Ideal Defense, Shield Rating, and Shield Absorption amounts?

[JediMasterSarynn]

Just wondering what the community thinks is ideal for tanking in PvE.

[RDeanOU]

It depends on how many points you have to budget. Malissant's theorycrafting on this issue is the best I have seen specifically aimed at Guardians. You can find that here.

 

The short answer is that at 400 Defense you want 70 shield and 130 absorb for the most overall mitigation. At 510 Defense you want 120 shield and 180 absorb.

 

Check out the charts and spreadsheets on that site for more detailed info.

 

I will add as a caveat that this is only telling you what gives you the best overall mitigation. Stacking defense will be slightly more spikey as opposed to stacking shield/absorb even though it will mitigate more overall damage.

[Lorrimar]

That is a spectacular post for guardians. I'd just like to add that I have been playing around with my numbers based on this post & currently it is quite difficult to get the "perfect" split on stats because of our gear itemization. Next patch when we can have augments on almost every slot it will be a lot easier to "lean" your defensive stats in the direction that they need to go.

[amrothe]

In the current gear set its best to engineer your gear for max defense until you hit around 850's using solely defense augments your goal is to get to 19% defense rating from stats giving you 6% from soresu 6% from riposte 5% base.

 

 

for a 36% defense chance with parry up. make sure you grab the -5% accuracy talent and bam your not getting hit 41% of the time +natural miss if any. This is what I currently run with.

 

With the new 1.3 augment changes you should be able to hit a natural 20% defense rating.

 

Shield chance and absorb are pretty but not the JK's main mitigator. Since you have to get some I'd recommend stacking shield chance and letting the absorb campaign trinket cover that side of things.

 

 

plus getting a 91-92% chance not to get hit with saber ward up for 12 seconds. Priceless

[darh_halo]

It depends on how many points you have to budget. Malissant's theorycrafting on this issue is the best I have seen specifically aimed at Guardians. You can find that here.

 

The short answer is that at 400 Defense you want 70 shield and 130 absorb for the most overall mitigation. At 510 Defense you want 120 shield and 180 absorb.

 

Check out the charts and spreadsheets on that site for more detailed info.

 

I will add as a caveat that this is only telling you what gives you the best overall mitigation. Stacking defense will be slightly more spikey as opposed to stacking shield/absorb even though it will mitigate more overall damage.

 

Hmm.. unless I am missing something, shouldn't it be like this below ? (copy from his post at bottom section)

 

At ~400 defense and ~200 shield start stacking at appromxately 1.1 defense : 1 shield ratio

 

I don't quite get it with 400 Defense you want 70 shield?

[RDeanOU]

Hmm.. unless I am missing something, shouldn't it be like this below ? (copy from his post at bottom section)

 

At ~400 defense and ~200 shield start stacking at appromxately 1.1 defense : 1 shield ratio

 

I don't quite get it with 400 Defense you want 70 shield?

 

Malissant is lumping shield and absorb together and then expecting you to go to the chart to figure out how to divide between them.

 

In other words:

At ~400 defense you want ~200 points devoted to your two shield stats (70 in shield rating and 130 in absorb).

 

Then you stack 1.1 defense : 1 point for both shield stats combined. That means at 510 Defense you will have 300 points devoted to your two shield stats. The optimal way to divide 300 shield stats (according to the spreadsheet) is 120 in shield rating and 180 absorb.

 

Does that make more sense?

[RDeanOU]

That is a spectacular post for guardians. I'd just like to add that I have been playing around with my numbers based on this post & currently it is quite difficult to get the "perfect" split on stats because of our gear itemization. Next patch when we can have augments on almost every slot it will be a lot easier to "lean" your defensive stats in the direction that they need to go.

 

I have experienced the exact same problem. Our current gear sets don't have enough absorb to stay optimal. I always find myself with more shield rating than I need as well.

 

The fact of the matter is that if you just augment absorb where you can you will be fine.

 

This post is about what is optimal. As long as you are not neglecting any one stat too much you will really be fine.

