I don't have this ability yet as I'm still leveling but I've seen it in PVP and my reaction was. *** ROFL. Bioware seems utterely clueless, as far as balance goes and this is by far the worst patch yet as far as balance goes its just ridiculous. You only have to look at the endgame scores to see that, they used to be pretty consistant now you see people with 1.2 mil heals and Millions in dmg where everyone else is in the 300k range, people with 700k dmg and 7 kills. PVP is utterly screwed up. It'd take months of rebalancing and testing to get this sorted even if they had a clue where to start.

Try it, if it works for you go for it. Ultimately it doesn't matter what everyone else thinks. If your doing the dmg and getting the kills and it works for you then..

1.7 was alot more balanced. 2+ is awful

So your saying Lev 52's should be able to rampage around warzones wacking level 30's with impunity? Erm no thanks. The problem with bolster is simple, expertise should be removed entirely from this game and bolster should bring everyone to the same point for pvp, if they want to slow the pacew of pvp down they can either bolster peoples Hitpoints by the same ammount or their armour. Expertise itself is the problem, and trying to get bolster which is required and trying to fudge it so expertise works when it doesn't. One set of armour for everything you do in game, nice and simple many like myself PVE and PVP I always thought it insane you had to have 2 sets of armour, and many PVE in PVP armour because of this. That's just nuts, even more nuts is forcing players to constantly renew thier armour when they only just got their last set and have many characters that I certainly don't agree with. Fix bolster, balance the game properly and move on.

Its not just shadows all stealth units need looking at and how they function in PVP. At the moment they are incredably powerful, because of their stealth abilities and they can fight on the move, static units types (IMHO there shouldn't be any) that can't attack on the move in PVP get screwed, doubly because they have to be still to attack and usually they have no shields and the lightest armour to boot so they get royally stuffed by stealth gank squads. ALL of PVP is now out of wack its a complete mess.

Lets face it Huttball as a map became useless ages ago because Bioware messed up the Gamesbalance so that none of the Firetraps etc are remotely much of a threat at high level. It needs redesigning.

Very true to a degree, but equally if you have alot of stealth units like OPS/Smuglers that is equally unbalancing. Healing was a issue, and will be till Bioware put in a proper matching system, you either had too much on one team and none on the other same goes with stealth gank squads which is going about now.

Any class that can deal such a high hit is going to cause problems, because then you have gank squads of them running about a WZ as is now. Bioware has seriously lost the plot.

While EXPERTISE is in the game removing bolster at 55 would be insane. Don't assume that every player thats 55 is in PVP expertise armour by the time they hit 55, if they aren't then what? They get ganked thats what. Many play PVE and PVP they level to 55 on Makeb and PVP, without bolster they would be screwed especially now Bioware already screwed them by making all their old PVP armour useless.

Bolster doesn't need to go, but however you either have to take the approach of it bolsters everyone to the same point and them its about player skill and go with one set of armour for anything PVE and PVP, which overall has its appeal, or you try cater for the dedicated PVP players would want different armour sets and a edge it gives them in combat. That unfortunately causes alot of problems, the biggest problem is Bioware is trying to do both and you can't its either or design wise they need to get thier heads out of the sand and choose. But by far the biggest problem in PVP is the complete lack of any MAtching system that builds Fair teams and actually takes into consideration players specs such as healing etc to form PVP teams, players levels etc to form fair teams in the first place which is a far bigger problem than bolster, which was biowares lazy solution to the problem.

