Expertise - As seen from both sides of the fence. It is broken.

ppl are quitting the game due to lack of content and u guys want stuff to be even easier amazing

I hit 50 last week. Been playing since early release but just leveled slowly, taking my time and enjoying the game with friends.

As a fresh 50, not even in daily reward gear, i jumped into the Warzones. Know what? I got stomped. A lot. Know what i didn't do? I didn't come to the boards and complain about it.

I watched for ways to help my team, passing the ball to better geared players, using slows and stuns instead of trying to get 1-on-1 kills, etc. Any player, of any class, with ANY gear can still help their team if they take a moment to think about what they can do beyond just "zomg killz!"

Since then (in the last week) i'm up to 2-3 pieces of Champion and 5 or so pieces of Centurion gear. I've just been doin' the Warzone dailies and one weekly, with some extra games here and there to buy bags. No Ilum yet. I've already noticed a tremendous difference. My kills and damage are going up, my medal counts are going up, and I can contribute in more and more ways.

Sure, i still get stomped sometimes -- especially if i get double-teamed. But i'm getting better, both in terms of skill and gear. Just by playing. Even after i've done my dailies, I queue up again. Know why? Cause i enjoy it. I like pvp and i find the Warzones fun.

The lack of xserver means i see a lot of the same people repeatedly. Getting to know folks who are on my team this round, and stunlocking me next is fun. I'm enjoying the game and slowly but surely i'm gearing up. My only complaint after a solid week of level 50 bracket pvp? The fact that I have not gotten a single champion token out of a bag -- Not ONE!

See, people need to read this over. 50 last week and you have 8 pieces of PvP gear, was it that hard? Why is it so hard for people that come here and post irrelvant complaints?

BTW, you probably wont' see a champion token, they are extremely rare, its like a small chance to crit. The champion commedations are where you get the champion gear progression.

I am not going to get into the math behind Expertise, I don't care, it has been done enough. This is simply my observation from playing since early access, taking two characters to 50 with a decent spread of time between them.

My first character to 50 was my Juggernaut, I hit 50 about mid January, and through WZ's managed to gear myself in full Champion gear. Being part of the early crowd to obtain my gear I at first didn't pay much attention to the Expertise argument, and how much of an advantage it is. Eventually I decided I would try and see what everyone was talking about, and rolled another character. The choice being the Agent to Operative route, even though they were nerfed heavily.

During the leveling of my Operative I spent a great deal of time in WZ's. I capped my Mercenary Commendations, fully geared myself in PvP gear several times, as well as companions. With the exception of a level 42 rifle, there is no Expertise on these items, just generally decent stats. At level 50 I completely upgraded my gear with items I had purchased during my level from the GTN, with commendations, etc. Generally getting about the best you can have outside of the PvP/PvE Tier sets.

Upon hitting 50 and being about as well geared as I could be for a "Fresh 50" I started the 50 bracket. It is hard to explain what it was like, I don't think frustrating is accurate enough, depressing I suppose is the word. The sudden plummet in damage I dealt to these geared characters was a slap in the face. I was seeing some crits down in the triple digits, only to have the returning hit to crit for upwards of 4,000. Overall survivability immediately became something along the lines of zero, to a few seconds if lucky. I went from dealing 200,000+ damage in a WZ to under 75,000. Due to the lack of damage dealt and how quickly I died upon revealing myself.

I was lucky enough to get into a 1 v 1 with another Operative, he of course being fully PvP geared. The disparity between damage coming and going between us was insulting. I am generally OK with gear providing an edge in combat, that is the point of getting better gear. But when gear gives a clear decisive win to the other, it just feels wrong. Especially when keeping in mind that my Operative hit 50 with about the best gear you can have out side of the Tier 1/2/3, I spent a great deal of time setting that up. Most new players are not going to be able or know to take that step. They are going to be using items they randomly found, or quest rewards. Not gear obtained through meticulous planning. Which really means the experience for them will be even worse than what I had.

It is just really sad, and slightly depressing, to experience what these new guys are talking about. It isn't something that they are making up, the gab between the new and older isn't a gap, more of a canyon. It is simply amazing switching between my Juggernaut and my Operative and seeing how drastically different play is, all because of one stat.

Night and day....it needs to be resolved.

Listen up pumpkin,

If you got over 400 expertise in 2 days, you play WAY more than the average player. Your argument is thus invalid, and stupid.

In a well designed game, skill should trump gear. In this game, you literally CAN NOT win against a better geared player if they have even half of a brain. I can outplay the **** out of someone, blow all my CD's and still lose to their gear.

How can anyone consider that enjoyable?

People are quitting the game because most of it sucks.

Expertise is a factor in that.

You simply cannot win in this situation as a developer though, and they've set themselves up for it, so don't blame the players.

If they remove expertise, "PvPers" will cry about it and unsub.

Then PvE carebears will cry about it and unsub because now all of a sudden you get close to equal gear from PvP (soloable) as you can from raiding (not).

Or you can nerf down PvP gear a bit, after removing expertise, then PvPers will cry again because they feel like their efforts should be rewarded with gear *at least* as good as what you get from raiding. As I said, Bioware's end game design is what put them here, not people crying for expertise nerfs, or kids that stay at home all day to grind gear. It's ****** design, at the core.

Or you could set your game up from stage one so that there is more of a reason to come back than soft gear resets. It's absolutely *********** ludicrous that we are only 2 months into the game's life and devs are already talking about the "next tier of gear coming in 1.2".

It is becoming extremely clear that this game's end game content is practically a carbon copy of WoW's. Complete with soft gear resets just to keep the gear grinders happy, because apparently thats the only crowd that belongs in MMOs.