SWTOR Leveling Guide I originally posted this on my website, deltiasgaming.com, but figured the community might like this information in the forms. Let me know what you think! With only a few weeks until SWTOR’s double experience weekend return, I thought I’d create a power leveling guide. This is a good time to start prepping your characters for the leveling experience to get the most out of the weekend. With these suggestions, I’ve leveled a character from 10-55 in under 24 hours during double xp and hopefully you can too! Table of Contents Leveling in SWTOR Types of Leveling Gear Companions Legacy Unlocks Guild Perks Setting Out Quick Tips Additional Tips Resources Version Please note this guide assumes you know little to nothing about SWTOR leveling. If you’re looking for quick tips and help, scroll down to “Quick Tips.” Otherwise read below for a step-by-step guide with detailed explanation. Leveling in SWTOR SWTOR, like many other MMOs, uses a somewhat linear system to leveling by obtaining experience points through killing enemies, questing, and exploration. The leveling experiences scales the higher your level, thus needing more and more experience to reach higher levels. For instance, going from level 8 to 9 takes 15,000 experience points, while 49 to 50 takes near 450,000. Starting off, you are limited to only a few possible ways to gain experience. As your levels increase, you’ll find more things to do, more travel, and an easier leveling process. For example, levels 1 to 10 are the starter planet and do not allow many dailies or quests or travel to another planet/fleet. At levels 11 to 49, you can start doing dailies, weeklies, and planetary quest. 50 to 55 is the easiest allowing for major quests, operations, and nearly all the parts of the game. Below is a list of quests/dailies I try to complete in order to gain as much experience as fast as possible. Following this method, I average a level once per hour. Make sure you’re completing your quest near or as close to your level as possible. Meaning, if you’re level 30, don’t do quests at level 25 or at level 35. It will take too much time or provide very little experience. Around + or – 1 level is ideal. Types of Leveling Class Quest – Your bread and butter standard story quest, rotating through various planets depending on your advanced class. These flow through certain planets, but give a lot of experience points and are very rewarding. I usually make sure to complete these first. Space PvE Daily/Weekly – Some people don’t like the “on rails” space mission, but they only take 5 to 10 minutes each mission and offer an enormous amount of experience points. Keep doing these daily and you’ll see a huge gain in experience points. Flashpoint Daily/Weekly – An instance PvE mission that is completed with other players. These take more time (30-60 minutes), but offer experience points for individual kills, plus a daily and mission completion reward. Flashpoints also give great gear, planetary commendations, and other items to help leveling. PvP Daily/Weekly – These are your standard ground PvP missions that give good experience for daily/weekly, but don’t offer individual kill experience so they’re less important than a flashpoints. I only complete the daily and move on since they don’t offer per kill experience. Space PvP Daily/Weekly – Similar to warzones in concept, no kill experience but good value in the dailies/weeklies. Planetary Quest – I usually don’t do any of these planetary quests because I’ve out leveled my planet by the time I’ve completed my dailies and class quests. Bonus Quest – These are given once a particular planet’s story arc has been completed. Same concept as Planetary Quest, most likely you’ve already leveled past that planet. Exploration – This counts by exploring each planet’s map. I don’t go out of my way to explore, but with various character bonuses, exploration adds up over time. Companion Affection Quest – Giving leveling your companions affection is a great way to offer some extra experience. These scale with your level, so I often wait until I’m near 50 or so before completing. Codex – These are given as a type of exploration by clicking various items in the world. Once again, I don’t go out of my way to find them, but I click on them when available. Datacrons – These are a permanent stat increase that are scattered throughout the world. Since they are hard to get and time consuming, I generally collect these once I reach endgame. Gear When it comes to gearing during the leveling process, I don’t get too concerned with my appearance or level of gear. You want have gear somewhat equivalent with your level, but you can complete quests with a very low level if need be. An effective way of gearing is picking out a mod-able orange gear set and using that from level 10 on. I then pick up cybertech, scavenaging, and slicing as my crafting skills. I level them up equally making armorings, mods, and enhancements as needed. I’ll supplement my crafting with planetary commendations or PvP commendations to buy