Is Jedi Gaurdian DPS good enough to raid?

[Caylen]

The issue is if ALL ELSE IS EQUAL - same datacrons, gear, optimized skill tree choices, and proficient skill at playing the character - that other classes greatly outstrip Vigilance Guardians in DPS in a PvE context.

 

The problem I have with a claim like this is that it seems to me impossible to prove.

 

How can you prove that two players are of equal skill level? If two Vigi Knights do the same amount of DPS, they might be equally skilled, if all else is equal. But if one of those Vigi Knights switched toons so they could compare Vigi against a Sage, how can you prove that the now-Sage player is equally skilled as a Sage as the Vigi Knight player is at Vigilance? When we're dealing with margins of 2-5%, how can you empirically demonstrate that one Vigi player has equal skill as a Sage player, within a variance of 2-5%?

 

2-5% skill? How do you even measure that?

 

If we're just saying that it's harder (i.e. requires more skill) to pull 1700 DPS as a Vigilance Knight than as a Gunslinger, I'm okay with that as long as it's possible. In that case, I have a choice to make: I can either challenge myself to master the Vigilance game and harness all of its potential, or take the equally-reasonable path of less resistance and do the damage more easily, if that's my cup of tea.

 

But I don't think that's what you're saying; correct me if I'm wrong.

 

The result if our developers take these posts about our lack of DPS seriously is that our class will be better. If they do testing of their own and find that we are within a 5% margin of an equally good Sage, then nothing is lost. Protesting that we have any lack is the surest way to HARM our class, preventing any improvement.

 

This also fails to convince; I believe you're begging the question. If Player X truthfully claims that his DPS is competitive with other DPS specs, then there is no need for class improvement from a balance perspective (putting aside the issues of "fun" and spec usability/ergonomics).

 

Campaigning for buffs to Vigi's DPS is only justified if Vigi DPS is sub-par, which Player X claims is not the case. Saying that Player X should stop claiming that Vigi's DPS is fine because his claims will prevent improvement assumes the conclusion, thus begging the question.

 

Claims about Vigilance (or any class/spec's) insufficiencies will not help the state of affairs if they are exaggerated. The intention of threads like this is to verify or debunk claims about our classes' effectiveness and serve as a way to give honest feedback

[Aienir]

I am not crying about a lack of DPS. I am extremely well geared and an experienced player. I read a lot about how to optimize our performance and play my class well. That has nothing to do with how our DPS compares to an equally well geared and proficient character on other classes.

 

You are comparing unequally geared characters, and that makes a huge difference, assuming even equal skill with the different characters.

 

The day you put out 550k DPS in a wz, or over 2000 DPS in a MOX test, then you can say Vigilance Guardians are even remotely close to the average DPS of other classes.

 

You aren't "defending" Guardians by insisting we are up to par. Comparing classes at different levels, faction, and with different gear is not valid data.

 

I hope the Devs do their own testing and come to their own conclusions.

 

don't have a picture of me breaking 550k dps, but i think that this screenshot of 515k is close enough don't you think? and I can do that often as well.

 

http://i.imgur.com/QPZeo.jpg

 

and I'm not comparing any class of different levels, all 3 are fully rakata geared out, all 3 are level 50. My guardian is the only one who outstrips them, but even putting him back in rakata, i outstrip the other classes.

Edited June 8, 2012 by Aienir

[myrrhbear]

Obviously gear matters, but are you on a Juggernaut or a Guardian? And if a Guardian, are you Vigilance or Focus spec? Focus will do way more damage in PvP because of crits on constant Force Sweeps.

 

I have to reiterate anyhow, the point of my comments here is not to complain, and not to criticize, so there's no need to judge me or be defensive. Guardian is my main since launch, and my favorite. I have been gathering data though from parsing, and looked through reams of results from warzones, and there is no question, other classes do on average get significantly higher dps.

 

The fact that you manage to get high numbers on your Guardian(Juggernaut?) that seems to compare favorably, without having parsed yet, to your alts who have lesser gear... well, I guess it means you have a well geared Guardian (Juggernaut?) who you play well. Kudos to you. That doesn't mean that if you played a DPS Sage as well, with the same tier of gear, that you wouldn't do a heap more DPS - and you definitely would.

 

The hope for me is simply that our developers will read these discussions, and do some careful testing of their own, and make adjustments for balance as necessary.

