Sigh.... the game registers distance from the target..... melee is normally less than 10M ranged is normally greater than 10 meters. hence the threat table would know that a ranged is a ranged by distance alone. I know the proper opener threat rotation. I never ever use AOE taunts in that unless I know for a fact that it will not be needed for 50+ sec. I also know my DPS that I play with. and I know that if I don't force pull taunt shock wither shock taunt deprivating volts. as my opener they will pull off me. You know I also want to point out how you say "you don't need to get insulting" to me yet every single post you do about the benefits of guard consists of putting down anyone who thinks other than you. So really, you don't need to be insulting. I've been trying to explain to why guarding a healer is less valuable than guarding a DPS from a numbers stand point. Which I find funny since you won't take any thing I've said for fact and to some degree won't even take what others say that are saying the same thing I said as fact either. it also doesn't help that a lot of these numbers and threads that consisted of this info was wiped by BW with what ever they did when they updated the forums. But you post threads from 3 years ago or posts that use PVP to test guard as factual proof. Then tell the rest of use to provide proof when those same posts don't show any torparse or the fact guard works differently in PVP than it does in PVE. So really... I think I'm done with this whole topic. It's obvious you don't want to be objective about this subject. And before you accuse me of that very same thing I was around in beta when we discussed this ability from the get go. Also I played the original game that the whole guard mechanic was based off. but apparently in your eyes I and others who say the same thing don't know diddly squat and use guard as a "crutch, because we don't know proper opening rotations."

Thrasher NiM you can't pull the mobs down or leap to them, so the tank that starts the fight gets punted up. You need the AOE taunt to make sure your healers/DPS aren't getting raped that are also up there. Draxxus it didn't matter. Nim Draxus you DO NOT want to AOE taunt those adds. Period. Those Subteroths would destroy a tank of more than 3 blew up on him. Bestia, Nim there where 3 monsters and they got a taunt immunity if they where to close together. One tank tanked two mosters at a time and the other tank tanked 1, also the kill target. if you blew your AOE taunt you would be raped since no one could get the 3rd monster off you and they hit like mack trucks on a 90 degree downgrade with no brakes (in short very very hard). Did not clear Brontes on NiM. So I couldn't tell you.

You are mistaken, it's 30% for ranged, melee is 10%. The reason I'm saying this is because I don't think the melee range is from the center of the mob. I'm not sure where the line starts to differentiate from, but when I was doing test with taunt/tank abilities coefficients I noticed changes in the numbers in <4m >4m and >10m. Yes taunt does work melee/ranged <4m as being melee and ranged. But when I used wither at it's max distance (10m) the threat value changed from when I used it at 6M or even 4M. This is why in my original post I stated 10m and not 4m for the melee 110%. Also test have been done by others in my guild to back up my findings and they noticed the same thing. Now if this is just a tank think I don't know, but the general rule of thumb that I've have always heard (til basically now) is <10m is melee >10 is ranged and the threat thresh holds where the same under that same guide line. You're not quite understanding. What that post is saying and for what it's worth others in this thread on this subject is melee and ranged generate the same threat equally. So yes based on that alone a threat table is nothing more than a table of numbers on who has done what. What that thread and others and myself are saying is the thresh hold at which aggro switches is different. A ranged character needs 130% threat or 30% more than the tank to pull aggro, a melee needs 110% or 10% more than the tank for the same thing. There is nothing at all that changes how each generates threat. they both basically generate 100% threat. 10k is 10k is 10k. Also, a bad tank will guard the healer. Which funny enough has been the butt of a joke in my guild for 3 years when we pug.

Thank you for explaining this for me. I will admit that it's been quite some time since I played around with the numbers game in SWTOR, but WoW and SWTORs threat mechanics are identical if slightly different values in numbers. So by this time I would have figured everyone knew how threat worked, I have been proven wrong on that account. Again thanks for explaining the threat portion for me so I didn't have to. As far as the taunt portion stated earlier with melee/ranged granting a weaker/greater threat boost this applies to all tank abilities. I did some testing with this when Aelanis mentioned the range difference threat coefficient of taunt. What I found out is my wither, shock, and deprivating volts all followed this same pattern. BUT melee and ranged DPS abilities do not. A ranged ability from a DPS that hits for 10k will generate the same amount of threat as a 10k hit from a melee DPS. But as was mentioned in the post above the thresh hold for when aggro is switched is different for melee (apparently 110%) and Ranged (130%). The main reason why the two thresh holds are different is normally ranged DPS have higher burst. Which means their threat can be uncontrollable, or unexpected. Also, a lot of DPS do not wait 2-3 sec for tanks to establish threat.

