The Old Republic for Dummies

[Miltiades]

To be honest, I still think I use my mouse too much myself. Although I've hotkeys for two rows of skillbars, I tend to only use the first 5 with hotkeys and my mouse for the rest. The thing is, you could use only your keyboard, hitting hotkeys all day long, but especially in harder fights (as in fighting World Bosses, for example), it's important to stay on the move, so I tend to keep my mouse ready at all times.

[snommism]

I think one or two of our guilds healers are "clickers." I was surprised when I learned that because they are both very good healers. I have 3 horizontal bars that i have keymaped to 1 - "=", f1 - f12 and s1-s12, I really only use 1-5 and f1-f5 99% of the time and will click items in the 10+ range.

However, on my gunslinger, every so often i'll have both hands on the keyboard covering all squares of my bars (so many useful skills on a slinger XD )

[Lynk Former]

I thought you and I already had a talk about using hotkeys instead of clicking @ mim

[mimartin]

Yeah, I kind of figured it out the other day, but I've been experimenting during dailies. Even attempted to do that 2+ Heroic on Belsavis solo, with this method, I’m fairly sure I could do it, that is if I wanted to take the time to do it. Got past the first 2 groups without death, but it just took too long to keep my interest. Had I been working on my implants or relic, I may have continue, but since I already have them I’ll stick with the easier faster dailies unless I have help.

 

2 months ago, I couldn't even imagine Brem taking on two strongs and a elite at the same time. Hell two strongs usually meant death.

[Miltiades]

I thought you and I already had a talk about using hotkeys instead of clicking @ mim

The awkward talk with your dad when he tells you to use hotkeys.

[adamqd]

I use both methods, If I can stand in one place its much more precise for me to click, when I'm moving around or in huttball I hotkey. Do what is easier for you, there is no Global standard or skillset you must follow, I'm sure they're are people with the most uneconomical play-styles that'll kick your ass every day. But as you feel you have improved by changing? cool

[Lynk Former]

They probably have better latency I know one of the biggest reasons why I use hotkeys is cause I'm always hovering around the 200ms mark since I'm in Australia... I'd rather not have to add slot clicking to the delay.

[Mav]

psh, I click the **** out of everything

[Pho3nix]

I kind of have a system where some abilities are strictly hotkey and some I click with no downtime since you become so accustomed to where they are on the bars.

[mimartin]

Alright I finally found the perfect TOR character for me, Jedi Consular, Shadow. She is a little fiery Miraluka red head that is lightside, but very independent and non-traditional. Unlike Brem, Leyn’a seeks battle from Elites and Champions and has yet to find one she cannot defeat. However, my only problem is that she does not dress like a traditional jedi. I want more of Aayla Secura look and less of the 100 year old Jedi librarian look. Thus far I’ve gotten this look by wearing the dancers top and everything else traditional jedi, however Lynk is accusing Leyn’a of being a Priss want-to-be, so it is time to upgrade her style. As a trooper I got a random drop of a bare-midriff Jedi Knight top, it was orange, but does anyone know if there is something similar in light armor for the Jedi Consular that is orange? Or does anyone have Synthweaving and the schematic for something like this in orange light armor? I would pay you for it or trade high end biochem stuff for it.

 

Let me know if anyone can help...

[Mav]

Unfortunately mim, you'll find that the Consular gear has the worst looks in the game, with my Shadow I've come to accept the fact that I look retarded.

[Lynk Former]

I've been looking through torhead at all of the different customisable light armour drops, while most of it does look pretty much the same, there are a few (very few) really good options provided you really want to work for it or you get lucky on gtn lol.

 

I'm also trying to come up with unique looks for each of my toons so I'm on the same kind of hunt mim is.

[mimartin]

Well I still have the starter orange robes given after becoming a Jedi, they actually look decent. Well at least they don't look like she is wearing a 5 inch thick burlap sack. Look thin, cool and form fitting. For now though, she will continue to be a Priss wannabe. I wonder if I can spacemail her the empire dancers outfit top.

[Canderis]

On my shadow, i quite like the lvl 20 pvp armor a lot.