hilts, barrels, or missing pieces. I’ll use my money gained from slicing to buy ear pieces, relics, and implants. Just keep the same outfit and swap items in and out and it should be easy. Companions Since you can only fulfil one role while leveling (tank, healer, DPS), companions play an important part by complementing your unfulfilled role. In my experience, Trek is the best companion by far. He can heal effectively, tank, and do consistent damage. You can unlock Trek through the cartel market bizarre or cartel coins. Once you get him, I recommend unlocking him for all your characters and getting a legacy set of gear. I pass around the set from character to character while leveling. Companion affection also provides experience and a bonus to crafting. So near end game, I buy 99 level 2 gifts companion gifts with the highest level of affection (love) . In between quest, I bind the gift to a key and just repeatedly give them. This will give you around 6,000 affection. If you want to finish it by gaining 10,000, either buy higher level gifts, more rare quality, or craft them yourself. TOR Head has a great guide HERE for companion affection. Legacy Unlocks Since patch 1.3, SWTOR has added some character specific unlocks and some universal unlocks via legacy. Each rank cost credits or cartel coins and are cumulative. I get the entire experience boost, both companion perks, and some travel convenience features. Dulfy has a more detailed guide HERE, but my recommendations are below: XP Perks I II III IV V Total 275k Warzone Experience 20k 30k 50k 75k 100k Total 275k Flashpoint Experience 20k 30k 50k 75k 100k Total 150k Space Mission Experience 10k 20k 30k 40k 50k Total 275k Class Mission Experience 20k 30k 50k 75k 100k Total 150k Exploration Experience 10k 20k 30k 40k 50k Total 275k Starfighter Experience 20k 30k 50k 75k 100k Grand Total 1.4 million credits Convenience Perks I II III Total - 90k Altruism (companion gifts) 10k 30k 50k Total - 90k Persuasion (conversations) 10k 30k 50k Field Respec - 200k Capital World Travel - 20k Outlaws Den - 50k Personal Ship - 50k CZ - 150k Speeder Piloting 1 - 40k Field Repair Droid 1 - 50k Field Mail Droid 1 - 50k Grand Total 790k credits Now, combine the experience and convenience for a whopping 2.19 million credits! Or you can use a combination of credits and cartel coins, but either way it’s not cheap to level fast. Guild Perks In spring of 2013, SWTOR released its Guild Reward Program giving all players in a guild an automatic 5% bonus to gaining experience. You can earn an additional 5% (10% max) for having 25 or more accounts within your guild. Best way to join one of these guilds is to simply ask in fleet or start your own and build one. Setting Out I’ve described the general concepts to leveling, now I’m going to describe how I maximize my time to level. I always make sure to log out the previous day in the fleet standing at the Supply Mission Terminal. I grab all the quests from the various quest terminals and queue up for everything I can (space PvP, ground PvP, and flashpoints). I queue up for everything at once. While waiting on the queue, I’ll travel to my class mission planet and complete missions in between my queues. Once I finish a planet and my dailies, I return to the fleet for a massive turn in, and pickup anything new, set out and do it all over again. It’s important to check the fleet for new missions because so many are unlock at different levels. The flashpoints are separated at or around every four levels. If you do all these dailies and your class quests, you’ll be almost ready for a new flashpoint quest. So just keep setting out, coming in and doing turn-ins, and watch the levels fly by. Quick Tips Buy all experience legacy unlocks Buy travel unlocks (personal ship, Tatooine, and capital world) Get in 10% experience Guild Get Trek Get full set of mod-able orange gear Pick up all the quests at the fleet and prioritize by: Class > Space PvE > Flashpoints > Ground PvP > Space PvP Return to fleet, turn in, pick up new quests, and set out again Additional Tips account unlocks Buy account unlocks for your ship to help with convenience (GTN, guild bank, and droid) Pick up crafting: slicing, cybertech, and scavenging Level slicing for profit, scavenging and cybertech to make items for your mod-able gear Make sure to log off in a rested area (fleet or cantina) The more presence you have from completing other stories, the better your companions will be Personally, I love double experience weekends. I usually pick a class I know little to nothing about and set out on an adventure. I hope you enjoyed this post and wonder what your leveling secrets are. Feel free to level a comment! Resources Dulfy’s Legacy Perks – dulfy.net/2012/06/06/patch-1-3-legacy-character-perks/ Guild Rewards – http://www.swtor.com/guildrewardsLegacy Information – http://www.swtor.com/info/legacy TOR Head Companion Gift Guide – http://www.torhead.com/companions Version 1.0 – Complete initial guide – on February 17, 2014

