Honestly, my hope is that solo ranked games would keep the rakata noobs and the "it's too hard Im just gonna chill on a node" folks out of my games. In my perfect hallucination my Wz would be full of people that cared and in my case in a mix of BM/WH full augmented or equivalent that fought hard and won or lost by slim margins. However, Im sure they'd find exploits and it'd be horrible... but can we at least try it.

The whole balance thing is and always has been wildly overblown. The only place balance really hurts is that it won't let some class / spec's participate in rated... (that hurts... ouchies) and even this is more a function of community failure than of game design.. The reality of the balance in this game is that it's really pretty darn good, honestly... and Im a Vigilance Guardian so... no Im not trying to defend an OP class. In general the whole forum balance tear festival is far more destructive to modern gaming than productive. Especially in AAA titles that have balance just about perfect... Crying constantly just takes dev focus away from important issues ... umnnnn world pvp?... and it makes them have 0 respect for the community which just looks like a bunch of unsatisfiable babies.

World Pvp should give credits based on the skill "rated" level of your kill and their gear. Those credits can be split evenly by anyone that does damage in the fight. That's a nice little reward that should break anything.

I just want a way to solo ranked wz please. I want to just do it... and have fun... and get feedback on my skill level so I can work on improving myself. Like starcraft.

Whoever the genious was that serperated MMO's into Pvp and Pve aspects needs to be drug out into the street and filled with better ideas and a deeper understanding of MMOs and those that play them. The ultimate yardstick for your progression isn't static AI encounters... it's other people.

Nice summary OP... rarely do I totally agree, but I do on your post.

Ok as a pvp'er Im about to take a stand thats kind of weird for me. Im fine with Juggies getting whatever they need, as they are our sister class and suffer as we do. However, for us Guardians... I like the animation and damage timing of sweep and wouldn't want it changed. Yep that's right I'd sacrifice pvp practicality for animation as I so love the animations on my Guard. Yes I realize this opinion is nonsense from a pvp perspective but, I do care about asthetics when it comes to Jedi.

thx again man... yep... gonna read that entire site and suck it in Ya I saw that thread was getting out of control and figured I'd try thowing ya a life preserver...

SolidPat you have gained +10 with VoidJustice faction... mostly from your help with my Str vs Pow problems thou... but, also for looking out for us Vigilance/Vengance force sensatives by speaking truth in this truly troubling time for us. just sayin...

ya... crit for vengeance/vigilance... yep... heck even I know that.

so given 1 Strength = (0.222 damage) + (0.03 damage)*(Your personnal crit stat weight) 1 power = 0.23 damage my self buffed crit is at .30 so 1 Str = . 231 1 pow = .23 Thanks... kind of sad it's so simple... will continue to test this does not jibe with my results from testing... so... I'll pull more str augments out... replace with more pow and retest... thx for your insight. p.s. I am in a hodge podge of battlemaster and wh... Im trying to understand the actual mechanics not just follow a boiler plate set of stats (although Im happy to take what folks feel is optimal for testing purposes and test it) although... heh... they don't make testing this stuff easy and cheap.

As a vigilance guardian I'd agree with this post, accept I play other classes also. Vigilance is seriously UP and even if it wasn't, at this point the community conclusion/perception is clear. Vigilance Jedi are 3rd or 4th or even last choice for a rated team. If you got on one you have recieved "mercy" and the reality of any meager dps numbers you put up are more a feather in the cap of the insane talents of your healers than any testiment to your skill. p.s. I continue to play Vig, and stay in pugs as not to hurt my friends teams.

1. How do you think your Guardian spec is perceived by other classes? Useless in Pvp and last choice as tank in pve. (Vigilance spec) Vs the damage output of every other class in PVP there is no convincing anyone we deserve a spot on a team unless they are close friends or super casual. I doubt many would be this honest about our class as it's painfull to admit... but this is the community perception of our class, and it has been this way since before the more recent nerfs. <thanks for that btw, really great> 2. How do you perceive your own spec? I feel we are underpowered, however, I love Vigilance and won't change, I will ride it out and hope we get enough love to be wanted in rated pvp teams or quit playing the spec I love. I could pvp with a toothpick in a wheel chair, and I will continue to do so... ugh...

Your str, pow, crit and end stats would be killer helpfull! thx

I appreciate the feedback, however, the childish "your methods are bad" without any explination of why is really not helpfull. Not that I care about trolling or general rudeness... if thats your thing go for it... However, I'd like to understand the stats better so, I will continue to ask for well thought out responses and ignore rude posts that offer no concrete help. Flaws Im aware of in my testing method. 1) there is no accounting for force damage. I was considering using force sweep to try to correct for that but, Im not sure if it's necessary as a Vigilance Guard Im far more concerned with white damage crits than force damage. Also waitting 12 seconds for a sweep... is beyond my endurance when playing Gav Dagon lab rat. However crit rate and dps are represented just fine by slash and the variability of a human doing rotations is removed as I am simply smashing slash, as far as my sample being too small to draw I'd say you can draw a conclusion to a confidence interval with any sample size greater than 30 as per statistics last time I took it Also, I did get significant results, although I do agree I may try a larger sample size in the future. To those that did honestly attempt too help, Im sorry but I was unable to understand your conclusions, your test methodology... /shrug please try again I'd be very greatfull! I'd also love to hear how my methods could be improved. p.s. Sim craft looks cool but, honestly it's a simulation and I'd rather use the actual game engine for experiment if possible. p.p.s. @Thesolidpat in your analysis did you ever compare a mixture of pow vs str... that's actually what Im attempting. Im interested in if there is a way to utilize the diminishing return curve of pow and str to optimize not a full set of one vs a full set of the other but a mix of both. Thx again.

