Kinetic Ward Mechanics

[EWOguy]

I started this game about a week ago and I'm loving it so far. I usually wind up in end game PVE and PVP with only one character I actually play. I rolled a Shadow and specced Kinetic Combat because the skill tree really appealed to me and I've been having a great time with it- except for one ability: Kinetic Ward.

 

I've never played a class in an MMO with an ability that is so essential to a spec that is also more of a headache to properly maintain. Maybe I just don't have the practice with it yet, but this ability seems to be something that should be a toggled or constant buff that was inexplicably made into a constant refresh. To compound the problem, Kinetic Bulwark makes the last half of charges the most effective, so just constantly mashing the KW bind now becomes suboptimal. Also, it has limited charges- which brings up a few more problems such as it falling off after the charges are spent but before the ability becomes available again, leaving me without the buff and spiking my damage until the timer ticks down. So I've found myself trying to practice micromanaging this ability, constantly scanning my buff bar, just to practice tanking at the optimal level and I've found this is really detracting from both my ability and enjoyment of tanking as a Shadow.

 

So I guess my questions are:

1. Is there an easier way to keep this ability up?

2. If not, with practice, does this become "second nature" or is at always a bit of a pain in the *** to properly maintain?

3. Are there other tools I'm not using such as buff bars or user interface options I'm not aware of?

 

Any other suggestions would also be appreciated as well as any other suggestions for this lvl 30ish Shadow. Just wanted to get some feedback early on before I commit more seriously to the class.

Thanks.

[Prototypemind]

You should have all your main abilities hotkeyed to make them easier to work into rotation and maintain. There are a few threads here and in the Assassin forum mentioning what a lot of others use if you want to take a look.

[Ryokusen]

It does becomes easier to mantain when you have some hours under your belt.

That said if you dont like watching your buff bar constantly shadow tank may not be the class for you, at level 55 not only do you have to track kinetic ward but also shadow protection stacks, harnessed shadow stacks, particle acceleration and face stab proc, while of course moving the boss and executing mechanics.

However if you are enyoing the class I suggest you keep practicing, you may stand on the red circles at the beggining but you will be rocking in no time

[EWOguy]

@ Proto:

It's not really a problem of binding- I have everything either bound to my mouse or my keyboard (with a gamepad on order). Its much more a problem of monitoring the buffs/charges/uptime. Without the ability to mod, I'm using the SWTOR interface which is pretty light on options and not really cutting it for me. I was wondering if maybe there were others tools I wasn't aware of for monitoring all of the stuff I need to.

 

@Ryo:

Yea that's the feeling I've been getting over the past few levels and doing some reading into the skill tree mechanics. I don't mind some rotational/situational/ proc difficulty but this particular tree seems to go past that point and into some pretty significant micromanagement, which I'm trying to avoid. Just not my thing. Might give Gaurdian or Vanguard another try and see how those work out.

[Vaidinah]

I started this game about a week ago and I'm loving it so far. I usually wind up in end game PVE and PVP with only one character I actually play. I rolled a Shadow and specced Kinetic Combat because the skill tree really appealed to me and I've been having a great time with it- except for one ability: Kinetic Ward.

 

I've never played a class in an MMO with an ability that is so essential to a spec that is also more of a headache to properly maintain. Maybe I just don't have the practice with it yet, but this ability seems to be something that should be a toggled or constant buff that was inexplicably made into a constant refresh. To compound the problem, Kinetic Bulwark makes the last half of charges the most effective, so just constantly mashing the KW bind now becomes suboptimal. Also, it has limited charges- which brings up a few more problems such as it falling off after the charges are spent but before the ability becomes available again, leaving me without the buff and spiking my damage until the timer ticks down. So I've found myself trying to practice micromanaging this ability, constantly scanning my buff bar, just to practice tanking at the optimal level and I've found this is really detracting from both my ability and enjoyment of tanking as a Shadow.

 

So I guess my questions are:

1. Is there an easier way to keep this ability up?

2. If not, with practice, does this become "second nature" or is at always a bit of a pain in the *** to properly maintain?

3. Are there other tools I'm not using such as buff bars or user interface options I'm not aware of?

 

Any other suggestions would also be appreciated as well as any other suggestions for this lvl 30ish Shadow. Just wanted to get some feedback early on before I commit more seriously to the class.

