I absolutely agree with the op 100%. As for the people complaining that people shouldn't get things handed and "of course they have an advantage"... Why should there be an advantage in the first place? I mean when you level up an alt to pvp with something else, are *you* going to want to go through the newbie 50 grind again? I know some people need gear to focus on to keep striving towards something to be interested, but aside from that, why *wouldn't* you want stats and gear to be completely even? If everything is all "L2P" as is repeated all over, then clearly the gear doesn't matter to you anyway. The most fun games should be the well-played and nail-biting matches. If you just want to have the best gear specifically to have an advantage over people, your opinion is entirely invalid. The "we put more time in" arguement should come out in your skill and objective-focus, not your gear.

I'm a Sniper. I generally get Demolisher, Quick Draw, Defender, Commando as givens. Combatant/Soldier are occasionals. I've never gotten Assassin or Warden in 50's so far. I didn't even know Annihilator/Destroyer existed. I always thought it was funny in Huttball during the 10-49's that focusing on the objectve, being available to pass up and winning the game quickly would end up awarding less than sitting there and farming the middle. Suppose maybe I just need to change my mindset and find a nice corner to snipe from. I've always hated seeing people ignore objectives, hate to be one of them... Teammates gonna hate me :<

Which, combined with having to trade those into Merc tokens for a single bag, is where my "weeks and weeks of losing" mindset comes into play. =(

But I need to *win* those 9 games for the weekly (yes, I know that's going to bring all kinds of "oh no, you have to win in order to get anything, heaven forbid" sarcasm). Losing repeatedly back-to-back-to-back-to-back, not having won a single warzone since hitting 50 has severely impacted my morale for being able to get those done ever. (I do appreciate the civility of your response though.)

50-60'ish. Since hitting 50, I'm usually getting 4-5 medals. Occasionally I'll get 75000 damage. Less Occasionally I'll get 25 kills. Havn't gotten Assassin yet at 50.

I'd really like to know more then. Right now it honestly feels like it's going to take weeks and weeks, since I feel like I need to get Merc tokens by trading up from Warzone (due to Ilum always being empty), it takes a full day of losing for me to get a single bag. Is it just because of my losing streaks that it's going to take that long? What am I missing? What more can I do?

Hmm, maybe "skill" is just a terrible word to use that skews the arguement. I'll totally acknowledge spec/class changes things. Maybe "attention based" is more appropriate. Staying on the huttball/passing, focusing on objectives. I don't care so much about beating an opponent, as I do about being killed before I can support the objectives.

I said I did have 6 bags waiting for me, but I suppose that's what I get for putting in a tl;dr in the first place :< I've been to Ilum multiple times and only once seen 2-3 random people wandering around, is there a timer for it like Wintergrasp/Tol Barad? Or are we supposed to just randomly find people there to kill? Maybe my server is just super low on that end... (I say that because right now the only way I'm aware of to get Merc tokens other than Ilum killing is by trading up Warzone tokens, if there's an easier way to do that that I'm not aware of, I'm all ears)

Well, I'm not a troll. But really, I just don't want gear to matter. Just because I want to play based on skill, does not mean I "want everything handed to me". I don't want to just auto-win, if I lose because of skill, I can recognize the difference and accept that, losing honestly does not bother me in the least. I never once minded losing 10-49, because I knew it was never about the gear. As for "It's easy to get gear Just do your dailies and 2 weeklies" I've done ~12-15 (I realise that's not much in the grand scheme, but it's a lot to lose back-to-back) matches since hitting 50 and lost them all. Call it bad luck, call it lack of skill, call it lack of gear, hell maybe I'm just repeatedly getting farmed by premades, it doesn't matter, I simply can't complete them, and so can't get the gear. Read: It's not even really about me, it's about the fact that I'm bringing down my TEAM by even being there in the first place, and I feel like hell that I can't help them as much as I'm trying.

TL;DR: I want 50 pvp to be as non-gear based as 10-49 is. And am cancelling my sub because I don't want to die for weeks and weeks, holding back my team before I can finally be useful. I hate that method of gear-grind in WoW, and I hate it here. I had an absolute blast with pvp up through 49, I probably leveled more in pvp than in quests. Whether I was 20 or 40, I could still be useful. The matches and everything were super fun, and I couldn't believe how much fun I was having compared to pvp in WoW. And so now I'm 50, and it's really not super fun anymore, not even in the slightest. I have ~12500 hp, and the people who skipped the pvp while leveling and just shot right up to 50 to start the grind are sitting at 16-17k hp, rolling in expertise. I saved up 1000 merc/warzone, had 6 Champ bags ready for me when I dinged over to 50 to try to prepare myself the best I could for it. I don't understand why bother keeping everything balanced and fun in one bracket, then make the next bracket 100% gear based. I play well, I focus on objectives, but I am absolutely useless to my team. I can't kill anybody (unless I stun them over fire), and if I defend an objective/carry the ball, I die in record time and barely make a scratch. I'm not going to die repeatedly, grinding for hours and hours for a single piece of gear, weeks and weeks for a full set, just so I can finally start playing on a balanced playing field. But it's not even balanced then, because I know that then I'll just be killing people who are less geared than me that didn't really stand a chance.