[RDeanOU]

In the current gear set its best to engineer your gear for max defense until you hit around 850's using solely defense augments your goal is to get to 19% defense rating from stats giving you 6% from soresu 6% from riposte 5% base.

 

 

for a 36% defense chance with parry up. make sure you grab the -5% accuracy talent and bam your not getting hit 41% of the time +natural miss if any. This is what I currently run with.

 

With the new 1.3 augment changes you should be able to hit a natural 20% defense rating.

 

Shield chance and absorb are pretty but not the JK's main mitigator. Since you have to get some I'd recommend stacking shield chance and letting the absorb campaign trinket cover that side of things.

 

 

plus getting a 91-92% chance not to get hit with saber ward up for 12 seconds. Priceless

 

You will not necessarily have trouble clearing content following this advice, but this is not optimal. Absorb is more valuable than shield rating and neglecting either stat so that you can stack Defense far past it hits diminishing returns isn't going to give you optimal mitigation. Defense is more valuable point for point, but an optimal division of these stats will include a healthy amount of shield rating and absorb as well.

 

You will also find your damage is a lot more spikey if you are totally reliant on the all or nothing nature of defense.

[Modays]

I just want to add one thing. using the experimental shield overcharger, it really takes away the need to stack absorption for a guardian, as it gives you max(I believe 50% is the max you can have) for at best over 1/4 of the time during combat, but probably only around 1/4 in actuallity. this is because the buff is granted on shielding an attack. therefore, by stacking shield, you also stack absorption. right now (full rakata with half of all my gear augmented) I am aiming for around 25% defense, and then stacking shield for the rest. this seems to be the best route to go while using the experimental shield overchanger

[JediMasterSarynn]

Here are my current stats in those categories. I'd like to hear feedback on what I should move around, if anything:

 

Damage Reduction: 47.38%

Defense Chance: 23.32% (Defense Rating 429)

Shield Chance: 41.62% (Shield Rating 344)

Shield Absorption: 38.58% (Absorption Rating 207)

[Thornsbane]

Here are my current stats in those categories. I'd like to hear feedback on what I should move around, if anything:

 

Damage Reduction: 47.38%

Defense Chance: 23.32% (Defense Rating 429)

Shield Chance: 41.62% (Shield Rating 344)

Shield Absorption: 38.58% (Absorption Rating 207)

 

Thats is similar to mine.

 

I am definately going for shield and absorb as these will stop spike damage, leaving no nasty suprises for your healers to suddenly have to heal and catch up from......., which really is the most important thing.

 

I think Defense is mainly dodge chance which means at any time a big hit may land and screw up a healers rotation....

[amrothe]

The thing a lot of math people don't figure in is riposte chance procs 6% is a lot if you have low defense you might have this buff up 50-70% of the tme If you stack defense you will have it up even more.

 

If you are not stacking defense consider that you are missing 20-30% uptime of your 6% flat parry chance.

 

Its the hidden reason why defense is optimal.

 

also when you get over a 40% chance of not getting hit you more easily string together periods in a fight where you are not getting hit 2-3 times. This really helps the healers.

 

As an example on the puzzleboss in karagas I have had the stacks naturally fall off me without using cooldowns multiple times single tanking the fight and with using saberward I can pretty much guarantee that stacks will fall off if popped at the approriate time.

 

Getting partial hits means you are getting healed. Staying at or close to full means the healers can take a break/take a look at the rest of the raid..

 

 

On the flip side defense can fail and you can take multiple hits in a row. this is what cooldowns are for.

 

In all reailty though we are given 5% miss from talents a base 11% defense with talents 6% defense from riposte.

Adding up to a 22% chance not to get hit

 

So if your natural defense stat is 18% as opposed to 20% Your not going to notice a staggering difference But if its 14% as opposed to 20% then you are going to notice more then a 6% defense loss because of the partial 6% defense from riposte having a low uptime.

[Zuckazz]

Bioware wanted us to go the way of the shield/absorb.

 

Look at all our BH and Campaign gear sets...defense rating is looking to be phased out. I would have liked to see defense rating been more of an option to go, but the spikes were just too random/frequent and ineffective.

