Republic....boring

[Auld]

Bronze_d: Powertech BH's only use one gun.

[Bronze_D]

i know which is why my alt is a BH powertech,

even though i already have a maxed out vanguard.

i just wish there is a viable ranged class that can use the blaster rifles or single blaster pistol... (since vanguard and powertech which are mirror class of each other are NOT an actual ranged class) when i first started vanguard i tried to emulate a clone trooper as much as possible which u'd think would be easy given how much of republic trooper is inspired from. Big mistake as i then find out my end game vanguard is stockstriking ppl in the face and tazering them all the time and hardly if ever fired blaster fire except as a filler to keep ammo level steady.

[Marcus Dunn]

The smuggler is really fun to play – am currently lvl 46 and into act 3. I have to say though that I preferred the Act 1 story – Act 2-3 has picked up, but it became quite generic I thought – ie go to this planet, do a special mission for the republic, as opposed to act 1 being quite specifically focused around a very smuggleresque storyline.

The smuggler character is a great mix of Han Solo and Captain Mal from firefly. I have played mine as a super light character – I would recommend if you play one to not go down either light or dark paths, but play it as a mixture of both. I feel I have missed some awesome badass/smartass style responses by playing the super good guy.

I think all of the storylines cannot be either just called good or bad – I think as someone said, they can be slow burning. You need to play them, bear with them and enjoy the ride as they tend to definitely have their highs and lows.

One of my favourite parts of the Smuggler story occurred on Tattooine, with a classic 3 enemies facing each other type scenario (ie mass pistol aiming) – there are some genuinely piss funny moments.
I’d love to experience the imperial agent, but I am kinda over the Smuggler style of gameplay and fear IA is going to be the same – that is, unless I play it as a healer/stealthier. My smuggler is sharpshooter specced Gunslinger – so cover dependant. I am not a huge fan of being tied to using cover.

[Auld]

Bronze_D: Play a Sniper or the Smuggler equivalent. Sounds like what you are asking for.

Marcus: Only problem with being neutral is there are no neutral relics and you can gimp yourself gearwise later in the game. Although you could mix it up on the way to 40 then farm light/dark points later on.

As for the Operative, the dialogue was great. Stealth + stabbing people was fun. Your first companion is truly evil so its a great class to be a real **** with, I thoroughly enjoyed full darkside on this guy.

[Vencha88]

Yeah they've really goofed with the choice department, Hul'kh is a very grey Jedi who tends to kill all imperials and traitors for the greater war effort, but is kind and forgiving to those weaker on the republic side. In the end, I am essentially level 40 and only light 1, so everything is locked off to me.

I've heard they intend to get stuff out there for grey people, but it's annoying that I can't use commendations because I played the character I wanted too.

[Bronze_D]

neutral items is on the way but when exactly will it come god knows...

until then we're basically boned gear wise if we don't stick to either majority evil or majority saint.

well not armorwise since options are plentiful there, but relics in particular hits us hard for being neutral.

Bronze_D: Play a Sniper or the Smuggler equivalent. Sounds like what you are asking for.

Gunslinger is out of the question since they dual wield and i hate dual wield, scoundrel is a short/melee range similar to vanguard/powertech so that doesn't help either...

sniper is about the only one that somewhat fits the bill though i then lose the armor choice i want and they don't exactly fill the air with blaster bolts either (well they are sniper... what else am i expecting).

it's really disappointing because i started the whole thing trying to get as close as possible to a clone trooper design... but then i realize that there is no way to do so while remaining effective. Blaster rifle is just not a good ranged weapon, or rather there is no ranged class that uses blaster rifle.. with talent tree designed around blaster rifles, sniper uses sniper rifle instead with skills based on few shots, while operative like the scoundrel counterpart is a short range/melee range stealth fighter.

[Auld]

Operative is pretty much all blaster/nades if you spec down the Lethality tree instead of Concealement(stabby tree).

[Marcus Dunn]

That's nice to know there's neutral items on the way, as you're seriously playing a pretty one dimensional character if you try and max either light or dark - just for those items. While I've gone solid white, as I said, I wish in hindsight i'd taken the middle road - as my character could have been so much more interesting overall.

[Bronze_D]

indeed, i personally can't really stomach full light or full dark as in either side u have to make some pretty damning stupid choice at times if u do so... some of which makes no sense logically.

