Good afternoon and welcome to another Game Update 4.0 Class Change Blog! Today, we are covering the lethal and stealthy Imperial Agents and Smugglers.

While they are already masters of deception and shadow, we wanted to reinforce the slipperiness of Operatives and Scoundrels, so we gave them a new ability that allows them to more easily chase down or flee from their enemies, depending on the situation.

We wanted to increase the survivability of Snipers/Gunslingers in order to make them a bit harder for their foes to take down in a fight. Their new ability reinforces this design intention by resetting the cooldowns of many powerful defensive abilities, allowing those abilities to be used twice in a row with little or no downtime between uses.

Below you will find a full list of changes coming to the Imperial Agents and Smugglers in 4.0. Like always, this list is not final, and is subject to change!

Operative/Scoundrel

• New Ability: Holotraverse/Trick Move! Supercharge your stealth generator, quickly moving you to a friendly or enemy target and increasing your movement speed by 75% for 3 seconds. Does not break stealth, cannot be used against enemy targets in cover, has a 45 second cooldown, and is off of the Global Cooldown.

Medicine/Sawbones

• New Passive Skill: Enduring Kolto/Prolonged Prescription! Increases the duration of Kolto Probe/Slow-release Medpac by 3 seconds (granting one extra activation of healing before it needs to be refreshed or falls off), and makes Stim Boost/Pugnacity grant a 15-second-long buff that causes your next Kolto Infusion/Pack or Kolto Injection/Underworld Medicine to activate instantly (it gets consumed when you use Kolto Infusion/Pack or Kolto Injection/Underworld Medicine).
• Surgical Probe/Emergency Medpac is now trained at level 42 (up from 41).
• Kolto Waves is now trained at level 58 (up from 57).
• Tactical Medicine/Bedside Manner is now trained at level 60 (up from 59)

Concealment/Scrapper

• New Passive Skill: Prey on the Weak/Pierce and Batter! Laceration/Sucker Punch deals 5% more damage to targets affected by your Acid Blade/Flechette Round. You get this new passive earlier than usual (at level 48), because we want the levelling experience to be better for Concealment/Scrapper. Additionally, we are granting Volatile Substance/Blood Boiler earlier, and replacing Shiv/Blaster Whip with Veiled Strike/Bludgeon later, as we needed to move two passive skills that buff Veiled Strike/Bludgeon to the end of the Discipline path for these changes to all make sense together.
• Veiled Strike/Bludgeon is now trained at level 58 (up from 41).
• Volatile Substance/Blood Boiler is now trained at level 42 (down from 57).
• Enhanced Chemicals/Pressure Cooker is now trained at level 44 (down from 59).
• Surgical Strikes/Scrappy is now trained at level 64 (up from 44).
• Calculated Frenzy/Rolling Punches is now trained at level 60 (up from 48).

Lethality/Ruffian

• New Passive Skill: Acidic Compounds/Sharpened Materials! Corrosive Grenade/Shrap Bomb gets a 10% chance to explode twice, and Toxic Blast/Sanguinary Shot deals 5% more damage.
• Toxic Blast/Sanguinary Shot is now trained at level 42 (up from 41).
• Lethal Strike/Point Blank Shot is now trained at level 58 (up from 57).
• Cut Down/Cheap Shots is now trained at level 60 (up from 59).

Utility
Tier 1 - Skillful

• New Utility: Curbing Shots! Overload Shot/Quick Shot and Carbine Burst/Blaster Volley slow the targets they damage by 40% for 6 seconds

Tier 2 - Masterful

• New Utility: Fortified Kolto/Supplemented Medpac! Each stack of your Kolto Probe/Slow-release Medpac increases your damage reduction by 3%, stacking up to 6%. This damage reduction is not conveyed to the target of your Kolto Probe/Slow-release Medpac.

Tier 3 - Heroic

• New Utility: Circumvention/Sleight of Foot! Allows Holotraverse/Trick Move to be used while immobilized, and it removes immobilizing and slowing effects when used

Sniper/Gunslinger

• New Ability: Imperial Preparation/Bag of Tricks! Resets the active cooldown on Evasion/Dodge, Countermeasures/Surrender, Shield Probe/Defense Screen, Cover Pulse/Pulse Detonator, Entrench/Hunker Down, and Covered Escape/Hightail It. This ability has a base cooldown of 3 minutes and is off of the Global Cooldown.

Marksmanship/Sharpshooter

• New Passive Skill: Marksman's Finesse/Sharpshooter's Touch! Snipe/Charged Burst grants Marksman's Finesse/Sharpshooter's Touch, increasing the armor penetration and damage dealt by your next Followthrough/Trickshot by 10%. Stacks up to 2 times.
• Followthrough/Trickshot is now trained at level 42 (up from 41).
• Sniper Volley/Burst Volley is now trained at level 58 (up from 57).
• Honed Shots is now trained at level 60 (up from 59).

Engineering/Saboteur

• New Passive Skill: Field Command/Conflagration! Increases the critical chance of your Area of Effect abilities by 15%.
• Plasma Probe/Incendiary Grenade is now trained at level 42 (up from 41)
• EMP Discharge/Sabotage is now trained level 58 (up from 57)
• Energy Overrides/Seize the Moment is now trained at level 60 (up from 59)
• Imperial Auto Loader/Jury-Rigged Mods is now trained at level 36 (down from 56)
• Electrified Railgun/Blazing Speed is now trained at level 40 (up from 36)
• Electrified Blast/Hot Shot is now trained at level 44 (up from 40)
• Efficient Engineering/Dealer's Discount is now trained at level 48 (up from 44)
• Sector Ranger/Spacer is now trained at level 52 (up from 48)
• Scatter Bombs is now trained at level 56 (up from 52)
• Explosive Engineering/Independent Anarchy is now trained at level 24 (up from 16)
• Cluster Bombs/Contingency Charges is now trained at level 16 (down from 20)
• Imperial Methodology/Insurrection is now trained at level 20 (down from 24)

Virulence/Dirty Fighting

• New Passive Skill: Caustic Substances/Gushing Wounds! Corrosive Grenade/Shrap Bomb gets a 10% chance to tick twice and Weakening/Hemorrhaging Blast deals 5% more damage (both these % values are adjustable up or down to reach the discipline's target DPS).
• Weakening Blast/Hemorrhaging Blast is now trained at level 42 (up from 41).
• Lethal Shot/Dirty Blast is now trained at level 58 (up from 57).
• Corrosive Mine/Incendiary Mine is now trained at level 60 (up from 59).

Utility
Tier 1 - Skillful

• New Utility: Pulse Screen! Cover Pulse/Pulse Detonator increases your chance to resist Force and tech attacks by 20% for 6 seconds.
• Calculated/Hot Pursuit is now Tier 1 (instead of Tier 2).

Tier 2 - Masterful

• New Utility: Lumbering Impact! Shatter/Flourish Shot slows the target by 50% for the duration of the trauma effect (meaning the duration can be increased by other skills that boost the Trauma duration).
• Reestablish Range/Reset Engagement is now Tier 2 (instead of Tier 1).

Tier 3 - Heroic

• New Utility: Over-prepared/Perfect Scheme! Reduces the cooldown of Imperial Preparation/Bag of Tricks by 30 seconds (from 3 minutes down to 2 min 30 sec), and when you activate Imperial Preparation/Bag of Tricks, your damage reduction is increased by 10% for 10 seconds.

Thanks for joining us today, and we'll see you next time! Or we won't. Because of stealth.

-The Star Wars™: The Old Republic Combat Team