 

My stats - i am looking to replace some of my absorb augs to shield augs because the shield amp relic is so sweet - and I REALLY like the consistency of the damage with this high shield/absorb stats. Defense is really my 3rd ranked tank stat. I tank better than my vanguard/shadow counterpart hands down.

 

23,750 hp buffed

18.74% - Defense Rating

46.62% - Shield

49.58% - Absorb

[amrothe]

I understand the need for consistency so lets look at your numbers 70.36% of the time you are not seeing a big number. But of that 46.62% you are taking about a 1/2 hit and 29.64% of the time you are taking a full hit.

 

Your absolute mitigation is 23.1% from shielding/absorb 5% from miss and 18.74% from defense Giving you a total mitigation of incoming damage before cooldowns of 46.84%

 

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My build has 21500 health 30% defense 38.78 shielding and 30% absorb giving me 11.63% mitigation from shielding/absorb 30% mitigation from defense and 5% from miss. For a total of 46.63

 

35% of the time I take no damage 38.78 I take 70% damage and 26.22% of the time I take a full hit

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Now here is why stacking defense matters.

 

With a 18.74% chance to proc riposte and even with it procing and bringing you to a 24.78% chance your uptime on 6% straight mitigation is woefully low causing you to take more damage.

 

With a base 30% chance to proc riposte and with it procing bringing it to 36% I have it up almost constantly.

 

Now plug this back into the consistency argument and with my build it turns out that I take a full hit about 1 in every 5 attacks on average and I take no damage 41% of the time

 

 

So no absorb/shielding isnt bad it is certainly doable but because of how reliant JG is on procing riposte it is not optimal.

Edited June 4, 2012 by amrothe

[Dragonexadon]

Bioware wanted us to go the way of the shield/absorb.

Nope, they wanted us to be mid range believe it or not. They had a recent interview where they said they wanted troopers to be shield tanks and shadows to be avoidance tanks (lol) and us somewhere in the middle.

Edited June 6, 2012 by Dragonexadon

[amrothe]

The funny thing is I think the devs may read my posts in 1.3 they are changing riposte to be less reliant on high defense for its uptime by extending the time for proc from 6 seconds to 12 seconds.

 

They are also reducing the effect from 2% per point to 1% per point

 

Don't worry though they are robbing us of 6% damage to give us the 3% defense rating back.

 

But wait dont worry about damage because soresu is now going to grant 100% threat wow threat will be a total joke now even without taunting constantly.

 

The most interesting change though is blade barrier stacking with stats.

 

This hands down makes the hybrid build with 9 second blade barrier top dog in 1.3

[Nippon]

Just wondering what the community thinks is ideal for tanking in PvE.

 

My stats....on 19 /22 / 0 tree

 

Health 22940 Buffed

Defence 18.4%

Damage Reduction 51.94%

Shield Chance 48.9%

Shield Absorption 51.21%

 

Based off full Rakata / Blackhole, and come 1.3 Guard tanks will rock even more....I love mine already and they are getting better.

Edited June 7, 2012 by Nippon

[Nippon]

I understand the need for consistency so lets look at your numbers 70.36% of the time you are not seeing a big number. But of that 46.62% you are taking about a 1/2 hit and 29.64% of the time you are taking a full hit.

 

Your absolute mitigation is 23.1% from shielding/absorb 5% from miss and 18.74% from defense Giving you a total mitigation of incoming damage before cooldowns of 46.84%

 

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

My build has 21500 health 30% defense 38.78 shielding and 30% absorb giving me 11.63% mitigation from shielding/absorb 30% mitigation from defense and 5% from miss. For a total of 46.63

 

35% of the time I take no damage 38.78 I take 70% damage and 26.22% of the time I take a full hit

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

 

Now here is why stacking defense matters.

 

With a 18.74% chance to proc riposte and even with it procing and bringing you to a 24.78% chance your uptime on 6% straight mitigation is woefully low causing you to take more damage.

 

With a base 30% chance to proc riposte and with it procing bringing it to 36% I have it up almost constantly.

