It is said that rakata is better than champion gear. The stat differce bettween champ and rakata is SO BIG that i dont think that exertise can make for up it, tbh i cant be sure beacause i dont know the "maths" behind expertise but from my excperience by switching champ leggings and main hand weapon to rakata my numbers(on the pvp boards) improved slighlty.

OFC i am talking abou pvp

Don't forget, Rakata is 3rd tier PvE gear. Comparable to BM, not Champion.

So yes you will hit a lot harder, but you lose the "resilence" effect of Expertise. I'd just try with a couple pieces of each set on til you find a balance.

based on all of the math i have seen the differences in dps is completely minimal with rakata being slightly ahead.

however the survivability of expertise counteracts that.

put it this way if you have a pocket healer then they will appreciate you wearing pvp gear more but if you are running solo its more your choice.

oh and also they plan to work on expertise to completely crush the debate on which is better.

in their opinion, pvp gear should be better for pvp. which is true.

There is a point where expertise becomes negligible and having more pure dps stats benefits you far more. After a certain point DR kicks in and expertise is worth far less per point making other stats better. Off the top of my head , and half asleep its about 7% or so.

It's just something that you're going to have to mess around with and find the balance that works the best for you. Personally far higher damage vs being very moderately more survivable is a good trade off, Truthfully if you can notice the difference between 7 and 10% expertise then I would be shocked. So yea, experiment and find what you like.

based on all of the math i have seen the differences in dps is completely minimal with rakata being slightly ahead.

however the survivability of expertise counteracts that.

 

put it this way if you have a pocket healer then they will appreciate you wearing pvp gear more but if you are running solo its more your choice.

 

oh and also they plan to work on expertise to completely crush the debate on which is better.

in their opinion, pvp gear should be better for pvp. which is true.

Expertise should ONLY provide +defense ,arguably also +healing because trauma is a stupid debuff, if its not player casted you shouldn't have a healing debuff on you.

The way it stands now, 10% expertise vs 10% expertise is a complete wash which makes it a useless stat.

http://imageshack.us/f/802/screenshot2012030413064.jpg/

this is basically an average screenshot when emp work together against the rep premade. I use rakata mh, columi oh. Mix of columi/rakata set pieces, 4 of them. I have modded boots with rakata armoring and mods. I run 410 power, 25% crit and 70% surge. I have 2v1 and won, I even 3 v 1 and won killing all 3. Not often, but possible. Usually i will kill my target even with 5 v 1. 1 of them will die. I run about 75 expertise. The Ear I use is the champion one, because i cbf farming dailys. 1 of the implants is also champ.

I only use my pve gear when pvping as annihilation as the heal refund is bigger due to more hps on the pve gear meaning the difference in the like 4% of expertise is made up.

My pvp is basically crap. I have 3 pieces of champ gear that is not equipped. I got unlucky with bags and just never bothered to farm it. I pretty much couldnt care.

Expertise should ONLY provide +defense ,arguably also +healing because trauma is a stupid debuff, if its not player casted you shouldn't have a healing debuff on you.

 

The way it stands now, 10% expertise vs 10% expertise is a complete wash which makes it a useless stat.

as it stands right now a healer with guard on him needs focusing to be able to kill so getting rid of the trauma debuff is moronic and mostly qqed about by none other than healers.

the whole point of having expertise is that it gives you the leg up in pvp vs people who raid. simply stated they are 2 completely different types of gameplay and as such should be treated differently.

they said it in an interview that they are working on expertise to make it the predominate stat for pvp. so enjoy the time you have with raid gear because i would suspect that with 1.2 pvp gear will clearly be better for pvp.

I would honestly argue that using 2 or 3 Rakata pieces along with the rest being BM would be the best for an Annihilation Marauder.

More HP means more healing.

Expertise is indeed a big stat for PvP (and there's little ways you're going to win a 1v1 against anyone with full BM if you're full champ).

Personally, I would say use the Rakata gear that you have that have Augments in them (with +28 STR). The rest should be PvP gear. AFAIK, you can only get three augments on Rakata gear: Relic/Bracers/Belt (second relic can be PvP, who cares). That requires you to go both Artifice and Synthweaving at some point in time, but it's well worth it. If you go Biochem after achieving these, you can get the benefits of three Crew Skills at once. It's borderline overpowered to do this, and I'm nearly at 400 Biochem myself (with 3 Rakata Augments).

I still do really well with Columi legs/boots + Rakata belt/bracers/relic/offhand and the rest Champion. I know it's a lot of PvE gear considering how often I PvP, but because of my inability to do Ilum due to the garbage FPS my computer dishes out, I'm quite undergeared as far as PvP goes. Regardless, Warzones tend to only get better for me as time goes on, and once I hit BM (which isn't far off) I am sure to be dominating everything using 3 Augmented Slots and the rest BM.

That's my theory and I'm sticking to it.