Combat balance, what's your bitch?

[Azuredream]

No ability to firmly toggle off companion abilities, like forever.  Looking at you and your damn harpoon-spamming-every-single-NPC Corso!

You should be able to. Expand your companions quickslot and all their abilities should show up to toggle on or off.

It works perfectly on my Inquisitor for turning off AoEs and such, but Doc on my Sentinel will never remember to turn off Carbonite Stream no matter how many times I tell him to stop doing it.

[Merusk]

Does he never stop, or does he only stop until the next time you zone or he's summoned after disappearing?   Guard is this way when applied to companions. Hop off a speeder?  Recast guard.  Went into an instance? Recast guard.   

There's something goofy on companions and persistent buffs/ toggles.

[Azuredream]

As you say, it works until he's unsummoned or you go through a loading screen.

[Jherad]

Jedi Guardian: buttons that don't work AT ALL on gold+ mobs are stupid. That's basically it.

1) With a Sith Juggernaut, This.

2) Class instance quests seemingly balanced for a tank Spec, highly frustrating as a DPS.

At 42, with well leveled custom gear, I am starting to feel like the weakest Sith in the galaxy within class story quests.

[jakonovski]

Lightsaber tanks are really sucky it seems. Starting to hate my Guardian.

[Der Helm]

No ability to firmly toggle off companion abilities, like forever.  Looking at you and your damn harpoon-spamming-every-single-NPC Corso!

You should be able to. Expand your companions quickslot and all their abilities should show up to toggle on or off.

They randomly decide to turn the toggle back on. 

[Ingmar]

No ability to firmly toggle off companion abilities, like forever.  Looking at you and your damn harpoon-spamming-every-single-NPC Corso!

You should be able to. Expand your companions quickslot and all their abilities should show up to toggle on or off.

Yes but several of the companions have an issue where they'll toggle it back on.

[Paelos]

Lightsaber tanks are really sucky it seems. Starting to hate my Guardian.

At what level? As with most tanks, your lvl appropriate gear could be a factor.

[Venkman]

No ability to firmly toggle off companion abilities, like forever.  Looking at you and your damn harpoon-spamming-every-single-NPC Corso!

You should be able to. Expand your companions quickslot and all their abilities should show up to toggle on or off.

They randomly decide to turn the toggle back on. 

It seems to be related to summoning, but only in some cases. On Corso, Harpoon Shot will not remember the "I turned this goddamned thing off" state. So every time I leave my vehicle and Corso reappears, I need to turn it off. Which I always forget to do. Meanwhile, his AOEs stay off or on just fine.

[Montague]

Lightsaber tanks are really sucky it seems. Starting to hate my Guardian.

At what level? As with most tanks, your lvl appropriate gear could be a factor.

My friend just hit 50 with the Jugg and is having a rough time of it in Ilum. A silver and normal with him and Quinn and a medpack take him down to 20% health. A silver alone with all cooldowns up kills him.

[Ingmar]

The mobs on Ilum are definitely tougher. I didn't quite have that level of trouble (as a guardian tank, so should be the same roughly) but it was a noticeable notch up from Corellia.

[zardoz]

The mobs on Ilum are definitely tougher. I didn't quite have that level of trouble (as a guardian tank, so should be the same roughly) but it was a noticeable notch up from Corellia.

Yeah Ilum quest are harder and I really hate it that some see through stealth + some quest seems to have a big baf radius, so you need to clean up around the main target first....


Do the belsavis one first. Do the solo one and you can buy with 8 marks a 126dps hilt/barrel. If you have stealth you can solo the heroic quest but I guess as a Juggernaut this is not a option. However I know only the republic quest, maybe the empire side has different ones.....


I hope someday the fix the bugs with disappearing act. So many times you stay in combat after a vanish thanks to your companion + ability delay in pvp is %$$&$......

[jakonovski]

Lightsaber tanks are really sucky it seems. Starting to hate my Guardian.

At what level? As with most tanks, your lvl appropriate gear could be a factor.

Only 26, so you're probably right. One factor is that I haven't seen a single shield generator drop after the Esseles. A DPS offhand dropped like 8 levels ago so that's good I suppose.