Hey Community, I made this guide on my website deltiasgaming.com, but figured I'd share it here. I'd like any feedback/comments so feel free to leave it (even nasty ones). Table of Contents Arena Basic User Interface Prepare Attitude is Everything Focus Targeting Initiate Combat First Early & Often Time on Target and Global Cool Downs (GCD) Classes Maps Summary Resources Terminology Version Arena Basic SWTOR’s Player vs. Player (PvP) content is divided into two sections; unranked and ranked (“ground” PvP). Unranked PvP randomly selects either objective based maps or arenas. However, all ranked queues are automatically arenas. You can either queue by yourself or with a four man team. No queuing with two or three players, only solo and a full four man team. By default, arenas are the only PvP format with leader boards. The first part of the guide includes suggestions players can do before even stepping foot into an arena. I’ve also made a video you can reference below that shows a walk through of this portion. The second portion are universal hints. User Interface I recommend visiting two sites prior to getting arena ready: Tor Assistant – This is a simple and light program that uses your combat log to make audible sounds when abilities or procs are available for use. This program is allowed by SWTOR. SWTORUI –Great site for finding UI’s that are more user friendly than the default SWTOR UI. The next step is to check your settings by pressing the escape key and selecting preferences. Here are the preferences I check. Controls – Focus Target Check enable focus target (video guide below). Set camera distance to 100% for better viewing. I keep ability action queue at .5 for personal preference. Combat Logging – Make sure the combat log file is enabled if you plan on using Tor Assistant or something similar. User Interface – Ops Frames Detailed item tool tip for additional information on gear. Operations frames as group frames for better viewing. Show cool down text for those who like to see numerically one’s cool down time remaining. Suppress crew member rewards in a warzone to eliminate gathering mission returns during combat. Nameplates – Always show resolve to see other people’s resolve gauge. Class symbol on because many players use different gear sets. Guild names turned off because I don’t like judging people based on their guild. Keybinds – Keybind for Focus target Make sure you have set focus target and acquire focus target enabled. Prepare Inventory Stim – Always use a stim. I repeat, always use a stim. At end game, you’re adding roughly 250 additional stats. This alone could win or lose a match. If you’re truly dedicated to winning, bring extra stims of every kind. You’ll encounter many players who aren’t prepared or don’t really take it seriously, so hand them out free of charge to increase your chances of winning. Grenades – These are a item that provides a area stun (mez) with a 180 seconds cool down. Only Cybertech can use the resuable version, so naturally I pick this up as my crafting skill. Plan on having extras non-reusable grenades for hand outs. Warzone Medpac – A non-reusable item which self-heals for 35% of your max health. You must have these regardless of your class or role. You can use all sorts of tricks to get the most out of these. For instance, Juggernaut’s have an ability called Endure Pain which temporarily increases health by 30%. Use this combined with a medpac for extra self-heals. Warzone Adrenal – Another non-reusable item providing 15% damage reduction (only in PvP). If I’m jumping into the fray as a melee class, I almost always use these to start a match. Combine this with one or more defensive cool downs for extra protection. Alternate Gear Set (If applicable) – If you’re playing a class that can fulfill two roles regardless of your talent tree, make sure to have an extra set of gear. An example of this is a Juggernaut tank who is fully geared DPS in Shien form, but changes stance and gear to Soresu for extra protection. I’ve won matches because I threw on a tank set and used a fortitude stim to achieve 40,000 health just to outlast the enemy. Attitude is Everything Prior to firing up that queue button, make sure you check your attitude. You will lose. Your mistakes will cost the team a victory at some point. So eliminate the preconceived notion that it’s your inherit right to win and that you are perfect. I’ve screwed up a lot of games, but I sat right back down and queued up again. You will get better over time by understanding class balance, gearing, and strategies on specific maps. Just relax and keep at it. Also, don’t bash other players before the match gets started. 