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I'm levelling an Operative, and I'd like to try my hand at a more Medicine centric build. My Concealment-specced practice of knifing people and then hitting Kolto Infusion isn't cutting it anymore in Flashpoints, and Kaliyo is turning into a sufficiently capable tank that I'm thinking it's probably a viable way to do things.

Is there a good efficient leveling build for the Medicine tree out there, or am I doomed to things taking forever to kill?

N.B. I'm not just looking for a talent calculator link, but also a bit of information about how the build plays offensively (and in terms of healing if, and only if it differs substantially from a standard Medicine Op healer) - A big part of my trouble is that when I spec Medicine, I find myself wondering what the hell to do to hit things a lot of the time - I feel like I just don't have enough buttons.

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(And please, spare me the comments about how trying to level in a healing spec is slow, stupid, etc. I'm aware of the limitations, and am curious about how to make the most of things within them, as I do a lot of Flashpoint and Heroic quest group healing, and respec costs are, at the moment, prohibitive.) – LessPop_MoreFizz Jan 4 '12 at 23:18
Leveling healing specs is slow? Granted I play Republic healers but I almost never slow down when soloing, and when in flashpoints no one can fault the healer if they need to regen after a fight (unless they spent all their energy/ammo/force on DPSing unnecessarily) – Xantec Jan 5 '12 at 3:33

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I am leveling the same way you are asking in this question :)

As a medicine Operative, your biggest damage comes from a few things:

  • Backstab
  • Shiv
  • Corrosive Dart
  • Overload Shot
  • Fragmentation grenade (if there is more than one target and you are not crowd controlling the other units).

I'm currently level 41 and this is what my build looks like so far: http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#401MffbzGoRzMZMZoM.1

The key to this build is the 3 talent points in medical engineering. It will constantly provide you free Tactical Advantage buffs that you can use on Surgical Probe while still doing damage.

For large groups, simply spamming Fragmentation grenade gets the job done quickly and efficently.

For fighting harder mobs or just a single target, start off with a Corrosive dart, Backstab, shiv, overload shot, then repeat when they are off cooldown for damage. Maxing sure that the Kolto probe buff does not fall off and that you always have Stim boost up. Should you run low on energy, use Diagnostic Scan a few times on yourself or Kaliyo, whoever has damage to them. Every little bit of healing helps and the DS crits will give you energy back as well.

The healing aspect for both encounters is handled by the Kolto and Surgical probes. I start by using one Kolto Injection to get my healing buff up caused by Medical Consult, then I drop 2 Kolto probes on Kaliyo, then pop Stim boost when Tactical Advantage procs off of Medical Engineering.

The start of the fight is done with the healing aspect because you want to make sure that you are procing TA so you can get "free" heals on Kaliyo by using the Surgical Probe while saving your energy for your damage abilities (Backstab, Shiv, Overload shot). Kaliyo is only there to hold agro while you kill the mob. At level you should be able to kill most with 1 Backstab, 1 Shiv, 2 Overload shots on green/yellow enemies.

You can see in the talent tree that I have only a few talents outside the medicine tree that increases the damage of Shiv and Backstab, my main DPS abilities. But aside from that the large majority is in the medicine tree.

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I find that Shiv and Backstab, with their long cooldowns, leave me with a ton of downtime. Do you just fill that with rifle shots? Overload Shot quickly leaves me energy starved. – LessPop_MoreFizz Jan 5 '12 at 0:09
I fill that with Overload shot, how are you getting energy starved? Are you ensuring that you have Stim boost up constantly? – Sorean Jan 5 '12 at 0:40
Yeah, definitely keeping Stim Boost up. – LessPop_MoreFizz Jan 5 '12 at 0:40
Then I'm not too sure then, but as I mentioned, the times that you find that you have gone down to almost no energy, just pop a few Diagnostic scans on Kaliyo, each one of the ticks that crit will restore 2 energy, I usually am able to get back to DPSing in 2 or 3 scans. And keep in mind that the time that you don't spend using up energy it ups your energy regeneration rate as well. Although that mechanic I'm still trying to figure out at the moment. – Sorean Jan 5 '12 at 0:49
That mechanic is fairly straightforward, you Regen +1 energy/second for every 20 you already have. – LessPop_MoreFizz Jan 5 '12 at 0:51
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