First off, Happy New Year everyone! I am back in the office now from the holidays so we are right back to some yellow posts

 

Game Update 2.6 first and foremost will mark the launch of Galactic Starfighter! That will mean the introduction of:

<snip>

Also, Game Update 2.6 will come with a few class changes, here is just an overview of some of what you will see:

• A fairly significant DPS boost for Operatives/Scoundrels.
  
• Mercenaries/Commandos will now have a skill to eliminate pushback on Tracer Missile/Grav Round and Power Shot/Charged Bolts.
  
• Sorcerers/Sages will now have a skill to eliminate pushback on Lightning Strike and Force Lightning/Disturbance and Telekinetic Throw.
  
• Mercenaries/Commandos can now cast Kolto Shell/Trauma Probe on more than one target at a time.
  
• Mercenaries/Commandos can now use Rapid Shots/Hammer Shot on themselves while Combat Support Cylinder/Combat Support Cell are active.
  

As always, look for the 2.6 patch notes for a full list of all changes that are coming! That is just a preview of what is to come.

 

-eric

As you can see here Commandos are finally getting some small (but useful) buffs. I just wish they'd address ammo management and/or survivability issues. Well... its a start at least!

Push back are'nt really a problem. Interupt are. But i take.

Nice buff for médic with the probe and love beam.

Playing a DPS mando i m a little disapointed, no defensif buff

Playing a DPS mando i m a little disapointed, no defensif buff

It's a preview highspeed. Take a look at the bottom. This ain't everything they're doing.

While I do agree with you that pushback isn't the biggest issue there's still the possibility they're MIGHT deal with the interrupts. But for now it's a step in the right direction. Though honestly I'd rather see that implemented for ALL casting abilities. I hate getting my plasma 'nades forcibly canceled due to pushback.

We could still see some utility upgrades. Keep your fingers crossed.

The big one for me is the multi-target Trauma Probe. Combat Medic isn't even my main spec, but the change is such a huge QoL improvement that it gives me the warm fuzzies.

Honestly, I'd prefer a pushback-immune Full Auto to Grav Round, but I'll take it either way.

We already have access to 70% pushback immunity on Grav Round, Charged Bolts, Concussive Round and Full Auto. Its a tier 1 talent in Gunnery, so is easily accessed by both Gunnery and Assault specs.

This pushback thing is a non-change, and I do not like it.

They had better include changes to Curtain of Fire or give us our free High Impact Bolt back! And why pushback immunity and not interrupt immunity? With so many different types of CC and phyics in the game, 99% our casts aren't made longer by pushback but outright interrupted. Grav Round, Full Auto and Charged Burst still needs some sort of interrupt protection, even if it's temporary.

I really hope that there is a lot more coming.

We already have access to 70% pushback immunity on Grav Round, Charged Bolts, Concussive Round and Full Auto. Its a tier 1 talent in Gunnery, so is easily accessed by both Gunnery and Assault specs.

 

This pushback thing is a non-change, and I do not like it.

It may not be the change you wanted but no pushback for grav/charged is a change. Maybe they will let you keep yours with pushback if you prefer it.

Curious to see what other changes they've got in store for healers.

I think the change to pushback for the DPS Commandos is a band-aid fix, though. If they are overhauling the pushback/interrupt system, then that change is going to be obsolete presumably.

A band-aid is better then bleeding out. I'm going to try and be optimistic about this.

We got this far by pushing them. Let's keep pushing until they finally open the can.

Where's our emergency gap-opener?

Where is the reversion of the utterly idiotic range-nerf to CryoGrenade/Electro-Dart?

Where are the reductions to our absurdly overlong cool-down timers?

It may not be the change you wanted but no pushback for grav/charged is a change. Maybe they will let you keep yours with pushback if you prefer it.

Do you not understand numbers?

We already get 70% pushback resistance for GR and CB. If you take that 2pt talent you almost entirely negate the effects of pushback.

Increasing that to 100% does absolutely nothing to address the actual problem areas with this class. So while you are all kowtowing to the devs for even mentioning us in the patch notes, Im going to continue being a good class rep and fighting for what we *ACTUALLY NEED*.

A band-aid is better then bleeding out. I'm going to try and be optimistic about this.

 

We got this far by pushing them. Let's keep pushing until they finally open the can.