 

The goal is to improve the game and the contribution of Vigilance DPS Guardians. No benefit comes from arguing against that. If my data is somehow incorrect, then they will leave us as we are. If my data is correct, and they see the same thing, then they will bring us up to par. Nothing wrong with that either. So...

Edited June 8, 2012 by myrrhbear

[Caylen]

That doesn't mean that if you played a DPS Sage as well, with the same tier of gear, that you wouldn't do a heap more DPS - and you definitely would.

 

I'd still like you to prove that. As I wrote above, making claims about a state in which all things are equal are not helpful unless they are verifiable.

 

The hope for me is simply that our developers will read these discussions, and do some careful testing of their own, and make adjustments for balance as necessary.

 

I think it's safe to assume that they already are. Exaggerated, unverifiable claims are not necessary to make them do their jobs.

[_Zorth_]

I am not crying about a lack of DPS. I am extremely well geared and an experienced player. I read a lot about how to optimize our performance and play my class well. That has nothing to do with how our DPS compares to an equally well geared and proficient character on other classes.

 

You are far from experienced if you think that guardians are bad dps, or that there is a huge gap between them and the other classes.

 

A guardian on my server constantly puts out more than 16k DPS in full campaign and breaks 550k damage in WZ's EVERY game, He is on par with his mara friend in terms of damage. The mara gets party buffs, The Jugg gets armor debuffs.. Having them both in the same group is one of the best setups you can have.

[Aienir]

Obviously gear matters, but are you on a Juggernaut or a Guardian? And if a Guardian, are you Vigilance or Focus spec? Focus will do way more damage in PvP because of crits on constant Force Sweeps.

 

I have to reiterate anyhow, the point of my comments here is not to complain, and not to criticize, so there's no need to judge me or be defensive. Guardian is my main since launch, and my favorite. I have been gathering data though from parsing, and looked through reams of results from warzones, and there is no question, other classes do on average get significantly higher dps.

 

The fact that you manage to get high numbers on your Guardian(Juggernaut?) that seems to compare favorably, without having parsed yet, to your alts who have lesser gear... well, I guess it means you have a well geared Guardian (Juggernaut?) who you play well. Kudos to you. That doesn't mean that if you played a DPS Sage as well, with the same tier of gear, that you wouldn't do a heap more DPS - and you definitely would.

 

The hope for me is simply that our developers will read these discussions, and do some careful testing of their own, and make adjustments for balance as necessary.

 

The goal is to improve the game and the contribution of Vigilance DPS Guardians. No benefit comes from arguing against that. If my data is somehow incorrect, then they will leave us as we are. If my data is correct, and they see the same thing, then they will bring us up to par. Nothing wrong with that either. So...

 

Seeing as how this discussion is about vigilance, then yes. Of course I'm in vigilance. And if you actually bothered to look at the picture you would have noticed it say Raif underneath the picture and Jedi Guardian right underneath that.

 

And I'll say it again and spell it out since you either are deliberately missing what i'm saying or just aren't reading,

 

I can put my level 50 assault specced Vanguard (in full rakata gear) vs my Lightning Spec DPS Sorc (in full rakata) vs my Vigilance specced Jedi Guardian (in full rakata as i still have thie set), and the guardian will win. And yes, I play all 3 classes very very well. I can constantly break 400k on any one of those classes in WZ and easily do 1500 DPS on the mox parser without paying attention.

 

I HAVE parsed the numbers. It seems like maybe you haven't and don't know the proper rotation for a vilgilance specced guardian. Doesn't matter if you've been playing the class since you signed up for TOR. I know many guardians on my server who thought the same as you until i raided with them and they saw i doubled or tripled their dps. First thing they said? was't my class is broken, but what am I doing wrong, because here is a person playing a guardian who is topping DPS charts in WZ, hitting 1700k DPS in the mox parser and we're both in the same level of gear.

 

I get marked in WZ because I can kill Trooper healers/Scoundrel healers, even if they have a guard on making it a 2v1. Thats saying something. The only person in my guild that I group up with that can consistanly beat me in DPS in a WZ is a gunslinger in my guild, and thats because he is a beast at any class he plays and is widely regarded as one of the top PVP'ers in our server.

 

I'm not getting defensive about my class, you however are asking for an unnecessary buff to a class that is sitting exactly where it should be as far as damage. What you should be asking for is a buff in survive ability since we dont have too much.

 

You are either stacking the wrong stats, not doing a proper rotation or specced not very well into the tree. or even a combination of all 3.

