So, when I get in I'm planning to begin the game as Jedi Consular - Sage. I've not played any betas so I'm not very sure on how easy/hard the leveling is with different specs.

 

I'm typically a dedicated healer in any MMO, and I usually like to run the character through the whole game in a healing spec. How hard will this be in SW:TOR? Will companions make up for some of the lack of DPS or am I looking forward to getting my *** handed to me?

There are 5 different companions wich will help you out. they all have different skills, some are better as tanks, and some are better as dps, since you are planning to roll a healer i would suggest you to play with a tank or dps companion. the down side is that you wont unlock all companions at once, so there might be some struggle at start depending on wich one you get, although if Consular is like Sith Inq. wich it should be I doubt you will have troubles lvling as soon as you get your companion. Sith Inq was really easy for me atleast.

Leveled a sage up to lvl 20, healer specc and had ZERO troubles.

 

Your first companion in each of these classes is designed to be your most efficient 'opposite' class.

 

I.e. as a Bounty hunter/Trooper you get a Healer/DPS companion since you are more of a tanking styled class.

 

As a Warrior/Knight you get a raw DPS class since you can 'tank' or DPS and just burn mobs down.

 

As a Consular you get a tank companion first which is brilliant .

 

So basically, even as a consular sage you STILL get some reasonable damage force abilities. However, because you can also heal efficiently you can let your companion tank multiple mobs while you heal him.

 

E.g. In TOR you've got 'heroic missions', in cat 2, 3 or 4 meaning missions ideally for 2, 3 or 4 people. At lvl 13 i was soloing heroic 2 missions with just my companion, where the mobs had around double my hp, often taking on mobs of 2-3 at a time. Basically i would use my pet to tank 1, i would CC another (you get a 60 sec CC a bit like polymorph from WoW) and then kill a 3rd myself. Further more i then went on to kill mobs with 10k hp with little difficulty!

 

Yes your DPS isn't as much as if you went DPS specc, and you may kill a bit slower than DPS lvlers BUT you can still lvl, you can do really tough encounters solo that DPS would not be able to do AND of course healers are always wanted in groups.....

 

 

 

EDIT:

 

Btw another possibility for you to consider. Remember that the Sage AC has 3 talent trees to choose from. 1 dedicated healer tree, a dedicated DPS tree and the hybrid tree. In the end, if you find that you're struggling while lvling you can always specc into the telekenisis tree for ranged DPS and then go back to healing later....

Edited December 14, 2011 by amandakun

I played Jedi Consular healer spec. Had no problem in PvP and exping. First companion is ugly as hell but he is great tank and good DPS. Brilliant thing is that you can gear him up a a DPS and they he have this extra juice Edited December 14, 2011 by MocnyBrowarek

Thanks so much for the answers, guys, I feel much better at going full-heals from the start!

You will get your first heal other skill at 10 when you choose the sage class. but it is not an easy heal it will take time to get the hang of it...but love playing the sage.

There are 5 different companions wich will help you out. they all have different skills, some are better as tanks, and some are better as dps, since you are planning to roll a healer i would suggest you to play with a tank or dps companion. the down side is that you wont unlock all companions at once, so there might be some struggle at start depending on wich one you get, although if Consular is like Sith Inq. wich it should be I doubt you will have troubles lvling as soon as you get your companion. Sith Inq was really easy for me atleast.

 

Like Sith Inquisitors the Consulars first companion is a melee tank.

Really, a healer spec and dps spec really don't diverge much until L20.

 

You have all the same powers until that point and only small bonuses either way from the skill trees. Some of those bonuses are great and helpful (e.g., large force pool), but not really much in terms of differentiating how the different specs play.