Don't listen to him. This guy couldn't pvp his way out of a wet paper bag.

Nice guide. I am a returning shadow tank who used to pvp a ton. Been gone for a couple years. Nice to see someone actually noticing that stacking endurance is the way to go. Used to see way too many people arguing that that wasn't the case.

If you want to be the classic tank then go with Survivor and shield (more useful in 2.0 than now). If you want to have a little more punch and be more of a DPS tank then start with the survivor set but drop the shield and replace all the mods that have shield or absorb on them with defense or power ones. Your augments should be Fortitude for the classic tank version and either Fortitude or Power for the DPS tank version

You bring up a lot of good memories Rok . Not going to be the same without you around. Have fun in whatever game you play and feel free to pop in and say hi if you get the urge.

If I remember correctly, in that Novarre fight, I was in my DPS tank gear. If it's any consolation, when you steathed out real quick in the middle, then mezzed me, and started meditating right next to me while I was mezzed, I was cussing up a storm . 1) correct 2) surge to 75%, defense to 28-30%, then power (you will probably end up with some accuracy and maybe even crit just due to the itemization). Usually pick the mods/enhancements with the higher endurance while going for these targets. No shield/absorb/crit except for what's in the implants in the non-dps tank set (due to the crappy itemization of the implants we have to choose from). 3) I use PVE armorings on the waist/wrist pieces. The tradeoff in additional stats (especially endurance) outweighs, in my opinion, the loss of expertise. I have never used the +41 expertise crystals but either the endurance or power ones depending on the build. I put both my gear builds on Ask Mr. Robot and linked them below. If you search for them, search for Deadweight not Deltus. These are my targets (more or less) and not my current gear as I am still optimizing (especially on the non-dps tank set which I had cannibalized for my dps tank set and to help gear up my assassin faster) toward these. Overall, I have found the dps tank gear is more useful in 1v1 and 1v2 type situations because what I give up on defense, I make up for in being able to take people out that faster. The straight tank gear is more useful when I am going to have many people beating on me (for example, carrying the ball in Huttball or defending in Voidstar). The dps tank gear is new for me and I have only been using it for the last couple months. From the time I hit 50 and got optimized until then I was only running the high endurance gear set. That's still the gear set I would probably run with most often in rateds although I haven't done any rateds in several months. http://swtor.askmrrobot.com/character/8aff9030-cc13-45b4-bab5-cd6220a7a67c http://swtor.askmrrobot.com/character/cd48c710-6022-468b-ab69-b5649d2f1d36

I ran a 31/0/10 spec from the time I hit 50 (January last year and Elite Warlord since just before 1.3 hit) until about a month or two ago when I made a slight change to 31/1/9 for a little more offense. I like going full 31 in the tank tree because I love Slow Time and Telekinetic Throw hitting with harnessed shadows. I have played with the hybrid spec but keep going back to what I have (although I really miss instant force lift). For a shadow tank you don't need to stack crit at all. You can get auto-crit projects fairly regularly and can pop Force Potency to get crits on your big hitter (Telekinetic Throw with 3 stacks of harnessed shadows) as needed. I would suggest tossing the shield (I have as it only works on white damage attacks that don't crit) and replacing all your mods that have absorb or shield on them. If you want to go more "tanky" then replace them by stacking mods with endurance and defense along with some power (and surge to 75% of course). In my more tanky armor and buffed I have 27k health, 30% defense and can still deal respectable damage. In PVP (unlike PVE), health is more important than shield mitigation and will keep you alive longer especially when you take into account the effect of the warzone medpac. I have also recently made a second set of armor that is more dps tank. In it I have 23k health, 17% defense, and about 950 bonus force damage by stacking power. It hits quite a bit harder while still being able to fulfill the tank role. I swap between the 2 armor sets depending on the WZ/situation.

From my heavily biased perspective , shadow/assassin tanks played well are very good/fun in pvp whether you want to be a straight tank or more of a dps tank.

