Since Ranked Warzones are finally here, I figure the new players and some old ones, could use some help regarding gearing up, getting ranked warzone commendations, medals etc.

 

Most of the info used here is from:

http://www.oldrepublic.net/470-how-get-war-hero-battlemaster-pvp-gear-ranked-warzone-commendations.html

http://www.oldrepublic.net/304-pvp-valor-ranks-medals-titles-list.html

For more details and screenshots check the original articles.

 

I’ve noticed that in Warzones a lot of new players, and even old PvE players are not getting the Recruit suit and instead, they are coming with pve gear. Well … that’s the worst way to do it – even if you wear Rakata gear, Recruit is a lot better due to Expertise, which is the most important stat in PvP. Don’t be cheap and buy it, it’s worth the money.

 

Here are the prices for the Recruit gear:

 

Wrist – 20500 Credits

Waist – 20500 Credits

Boots – 26200 Credits

Ear – 17000 Credits

Implant – 17000 Credits

Hands – 26200 Credits

Head – 31700 Credits

Chest – 31700 Credits

Main-Hand – 38700 Credits

Off-hand – 19300 Credits

Legs – 31700 Credits

Champion Relics – 11300 Credits

 

So, to get full Recruit gear (including 2 Relics) it will cost you only 320000 Credits and provide you with approximately 900 Expertise which is more than decent for a fresh PvPer. Also lvl 50 players will get a new one-time PvP mission (New technology) available at the Mission Terminal on the Imperial and Republic fleets located in the Combat Training Quarter. This mission will allow you to choose between the following rewards: Recruit Gear Box (a complete Recruit set based on your AC) or a Recruit Credit Redemption Token, which can be sold at the vendor for 320000 credits (the cost of a full Recruit set).

 

After getting the Recruit gear, you are ready to do some Warzones and get Commendations for the Battlemaster gear. You can’t skip this tier if you want to go further and get the War Hero set.

Warzone Commendations (these can be obtained by playing normal Warzones) are needed in order to buy Battlemaster items.

 

Let’s take a look over the Battlemaster gear prices:

 

Wrist – 550 Warzone Commendations

Waist – 625 Warzone Commendations

Boots – 875 Warzone Commendations

Ear – 625 Warzone Commendations

Implant- 625 Warzone Commendations

Hands – 875 Warzone Commendations

Head – 1075 Warzone Commendations

Chest – 1425 Warzone Commendations

Main-Hand – 1550 Warzone Commendations

Off-Hand – 1550 Warzone Commendations

Legs - 975 Warzone Commendations

 

War Hero gear and Ranked Warzone Commendations

 

The next step is the War Hero gear. Players can buy it with Ranked Warzone Commendation + the equivalent Battlemaster item. For a full list of War Hero and Ranked War Hero gear costs please check this article: http://www.oldrepublic.net/470-how-get-war-hero-battlemaster-pvp-gear-ranked-warzone-commendations.html

 

Note: When buying a piece of War Hero gear players must have the equivalent Battlemaster item in the inventory (not equipped). Only the empty shell is needed (you can get the mods off from the item and you should still be able to trade it for War Hero gear).

 

Ranked Warzone Commendations can be obtained by doing Ranked Warzones or the PvP Daily and Weekly missions. Also players will be able to trade 30 Warzone Commendations for 10 Ranked Warzone Commendations, but Valor Rank 40 is required. More details about this can be found in the link above.

 

Note: Valor Rank is the system implemented by Bioware as a method for distributing PvP rewards and titles (such as crafted Battlemaster / War Hero / Rated War Hero gear, Longspur Recon mount. etc). Valor XP can be obtained by doing Warzones and Open World PvP.

 

Crafted Battlemaster and War Hero gear

 

This gear can be made by Synthweaving and Amormech. The gear has no mods on it, basically it’s just the empty shell.

However, to equip this crafted gear, players have to obtain a certain Valor Rank (Rank 60 for Battlemaster, Rank 70 for War Hero, while the Rated War Hero also requires Warzone Rating).

