SW: The Old Republic Part 5

[Raithe]

I don't think I'm quite that desperate yet..

[Hurlshort]

I feel bad for switching, because I did play with Raithe a few times back when it was released, but the game runs much smoother for me on the west coast servers.

[ShadySands]

Been enjoying Makeb quite a bit though I'm a little disappointed they didn't expand on the class and companion stories

 

Also grinding all the lower level heroics for planetary comms to update all my companions gear to purple level 50 mods

[Nepenthe]

Perhaps Raithe should consider... the Red Eclipse?

[Raithe]

Unfortunately, now I've got two connected guilds (Imp and Republic) and a sister on the server currently. I can't run out just for chance to hang with the "cool kids"

[ShadySands]

Still chugging along on Makeb

 

I've stopped using Xalek as a tank for most things now and only bring him out for really hard boss fights. Using Ashara makes most trash and strong mobs easy work and only multiple elites and champions that hit waaay too hard are a challenge at this point, but the really heavy hitters tear through Xalek like wet paper also.

 

Gear wise I'm trying to find the right balance with crit, surge, and power. I haven't really bothered with accuracy or alacrity as even with the lower resistance and the GCD bonus it still doesn't seem that worthwhile of a trade off over raw damage.

[Guest Slinky]

Gear wise I'm trying to find the right balance with crit, surge, and power. I haven't really bothered with accuracy or alacrity as even with the lower resistance and the GCD bonus it still doesn't seem that worthwhile of a trade off over raw damage.

You were dps sorc right?

 

Optimal would be 0 crit 0 alacrity 100% accuracy 70% surge and as much power as you possibly can get. They absolutely destroyed crit in the 2.0 patch, which was beyond stupid if you ask me.

[ShadySands]

 

Gear wise I'm trying to find the right balance with crit, surge, and power. I haven't really bothered with accuracy or alacrity as even with the lower resistance and the GCD bonus it still doesn't seem that worthwhile of a trade off over raw damage.

You were dps sorc right?

 

Optimal would be 0 crit 0 alacrity 100% accuracy 70% surge and as much power as you possibly can get. They absolutely destroyed crit in the 2.0 patch, which was beyond stupid if you ask me.

 

 

Yep, DPS Sorc with a Madness hybrid spec

 

All my attacks are instant or channeled and I put up decent numbers (but I'm sure it's not optimal) with stacking dots, force lightning/force storm, and lightning strike/chain lightning whenever I can instacast them but I kinda miss having a real heavy hitter attack just to see a really high number flash across the screen.

[Spider]

You were dps sorc right?

 

Optimal would be 0 crit 0 alacrity 100% accuracy 70% surge and as much power as you possibly can get. They absolutely destroyed crit in the 2.0 patch, which was beyond stupid if you ask me.

 

 

The death of crit is somewhat exaggerated.  Power is stronger for most dps classes all the way through the curve, but 100-200 crit isn't that far behind, and for some classes even equal.

 

Don't know the gearing goals for sorc dps though, but 0 crit and all power is probably optimal. but a piece that give more crit than power is still probably better overall. (maybe not if it's a 1 point difference, but at 10 points crit could very well be stronger).

Edited July 2, 2013 by Spider

[Guest Slinky]

 

You were dps sorc right?

 

Optimal would be 0 crit 0 alacrity 100% accuracy 70% surge and as much power as you possibly can get. They absolutely destroyed crit in the 2.0 patch, which was beyond stupid if you ask me.

 

The death of crit is somewhat exaggerated.  Power is stronger for most dps classes all the way through the curve, but 100-200 crit isn't that far behind, and for some classes even equal.

 

Don't know the gearing goals for sorc dps though, but 0 crit and all power is probably optimal. but a piece that give more crit than power is still probably better overall. (maybe not if it's a 1 point difference, but at 10 points crit could very well be stronger).

 

I would't say crit is dead, but I would say its destroyed without feeling too dramatic

 

38% or more crit chance was great for some specs pre 2.0, but now if you have more than 25% crit, chances are you have too much crit rating, no matter what class/spec you are using.

Sure, difference between the first 150 power and crit rating are small now, but pre 2.0 that first 150 crit rating was veeeery beneficial for everyone except tanks. Now you can completely ignore it on many specs and go for full power, which I find boring.

 

Also their attempt to make alacrity useful for everyone failed quite miserably at the same time.