9 times out of 10, I turn off chat because it’s just offensive nonsense directed at one player or another. Help each other out even if you can’t stand the other player. You’re all on the same team so you might as well work together to achieve a goal. Focus Targeting Focus targeting is one of the most important aspects of PvP. Focus targeting allows you to set one player (friendly or enemy) as the focus and click a button to see who they’re targeting. Offensively you can use this to pressure the same target. Defensively you can use this to swap guards to different players. I’ve seen many solo ranked matches where our team comes up with some elaborate plan which immediately crumbles upon the first engagement. So, I turn chat off, set someone to focus and attack their target. If this doesn’t come natural, it’s okay because it takes a lot of time, practice, and patience to develop an innate ability to follow someone’s target. Initiate Combat First I can’t stress how important getting off the first attack can be. Typically, I play melee classes that have strong cool downs such as a Vanguard. Generally I’m the player who intends on attacking first. My goal is to initiate combat, use as many defensive cool downs as needed to limit players burst DPS, then open up with an offensive flurry after my resolve is full. Something like this will happen if I’m playing a Vanguard. I move into middle and pull (Harpoon) a target Their team panics because they’re separated and come rushing in I stun the player which was pulled (really panicking now) That player breaks the stun I stun them again (they hate me at this point) Now their team is peeling for that poor guy/gal and it’s my turn to be attacked I use one or more defensive cool downs and a warzone adrenal Example would be Reactive shield 15% damage reduction, adrenal another 15%, if someone else taunts the group an additional 30%, if I’m stunned an additional 30% damage reduction, at this point I’m literally taking 90% less damage and that’s why I want to start combat and get them tunneling me After this initial altercation the first target is dead, it’s 3 v 4 and mostly mop up duty This is just an example with a near endless amount of possibilities. Know your class and if you should initiate combat or not. Two great class choices are the Vanguard (PowerTech) and Sentinel (Marauder). Both have strong defensive cool downs that really hinder the other teams DPS if they target you. Keep in mind I’ve lost plenty of matches trying to initiate combat because I didn’t execute properly. It just takes practice. Early & Often Someone once told me “use trinkets early and often.” I didn’t know what trinkets meant, but it’s a World of Warcraft term essentially meaning use your big cool downs (defensive or offensive) at the start of battle. I learned this the hard way after I was absolutely demolished in a duel. After that embarrassment, I learned to not hold anything back as if it were a 12 minute match. An example of this is taking the example above with my Vanguard and adding some pieces to it. I haven’t talked about resolve yet because it’s a complex topic with many varying ideas, opinions, and facts. Essentially it’s a meter that fills up once you’ve been stunned for a period of time giving one cc immunity for a period. I made a complete guide on this for TORWARS podcast which can be found HERE. I try to time a full resolve bar (or white bar) with a big offensive rotation. I go in as the bait and initiate combat saving my big offensive abilities until my bar is full. Once full, I immediately break my cc and start using my main offensive DPS abilities and rotation. For a Vanguard it would be the critical hit buff and my AoE damage abilities. This will increase your chances of getting at least one major burst cycle. Time on Target and Global Cool Downs (GCD) SWTOR uses a GCD system which is basically a universal cool down period of 1.5 seconds each time an ability is activated. This time can vary depending on many factors such as talent tree, alacrity stat, etc. There are also abilities “off the GCD,” but for the most part it limits you from spamming abilities. Time on target is just how often you’re attacking or healing a specific target(s). Sounds simple right? Well simply staying on a target is a great way to improve ones performance. Basically what you want to do as a DPS is to always be attacking something (unless it’s mezed). I show some examples of this in the focus targeting video, but even when you’re moving to a new target, try to hit something on the way. Anything really as long as you’re not breaking a stun or preparing it for something else. You don’t have to use a certain rotation just be doing actions over and over. Keep this up and you’ll see your performance increase. Summary I’d like to say arenas are hard and challenging. Sometimes there are things out of your control such as win trading, people leaving matches, being unprepared, or whatever. You can only control yourself. Bring you A game, get prepared, practice, and focus with a positive attitude before you enter. You may not win all of your games, but you will stand a better chance. I hope you enjoyed this guide, let me know if you have any special tips and tricks. Resources Resolve guide on TORWARS http://torwars.com/swtor-pvp-resolve/ TOR Assistant Link – http://froyosoft.com/torassistant.php TOR Head for finding items – http://www.torhead.com Terminology Area of Effect (Aoe) – An area based damage or