Also, augment slots can be added on any gear now. Bonus sets can be transfered on them but only from the new items added in Game Update 1.2 or later, such as War Hero set.

 

For some screenshots please check the original article: http://www.oldrepublic.net/470-how-get-war-hero-battlemaster-pvp-gear-ranked-warzone-commendations.html

 

Medals and Titles

 

Completing some achievements during a Warzone, will award you with medals. The first 8 Medals are now worth 250 Valor and 5 Commendations each. Players earn Valor and Commendations only for the first 8 Medals (2000 Valor / 40 Commendations in total).

For the full list of medals and titles please refer to the original article: http://www.oldrepublic.net/304-pvp-valor-ranks-medals-titles-list.html

 

Resolve Bar

 

Basically, the resolve bar is a visual representation on how many movement, knock backs or action impairing effects (purple bar) a player can take before he becomes immune (the white bar). A good article explaining how this works can be seen here: http://www.oldrepublic.net/391-pvp-resolve-bar-explanation.html

Edited June 26, 2012 by Bytesin

Reserved for future editing.

Nice guide, thanks for the info. Hope the Rated Warzones come soon.

nice guide the thing i dont understand fully is why when i get 12 medals and win sometimes i dont get 140 comm

huttball is where u see it the most since is the one that you win for the score and not because u accomplish the 6 goal

then come voidstair 2 decent team will never read the end

 

on the other hand Civil but novare too once u get 2 base it's very probable that you hold them all the way so it usually end up inside the time constrain

 

that means that victory is not always 100 commendation but is 100 commendation if you win in the first X miunts and then it goes down

 

anybody knows how is the formula for the time/commendation in victory?

Edited May 22, 2012 by Pekish

nice guide the thing i dont understand fully is why when i get 12 medals and win sometimes i dont get 140 comm

huttball is where u see it the most since is the one that you win for the score and not because u accomplish the 6 goal

then come voidstair 2 decent team will never read the end

 

on the other hand Civil but novare too once u get 2 base it's very probable that you hold them all the way so it usually end up inside the time constrain

 

that means that victory is not always 100 commendation but is 100 commendation if you win in the first X miunts and then it goes down

 

anybody knows how is the formula for the time/commendation in victory?

 

The amount of commendations you get goes up as a function of time up to some maximum (probably 100 for win + 40 for medals). I think the time factor differs depending on the map. Winning faster actually decreases the commendations you get (though you'll get more medals). That said, most maps have pretty generous time scaling factors such that you'll almost certainly still get the full 100 even if you won as fast as possible.

Astarica is right. I had max 140 Commendations from a full game. Wining faster decreases the commendations you get, but 2 fast wins are better than 1 full game win.

This is easily noticed in huttball. Get your 8 medals and win a 6-0 in 5 minutes or something, you'll end up getting like 110 comms.

 

If I remember right, there's more to it than that though. Devs even stated that you'll be rewarded more when your team does better, and that doing things like intentionally letting the other team in civil war win would be a bad idea.

 

This bears out in my experience:

 

I've had several games of voidstar now where both teams made it to the datacore. One team (the losing team) made it pretty late, 10-30 seconds left on the clock. Us (the winning team) would make it to the datacore lets say 30 seconds faster than them.

 

Then we're awarded 115 comms or something like that. After getting 8 medals and after being in the game nearly as long as you can be...well minus maybe 60-90 seconds.

 

So your performance in relation to the other team...AS WELL AS how long the game lasts, may figure in.

Edited May 22, 2012 by ShadowOfVey

little off topic, just wondering if anyone else thinks its a good idea to possible earn social points for pvp. maybe it could be half what you get from fp, just a few points for pvp would be nice.

 

very nice guide btw great info to know!!

Right now the way that Warzone Commendations are earned seems fine, especially since the Daily PvP mission only requires Warzones played not won. This probably helps a lot players on servers with low population where the teams are often unbalanced. The only problem is that right now War Hero gear is pretty expensive. Rated Warzones can't get here soon enough.

little off topic, just wondering if anyone else thinks its a good idea to possible earn social points for pvp. maybe it could be half what you get from fp, just a few points for pvp would be nice.

