Good, Bad, I'm the guy with the gun. [Trooper/BH Mechanics]

[Draegan]

I hit level 16 before I went to bed last night and equiped two blasters from Kaas City comms.  Did a flying missing for 10k xp and hit the sack.

Can't wait to get back and blow more shit up.

Best part of a BH

[Sky]

I also ran one flying mission before bed last night. Actually read the tutorial tips and learned space for barrel roll and that you can rt-drag to select multiple missile targets. Made things go much easier.

[kildorn]

Also helps if you just buy all the first tier space gear immediately. It's a good way to polish off a level or two between planets, and kind of relaxing imo.

[Draegan]

Also helps if you just buy all the first tier space gear immediately. It's a good way to polish off a level or two between planets, and kind of relaxing imo.

Oooh I actually forgot my ship gear and the reward I got.  I need me some.

Space is a barrel roll?  Didn't know that.  Did know the drag thing.

[sam, an eggplant]

I ended up just leveling as a shield tech, the tanking tree of powertech. Seems fine so far, although I'm still on Dromund Kaas so it's difficult to tell if my lack of DPS will hurt me later on.

[Merusk]

Fuck it.. outlive, outlast!

Tank spec all the way!

[sam, an eggplant]

This isn't EQ where soloing to max level is an accomplishment in of itself, killing speed matters.

[Zetor]

When questing, I find myself deliberately looking for clumps of 4+ mobs so I can one-shot them with Mortar Kombat... once a minute. 

[Ingmar]

This isn't EQ where soloing to max level is an accomplishment in of itself, killing speed matters.

Bringing a DPS companion should make that pretty acceptable, you only need your healer for the hard stuff.

[Merusk]

If you're overly-concerned about it, just start putting points into one of the DPS trees instead.  You get a tank companion in the Jawa.  I doubt the killing speed is ever going to diminish to WOW-BC Era tank vs. rogue levels either way.

[sam, an eggplant]

Obviously if it gets slow I'll switch to a DPS tree. My question was if anyone here had leveled as a tank-specced trooper/BH and if so, if it was crap.

[Ingmar]

Fordel went all the way to 50 as a tank trooper in beta and had no trouble I believe.

[Fordel]

Yeaup.


If you go Tank Spec on your BH, just keep little Mako at your side the entire time. The only time the tank spec trooper/BH is sad is when they don't have their healer companion.

It will go slower, but not because your tank specced, EVERYONE goes slower as mob HP keeps scaling up and up. Like things you are out right obliterating with MortarVolley/DeathFromAbove now, will survive with 50-75% health left in the upper brackets. Like yea, your mob kill speed in a vacuum is slower then a DPS guy, but you won't have downtime and you'll be able to solo shit they really can't manage on their own. It's nothing like Vanilla/TBC WoW, where being tank specced means plink plink plink damage. It's much more like Wrath tank specced, where you just mow down packs with massive AE damage and without the downtime.



The only downside to Tank Spec leveling is you really need to use your healer companion, so everyone else is window dressing for your ship basically. It suuuuuucks without your healing companion past like, level 20-25. The few class quests that forced me to use the other companions were so fucking annoying to do, having to 'drink up' every pull, use half my cooldowns every pull. Some of that was wacky Beta mob balance, but not all of it. If you want to cruise around with the little Jawa, you'll want to spec something else probably, Tank Spec + Tank Companion is kinda shitty.


But the only thing more self sufficient then TankSpec + Healer Companion is the Healing Spec + Dps/Tank companion.

[sam, an eggplant]

Awesome, great news.

Yeah, I'm not gonna play a healer healing a NPC for 50 levels.

[Fordel]

You don't heal them as much as you'd think, but yea it's more fun being healed then doing the healing while leveling.

[Sjofn]

Awesome, great news.

Yeah, I'm not gonna play a healer healing a NPC for 50 levels.

I hardly healed my tank guy as my sage, to be honest, unless it was a nasty fight, I mostly pew pew'd with a little CC thrown in. :P Then for giggles I duoed with my heal companion for a while, that was just silly. <3

[Evildrider]

I'm up to level 31 on my Mercenary.  I hated the fact that I get to my last fight for Chapter 1 and then notice the "Server will be shutting down in 10 minutes" pop up in the chat window.   

[Sky]

When questing, I find myself deliberately looking for clumps of 4+ mobs so I can one-shot them with Mortar Kombat... once a minute. 

I feel compelled to just DFA groups of weak/normal mobs if it's up....just cuz.

I've also taken to using my flamethrower a lot more, it will be nice to nab a couple more heat venting options.

