Guardian with vigilance help.

[MozezKim]

I am a lvl 11 guardian right now and have been looking at the forums to see a effective way to play this class. One thing I have learned is that all the tree's are viable for pvp and pve with enough practice. After researching I found that the vigilance tree appeals to me and I just have a couple of questions.

 

I read some posts that said that even if you are specing in vigilance you should use soresu instead of shien because you will have more survivability while still doing good damage. Is this true? Is the 12% damage increase that shien provides really not worth trading for the 6% damage reduction and 60% armor rating increase?

 

If that is the case then using soresu form my build would look something like this.

 

http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#500crZhGrMRhddMRZh.1

 

However, if using shien form is superior then my build would be this

 

http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#500cRZcGrRMuddMRZh.1

 

Also for the offhand, would you use the shield generator or the focus? I know this is a DPS spec, but I read that have a shield generator provides more durability that is more beneficial than the extra damage a focus might provide.

 

What you guys think? Any suggestions and constructive criticism would be appreciated.

Edited January 8, 2012 by MozezKim

[KiranK]

I am a lvl 11 guardian right now and have been looking at the forums to see a effective way to play this class. One thing I have learned is that all the tree's are viable for pvp and pve with enough practice. After researching I found that the vigilance tree appeals to me and I just have a couple of questions.

 

I read some posts that said that even if you are specing in vigilance you should use soresu instead of shien because you will have more survivability while still doing good damage. Is this true? Is the 12% damage increase that shien provides really not worth trading for the 6% damage reduction and 60% armor rating increase?

 

The whole "ZOMG Soresu everything" is just a bandwagon trend. Last week it was "ZOMG Vigilance owns everything". Ignore it and it will pass. Fight in the style you're specced for. If all else fails, try it out for yourself. The forums are no substitute for real world nit and grit.

 

If that is the case then using soresu form my build would look something like this.

 

http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#500crZhGrMRhddMRZh.1

 

However, if using shien form is superior then my build would be this

 

http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#500cRZcGrRMuddMRZh.1

 

Also for the offhand, would you use the shield generator or the focus? I know this is a DPS spec, but I read that have a shield generator provides more durability that is more beneficial than the extra damage a focus might provide.

 

What you guys think? Any suggestions and constructive criticism would be appreciated.

 

Use a focus.

[russmanOR]

soresu>Shein for questing and pvp as vigilance.

[bamsmacked]

I am a lvl 11 guardian right now and have been looking at the forums to see a effective way to play this class. One thing I have learned is that all the tree's are viable for pvp and pve with enough practice. After researching I found that the vigilance tree appeals to me and I just have a couple of questions.

 

I read some posts that said that even if you are specing in vigilance you should use soresu instead of shien because you will have more survivability while still doing good damage. Is this true? Is the 12% damage increase that shien provides really not worth trading for the 6% damage reduction and 60% armor rating increase?

 

If that is the case then using soresu form my build would look something like this.

 

http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#500crZhGrMRhddMRZh.1

 

However, if using shien form is superior then my build would be this

 

http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#500cRZcGrRMuddMRZh.1

 

Also for the offhand, would you use the shield generator or the focus? I know this is a DPS spec, but I read that have a shield generator provides more durability that is more beneficial than the extra damage a focus might provide.

 

What you guys think? Any suggestions and constructive criticism would be appreciated.

 

Shien is superior if you want more damage output... Soresu makes it harder to build focus unless you're getting attacked, and building focus is already a task for Vigilance guardians until 30ish or so.

 

Shien gives you a 6% damage increase, not 12, plus it refunds 1 focus for every attack that costs focus.

 

People have so many problems with Vigilance guardians and Vengeance Juggernauts because they try to turn them into something they're not. Either semi-tanks, or focusing on crits.

 

I recently switched over my Jugg to a tank and made a Guardian. My Jugg was Vengeance and I focused more on crits. But on my Guardian I focused more on raw damage through power enhancements, that I craft myself and my damage has went up significantly. My survivability in PvE has increased a lot as well, but my goal is to make a strong PvP character and I'm managing to take out other characters my level in just a few hits.

 

http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#500cRZIGMRMhddhoZMM.1

 

This is my "experimental" final build.

[invispoet]

soresu>Shein for questing and pvp as vigilance.

 

For questing, you're flat out wrong. There's no reason to be in soresu if you're spec'd vigi. 12% damage increase AND reduced focus cost on all abilities? yes please.

 

As for pvp, if you're spec'd vigi, the ONLY times you should be in soresu are if you're carrying a hutball, or you need to put guard on someone (who is probably carrying the ball, healing the guy with the ball, or defending a node). You lose WAY too much damage going into soresu.

 

As for the post that said shien is 6%...you get another +6% from a tier 1 vigi talent, which affects almost all (I believe except sabre throw and force stasis) of your attacks.

[bamsmacked]

For questing, you're flat out wrong. There's no reason to be in soresu if you're spec'd vigi. 12% damage increase AND reduced focus cost on all abilities? yes please.

 

As for pvp, if you're spec'd vigi, the ONLY times you should be in soresu are if you're carrying a hutball, or you need to put guard on someone (who is probably carrying the ball, healing the guy with the ball, or defending a node). You lose WAY too much damage going into soresu.

 

As for the post that said shien is 6%...you get another +6% from a tier 1 vigi talent, which affects almost all (I believe except sabre throw and force stasis) of your attacks.

 

Yes I'm aware. Just stating.

[knowitall]

Don't skip the Force Sweep damage/CD talent and don't skip the Force Leap immobilize talent.

[lsarii]

You use Soresu for the ability to Guard on people, not for survivability (though as long as you're already in Soresu, you may as well use a Shield Generator).