Well, first of all that test was in PVP.... guard doesn't work like that in pve. For one, the damage isn't split in PVE. Yes you do see little lightning bolts jump from your guard target to you I've never noticed any damage recorded on my end in PVE. Also guard takes 5% of what ever damage is left after DRs that the player guarded already has.... you can test this your self. So on average a Scoundrel or sage will have 15-20% passive DR to K/E and around 10% F/T. THis is not counting any CD dr's that are popped as well. So if the healer pops a CD DR then the number is even smaller. It will be 5% AFTER all other DR's are calculated.... which = to about 1-2% of the total premitigated hit. Well... that's not how the aggro works on them either. Aggro the healer generates when adds spawn is not from the beginning of the fight.... it's from when the adds spawn. Yes.. if you are to stupid to pick up adds until 2 min after they spawn you will need a taunt to pick them up. If you react the way you are suppose to, the adds should only have a total of 5-10 sec at most to build threat. Even if your healer is casting AOEs and Single target heals the amount of threat they would generate on average is about 10-15k..... and that's being generous. More than likely they wouldn't have time to build threat of more than 10k tops. WHich is easy for a tank to generate WITHOUT a taunt that it doesn't warrant a guard. You must not have done to many HM/NiM raids if you think you can ALWAYS do that opener. I have never had to rely on that opener and I can still hold threat..... by guarding one of the two melee DPS since I know how threat works in this game. Excuse the **** outta me, I made a mistake about group sizes. Well first off they won't, Because melee and range threat works differently, again another argument against guarding healers. Second, I'm talking pulling off you in the first 5 seconds-10 seconds. We had a sniper that had so much burst that he'd still be able to pull off your little *20 sec* threat rotation. You needed to taunt with in 3 seconds and again before 6 seconds. Other wise you WILL lose aggro to him. And again, you where not always able to pop taunts like that because of either adds that spawn near the beginning of the fight or the way tank switches happen early on. So getting used to a *20 sec taunt rotation* is not a good idea. So, since you obviously don't know how threat works in this game I'll try and explain it to you. Healers generate 50% threat, DPS 100%, but they have different thresh holds on when they can pull aggro. Tanks are roughly 115%-150% depending on ability. So...... why would you guard a healer over a melee DPS or even a ranged DPS. Also, using a guard on a melee DPS helps with total overall raid DPS. If they don't have to waste a keystroke to dumping threat then they can add that keystroke to damage and not having to compensate for your inability to throw them a guard. Extending farther on this Melee DPS will pull off you at 115% aggro. Meaning they just need 15% more threat than you do to pull aggro. Where as range (>10m) will need 130% threat so again.... you have ranged role that generates 50% threat..... and you are guarding it..... pointless. Oh and since I took the time to look at the top threat openers for all tanks..... yeah..... none of them use an AOE taunt in there. So yes you are doing it wrong. Most tank openers (including the one I use which is slightly different than the one Aelanis says in his guide) is something like this: ability, ability, ability, taunt, ability, ability, ability, taunt. That's roughly a 11 sec rotation...... not 20, and I've still seen some classes that get a very lucky string of crits still pull off you. Since crits generate 150% threat iirc even with a taunt, they can still pull aggro. If you have DPS that aren't in the top 15% of the players in this game then I understand completely how you could be confused with guarding a healer over a DPS. Edit: there is a few rotations that use AOE taunt in their opener. I don't agree with this thinking because it's over kill, but it would combat the possibility of a lucky string of crits.