healing ability. Buffs –Abilities that apply a bonus for a duration. Cleave – Another way to say AoE. Cooldowns – A ability with a waiting period after use. These can be used offensively or defensively. Crowd Control (CC) – Something that hinders your movements or stuns you. Damage Per Second (DPS) Class – Class focused solely on damage. Diminishing Returns (DR) – The point at which the stat takes more and more if it to get the same result or the more points you put into a stat, the fewer bonuses you get per point. Expertise – PvP only gear stat that determines your effectiveness in a PvP setting. Full Healer – Generally a healer that has 31 points or more into main healing talent tree. Full speced – 46 talent points or more into one specific talent tree. Global Cool Down (GCD) – A universal cool down of 1.5 seconds before another ability can be triggered. Globaled – Only using one ability per person to wipe out an enemy. Hit Box – The position you have to face in order to hit someone. Hybrid – Class that isn’t fully speced into one tree, e.g. a PowerTech playing 10/30/6. Kite – To limit the opponents damage because you move behind an object or Line of Sight (LOS) Knockback – Temporarily punts or knocks back player a certain distance, instant effect with no stun, generates 400 resolve. Example: Sith Inquisitor ability Overload, which knockbacks enemies with eight meters. Line of Sight (LOS) – Avoiding damage because you use an object as cover. Mez – Completely disables player for certain period, can be broken on stun, and gives 100 resolve per second. Example: Imperial Agent ability Flash Bang, which disables opponents for eight seconds and can be broken on damage. Mid/Max – Finding every possible way to extract the exact stats one wants. Peel – Stopping what you’re doing and helping a friendly player. Pillar Hump – Simply circling an object to limit players DPS. Proc – a “procedure” – triggered under particular circumstances Pocket Heal – Single target heals provided by DPS not full spec’d. Pull – Interrupts targets current action and pulls them to the caster. Example: Sith Assassin ability Force Pull, pulls target towards the caster. Punt – Same as knockback Rambo/Rambo’ing – A play style that has complete disregard for team goals and objectives. Resolve – Statistic relating to cc immunity Rotation – Series of abilities used in sequential order for maximum effectiveness. Spam – Pressing a botton rapidly. Stack – Put as many points as possible into one stat. Stun – Completely disables player for certain period, cannot be broken on stun, and gives 200 resolve per second of stun. Example: Sith Inquisitor ability Jolt, this disables opponent for four seconds. Tank – Class that use form that allows for guard. Tunneling – Only attack one target even if it’s not wise.

Hey Community, I created this guide on my blog and figured some people could use it. I'm curious on your thoughts if you have an suggestions or comments, please leave them. Here's link if interested (with videos) Have you ever wanted to play a class that’s immune to crowd control (CC), can move like lighting, and alternate between tank and damage? Welcome to the ultimate Juggernaut PvP guide! This guide’s purpose is to go over Juggernaut strengths, examine gear setups, talent builds, and anything else relevant to succeeding in SWTOR PvP. Juggernauts are one of the most unique classes in the game. Their three skill trees are all strong. Juggernauts can also swap stances instantly to guard an inquired teammate, then switch back to damage when out of trouble. Their utility is also essential to teams using taunts, stuns, and leaps. I’ve listed some strengths and weaknesses of the class as I see it. + Great burst damage + Mobility with leaps + seamlessly switch between tank and DPS - Limited defensive cool downs - Few stuns Table of Contents Overview Specs Gear Combos Priorities & Cool Downs Counter Strategies Terminology Abilities & Uses Most of these are self-explanatory, but I’m going to give my take on how and when to use them. Specs Full Tank Hybrid Tank (listed as DPS) Full Vengeance (my main DPS spec) Full Rage (rarely used in arenas) Having played and experimented with all three trees a great deal, I feel that the best for arenas is the Vengeance (middle). Vengeance has the best damage mitigation, cc immunity, utility, and good damage output. Rage has bigger burst and damage, but without AoE reduction, it’s a very squishy tree to play. Another reason Vengeance is great for solo/group ranked, is it can swap between Soresu and Shien form and still produce. Often times solo queue matches are four DPS vs four DPS. If my team has an off-healer and their team doesn’t, than it’s simply a matter of survival. I’ll swap stances, throw on my tank gear, and just do my best to keep our healer safe. The second main talent build I use is a hybrid tank build of 23/23/0. This lists me as a DPS even though I’m built like a tank. I generally only queue this way when I know there’s a lot of good DPS online and off-healing playing. This build is