From the Guardian side of the spectrum, I stomp bosses in the nuts. I think one of the guilds that raided the new operation on the PTS ranked us just after Madness Sorcs and Annihilation Marauders (Tied with Pyro PT) in the DPS Hierarchy. Also if your tank isn't a Juggernaut you need to have one there anyways for the Sunder. Even if our personal dps were 5% behind the other melee DPS ACs (In most cases, it's not) we'd still be worth taking for our raidwide vicarious dps contribution via SA.

I used the MD-5 Shock Viper Vibroblade on my Guardian from 34 on Balmorra up until I was offered an augmented one today by a guildie. Good stuff, Maynard. One I'm using now looks like it was cobbled together from various pieces of industrial hardware with a bare-tanged straight-edged Katana hanging off of it.

Hrmmm. You must be one of these 'Play by feel' guys. Fair enough. Okay so this is what's going down. You're a PVE Vigilance guardian that doesn't have Unremitting. You should fix that. Unremitting is the 2 point skill in the Vig tree that makes you immune to all CC for a few seconds every time you force leap. Aside from that, you're still not taking into account that getting knocked back isn't the same as an interrupt. It does stop Master Strike, but it doesn't 'interrupt' it in the sense that Force Kick or Mind Snap would. Those are abilities on short cooldowns whose sole purpose is to interrupt casts in progress and also lock the target out of using that ability for a number of seconds afterwards. These are 'Interrupt' abilities. It's to these that Master Strike is immune, not legitimate crowd control like Force Stun, Force Push, etc. You can only use Master Strike without fear of these types of abilities when under the effects of Unremitting. You're given a toolbox. If you learn to use the tools you're given in every applicable situation, you'll be better at the game. Using Guardian Leap offensively falls under this category. This needs to change. Guardian Leap is one of two unique things we bring to a PVE encounter as Vigilance, the other being another primary source of sunder. Remember the toolbox. It lowers the aggro of whoever you use it on, like Sage's Rescue but one that moves you to them rather than moving them to you. Excellent and unique ability. Very utilitarian in the right hands. If you're not feeling a significant improvement to your dps as Vigilance, it's either your spec, your rotation, or some combination of the two. Here's my preferred spec for PVE vig DPS. http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#500MMZcGMRMuddhRZrM.1 If this puts you over budget on Accuracy Rating, rather than pulling points out of Accuracy, I suggest running some HM Flashpoints and picking up some knight/smuggler gloves and yoink some Crit/Surge or Power/Surge enhancements out of those mofos and put them to work in your gear over your accuracy stuff you're using now. PVE DPS Priority flowchart is as follows: (Assumes you know how a flowchart works, priority in descending order of importance, if a line isn't applicable or possible go to the next until you hit one that is. Prerequisite conditions separated by actions with colons, otherwise just use the skill listed.) Have Aggro: Saber Ward <50% Health: Medpack (Not negotiable.) Enemy >10m: Saber Throw Enemy >10m: Force Leap Enemy >4m: Dispatch (Procs preferred) Enemy >4m: Blade Storm (Procs preferred) Weak/Normal/Strong + CCed: Pommel Strike Weak/Normal/Strong + Snared/Rooted: Opportune Strike 3+ Enemies in range: Force Sweep 3+ Enemies in range: Cyclone Slash Weak/Normal, 4k+ Health Remaining: Master Strike 4pc Vindicator, <5 Stacks of Sunder or <9 Focus: Saber Throw <5 Stacks of Sunder or <9 Focus: Sundering Strike Riposté Plasma Brand DoT Not Present: Plasma Brand Force Rush: Dispatch Force Rush + Momentum: Blade Storm Overhead Slash <9 Focus and enemy susceptible to CC and not currently affected by one: Force Stasis Non-Force Rush Dispatch Force Rush + No Momentum Blade Storm Master Strike Force Sweep No Force Rush and/or Master Strike is on CD: Plasma Brand No Momentum + <5 Focus: Guardian Leap + Saber Throw (No 4pc Vindicator)+ Force Leap No Momentum + Force Leap on CD + <5 Focus: Combat Focus Naked Blade Storm (No Force Rush or Momentum) <5 Focus: Force Stasis

I'd mod for defense/shield/absorb and a little accuracy (I'd say 95% on melee would be a good compromise). Also get the hell rid of those terrible defense/surge enhancements asap.

I would argue that my pve build would probably still work pretty well in pvp. Soresu Variants can stick all 10 of your extra points after the 31 in vig into the Def tree for some extra utility, although I personally think staying in Shien is best unless you're hybrid or going for protection. Vig likes crit only up to a max of 35% pre-Lucky Shots, not only is it hitting DR at that point but 40% buffed is soft cap for instacrit Blade Storms and Dispatches. Surge and Power scale great for Vig regardless of crit chance with Power having no DR.