I've been playing a Shadow Tank from the beginning of the game and pvp way too much . Kitru is correct. Ignore crit and stack power or maybe defense instead (and enough surge to get to around 75%).

From my experience, I would say most pvp players that also do pve don't have seperate toons for each. Usually it just requires a gear swap and maybe a respec. I only swap into pve gear if I'm going to do an op or fp, otherwise, for running dailies for example, I just use my pvp gear. Using voice in pvp is pretty much required if you want to compete at the top levels of pvp. For running regular WZs its nice but not necessarily required. Going into pvp with mostly pve gear is a bad idea. Expertise overides pretty much all other stats until you get it to 1100+. At that point you can start playing games with the additional expertise vs. other stats tradeoffs.

Well just to get the history straight, Elite Forces wasn't "supposedly" queue dodging back then. They were actually queue dodging. There is nothing wrong with wanting to queue 2 teams to practice tactics vs. each other and gain comms. But when you get a queue against another guild and then leave the queue to let the other team hang in an empty WZ (since if they leave it will cost them rating), that is crap. If you queue up then you are implicitly agreeing to play anyone else who queues up. If you aren't prepared to do that then don't queue for ranked.

I still think that shield/absorb doesn't give enough benefits in pvp to keep it but I see lots of shadow tanks that still use a shield.

Go 31/0/10 like AstralFire said but, if you want to add a little more punch while still being tanky, use the survivor set, drop the shield and rip out all your absorb/shield mods. Replace them with mods that stack endurance, surge (to ~300), defense, and power. Ignore crit and sacrifice some expertise by using custom wrist and waist pieces (and maybe a campaign relic also). Fully buffed I have just over 27k health, 29% defense, and ~1140 expertise and do a lot more damage than the average tank.

Well, I'm open to new styles as long as I can keep my white color theme to match my saber. I've had it long enough that's it's practically a trademark of mine by now. http://s1165.photobucket.com/albums/q596/luckyknight1/?action=view&current=swtor2012-10-3109-50-05-21.jpg

Basically just do the test. Check your stats with each set of gear and see what the tradeoff is and if you think it is worth it. That's what I did and my expertise has been at 1127 since I finished reconfiguring my gear several months ago.

Do it! I double-dog dare you.

Here are several from the Deadweight archives. 20 Medals - Deltus http://s1165.photobucket.com/albums/q596/luckyknight1/?action=view&current=swtor2012-06-1819-26-59-69_zpsaf3a6c7a.jpg 23 Medals - Cruz http://s1165.photobucket.com/albums/q596/luckyknight1/?action=view&current=swtor2012-06-1819-26-59-69_zpsaf3a6c7a.jpg#!oZZ2QQcurrentZZhttp%3A%2F%2Fs1165.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fq596%2Fluckyknight1%2F%3Faction%3Dview%26current%3Dswtor2012-06-2619-19-43-43.jpg 222k Protection - Deltus 776k Healing - Mackenzi http://s1165.photobucket.com/albums/q596/luckyknight1/?action=view&current=swtor2012-06-1819-26-59-69_zpsaf3a6c7a.jpg#!oZZ3QQcurrentZZhttp%3A%2F%2Fs1165.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fq596%2Fluckyknight1%2F%3Faction%3Dview%26current%3Dswtor2012-06-2618-21-09-10.jpg

If you want to fulfill the main tank role for your group and be a general pain in the *** to the opposition then stack endurance. Fully buffed and stimmed I have slightly over 26k health and the last time I checked, nothing correlates more strongly with staying alive than health. Now you also need to stack power/surge/crit in order to make sure your targets actually notice when you hit them (no shield). I would suggest the survivor set for the set bonus but replacing all the shield/absorb mods with more offensive mods while still prioritizing endurance as much as possible. Also don't be afraid (once you get over 1100 expertise) to swap out some pvp pieces for custom pieces with overall higher stats if the math makes sense (which it does if you're trying to increase survivability). I am "fully" geared and have an expertise of 1127.