tanky, has great utility, but suffers from weak DPS. So be careful before you jump into solo with this. If I’m playing a four man rated game and we need a tank, this is the only time I play my full tank build 36/10/0. I generally don’t queue solo as a tank because the wait times are enormous and I feel that I can contribute more to my team as a DPS than a tank. Juggernaut tanking offers enormous group benefit and are nearly indestructible. But, again, they do minimal DPS even with full DPS gear. So only use this build in specific situations. Lastly, we cover the Rage tree. As previously stated, the Rage tree has tons of DPS and high burst. But it lacks survivability. You have to be in the “mix” or close to damage players and often times they damage you. It seems nearly impossible for me to play this effectively against good players. It’s still a great tree, I just find it hard to play as your opponents get more difficult. Gear (Consistent Damage Gear) Main Stat > Surge 75% > Accuracy 95% melee > 180 points into Critical > Power (Heavy Burst Gear) Main Stat > Surge 75% > Accuracy 95% > Power (with power/main stat relic) - (Main Tank Gear) Endurance > Absorption 30% > Shield 30%> Defense> Strength For DPS gear, I focus on main stat over power because Juggernaut’s talent tree provides a 6% bonus. I also use a bit of accuracy since our main damage abilities come from weapons based “white” damage. Some people (actually a lot of people) run zero critical. I like a little bit and it seems that 180 and a critical relic is enough. For tanking I focus primarily on endurance and absorb. Since some of the Juggernaut’s abilities are based on how much health one has, I stack a lot of endurance. Followed up by absorb/shield to mitigate damage from you and your guarded friendly. Bolster and PvE Gear – Unfortunately, the game’s best in slot (BiS) gear is level 46 PvE gear show below. Combos Here’s a general list of “combos” or abilities sequenced together that work well in certain situations. Leap 2 Full (L2F) – Use when nearing 30% health to avoid opponents finishing moves. This sequence will generally work once per fight, so if your healer is just lagging behind, don’t blow it. Endure Pain – WZ medpack – Intercede Iron Leap – I use this when initiating combat and expect to receive high damage. Notice I don’t use saber ward or reflect because I want to use them as follow-up abilities if I’m in trouble. Enrage –Enraged Defense (20% damage reduction) – WZ adrenal (15%) – Force Leap (20%) Stun Shutdown – I use this to frustrate another player getting them to break their stun early then isolating them. Force Leap – Force Choke (wait for them to break it) –Intimidating Road (if they didn’t break it, force push then do roar) Save A Healer – When a healer is getting focused hard, I use this combo to give them time to catch up or at least regain some health. Make sure Soresu form is active – Guard target (50% absorbing damage) – Intercede to target (20% damage reduction to healer) – Threatening Scream (30% damage reduction for healer)- Intimidating Roar to stun everyone – Followed up with Chilling scream to slow everyone – Wait for healer to get up, then start attacking Pop Smoke – When I’m getting focused , I use this combo to escape and get some space between me and my opponents. Intimidating Roar – Chilling Scream – Intercede Mr. Eight – Use this when you know someone has used their stun breaker and zero resolve. In pug groups, you can’t expect someone not to break a soft stun. I always push the opponent way out of the way so people don’t accidentally hit them. Force Push – Force Leap – Intimidating Roar – Intercede to get back in fight DPS Priorities PvP is so chaotic there really isn’t a “rotation” per say. It’s more about using what’s most important rather than beating on a target uninterrupted. Since our abilities focus on single target almost solely, our main rotation doesn’t differ between a group of enemies or one. Just use smash more often if three or more people are in range. Armor debuff via Saber Throw or Sundering Assault Ravage Vicious Throw (with or without proc) Force Scream with 2 stacks of Savagery Shatter (recently got buffed and does more damage and is internal bypassing armor) Impale (can be used as number 5 if target is low health) Smash (if ravage isn’t up for some reason) Arena Strategies For general strategies in arenas, check out my previous guide HERE. The hardest part about arenas is knowing your teams strengths and weakness and the enemies. As soon as the queue pops, get in there. Start looking at the other team and game-planning how you’re going to be effective. Once that’s done, stick to the plan but don’t be afraid to change if something isn’t working. Juggernauts are built to shut down targets with interrupts . Since Juggernauts don’t have AoE reduction, I try to avoid the melee scrim. I first engage combat on the nearest target regardless of their class. This puts a lot of pressure on the other team and they have to react. After the initial engagement, I try to find a