ormond Posted February 29, 2012 Share Posted February 29, 2012 Do I switch to a focus item instead of a shield? Or keep the shield to help offset any damage? What else should I know or do? I have been defense for 38 levels. Thanks in advance! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Veniras Posted March 1, 2012 Share Posted March 1, 2012 You lose shield buff if you go out of soresu form IIRC. Focus might be better in another stance Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Helig Posted March 1, 2012 Share Posted March 1, 2012 (edited) Shield has only 5% chance to proc in a damage stance (unless you have +shield gear, which would be silly). Focus offhand gives you a sizeable Force Power boost over the shield. General PvE strategy - send in the companion first, if it's a tank or DPS, then attack - this way you'd save yourself downtime. Force Sweep (Momentum Bladestorms, too) actually *gives* you Focus when you are Vigilance-specced and are running Shien, so it becomes a Focus generator in your rotation. Edited March 1, 2012 by Helig Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kinrain Posted March 1, 2012 Share Posted March 1, 2012 If your going Focus lose the Shield Generator and replace it with a Focus offhand. Use either a Tank Companion or Doc (I prefer Doc) and depending on level and availability of skills start fights like this (assuming a fairly normal group of 3 ranged and 1 melee mobs): Saber Throw the melee target 1>tab to change to target 2>Force Leap>tab to change to target 3>Force Exhuastion> tab to change to target 4> >Sundering Strike>Force Sweep. That will stop the mobs from chasing after your companion and do a bit of damage to each one so when you hit Force Sweep it'll a) get everyone in range and b) probably kill the lot. Go for Strength>Power>Surge>Crit gear. You'll get Endurance on that armour anyway without trying. At 50 with Doc and attacking equal level mobs I kill all 4 Normals & Weaks with the first Sweep, Strongs and Elites take a could of cycles but with the aggro on me and Doc's healing keeping me at pretty much full its very fast. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ormond Posted March 1, 2012 Author Share Posted March 1, 2012 If your going Focus lose the Shield Generator and replace it with a Focus offhand. Use either a Tank Companion or Doc (I prefer Doc) and depending on level and availability of skills start fights like this (assuming a fairly normal group of 3 ranged and 1 melee mobs): Saber Throw the melee target 1>tab to change to target 2>Force Leap>tab to change to target 3>Force Exhuastion> tab to change to target 4> >Sundering Strike>Force Sweep. That will stop the mobs from chasing after your companion and do a bit of damage to each one so when you hit Force Sweep it'll a) get everyone in range and b) probably kill the lot. Go for Strength>Power>Surge>Crit gear. You'll get Endurance on that armour anyway without trying. At 50 with Doc and attacking equal level mobs I kill all 4 Normals & Weaks with the first Sweep, Strongs and Elites take a could of cycles but with the aggro on me and Doc's healing keeping me at pretty much full its very fast. How about the vigilance spec? I'm mostly going for Pve. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kinrain Posted March 2, 2012 Share Posted March 2, 2012 (edited) The current theory on PVE/PVP is that Focus does its damage in a short burst which tails off a bit until the next burst comes along, and that Vigilence does similar damage but spread out smoothly over time. (Please note without a damage parser this is all supposition but I believe its right) To try and explain that a bit better imagine both builds do 100 damage over the same amount of time: Focus does 30,5,5,5,5,30,5,5,5,5. Vigilence does 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10. The critical factor here is that you may do enough damage to kill your target with Focus after the second burst hits and be done in 60% of the time Vigilence takes. In that 60% of time Focus has done 80% of the damage and Vigilence has done 60%. However, in both PVP and PVE the ability to actually apply that damage is the moderating factor. If your target will still still and not stun or knock you back I think you'll get the max from Vigilence. If there are stuns, knockbacks etc you'll get a lot more from Focus as you can make sure th ehits you are getting on your target are the biggest ones. In my experience there aren't that many bosses that just let you whale on them. I only played with the Vig and Vig/Def Hybrid build for a short time, long enough to realise that it wasn't for me. Intellectually I know that the Vig/Def build is best for me in PVE but its just too boring. Also when your in PVE you are almost always fighting 3+ mobs at the same time and the ability to hit all of them at once for 4k+ is far better than Vigilence so makes your fights much shorter. I run as Focus for PVE (Heroics, FPs, OPS etc) and feel pretty certain that i'm doing at least as much damage as I would in Vig. In PVP with all the CC flying around and the risks involved in being focused down by groups its much better to kill your enemy as soon as possible, because they definately won't still still for you to get into a rotation rythmn. Edited March 2, 2012 by Kinrain Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CapuchinSeven Posted March 2, 2012 Share Posted March 2, 2012 Hmm, I get that Vigilance isn't for you and that's totally cool and I do agree with your points but I think you're forgetting the DOTs, alone they are not much good but when you chain on all three they are actually pretty hard hitting and also don't require you to be on your target to deal damage, which you pointed out as a failing of the build. Sure, Focus still has the edge on that for the reasons you stated but those DOTs do help ease that, as well as Unremitting, making you totally immune to knockbacks and roots. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kinrain Posted March 2, 2012 Share Posted March 2, 2012 Don't get me wrong Cap I don't think there's anything wrong with Vigilence, in fact I think the tree is pretty good actually. It just doesn't fit my playstyle. My post was trying to make the point that Focus is viable as a PVE spec as well as PVP. Just as Vig is viable for both. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CapuchinSeven Posted March 2, 2012 Share Posted March 2, 2012 (edited) Don't get me wrong Cap I don't think there's anything wrong with Vigilence, in fact I think the tree is pretty good actually. It just doesn't fit my playstyle. I hear you, I keep wanting to like Focus but I just can't make it work for me. I like the extra survivability of Vigilance and the immunity to CC just when I need it. I think when we get dual specs I'll be keen to try Focus more. Edited March 2, 2012 by CapuchinSeven Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KiranK Posted March 2, 2012 Share Posted March 2, 2012 The squishiness factor going from Defense to DPS is uncannily large. You will be very surprised at how much more quickly you will take damage. Be aware of this. You'll feel like you're made of paper the first few times around. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bicuspid Posted March 2, 2012 Share Posted March 2, 2012 (edited) i wasnt able to consistently get 500k damage with vigilance on dps maps like voidstar, which i can do pretty easily with focus also in terms of killing stuff it seems focus burst gets the job done better because of 4-7k crits aoe putting a lot of pressure on healers not saying vigilance is bad but in my thousands of warzones i have not seen it work as well Edited March 2, 2012 by bicuspid Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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