LOL, this makes me laugh. the DR from guard is multiplicative not additive. There for it doesn't give 5% after other sources of DR are calculated in. it's like 1% if that. 2nd the only reason healers have aggro is because NO ONE has hit the adds. One AOE hit from any ability from DPS or a tank will rip those adds off the healer. So again the -25% threat is pointless. And 3rd, you can't always blow your taunts willy-nilly in due to boss mechanics. So relying only on taunt to hold aggro isn't a viable option. Yes in 5 mans you can do what ever because it doesn't matter. Hell I don't even use a guard in 5 mans because I normally don't have DPS that are as good as the DPS I run with in raids. Who WILL pull off of you if they are not guarded. And before you give the retarded cliche of "L2P" I do. I'm damn good at playing tanks in this game and understand the mechanics behind them. So I understand the way guard works, which is why it's pointless to put it on a healer. As a final note.... healers already generate 50% less threat than everyone else due to passives.

Pointless. They generate the lowest amount of threat and only gain maybe 1% DR from the guard.

Oh don't get me wrong, I've done some wacky crap on my Jugg to get through a boss fight. Even interceding the other tank just to boost his DR to help the healers out. But I'm just saying from my personal experiences, my guard swaps are between the DPS. I only have about 1-2 maybe 3 fights that I guard the healers to try and reduce their threat to the over whelming amount of adds the boss may have. But I never value guard (outside of pvp) for the DR portion.

level 55. I think it was HM Mando Raiders that I was in.

Nope you're right, I forgot about the 50% < 15m part of guard for some reason. Still putting guard on someone for the sole purpose of a dam reduction is pointless. I mean I can see it for last phase of terror since threat doesn't mean any thing. But other than that, 5% in a Operation environment isn't going to save you. Also, if you can get away with not using guard on certain DPS classes... well then you must have some really bad DPS. Personal experience I have always guarded DPS classes because the threat drop was needed. Even with going through a taunt rotation and less than 60 sec in the fight some classes have so much front loaded burst that the guard is actually needed for a threat reduction not a damage reduction. Also, most RL's (Raid Leaders) call for raid DPS CD's at the start of the fight. So you as a tank have to deal with all those adrenals being popped on top of the Raid CD's and personal buffs beyond that. And heaven forbid they get a lucky string of crits in there.

Yes... in pvp. In PVE anyone out side of 10 meters DOES NOT get the 5% damage reduction. So no it's not what good tanks do. Good tanks swap taunts to highest threat DPS to help with aggro.... As I said to the guy above you. The 5% Damage reduction DOES NOT extend past 10m. So if you have a healer that is standing inside 10 meters he is make life a hell of a lot more complicated for himself as well as the melee DPS. If a boss mechanic has a random target ability then Healers/Ranged DPS standing in melee make it so Melee DPS get less DPS time on the boss than they normally would just so a healer or Ranged DPS could get a 5% damage reduction.... yeah.... I think not.

Well, you can't fix stupid or impatience. And in your case it sounds like the group would rather not take the chance of a longer queue due to impatience than have a smoother and more enjoyable run. Along your story, I was playing my healer once and couldn't figure out how this tank was taking so much damage. He was in the right spec (he was a shadow and I main a shadow/assassin tank) from what it looked like. Then I looked at his gear and he had no tanking gear on.... now even a shield generator. I asked him if he could get into his tanking gear.... he replied back with "I am". Needless to say I dropped group.

Then role a tank. I don't mean to sound like an ***, but the reason there are so few tanks in this game (or any game for that matter) is it takes some skills that just can't be taught. Yes I know tanking is easy *rolls eyes* if it was so easy, we wouldn't have so many bad tanks. When you look at the ratio between each role and bad players in that role. You are for more likely to get a bad tank over a bad healer or bad DPS.... there are just not many of them. Now... with DPS pulling... that's them being an *** and wanting to speed run every thing. Because the amount of mechanics a DPS needs to know compared to a tank is like a 5th. They don't need to know about tank swaps or positioning or how the tanks are going to deal with certain situations if they pop up. Hell most of the time you can brain dead yourself as a DPS and just tune every thing out and smash buttons and be fine. That doesn't work as a tank. This is happened to me before. I'm trying to teach a new tank to the mechanics of the fight so he doesn't wipe the group or get people killed and to my not very surprise a DPS jumps in or tracer missiles or what ever because mechanics aren't important.... we wipe. So I've adopted an old rule that has become increasingly used with tanks as MMOs have gone on of "you pull it, you tank it". A couple times of that and normally the DPS stops. but then sometimes you still get those overly retarded ones that just can't learn.