Thanks.

 

You just started playing the game a week ago and you are trying to practice tanking at an optimal level? You should start with setting realistic goals like getting a good handle on the fights you are going into and doing your basic rotation correctly.

 

You are vastly overcomplicating what you are trying to do. One of the most common and paralyzing mistakes players make with regard to playing a Shadow tank is staring at the buff bar. When you are the "main" tank, you never have to look at your buff bar for the entire fight to play almost completely optimally.

 

When Project is reset due to a proc, you simply use it on cooldown. When Shadow Strike is procced, it lights up on your skill bar so you know it's available to use the next time you would normally use Double Strike (differs slightly if you are not the main tank). You should always know when you have 3 stacks of Harnessed Shadow to use Telekinetic Throw because it always comes after your 2nd use of Project in your single target rotation. If you manage your effective rotation properly, you can keep up your 4 stacks of Shadow Protection fairly easily and you have your stealth every 2 minutes in case you make a mistake or the game mechanics make this difficult/impossible.

 

When it comes to Kinetic Ward, remember that it has a 15 second cooldown and that it lasts for 20 seconds. Since you are new to this game, you may not be aware that the vast majority of skills have a global cooldown (GCD) of 1.5 seconds. This means you can't use any other normal skills until 1.5 seconds has passed (not counting defensive cooldowns and certain offense boosts like Force Potency). Any skills that do not specifically say they do not respect the global cooldown or have channel times that last longer than 1.5 seconds. As you are a Shadow tank, the only skill you would normally use that is different than the standard 1.5 second cooldown is Telekinetic Throw, which is a 3 second channel.

 

I mention all this about the GCD because if you want to start optimizing your Kinetic Bulwark stacks, you have 5 seconds from when Kinetic Ward comes off of cooldown and when its duration is over. This is almost equivalent to 4.5 seconds (3 GCDs) so you can use 3 normal skills (like Project) or 1 normal skill and 1 Telekinetic Throw and then you can refresh your Kinetic Ward with .5 seconds left. You really don't want to wait until Kinetic Ward actually falls off because it's a massive boost to your mitigation.

 

Edit: Fixed most of the bad grammar and corrected some terminology to Shadow skills instead of Assassin ones.

Edited February 11, 2014 by Vaidinah

[Aelanis]

You just started playing the game a week ago and you are trying to practice tanking at an optimal level? You should start with setting realistic goals like getting a good handle on the fights you are going into and doing your basic rotation correctly.

 

You are vastly overcomplicating what you are trying to do. One of the most common and paralyzing mistakes players make with regard to playing a Shadow tank is staring at the buff bar. When you are the "main" tank, you never have to look at your bar for the entire fight to play almost completely optimally.

 

When Project is reset due to a proc, you simply use it on cooldown. When Maul is procced, it lights up on your bar so you know it's available to use the next time you would normally use Double Strike (differs slightly if you are not the main tank). You should always know when you have 3 stacks of Harnessed Darkness to use Telekinetic Throw because it always comes after your 2nd use of Project in your single target rotation. If you manage your effective rotation properly, you can keep up your 4 stacks of Shadow Protection fairly easily and you have your stealth every 2 minutes in case you make a mistake or the game mechanics make this difficult/impossible.

 

When it comes to Kinetic Ward, remember that it has a 15 second cooldown and that it lasts for 20 seconds. Since you are new to this game, you may not be aware that the vast majority of skills has global cooldown (GCD) of 1.5 seconds. This means you can't use any other normal skills until 1.5 seconds has passed (not counting defensive cooldowns and certain offense boosts like Force Potency). Any skills that do not specifically say they do not respect the global cooldown or have channel times that last longer than 1.5 seconds. As you are a Shadow tank, the only skill you would normally use that is different than the standard 1.5 second cooldown is Telekinetic Throw, which is a 3 second channel.