[Gorth]

Also their attempt to make alacrity useful for everyone failed quite miserably at the same time.

Who would alacrity be useful for?

 

Since my dedicated healer Commando is due for equipment upgrade, I was having a look at surge and alacrity, since those healing powers are often needed here and now (as in, immediately) when you get "spikes" in your workload and the tank suddenly drops from max to almost dead.

[Guest Slinky]

 

Also their attempt to make alacrity useful for everyone failed quite miserably at the same time.

Who would alacrity be useful for?

 

Since my dedicated healer Commando is due for equipment upgrade, I was having a look at surge and alacrity, since those healing powers are often needed here and now (as in, immediately) when you get "spikes" in your workload and the tank suddenly drops from max to almost dead.

 

Heh, slight correction to my statement: Alacrity IS useful for everyone, the problems is everything else tends to be more useful than alacrity.

 

Roughly, the more channeled abilities you have and use, the more useful alacrity is. Looking at commando healers spec, they already get 2% passive alacrity from skills, and extra 3% for 6 secs every time you crit, so I dont think you need huge amounts of it from gear.

 

Also seeing you get 6% tech crit chance from skills, I'd say get surge around 70% and then put the rest to alacrity. Leave accuracy to 0 since you cant miss with heals. Go for all power. Crit is nice for healers, but I dont personally think you need any more of it after the 6% from skills and what you get from aim.

 

I dont have a commando healer my self, mind you, so dont take that as any sort of supreme truth that rules all the other truths

[Gorth]

I dont have a commando healer my self, mind you, so dont take that as any sort of supreme truth that rules all the other truths

No worries, just looking for advice from experienced players who may understand the numbers and skills a bit better than myself.

 

Amusing anecdote... he started life because I had some bad ass damage dealing cyborg with an oversized assault cannon in mind. As it turned out, he always ended up assigned the healer role in flashpoints, so around level 21-22 I respecced him as healer.

 

Of course it was a disaster at the beginning, but then I had the fortune, us getting stuck in Cademimu and players leaving left and right (we couldn't beat Xander), an "oldie" turned up with a lot of helpful tips, telling the noob tank what he was doing wrong and me, the noob healer, how to most efficiently using some of my special abilities. Replacement players weren't that easy to come by either, as it was still on the old APAC servers before the move.

 

I don't remember his name, but my old character is eternally grateful for the advice (patiently) given. Oh, and after an hour and a half, we finally beat the FP.

[Hurlshort]

I don't know why I have so much trouble getting the numbers game in TOR.  I have it down pat in LOTRO.

[Spider]

Actually the amount of channeled abilities or abilities with cast times doesn't matter for alacrity any more. Alacrity also reduces the GCD, so instant abilities benefit just as much. What alacrity doesn't help with is cooldowns, so any class that relies on cooldowns for it's heavy hitting abilities will benefit less from alacrity. Which is virtually all of them. So alacrity isn't very beneficient for DPS classes, although I have seen people trying to incorporate it with decent results. And given the harsh diminishing returns on Surge and pointlessness of going above 100% accuracy, some alacrity will probably be useful in a ger tier or two.

 

Healing is a bit different, since all healers have one long cast heal that heals for a bunch. Not necessarilly your best heals, but they're still there. Personally on my operative healer I want a lot of alacrity. Just shy of 500 was my goal, and until reached that, I took alacrity over surge all the way. Commando healers are a lot more reliant on cooldowns though, so I suppose alacrity might be a bit worse for them, but since having more than 300 surge isn't that great, you'll be bound to take some, I think.

[ShadySands]

Thinking of giving sniper another shot (no pun intended)

 

I haven't been able to get into the shooty classes that much since my wife only wants to play Jedi and I don't like to be bossed around by force users... I get force envy. I do have a mid to high 30 something whatever the tank commando is called but I play him so rarely that I don't even remember the name of class, a low 30's double pew bounty hunter, and I also have a low 20 something operative. I have 2 of each class type (Sith Sorc/Jedi whatever they call assassin, Sith Marauder/Jedi Guardian, etc) except the smuggler/agent and I think I would rather have a sniper than a gunslinger

 

Also, I want to be able to cast all the class buffs instead of just the force ones

Edited July 3, 2013 by ShadySands

[Gorth]

"Tank Commando", that would be Vanguard?

