior-monks whom are trained that emotions like love are evil. They had so much more freedom when designing the Sith to be interesting and multi-coloured. Now I should probably get to bed . And then to wake up to wonder what was going through my head when I wrote all this.. Sleep tight peeps!

One isn't inherently better than the other. I'm constantly topping the damage with both specs in warzones (and PvE). Assault requires less charging up than Gunnery but at the same time won't get full effect out of it's attacks unless the fight lasts longer than your standard hardmode flashpoint mobs (which dies in a few seconds). Gunnery will do massive damage if you can stand still and nuke. Assault will allow you to keep doing good damage even while moving. Assault is also great for dealing with melee as you can kite 'em. Gunnery is more ammo efficient but once you go low your damage will plumet (assuming you've already used your CDs). Assault has higher upfront ammo costs but with the skill Adrenaline Fueled you've got good ammo recovery mechanics. Do you see what I'm getting at? They've both got their strengths and weaknesses. It mostly comes down to individual playstyles. For leveling I'd probably pick Gunnery though. PvP? Dunno, they both have merit. But at the end of the day I think I prefer the mobility of Assault. Unless I'm playing late at night and just wanna shoot Grav Rounds while half asleep ^^ But that's just me.

I have almost the same Assault spec. But I've put two points in Nightvision Scope rather than Rapid Recharge. The increased stealth detection is just pure gold in PvP. It always amuses me how surprised all stealthers are when I break 'em out of it from several meters away

I'd like to restate what others have said. Use pillars and the terrain! Don't ever get caught in the open, that's when you're in trouble. Use a pillar to hide yourself from the spawnpoints in Voidstar and The Civil War and let it rip on those at the door/turret. For enemies to reach ya they'll have to run through all of your melee friends first thus painting a big isgn on 'em saying "KILL ME!" I alternate between Gunnery and Assault to keep things interesting. Both specs are great for PvP AND PvE if you know how to play 'em. About Assault's ammo issues. I agree that the spec is a lot more ammo intensive. But what many seem to forget is that you're not supposed to spam Charged Bolts/Auto Fire. You need to squeeze in Hammer Shot in there as well. HS does great damage with Plasma Cell and in PvP it'll in most cases slow down enemy players. Also keep in mind that the DoT from the cell can do crazy damage. 1k crits is not uncommon with a little gear, so you want this on your opponent as much as possible. Another ammo/damage tip for Assault. Using Full Auto will immediately give you the HIB proc while Charged Bolts will proc when you finnish casting. In order to not waste time waiting to see if HIB procced or not do a Hammer Shot right after. This'll both give you lots of Plasma Cell procs but also give you 1.5 seconds of ammo regen between shots. In a lot of cases this little break will be enough to keep your ammo at a healthy level. And remember to strafe shoot when running, never turn your back on an opponent. Use Concussion Charge often, as it's only on a 20 second (15 with 2p PvP set bonus). It sends people flying all over the place. I run with a pocket healer which makes things considerably easier but still save Tech Override for a instant heal (2-3k) for emergencies. About preventing enemies from capping turrets in The Civil War. Hail of Bolts is your best friend when there are multiple cappers and not enough time for a Plasma Grenade. But don't aim it in front of the turret as it'll give enemies on the other side cover. Any enemy with a brain will use the turret as cover from incoming fire so put it down on their side. Try finding the targets that are about to drop and finish 'em off. There is no such thing as stealing kills in this game and if anyone says different just remind 'em there is no I in team. OK that became longer than I'd thought and covered way more than I had planned. It's just tips and thoughts from the top of my head

True, it does seem like this. But if this is how they want it they MUST give us an ability to have two specs. But I think pigeonholing players into one spec is just bad design and I'd rather not see it. I too think the PvP set favours Assault. But Gunnery still gets a lot of mileage from the 4p bonus. HIB does a ton of damage for 'em especially charged up through Grav Rounds. In the end the 4p PvP set bonus isn't useless for Gunnery. That is the case with the PvE set and Assault.

