Consolidated Vanguard class issues

[Winguardian]

Agree on all counts on this thread. As a vanguard DPS (with 633 expertise) I feel terrible UP in certain encounters and alot of our skilltree skills are absolutely useless. Top assault tree skill that replaces another skill? Really? And it's even a single target and sticky grenade damages the targets surrounding your target aswell.

 

Needs alot of work imo.

[luchiferchuga]

Remove the spoliers or use the spoiler tag!!!

[Skrotnisse]

Work in progress- please provide feedback.

Op's text

 

I agree with most of these except a few.

 

1. Tank threat is a non issue, Taunting an enemy nets you 110% threat and and if you still can't keep aggro then you're doing something wrong and/or you got dps guardians/vanguards/shadows with threat stance on.

 

2. Smoke Bomb damage reduction is (problably) impossible to calculate, The server always calculate whether an attack is a hit or miss THEN it calculates the damage.

 

3. Just cut out Blitz incapacitation part and the ability is good go.

 

4. Supercommando PvE is indeed itemized for accuracy but another issue is that the Columi set grants Absorb rating while Rakata grants defense instead, defense is the weakest stat for Vanguard tank.

[jjanni]

Can we please get this thread STICKIED!

[grandmasterub]

Community Support ignored my sticky petition...

 

However they managed to respond to my "name calling" in about 30 minutes... O and we got blaster appearances stickied...

 

#winning bioware

Edited January 31, 2012 by grandmasterub

[Uthmere]

I completely agree on all points, including the points on threat that have been raised.

 

Vanguards could use a major reduction in cool-downs for thier interupts, riot strike, cryo-grenade, and nueral surge. After all arent interupts meant to be the threat generator? Sonic round is a fair idea, but again cooldown, could last a bit longer as well.

 

I've played every game ever released by Bioware and noticed the same theme concerning a heavy armor non-casters though. It's always a really chalenging class to play in a game from them.

[TheRealNosirrah]

bump for sticky

[thepowerforce]

tanking spec needs to be re-vamped

[kajind]

 

2. Smoke Bomb damage reduction is (problably) impossible to calculate, The server always calculate whether an attack is a hit or miss THEN it calculates the damage.

 

 

false, it is just really hard. if it is a single combat table it might calculate all of them at the same time, wow used a single combat table model, thats why you could push crit and crushing blows off the table.

[ventismith]

I agree with most of these except a few.

 

1. Tank threat is a non issue, Taunting an enemy nets you 110% threat and and if you still can't keep aggro then you're doing something wrong and/or you got dps guardians/vanguards/shadows with threat stance on.

 

I believe this is a false assumption.

 

From what I understand, taunting does not in fact raise your threat level, but instead forces the enemy to attack you for a given amount of time at the end of which threat levels go back to normal.

 

This leaves threat still an issue, especially when ammo is low.

 

[citation needed]

Edited February 1, 2012 by ventismith

[Mayol]

Very large stamp of approval, good summary.

 

The dodge animation preventing ability use is the one getting me right now... if I wanted to bash every key twice I'd tip beer on my keyboard.

 

 

I believe this is a false assumption.

 

From what I understand, taunting does not in fact raise your threat level, but instead forces the enemy to attack you for a given amount of time at the end of which threat levels go back to normal.

 

This leaves threat still an issue, especially when ammo is low.

 

[citation needed]

 

A proper taunt will bring you inline with the highest threat, otherwise taunt switching to bring an OTs threat up would no work.

 

I'm pretty sure Neural Jolt works like this, as I've successfully used it on half dead elites I had NO threat on (and held the mob after the active taunt wore off). Sonic round I'm not sure about.

[RPGers]

Excellent post, I fully support it.

 

I still have the Stay Frosty bonus quest in my log like you mentioned. Its very annoying and Customer Service offer no advice other than a specialist team are investigating.

Well investigate faster and implement a fix dammit.

 

They better not change the animation or sound effects of Stockstrike, the SMACK! sounds good and the animation (especially if used to finish someone) is satisfying.

[Uthmere]

I'm a little disappointed there has been no response to this threat from Bioware, I had really hoped they would have at least gotten someone to sticky it, so we would know they have read our concerns.

[Skrotnisse]

I believe this is a false assumption.

 

From what I understand, taunting does not in fact raise your threat level, but instead forces the enemy to attack you for a given amount of time at the end of which threat levels go back to normal.

 

This leaves threat still an issue, especially when ammo is low.

 

[citation needed]

 

I don't have any evidence that taunts nets you 110% threat but I can tell you this, I've been add tank on the Kintan boss in Karagga's palace, just standing there and waiting for the adds to spawn and not hitting the boss, our main tank died during enrage at 50%, I taunted the boss and held it for the rest of the fight with no threat issue.

 

Just work Taunt into your rotation while main tanking and you will NEVER lose aggro.