 

I mention all this about the GCD because if you want to start optimizing your Kinetic Bulwark stacks, you have 5 seconds from when Kinetic Ward comes off of cooldown and when its duration is over. This is almost equivalent to 4.5 seconds (3 GCDs) so you can use 3 normal skills (like Project) or 1 normal skill and 1 Telekinetic Throw and then you can refresh your Kinetic Ward with .5 seconds left. You really don't want to wait until Dark Ward actually falls off because it's a massive boost to your mitigation.

 

This is all the stuff I wish someone had told me when I started tanking on my Shadow. It's all second nature now (though I still struggle to wait the extra 3 GCDs when a fight is hectic, due to the way it worked pre 2.0), and it does get a lot better. I look at the buff bar sometimes, but typically to see how long I can put off TKT to do other things, and to double check any debuffs I might have.

[Prototypemind]

You also get an animation for it, during the majority of its up time, so that does help. As you play more you'll get used to watching your procs.

[MGNMTTRN]

I don't think anyone's mentioned this yet: in addition to the other things that Shadow tanks need to track (Kinetic Ward cooldown, Kinetic Bulwark stacks, Project procs + Harnessed Shadows stacks, Shadow Strike proc), they also need to not use Force Breach on cooldown in single target situations.

 

Trying to play my Shadow tank well drives me crazy. The game's user interface is just not conducive to good Shadow play.

 

But to answer your question about how to know when to refresh Kinetic Ward: since its cooldown is 15 seconds and it's duration is 20 seconds, you can note when Kinetic Ward comes off cooldown, use 3 GCDs after (because each GCD takes 1.5 seconds) and then you'll know it's been 15 + 3*15 = 19.5 seconds since your last Kinetic Ward use. This presumes your KW stacks have not all been consumed.

[Vaidinah]

Using Force Breach on cooldown is perfectly fine even in single target situations. Yeah, it's definitely not optimal, but at most you lose a relatively small amount of DPS. Once people are experienced, they can simply delay Force Breach until after the 1st Project right after the 2nd Telekinetic Throw. Since Force Breach has a 6 second cooldown, this still gives you enough time to use it again in case it gets resisted even assuming you only get 0 procs on your Project reset. For example:

 

Project --> Slow Time --> Force Breach --> Double Strike --> Project --> Telekinetic Throw --> Slow Time --> Project --> Double Strike --> Double Strike --> Double Strike --> Project --> Telekinetic Throw --> Slow Time --> Project --> Force Breach

 

If you want to use a bit earlier it, you can afford to delay the Slow Time after your 2nd Telekinetic Throw to use Force Breach and replace the 2nd Force Breach above with Slow Time to swap places. As long as you continually use Project on cooldown, you'll be fine. Of course, you can also replace Double Strike with any Shadow Strikes if you get the proc or Spinning Strike if the target is below 30%.

Edited February 11, 2014 by Vaidinah

[Ancaglon]

Using Force Breach on cooldown is perfectly fine even in single target situations.

I'm pretty sure he means, "don't hit FB when there's a CC'd mob next to the one you're hitting", not "don't waste Force on a single target" (since, unlike Slow Time, Force Breach isn't "smart").

[Simmerr]

Welcome to shadow tanking, where you have to manage 3 stacking buffs, 3 rotation dependent procs, 2 debuffs on the targets, and variable cooldowns on main abilites and cd's, while attempting to position mobs properly, perform perfectly timed tank swaps, and hold aggro off of insane tryhard DPS.

 

Good Luck

Edited February 13, 2014 by Simmerr

[MGNMTTRN]

I meant that you don't want to reapply Force Breach's accuracy debuff more than once every 30 seconds. It does strictly less damage than Double Strike. Val is correct that you can substitute all Double Strikes with Breach and you'll do barely different DPS, but it's still suboptimal.

 

Values from my Shadow tank in 69 gear:

Combat technique Force Breach: 897-1021 internal = 959 internal average, 0.94 hit chance, 0.1687 crit rate, 0.51 surge. Expected damage per hit is 959*0.94*(1+0.1687*0.51) = 979.01 damage / cast, at 20 force / cast.