I did pure defense for a normal mode EV the other night and most of my problem was the recent change to my control scheme more than anything else. I still had to rely on using taunts on cooldown every once in a while but held aggro pretty well.

Cya, me and my vig bros will be drinking bacardis and wrecking ****.

Is this for pve or pvp? Vindicator is our PVE tier set for DPS guardians. I'm using 4/31/6. Force efficiency stuff in the Defense tree, pure DPS stuff in the Vigilance tree + Unremitting and 2 points in all 3 of the bottom tier skills in the Focus tree.

Golden reference is golden. Force Kick is an interrupt. Force Push is not an interrupt. CC still stops master strike, but CCs aren't Interrupts. Also Zen Strike is great. It improves your focus dump in both PVE and PVP and Master Strike is worth chaining with Leap root and Freezing Force for huge damage.

I think the misconception of Guardian DPS being bad (Specifically Vigilance) in comparison to other DPS specs of other classes is past its prime now that 1.2 has rolled out. Also this is clearly a PVE thread, those of you talking about PVP. FFS.

I didn't even clip MS before 1.2 and don't now unless it's Time to Move™. I often save Stasis Mastery for adds but even on a single target boss fight it may be worth using once you apply your dots. Problem is, it costs 2 gcds worth of time to cast for mediocre damage, is a channel, and chances are if you're weaving Sundering Strike and leapfrogging properly you may not need the focus. Without the utility of the CC effect I personally don't think Force Stasis pays for itself in your single-target boss rotation, IMO.

Tier 1.1/1.2/1.3 gear looked like transvestite space nun costumes, not sure if sexy 12 year old jedi is much of an improvement.

For the love of all that is unholy will you people please just HIT THE DAMN SPACE BAR.

It's the exact opposite with consulars. 3/4 of our gear is optimized for females and questionable at best on men. Too easy.

Not a lot of people interested in this subject? Too much PVP QQ?

I respecced t7 to DPS by basically giving him moddable cybertech droid gear with high aim and crit/surge/power/accuracy enhancements, all blue level 49 quality. Gave him a generator instead of a shield, ran him in Targeting Process, turned off Stimulus Applicator, EMP, Flare Gun, and had him pewpewpew. Focused on the boss exclusively without even bothering with the adds, he never attempted the OHKO attack the entire time because mine and T7s dps was too much for him, he went down in around 20 seconds.

Definitely a bug. I don't know what their fixation is with giving cunning gear tank stats. Shotguns with Aim/Shield/Absorb? It's a *********** offhand, a slot mutually exclusive with the very shields that Shield and Absorb ratings are gated by, and classes that can use shotguns can't even use them in the first place.

Whooooeeeee, sum*****in monkeynuts! Good thing they gave us a free month. :x

This is a good idea. There's times where the chest is actually the odd piece and changing it to match the other pieces is desired, or when you just happen to like the color scheme of a single piece of gear and want everything else to match it.

Vigilance is nuts now. Oh, and doc's improved performance is likely due to the 200-300 presence you picked up in the patch.

It was removed from the game because we shouldn't have unavoidable resolve on our gap closer once every 12 seconds.

It's a dps build so yeah. Extra health helps a lot but once you get doc he more or less becomes your health bar while you level. Having good armor and keeping Doc's relevant healing stats up (Cunning, Power, Crit, Surge) will mean more than stacking extra Endurance on your own gear.

With practice it flows really nicely, Saber Throw into Leap and you have 6 focus there, *Plasma Brand, (which will set you at 2-4 focus depending on if you got a Zen Strike proc), Sundering Strike, (now you're at 5-7), burn Momentum on Blade Storm (net gain of 1 because it was free, 6-8) Overhead, (3-5, again, depending on Zen proc), another Sunder (6-8), Force Sweep (7-9), Master Strike while Plasma Brand comes off of cooldown, then Sunder again (10-12) PB immediately (6-8), if 6 or less focus, use Combat Focus here (12), if not, Blade Storm first then do it (10-11), continue with your focus burn rotation while weaving Sundering Strikes. When you start getting low enough that you would ordinarily start using lolstrike, just Guardian Leap a distant friendly and Saber Throw > Force Leap back in. Takes 3 globals for a total of 4.5 seconds and gives you the same amount of focus as 3x strike but also gives you Momentum and Unremitting. Resume at the astrisk (*). If you have the 4 piece Vindicator bonus you can just bust out Saber Throw on cooldown alongside your Sundering Strikes whether you're in melee range or not. Between 2 of your 3 focus burning attacks refunding an extra 2 30% of the time and the 3rd being free roughly every 3rd casting, focus management is super super easy now with Vigilance. As long as you remember to use Sundering Strike every third global as long as you're at 9 or less focus you shouldn't ever have problems with Focus.