A good way of putting things is this: I spent all my creds on crafting before level 25. Then I started saving up for a speeder. I quested until I had 15k, of which 5k went to repairs.

[Tyrnan]

No ability to firmly toggle off companion abilities, like forever.  Looking at you and your damn harpoon-spamming-every-single-NPC Corso!

You should be able to. Expand your companions quickslot and all their abilities should show up to toggle on or off.

Yes but several of the companions have an issue where they'll toggle it back on.

Just did a quick check on the companions I have access to (Corso, Bowdaar, Risha, Qyzen and Kaliyo) and slots 6 and 9 on all their bars are bugged and will turn back on every time. Additionally, slot 8 on Bowdaar (Wookie Roar) does it too.

[Merusk]

Lightsaber tanks are really sucky it seems. Starting to hate my Guardian.

At what level? As with most tanks, your lvl appropriate gear could be a factor.

Only 26, so you're probably right. One factor is that I haven't seen a single shield generator drop after the Esseles. A DPS offhand dropped like 8 levels ago so that's good I suppose.

Shields, Focus & Generators all drop pretty rarely. However, they can be crafted by artifice so someone in your guild should be able to provide for you.

[Hayduke]

Companions not remembering when you turn off their abilities almost made me respec out of the gunslinger's AE tree into marksmanship.  Turning off harpoon shot every five minutes is damned obnoxious.

Also second to the way too many abilities problem.  WAR had this problem, but at least it had macros and a UI that was moddable so I could install a conditionals addon.  The game just screams for the ability to let us make macros given how many abilities we get that have requirements to even use them.

Balance wise I think the game's alright.  Without things like parsers it's going to take a little more time to find the dominant builds.  And with 50s screwing over warzones there's no good way to judge in WZs yet.  Storyline wise though it's way out of whack.  Just seems like BioWare spent a lot more time on the Empire side and it's showing.  And of course it seems like Republic got the short end of the stick when it came to combat animations since a lot of them root them in place.

[Nebu]

Balance wise I think the game's alright.  Without things like parsers it's going to take a little more time to find the dominant builds.  And with 50s screwing over warzones there's no good way to judge in WZs yet.  Storyline wise though it's way out of whack.  Just seems like BioWare spent a lot more time on the Empire side and it's showing.  And of course it seems like Republic got the short end of the stick when it came to combat animations since a lot of them root them in place.

Balance is actually much better than I would have previously known.  Right now, the regular pvp crowd has nearly a full set of champion gear.  I'm finding the top contributors on the server to be very similar in output and consistency once I factor in heals and the like.  I think that a 50-only battleground will be quite fun.  I just hope that the cc issue gets sorted out (re: resolve working, fair distribution among classes, immunities, purges, etc.).

I have to say that I enjoy the pvp much more than I would have originally thought.

[Threash]

What's wrong with resolve? i know i've seen it working plenty of times.

[Zetor]

Most of the roots go through resolve, which can be brutal (I have been chain-charged on my vanguard by 2 sith on a fire pit and died, even though I started to walk across the pit with a full white resolve bar).

[tmp]

Shields, Focus & Generators all drop pretty rarely. However, they can be crafted by artifice so someone in your guild should be able to provide for you.

They also show up fairly often in the treasure hunting mission loot boxes. Blue ones every now and then, even.

[jakonovski]

Shields, Focus & Generators all drop pretty rarely. However, they can be crafted by artifice so someone in your guild should be able to provide for you.

They also show up fairly often in the treasure hunting mission loot boxes. Blue ones every now and then, even.

Really? I now know one of my Smuggler alt's gathering professions.

[Fordel]

Yea, I've been using a purple shield generators for most of my levels thanks to the super expensive comm vendor boxes.

[MournelitheCalix]

Bodyguard:  The tree has severe problems due to no combat enhancements completing even solo content.  Fights against healing strongs and elites can routinely last 7 minutes even using the dart and jet pack interrupts.  To pure bodyguards the problem is so severe that you can get caught in your class quest and wait more than 5 days being stuck until customer service extricates you.  We have several bodyguard BHs that were stuck unable to finish their class quest, unable to leave, and unable to bring in help due to the progress they made in the story quest.  Additionally I know that personally I am stuck on the Ilum class finale unable to kill the admiral, unable to heal myself because the boss debuffs prevent healing, unable to remove the debuffs using the cure ability.  Essentially the boss negates my whole tree.  

