What's the deal with level 50 Vanguard PVP?

[MikeDestroyer]

Hey folks,

 

I've read multiple posts here stating that Vanguard is great in level 50 PVP, the DPS is good, good survivability, etc.

 

Then I've read in other posts that Vanguard is useless after level 50 in PVP, as they're shield gear hardly absorbs any damage in PVP and their DPS output can't match that of the other classes. Even with all the fancy PVP gear, they still suck.

 

Can we clarify this once and for all? What's the deal with level 50 Vanguards in PVP?

 

Thanks guys!

[Bawheidbob]

Suppose the difference there is good players against bad players on both sides.

[MikeDestroyer]

Suppose the difference there is good players against bad players on both sides.

 

I understand where you're coming from, but there are still great players on both sides of this argument, and I'd like to hear from them.

[Fdzzaigl]

Don't know, so far, as a tank, I consistently got 8-9 medals every match in pre-50 PvP.

 

As an undergeared tank in 50 PvP I get destroyed in seconds by just about everything. There is nothing meaningful I CAN do about it, the gap is just too great.

I still get the "easy" medals for defending and guarding about 40k each match, but I'll end up dying 10 times or so to get that.

 

I hear DPS does well, but I'm invested in tanking too much to go there. And even for them, I can't imagine wrecking face is possible without gear.

 

You just have to grind it out until you match the rest of them atm I guess :/

Edited January 22, 2012 by Fdzzaigl

[GregP]

I'm finding that I usually get 8-10 medals per match. I've got around 360 valor (8% damage/reduction/healing) 4 pieces of Champion armor and some of the misc. pieces. However, as other classes obtain the same gear I'm finding it harder and harder to keep up damage wise. These days I'm usually close to around middle of the pack for total damage. I still win most of the one on one fights I get in, but they're getting closer. Operatives in particular are getting out of hand with the amount of damage they do out of stealth. They take so much of my HP away while I'm stunned, that by the time I can react, my DPS isn't sufficient to win the fight. It doesn't matter if I'm running a Tactics PVP spec or an Assault PVP spec.

Now, bear in mind, that I don't run with a premade. I generally don't have a healer keeping me up or anyone working with me to take or defend objectives. It does seem to me, however, that as other classes obtain PVP gear Vanguards are starting to fall behind.

Edited January 22, 2012 by GregP

[Therealkoop]

As a lvl 50 with 450 expertise and assault spec, I feel pretty powerful.

 

I typically end with the most damage, least deaths, and most kills. Many rounds I feel as though im not doing anything (guarding left on alderaan, standing next to a door on voidstar with nobody coming), and ill still end with the highest dmg.

 

I have problems with dropping healers sometimes. Mainly caused by people coming to help them once i get them low. Sometimes Ill blow too much ammo on them and they will heal up or my cc will be down.

 

I feel as though my burst is still somewhat low compared to other classes if i dont pop adrenals. But overall vanguard seems to be a very mobile and flexible class with a decent amount of cc. Nice consistent dmg and good survivability through cd's.

 

Ive tried to play other classes and thier playstyles just dont work for me.

[Fafryd]

I am valor rank 58 with 622 expertise. I run assault/tactics spec in full champ gear.

 

My view:

- survivability is 'ok' overall but always remember you are most effective at or near melee range. That means you are in the kill zone for any powerful ranged DPS. Hence, your survivability is generally poor in larger group encounters but is reasonable in small skirmishes

- your defensive abilities only add modest survivability. However, Supercommando gear has a lot of endurance and you can become harder to kill merely by having a 22k hp pool. Is it material to have 22k versus 17k on a pure DPS? Probably not

- a lot of your damage is over time, rather than burst. If you face a team with healers, you will struggle to land the killing blows needed. HIB is the bread and butter and is fine but you're going up the DPS rankings usually with DOT damage which is easy to heal if the enemy team is competent

- using harpoon for insta kills or hazard damage makes you very unpopular with the enemy team and you will get some extra attention. It's still fun but expect payback

- we remain prone to being CC. 1 breaker, HTL or Storm doesn't really make up for it. The better known you become, the more likely you will be CC locked. That's alongside the fact that you generally aren't more survivable

 

If you watch the Oozo and Taugrim style videos, you can be very encouraged, of course. I have large lingering doubts over the viability of Vanguard in PVP at the genuine end game however.

 

Getting a lot of medals is kind of irrelevant. Most matches I end up with 2.5k hit (a HIB crit), 75k total, 2k and 5k defense, killing blow, 10 and 25 kills. These are reasonably straight forward for a DPS DOT based class. It can be harder to get the 300k, solo kill, 10k single life defense medals and depends on the fight and your team. The healer which does 350k healing in a warzone probably helped you win it more than someone walking away with 9 medals.