[Atamasama]

As for the post that said shien is 6%...you get another +6% from a tier 1 vigi talent, which affects almost all (I believe except sabre throw and force stasis) of your attacks.

No, it only affects melee attacks. It doesn't affect Force attacks. Aside from what you mentioned, Force attacks also include Blade Storm, Force Sweep, and Force Push.

[MimicUnleashed]

soresu>Shein for questing and pvp as vigilance.

 

Only true on packs higher than 4-5 (depending on your gear), more than 1 silver, or anything with a gold border. Then you Soresu and go. Unfortunately later in the game silvers come in 2s and sometimes 3s. So you'll spend the last 5-ish levels in Soresu more than Shien while soloing unless you've geared Doc out so much that your Smuggler friends hate you for being a ninja looter.

[MozezKim]

Thanks for all the feedback guys! I really appreciate it. After reading the forums again, I noticed a hybrid spec build with vil/def. It looked something like this.

 

http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#500crh0zZhGrMMhdzMM.1

 

I don't really know where to put the last 3 points.

 

What do you guys think of the viability of this hybrid build in pve and pvp?

[PhilMeyer]

Put them in Blade Barricade, and congrats, you've got the spec from the sticky at the top of this forum .

 

Edit: Not quite, but very close.

Edited January 10, 2012 by PhilMeyer

[Drakks]

For leveling, it's honestly nice to stay in soresu. Always has been. Stuff is always hitting you which is generating focus, and you aren't deep enough in the tree to where 6-12% total damage is really a good trade for the survivability soresu provides.

 

The bandwagon comment was hilarious, but completely unfounded. I've never heard anyone suggest leveing in anything but soresu.

[Seismax]

For leveling, it's honestly nice to stay in soresu. Always has been. Stuff is always hitting you which is generating focus, and you aren't deep enough in the tree to where 6-12% total damage is really a good trade for the survivability soresu provides.

 

The bandwagon comment was hilarious, but completely unfounded. I've never heard anyone suggest leveing in anything but soresu.

 

The focus generation on Soresu really isn't anything worth talking about. Shien has it built in, Shii-cho gets it as a tier 2 focus talent.

 

6-12% total damage might be a good trade for soresu, but you're actually losing a bit more due to going shield instead of a dps offhand and the slower focus building overall.

 

imo soresu is very overrated, nothing ups survivability like quickly killing sources of damage.

[Ruggs]

That build is very similar to what I use.

 

I would swap burning blade for Gather Strength and put the last 3 points in Pacification.

 

Burning blade doesn't do very much damage. It ticks for under 100 damage, which is useless. Gather strength doesn't apply to every fight, but it helps you when you're being kited, which is our biggest weakness IMO.

 

As far as the stance discussion, if you aren't PvPing in soresu and using guard, then you aren't earning as many medals as you could, and you aren't helping your team to the fullest extent. Full stop.

 

I never switch forms, and I don't have any focus generation issues, so the only difference is damage. The biggest crit I've gotten from an overhead slash is about 1600. I'm always in soresu, so adding another 12% to that is roughly another 200 damage. My overall damage in a warzone is usually around 100k, so (without taking into account survivability, and the dps lost while dead) we're talking about another 12k damage or so over the course of a game. That's not game-changing.

 

What is game changing is reducing someone's damage by 50%. Being able to hold a node with a healer vs 4-5 enemies for a while is fantastic. You win games like that. Try this: when you start a game, just before the initial contact between the 2 sides, guard your front-most teammate. When they get jumped by all the enemy melee, pop your aoe taunt. You'll immediately have 2-3 medals, and have effectively prevented 5-10k damage depending on how many melee the enemy has.

 

Shien is about big hits. Soresu is about winning.

[Drakks]

The offhands don't add much -- even at 50 you can use a shield and not notice the difference, so you can imagine how trivial those values become sub 50.

 

This is, however, anecdotal since we don't have damage logs.

 

6-12% through the 30s and probably early 40s isn't even something you could notice. 12% would be in fully talented Shien, Shii-cho less, but when you're talking mobs with 1k, or 2k, it really doesn't come out to anything. Where I always say the difference was on strong or elite mobs, where not being in soresu really seemed to work against me.

 

Ymmv.

[PhilMeyer]

I switched to Shien form for about half a level. I did notice the increase in damamge(or thought I did) but it still wasn't worth the decrease in defense, in my opinion (with Kara as my companion).

 

I switched back to Soresu, and probably will stay with it until 50.

[VertisReaper]

go 7 pts into focus and you can spam crit slashes for 2 focus each you can take the 2 pts out of the defense tree, you get plenty of focus in shien form.

[Seismax]

The offhands don't add much -- even at 50 you can use a shield and not notice the difference, so you can imagine how trivial those values become sub 50.

 

This is, however, anecdotal since we don't have damage logs.

 

6-12% through the 30s and probably early 40s isn't even something you could notice. 12% would be in fully talented Shien, Shii-cho less, but when you're talking mobs with 1k, or 2k, it really doesn't come out to anything. Where I always say the difference was on strong or elite mobs, where not being in soresu really seemed to work against me.

 

Ymmv.

 

You don't need damage logs to see the tooltip and actual output difference. Even without running the numbers it is a fairly large loss in damage. As in, a level 40ish Focus offers higher dps than a level 50 Shield generator.

 

Of course, if your argument is "Oh well gear doesn't make a noticeable difference to dps, you'd hardly be able to tell if you're missing a slot." Then yes, I suppose a lot of people won't notice it. That doesn't change the fact that it IS a loss.

 

Anyways, if you really don't think 12% is noticeable, then there's nothing to really discuss, that's more of an increase than half your talent tree is worth(Well, the non-stance buffing portion lol).

Edited January 10, 2012 by Seismax