[Jeff]

Unfortunately mim, you'll find that the Consular gear has the worst looks in the game, with my Shadow I've come to accept the fact that I look retarded.

At least the Battlemaster pvp gear looks great. But unfortunately the new pvp gear is terrible. And yeah as far as leveling gear, not too familiar with great looking designs.

[Pho3nix]

Actually I think pretty much all the armor in the game looks a lot better than most other MMO's... especially World of Warcraft where you were stuck looking ugly as **** for at least the first 40-50 levels.

[mimartin]

Been doing story ops, by no means am I great or ready to single-handedly take out a Ops boss on my own, but I'm fairly confident in my healers abilities. Last Ops died twice, once was stupid, trying to keep the other healer up right by hitting with a big heal which required me to remain stationary while getting hit with flames. Got the big heal off that most likely saved the other healer, but died in the process (so it was stupid). The other death was not my fault. We wiped in the one on one fights, because someone used AOE heal or something. Wasn't me, I took Kolto Cloud off the bar before the fight and my target was dead before the wipe.

 

So my questions is, after I get my hat, what should I be doing, other than waiting for guild members to reach 50 to heal through their HMFPs? How do I know when I'm ready for the next level of Ops? Is it only gear related and when I get the last piece, my hat, I'm ready? Should I just continue to do more story Ops, but only going when they need a healer? I have improve over my hopeless, under-geared self that attempted to do HMFP without a proper understanding of my abilities, I don't want to lose the momentum. However, I also don't want take up places in story mode ops from fresh 50 toons.

 

If it wasn't a issue, I would be happy sticking with story mode at least 2 or 3 more times. Would really like to complete a Ops without have to use resurrect once to know I was ready for the next level and I am fairly confident I can get to that level as a healer. Provide people don't stand in lava.

[snommism]

So my questions is, after I get my hat, what should I be doing, other than waiting for guild members to reach 50 to heal through their HMFPs?

That's pretty much it, I've been pretty well geared on my smugglers for a while, but am still very active in operations (and HMFPs to a much lesser extent) while others are gearing up (granted we are doing hard/nightmare these days).

 

How do I know when I'm ready for the next level of Ops? Is it only gear related and when I get the last piece, my hat, I'm ready?

Yes and no. There are many variables, one being the team. If the team is mostly decently geared then one or two can be under geared. Just two weeks ago we took two freshly level 50s through EV hardmode (well till Soa, he takes a bit of coordination that they didn't have yet, which brings me to the next point). Skill can make up for gear. I healed hard mode EV the day after I hit 50 (the main healer was a good healer and I did have full orange gear with daily armorings).

But the absolute best way to tell? Try and see

 

Provide people don't stand in lava.

lol. Yeah I guess to add to my above "are you ready for the next level," as a healer, it also depends on your team. If people are constantly taking stupid damage then even the best healer is going to struggle.

[mimartin]

lol. Yeah I guess to add to my above "are you ready for the next level," as a healer, it also depends on your team. If people are constantly taking stupid damage then even the best healer is going to struggle.

Never know about my team...Most of my guild is way ahead or way behind me so I've been running ops with Casual Alliance. In all but one Ops this has worked out really well. Even the one bad Ops the team was decent with the exception of we kept hitting the enrage timer with Gharj. Must have wiped 6 to 10 times, not sure how many, a couple times I was still standing during enrage and I just escaped from combat. Not really sure what the problem was. My guess is we were lacking in range attacks, too many first timers, too many tanks trying to DPS and one guy standing in lava the entire fight. Had he not been in the lava I may have had enough energy to do a little DPS to help with the last 2% of Gharj health. We got him to 2% or 3% a couple times before he enraged.

 

Did Eternity Vault again last Saturday and made it through no problems at all, with the same two healers. So I don’t believe I was the problem the first time, but I have gotten better too, thanks largely to all the practice I received from that first time through Eternity and dealing with Gharj so many times.

[snommism]

That's another thing about being ready for the next level, the fights are very similar and after you have done them enough times, you know what is going to happen when.

 

I usually go off of audio cues but BW has seemed to remove that lately which really messes me up.