Simply put the solo content is not balanced well for all specs.  The tree needs desperately a buff to its survivability or the ability to debuff.  Personally I am for the latter.

[Nebu]

The mobs on Ilum are definitely tougher. I didn't quite have that level of trouble (as a guardian tank, so should be the same roughly) but it was a noticeable notch up from Corellia.

The Ilum quests get much easier when your companion is well geared.  The dailies also pay VERY well. 

[devildog]

The shielding and defense mechanic on tanks only working on 15% on the abilities in pvp. Tree skills that are related to shielding being rendered fairly worthless.

[Ingmar]

The shielding and defense mechanic on tanks only working on 15% on the abilities in pvp. Tree skills that are related to shielding being rendered fairly worthless.

This is pretty normal for tanks in MMO pvp. Not saying it is good, but it is certainly normal. Can't parry a fireball, etc.

[Nevermore]

Except in Star Wars canon, Jedi routinely parry lightning bolts.  And why exactly wouldn't an energy shield work on... well everything?

[Lantyssa]

Magnetized bullets.

[Sky]

The shielding and defense mechanic on tanks only working on 15% on the abilities in pvp. Tree skills that are related to shielding being rendered fairly worthless.

Shieldtechs are fun...until you find something that does elemental/internal. Then you're looking at taking something like 40% more damage 40% of the time. Then stack on the penalty for not having expertise gear (new 50) and pvp is so awesome. If you don't get in right away, you are penalized the entire time you pvp until you finally slog your way to being fully geared. I like a little light pvp, but in both Rift and TOR, I just don't get how people can put up with that steep climb.

I'm interested to see how my Shadow tank develops, though.

Also, in SW canon, Jedi hate those little shieldy bots that seem to be the toughest form of droid.

[Nebu]

Four obvious faults that I'm seeing:

1) Inequality among the healing classes.  Sorc/Sage are >>> all

2) Tanks don't get enough tools to be optimal.  They would benefit from shorter cooldowns on taunts and another interrupt.

3) Damage type makes a HUGE difference.

4) PvP and PvE seem to favor ranged classes in an obvious way.  Well-played melee can still do their job equally, but it takes more finesse than ranged.

[devildog]

Yea, without going into it in depth, there are tank problems in pvp. They don't dodge,block, or shield a lot of attacks you would expect to be defensible from other games, like certain melee strikes to the face and the like. As was said, it all depends on damage type, and it really has no rhyme or reason in this game. Classes have varying attack damage types, and once they figure out what can be shielded and what not to use, that 15% goes down as people don't use those skills against you. In pve as a tank you will see your shield go off a lot. Bear in mind this isn't an outright block of all damage, but rather an absorb of a certain percentage, like shield block. Some attacks avoid shielding, armor, and your defenses, and to no surprise are very popular builds. Now, i could even possibly see these being the anti-tank specs, but that isn't the case. The anti-tank classes are the anti-everyone spec, so there is no real drawback to speccing that way.

The alternative is to try and spec dps as a vanguard or other tank. I can only speak for the vanguard, but their dps specs aren't anything to write home about. Your mileage may vary on that, but i found it very lackluster. On a positive note, i think eventually they will figure out the defensive side of tanks aren't working in pvp and will adjust, but i assume they have bigger fish to fry at the moment with the illum disaster and other issues. I'm having some fun on a commando healer/dps alt until then.

I think when and if they get combat logs working we're going to see  a lot of these problems come to the forefront, until then i'm just trying to enjoy the parts of the game that seem to work fine.

[Ingmar]

I feel like I have plenty of tools for tanking, in fact they're generally better than my tools in WoW were, in particular my area taunt is better and on a shorter cooldown to boot. I already feel like I have a huge number of interrupts also.

What sucks is my threat.

[Lantyssa]

Threat harder.

[Mrbloodworth]

Totalbiscuit - Interview - Gabe Amantangelo

[Threash]

Summary please?