[Rep] State of the Guardian Address

[Maelael]

My responses are in red above.

 

Where I was approaching it was the idea that Guardian DPS = Less damage, more survivability. It's kinda not like that right now. Although I can build Singularity way faster on my Sent than I can build shockwave stacks on my Jugg (Especially if I'm being retarded like most DPS Juggs/Guardians in regz and ignoring Objectives).

 

I do NOT agree they need a damage bump in Focus. Suggesting this is insane. If you aren't topping the charts and beating people down in Focus/Rage on a Guardian/Jugg just fine something is wrong with your version of the game.

 

Taunts and Guardian Leap are nice, but don't increase YOUR survivability. The aoe slow is cool tho, but isn't spammable like with Defense. And again, YOUR survivability. I consider Taunts and etc to be more of CCs/Support skills.

 

Vigilance is RNG based, but has some odd inconsistencies for rotation that could be ironed out (Combat has this issue too). Personally? Add some more survivability to Vigilance and Focus and I'd put up with the odd ball RNG/inconsistency issues just fine. Sure, it's odd and things happen in weird places. But its more tanky. And that would be a better balance.

 

Focused defense is terrible as is though, and has always been the glaring wth hole in the class.

 

I'd almost say - whats their vision for the class' DPS specs? Less survivability than a Mara/Sent but more Damage? Less damage than a DPS class but more surviability? Good damage, support skills, but less survivability? Collect Underpants? I think that question with a follow up of "Would you be willing to take suggestions on what to change to meet your vision?" might be the most beneficial.

 

As far as I understand, this is a Q&A for the combat team, not a request line.

Edited August 1, 2013 by Maelael

[Kitru]

I commented in red for the points that were interesting to debate.

 

Dear god, when people respond in that manner it's annoying as hell. It's no easier to write it (since you're adding the color tags anyway; you could just as easily frame the comment with an endquote and startquote), and it makes it harder to quote it, which actually decrease the likelihood of the debate continuing. Seriously, if you're going to respond, don't do it in a manner that seems specifically designed to make it annoying as hell for people to read as well as less likely to respond.

 

LoL, if you look at the lore behind lightsabres deflecting blaster bolts, or re-channeling force energy...you'll begin to appreciate what said ability does in game. It was the next evolution from soresu.

 

First off, from a lore perspective, Saber Reflect only makes sense when reflecting Force and ranged attacks. Defense's Riposte focus is the basis of the "defend then attack" mentality that is demonstrative of Soresu form. Being able to bounce back blasts of fire, grenades, screams, rocket punches, missiles, thrown rocks, and the like are *not* logical extensions of Soresu form, especially since even those capabilities that *do* reverse techniques such as Force Lightning are neither universal nor easy for even the greatest Jedi: Mace Windu, the Weaponmaster of the Order, had to struggle and only barely managed to turn the lightning back on Palpatine after a substantial amount of effort. You never see a Force user do anything approaching the same with a Telekinetic Blast, nor do you see one reflecting anything beyond blaster bolts in the manner that Saber Reflect does it.

 

Sabre reflect is absolutely fine, and if it reflects anymore damage it will be nerfed beyond comprehension.

 

I never *said* that it should reflect more damage. In fact, I suggested that it work on *fewer* attack types, so that it would be comparatively weaker (which it honestly needs; Saber Reflect is *insanely* good) while still maintaining its amazing threat generating capability while giving Guardians a very specific tanking/survivability niche: the anti-M/R tanks.

 

LoL, you are asking for too much.

 

As said before, that's not debate. That's commentary. Debate would require you elaborate and explain your position while providing assertions to either disprove or contradict the previous arguments or presenting a more logical case of your own. You just stated something without any kind of support.

 

I'm quite curious how I'm asking for too much as part of that. It's actually not all that difficult to calculate the proper contributions of Shield and Absorb when you've got a given end point of mitigation. Currently, a Guardian in full UW gear is going to manage 69.97% mitigation outside of Blade Barrier (1 - (1 - 0.3) * (1 - 0.395 * 0.3307) * (1 - 0.5067)). Pull the DR contibution down to .4553 rather than .5067 (removing the Guardian Slash's DR and Guard Stance's armor contribution), do some algebra to find the equivalence, and you'll find that, if you add 5% Shield through Guard Stance, you need only add 14.66% Absorb to achieve the same level of mitigation as is there currently. Pull that up to 15% flat and you've got a pretty damned simple solution: Guard Stance provides 5% Shield and Guardian Slash (or some other source) provides 15% Absorb.