That would be an option, but the time I'm thinking I had a debuff where the boss could one shot me if I got hit.

This change annoys me. With the current content being a pain and unforgiving to melee I find this change difficult to swallow. I understand why it was needed in PVP, but to gut PVE just to somewhat fix PVE sounds absurd. I've been saying this since 1.2 that they need to make the specs behave differently in and out of PVP. I know it's a lot of extra coding which can throw unforeseen monkey wrenches into the works, but it's the only way I can see that both sides can be happy. I use Hatred as my off spec when we don't need 2 tanks for a boss fight. To see this (and now learn that Pyro is in the same boat as Madness) makes my head hurt. Maybe I should just cave and level my merc and become another tracer missile spammer. (was a joke for those who will take this last sentence literally).

This is a reoccurring theme in MMO's today. You'll get a 75% of the fights in a tier make playing melee a pain. While range will get a closer to 10% of the fights are a pain. It's rather dumb, but I don't design the games I'm just forced to adapt to it. Hell, I've done fights in a couple games that as melee you sit around twiddling your thumbs in the back of the room for an entire phase because it's that unfriendly to us.

The only time I really care what the other tank is doing is when they clearly lack situational awareness and positioning skills. Can't tell you how many times I just let an under geared tank take the lead to let them feel special and they threaten to wipe the raid by facing bosses towards the raid group. Also, I've pulled threat off of tanks on accident before. I even had one that was so bad I had to pop cloak to wipe my aggro to keep from pulling aggro.

So.... you throw your guard on the lowest threat producing role in the game.... because of 5% damage reduction. lol ok. I can think of 2 fights that I actually needed to guard the healers and that was on the last phase of the Terror fight and Corrupter Zero.

Basically what Aelanis said. I've tried to hit the HP mark with just mods and you can't, you need at least 2 implant/ear piece.

Hmm that was very informative. I love learning new things. Thanks for the post.

Either you missed the point I was trying to say, or I worded it badly. So let me start again. I never said Death and Taxes was bad. I know full well who they are. I've been around MMO's for at least 10+ years. Now that being said. What I was trying to say is that just because one person uses a spec and is able to progress with it in top end raiding guilds doesn't mean the spec is better than another that is reportedly better by some of the top end players in the game. What I was trying to say is that a good team can carry a mediocre spec or even player and still be at the top of the progression game. Progression is less about individual skill and more about the skill of the collective team. Trust me I've seen my own personal guild fail to some of the simplest mechanics. And they aren't bad players. They're just directionally challenged at times. BTW, I found your quick response to defend them quite comical.

Just get your health to around 55-56k though mods and ear/implants. You should have enough mitigation on your enhancements to cover the lower levels. When you start getting 198 token gear replace the implant/earpieces first then scale back the amount of lettered mods till you are still sitting around 56k. I think that is about 4-5 lettered mods at 198. Until they release NiM we won't know if we'll need more health so I wouldn't throw out any lettered mods from gear that is need to progress to the next level (basically get a full set of 198's in preparation for NiM).

What the hell does guild progression have to do with a players performance? Speaking from experience... nothing. I've been in guilds that had some of the worst keyboard turning clickers you could possibly imagine and we where still server first in progression. All progression means is the team works well and can comprehend and execute the mechanics. If you have 7 really good players they can carry a bad spec. Even if you have 8 really good players and one of them plays a under performing spec because they like the play style they can still pull it through. As far as Deception vs hatred and personal experiences with pvp, you guys seem to keep forgetting that just because you beat someone with a certain spec doesn't mean that the spec is better. Player skill is more of a factor than the spec is. Between two evenly skilled players yes the spec and how lucky a player gets can be more of a deciding factor. But that's a big IF.

I was playing around with your spread sheet adjusting the stats to my gear when I noticed it was telling me to use 15 Augments. This obviously is an error. So I looked back at your original sheet and saw that on yours it's telling you to use 14 like it's suppose to. So I started playing around with the numbers again on my copy (just the numbers in the light yellow area no equations or any thing like that) and for some reason it's calculating the stim as an extra gear slot for an augment which is why it's telling me 15 augments instead of 14. Any idea why this is changing like this?

You're talking pvp, this is a pve guide. Things are a bit different when it comes to rotations and such.