 

Now plug this back into the consistency argument and with my build it turns out that I take a full hit about 1 in every 5 attacks on average and I take no damage 41% of the time

 

 

So no absorb/shielding isnt bad it is certainly doable but because of how reliant JG is on procing riposte it is not optimal.

 

Im going to be Honest I could sit here and do the numbers for you all day, but basically Defense sucks...It has a high diminishing return and is not worth the effort to stack it.

 

Your Highest chance to Mitigate an Attack is 38%....and of that 38% you mitigate 30%[ damage, with a 30% CHANCE to block the attack completely, if you was hit 1000 times you are Highly likely to be hit more often for a lot of damage.

 

As opposed to a 48% chance to Mitigate 52% of damage and a 19% CHANCE to block all damage. The chances are you will get hit more often but for a substantially lower amount which is easily manageable by a healer.

 

I would imagine in any runs you do you are standing there at 19k then all of a sudden at 7k, and people wondering what happened. That never ever happens to me on my Guard as my damage drops in steady progression.

 

Please remember your Defense chance is a CHANCE per hit, not that you will Defend 30 attacks out of every 100.

 

Personally id rather have a 48% chance to mitigate 51% of the damage i take over 38% chance to mitigate 30% damage.

Edited June 7, 2012 by Nippon

[RDeanOU]

Im going to be Honest I could sit here and do the numbers for you all day, but basically Defense sucks...It has a high diminishing return and is not worth the effort to stack it.

 

Your Highest chance to Mitigate an Attack is 38%....and of that 38% you mitigate 30%[ damage, with a 30% CHANCE to block the attack completely, if you was hit 1000 times you are Highly likely to be hit more often for a lot of damage.

 

As opposed to a 48% chance to Mitigate 52% of damage and a 19% CHANCE to block all damage. The chances are you will get hit more often but for a substantially lower amount which is easily manageable by a healer.

 

I would imagine in any runs you do you are standing there at 19k then all of a sudden at 7k, and people wondering what happened. That never ever happens to me on my Guard as my damage drops in steady progression.

 

Please remember your Defense chance is a CHANCE per hit, not that you will Defend 30 attacks out of every 100.

 

Personally id rather have a 48% chance to mitigate 51% of the damage i take over 38% chance to mitigate 30% damage.

 

Did you actually read the post you quoted? His point was that with his Riposte uptime his real chance for attacks to miss completely sits somewhere around 41% for pretty much the entire fight. With his shield at 38.78% He is really only going to take a full hit about 20% of the time. That's not as spikey as you claim. In fact that is less spikey than the alternative. The shield and absorb heavy player he was responding to is actually taking a full hit about 30% of the time. That's getting hit at full strength 10% more often than amrothe does in his defense heavy gear.

 

Also keep in mind that amrothe's higher defense will make potential crits miss completely more often while shield is knocked off the table by crits. This means that the shield/absorb heavy stat priority will take more full strength hits, will get crit more often, and will mitigate less overall damage than a stat priority weighted more heavily toward Defense. So please go ahead and explain to me how that is less spikey.

 

I haven't checked his math, but if he is calculating correctly then he is completely right and you are completely wrong.

[Nippon]

Did you actually read the post you quoted? His point was that with his Riposte uptime his real chance for attacks to miss completely sits somewhere around 41% for pretty much the entire fight. With his shield at 38.78% He is really only going to take a full hit about 20% of the time. That's not as spikey as you claim. In fact that is less spikey than the alternative. The shield and absorb heavy player he was responding to is actually taking a full hit about 30% of the time. That's getting hit at full strength 10% more often than amrothe does in his defense heavy gear.

 

Also keep in mind that amrothe's higher defense will make potential crits miss completely more often while shield is knocked off the table by crits. This means that the shield/absorb heavy stat priority will take more full strength hits, will get crit more often, and will mitigate less overall damage than a stat priority weighted more heavily toward Defense. So please go ahead and explain to me how that is less spikey.

 

I haven't checked his math, but if he is calculating correctly then he is completely right and you are completely wrong.