 

And it took me all of 5 minutes.

 

So how is *that* asking for too much?

[Aelaias]

You are wrong on the first point.

 

You are amusing on your second point. It's basically like saying..." In my opinion, 2+2=4. So therefore we must consider my opinion, as a worthy consideration." <=== this may be "considered" a "disparaging comment".

 

And yet you disagree with the 2+2=4 so I am going to consider myself well ahead of you on the issue of both kindergarten level arithmetic and understanding of the game. Be careful with those knuckles.

 

Edit: almost forgot, lol.

Edited August 1, 2013 by Aelaias

[UncleOst]

And yet you disagree with the 2+2=4 so I am going to consider myself well ahead of you on the issue of both kindergarten level arithmetic and understanding of the game. Be careful with those knuckles.

 

Edit: almost forgot, lol.

 

LoL I don't disagree with that at all, you were totally steamrolled by the jest I placed. Poor crutch for a retort I'll add.

[UncleOst]

Dear god, when people respond in that manner it's annoying as hell. It's no easier to write it (since you're adding the color tags anyway; you could just as easily frame the comment with an endquote and startquote), and it makes it harder to quote it, which actually decrease the likelihood of the debate continuing. Seriously, if you're going to respond, don't do it in a manner that seems specifically designed to make it annoying as hell for people to read as well as less likely to respond.

 

 

 

First off, from a lore perspective, Saber Reflect only makes sense when reflecting Force and ranged attacks. Defense's Riposte focus is the basis of the "defend then attack" mentality that is demonstrative of Soresu form. Being able to bounce back blasts of fire, grenades, screams, rocket punches, missiles, thrown rocks, and the like are *not* logical extensions of Soresu form, especially since even those capabilities that *do* reverse techniques such as Force Lightning are neither universal nor easy for even the greatest Jedi: Mace Windu, the Weaponmaster of the Order, had to struggle and only barely managed to turn the lightning back on Palpatine after a substantial amount of effort. You never see a Force user do anything approaching the same with a Telekinetic Blast, nor do you see one reflecting anything beyond blaster bolts in the manner that Saber Reflect does it.

 

 

 

I never *said* that it should reflect more damage. In fact, I suggested that it work on *fewer* attack types, so that it would be comparatively weaker (which it honestly needs; Saber Reflect is *insanely* good) while still maintaining its amazing threat generating capability while giving Guardians a very specific tanking/survivability niche: the anti-M/R tanks.

 

 

 

As said before, that's not debate. That's commentary. Debate would require you elaborate and explain your position while providing assertions to either disprove or contradict the previous arguments or presenting a more logical case of your own. You just stated something without any kind of support.

 

I'm quite curious how I'm asking for too much as part of that. It's actually not all that difficult to calculate the proper contributions of Shield and Absorb when you've got a given end point of mitigation. Currently, a Guardian in full UW gear is going to manage 69.97% mitigation outside of Blade Barrier (1 - (1 - 0.3) * (1 - 0.395 * 0.3307) * (1 - 0.5067)). Pull the DR contibution down to .4553 rather than .5067 (removing the Guardian Slash's DR and Guard Stance's armor contribution), do some algebra to find the equivalence, and you'll find that, if you add 5% Shield through Guard Stance, you need only add 14.66% Absorb to achieve the same level of mitigation as is there currently. Pull that up to 15% flat and you've got a pretty damned simple solution: Guard Stance provides 5% Shield and Guardian Slash (or some other source) provides 15% Absorb.

 

And it took me all of 5 minutes.

 

So how is *that* asking for too much?

 

Whoa..drama. First of all, check your lore source. The ability to return blaster fire and force attacks WAS an extention of soresu. Like I said it was the next step taken to progress from said form.

 

 

Sorry adding shield/absorb boosts with every crushing blow is...I'll reiterate...a bit too much. I say "too much" in the sence that you are overcomplicating things, while at the same time shooting yourself in the foot. Your suggestions would not benefit said abilities from what they are now.

[Aelaias]

LoL I don't disagree with that at all, you were totally steamrolled by the jest I placed. Poor crutch for a retort I'll add.

 

Not really but you are welcome to your... Well, we'll have to do it in another thread.

