Tips/thoughts: Give us a monthly schedule in advance, or at least 2-3 weeks notice, and have the bonus period last at least 3 days (ie: FRI-SUN) ideally weekends, every 3-4 days, or just every week. Alternate bonuses to CXP, such as: Operations, Flashpoints, PVP / GSF, Stories, Heroics, Dailies. Do not make it a "random" bonus (ie: Making one PVP map the bonus map would piss people off, because you cannot select your PVP map) but rather give players the ability to plan ahead ("3x CP for PVP on the 12th-15th? Awesome!") For instance, I would LOVE a weekend with 2-3x CXP on Operations - I'd be happy to get back into raiding and that would be the best way to incentivize a large portion of the community to raid.

I think anything in the 550-750 range is fine. You'd get a command chest w/o boosts every ~10-15 missions / bonus missions at max rank. I do think they should add unassembled parts starting in Tier 2 to give a mechanism for (eventually) getting exactly the pieces you want, as that would allay the "woe is me RNG hates me" crowd who are opening their 600th chest and not getting the piece they want.

I don't think they should stay at current rates. I'm 160 after a few days of casual play on my main, that's ridiculous. Maybe 50-75% of current amount (base is 1150 iirc, so 550-750 seems fine to me). You'd still be able to get a command chest with no boosts every ~2 daily planets at max rank. I do think the chests should also contain unassembled parts after Tier 2 or so, so that you can eventually get exactly what you want.

My general take after a few days back: * For solo / story players, this game is 'worth'. There's lots of story, the planetary and flashpoint content has been dumbed down and trivialized to the point where anyone and their companion can do heroic 2/4's. Gearing up at 70 is easy via GC, just takes time. * For PVP players, what I hear is that there's (as always) a bunch of class imbalance, and that gearing up solely through PVP takes a long time now. Probably worth, if you're playing just for PVP a few stats don't matter as much as skill anyhow. * For group content (FP/OPS) players, Vet mode FP's and story ops are a total joke. MM / HM / NM still have some challenge. Gearing is easiest for people who do groups, and if you're not on a populated server move to one. Main issue is there's a dearth of actual new content, except for uprisings - which are gated behind Story content. If you last played around 5.0, probably not worth - not much that is new and some of it is gated behind Story. IDK, I'm planning to try to get my casual group of friends into the game with free 65's and see if I can hook them on group content. We tried once 2-3 years ago to get them into it but they got very bored with all the running and talking with class quests and quit long before they got to actual group content.

I came back under a week ago after several years off; I wanted a very casual MMO I could get some friends into and I remember all the group content being a lot of fun. Really had no expectations for Galactic Command. Leveled my Jug, Sin and PT all to 70 and their GC ranks are ~160, ~40, ~10 (dailies, flashpoints, a raid, and 2x cp). I don't really see what the fuss is all about. GC ranks are super easy to earn, and you eventually get gear. Having full set bonuses on two chars in under a week seems ridiculous to me as someone who was a progression raider for most of the time I played. Frankly I feel like so much of the content has been dumbed down / simplified and the focus so much on story rather than MMO-type content that it could be argued that's what's 'killing the game', but as the thread is about the GC system I'll just give my $.02 as a total newb: "Seems to be working fine for me."

So coming back a bit late to check out the expansion, get a few chars up to 60, decide to try some HM FP's (not ops, FP's). My DPS Jug in full 186's except for some old set bonuses (so many spare basic comms, thnx expansion) and full augments gets accused of terrible gear and poor dps by a group that can't focus fire or target properly, twice. Ok, par for the course, pugs are rarely mensa candidates. So I tank two HM FP's on my assassin for a change of pace. Afterwards I realize I'm 172 mainhand/offhand, all 172's except for two 186's (didn't have max basic comms on her like the Jugg), no augments, and 115 absorb rating (hahah, 22% absorb) ... mind you, I didn't notice my terrible, terrible stats till after I'd tanked them. So that juxtaposition was hilarious to me.

Play operative or scoundrel, get it to 55.

This. Taunt makes non-mechanic single-target tanking ridiculously easy in this game; Taunt locks the target on you for six seconds *and* puts your threat at current top threat * modifier. Modifier is 1.1 under 4m and 1.3 over 4m (ie, taunting from beyond melee range actually generates more threat if you have the opportunity) and if the top threat is you, congratulations, you just boosted your threat. Generally speaking, if you don't need to worry about tank swaps or threat drops, you just taunt whenever its up. Burn aoe taunt too, its just skyrocketing your threat. Case in point: Main tanked a TFB last night on my alt powertech with a 66 mainhand (blue) and 69 offhand, had no trouble keeping threat off 72+ geared dps other than initial burst. Typical start to a fight was something like rocket punch railshot *taunt* flamethrower missiles flameburst *aoetaunt* and then taunt again as soon as its up. Keep in mind many hardmode fights have tank swap mechanics where you need to keep your taunt available and can't just burn it willy-nilly - but if you can, you should have no trouble keeping threat.