I'm going to take it the OP is one of the Stealth unit gank squads now running about the game. Highly Fun for those doing it not so much on the receiving end. Bioware has completely and utterly made a pigs ear of PVP. They have utterly thrown out any game balance out the window, totally failed to see and anticipate what effect the new changes would have especially alacrity would have on stealth classes which in the case of OPS/Smugler were already OP and needed to be rained in, now you have Gank squads of them running about, I run one even at lev 12 it controls the battlefield for my team. Ontop of that they got Big number syndrome increased Damage output immensely, as well as healing which already was showing issues when one team had several healers on, because the maching system makes ZERO attempt to form even and fair teams that looks at players Specs. Nor did they think about what would happen to the overall game pace and the effect it would have on gameplay with Zerging Ganking and the increased DMG output, or take any measures to negate this by giving defensive bonus's to players being enganged by many individuals to stop gank squads and promote spread out and fair combat, and a matching system that actually forms fair teams in the first place, and stops teams of all one unit type and teams with no healers v teams with many etc. Bioware basically ignored the problems in the design of the current system and put in changes that exagerated existing ones to the point it pushed everything over the tipping point. Result? Simple you have gank squads of Stealth and Sents etc running about in packs insta poping everyone, and the games pace has gone insane, and for unit types that have light armour and can't attack on the move, which in pvp is a insane design itself it makes them even more vunerable to classes that aren't especially stealth. They said HEY! we changed the shields to try compensate, sadly not every class has them classes with temp shields like sages get the shaft because now their Force armour is nigh on worthless, while those classes with Shield gens come out on top, because their both mobile and can attack on the move and have active dmg reduction and Heavy armour to boot. Expertise was a noble idea to try combat the game pace but it failed and has caused immense issues itself, the whole system needs ripping out and reworking and ALOT of testing before dumping it live. Seriously bad engineering and design.

Its not just bolster thats screwing PVP its also the new alacrity changes basically Bioware now gives players a legit method of running a accelerated process. And of course that obviously is the best method to promote a balanced game. Expertise has and always will unbalance the game, PVP shouldn't be about gear it should be about the skill of the players and their team. All the elements that unbalance the game should be removed and a proper baseline set to balance the game again, you don't bork the entire game to make poorly engineered elements work you remove them, you made alacrity basically the only way to go, and with every patch push pvp further and further out of balance in a attempt to bring in more gear with ever higher stats which pushes the game ever further away from the balancing point. There should be armour you can pve in and pvp in, a crafting system and a economy thats actually worth a damn and PVP thats balanced and at a pace thats enjoyable for the player thats based on skill of the player and their team not the gear they are in. Also matching should also try to form teams where each team has similar ammounts of healers or none at all on both sides. Its long overdue Bioware wake up and start making some serious inroads into the enginering shortfalls of this game and turn this single player game with multiplayer, and into a MMO as it should have been.

It is utterly stupid to remove expertise from old players gear unless you intend to give them something back even entry level pvp gear in return. The reason is simple, if you have players like me who pve and pvp at lev 50 they go off run the makeb content to 55 only to find they now have no effective pvp gear they get rolled even with bolster. If they PVP to replace their gear to 55 it invalidates the new content, something bioware failed to consider. One of the reasons being of the insane alacrity changes which have pushed the balance so far out of wack its untrue, they effectively gave alacrity users the ability to run a accelerated process, because obviously that works out well, they didn't think about those with no perm shields like sages and the effect it would have on the increased dmg output and the insane amounts of healing going about now. Then they removed expertise from players gear leaving them with sub par PVE gear and a expertise level lower than they had in the old outdated gear. Result they get hammered, and PVP has gone even more insane that it was, some may enjoy getting peeled like a banana in 2 secs by a high alacrity user with scores going into the millions and think thats a sane game but I'm not one of them. Alacrity didn't work, it should have just been removed from the game not bork the entire game to make it work, and as for expertise, personally I think it should go entirely so you have one set of armour for PVE and PVP and you just go play simple, but taking it off existing gear was a bad move, least in previous patches they gave people entry level PVP gear which was usually higher than their old stuff. IMHO the game is now totally borked alacrity being a big part of that, where as before it was hardly used now its pretty much the only way to go. Insane just insane.

None of those sugestions actually address the biggest problems with the game. Some add to it sure, but none really change the gameplay in a fundemental way or the game systems which by far is where the most work needs to be done for the long term.

Don't know how you figure that one out. EA have no problems giving the chop to MMO's it doesn't think are working. E&B anyone. I fully expect Swtor to be next on the list, prolly early next year.