 

If focus is nerfed before heals/tanking in pvp it will make the current situation that much worse. The spec was nerfed reasonably well in 2.0. However it has a couple of factors which makes it attractive for premades especially in the caseof dual-wielders - instant difficult to avoid damage and stackability. Making stacking less effective one way or another could help.

[Kitru]

I say "too much" in the sence that you are overcomplicating things, while at the same time shooting yourself in the foot. Your suggestions would not benefit said abilities from what they are now.

 

The entire point is to correct for the overstabilization of the Guardian incoming damage profile. A smooth incoming damage profile was *always* supposed to be the VG schtick and yet now it's something that Guardians share with them. My changes aren't complicating things in any sense of the term, unless you somehow think that straight DR is simpler for whatever reason than Shield and Absorb, which makes no sense to me. Shield and Absorb are actually pretty simple systems.

[Dragonexadon]

On a side note : I always think it is a bad idea to put lore into class balance debates. In lore I would not have to train as a sage to learn pull, or as a shadow to learn how to pull an enemy instead of a friend .

[UncleOst]

Not really but you are welcome to your... Well, we'll have to do it in another thread.

 

If focus is nerfed before heals/tanking in pvp it will make the current situation that much worse. The spec was nerfed reasonably well in 2.0. However it has a couple of factors which makes it attractive for premades especially in the caseof dual-wielders - instant difficult to avoid damage and stackability. Making stacking less effective one way or another could help.

 

A suggestion I made for Andrew was perhaps changing smash from a 360 degree aoe, to a frontal 180 degree frontal cone. The dps potential then would not need to be nerfed, for it would place all damage potential into the skill of the player.

 

It's not my favorite solution, but it would seperate the good smashers from the lolsmashers.

[UncleOst]

The entire point is to correct for the overstabilization of the Guardian incoming damage profile. A smooth incoming damage profile was *always* supposed to be the VG schtick and yet now it's something that Guardians share with them. My changes aren't complicating things in any sense of the term, unless you somehow think that straight DR is simpler for whatever reason than Shield and Absorb, which makes no sense to me. Shield and Absorb are actually pretty simple systems.

 

 

You're a feisty one. I appreciate that. Shield/absorb look good on paper, but essentially while in combat, with your suggestion, there would be a perpetual boost...soo it's basically a redundant process.

 

Six of one, half a dozen of the other... Damage reduction trumps in my opinion. Unless you are infatuated with RNG.

[UncleOst]

On a side note : I always think it is a bad idea to put lore into class balance debates. In lore I would not have to train as a sage to learn pull, or as a shadow to learn how to pull an enemy instead of a friend .

 

Agreed I apologize for my use of it. I had used it as color for an earlier point I was making.

[Dragonexadon]

Agreed I apologize for my use of it. I had used it as color for an earlier point I was making.

 

No need to apologize , just throwing that out there.

[Kitru]

Six of one, half a dozen of the other... Damage reduction trumps in my opinion. Unless you are infatuated with RNG.

 

Yes, that's the point. DR is the absolute best mitigation mechanism in the game: it's static and preventative. The issue is that Guardians are *too stable* at the moment such that they're impacting what is *supposed* to be the domain of a different tank class. The entire point with swapping out the DR for Shield/Abs is for Guardians to stop acting like Vanguards and start acting more like Guardians. On top of that, it actually provides a *reason* for Guardians to use Shield and Absorb rather than just stacking up unholy amounts of Defense (since the value of Defense is static but the value of Shield/Abs is contingent upon the listed percentages of Shield and Absorb; as it stands, Guardians get the absolute least value out of Shield/Absorb because they don't have any appreciable bonuses which is why you always see Guardian BiS loadouts that are so Absorb light).

[UncleOst]

Yes, that's the point. DR is the absolute best mitigation mechanism in the game: it's static and preventative. The issue is that Guardians are *too stable* at the moment such that they're impacting what is *supposed* to be the domain of a different tank class. The entire point with swapping out the DR for Shield/Abs is for Guardians to stop acting like Vanguards and start acting more like Guardians. On top of that, it actually provides a *reason* for Guardians to use Shield and Absorb rather than just stacking up unholy amounts of Defense (since the value of Defense is static but the value of Shield/Abs is contingent upon the listed percentages of Shield and Absorb; as it stands, Guardians get the absolute least value out of Shield/Absorb because they don't have any appreciable bonuses which is why you always see Guardian BiS loadouts that are so Absorb light).