In a nutshell, First, classes are mirrored between factions (ie: Imperial Sorceror = Republic Sage) Second, there's a base class until level 10, then you split to an advanced class If you want 'magic ranged' and 'healing' then take Inquisitor/Consular base class > Sorceror/Sage (ranged dps/heal) Every advanced class can do viable damage and 6/8 of them can also do another role depending on their spec/gear. Imp/Rep Base Class -> Advanced Class (Role) or Advanced Class (Role) Warrior/Knight -> Juggernaught/Guardian (MDPS/Tank) or Sentinel/Marauder (MDPS) Inquisitor/Consular -> Sorceror/Sage (RDPS/Heal) or Assassin/Shadow (MDPS/Tank) Trooper/Bounty Hunter -> Powertech/Vanguard (MDPS/Tank) or Mercenary/Commando (RDPS/Heal) Agent/Smuggler -> Operative/Scoundrel (MDPS/Heal) or Sniper/Gunslinger (RDPS)

My opinion breakdown as follows, I have tanked HM ops with all three (er, 5 total given both sides...). All of them are viable in any situation, some situations are harder than others for various reasons, but all are viable. I recommend you pick up Vanguard. All of them tank best at melee range regardless of the many options Vanguard and Shadow have for threat at range. Passive Mitigation (base defense, no clicking): Shadow > Vanguard > Guardian Active Mitigation (active defense, click at right time): Guardian > Shadow > Vanguard Resistance to Damage Spikes: Vanguard > Guardian > Shadow ST Threat/Control: Shadow > Guardian > Vanguard AOE Threat/Control: Vanguard > Shadow > Guardian Utility: Shadow >>> Vanguard > Guardian Keep in mind, they all can get the job done just fine. If your goal is ease of use and being effective, I'd recommend Vanguard over the other two. Least active mitigation means less thinking to do in terms of cooldowns/utility, strong aoe threat makes tanking easier for unskilled groups (ie, dps who don't target properly) and gives you more active ways to display skill, high passive mitigation and lowest spikiness means you can do the mitigation part of your job pretty easily and focus more on agro. If your goal is massive utility, Shadow's are insanely complex in terms of all the things they *can* do. Stealth, vanish, cc, teleport/heal bubble, totally ignore yellow damage, etc. That said, they're an easy to play hard to master class imo and get a bad rap for light armor -- shadows may have the best overall defense but when a big hit gets through its *very* noticeable. Guardian's middle of the road between those two and I'd advocate for it the least (despite being my original main) simply because the *amazing* defensive cooldowns the guardian gets doesn't offset (in my mind) the aoe/utility perks of the other two. I'm also thinking in terms of life cycle (leveling, dailies, FP's) not just raids here - Guardians are arguably the "best" tanks simply by virtue of their numerous active defenses, but there's more to quality of life as a tank than just using clickies on hardmode raid bosses. They're all good. I'd recommend Vanguard based on your post.

/snip I think the theme of your post about spec'ing for your role for the betterment of all is all well and good, but the point of mine is that can't is the wrong word. IE, I had already done it a bunch of times when I read this post (as a pretty fresh 55, at that), therefore I laughed.

Same deal - came back a month or two ago and love all the changes. Still a bunch of annoying, basic things (chat window for damage? get rid of annoying red error messages in middle of screen? better ui customization?) that drive me batty, but the content's improved and I like the new ops. Trying to get my friends to play with me...

Lulz I came back, got a Jugg to 55 around new year's and tanked a bunch of HM FP's in veng spec. Tanking gear obviously, I was just too lazy to respec. Anyhoo, probably not wise to do it if you don't know the class well (I had a few months' experience at top tier tanking/dps on guardian before I quit so I knew what I was doing, and built a strong set of 66/69 tanking off-spec gear pretty quickly after hitting 55) and I wouldn't really recommend it for Ops unless you strongly outgear them, but 'can't' is certainly the wrong word here.

Seems very much like an exploit then. If its not, mods, please let me know - I'd love to bang out a new 50 in a few hours.

I have no problem with people leveling up quicker than normal on DXP weekend, but the OP seems to be describing an exploit.