 

The previously mentioned handful of characters that don't get much playtime is mostly there so I have something "meaningful" to do with item drops that my main guys (and my smuggler girl) can't use. I had been playing for number of weeks, before I realised I could email items as attachments (and had been wondering why the galaxy had mailboxes everywhere)

 

Edit: Somewhat unrelated, but one of the first things I invested in was the Legacy unlocks that equips my ships with all the conveniences (GTN, Mailbox etc.) so I don't have to visit the space stations that often. I wonder if there are any plays to also offer mod stations for ships. Whoever designed the space stations apparently thought it funny to place the supply stores and the mod stations in exact opposite ends. Empire and Republic both. Oh, and the Mission Terminal seems bugged, never showing up on the maps, even if set to "tracked". Running around in circles FTW

 

Edit2: The latest introduced bug, that yanks companions out of their crew missions is most frustrating. Done 1 hour and 10 minutes of a 1 hour 15 minute mission? sucks to be you if you forget and mount a speeder. Get shot at, forced to dismount and your bloody companion will happily have wasted the last hour and return to tell you to 'STAND STILL!' (Elara, while jabbing a syringe in my shoulder or whatever).

[Nepenthe]

I don't know why I have so much trouble getting the numbers game in TOR.  I have it down pat in LOTRO.

 

I just don't care.

Of course, that part might have seeped over into my general attitude towards this game, since I've only been in-game once in the past six months... And I couldn't play because I had no idea what they've done to the trees, so I should look that up before I respec to not completely hose myself.

[Gorth]

It took at least 3 seconds for me to realize, that you weren't talking about rainforests...

[Nepenthe]

It took at least 3 seconds for me to realize, that you weren't talking about rainforests...

 

The TREES, WHAT HAVE THEY DONE TO THE TREES?!!!!!111one

 

Yeah.

[ShadySands]

Speaking of trees, I've been playing around with mine 

 

I've been trying to mix in some Corruption into my Madness hybrid but the small amount of extra healing doesn't seem to offset the hit I take on damage in most situations. It worked great for the Archon fight but for the rest of my play session it was just unnecessary healing and prolonged fights.

 

Also, when did they remove the cost of skill resets? I picked up the field respec legacy perk and was just changing everything around on the fly

[Guest Slinky]

Oh, and the Mission Terminal seems bugged, never showing up on the maps, even if set to "tracked". Running around in circles FTW

It does usually take ages to load into existence. Dont know why, just started to do that after some patch. People are constantly asking where the thing is on the fleet.

 

 

I've been trying to mix in some Corruption into my Madness hybrid but the small amount of extra healing doesn't seem to offset the hit I take on damage in most situations. It worked great for the Archon fight but for the rest of my play session it was just unnecessary healing and prolonged fights.

 

Also, when did they remove the cost of skill resets? I picked up the field respec legacy perk and was just changing everything around on the fly

The middle tree, lightning, gives the best dps these days. It's kinda busy though, I was pretty crappy at it when I tried it

 

They removed the respec cost for subscribers when f2p came.

[ShadySands]

I've gone back to my 16 lightning 30 madness build after trying some all out lightning builds. The damage was certainly a little better for random PVE questing but I'm so used to a run and gun play style at this point that it's hard for me to just stand there and cast. Not to mention the healing I get from my DoT crits and death field. At the same time I don't like going full madness because I miss chain lightning, lightning storm, and lightning barrage.

 

If I ever start doing group content then I'll probably make the jump to full lightning

 

EDIT: PS thanks again for all the helpful advice. I feel like I've got a better handle on everything now

Edited July 3, 2013 by ShadySands

[Spider]

If you're interested in healing and dpsing, there's a corruption/lightning hybrid you can run. It's not for the faint of heart though, sooo many procs and dots and stuff to keep track of, but a fun way to solo stuff.

 

Good enough to keep a companion and yourself alive through most things (you're only really missing the aoe heal, which isn't that good when solo-ing anyway), while still dishing out a fair bit of damage.

[Hassat Hunter]

The mission terminal is in the supply section, so you know.

But I know the feeling of it taking long to load (and thus long for icons to appear). Had a hell of a time getting the Section X, Black Hole and Directive 7 quests for my alt last, since not only is it hard to know who gives what, it takes so long for them to appear. And I wasted a lot of time loading up absoulutely nobody before getting all I wanted :/

 

It's since 2.1 btw... and I HATE it...