 

Hmm. Good arguements. If this is an endevour the developers chose to take, it wouldn't ruin immortal tanking. In fact if your suggestion was applied, then my suggestion of the "new enraged defence", would actually assist with the new reduced damage reduction values.

 

The drama is strong with this one, but I like her lol.

Edited August 1, 2013 by UncleOst

[maverickmatt]

 

Disclaimer:

I want to make it clear that I am addressing where the Guardian fits in the game, fundamental concerns, and solutions. I am not addressing bugs in this thread.

 

Everything in this post is my opinion based on my experience with the class since pre-launch. However, I have been extremely successful on the Fatman and POT5 servers using this class in PVP, and feel that I have a firm understanding of the class. If you want more on my background, check This thread.

 

General State of the Guardian Class:

Guardians are in a fairly good state at the moment. Yes, there are issues and concerns that need to be addressed. However, this hasn't stopped Guardians from being a very viable class in both PVE and PVP. Guardians can be competent tanks and DPS. Guardians have fairly strong defensive abilities, but they aren't as easy to use as a Sentinel's. This combined with less raid utility and overall DPS can sometimes lead to DPS Guardians being overlooked in both the PVE and PVP arenas.

 

State of PVE Guardians:

Tanking:

Guardian PVE tanks are in a fairly good spot right now. Guardians have some of the strongest set of defensive cool downs in the game, and good passive defensives as well. Guardians are competitive for all end game tanking content. However, there are a couple issues. The main issue being threat management. Due to the Guardian's limited range, holding threat on multiple targets can be an issue. Additionally, Guardian's are susceptible to knockbacks at the beginning of pulls, which can cause an issue of not being able to build enough threat to keep the boss from turning to DPS.

 

DPS:

Guardian PVE DPS is in a good, but not great, spot right now. Both DPS trees are usable in endgame content, and can be switched between on a per fight basis. Guardian single target DPS can be high, with good RNG. However, they are still behind both Gunslingers, and, more importantly, Sentinels. There is also the issue of our threat dump being so expensive. These issues coupled with lack of unique raid wide utility compared to Sentinels has caused some otherwise outstanding Guardians to be overlooked.

 

The main issue with Guardian PVE DPS is how they compare to Sentinels. They fall behind in damage output, require more RNG to even get close to that output, and provide less raid utility. The issue is not large enough to exclude Guardians from serious PVE content, but it still is not ideal.

 

State of PVP Guardians:

Tanking:

Guardian PVP tanks are in a great spot right now. Guardians have some of the strongest set of defensive cool downs in the game, and good passive defensives as well. Guardians are almost always chosen to be the main tank for serious rated teams. Guardian PVP tanks have great mobility, a large amount of CC, great tools for peeling and guarding, and great group utility. The only issue I see for Guardian PVP tanks is that their damage is lower than other tanks. However, this isn't a huge issue.

 

DPS:

Guardian PVP DPS have some great points, while needing help in others.

 

Focus:

The damage output of the Focus tree is incredibly high in a PVP environment due to the highest AOE damage of any spec in the game. This damage output is almost too high, but I will get into that in another thread. The rotation is incredibly simple, almost to a fault. The damage potential of Focus Guardians is slightly higher than a Focus Sentinels, due to 6% extra force damage, 6% extra Strength, access to armor sunders, and 10% higher Masterstrike damage. Focus Guardians also can easily snare groups of enemies regularly, whereas Focus Sentinels can only reliably snare one target at a time. Guardians can also taunt enemies and provide better control with Force Push.

 

Despite these strengths, Focus Guardians are usually overlooked for rated team slots due to being less survivable than Sentinels. Focus Guardians have no good general purpose short cool down defensive ability. Focused Defense helps a bit, but isn't even close in comparison to the Rebuke that Sentinels get. Another huge downside is that Focus Sentinels have access to 30% AOE damage reduction. Focus Sentinels can also obtain an extra 4% passive damage reduction, which brings their passive damage reduction close to Focus Guardian levels. Additionally, Focus Sentinels can lower the cool down of Guarded by the Force by a whopping 30 seconds. This greatly out shadows the Guardian equivalent talent that reduces the focus cost of Focused Defense by 2.