 

very nice guide btw great info to know!!

 

Has been posted several times in the past, with approval from most.

 

One of my ideas was that you get 5 social points at the end of a WZ for voting for an MVP. Not 5 social for each person that votes for you, just 5 social for the act of voting for someone.

Now if only there were more than 10 people on the Republic Fleet to PvP with....

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

o.O

 

 

SRSLY

Assuming queue time isn't a significant factor, you get more comms if you win quickly and then just forfeit the next game (i.e. get 8 medals and then start helping the other team like force pull their guys to goal) compared to winning a game slowly for the full 140. Since it is trivial to lose a game (if not, then you should try to win that game instead) it's always better to win fast.

 

Now if the queues take an hour to pop you might have to try to get the most out of your only game, but in that case you also got other issues to worry about in general.

Indeed, the queues are a pain lately and taking in consideration the time you have to wait in order to join a game, winning the game slowly might get you more commendations. I mean, if you wait 1 hour between WZs... playing the full WZ and getting the max commendations will definitely reward you better per total, rather than wining them fast.

I'm sure BW will do something regarding these queues soon.

Edited May 23, 2012 by Bytesin

I am extremely disappointed with the cookie-cutter nature of the PvP gear. Why bother having other stats and other gear choices? Why bother with even having a 1-50 levelling experience, only to have the SAME stuff as everyone else when you get to end-game PvP? Why not just roll a Sentinel, and give them the recruit gear?

 

And why even HAVE a magical "I'm better at PvP because I spent more time grinding THIS than other stuff" stat anyway? What is the point? Why is it even needed?

Nice guide. Short, sweet, and to the point.

 

And why even HAVE a magical "I'm better at PvP because I spent more time grinding THIS than other stuff" stat anyway? What is the point? Why is it even needed?

 

It's not like that at all. The tone of your post makes me believe that you're a bit frustrated; I sympathizer with you, but please allow me to explain why having PvP gear is -very- cool, and a worthwhile edition to the game environment.

 

When you start off as a fresh level 1 jedi on Tython, you are given the basic necessities, and are rather quite weak. But in time, you are able to grind your way up in level, credits, legacy, etc. Eventually, you reach level 50, bought/quested for nice gear, and are the big cheese of mob-slaying.

 

Well PvP is just like that, and for those of us who appreciate the multi-layered mechanics that set both PvE and PvP apart, it can be the next level of accomplishment for us to face and overcome. PvP is not supposed to be an extension of PvE, or general storyline gameplay for that matter. It's designed to be an alternative route of exposure that comes with entirely new set of goals, challenges, and rewards.

 

This is why expertise is important. It make PvP gear ineffective in PvE, and PvE gear less effective in PvP. This is what makes it so cool.

 

For this, those of us who do the grind, are thankful, and appreciative, and I guess we all just "get it", the point is made obvious to us, we appreciate this "need". That said, I can certainly understand that this may confuse, or frustrate you, and that is actually 100% totally okay, because not every aspect of this game (or life in general) was meant to be absorbed or appreciated by 100% of all demographics.

 

My advice to you is to let go of the hate, and embrace the force, my young PvP Padawan.

Nice guide. Short, sweet, and to the point.

 

 

 

It's not like that at all. The tone of your post makes me believe that you're a bit frustrated; I sympathizer with you, but please allow me to explain why having PvP gear is -very- cool, and a worthwhile edition to the game environment.

 

When you start off as a fresh level 1 jedi on Tython, you are given the basic necessities, and are rather quite weak. But in time, you are able to grind your way up in level, credits, legacy, etc. Eventually, you reach level 50, bought/quested for nice gear, and are the big cheese of mob-slaying.