At what point does it make sense to add power over strength? I've seen str>pow a bazillion times... however, given my own testing (slash, augments, dummy, parser) and things that I've read... Power does increase damage faster than strength at certain levels. My issue is that even thou my analysis says that @1456 strength my damage increases more with a pow augment than a str augment... Im suspicious of my results. I realize that str addes other stats besides straight dps but, ... alas I'd like to know what the common wisdom is... what am I missing... what is the common consensus on end game str and pow levels and optimization! thanks in advance! My testing method. Pre testing strength reads 1456 (Combat dummy, Mox Parser..) add str augment +18 hit slash everytime it's up for 1 minute take reading repeat x30 add pow augment +18 add str augment +18 hit slash everytime it's up for 1 minute take reading repeat x30 average each set of 30 readings compare sort each set of 30 readings highest to lowest and compare conclusion pow>str @1456! looking forward to your review! p.s. what ability has the lowest cooldown and a force component to damage... is it sweep?

I like to switch back and forth between soresu an shien in pvp (Vig spec). So far the best way I've found to do it is to use Soresu the second I feel some pressure (2v1 or a dangerous 1v1) and stay in Shien otherwise. Of course I'll switch to Soresu when I see a healer get targeted and I think they are making a difference (ie I've seen them heal me). In general thou the penalty in dps for switching to Soresu is insanely painfull. Obviously the switching makes life hard for focus also but... I'd rather be alive and out of focus then dead with a full bar of it. The days of depending on getting any heals seems over for me. Im forced to pug almost all the time However, there seems to be a lack of healing going on... which is squeezing me out of shien more and more. Does anyone else have this issue, or any neato tips for staying in Shien more? Thanks in advance!!!

You can remove the channelling aspect of force stasis if you go deep defence build. Honestly thou... Guardians don't need cc... just kill from the weakest to the strongest and you'll be fine. By the time simply killing the weakest to the strongest is no longer sufficient you'll have doc and ... DOC OP...

Any one of our spec's can be used to pvp successfully. That being said most of us either go Vigilance (*) which gives you a lot of self reliance, or Focus which gives you our biggest damage numbers. Few of us go Defence tree for pvp and if your doing that I'd make sure you have a healer you ALWAYS team with... honestly thou I've never run defence in pvp so....(grain of salt) The most important tip has kind of been covered. KEYBIND EVERYTHING and learn them all like a pianist. Guardians don't click... at least not the living ones... Here are a few tips I haven't seen but are very important. 1) Objectives are your priority 2) Staying alive is your next largest priority 3) Use AOE taunt and awe at the perfect time every time 4) Kill any healer that you can 5) Stay on the same target as the Sentinals. *Bonus extra special tip Keybind target friendly, you'll need it. (*) = AWESOME!!!!

Tunewalker how did you do your dummy testing? I've found the best way to test is to simply use slash only and take large datasets of hundreds of average dps readings after hitting the bag for a set period of time (about 1 minute). If your doing a rotation I'd be very carefull about what you think your results are. ESPECIALLY when testing crit which is probability based and therefore can throw off shorter tests wildly. If your not using slash to test and your running a rotation... you have to hit that rotation perfect everytime... not something I'd attempt for such expensive readings. Personally, I keep my self buffed crit at 30%. No specific reason or scientific analysis either... I figure critting 1 out of 3 is good enough that I want to work on damage... lol..

Why no love for straight VIgilance Guardians! Do folks even understand what the difference between Vigilance and Vig/Def? It's a 3 minute 10 second survivability cool down vs a huge boost in dps... Honestly, its debatable which is better, although I think the extra damage and stealth denial is far more important... Either way it seems to me that alot of these MUST HAVE WZ rules are just insane...

Vengance spec isn't as clumsy or random as Rage spec. Its an elegant spec for a more civilized age.

The problem isn't the F2P model. It's the fact that EA/Bioware seems more interested in doing anything besides supporting the PVP player base. We've been screaming for fixes since inception and yet every patch we get stuff our community could care less about and absolutely no communication from the devs. The rated system is exclusive and non-casual friendly. The balance is borked. Hell even the Hutball score thing is completely borked. (at least the last time I had the heart to log on it was) Balance changes are made with a sledgehammer and no follow up. There is no pvp or even pve end game. On top of all this... we can beat our chests and cry all we want... not a single dev comment about pvp... What I find really sad is that the actual combat mechanics and animations and feel... WERE AWESOME... however the metagame, the balance, the lack of content are too much to take... even if it's free... heck if they even had a plan or let us in on a plan to fix the pvp ... I'd stick around and keep paying... but as it is... all I hear about are the great new pve stuff and cool pets and legacy junk and how they have plans to milk us for more cash with their financial saving Free to play model... and honestly... I don't care. The game is no fun at max level... therefore, why stay? /sosad...

When was the defence tree ever viable? I think this thread would make more sense if it simply stated GUARDIAN is dead, no one cares about single saber iconic Jedi. Take a Vangaurd... even in Pve, were basically useless compared to the other tanking classes. It's over Johnny even the fat lady packed it up a while ago, she's done singing... GG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yep and it's intended to work that way. Also you can buy a cheap crafted BM piece and keep your original and save yourself the cost of pulling the mods. Wish I had known all that when I spent over 500k for no reason... grrrrr