Not sure how people on your server play Shadows? Have seen Shadows in our guild put up 500k dmg/200k protection in a ranked game of normal length. Hybrid Darkness/Madness with DPS mods in tank 4pc set bonus is probably the strongest class and spec currently in the game. A well played Shadow shouldn't lose a 1v1 to anyone, not even a Marauder with all CDs up, and they can guard, and peel, and carry the huttball, and stealth. I'm not saying nerf them into oblivion but the Shadows we have who come to ranked say they still need to be fixed. The clearest way to fix Shadows is to divorce Darkness of some of its DPS capability, possibly through a bigger flat reduction on the stance, but at the same time buff the other two DPS specs to be more viable. As far as VG/PT stuff goes, I actually think the OP is somewhat on the right track if BW wants to bring our DPS down a bit. Except you shouldn't remove the auto-proc DoT since the presence of a burning effect on demand is critical to the rotation, and Incediary is just not viable with its resource cost except as an opener. Instead if they change something it should just be a flat reduction on how much damage the cylinder does, since in parses your cylinder DoT accounts for more damage than Rail Shot or Flame Burst.

Roots shouldn't respect the resolve bar or generate resolve. However there should be a separate diminishing return on roots, such that no individual class is disadvantaged, but chain rooting is mitigated. I think rooting someone in fire in Huttball is a good mechanic, especially for non-ranked games where you have tons of silly stuns flying around outside of fires. However you shouldn't be able to keep someone in place permanently by chaining together roots, since numerous roots have very short CDs. That has nothing to do with individual class mechanics and everything to do with the overall ebb and flow of the game.

I agree with this somewhat, seeing as we've had a number of raiders drop off over the past month or so. But I do think Nightmare is the solution and a clearer distinction between gear stats. Also not allowing the same tier of gear from non-raid content as the hardest raid currently in the game would help, since Black Hole Comms have just made the gearing process considerably shorter (I built my entire off-spec set and half of my main spec set with BH comms, sans mainhand). As raid leader I've been running HM EC for the past two months and taken little loot, and that's fine for me, but for most it's about the shiny loot and if it's either not shiny due to being a small upgrade, or the time it takes to get all of it is too short, then problems arise.

You've gone through the process of adding an augment slot to existing gear, and stated that this system combined with the "adaptive gearing" will allow us to have whatever look we want. I'm curious to know if the augment kit will only work on Orange gear or if an augment can be applied to Purple gear as well.

Marauders don't need nerfs to damage or whatever. Only thing that should be changed is Undying Rage should be 90% not 99%. It'll still be useful as a damage reduction in PvE content, and it'll still be very useful in small engagements, but there will actually be incoming damage in situations like 6v1 on a Voidstar door. One Marauder sure, stun lock, but five alternating CDs is uptime that isn't hard won or deserved.

It seems very possible with all melee DPS, though doubtless it makes the fight harder. Last week we had three melee DPS with the following comp: Healers: Operative, Operative Tanks: Powertech, Assassin DPS: Marauder, Powertech, Powertech, Mercenary We don't use the melee on Toth strategy. Our tanks switch mobs every 20% but otherwise remain on the same side. Melee are on Zorn when he's being jumped to half the time, and generally they just move out as it's about to happen or pop a cooldown if that's not possible. Nobody ever really worries about Fearful since the Zorn DPS are never on Zorn again while it's up unless they shoot him during the transition. Obviously this is a healing intense approach, but we have good healers and conscientious melee DPS. (And yes, I'm referring to Hard Mode, Story you could probably do with 5 M-DPS and 1 Healer )

Tanking ACs need the most work. I can protect my healer better by running DPS spec and blowing up the people who are on them than I ever could by guarding them. Guard is such a passive ability, and taunts are only relevant every 45s and 15s respectively. The rest of the time as a tank you're basically either moving people around, trying to annoy somebody(Juggs probably best at this), or doing bad DPS while existing with a lot of health. The skill cap on a pure tank is pretty low because of the fact there's so few active abilities you employ to mitigate damage compared to dealing poor damage.

The only change I'd make to Undying Rage is altering the skill to require less health taken but increase the damage taken to say 10%; it'd still be a huge factor in a 1v1 but it'd stop it from being a free 6s of ball carrying in Huttball or door prevention in Voidstar even with 7 people beating on the player. The skill scales too well, especially for a DPS class. It should buy a Marauder time but not prevent death when vastly outnumbered. Only other thing I'd say is it'd be better in the 2m-3m CD range than in the 45s-1m30s range it currently occupies. Not sure why the majority of focus is on that skill though honestly. Undying Rage is not only obvious but there's an obvious counter which is anything to buy time like stuns. It's the other CDs which all piled together make for a nearly impervious 1v1 class (Assassins excepted). Saber Ward, Cloak of Pain, Obfuscate, and Bloodthirst/Frenzy/Berserk, in conjunction with consumables, basically makes the class a brick wall propelled at high velocity. It's easy to say stun a Marauder/Sentinel through Undying Rage, but a lot harder to try and go four GCDs without them being touched to let Cloak of Pain lapse (excepting classes with potent root capabilities like Snipers). In theory they could keep the 20% dmg reduction up 100% of the time using Retaliation, though that's not necessarily cost effective.

