The reason that healing operatives are so durable is not because their heals are particularly powerful, but because they are mobile and they have a lot of instant casts. The DPS specs are mobile as well but suffer from severe issues with survivability. Here is an idea for how to fix that:

 

1) Concealment: Shadow Operative Elite now also makes it so that Kolto Infusion is instant, has no cooldown, and does not break stealth. The idea here is that if you have the TA's and energy to spare, you can rapidly heal yourself up and can even do so in stealth. The catch is that you are eating up your TA's and energy.

 

2) Lethality: Quickening now applies to kolto injection instead of kotlo infusion. Additionally kolto infusion is now free and doesn't cost a TA. Lethality doesn't have to be in the heat as often or for as long so it instead gets more of a background heal with an RNG procced burst off of exfiltrate. Having kolto infusion for free also gives the spec some much needed utility as an off healer since they are currently a net negative in terms of utility (their dots break mezzes).

 

In both cases the idea is to make operatives feel more slippery by giving them a means of rapid regen during short breaks in combat (lethality obviously isn't gonna cast its free heal while getting whaled on and concealment can't waste TA's/energy while burning a mark).

I like the concept of (1) but honestly it seems so far departed from kolto infusion it might as well be a new ability entirely. Plus the energy cost would still make it too prohibitive while lack of medic talents mean kolto infusion is a lackluster heal anyway. Same reason dps ops don't get much real usage out of the roll in combat.

 

Maybe even just allow conc operatives to heal themselves from stealth period? Currently vanish isn't really all that useful as an escape even if they didn't already need it for burst. If you're low then you might as well die and roll back. Without the ability to get back in the fight before you could hypothetically respawn it's not much good beyond lowering your number of "deaths"

 

Problem with (2) is that quickening isn't bad because of the free heal being infusion, it's bad because a 30% chance on a 25 energy ability is bollocks. It need to either be 100%, last an ice-age or do something entirely different in my eyes.

Otherwise it'll never proc when you actually need it to survive, which is sort of the point of survivability talents.

Edited January 31, 2014 by CaptainApop

Well the details could certainly be worked out, but I guess the general idea here is that DPS operatives defense could be in terms of rapid regen at the cost of energy/TA's. I think that if anything ever gets done about this (and i'm sure it will eventually the question is when and how much more they will buff mara's in the meanwhile), it will come in the form of changes to existing skills. We already have skill bloat as is and kolto infusion is still, as you said, a useless skill so may as well overhaul it for the dps specs to allow them to regen in combat. Maybe they could have it work sort of like the mercs kolto shell where the stacks tick for a set percentage of the damage you take every time you take damage? I think that would be a rather unique ability, and if it was limited to the DPS trees and only be castable on self then it wouldn't change anything for the healers.

wish you play lethality in pvp way more than me, but what would you think of borrowing something from annihilation/watchman, namely that crits on your dots heal you for moderate amount or something like that, I think it would be kind of fitting and would boost survivability without adding further CDs.

Well it wouldn't really help much because nobody dies in PVP from steady damage, people die from focused burst. Thats why all the DCD's are so short and so powerful. Having a latent background heal would be sort of useless. If i'm not in immediate danger and hurt i'll pop a kolto injection rather than wait for some RNG heals like that. Its when i'm taking damage hard and fast that I need help, and that's where instant heals, DCD's, or better mobility are needed.

I still think the evasive imperative talent in medicine should be given to concealment, preferably worked into a pre existing talent.. I kind of don't want to give up the 30s debilitate. Maybe they could scrap brawler's grit/whatever it is for ops completely, (the endurance boost), and just put it higher up in the tree and make it evasive imperative? Or maybe just switch that talent with evasive, some extra endurance as a healer wouldn't hurt when they already have a lot of heal boosting talents anyways. That, or Revitalizers needs to be buffed GREATLY.

 

Also, quickening absolutely needs a 100% chance to proc. Isn't the ICD like 15 seconds, anyways?

 

The funny thing about our "survival" talents right now, is that they're so bad that we just don't take them, and instead take minor DPS boosts.

