Gearing Up with Mods Guide & Tips in 7.1

If you are an experienced level 80 player in Star Wars: The Old Republic, gearing up your alternate discipline and characters at a high-level just got easier than ever.

Explanation

A new type of quest was introduced attached to the NPCs named Hyde and Zeek, located in the Supplies section of the Fleet. In return for turning in a single item-rating 330 purple piece, and a single item-rating 330 blue piece, you can unlock a vendor that will sell you mods and enhancements that add up roughly to Rakata item-rating 330 gear, with each modification costing 100,000 credits each. You’ll still need to get your Relics and Earpiece the old fashion way, and you’ll buy your Legendary Implants with tech frags, but you can skip the task for gearing up through “Nightmare Mode Nefra” for all other pieces.

Hyde & Zeek Mod Quest

If you haven’t already unlocked mods through Hyde & Zeek, check this guide out for how it works.

How to Get Mods in 7.1

Tips

• “Best gear”: With update 7.1, these mods are not “the best in the game”. The best gear comes from Veteran Mode R-4, and that R-4 gear does not include modifications. So if you are going to play Veteran R-4, you will eventually replace all your Hyde & Zeek moddable pieces with Hazardous and Virulent gear.
• Alts: This system is most useful for players gear alternate disciplines and characters. Experienced hardcore players may not need this vendor at all.
• Legacy-bound Gear: When choosing moddable gear shells to place your modifications from Hyde & Zeek into, choose legacy-bound gear. That way you can share it between characters. An easy place to get some is at the Adaptive vendor in the Supplies section of the fleet (double-check it’s legacy-bound first) or from various Reputation tracks.
• Modifications are legacy-bound: The things you buy from Hyde & Zeek are also legacy-bound. So you only need to unlock the quest on one character, then you can mail or legacy-bank the items. If the 2-hour timer prevents you from mailing or banking the item, put it in a piece of gear then take it out again first. Or just wait the 2 hours.
• Casual Player: This system is also incredibly useful to players who are not hardcore gamers, but have managed to get at least 1 of the items needed to turn into Hyde & Zeek. For example, if a more causal non-solo player manages to get a single Rakata piece from Nightmare Mode Nefra or even just a relic / earpiece / implant from Veteran Mode Operations, they can continue to upgrade that piece at the Operations vendor until it reaches 330. If they also do the same with a blue piece from either Master flashpoints, or Veteran Operations, or even a relic / earpiece / implant from Story operations or Veteran Flashpoints, and upgrade it to item-rating 330 at the Flashpoint vendor, they would then have access to all the same great gear for all their characters as a more experienced player would!
• Solo Player? Solo players can take great advantage of these vendors! Level 80 Solo Gearing Guide
• Can’t talk to Hyde & Zeek: You need a current item-rating of 324 equipped to unlock the Hyde & Zeek quests. You can get this easily through solo Conquest gear over time.
• Not seeing all the modifications: There’s a bug that causes some of the modifications on the Hyde & Zeek vendor to be missing. Change the dropdown at the top form your current Discipline to “all”. Keep in mind that you can not get purple mods or armorings, they are not available.
• Stats: Your stat distribution is just as important with moddable gear as it is for pre-set gear. Make sure you are consulting guides or another experienced player before buying all your mods to save credits later. Most damage-based players are shooting for 110% accuracy, then an alacrity threshold, then after that worrying about other stats.
• Figuring out what to put in as DPS:
  1. Start by getting and equipping a full set of empty moddable gear, weapon and offhand equipped
  2. Equip what have available or can get for your Relics, Earpiece, and most important, Legendary Implants.
  3. Next, look at your Accuracy stat in your Character Sheet (Details). You want to reach as close to 2694 accuracy as possible, aka 110% accuracy, for non-PvP content. So start buying and equipping the yellow accuracy enhancements “[Advanced Initiative Enhancement 96]” until you reach 110% accuracy on the Details sheet (scroll down in the sheet), so you never miss an enemy. Note your bracers and Belt can’t have enhancements. I needed about five accuracy enhancements.
  4. Your next step is your Alacrity, which controls how often you can use your abilities (and how fast casted abilities go). For most classes, you will be shooting for roughly just over 2,000 Alacrity, but it varies by class and by preference. With my Legendary Implants, this meant I only needed to buy two Alacrity enhancements.
  5. The rest of your stats you can put into crit. The may mean an enhancement, or augments.
  6. The next part is easy – buy 7 of the red armorings “[Versatile Armoring 100]” one for each of your armor pieces, then the hilts/barrels/armorings you need for your weapon and offhand
  7. And then buy 9 of the red mods “[Lethal Mod 100]”, one for each of your moddable pieces
  8. Last optional step would be to augment your gear.

Piece-by-piece

• Weapon: Any moddable weapon for your discipline, blue item-rating 330 hilt/barrel from Hyde & Zeek, blue item-rating 330 mod from Hyde & Zeek, purple item-rating 330 enhancement from Hyde & Zeek
• Offhand: Any moddable offhand for your discipline, blue item-rating 330 armoring/hilt/barrel from Hyde & Zeek, blue item-rating 330 mod from Hyde & Zeek, purple item-rating 330 enhancement from Hyde & Zeek
• Head: Any adaptive moddable headpiece, blue item-rating 330 armoring from Hyde & Zeek, blue item-rating 330 mod from Hyde & Zeek, purple item-rating 330 enhancement from Hyde & Zeek
• Bracers: Any adaptive moddable bracers, blue item-rating 330 armoring from Hyde & Zeek, blue item-rating 330 mod from Hyde & Zeek, (no enhancement)
• Chest: Any adaptive moddable chestpiece, blue item-rating 330 armoring from Hyde & Zeek, blue item-rating 330 mod from Hyde & Zeek, purple item-rating 330 enhancement from Hyde & Zeek
• Gloves: Any adaptive moddable gloves, blue item-rating 330 armoring from Hyde & Zeek, blue item-rating 330 mod from Hyde & Zeek, purple item-rating 330 enhancement from Hyde & Zeek
• Boots: Any adaptive moddable boots, blue item-rating 330 armoring from Hyde & Zeek, blue item-rating 330 mod from Hyde & Zeek, purple item-rating 330 enhancement from Hyde & Zeek
• Belt: Any adaptive moddable belt, blue item-rating 330 armoring from Hyde & Zeek, blue item-rating 330 mod from Hyde & Zeek, (no enhancement)
• Legs: Any adaptive moddable pants, blue item-rating 330 armoring from Hyde & Zeek, blue item-rating 330 mod from Hyde & Zeek, purple item-rating 330 enhancement from Hyde & Zeek
• Earpiece: The best you can get from whatever type of content you can play, example “Nightmare Mode Nefra” or Veteran Operations for purple item-rating 330 earpiece after forcing the drop and upgrading over time
• Relics x2: The best you can get from whatever type of content you can play, example “Nightmare Mode Nefra” or Veteran Operations for purple item-rating 330 relics after forcing the drop and upgrading over time
• Implants x2: Legendary implants which can be bought at item-rating 326 and upgrade to item-rating 330 legendary implants with tech fragments
• Augments: x14 Augments and x14 Augment kits, either the Legendary item-rating 300 augments, or if you can’t afford them, the blue or purple versions