Are vanguards considered viable tanks for ranked/arena if specced and geared as tanks? I understand most feel the burst is gimped, but what about the tanking utility in PVP?

Thank you I truly appreciate the honest feedback. What happened that nerfed us so bad? When I quit I actually got bored because I felt the game was too easy as assault and eventually just got so bored I quit playing.

Hi All, I'm returning from a long break and used to play a Vanguard, mainly assault or tactics and exclusively PVP. I am reading a bunch of stuff about Vanguards being weak and such, so I'm not really looking for the QQ. I guess what I want to know is, what is considered the best PVP spec we have right now? I'm assuming based on reading Assault has fallen from it's throne, but is it still viable, and will it be viable for arenas? What about tactics and shield spec? Thanks in advance, going to start grinding 50-55 and would like to get some ideas on how to gear up for PVP to be most effective. =)

Now you can see why when EA boasts "Mythic pvp devs" you know they are lying. There is like 1 mythic PVP dev left, and he sucks balls....literally. Mythic died years ago and is just a name with nothing to back it anymore. We saw this with Warhammer, and now we see it with SWTOR. Please learn as I did that Mythic no longer means anything in terms of PVP in a few years when they try to shove it down your throats for the next MMO failure they release.

I thought dual speccing was one of the major features of the legacy system? I don't see it anywhere....was it not released?

So we can show bioware how smart they are.

GW2 is around the corner. I suggest unsubbing now and playing a free game until then such as League of Legends. All the work you are putting into this failboat will be a waste of time come GW2 when you quit anyways, just quit now and cut your losses like the rest of the hardcore PVPers.

On the bright side they didn't put in a leaver penalty so you can still leave the losing matches.

I run full tactics all the time, and yes I use high energy cell. It's a very under rated spec. The main difference is that with tactics you know your burst potential at all times, with assault some of your burst depends on procs and can be less than a tactics burst, or better. With tactics a full burst will not beat a full assault burst, but I find it to still be solid and reliable burst. Not to mention the constant move speed + hold the line to be amazing as well as almost infinite ammo. Lastly I find assault to be a very boring spec. Granted most classes in this game don't have more than 1 rotation, but with tactics you atleast have 2 main rotations which I find keeps me amused a bit longer.....even if 1 of them involves spamming ion pulse 5 times lol... Either way, just look at the trees and pick what you like. I tell you this, someone else tells you that, in the end you do what you like and you make it work. Edit: Here is my main spec: http://db.darthhater.com/skill_calc/trooper/specialist/#::efe2de2fe7fe5f2ef8ef10ef13: Also, I solo almost exclusively at all times because I work 2nd shift. 1v1's no problem other than a few classes/builds, wz's no problem at all and usually lead damage by a mile.

I gave them 1 more month to offer me a free character transfer after that I'm done. I only log in to do the 2 pvp dailies then I play league of legends. /shrug

I use HEC almost exclusively now and love it. Not only is the extra damage nice but I never run out of ammo....like I can literally spam ion pulse x5 + pulse generator and still be in medium range of ammo. The best is the movespeed. It's not noticeable at first but the more I play the more I have come to love it. If I can see a melee coming and start pre kiting they can not catch me without wasting a gap closer....which is easily avoided by HTL or a stun.

LOL With fully modded combat tech gear using mostly power/surge from gunslinger gear, if everything crits and I have red buff + power trinket, this is what that would look like: Fire dot ~ 2k over what, 8 seconds? High impact bolt (railshot) - 3800 Stockstrike (Riot strike) - 3200 You couldn't kill a bolstered level 49 in 3 hits. Add in Assault Plastique and MAYBE, but most don't go all the way up assault tree. I've seen that crit for around 4200. Most use the carolina parakeet spec which doesn't get AP, or a version of Assault/Tactics. Not many people go full assault.

Yea the smugglar helm is the only one that I know of that has the power/surge. Good luck.

Not bad have you optimized your gear yet? As in pull out all of the accuracy junk? You can do alot more damage than that with the right enhancements. The gunslinger enforcer helm in particular gives the power/surge enhancement which is great for replacing the junk in our gear.

Yes. Go against the grain my friend, you will be surprised.

I use it all the time, it's very under rated. If you enjoy kiting definitly try it. But don't give up after 3 games like most people do. If you focus on learning the spec and the 2 rotations, as well as getting good at pre-kiting/kiting, you will be amazed.

Meh he makes some valid points but alot of his issues are due to him having a crappy PC. He goes "You can't compare wow to swtor because wow was 2004 and swtor is 2012" yet he compares the graphics and how his PC handles the games. I ran WoW on ultra on my last 2 PC's over the last 6 years....not big accomplishment. I run 1 nvidia 580 TI and I get 100+ FPS in ilum in small skirmishes and about 75 in the zerg. Get a new PC brah.

There isn't any kill trading on my server that I know of. We are outnumbered probably 3-1 but still do our best to put up a good fight. Or, if their zerg is just too big, we just pull them into our turrets.

QFT I dropped cybertech for biomed just because I couldn't afford to grind gear and medpacks due to time constraints.

I can already see premades booting people just to grief or booting lesser geared peeps to get someone with better gear in. Definitly going to be an issue.

I disagree. It has solid burst when played correctly. That being said, Assault is probably better overall, but tactics can definitely do some great damage. I also am growing very fond of the in-combat move speed especially for pre-kiting. Once you break the snare on a melee I can't count how many times they chase me for a few seconds then run away when they realize they aren't catching me lol...then i get to chase them with increased move speed and finish them off. I think alot of people aren't giving it a as much of a chance as they should. I won't deny it needs some help/tweaks, but I think alot of that is due to the OP-ness of our tanking bullets...it's really hard to give that up for a small %damage increase. Then again i always play the weak/non-played specs so meh, take it for what it's worth.

Maybe it's just buggy all together haha. There might be some bug where if you do it from a certain distance you do/don't take damage? I dunno, I do it alot though and don't remember taking any damage. I do it all the time in Ilum because they always run down the sides of the mountains and I just jump off the side and storm them lol....

Uh pretty sure you don't take damage I just did it a few days ago in Ilum where I jumped off of center and stormed a guy on the bottom of the cliff and took 0 damage.

OMG yes. It's soooo annoying. The worst part is that you can't even mount to run through the darn things.

Most of us PVP to PVP.