target off by themselves casting or healing. This way I’m attacking a target away from the melee group and taking less damage. Most of the time the target tries to avoid me by running away, line of sighting, or knocking me back. Just keep coming at them frustrating them and waiting for them to break their cc. Once this is done, check if they have a DoT on them, if no, use intimidating roar and watch them sit out of the fight for eight seconds. If not, just keep on attacking them, shutting them down. If this strategy isn’t working or you’re facing a heavy melee class, try to create space with your push. Pick out a target that’s heavily armored and debuff them, force push, then sit on them away from the group. You can really control a single target if left alone and that’s your goal, to find someone alone to pick on and completely destroy. As far as tanking goes, I’m really not trying to do a whole lot of damage. I’m mainly focused on swapping my guard, using AoE slows, applying armor debuffs and stunning targets. The general overall strategy is to annoy people by limiting their damage via slows, stuns, or knock backs. Don’t just focus on one target, keep moving and annoying multiple targets. I hope you enjoyed this guide and feel free to leave comments or questions below. More to come! Terminology Area of Effect (AoE) – An area based damage or healing ability. Best in Slot (BiS) – Optimal gear per slot. Buffs –Abilities that apply a bonus for a duration. Burst – How hard something hits or how much damage something can do for a short period. Cleave – Another way to say AoE. Cool-Downs (CD) – A ability with a waiting period after use. These can be used offensively or defensively. Crowd Control (CC) – Something that hinders your movements or stuns you. Damage Per Second (DPS) Class – Class focused solely on damage. Debuff – Applying a negative bonus for a duration. Diminishing Returns (DR) – The point at which the stat takes more and more if it to get the same result or the more points you put into a stat, the fewer bonuses you get per point. Damage over Time (DoT) – Ability that does damage over time. Expertise – PvP only gear stat that determines your effectiveness in a PvP setting. Full Healer – Generally a healer that has 31 points or more into main healing talent tree. Full speced – 46 talent points or more into one specific talent tree. Global Cool Down (GCD) – A universal cool down of 1.5 seconds before another ability can be triggered. Globaled – Only using one ability per person to wipe out an enemy Hard Stun – A CC that can’t be broken by damage. Hit Box – The position you have to face in order to hit someone. Heal over Time – Ability that heals over time. Hybrid – Class that isn’t fully speced into one tree, e.g. a PowerTech playing 10/30/6. Kite – To limit the opponents damage because you move behind an object or Line of Sight (LOS) Knockback – Temporarily punts or knocks back player a certain distance, instant effect with no stun, generates 400 resolve. Example: Sith Inquisitor ability Overload, which knockbacks enemies with eight meters. Line of Sight (LOS) – Avoiding damage because you use an object as cover. Mez – Completely disables player for certain period, can be broken on stun, and gives 100 resolve per second. Example: Imperial Agent ability Flash Bang, which disables opponents for eight seconds and can be broken on damage. Mid/Max – Finding every possible way to extract the exact stats one wants. Peel – Stopping what you’re doing and helping a friendly player. Pillar Hump – Simply circling an object to limit players DPS. Proc – a “procedure” – triggered under particular circumstances Pocket Heal – Single target heals provided by DPS not full spec’d. Pug – Random group. Pull – Interrupts targets current action and pulls them to the caster. Example: Sith Assassin ability Force Pull, pulls target towards the caster. Punt – Same as knockback Rambo/Rambo’ing – A play style that has complete disregard for team goals and objectives. Random Number Generator (RNG) – How dependent something is on a percentage based circumstance. Resolve – Statistic relating to cc immunity Rotation – Series of abilities used in sequential order for maximum effectiveness. Soft Stun – A stun that can be broken by damage. Often players say fearing/mezing or something similar. Spam – Pressing a button rapidly. Stack – Put as many points as possible into one stat. Stance dance – Alternating between DPS and Tank stance. Stun – Completely disables player for certain period, cannot be broken on stun, and gives 200 resolve per second of stun. Example: Sith Inquisitor ability Jolt, this disables opponent for four seconds. Squishy – Easily destroyed target. Tank – Class that use form that allows for guard. Tunneling – Only attack one target even if it’s not wise. White Damage – Weapon based damage, melee or ranged (visually white when it hits target). Yellow Damage – Force or tech based damage (shows up as yellow when it hits target). Version 1.0 – Complete initial guide – on February 5, 2014

Amazing job!