Edited January 31, 2014 by QuiveringPotato

Here is my take on some possible defensive changes:

 

Scrapper.

1) Slippery devil reworked from 50% to 100% to procc dodge , internal cd increased to 20 sec.

2) Supprise comback and Brawlers grit should both be scrapped and merged into a new talent in tier 6. The new talent should mirror the vanguard talent "Shock absorbers".

- Reduces damage taken from area effects by 15%/30%. Additionally, while stunned, you take 15%/30% less damage from all sources.

 

Dirty fighting:

1)Scurry reworked to give a "cheat death" like effect . When you drop under 30% hp , gain 85% dmg reduction for 4 sec. 90 sec internal cd.

2) Hot wired defenses buffed to 25/45% . After defense screen end give 15% dmg reduction for 5 seconds.

3) Hemorrhaging blast taken off GCD.

Edited February 3, 2014 by Thubb

Here is my take on some possible defensive changes:

 

Scrapper.

1) Slippery devil reworked from 50% to 100% to procc dodge , internal cd increased to 20 sec.

2) Supprise comback and Brawlers grit should both be scrapped and merged into a new talent in tier 6. The new talent should mirror the vanguard talent "Shock absorbers".

- Reduces damage taken from area effects by 15%/30%. Additionally, while stunned, you take 15%/30% less damage from all sources.

 

Dirty fighting:

1)Scurry reworked to give a "cheat death" like effect . When you drop under 30% hp , gain 85% dmg reduction for 4 sec. 90 sec internal cd.

2) Hot wired defenses buffed to 25/45% . After defense screen end give 15% dmg reduction for 5 seconds.

3) Hemorrhaging blast taken off GBC.

 

Those actually sound good, too!

AoE damage reduction!

God, that would be so nice.

dmg reduction during stun....

 

 

what would we shoot while we were stunned? I mean that's a AP talent, and a few others.

 

Survival isn't linked to your dcd's. Those help 1v1, but in a group battle, Your stuns, and aoe stuns can cause confusion, and prolong your survival. You aren't fighting the person attacking you, you cc them and run to your friend and help them put down their opponent saving stuns and roots to give yourself distance and to create space as a defense.

 

Operatives are melee yes, but your survival is not linked to evasion and shield probe, it is linked to how you use your terrain and your abilities to create space and to hit them in between their abilities.

 

Hit and run gentlemen, and ladies. Hit and run. 4 people can only attack 1 person but only 1 person can be attacking if the others are stunned.

dmg reduction during stun....

 

 

what would we shoot while we were stunned? I mean that's a AP talent, and a few others.

 

Survival isn't linked to your dcd's. Those help 1v1, but in a group battle, Your stuns, and aoe stuns can cause confusion, and prolong your survival. You aren't fighting the person attacking you, you cc them and run to your friend and help them put down their opponent saving stuns and roots to give yourself distance and to create space as a defense.

 

Operatives are melee yes, but your survival is not linked to evasion and shield probe, it is linked to how you use your terrain and your abilities to create space and to hit them in between their abilities.

 

Hit and run gentlemen, and ladies. Hit and run. 4 people can only attack 1 person but only 1 person can be attacking if the others are stunned.

 

Fair enough , but when you are stunned you can neither use the terrain to your advanged or your other DCDs.(Lets not get into how "easy" it is to kite when you have a slow.) It should be fairly obvious why dmg reduction while we are stunned is usefull. RIght now , if you get stunned and you dont have your cc breaker your very often dead.

Edited February 4, 2014 by Thubb

Fair enough , but when you are stunned you can neither use the terrain to your advanged or your other DCDs.(Lets not get into how "easy" it is to kite when you have a slow.) It should be fairly obvious why dmg reduction while we are stunned is usefull. RIght now , if you get stunned and you dont have your cc breaker your very often dead.

 

good points.

 

Just merely pointing out that everyone is so obsessed with what others have and not using what we have.

 

dmg reduction while stunned, super nice... go roll a p/t.

 

on that note... even if you are stunned and then die, then depending on the wz... go find a new fight and make someone else's life miserable. why are you in the middle of the fight anyways?

Edited February 4, 2014 by AngelofCain