I'd already heard the bit about powertanks being tied to Mako for the whole run, kinda sucks for versatility but I like Mako and I love the tank spec thus far. Hopefully when dual spec goes in I'll get to use Blizz some. Mako has now healed us through BT a few times as the only healer, and we ran a 4-man heroic quest on Kaas (kill the sith chick) with 2 tanks and a dps, mako healing and it went great. She's not too bad. Then just before the boss instance at the end our sniper disconnected, so the jugg and I duo'd the boss with our companions. Reallly close but we squeaked it out. Companions are a phenomenal addition to the game. A cockblock 'lf healer' turned into a fun creative romp.

[Merusk]

I  Flamethrower.

But I always had far too much fun with it in the Jango Fett game that came out for the PS2 as well.

[Evildrider]

When questing, I find myself deliberately looking for clumps of 4+ mobs so I can one-shot them with Mortar Kombat... once a minute. 

I feel compelled to just DFA groups of weak/normal mobs if it's up....just cuz.

I've also taken to using my flamethrower a lot more, it will be nice to nab a couple more heat venting options.

I'd already heard the bit about powertanks being tied to Mako for the whole run, kinda sucks for versatility but I like Mako and I love the tank spec thus far. Hopefully when dual spec goes in I'll get to use Blizz some. Mako has now healed us through BT a few times as the only healer, and we ran a 4-man heroic quest on Kaas (kill the sith chick) with 2 tanks and a dps, mako healing and it went great. She's not too bad. Then just before the boss instance at the end our sniper disconnected, so the jugg and I duo'd the boss with our companions. Reallly close but we squeaked it out. Companions are a phenomenal addition to the game. A cockblock 'lf healer' turned into a fun creative romp.

Blizz is a ranged tank in heavy armor.  I'm sure you can use him instead of Mako if you are DPS.

[Fabricated]

I'm hoping the trooper story picks up more on Taris when I get back there. Corusant really is a bore as a trooper; my boss is a dick and Jorgan is as shitty and unlikable as Corso with the one benefit that he talks a lot less in combat.

[Pezzle]

Bore as a Trooper??  What exactly are you expecting?  The gun toting classes in this game are far more engaging than the force users on both sides.  As a trooper you are about to pick up an interesting if somewhat predictable companion + storyline.  This is bioware, do not expect a masterpiece.

[Ginaz]

I'm hoping the trooper story picks up more on Taris when I get back there. Corusant really is a bore as a trooper; my boss is a dick and Jorgan is as shitty and unlikable as Corso with the one benefit that he talks a lot less in combat.

Hush your mouth!  Troopers are awesome.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViavxtT7Lpo&feature=related

[Evildrider]

Why do people take good songs and make shitty covers.   

[Pezzle]

question about the Trooper story

[Zetor]

question about the Trooper story

Anyway, hit the 30s and my vanguard's really coming into his own now -- both in pve and pvp. The only downside (as said earlier in this thread) is that I -have- to use Dorne or suffer downtime and even danger of dying in larger pulls. Doing cat-dude's quest was pretty annoying for that reason.

[Fordel]

[Evildrider]

Sooo I like the BH so much I'm probably making a Powertech once my Merc hits 50.   

[Fordel]

I'm probably going to end up with two Troopers as well.


You are all shocked, I know. 

[Lantyssa]

Only two?

[rattran]

I'm enjoying Merc much more than Marauder. Setting people on fire beats yelling at them. And Mako is easier to keep happy than Vette.

[Ginaz]

Managed to get my third companion tonight at level 24.

[Sky]

Sooo I like the BH so much I'm probably making a Powertech once my Merc hits 50.   

The thought had crossed my mind to make a Merc and go dark side with him. (My PT is light side)

[murdoc]

Sooo I like the BH so much I'm probably making a Powertech once my Merc hits 50.   

I'm totally doing this. I already have him sitting and waiting to go.

[sam, an eggplant]

I'm leveling a BH powertech (shield) and jedi guardian (vigilance) simultaneously and I've got to say that the BH is much, much, much better solo. It's not just the healing companion, although that's a huge improvement-- BHs have tons of AE, and every fight is 4-5 dudes. Also, the resource mechanic of burning energy is much better for soloing than the JK's build/spend rage mechanic. Just a massive improvement.

The JK is fine too, jumping into melee is fun and the astromech droid companion is cute as a button, but it's nowhere near as effective as the BH even if you don't include death from above. With DFA, they're in totally different ball fields. I'm only level 20ish on both, so hopefully the JK just started slow and picks up at later levels.