[mimartin]

I went on my first two hard mode operations last night. Takes some getting use to and I know I made some bone head mistakes, but I think it was way easier than making the jump for regular dailies and game play to story mode operations. Most of my mistakes were due to just plan stupidity mainly brought on by the lack of sleep, but were mostly covered up by having the other healer being Kusanavi and Zazz from CA being the tank. Many times I would be about to put a big heal on someone and before I got it off Kus already had them near 100%. Soa, was especially challenging since my internet decided at that point to develop a huge lag and the game sound all but disappeared. I am amazed at how important hearing has become to my ability to use my healer properly. ½ the time with my Shadow, I have the sound turn down and the stereo cranked up. With my smuggler, that just isn’t practical. Anyways, we survived and completed the task despite my problems.

 

Only embarrassing parts was the infernal council, this part has never given me a problem in normal. I usually finished before some DPS and long before anyone thought about helping me. In hard mode, it was a different story. I had to kill her twice (we wiped once because someone used an AOE (not me)) and did, but I the last one finished and I had help.

 

The other time I got left by the group while doing a bioanalysis scan and then in finding the group I fell in lava (again). Then when making my way back I drew aggro from a group and while I escaped out of combat, the group remained in combat, so they had to run over and kill the mob.

 

All in all, though I think I did better than I did in my first normal ops and I had a blast, but still have major room for improvement.

[snommism]

Soa, was especially challenging since ... and the game sound all but disappeared.

Yeah, they messed up sounds in a big way. The worst is Soa and the Annihilator Droid. I've spoken to CS and they just say "we are aware and working on it."

I am amazed at how important hearing has become to my ability to use my healer properly.

Yeah, I really don't like that they took our "you got upper hand!" sound away

 

Only embarrassing parts was the infernal council, this part has never given me a problem in normal.

I have more trouble on my gunslinger on normal than I do hard Mostly because the enemy is constantly kicking me out of cover.

Not sure why, but it seems Smugglers of all flavors have the most trouble with this fight out of any class I've seen go though.

 

and I had a blast

That's the important part!

[mimartin]

Yeah, I really don't like that they took our "you got upper hand!" sound away

I was one of those that moaned about the silly school girl giggle, but now that it is gone, I really miss it.

 

That's the important part!

 

Nope getting Rakata pants, belt and gun were the most important parts.

[snommism]

I was one of those that moaned about the silly school girl giggle, but now that it is gone, I really miss it.

The part that makes me angrier that people complained about it, is that they chose to "fix" that when there are so many game breaking bugs. Before anyone claims it was a "low hanging fruit" or "easy win," it was not, there were plenty of people that either liked the sound or didn't mind it.

 

Nope getting Rakata pants, belt and gun were the most important parts.

lol that definitely helps!

[mimartin]

Went on another hard mode ops last night and the difference in the group was apparent. Great bunch of people, but nowhere near as well equipped as my last group. Last time we burned through both EV and KP with no problem, in the time it took this group to get to Soa, the last had completed both HM EV and HM KP. Pretty telling when my healer has the 3rd highest HP in the group and only 200 HP lower than the off tank. Not going to say we couldn’t complete it, but Soa got lucky that we ran out of time.

 

My question is: I never spent so much time in EV stuck in the mind trap, so is it random who goes into the mind trap or does it have anything to do formula that considers HP/armoring?

 

It is really hard to heal the group when stuck in a mind trap or being flung around the room bouncing off walls. The second is the worse, at least in a mind trap I can use diagnostic scan to build energy back up. Not sure if we were just under equipped or just had bad luck. Once I got flung around the room right as the floors dropped, so I could not get to my place before the floors dropped. Another time, I died because we took too long and I was bringing up the rear making our way down. Someone died and I used resurrect and was healing them so they would die on the next jump…just took too long. The others deaths were largely due to both healers being in mind traps too often and too long at the same time.

 

First time I saw this last night too. I hit a commando with a +5000 heal (with use of an adrenal), but he got no healing, he took +5000 damage at the same time. This happened twice, both times while solving the puzzle. Not sure if that was a bug or not, because I find that very hard to believe because there was nothing pounding on him at the time…the bad guy was pounding me at the time.