Agreed with Wallsie. It's not bugged per se to get it on any member of the raid, but if the *Toth* tanks gets it then it presents a situation different from the other 7 or 15 possible scenarios, where that tank has to walk into the boss and place it, then re-position. It's not "hard" to do so, I've probably done it 5+ times by now, but it would make sense for that tank to be unable to get it just from a removing randomness perspective.

I disagree with the notion that Hard Mode operations need to be accessible to everyone. It's called Hard Mode for a reason, and the gear it rewards is for completing the challenging content. For those who want to experience the raid there's Story Mode, which currently is intended to take place after participation in the last tier of raids and acquisition of some of that gear. I've never understood the notion that everyone needs the best gear available. If a player is not completing the hard content then what does it matter if their mods are 61 or 58? The mobs in the Corellia dailies or the easier operations or the flashpoints die just the same. Hell, now anyone can get top tier looks (War Hero at least) and just slot whatever mods they want, so looking cool isn't even a reason. The gear exists to make progressively harder content feasible and to provide a sense of accomplishment with a modicum of exclusivity for the efforts. You've stated that Nightmare Mode should be the realm of the more hardcore segment of the player base. Out of curiosity have you done Nightmare at all? In both Eternity Vault and Karagga's Palace the Nightmare difficulty gave, with few notable exceptions, the exact same rewards as Hard difficulty. There's currently no word from the developers that this is likely to change with Explosive Conflict. But if they did give gear, say mod level 63 gear, then would the argument lobbied against Hard being exclusive not simply be extended to Nightmare? That's gear everyone can't get after all, so need the devs make it more accessible and add a Double Nightmare mode? I'm not trying to put words in your mouth so forgive me if it seems that way. I can sympathize with where you're coming from on the basis that the current Story Mode does not provide any upgrades over the last generation of operations and is harder. I would be fine with Story giving 60 mods, hard 62, and nightmare 65, or something along those lines, so that even people with Rakata get upgrades from new content. But I don't feel that the top tier of gear needs to be accessible to everyone, since it's unnecessary to completion of the rest of the game. As far as PvP is concerned, I've stated a lot of issues I have with post-1.2 PvP. One of them is that the gear acquisition is a slippery slope where the winners keep getting better geared and winning more handily(and I say this as a winner most of the time). However you have the wrong information about gear. War Hero gear, currently the highest available, does not require a certain rating level (or even a certain valor level I'm fairly certain but don't quote me on that). What does require a certain rating is the (Rated) version of the crafted War Hero cosmetic set, which is a different color than the regular War Hero cosmetic (that doesn't require any rating). Is it not fair that someone with a high rating distinguish themselves in a warzone with something as small as a different color on the same armor with the same stats? I think that's quite fair, and the colors should honestly be made less horrid.

I think the confusion is that this post (which seems to be the only one mentioning chest auto-loot)... ...seems fairly sarcastic to me. I took it to mean "wanting speeders is ridiculous, next thing you know chests will be auto-looted". Similar arguments I've heard include giving everyone full campaign gear on login since raiding takes time. You appear to have taken it literally in your response? (which I didn't quote, for the record ) Anyways no point in arguing semantics, I'll leave it at: I agree with the OP that the speeders should be like in KP, and am asking for no further convenience than a reversion to previously provided convenience that nobody complained about.

I would imagine so. We didn't try having a Sorcerer explode them, probably the squishiest class which could. When the group is mobile and they're in front the tank would explode them. Otherwise a Marauder would get them with one of their various CDs. When neither of those happened we had a Merc stunning one, blowing up the other, getting healed, then blowing up the stunned one.

Straw man fallacy. Because misrepresenting an argument is the best way to counter it, right? Nobody is asking for anything more than what the developers have already shown they're willing to do in KP, which is make the speeder rides to the various checkpoints instant. That's it. By all means keep exaggerating what's being suggested, though, it makes for such a compelling argument.

As soon as you place a yellow square start the induction to get a probe droid and spawn one. Don't wait for someone to call for a spawn, the group below needs to always be able to handle rapid probe spawns. It might also help you if you send a DPS class up top with whoever is doing the grid to kill the first add faster, allowing them to spawn the first probe faster. Lastly make sure you aren't wasting DPS on Assassination Droids, just have someone run into them away from the group.

It puts you at the place you fight Colonel Vorgath. It just so happens that between Vorgath and Kephess there's a lot of trash. The run is probably similar to wiping on Vorgath and being put at tanks... but who wipes on Vorgath?