Exile, You're like the guy wishing things went back to the "good ol days." Do whatever everyone does, grow, evolve, and change. Re-roll on sith, get some legacy gear, and get carried. FYI, you might want to stop playing a PvE spec and maybe you'd be mores successful.

Amazing guide dude. You've crushed us in ranked and I'm glad you can share your knowledge with us lessor beings Also, big shout out to you considering you answered my questions in game. Thanks man.

Totally agree. People rolling commandos zero dps and die in two seconds..... Do what I'm doing, legacying gear over to sith side so I can roll some Brazil Force!

Great ideas. incentivize PvP, that's all we want. I don't care about grinding gear. Keeps people play, what doesn't is eliminating all reason to compete and be "elite." Everyone wants that cool title, mount, armor, etc so they can say yep, you can't get this. Great post.

Gratz, you had a great huttball standing on top when no one else was attacking you. Try pulling this off in ranked against an organized team. Good class if setup and used properly. But selfies with high numbers are lame.

Basically the good side(s) whatever server you're on, just solo que together. Then when they get four buddies together they que until they lose than stop. I know on POT5 once most teams run into a great comp/players they stop queing entirely and wait to farm someone else. ELO system is broken to me, no incentive beyond gear to keep trying if you're not good. Moreover, when arenas started out my rating was 1000 because of a previous guild I was in. I won 40 lost 7 and now 1300. So what's fair? You get on a ridiculous hot streak but it doesn't count. Either way, good points.

POT5 Pub PvP is terrible. I came back to the game from a three month break only because my best gaming bud did and of course, he was on rep. So, now joining the likes of Brazil Force, Nova Republic, and the list goes on and on of bad PvP guilds. People aren't even breaking 100k in WZs, yet its fun for them. Moreover, they solo rank que and its basically fighting 3 v 4 to start. I don't mind losing to a better team, but people who roll shadow tank, don't have any damage, don't watch the node, and don't use taunts shouldn't be playing this game at 55.

My take on bolster at 55, It's not that bad besides the whole "naked" thing. If you made people have some entry level gear great. However, my friend (sorc) is wearing full PvE gear and sitting at 1120 force power, 1850 expertise, 26k health, and is healing for over one million on a full voidstar. The first day at 55 I did 1.5 million damage as a dps jugg in PvE gear...... Yes Rage spec is still good so get use to it. Bolster people fine, but at level 55 one should have relics for god sake. And what happen to people getting to learn the game and be a beginner? We all have to, whether in work or in life, you're the new guy. it'll go away soon, so don't worry. Last point, gear hasn't mattered much in WZs anyways. Same teams are destroy the same people. Gear or otherwise, good players are good players, just don't let people run naked with 30000k health. Otherwise, 2.0 PvP is awesome!

Also wondering. Seen some sorcs using two different types of healing ones (both conq).

Thanks for the help, I respec'd and didn't drop of any DPS and instant force lift is awesome. Last question, is rapid recovery worth taking? Thanks again.

Trying to find out why you shy away from Expertise in Kinetic Combat? Can't find any information and I made another post about it for some answers. Could you help me out? Thanks! Del'tia http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=590253