I have news for you. He was definitely using guard, and in range of that player. Reason is because the survivor 4 set bonus is +5% damage while your guard is active. Then he stacks all dps stats (power and surge especially) and gets a huge damage boost while guarding. I know this because I do the exact same thing.

LOL you obviously don't understand shields in PvP if you think you want one. Force and Tech attacks can NEVER be shielded. Force and Tech attacks make up the bulk of damage and nasty effects that you might want to shield. Plus, shields already have less stats than offhands and foci to make up for the shield chance/absorb on them. So pretty much, they're ALREADY useless, much less with your proposed nerf.

As a Shadow Tank in PvP here was my line of thought when gearing: 1.) Force and Tech attacks can't be shielded. So when I get attacked with a force/tech attack, all the stats I have in Shield Rating and Absorb are worthless. Considering most of the nasty attacks that you might want to shield are force and tech based, why on earth use a shield or stack shield stats? 2.) If there's defense on gear, that's fine, its a good stat for a shadow, especially when coupled with a +Defense pop relic and Deflection. This is how dps shadows are able to tank 4 people for 20-25 seconds while help is on the way. 3.) Stack power and surge, and get the survivor PvP 4 piece bonus (+5% damage when guarding). Pull out mods and stat accordingly. 4.) Now instead of trying to tank people for a long time, KILL THEM BEFORE THEY KILL YOU OR YOUR GUARD TARGET. This worked out remarkably well. I'm not saying Shadow's didn't need a nerf, because we did. But the nerf we got in 1.3 didn't address the basic problem: A HUGE part of being a Shadow tank is being able to increase our survivability with shields. Making most nasty attacks bypass our shield FORCED us to abandon our role as pure tanks in PvP and stack damage gear instead. Had BW addressed the shield issue from the start, we wouldn't be in this mess. Just my thoughts. BW doesn't understand the problem, so it doesn't surprise me that their solution sucks.

This was my question as well. As a KC spec'd Shadow, I will fully admit that the self heals were over the top. However, the armor nerf is HUGE. 35%? Unless they were going to couple this with a fix for shielding/absorb, making it apply to force and tech attacks, I just can't believe that they're going to destroy the passive defenses of this class this much.

I hate to keep reiterating this, but this is a TEAM game. I know you healers don't want to hear it, but if we give you all these tools and escape mechanics/increased heals you wont need tanks anymore. You'll be able to solo your way to victory and trivialize dps attempts to kill you. If healers aren't vulnerable there's no reason at all to have tanking as a PvP mechanic, and I for one love it.

Ah thank you for that. I hadn't even thought of that. Haters in this thread are still dismissing it, but I still believe it shows that sage/sorc heals are capable of amazing things in competent groups with tanks.

I think a lot of the healers around here are under the impression that all dps are maras/sents. They forget that there are plenty of dps out there that will be killed very quickly if they're away from teammates or heals for too long. These dps also have to play like a team to avoid focus fire and near instant death at the hands of a group. Just as the healer should probably stay near the tank, the smart dps should stay near the healer. I'm not trying to throw any nerf mara/sent talk in here, but I think they are a special case of dps that can operate alone for long periods of time due to having the best defensive CDs in the game. But that's another issue...

Sounds like you need to move onto a game that revolves around solo game play and 1v1 mechanics. Also, if a dps is out on his own without heals, they're going to find that their dps drops significantly because they are dead. The solution is simple, just stick near a tank, ask them for guard....and profit. Or don't and be fodder, I don't care.

But if we give you those tools and you don't need a tank, why take one? If you are capable of escaping any foe and never needing to rely on your team for help, you might as well just drop the tanks and stack more dps. I see nothing wrong with at the beginning of a pug WZ you ask whos a tank and if you can get guarded. I often will call out in pug WZs to see who is heals and gravitate towards them for the teams sake. This is a team game, you have to learn to work with others to shore up your classes weaknesses.

I respect that. Thanks for not flaming. However, just from personal experience I disagree. In my premades I've never seen a Scoundrel healer outperform a competent Sage by a factor of 2. I've also never had a problem locking down a dps or 2 on my sage heals. If the sage is kiting correctly (esp using pillars or terrain), and I'm keeping force slow rolling + we're both using our KBs to effect, 2 maras can basically NEVER close to harass the healer. Not to mention, if they're away from heals of their own, I WILL kill them. Beware the shadow tank who stacks surge for auto-crit projects. It's the same with Vanguards, plenty of hobbling tools and great damage on stock strike. I respect that your experience may be different. Agree to disagree I suppose.

I agree not all healers are in the same place. For sure Scoundrel is better off than sorc, that I'll admit. However, my point was that tanks are the pivotal game changer for ANY healer. As a shadow tank, with some work, I can shut down 2 dps trying to kill/interrupt my healer between my KB, taunts, knockdown, stun, and mezz I can tie them up nearly indefinitely, freeing my healer to get out group heals on anyone in the immediate vicinity. One of my more regular PvP premade partners is a sage, and I've never seen him underperform in a WZ.

I don't know if I'd say required. If you want to be competitive, then yes, but the alternative was pre 1.2 when tanks were useless and all stacked dps gear because healers didn't need any help.

It proves the concept that tanks are VERY important in PvP. Regardless of the class, a well guarded healer can change the balance of a WZ.

That's what you get when you don't think. Also, just because a competent team can shut you down, doesn't mean you are overnerfed. It just means your team wasn't as competent. I imagine the sorcs/sages on their team did just fine because the dps we're doing their jobs, killing/interrupting your heals, and allowing them breathing room. Seriously, if you can't pull out more than 100k healing in a match, I'm going to say that the problem exists between your keyboard and your chair.

Oh look Brittany, another screenshot showing that healer with good tank can pull off amazing numbers. Seems to me like the evidence is mounting. Thanks for that ComeAndSee! For those too lazy to look at it, it shows a well guarded healer doing 750k healing while the top dps in the WZ was only able to do about 350k.