 

Vigilance:

Vigilance is one of the most adaptive specs in the game. It has great defensive capabilities, decent burst, and good sustained DPS. A skilled Vigilance player can take down any other class, some harder than others. Vigilance is also the best DPS spec in the game to off tank with, should the situation arise. Well played Vigilance will also be a serious threat to anyone he or she decides to sit on. Vigilance also has a large variety of abilities that keep the spec interesting and complex in a good way. Vigilance's CC immunity coupled with Force Leap's root can also be used for great effect to put a lot of pressure on a vulnerable target.

 

Regardless, these advantages are not enough for most rated teams to bring Vigilance. While Vigilance does very well in a lot of different areas, it doesn't have enough to stand out. The burst it does is good, but not spectacular. The sustained damage is great, but can be mitigated in a rated environment with guard switching and cross healing. Vigilance also has issues with being kited and is highly susceptible to roots.

 

Though, the main issue stems from the fact that Vigilance is the only Knight spec without any unique group utility. Watchman has group heals and a shorter CD interrupt, Combat has greater Transcendence speed and a plethora of roots, Focus has greater group pressure and more/easier to use snares, and tanks have guard, group armor sunders, and a great amount of CC. Vigilance has nothing to offer in terms of unique group utility.

 

Solutions:

General changes:

Focused Defense:

Focused Defense is a great defensive cool down... if you're playing Vigilance. Even then, it is disproportionately expensive compared to other short duration general purpose defensive cool downs in the game. For tanks and Focus players, Focused Defense is an afterthought. It simply does not provide enough mitigation to be worth the focus spent on the ability. Furthermore, PVE tanks can't even use it due to it being a threat drop.

 

I propose that Focused Defense be changed to provide 15% damage reduction, in addition to the healing, whenever Shien or Shii-cho stances are active. Additionally, each tree would have a talent that affects Focused Defense. For tanks, the Inner Peace talent would, in addition to its current talent effects, would remove the activation cost of Focused Defense, increase threat by a moderate amount (instead of decreasing), and provide two seconds of knockback (not full CC) immunity while Soresu stance was active. For Vigilance, the Commanding Awe talent would, in addition to its current talent effects (minus the 15% damage reduction effect,) remove the healing cost (the 1 focus per second) of Focused Defense and removes all negative effects (DOTS, snares, explosive probe, roots, etc..) For Focus, the Through Peace talent would, in addition to its current effect, would decrease the cool down of Enure by 30 seconds and increase the amount it heals for by 10% or 15%.

 

Making these changes to Focused Defense would solve a lot problems. Tanks would have an easier time gaining and maintaining threat, Vigilance wouldn't sacrifice nearly as much DPS to dump threat and would have a way to combat roots, and Focus would gain the short cool down, general purpose defensive that it needs, in addition to having an equivalent to the Guarded by the Force cool down reduction talent.

 

Saber Reflect

The only major change outside the Focused Defense change that I see being needed is changing Saber Reflect to ignore defenses, the Guardian's and his or her attacker's. Tanks shouldn't be punished for having a high defense rating.

 

Vigilance:

The main thing that Vigilance needs is a group utility ability or debuff. My main goal for the suggested changes is to increase Vigilance's PVP damage, mobility, or usability. There will be some suggestion that will increase PVE damage as well, but my main goal for PVE is to suggest a group utility. However, there are some talents that are fairly lackluster or are too RNG based. Let's look at those first.

 

Accuracy:

This talent is fairly straightforward and does help Vigilance out. However, it is very lackluster when you compare it to the accuracy talents of most other classes. For example, a Commando's accuracy talent not only increases accuracy by 3%, but it increases armor penetration of Full Auto and High Impact Bolt by 30%. Vanguards, Shadows, Sages, and Scoundrels also have extra effects on their accuracy talents.

 

Therefore, I propose that Vigilance's accuracy talent also receive additional effects. However, I'm not exactly sure what it should be. Some suggestions would be: 30% increased armor penetration for Masterstrike, 3% alacrity (I'd prefer something else, but it's an idea,) 6% increased melee critical chance, etc.

 

Defiance:

I generally like this talent. However, I also feel that knockbacks should generate focus as well.

 

Gather Strength:

Gather Strength is an "okay" boost to damage, but is far too circumstantial and the buff duration is too short to be of any great value. I suggest that it be returned to its old 5% / 10% per stack model and include all CCs, knockbacks, snares, and roots to what gives stacks. This would include giving stacks when Unremitting is active to further punish players who use control abilities on Unremitting. Additionally, Gather Strength's buff duration would be increased to 20 seconds instead of the current 10.