Operative is pretty much all blaster/nades if you spec down the Lethality tree instead of Concealement(stabby tree).

except u r still forced to fight at 10m range or less (like scoundrel) to do ur damage so it's no different than vanguard/powertech.

vanguard/powertech/operative/scoundrel

are not ranged class per say, they r melee class with some ranged attacks... despite the deceptive look they portray, being armed with blasters etc.. the main difference is that vanguard/powertech have more defensive and survivability when fired directly plus access to charge and grappling hook whereas scoundrel/operative rely on stealth to make up for their lack of heavy armor and extra tools that vanguard and powertech have.

they can kill regular or even strong and elite mobs with decent play using nothing but 30m ranged attacks, but it is neither effective at doing so (compared to one that fights in short/melee range) nor can they be expected to stand up toe to toe against actual ranged class in that manner.

[Marius]

One of my favourite parts of the Smuggler story occurred on Tattooine, with a classic 3 enemies facing each other type scenario (ie mass pistol aiming) – there are some genuinely piss funny moments.
I’d love to experience the imperial agent, but I am kinda over the Smuggler style of gameplay and fear IA is going to be the same – that is, unless I play it as a healer/stealthier. My smuggler is sharpshooter specced Gunslinger – so cover dependant. I am not a huge fan of being tied to using cover.

Try switching to saboteur or dirty fighting specs. My sab only uses cover 25% of the time... I've also made a dirty fighting spec that uses cover 0% of the time.

[Bronze_D]

alternatively play operative, which like scoundrel are not cover dependent at all... because all their most effective skills does not require cover instead they are usually position dependent
ie: ur bread and butter dps move that ur talent tree revolves around is usually a point blank, on the back move or a very short range offensive skill.

essentially u sacrifice range coming from sniper or gunslinger, for being completely mobile and stealthy.

u can't do effective dps from range, and now have to enter melee or very short range to do ur dps, but on the upside u have no need for cover to do them and u have access to stealth.

and operative doesn't necessarily need the stealth either... in PvE cases as long as ur companion tank the damage u can just focus on the backstab moves or poison based talents, all u need is usually for their back to be facing you (the angle is quite wide and sidestab is perfectly viable too)

in PvP is where things get a bit complicated and stealth is indispensable.

[Marius]

I consider dirty fighting gunslinger even more mobile than scoundrel/operative, because their skills are both used outside of cover and don't require position.

The basic dirty fighter rotaiton goes like this:

Vital shot
Shrap bomb
wounding shots
Hemorrhaging blast
Quickdraw

All of which are used outside of cover.

The downside to that rotation is that while it's massive single target DPS from 35 meters out, it's energy intensive and that's the only thing it does. So it's not so great for levelling, though excellent for end game PvE and PvP.


Saboteur is similarly non-cover dependent. Their biggest skills are:

Thermal grenade (non cover)
Sweeping gunfire (non cover)
XS Freighter Flyby (non cover)
Incendiary grenade (non cover) or Shrap Bomb if doing a hybrid build (non cover)
Quickdraw (non cover)
Speedshots (cover)
Sabotage charge (cover, but is an instant attack)

To make up for the defence of being out of cover so much sabs get a massively more powerful defence screen. The only thing with saboteur is that sabotage charge and speed shots are important to use, so you'll be dropping in and out of cover often, even if just to channel in speed shots.

Sabs are also a little harder to use in PvP than sharpshooters or dirty fighters, as they require a lot of team coordination to keep enemies in their blast zones. Although they are potentially the most powerful gunslinger in group pvp for this reason.

[Bronze_D]

much more mobile yeah, but not entirely mobile either... unless it's different from the sniper equivalent as you still need to channel the hemorrhaging blast (that's the sniper's cull equivalent i take it) a 3 second channeled attack (minus ur alacrity) as the main punch of the rotation that does the big chunk of the damage.

similarly sweeping gunfire if i understand correctly is the equivalent to the suppressive fire of the IA which again is not instant and channeled.

that's the key to operative/scoundrel... many of their most useful moves are instant including their best damaging moves that delivers the punch.

and scoundrel/operative have the extra advantage in one on one PvP because their opener moves knocks ppl down if specced for their offhand focused talents...

to the best of my knowledge there is no way to get out of a knockdown, u can remove stuns, but not knockdown... so properly timed, a scoundrel/operative will open up and have u face down on the ground and stab/shoot u full of lead first before anything else and by the time u get up he shaved a good chunk of ur health, then follow it up with simple looping (and self sustaining) moves.

[Marius]

I dunno. My leveling as a gunsligner is throw up defence screen then spam instant thermal grenades every 3 seconds - pretty easy.

I get what you're saying about the channels, but the lack of instant attacks seems to be balanced out by the lack of need to run up 35 meters to punch who you want to hurt.

The main culprit with gunslinger mobility is the need to drop into cover, since that takes up to a second during which you're not doing any damage. Has its advantages especially with hunker down, but I don't like to rely on it too much.

[Auld]

Operatives backstab has a very long cool down - standing behind someone only makes your rotation smoother.