Edited January 22, 2012 by Fafryd

[MikeDestroyer]

Thanks for the replies guys, deffinitely enlightening.

[Thankyjack]

I'm finding that I usually get 8-10 medals per match. I've got around 360 valor (8% damage/reduction/healing) 4 pieces of Champion armor and some of the misc. pieces. However, as other classes obtain the same gear I'm finding it harder and harder to keep up damage wise. These days I'm usually close to around middle of the pack for total damage. I still win most of the one on one fights I get in, but they're getting closer. Operatives in particular are getting out of hand with the amount of damage they do out of stealth. They take so much of my HP away while I'm stunned, that by the time I can react, my DPS isn't sufficient to win the fight. It doesn't matter if I'm running a Tactics PVP spec or an Assault PVP spec.

Now, bear in mind, that I don't run with a premade. I generally don't have a healer keeping me up or anyone working with me to take or defend objectives. It does seem to me, however, that as other classes obtain PVP gear Vanguards are starting to fall behind.

 

Seriously? If an op out of stealth is doing "out of hand" damage, I don't know what to say. Ops out of stealth are horrid.

[Cryowolf]

By "out of stealth" he is referring to the opening damage burst as they pop "out of stealth".

[Raggok]

I have problems with dropping healers sometimes.

 

Everybody does if they are good healers with good gear.

 

I just usually call a friend over and rotate our interrupts to kill them.

[Raggok]

If you watch the Oozo and Taugrim style videos, you can be very encouraged, of course. I have large lingering doubts over the viability of Vanguard in PVP at the genuine end game however.

 

I agree with a lot of what you said.

 

In Voidstar I typically end up top on damage due to the nature of the warzone. Of course, a lot of my damage is AoE and tab-target DoTing which probably doesn't actually kill a lot of people BUT you often times don't need to kill people at all to win Voidstar. We bring a lot of utility when defending doors and/or nodes. And, of course, the utility we bring to Huttball is excellent.

 

In Alderaan I typically don't end up with top damage since I'm usually busy solo assaulting or defending nodes. I almost always end up with the highest number of solo kills in any match I play. But that is due to playstyle, mostly.

 

I think our biggest weakness are long and drawn out fights with tons of healing on both sides where our ammo becomes an issue.

[Riulassher]

Seriously? If an op out of stealth is doing "out of hand" damage, I don't know what to say. Ops out of stealth are horrid.

 

When I see them jumping on our squishies, I usually pull them towards me. And I do remember getting my *** kicked several times in this situation, by operative who has already blown his opener, but his melee dps in next 10-15s or so was still enough to kill me.

 

It could be a gear difference, I didn't have any expertize gear yet, and I am pretty sure that they did.

 

I did learn to keep them pinned and harmless for a while after they pop out of stealth, to avoid any relic/acid blade/adrenal-related injuries.

[Rykke]

I play the mirror equivalent of a Shield/Assault Vanguard on the Imperial side. Not completely geared yet, I currently have 7.41% expertise. Damage is not lacking, it is enough to force kills and apply a decent amount of pressure. Geared Healers on the other hand, you will need a friend or two to come help, it's not going to happen if you go solo.

 

You have plenty of staying power provided you preemptively use your defensive CDs and rotate them. As a tank, you're still one of the best ball handlers. You will get ripped to shreds if you waste your CDs and don't have them when you need them.

 

You are one of the best PvP classes atm whether it be Assault or Shield Spec. The other tree is a little gimp compared to these two.

[Khitchary]

I realy dont understand why no one is talking about tank spec, surely there is some value in going full tank to keep your own teams healers alive ?

[Rogmar]

I realy dont understand why no one is talking about tank spec, surely there is some value in going full tank to keep your own teams healers alive ?

 

not in pvp

[wallywaffles]

I've stayed tank spec in PvP for one reason only; Storm. It's super handy for mobility in general and huttball in specific. Perfect for that "Oh ****" moment when the enemy is charging through the last fire with a full resolve bar (immobilization doesn't affect resolve). Sure I'm stuck there too but the sacrifice is worth it

 

Other than that I agree with most of the other comments. Our best map is Voidstar cause of our AoEs and DoTs. I do last longer than non-tank Troopers, but not by much. Enough to hold a turret against 2-3 enemies until allies arrive. Usually get 8-9 medals. And in the end, a lot comes down to gear differences (skill too, but gear is a large factor).

