What mods for Vnguard tank?

[Lordmird]

What mods should I be using for Vanguard tank? I used to think I should be stacking up Endurance, but I realize I need more absortion.

 

What types of mods should I use?

[TheRevv]

Mods that boost Shield Rating and Absorption Rating are the most important for Vanguard tanks. You want to have upwards of ~60% and higher shield and absorb respectively when tanking. Defense and endurance are tertiary stats that, while still important to a tank in general, should be superseded with Shield/Absorb. I hope this helps.

[Kaos_KidSWTOR]

Mainly you will want to go like this Endurance > Shield > Absorb > Defence > Power. Reason?: Well for starters extra health is always critical. Shield Rating comes next because of Shield Cycler and Static Shield. Absorb helps shield out so it comes next. Defence is kinda meh so if you can just skip it. Power comes last because its a raw damage buff so if you can stack a little its not gonna hurt.

[Kitru]

Mainly you will want to go like this Endurance > Shield > Absorb > Defence > Power.

 

That priority is wrong on so many counts.

 

First off, no, more health is *not* always better. In fact, more health at the expense of additional mitigation is generally *worse* since it means that, while you can take a similar amount of punishment before *dying*, you're going to require more *healing* in order to not have the inevitable occur. Additional mitigation is *always* prioritized above additional hp.

 

Secondly, Shield exists on a separate axis of itemization than Defense and Absorb (in fact, Endurance only has *minor* overlap with Def/Abs/Shield and, even then, should be ignored in those cases). With the exception of augments, you'll never have to choose between Shield and Def/Abs. You either get Shield or something useless (like Accuracy). Putting it in the same linear priority as all of the other stats is simply ignorant.

 

It's hard to answer the OPs question without first determining what level/progression s/he is. While you're leveling, mitigation stats are both in short supply *and* nonexistent for a long stretch of time, though the answer is pretty simple since, honestly, getting *better* gear matters more than trying to figure out what stats you need to have since, honestly, you'll outlevel said gear in no time flat.

 

Once you hit 50, optimization of your stats takes a back seat to just getting better gear until you get into BH/Campaign/DG/Hazmat gear. Once you've gotten there, optimization starts to matter but it's not a case of just stacking everything you can onto a certain mitigation stat. The secret is finding the relevant ratio between all 3 tank stats (Def, Shield, and Absorb) for your current itemization budget. Since 2.0 is coming out in a week, I'm not going to bother trying to tell you what to do as a VG tank pre-2.0 since that's going to be out of date by the time you're likely to implement it. For 2.0 (assuming the devs don't change the DR curves again since the last curves we saw did some *really* screwed up things to the optimal ratios), however, Absorb is functionally worthless for VG tanks: until you get into itemization budgets in excess of 2000 (re: the new top tier of raid gear in 2.0), you're best off not using *any* Absorb at all and just setting up a 3-to-2 split between Defense and Shield (yes, in 2.0, as a VG tank, you want more Defense than Shield).

[ScytheEleven]

That priority is wrong on so many counts.

 

First off, no, more health is *not* always better. In fact, more health at the expense of additional mitigation is generally *worse* since it means that, while you can take a similar amount of punishment before *dying*, you're going to require more *healing* in order to not have the inevitable occur. Additional mitigation is *always* prioritized above additional hp.

 

Secondly, Shield exists on a separate axis of itemization than Defense and Absorb (in fact, Endurance only has *minor* overlap with Def/Abs/Shield and, even then, should be ignored in those cases). With the exception of augments, you'll never have to choose between Shield and Def/Abs. You either get Shield or something useless (like Accuracy). Putting it in the same linear priority as all of the other stats is simply ignorant.

 

It's hard to answer the OPs question without first determining what level/progression s/he is. While you're leveling, mitigation stats are both in short supply *and* nonexistent for a long stretch of time, though the answer is pretty simple since, honestly, getting *better* gear matters more than trying to figure out what stats you need to have since, honestly, you'll outlevel said gear in no time flat.

 

Once you hit 50, optimization of your stats takes a back seat to just getting better gear until you get into BH/Campaign/DG/Hazmat gear. Once you've gotten there, optimization starts to matter but it's not a case of just stacking everything you can onto a certain mitigation stat. The secret is finding the relevant ratio between all 3 tank stats (Def, Shield, and Absorb) for your current itemization budget. Since 2.0 is coming out in a week, I'm not going to bother trying to tell you what to do as a VG tank pre-2.0 since that's going to be out of date by the time you're likely to implement it. For 2.0 (assuming the devs don't change the DR curves again since the last curves we saw did some *really* screwed up things to the optimal ratios), however, Absorb is functionally worthless for VG tanks: until you get into itemization budgets in excess of 2000 (re: the new top tier of raid gear in 2.0), you're best off not using *any* Absorb at all and just setting up a 3-to-2 split between Defense and Shield (yes, in 2.0, as a VG tank, you want more Defense than Shield).

 

Yeah I read that about absorb being worthless for tanks in 2.0. It's going to feel so weird swapping out defense for absorb on my tanks in 2.0, specifically on my tanking set for my PT

[Kitru]

Yeah I read that about absorb being worthless for tanks in 2.0. It's going to feel so weird swapping out defense for absorb on my tanks in 2.0, specifically on my tanking set for my PT

 

It's only worthless for VGs and PTs. Shadows will actually be using it in similar levels as they are currently on live.

 

Keep in mind, as I said before, we can't be too sure about those numbers right now though. The calculations themselves are derived from assumptions about the ratio of attack types derived from current content. If there are more fights like Kephess the Undying (a vast majority of his damage is F/T K/E rather than M/R) or the average ratio of M/R-to-F/T (generally guessed to be roughly 90:10) favors F/T more than we have currently estimated (which is a reasonable assumption; some math has been done for an 80:20 split and it actually shows a vastly different picture for optimal stat allocation where all of the tank stats are stacked in a much more even manner for all tanks), then the numbers that tell you to laugh at Absorb aren't really going to be applicable (though, if there is more F/T than we expect, Guardians are going to have some mitigation problems seeing as they're much more heavily focused on Defense than either of the other 2 tanks).

 

Even if the damage ratio we're currently using is appropriate for content down the line, it's still entirely possible for the devs to change the DR curves once again: at the release of the PTS, Defense was pretty much entirely worthless so they changed the DR curve on Shield and Absorb and it simply reverse everything (i.e. Defense and Absorb went from being worthless and absurdly amazing, respectively, to Absorb being worthless and Defense being amazing). Since we're talking about something that is *entirely* math based and governed by some pretty easily controlled and manipulated formulas, the devs wouldn't actually need to test new DR curves that allow for a more balanced optimal itemization allocation and, instead, just end up implementing them wholesale at release (the devs have actually stated a few times that there are changes they planned on implementing that didn't get to the PTS, so it's not like it would be without precedent).