 

I dont really do math.....I leave that to my guild mate.

 

I do go out and fight all the hard raids and listen to feedback from my healers. Basic assumption was with full Rakata Defense heavy gear I was taking way more damage then I ever did with SC AB stacking. So i changed all the mods out over time and now I take considerably less damage consistently over the course of a fight.

 

You can throw all the numbers and Right Wrong accusations at me till your blue in the face....I have 8-9 healers behind me saying i was getting hit way harder and more often when Defense heavy.....As opposed to SC AB heavy.

 

I go by reality and actual events in game, not calculations and speculation based on chances and if and buts.

 

Ive tanked in High Defense and In High SC AB........Defense sucks. IMO.

 

I also play a Rakata Specced Sage, believe me when i say i can spot a Defense stacking tank from a mile away, Just by the amount of damage they take.

 

Defense is good IMHO against crits and big hits, and all tanks should have at least 20-22% Defense.......Its just a shame you fail to realize that 90% of the attacks in this game are not Huge hits or Crits and the majority of damage is mitigated by your shield.

Edited June 7, 2012 by Nippon

[amrothe]

Really you had me at "I don't do math"

 

ask your guildy who does understand math to explain it to you.

[Monoth]

Now that 1.3 is out here are my stats on my Jedi Guardian Tank spec

 

23% Defense

38% Shield Chance

45% Shield Absorption

 

I've getting hammered after 1.3, Tried to tank Nightmare Pilgrim with Rakata/Black Hole gear and the healers could not keep me up very long.... yet the Shadow Tank in our guild has no problems staying up.

 

Did we get a nerf? because I'm feeling very squish now.... should i try to get to 30% Defense? would it help with the 1.3 changes? I'm really puzzled which direction I need to go with on my Tank stats...

Edited July 10, 2012 by Monoth

[RDeanOU]

Now that 1.3 is out here are my stats on my Jedi Guardian Tank spec

 

23% Defense

38% Shield Chance

45% Shield Absorption

 

I've getting hammered after 1.3, Tried to tank Nightmare Pilgrim with Rakata/Black Hole gear and the healers could not keep me up very long.... yet the Shadow Tank in our guild has no problems staying up.

 

Did we get a nerf? because I'm feeling very squish now.... should i try to get to 30% Defense? would it help with the 1.3 changes? I'm really puzzled which direction I need to go with on my Tank stats...

 

I'm not sure what you are doing with your gear, but those stats don't sound like Rakata/Black Hole quality gear to me. I have all Columni (maybe 2-3 Rakata level mods that I've bought from the GTN) and my Defense is up around 30% with Shield and Absorb both right around 40%. I'm not sure how your defense could possibly be that low in the level of gear you are talking about unless your shield and absorb were off the charts (and they aren't).

 

The easiest thing for me to say is that your Defense and Shield chance are both too low. You are taking full strength hits far too often with those stats.

[Zailou]

My guardian stats are

 

Dmg reduction: ~49%

Defense: ~24%

Shield: ~50%

Absorb: ~53%

 

that is while soresu is on so the 3% buff is on. I got absorb proc relic and defense relic that i use. I have full campaign with some blackhole becouse I liked some BH pieces better than campaign. All my pieces are augmented with mix of defense, shield and absorb.

[Monoth]

I'm not sure what you are doing with your gear, but those stats don't sound like Rakata/Black Hole quality gear to me. I have all Columni (maybe 2-3 Rakata level mods that I've bought from the GTN) and my Defense is up around 30% with Shield and Absorb both right around 40%. I'm not sure how your defense could possibly be that low in the level of gear you are talking about unless your shield and absorb were off the charts (and they aren't).

 

The easiest thing for me to say is that your Defense and Shield chance are both too low. You are taking full strength hits far too often with those stats.

 

I would double check your stats because there's no way Columi by itself is giving you those kind of stats.. The stats I listed is just from putting on the Rakata Gear which leans heavily towards Shields vs Defense...

 

I've put all Defensive Aug slots on and i'm almost to 30% defense and have noticed a pretty big difference in survivability...