 

Well PvP is just like that, and for those of us who appreciate the multi-layered mechanics that set both PvE and PvP apart, it can be the next level of accomplishment for us to face and overcome. PvP is not supposed to be an extension of PvE, or general storyline gameplay for that matter. It's designed to be an alternative route of exposure that comes with entirely new set of goals, challenges, and rewards.

 

This is why expertise is important. It make PvP gear ineffective in PvE, and PvE gear less effective in PvP. This is what makes it so cool.

 

For this, those of us who do the grind, are thankful, and appreciative, and I guess we all just "get it", the point is made obvious to us, we appreciate this "need". That said, I can certainly understand that this may confuse, or frustrate you, and that is actually 100% totally okay, because not every aspect of this game (or life in general) was meant to be absorbed or appreciated by 100% of all demographics.

 

My advice to you is to let go of the hate, and embrace the force, my young PvP Padawan.

 

100 percent correct, well almost since you said "start off as a Jedi" lol. Still a great speech though.

Nice guide. Short, sweet, and to the point.

 

 

 

It's not like that at all. The tone of your post makes me believe that you're a bit frustrated; I sympathizer with you, but please allow me to explain why having PvP gear is -very- cool, and a worthwhile edition to the game environment.

 

When you start off as a fresh level 1 jedi on Tython, you are given the basic necessities, and are rather quite weak. But in time, you are able to grind your way up in level, credits, legacy, etc. Eventually, you reach level 50, bought/quested for nice gear, and are the big cheese of mob-slaying.

 

Well PvP is just like that, and for those of us who appreciate the multi-layered mechanics that set both PvE and PvP apart, it can be the next level of accomplishment for us to face and overcome. PvP is not supposed to be an extension of PvE, or general storyline gameplay for that matter. It's designed to be an alternative route of exposure that comes with entirely new set of goals, challenges, and rewards.

 

This is why expertise is important. It make PvP gear ineffective in PvE, and PvE gear less effective in PvP. This is what makes it so cool.

 

For this, those of us who do the grind, are thankful, and appreciative, and I guess we all just "get it", the point is made obvious to us, we appreciate this "need". That said, I can certainly understand that this may confuse, or frustrate you, and that is actually 100% totally okay, because not every aspect of this game (or life in general) was meant to be absorbed or appreciated by 100% of all demographics.

 

My advice to you is to let go of the hate, and embrace the force, my young PvP Padawan.

 

I completely disagree.

 

What they have done, is made one path completely worthless to the other. It's not merely about being competitive. You also are assuming that I don't PvP. I'm just some PvE carebear who wants to walk into a Warzone after dinging 50 and compete with everyone.

 

First off... If PvP is REALLY that much different, a PvE carebear cannot just waltz into a warzone and stomp everyone just because they have decent gear. (Remember, the mantra of the leet PvPer is that it is SO much more challenging.)

 

Why should PvP be completely separate from PvE? Seriously... Why? Why should PvP gear suck in PvE and PvE gear suck in PvP? Why can't they both have nice gear rewards that use the same stats?

 

I'll tell you why...

 

Because all of these posers out there who think they are leet PvPers are nothing but crybabies who THEIR time-sink to mean more than anyone else's. They like to THINK that their favored gameplay is SO much more challenging and hard than anything else, when the reality is that skill PvE players can learn it and master it much easier than you want to believe.

 

So you have to create an artificial advantage.

 

Now... I'll tell you why I'm bitter about this, rather than just let you continue to assume you know something about me...

 

I like crafting. I maxed out all six crew skills while my characters were all below lvl 25. I create my own "challenge" in these games by not dinging a level until I have ALL my nice gear made for that level. I deliberately level slower, because I don't care for the whole race-to-max-level-because-nothing-else-matters, and I don't care for most of the zero-attention-span WoW-kiddies who embrace that attitude. (Yeah, I'm old, and most of you are effing NOOBS).

 

I have been doing warzones (since there is no open-world PvP to be had, because of ezmoder PvP warzones) all along. Levels 1-49, blue and purple crafted gear, along with teamwork and playing skill has been working beautifully. I started working on my super-awesome purple-critted max level crafted gear in anticipation of dinging 50.