 

Guardian DPS is not easy. Vigilance DPS, even more so if you want those high numbers in PVP. For a sage/sorc it's easy to get hose high numbers due to them having a lot of powerful AOE attacks and dots that they put on a lot of people and a lot of them aren't mitigated by armor/shield. Assault spec is easy cause almost ALL of the attacks there are NOT mitigated by armor/shield .

 

Vigilance is not so lucky. Almost all of the attacks we do are mitigated by shield/armor and you have to work HARD to get the high numbers in PVP. For raiding? that's not really so much of an issue because if you have a proper composition then your target should be a single target anyway as you focus fire and on raiding bosses your focusing ONE target and can constantly rotate your high end moves without slowing down as with the right rotation you would never, ever run out of focus.

 

If you were looking for an easy mode DPS class, guardian/sentinal is not it. We're not like assault spec vanguard where its a 4-5 button rotation that's lols to do. or a sage/sorc thats also lols. Guardian DPS is HEAVILY gear dependant unlike the rest of the classes. You want to do the best damage? then you need to tweak your gear. that extra 50 power can do wonders for your DPS.

[Caylen]

Aienir, I want to learn from you. Where's your Vigi PvE guide video? XD

[myrrhbear]

It's so rude to reply to people with different opinions, or in this case, different data, that they don't know how to play. Please try to keep it respectful, and provide your own data.

 

While a Guardian in full Campaign gear naturally does good DPS, what I would want to see to get informed data would be some testing using your combat logger, and a comparison to other Classes in the same tier of gear.

 

There are ways to do this.

 

One idea I had for testing, though it may be flawed, was to have a level 50 of each class remove all gear; no armour, no implants, earpiece, relic. Nothing. They will need a weapon equipped in order to use their skills, so grab an orange customizable weapon, with no mods in it, so you just have the shell. Then test on the training dummy on the Gav Daragon for 10 min (to even out some of the highs and lows of burst moments that would throw off results from one test to the next in shorter tests. Run the MOX parsing program (it's a very small download and easy to use).

 

Then post your DPS results from MOX here, noting class, advanced class, which skill tree build, duration of the test, and DPS achieved.

 

Keep in mind that a melee class in actual combat situations will lose a big chunk of DPS s compared to a ranged class, because of the time wasted running from mob to mob between kills whenever leap is on cooldown. That may seem like a small amount, but it adds up over time for sure.

 

Another way to test that I'm just becoming familial with is this:

 

1. Go to this website: http://swtor.askmrrobot.com/

2. Register (very fast to do - I did this last night)

3. Fill in the details of characters from each class geared identically, with the exact same datacrons

4. Then download the Simulation Craft program. It's made for SWTOR. You can import the data from Mr.Robot and run a simulation which even takes into account moving between mobs, buffs, debuffs, etc...

 

I haven't fully figured out how to use that program yet > was getting tired > but it should be possible to use to compare each classes, advanced class, and spec, against each other, with the exact same gear, datacrons, buffs, debuffs, etc... under controlled and realistic combat conditions, doing litterally tens of thousands of trials of 10 minutes segments for each class in a short time. I ran one test for my character last night for 25,000 trials of 10 min, and it took about 3 or 4 minutes to run the tests I think. As I said, I haven't figured out how to get the program to work right though yet, but I will soon.

 

Anyhow, if it turns out that my data so far has been off for some reason, and Vigilance Guardians can produce equal numbers to Sentinels in equal gear, and Sages, and Gunslingers etc... that would be great news : ) It's hard to believe all the data I gathered so far could be so far off, but I m open to correction. If the tests prove that our DPS, ALL ELSE BEING EQUAL, and specifically for Vigilance Guardians (since Focus in PvP does WAY more), is indeed notably below par, then hopefully our Devs will adjust things so our DPS is brought up to par. What's so bad about that? It's just about making the game as good as it can be. Nothing to be defensive about.

 

By the way, the Mr. Robot website has a place you can upload your combat logs, and it does an instant calculation to show your DPS. You can look at logs uploaded by other people. I looked through pages and pages of results, from Ops groups of 8, doing every different Operation, and NONE of the top DPS contributors were Guardians. They are almost all Sentinels, and Sages, and some Commandos, and Gunslingers. This is real data from actual game conditions, and while gear varies from person to person in those logs, so it's not that accurate of a result, you can at least see a large cross section, from dozens of Ops groups, and get a general idea of the bell curve. Seeing as that there are no Guardians in the top numbers, I would further be surprised if after more testing we can prove that Guardians in equal gear etc.. can contribute as much DPS as those other classes.