I love Assault in PvP. Went back to Gunnery for two days to play around with it but found the lack of mobility and survivability to be a real bummer. True Gunnery has just insane damage. But only when no one notices 'em. If an enemy throws a pebble at ya you're in trouble For Gunnery I think a short duration sprint would be in order. Or a cooldown which prevents interupts/pushback for a short while. Another option would be to give 'em a skill that reduces the cooldown on Tech Override whenever they crit, get hit, or something. As others have said Assault is lacking a bit on the burst department. When my HIB crits with Assault Plastique coupled with a proc from Full Auto I can utterly destroy opponents though. But I would love some ability getting close to that 5k crit for the takedowns. That's not saying I ain't getting crits close to that but they aren't as reliable as Gunnery's Demolition Round. I'd also like to rearrange the skill trees a bit. There are a tad to many fillers in the lower tiers and to many mandatory skills in the higher. And what do you guys think about Adrenaline Fueled? I can't make up my mind about it. Adrenaline Rush is a kinda lackluster heal (and it doesn't work as the tooltip says) but it is a nice buffer. The Reserve Powercell component of that skill is very good though and at times I feel it's almost the backbone of our ammo restoration. I do find the way skills work to be odd. I'd rather have the first point give a 100% chance to proc but for a lower effect than both points increasing the proc chance AND the effect. With the former we'd have much more freedom in picking skills. If I only want 1 point in a certain skill I should be able to place only 1 point without gimping the skill two-fold. For PvE I'm finding Assault to be very good as well. Compared to other MMOs movement on bosses are very important. I'm also liking how Assault feels more involved than Grav Roundx2, Demolition Round, HIB, Full Auto on proc.. Rince and repeat

Gunnery get Grav Round as a replacement for Charged Bolts (some people say CB does more damage though and should remain in your rotation, I can't comment on that and it is besides the point of this thread). There are four sets: Eliminator - Commando DPS Combat Medic - Commando Healer Supercommando - Vanguard Tank Combat Tech - Vanguard DPS Names should be the same for the PvP sets but don't quote me on that as it's 04:44 in the morning/night/whatever

2p +15% crit chance with Charged Bolts and Grav Round 4p -1 cost for High Impact Bolt The first bonus I can kinda get behind. Even though it's the worst ability in the AS arsenal compared to how it's the bread and butter of Gunnery. In fact it is freaken awesome for Gunnery! Problem with it is that it also pigeonholes AS into going at least 6 points into Gunnery for the reduced cost (otherwise it's insanely expensive) and thus giving up useful skills in Combat Medic (I like to run with 2/2 Quick Thinking for the emergency off-healing). The second bonus though is just insanely stupid and utterly worthless. As a AS HIB is in about 80% of the cases a free shot and regenerates ammo. For Gunnery though this bonus removes the cost of HIB completely making it rather nifty but somewhat pointless as Gunnery already have very very good ammo regeneration (especially so with the 2p bonus). Suggestion? For the 2p bonus I wouldn't mind a increased chance of Plasma Cell to proc or damage along with the current bonus. This will in no way affect Gunnery's damage. That should more than make up for it. However with my suggested alteration of the 4p bonus AS would probably end up slightly on top so this might have to stay as is. For the 4p bonus to work, as I think BW intends, it needs to restore 1 ammo when used. For Gunnery HIB will still require 1 ammo to cast but it will restore that making it a teeny weeny nerf (losing 1 ammo might make 'em dip into a slower restoration rate for a wee bit). BUT it will now be useful to AS as well. As a final note. Keep in mind that the 2p also increases the ammo efficiency of Gunnery (they regen ammo from critical hits with Full Auto and rounds). So in the end the increased Plasma Cell proc rate or damage along with 1 ammo restoration on HIB might actually be very well balanced.

Here is a link to a video giving a brief explanation of the java tool. I agree that the area should be clear of mobs. And that maybe the transformers shouldn't blink but be completely lit to make it easier to see what's on and off.