I have to strongly disagree with the idea that Shadow tanks have no place/are inferior in rated WZs (even high-end rated). I've been running in a team on our server that is one of the top two teams on the server so far. I use the standard 31/0/10 spec with heavily modded survivor gear. We typically run with me and a Vanguard tank. We don't have a Guardian but Huttball is arguably our strongest WZ. Did 1.3 hurt? Sure. But mostly in the 1v1 and 1v2 area as opposed to the mass melee you get in Voidstar. I compensated by adding a couple thousand more health and trying to be a little smarter with my defensive cooldowns. In Civil War or Novare Coast I can still solo guard a node and hold off 1-3 attackers long enough for reinforcements to show up. I don't seem to be dying much more than I did pre 1.3. So for anybody saying Shadow tanks are inferior to the other tanks in rated WZs, sorry, not buying it.

I don't know. I think the healing nerf is worse, especially for 1v1 and 1v2 fights. Pre-nerf I could self-heal for around 4k every 20 seconds or so. Now its about half that. I'm noticing that more than I am taking 8% or so more damage due to the armor nerf.

I've been PVPing almost exclusively and while it's noticeable, I haven't really been dying any more than before 1.3. The biggest effect I've seen is that I can't 1v1 someone and kill them while still having 90%+ of my health still left.

I've had the 3% Endurance boost specced from the beginning. Stacking endurance is what i do . Worked pretty well so far.

I would suggest Synthweaving. I leveled up with it and it allowed me to always have the best armor possible (consistently better than any drops/rewards I got) which is helpful when you are a tank. At 50, it has made me a ton of credits by selling low-mid level purples on the GTN (as well as custom augmented armor and augments).

I'll preface my remarks by stating they are geared toward people wanting to play a Shadow tank and actually be a reasonably effective tank. If your main goal is to dps then you should be doing balance or infiltration as they are pretty much always going to out dps a kinetic Shadow. Well, I guess i'll have to put up a dissenting opinion. My main is a Shadow tank and I wear the survivor set armoring (for the set bonuses) but I swap out most of the other mods in order to stack endurance, power, and surge. I don't use a shield. I consider stacking endurance very important and have passed up on certain mods which would increase power because they had lower endurance (45 end/22 pow vs 27/40 I think). I currently even have a campaign relic equipped and a custom wrist piece equipped (as opposed to the war hero piece) because I think the added endurance is worth more than the lost expertise. My health is currently slightly over 23.5k and I am regularly told that I am a serious pain in the *** to take down. I have also been told by people I pvp with that I hit harder than most/all other tanks (shadow or otherwise) they have faced so I don't feel like I have sacrificed too much offense for more health. Bottom line: If you want to maximize your utility to your team then you need to be in the game and not in the respawn area and one of the main ways to achieve this is to stack endurance.

It really depends on which crafting skill your talking about. Different skills have different things that sell well/don't sell well and you need to research what that might be for any particular crew skill. As an example, my main has synthweaving and I always get a chuckle out of people who say synthweaving is worthless. It not only kept me better geared than just relying on drops/rewards would have but, starting in the 30's allowed me to make money selling purple items. I now make about 100k per day selling purple armor from lvl 9-39. I assume that Armortech would have a similar potential.

I've been pvping quite a bit (valor rank 88) as a shadow tank and run a standard 31/0/10. I use survivor gear with no shield and replace all the shield and absorb mods with power, surge, and occasionally defense mods. I sacrifice a little health (although I still have an unbuffed health of 21k+) but gain a substantial boost to my dps. The survivor set bonuses are both quite useful and I highly recommend them. I am currently experimenting with whether its worth it to swap out pieces that give you a 40-50 point endurance boost but lose you the same amount of expertise. Haven't come to a conclusion on that yet.