Well if you're bleeding that much...a band-aid won't save you.

As usual though, I'm going to reserve judgement until the patch notes are out next week. I'm happy to see they're making two quality changes of life for Combat Medics, one of which (to Trauma Probe), should help a lot. But I've also bought that before and wasn't happy about it. Before 1.2 they did the same thing with Kolto Bomb: they said they were increasing its player cap. They did -- by increasing it from 3 to 4. Is it a change? Yes. But its the kind of change with no other purpose than to say "look, we did something for you". (Especially considering every other ability got nerfed in that update). I've also seen Bioware say they're doing a preview of upcoming changes, implying there were others not shown, and yet there were no other changes.

After leaving Commando/Mercenary in the dark for almost an entire year, its good to see them showing some changes in good faith. I hope they keep it up, because there's still a lot of work to do.

The big change we know about so far is the CM change. I agree with Cash. The pushback thing is a complete non-change. If it applied to PG maybe that would be helpful, but mostly this is akin to the root on Master Strike that Guardians go. A change for the sake of change.

I'm withholding final judgment till we see the full patch notes, but mostly, unless something else is coming, I'm calling this a nice change to CM, and nothing else substantive.

It's a change that exists to bring us up to where virtually everyone else is with regards to pushback on dps casting. It's not exactly exciting or anywhere near to what we need in total, but it's something that had to happen some time or another.

'Course, it's a pretty underwhelming thing to bring up in a preview.

Do you not understand numbers?

 

We already get 70% pushback resistance for GR and CB. If you take that 2pt talent you almost entirely negate the effects of pushback.

 

Increasing that to 100% does absolutely nothing to address the actual problem areas with this class. So while you are all kowtowing to the devs for even mentioning us in the patch notes, Im going to continue being a good class rep and fighting for what we *ACTUALLY NEED*.

No one said you were a bad class rep. I also understand numbers which is why I understand that 100% no pushback IS different than 70% - no need to patronize. I happen to agree with your assessment that it doesn't address the broader issues with the class. But think the way you went about pointing that out was counter-productive. And like you, I want what's best for the class so thought there's a better way to address it.

I like the idea of one of the posters above me about continuing to push devs for solutions to class issues. I think there are many suggestions in the class brainstorming thread that would improve the class without being overpowered. Not only that but it gives the devs a flavor of what direction the community wants to see the class go.

Do you not understand numbers?

 

We already get 70% pushback resistance for GR and CB. If you take that 2pt talent you almost entirely negate the effects of pushback.

 

Increasing that to 100% does absolutely nothing to address the actual problem areas with this class. So while you are all kowtowing to the devs for even mentioning us in the patch notes, Im going to continue being a good class rep and fighting for what we *ACTUALLY NEED*.

Thank God, at least You get it!

1 year and 9 months of lobbying since 1.2 dropped on us medics....

It has finally paid off, we're getting buffed directly after all these months of being the underdogs.

What will be the actual effects and limits are yet remained to be seen, though.

Lets see if it goes another update without them adding a numeric ammo counter.

Otherwise what I would like to see.

Gunnery to get CoF proc buffed, so it acts the same as the IA proc on assault. Smooth out ammo managment with a free HiB again. Then add a sub 30% damage boost to 1 attack (like what many have said, auto crit on DR @ sub 30%). That would help even out the 500+dps difference there is between gunnery and assault right now at the high end.

What do I think is going to happen. They will change around the skill trees, adding in useless skills. Then they will adjust the IA proc so it acts the same as the COF proc, thus ruining assault.

Well if you're bleeding that much...a band-aid won't save you.

Pffft.

I just walk it off and drink some water. LIKE A BAWS.

I apologize if I came off hostile, Im just sick of the devs either lacking the comprehension to work on real fixes or being too stupid to realize that what they 'fix' doesnt actually fix anything.

Ive been a heavily involved member of the community since before launch. Im just tired of waiting for the devs to finally wake the fk up and make the changes that need to be made.

Putting Tech Override on a 60s cooldown would be an enormous help to this class. IMO it would probably be the one single change that would have the most improvement in PvP QoL. The devs even acknowledged how ridiculous the cooldowns on some of our abilities are in the Mercenary answers. How freaking hard is it to change the fking cooldown on an ability? Change it, send it to PTS, and lets us fk around with it since they are clearly too fking lazy/dumb/ignorant to do it themselves.