 

Double strike: 890- 1030 = 960 kinetic average per tick, 2 ticks, each has a 0.94 hit chance, assume 0.7 multiplier from damage reduction, 0.1725+0.09 = 0.2625 crit rate, 0.51 surge. Expected damage per tick is 960*0.7*(1+0.2625*0.51) = 761. 0.94^2 = 88.36% chance of both hitting, 0.06^2 = 0.36% chance of none hitting, and 11.28% chance of one attack hitting. 761*(2*0.8836+1*0.1128 + 0*0.0036) = 1430 damage / cast, at 25 force / cast.

 

If you use Breach on cooldown (6 seconds) over 60 seconds that's 10 uses, consumes 200 force, and gives 10*979 = 9790 damage over 60 seconds. If you replace all non-maintenance Breaches with Double Strikes and/or consume at most 200 force, you still use Breach at 0 seconds and 30 seconds, leaving you with 160 force. You can spend 150 = 25*6 force on Double Strikes and still have 10 force left over. 2*979 + 6*1430 = 10538 damage over 60 seconds, 10 force left over, and better maintenance of your rotation. You gain (10538-9790) / 60 = 12 DPS by replacing non-essential Breaches with Double Strikes.

 

Double Strike also indirectly contributes more to your survivability and damage by giving Particle Acceleration procs at a high rate. Since each tick has a 0.94 chance to hit and each hit has a 0.3 chance to give Particle Acceleration, we have P(both ticks hit and at least one doesn't fail to give Particle accelerator) P(exactly one tick hits and that tick gives Particle Accelerator) = 0.94^2*(1-0.3)^2 + 0.1128*0.3 + 0= 0.467. This used to be the big $$ for Shadows. It's still important to get Particle Accelerator procs for increasing your DPs, but it doesn't contribute much to DTPS anymore. Presently you can expect 0.467*6 = 2.802 accelerated Projects due to replacing those Force Breaches with Double Strikes.

 

I was trying to do an estimate for Project's damage but I discovered that the increase in Project's base damage from Shadow's Training isn't even factored into the Project tooltip. I just about flipped over my desk at that point.

[Prototypemind]

Welcome to shadow tanking, where you have to manage 3 stacking buffs, 3 rotation dependent procs, 2 debuffs on the targets, and variable cooldowns on main abilites and cd's, while attempting to position mobs properly, perform perfectly timed tank swaps, and hold aggro off of insane tryhard DPS.

 

Good Luck

 

Have to say that in general the tanking classes are pretty well balanced. The rotation now is no different than before these changes, and Sin/Shadows have always been the tanks run by those who want a different feel and enjoy the challenge because the rewards are there as well.

[tXHereticXt]

So I guess my questions are:

1. Is there an easier way to keep this ability up?

2. If not, with practice, does this become "second nature" or is at always a bit of a pain in the *** to properly maintain?

3. Are there other tools I'm not using such as buff bars or user interface options I'm not aware of?

 

[*]1) Well keep it on Cooldown. Have it on a keybind easily accessible and just keep it on cool down. Once you get used to the timing and balancing that with protections you can delay it a little bit to get the maximum 8 from Bulwark.

[*]2) I'm sure "number crunchers" (AKA the smart and talented ones) would probably frown on what I'd say here but I do feel that your over all absorption stat can make up for the lack of bulwark stacks assuming you're getting 5-6 going which is very easy depending on what boss you're fighting. My general rule of thumb is give Ward three seconds after cool down and trigger it again. For me it's second nature though, get the timing down with your threat generation and then "experimont"

[*]3) Not that I'm aware of. Buff bars? Watch the buff for Ward that says 15. After the 8 stacks are used up, you're down to 7 but generally the recharge is quick approaching by then. Granted some fights are the opposite where they eat your stacks up so quickly that you need to keep it on cooldown for the best mitigation.

 

Welcome to shadow tanking, where you have to manage 3 stacking buffs, 3 rotation dependent procs, 2 debuffs on the targets, and variable cooldowns on main abilites and cd's, while attempting to position mobs properly, perform perfectly timed tank swaps, and hold aggro off of insane tryhard DPS.

 

Good Luck

 

That is precisely why I like it, as someone who started out as a jugg and felt it was too easy with their "invincibility nonsense", this class became quite the attention hog.

 

I'm pretty sure he means, "don't hit FB when there's a CC'd mob next to the one you're hitting", not "don't waste Force on a single target" (since, unlike Slow Time, Force Breach isn't "smart").