[pyrobot]

I understand where you're coming from, but there are still great players on both sides of this argument, and I'd like to hear from them.

 

No, if a 50 vanguard is telling you they're horrible, they're a bad player. There are not good players from both sides arguing it. People need to realize this.

[Yun_Gemstone]

Well, I use a SS spec. Its still pretty good in PvP. Since I figured a decent macro rotation I am usually finishing as the top 3 DPS in every WZ, sometimes even as first (mostly when my team sucks). And you should consider that my main goal is always going after objectives first (ending on top of that chart 8/10) and guarding players.

 

As for numbers, I got 8.7 % PvP. Before the 50 bracket I managed to pass the 300k damage on several occasions. Since the bracket I am at around 200k, most of the time sitting at 170k.

Edited January 23, 2012 by Yun_Gemstone

[Gretha]

I realy dont understand why no one is talking about tank spec, surely there is some value in going full tank to keep your own teams healers alive ?

 

Simply putten:

to tank in pvp you use guard and/or the 2 tauns,

all of them available to any spec.

 

Shield Spec is cool,

but many of its skills ,that you have to pick ,buff shielding chance and migration.

2 things that currently get ignored by tech & force attacks,

What happen to be the most common source of dmg in PvP.

Edited January 23, 2012 by Gretha

[Lyability]

Lvl 48, SS vanguard I waited as long as possible for the bracket implementation, and now I love it. I don't mess around with Huttball, as I don't find it enjoyable at all. The other two maps tho and I find them incredibly fun. I average 5-8 medals a round now, I do much better with we have healers (obvious).

 

I'm also running at this time a lvl 26 gunney trooper that is also hella-fun. I'm leaning more towards the gunny for fun factor, but as long as I'm not focused by 3-5 imps as my SS vanguard I can live a decent round. Guard is decent skill, but when you start taking damage health goes fast. Ultimately, killing stuff with the trooper is a lot more fun that guarding stuff with he SS. Plus, having a whole skill tree made void by faulty pvp mechanics doesn't help/

 

Not a fan of the expertise grind. I might just stay PvE with my vanguard and re-rell and start again. PvP is more fun 10-49 is the impression I'm receiving. I don't know why you pvp freaks would want something like expertise implemented.

[Jetflair]

How good Vanguard is in pvp depends on many factors. Where you play and how. If somebody says he gets lot of medals it may be because he has good group most of time in his war zones.

 

What comes to all claims I think there is some confusion what comes to survivability and dps of vanguard.

 

First of all, not all Vanguard specs have same survivability and gear has much to do about it as how you play your Vanguard. Expertise adds survivability and so do talents.

 

So if you are running with Assault talents with poor gear you get killed fast by pvp geared players since you will have very little what would stop damage.

 

On the other hand, if you got mediocre gear, run with Ion Cell, take all damage migration talents with trees that have them and run with decent shield you probably have twice the survivability of above mentioned Assault talent tree. When you finally get lot of expertise with pvp gear the dps and survivability shoots up quite lot.

 

So the sum it up, all the claims are right. But you propably won't have fantastic dps combined to fantastic survivability same time. And you need to get talents right and gear helps a great deal.

Edited January 23, 2012 by Jetflair

[Riulassher]

A Shield specced Vanguard can have both. A great survivability and almost impossible to kill Jedi Sentinel on a guard leash.

 

That combo wrecks enemy lines like nothing.

 

[Rykke]

not in pvp

 

Wrong tanks are invaluable when someone plays it with a different mindset than of going rambo "d3RP I wanna top DerPS!"

 

 

Simply putten:

to tank in pvp you use guard and/or the 2 tauns,

all of them available to any spec.

 

Shield Spec is cool,

but many of its skills ,that you have to pick ,buff shielding chance and migration.

2 things that currently get ignored by tech & force attacks,

What happen to be the most common source of dmg in PvP.

 

It's very unfortunate that shielding isn't as effective as it should seem but you can still make an extremely effective tanky spec. A bulk of your vitality as a tank stems from being in the stance. With a hybrid Shield/Assault spec, you become an impact bolt machine compared to previously going deep shield and all the same survivability.

 

http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#801GRG0bMdoZ0MZbIbbdh.1

Edited January 23, 2012 by Rykke

[MikeDestroyer]

Thanks for the great input guys. At the moment I'm running my level 37 vanguard on 100% SS right now, he sort of sucks in PVP, i can't get any where near the DPS of my level 25 commando, but I'm hoping to switch him to tactics/assault after 50 and see how he does damage wise.