 

BUT

 

Now I discover that all of my crafting was worthless. Now I am basically FORCED to buy cookie-cutter gear (you can't even do different custom builds because the PvP sets assume there is only ONE way to build the stats for your class). If I don't buy this gear - the SAME CRAP EVERYONE ELSE HAS - then I will suck. Not because I ACTUALLY suck as a player - I know better than that. I will suck because I didn't do the same grind that everyone else did. I chose to NOT follow the crowd, and chose my own path in the game.

 

And here's the REAL icing on the cake.

 

YOU CAN COMPLETELY SUCK AT THE GAME IN EVERY WAY, BUT IF YOU DO YOUR MINDLESS WZ GRIND YOU WILL AUTOMATICALLY GET THE BEST GEAR IN THE GAME. THERE IS NO RISK VS. REWARD TO JUSTIFY THIS, BECAUSE THERE IS NO RISK OF BAD THINGS HAPPENING WHEN YOU DIE / LOOSE.

Here's some more, while I'm at it...

 

I can craft all sorts of custom stats for various classes. My friend plays a Sentinel, and wanted to do a build based on Accuracy and Power. Well, guess what? The PvP gear is all Crit. If he wants Expertise so he doesn't get pwned, he has to abandon any desire he might have had to customize his character for his playstyle or to think outside the box and do something OTHER than what the crowd is doing.

 

Once again, this aspect of crafting that was actually VERY COOL is now COMPLETELY WORTHLESS.

Edited May 27, 2012 by Klapton
typo

What the heck are you talking about?

 

Yes, BM statting sucks. This is true for all BM. Champ statting was much better and more varied.

 

WH statting is not only varied, it lets you trade pretty much any stat for another. Power vs Crit, Surge vs Accuracy, End vs mainstat (any dpsers actually *buying* those 100End implants?)... I've spent way too much time looking at the various gear combos to try for an optimal stat mix.

I completely disagree.

 

What they have done, is made one path completely worthless to the other.

 

Yeah, I dont think you understood what I was saying in my post that you quoted. The POINT is that they are separate, and one cannot do well in one, and automatically transcribe that into the other. This IS the point. They are supposed to be different types of gameplay with different types of goals, gear, etc.

 

It's okay for you to not like this, because as I said above, the world cannot cater to everyone. You are the minority. And yeah, we might have a few people that agree with you that want to voice themselves on the forums but if you ask every single SWTOR subscriber if they think its cool to have two different paths of challenge, you can bet your sweet arse that they will tell you, heck yeah we like this. I want different challenges, different goals, and different routes in which to achieve these goals.

 

Some people don't play PvE, or don't have a guild with access to all of the endgame content. If you discredited their inability to compete, and compare it with the complete 100% availability to compete via hard work in the PvP arena, I think you'll find it making a heck of a lot more sense.

 

EDIT: I feel your pain about wanting more customized options though, More options are always better.

Edited May 27, 2012 by Lunez

if you really shouldn't Que warrzone till you get recruit gear, then why does the pvp venders all the way there sell gear for lvl 20 and 40?

if you really shouldn't Que warrzone till you get recruit gear, then why does the pvp venders all the way there sell gear for lvl 20 and 40?

 

You shouldn't queue Warzones till you get Recruit gear IF you are level 50. It doesn't apply to low-level chars.

If you leave pvp till level 50 your a fool.

 

Trying to grind 50 ranks+ post 50 you will pull your hair out.

 

Ideally you should try to be at or very close to valour rank 50 when you turn 50, converting coms after level 40, so when you do hit 50 you get a leg up and can buy several bits of BM gear.

Ideally you should try to be at or very close to valour rank 50 when you turn 50, converting coms after level 40, so when you do hit 50 you get a leg up and can buy several bits of BM gear.

 

Is there a cap on WZ commendations?

 

Would any one recommend buying the BM gear and saving it in the bank until hitting 50? For reference, I'm currently lvl 29, if it affects the decision.

cap on WZ is 2000