 

This change would give PVP Vigilance players a decent boost in mobile damage while not effecting PVE damage output by any substantial means.

 

Narrowed Focus

This talent nearly useless. In PVE, AOE damage is mostly avoidable, and in PVP Vigilance has much better ways to consistently gain greater amounts of focus. This talent needs to be reworked or replaced.

 

This would be a great place to add a 30% AOE damage reduction talent to Vigilance. Every other middle tree melee spec has some sort of AOE damage reduction talent, with the exception of Scrapper. Additionally, Vigilance is usually more in the middle of fights than the other melee middle tree specs. This gives it a greater need for such a talent.

 

Sundering Throw:

This talent is a bit lackluster. The cool down reduction should be 10 seconds instead of 5.

 

Zen Strike:

This talent is the bread and butter of Vigilance. Getting these procs can make or break Vigilance. However, this proc relies far too much on RNG. Additionally, Masterstrike's burst wihout DOTs already rolling can be a bit lackluster, which is a problem in PVP. Therefore, I propose two changes to Zen Strike.

 

First, Zen Strike needs to either have Dispatch also have a 30% chance to proc, or Plasma Brand needs to have a 45-55% chance to proc. Doing either of these would greatly help with RNG factor Zen Strike. Watchman has a similar setup for how it procs its Cauterize reset. Merciless Slash and Dispatch have a 66% chance to proc Cauterize, and Slash has a 33% chance. These numbers would need to be played with a bit, but the amount of RNG reliance that Vigilance has currently is unacceptable.

 

Secondly, the Zen Strike talent should cause all Masterstrikes ticks to apply or refresh Burning Blade and Burning purpose (the Blade Storm and Overhead Slash DOTs) and cause the first ticks to auto crit (that is, the ticks that happen with a Masterstrike tick.) This would help solve a couple issues. First, it would give PVE Guardians a bit of a boost without increasing damage output substantially. Secondly, it would increase burst in PVP and allow DOTs to be setup quicker.

 

Preparation:

This talent is utterly useless in all end game talent. In PVE, you never go out of combat during a boss fight. In rated PVP, Vigilance would be in the main fight and constantly engaged due to taunts, snares, and CC. This talent needs to be completely replaced.

 

This talent is also in a good position to add the group utility talent that Vigilance needs. Therefore, I propose that Preparation be changed to lower the cool down of Force Leap by 3 seconds and Saber Reflect by 15 seconds. Additionally, when Combat Focus is activated the Guardian and all nearby (within 30 meters) ops group members have their alacrity increased by 15% for 10 seconds. This talent would finally give Vigilance the added group utility it needs to stand out. An alacrity boost would help in both PVE and PVP settings, and could be used both offensively and defensively (allow healers to cast faster/regen resources faster.) It would also allow for skilled coordination of burst attacks. An example would be a Vigilance Guardian, Combat Sentinel, and Telekinetic Sage working together. The Guardian could use Combat Focus, Combat Sentinel could use Zen, and the Telekinetic Sage could use Mental Alacrity.

 

I've seen other notable ideas for group utility in PVP such as guard removal or adding trauma to Sundering Strike. However, these would only affect PVP when PVE Guardians have group utility needs as well. I am open to suggestions as to a replacement for the alacrity boost, as long as it is usable in PVP and PVE.

 

Focus:

The Focus tree is fairly straight forward, and doesn't require too much reworking outside of a possible reduction in AOE damage output, but I will go over that in another thread. I already made a suggestion to change the Through Peace talent when talking about Focused Defense. There are a couple other talents that should be looked at as well.

 

Second Wind:

This is a very lackluster talent. A 10% heal every two minutes is not worth two talent points. To make this talent more appealing, it should additionally reduce the cool down of Resolute by 30 seconds.

 

Force Guard:

The 6% force damage reduction is fine, but the focus gained from reflecting force attacks is not. It is way too situational to gain focus that the Focus spec is already swimming in anyways. Instead, Saber Reflect should cause all reflected damage to auto crit.

 

Final Thoughts:

Again this is all my opinion on where the Guardian class is, and where it should go. I feel that if my suggestions go through, the Guardian class would be in an excellent position to be competitive in all content without being overpowered.

