As a crew skill, would it be better for leveling and end-game purposes, to go with armstech, armormech, or cybertech? And if you wouldn't mind, please explain why. Thanks.

Cybertech is the only one of those three that will have anything unique in the Endgame after 1.3 hits. Reusable Grenades can be quite useful, although not for a Merc as much as for some other classes (you already have ranged cc and aoe.) You can get a few items slightly quicker/easier with the other two but now people will be able to augment everything the USP of augmented relics, bracers, etc., is no longer there.

Cybertech is the only one of those three that will have anything unique in the Endgame after 1.3 hits. Reusable Grenades can be quite useful, although not for a Merc as much as for some other classes (you already have ranged cc and aoe.) You can get a few items slightly quicker/easier with the other two but now people will be able to augment everything the USP of augmented relics, bracers, etc., is no longer there.

 

This is not entriely accurate. Patch 1.3 will give the ability to add an augment slot to any armor/weapon, but in order to add this augment slot it will require a kit that can only be made by crafters. Augments will still only be able to be made by crafters as well, so any of these crew skills will be useful as they will offer the augments and augment slot kits for their particular gear type.

 

My personal suggestion is to go with armormech since it will give you the most ability to customize your look and the majority of what people need will be armor (more slots per character than implants or weapons). Ultimately, the majority of people go biochem on their main for the stims/medpacs that are the highest level, especially if you plan to PVP. My crew skill suggestion is to level through armormech first to craft Rakata bracers and belt, then drop it for biochem and pick up the other crafting skills on alts if you want them. The armor, weapons, etc. can be used by any of your toons (although the Rakata gear is bind on pickup, which is why I suggest doing it first), but the biochem craftables require a skill level of 400 in biochem to use. So you can continue using armor you've crafted that is BoP and buy other armor other places or craft on alts, biochem crafts can't be used if you drop biochem.

 

If you simply want to do the best crafting possible, there are multiple guides you can google that will tell you how much of each mat you need to craft at the fastest pace. Essentially, you will want to keep making the highest level green schematic you can make to level your crafting skill to the max level and spend the least amount of money. If not, then whatever crafting skill you pick will be equally rewarding as you level your toon.

Even with the changes coming in 1.3, the most useful (possibly the only really useful) Crew Skill for Endgame is Biochem, with the adrenals/stims/medpacks that can only be used by a Biochem.

 

Of the 3 you have mentioned, and assuming the crew skill is for personal use (so ignoring any potential income you might get from crafting and selling on the GTN), Armstech will be useful for producing your end-game gun, or Armormech will be useful for producing your end-game armor. But once the armor/gun are crafted, you will have no further use for them, and you will still need to buy the mods to put in that armor/gun (either using one metric *****-ton of Warzone Commendations gained from PvP to buy end-game PvP armor and transfering the mods to your chosen armor), or crafted by a Cybertech. Armstech and Armormech are useful when leveling for producing leveling gear, but the cost of grinding your crew skills while you are also leveling adventuring is difficult to manage unless you can sell your crafted items on the GTN - something which is not guaranteed, depending on the server.

 

Cybertech is the one of those 3 that will be useful to you - while leveling, once you are in orange armor that you like the look of, and with an orange gun (the items where you can swap mods in and out, to alter the stat bonuses of the items), you can keep yourself up to date with Cybertech and the occasional visit to the GTN or a Commendation vendor to pick up the odd bits that Cybertech cannot make. At end-game, you will probably be aiming for the gear that drops in raids, so Cybertech is still useful, but not as useful as while leveling.

 

Most people I know take Cybertech while leveling, and then when they hit level 50 they drop that and start on Biochem.

This is not entriely accurate. Patch 1.3 will give the ability to add an augment slot to any armor/weapon, but in order to add this augment slot it will require a kit that can only be made by crafters. Augments will still only be able to be made by crafters as well, so any of these crew skills will be useful as they will offer the augments and augment slot kits for their particular gear type.

 

Currently, the plan is to allow only Armstechs, Armormechs and Synthweavers to create augment kits in 1.3.

For Game Update 1.3, augment kit creation is limited to the classes that can currently make augments. This is necessary for the introduction of the system; it allows us to distribute the components at a steady rate, because each augmentable item you RE results in a portion of the augment slot. The items created by the other crew skills don't fit in with this progression as cleanly - if we decide to allow Artifice or Cybertech to acquire the kits through their commonly created items, under our current systems they would produce kits substantially faster than the other skills. It is safer to open augment kits to a limited set of crew skills.

 

Unless things change, Cybertechs will be SOL as far as the augment and augment kit market is concerned.