Not to mention I am getting really, really fking pissed about this Class Rep thing. Yet another instance of the dev team jerking us around.

/endrant

While I'm going to reserve judgment until I know the full extent of the changes, I will say that the developers opted to highlight the wrong parts of the patch, if indeed more changes are coming. That is because these changes do absolutely nothing to adress the core issues this class has, those core issues being:

- Unreasonably unforgiving energy manegement and overt reliance on RNG procs

- Unreasonable susceptibility to cast and channel cancelling due to interrupts AND physics

The highlights are minor changes that completely ignore these two issues:

- Another Trauma probe on another tank isn't going to make heals cheaper or energy regeneration faster. Trauma probe ticks heal for the least amount of all healing skills (save for Hammer Shot), so a Trauma probe is not going to save the tank unless he receives significant amounts of healing from other skills. Those other heals, however, are overpriced, inefficient and slow, as per courtesy of patch 1.2. As such, another Trauma probe does nothing to buff our meaningful healing skills (Medical Probe, Advanced Medical Probe, Bacta Infusion), especially considering that we would still have to take the absolutely worthless "Frontline Medic" talent. Personally, I'd rather have 1 Trauma probe without "Frontline Medic" than 2 probes with.

- Hammer shot usable on self is a meaningless change on its own. When answering the Commando questions, Bioware already pointed out that Hammer shot used on us will not generate Combat Support Cells for whatever reason. So on one hand we get to use it on us, but on the other it's completely pointless becuase using Hammer Shot on virtually anyone else is more beneficial. Besides in what situation in PvE or PvP would you not have at least one team member within 30 meters of you? (EV Infernal Council, ok, but that's pretty much it.) And Bioware already commented that Hammer Shot critical hits will not regenerate cells like Diagnostic Scan regens Energy for Scoundrels/Operatives. So, there were two meaningful ways in which to change Hammer Shot (build CSS on yourself and have crits restore Ammo) but no, they opted to do neither.

- 100% pushback immunity is, again, meaningless on its own. Our casts and channels are not getting pushed back, they are getting outright interrupted by anything, not just interrupts. Leaps, pushes, pulls, knockbacks anything that can move us physically will interrupt a channel/cast. Even with Hold the Line (which only lasts for 6 seconds for healers), the window in which we can be completely shut down, even by one melee, is still very long. Any meaningful change would have to provide, real, tangible interrupt immunity. Besides, as our representative already pointed out, we already have access to 70% pushback immunity and it hasn't made the situation one bit easier for us. It's unreasonable to think that changing it to 100% will have a meaningful impact. Commando DPS and Healers will still be the primary target for everyone in PvP because they are still unable to defend themselves.

And that's it. Not a word about streamlining resources for DPS or adding in numerical values for Ammo, both of which the developers commented we deserve. Like I said, I hope it's just the very beginning of the changes, the very thin tip of the iceberg and lots more are coming, otherwise it will only piss people off again. I seriously hope that Bioware will prove me wrong and fix everything that needs fixing, however, it still strikes me strange to highlight such minor, meaningless changes if larger, more impactful ones are being implemented at the same time.

- Another Trauma probe on another tank isn't going to make heals cheaper or energy regeneration faster. Trauma probe ticks heal for the least amount of all healing skills (save for Hammer Shot), so a Trauma probe is not going to save the tank unless he receives significant amounts of healing from other skills. Those other heals, however, are overpriced, inefficient and slow, as per courtesy of patch 1.2. As such, another Trauma probe does nothing to buff our meaningful healing skills (Medical Probe, Advanced Medical Probe, Bacta Infusion), especially considering that we would still have to take the absolutely worthless "Frontline Medic" talent. Personally, I'd rather have 1 Trauma probe without "Frontline Medic" than 2 probes with.

Hopefully they'll make Trauma Probe available for more than just 1 or 2 extra targets and give us enough to put it on a few DPS as well, which will improve our utility when dealing with ops-wide damage phases. It's a small heal, but it's fire-and-forget and extremely efficient. It's basically damage mitigation in a can, and it's an underrated skill IMO.

I ABSOLUTELY agree that they need to stop making us take Frontline Medic; it's 2 wasted points 99% of the time.