 

 

 

 

Thanks for taking the time to write all of that. It's well thought out and you clearly understand the issues that plague the Guardian, and the spec that will have the whole class nerfed to the ground.

 

I don't know that much about PvE Guardians in 2.0, but on the topic of PvP...

 

We all agree Vigilance feels incomplete. It's DPS is easily replaced by a Sentinel and it brings nothing to the group.

You and I talked about something I'd like to see and that's a higher tiered ability that affects an enemy Guard, whether it removes the guard and places a debuff that doesn't allow it to be reapplied for x amount of time or reduces the effectiveness of said guard. I'm sure there are other and likely better ways to improve Vigilance, though.

 

I have a million things to say about smash, but you've already stated you will make another thread concerning those issues.

 

Thanks again, Andrew.

[Riivan]

Blah blah blah

 

That was the point. I don't recall being butthurt but you seem to know more about my state of well being than I, so I will defer to your assessment. It amuses me that you post ponderous walls of text and yell at someone for commenting within a quote for doing something to lessen the chance of debate. Get to the point so the debate can actually move. There's no reason to post walls of text unless you erroneously think post length is directly proportional to being correct.

 

There is nothing wrong with Guard tanks. They're finally in line with VGs and Shadows (no shadows aren't horribly broken, but yes they do need a little love). I don't see why each tank has to have a mitigation niche either, it's unnecessary.

[Killamanjaroo]

Congrats Andrew. Glad to see we will be well represented.

 

I have played a Guardian since pre-release as well, primarily in PVP. I would agree with your definition of our class.

 

I would summarize what I would like to see,

 

-more abilities with combo skills on them (i.e. snares after landing the ability automatically built in)

-something to reduce AoE dmg in the middle tree while in certain stances

-some group utility (maybe a nice heal debuff, -50 percent outgoing in Vig, inc in another tree)

 

I think overall we are in a good spot with various builds though. Some tweaks would be nice.

 

Thanks!

[Marb]

There is nothing wrong with Guard tanks. They're finally in line with VGs and Shadows (no shadows aren't horribly broken, but yes they do need a little love). I don't see why each tank has to have a mitigation niche either, it's unnecessary.

 

After the tank specific interview last year, it did seem the devs want the tanks to feel different in the way they take damage, and that is linked to the theme of their class. It just bothers me that the tanks were so nicely balanced in a pre 2.0 world (in the way they took damage), with the only class coming out on top were shadows that were played to a very a high standard. I would like to see tanks get back some of that identity. If they go the opposite direction and balance the other two tanks to the standard of Guardians (giving PT's a saber reflect, boosting sin DR too much), I fear we will be on the road to homogenization.

 

I'm also confused about "They're finally in line with VGs and Shadows". For threat generation, yes guards had issues, and there were workarounds. Functionality as tanks and actually taking damage? All the tanks were surprisingly well balanced on that front, while still being different. Pt's were passive and stable but had weak cooldowns, Guards were less stable but had the best cooldown suite in the game, and Shadows lived and died by the player at the helm, with short term cooldowns and self managed active mitigation.

 

And there is really no need for this hostility, people are being sniped at left and right in this thread and its making it a chore to sort through and respond to different peoples suggestions and ideas.

Edited August 2, 2013 by Marb

[Amortys]

Like you mentionned the 3 specs have their own niche, vigilance being all about single target cannot compete right now to the burst of a combat sentinel, it is one of the best 1on1 spec but I think it shouldn't be confined to that for group pvp.

 

Here is 3 ideas I came up with to help vigilance for pvp and it would probably fit also PvE.

 

1. Increase dot damage by x%, I do feel that those need 40% increase if not higher, getting them too high could be a problem also as we have 3 applications, right now my feeling is that they're only there to proc dispatch.

 

2. Right now Combat Focus for vigilance is a ''recharge'' ability on 45sec CD, gaining 6 focus and nothing more is ridiculous when you will burn those in one ability or two, it need a little something like inspiration, increase damage % for the upcoming 6seconds for yourself, just the right amount of time for a regular rotation after a leap.