[Syclic]

taunt does absolutely nothing unless you arent top aggro.

 

if you just "Work taunt into your rotation", which has holes in it anyway, you wont have it up if someone pulls during those 9 seconds where it isnt fixated to you. meaning if theyre at 99% of your threat and you taunt, you gain nothing from that taunt, and there's the possibility that the DPS will pull off you with a lucky crit string or if they pop DPS CDs.

 

taunt is also for the most part off the GCD, even though you cant use it if you are in an animation, which they seriously need to fix. So putting it in your "rotation" doesnt make sense because its outside of the constricting factor in that rotation(GCD).

 

TLDR: don't taunt unless someone pulls off you

[Nukeo]

Something I noticed in looking forward to the future, comparing my Champion PvP gear to the battlemaster gear it looks as though I will lose a significant amount of accuracy, shield rating, and absorption rating. While increasing Defense Rating considerably. I've not gotten to battlemaster yet, but I am somewhat concerned, will have to see how it plays out.

[Shizophim]

Something I noticed in looking forward to the future, comparing my Champion PvP gear to the battlemaster gear it looks as though I will lose a significant amount of accuracy, shield rating, and absorption rating. While increasing Defense Rating considerably. I've not gotten to battlemaster yet, but I am somewhat concerned, will have to see how it plays out.

 

So far i understand,...

 

The increase in Defense is to counter increased accuracy.

 

If you ask me Absoption is not a desireable stat in pvp because enemies crit chance will always reduce your shieldrating to zero,.. also you cannot shield crits.

 

So imho at best switch form shield / absorb to shield / surge to just support your abilities that are specced to crit, (shockstrike for example)

[kajind]

So far i understand,...

 

The increase in Defense is to counter increased accuracy.

 

If you ask me Absoption is not a desireable stat in pvp because enemies crit chance will always reduce your shieldrating to zero,.. also you cannot shield crits.

 

So imho at best switch form shield / absorb to shield / surge to just support your abilities that are specced to crit, (shockstrike for example)

 

if this is true, and it works the way wow did, while you cant shield crits, if your shield chance and crit chance overlap, crits are pushed off the combat table before shield, therefore while you cant shield a crit, it can reduce the crit chance if you get enough of it.

[Shizophim]

if this is true, and it works the way wow did, while you cant shield crits, if your shield chance and crit chance overlap, crits are pushed off the combat table before shield, therefore while you cant shield a crit, it can reduce the crit chance if you get enough of it.

 

Thats right, but so far i know in the end every single damage dealer comes up with higher crit chances then your shield chance. So your shieldchance will be pulled of the table more likey, leaving all your stats of absorb to be useless.

[Guurzak]

SWTOR is not WOW. In this combat engine crit chance pushes shield chance off the table, not the other way around. This is mentioned in the original post. Edited February 2, 2012 by Guurzak

[kajind]

Thats right, but so far i know in the end every single damage dealer comes up with higher crit chances then your shield chance. So your shieldchance will be pulled of the table more likey, leaving all your stats of absorb to be useless.

 

from the way i understand the combat table works, the lower one is not pushed off, it has to deal with which one is a higher priority, if it adds the shield to the combat table first, then if your remaining crit chance would cause the table to over flow it gets truncated.

[MartyMacGraves]

This is nicely done. Kudos to the OP.

[WildBil]

Noticed this the other night and did some testing.

 

The animation for Pulse Canon extends approximately 3- 5 meters further then the actual AOE damage cone. As a result, basing your use of the ability off it's "screen real estate" can lead to misjudging what will and won't be caught within it's effect.

 

This is only really a problem when dealing with NPC mobs.

[Necodreus]

Noticed this the other night and did some testing.

 

The animation for Pulse Canon extends approximately 3- 5 meters further then the actual AOE damage cone. As a result, basing your use of the ability off it's "screen real estate" can lead to misjudging what will and won't be caught within it's effect.

 

This is only really a problem when dealing with NPC mobs.

 

I have noticed this as well when trying to PC a larger group

Edited February 13, 2012 by Necodreus

[Tawkis]

7A) Endgame tanks find it difficult to hold aggro against endgame DPS, since the endgame DPS gear greatly increases DPS while the endgame tank gear does not greatly increase threat. Consider increasing the threat multiplier in tank stance to 80% or 100% or adding additional threat multiplier to endgame tank gear.

To me this is working as intended, with the caveat that our threat should work off of hits vs damage. DPS should have to be careful about pulling threat unless there's a lot of other things for them to worry about in the fight.

 

7B) Endgame tanks also find it difficult to find operation slots since heroics and flashpoints demand a 1/4 tank population ratio, but operations allow for only a 1/8 or 1/16 tank population ratio. We need a much greater role for off tanks in operations, or we need dual spec so we can freely switch to a DPS role as needed.

 

Excellent point