 

3. Vigilance is one of the most energy hungry spec in the game, I wish i'd knew how much time I spend auto-attacking compared to focus. Looking at Focus where you are encourgaed to use ''strike'' abilities to decrease the CD on your big attack, vigilance is losing a lot of momemtum getting their energy back. I feel an easy fix to this would be to make ''preparation'' the same as the PvE set bonus for dps; decrease the range of saber throw by 10m, it deal decent damage and we get our focus back. PvP and PvE involved I feel those points are only worth while leveling, boss fight in a raid you won't get out of combat for 5min+ and long engaging fights in pvp will do the same.

[Lahsbee]

Does anybody else want a different stance while holding the lightsaber

 

I don't.

 

The "baseball bat" stance is the closest stance in the entire game to an actual real-world longsword guard, which is the most relevant martial tradition IMHO. You could make a case for Kendo, but they don't hold the blade out of the way in their guards either.

 

(edit - returning to the topic)

 

I agree that the talent slot currently occupied by Preparation represents fertile design space. A PvE QoL improvement shouldn't be so far up in a tree, or in a tree at all. The alacrity boost idea would have good synergy with other class abilities and be useful in both PvP and PvE.

 

Congratulations to our new rep! If your initial writeup is any indication, you'll do a fine job.

Edited August 2, 2013 by Lahsbee

[Riivan]

You hit on what I meant. Our threat is in line now and we have some better tools to use against ranged mobs.

 

VGs and Shadows need to be bumped up, not guards brought down.

 

Also I don't care about the lore of stances or real world examples of how things should be. Should just be whatever looks good.

Edited August 2, 2013 by Riivan

[Kitru]

The "baseball bat" stance is the closest stance in the entire game to an actual real-world longsword guard, which is the most relevant martial tradition IMHO.

 

Depends upon whether you're using the English or German longsword tradition. The German tradition preferred the high guard whereas the English was much more defensive and kept the blade close to the chest.

 

Of course, the lightsaber forms have actually been explained pretty explicitly with the relative stances, guards, and techniques in LucasArts published content. I recall that Soresu form is the only one that keeps the blade very close to themself, which is part of the "complete defense" idea behind it (create a tight circle around yourself that nothing can penetrate), but none of the others do, which would indicate that the "default" stance, as far as the animations are concerned, is actually Soresu's.

 

All of this is largely arbitrary because the devs weren't attempting to transcribe the actual forms into the game's animations so it's not like it's really an issue. It's also pretty unlikely that the devs would go out and make a bunch of new animations for the different stances simply because it would be a *crapton* of work with only tangential value since it's for a single class and specific specs within it.

[OlosBC]

3. Vigilance is one of the most energy hungry spec in the game, I wish i'd knew how much time I spend auto-attacking compared to focus. Looking at Focus where you are encourgaed to use ''strike'' abilities to decrease the CD on your big attack, vigilance is losing a lot of momemtum getting their energy back.

 

A fair bit.

 

 

 

But in focus, slash is your auto attack, not strike.

[Riivan]

Weren't the forms based on Samurai? I mean, the films themselves lift a lot of Kurosawa's films and Japanese culture in general.

 

And they'd only need to do one new animation per stance, the idle. Maybe the run. The engine will blend all the other animations together. Unless either of these forms held the saber with one hand for all the attacks or there is some other technical engine issues. Otherwise it's a relatively simple change.

 

As for energy. Vigi is starved sometimes, but I find myself not really using strike all that often. If you hit slash a lot then yes you're going to have to strike more often. But I only hit slash if everything else is on CD and won't come off in a gcd and it won't keep me from doing PB, OS, and BS.

[Kitru]

Weren't the forms based on Samurai?

 

The samurai/Kurosawa influence was more in the philosophy/aesthetic of the Jedi moreso than their combat style. Kendo and kenjutsu stances and strikes have pretty much nothing in common with the lightsaber forms. The few lightsaber combat sequences in the original movies were really designed before the lightsaber forms were even defined.

 

The actual construct behind the lightsaber forms is actually pretty interesting, since it's broken down into 3 circles (long, medium, and short) and 4 zones (up-left, up-right, down-left, and down-right). The zones and the intent of their use draws from the Germanic longsword tradition of attack zones and moving from one to the next in a series of masterstrokes that act as both attack and defense whereas the circles draw from the English and Italian longsword traditions concerning maintaining distance, though it also includes a fair deal of Jedi mysticism in creating circles of Sense and creating a region of prediction and action. It's not really a real fighting style in any sense, but it's well defined enough that, if the Force actually existed, it would present a reasonable construct for it.