 

Agreed. I manage well enough. I just think had the changes gone differently I would have taking the accuracy debuff from FB/Discharge and gave it the ability to stack Protection up to 4 times. Granted it would make keeping Protection up near trivial but our heals would stay and our armor wouldn't necessarily need as big of a boost that we got if any at all. I mean some, I want to say Kitru but I could be wrong, did say that while discussing our spikiness - all we needed was some kind of 5% DR boost.

Edited February 16, 2014 by tXHereticXt

[slafko]

So I guess my questions are:

1. Is there an easier way to keep this ability up?

2. If not, with practice, does this become "second nature" or is at always a bit of a pain in the *** to properly maintain?

3. Are there other tools I'm not using such as buff bars or user interface options I'm not aware of?

 

1) Key binding. Set it up so it's easily used. My KW is bound as SHIFT+E with SHIFT mapped to a mouse button under my thumb.

2) It becomes second nature with practice and time played. Shadow tank is my main, and most played, character. I find myself clicking that SHIFT+E while running around on all other characters.

3) If you don't have programmable mouse buttons, you can set a skill bar on the right side of the screen and populate it with often used, easily clicked on, skills. I have one with Force Speed, stun, Stealth and stuff like that.

[slafko]

I meant that you don't want to reapply Force Breach's accuracy debuff more than once every 30 seconds. It does strictly less damage than Double Strike. Val is correct that you can substitute all Double Strikes with Breach and you'll do barely different DPS, but it's still suboptimal.

Not if you're tanking several mobs at once it's not. Which you will be doing for the most time in flashpoints and often in operations.

 

In situations (boss fights) where you're concentrating on a single target - Double Strike is the way to go.

[AAAAzrael]

I am currently working on getting rid of force breach from my rotation completely if there is someone else providing the debuff like guardian co-tank. There is no such thing as too much deeps

[Leafy_Bug]

I am currently working on getting rid of force breach from my rotation completely if there is someone else providing the debuff like guardian co-tank. There is no such thing as too much deeps

 

I will keep using breach and there is nothing you can do to stop me!

[jrwellworth]

I saw this post, and wanted to add something useful, but it seems my colleges have beat me to the punch, you really cant go wrong with anything intrepid said in his posts, as well as the others. I would also recommend reading anything by keyboardninja that has to do with shadow tanking (and everything else). I wish you well on your journey, as this is not the easiest class to learn, but an exceptionally fun class to play. The only thing i can add is don't forgo the set bonus in favor of straight 78's, since it seems you want to be an endgame PVE tank. Many shadows do this because they want that full 180 rated set, as if that is a huge accomplishment. I thought the same thing myself, truth be told, before i was set straight. I hope my small advice and the great advice of the other shadows in this thread helps.

[jrwellworth]

I saw this post, and wanted to add something useful, but it seems my colleges have beat me to the punch, you really cant go wrong with anything intrepid said in his posts, as well as the others. I would also recommend reading anything by keyboardninja that has to do with shadow tanking (and everything else). I wish you well on your journey, as this is not the easiest class to learn, but an exceptionally fun class to play. The only thing i can add is don't forgo the set bonus in favor of straight 78's, since it seems you want to be an endgame PVE tank. Many shadows do this because they want that full 180 rated set, as if that is a huge accomplishment. I thought the same thing myself, truth be told, before i was set straight. I hope my small advice and the great advice of the other shadows in this thread helps.

[DawnAskham]

Lot's of good information in here, and I'm sure some of it has helped the OP, however none of it changes the fact that SWTOR has one of the most abysmal backwards outdated UIs for those of us that have played other games at high levels through hard progression who already use advanced set up techniques including using key binds, programmable mice, and tweaked / customized UIs.

 

Simply put, the devs need to get off their butt and add some additional ways to filter, highlight and sort buffs / debuffs as well as add the ability to customize proc notifications or just go ahead and publish an API for the community to do so if they can't be arsed to make such improvements.

 

Otherwise 2004 called and wants its UI back. Obscurity through a frustratingly limited and clunky UI does not make a game more difficult or more challenging, just more frustratingly limited and clunky.

 

And to the OP, it does get easier with practice, but if you are used to being able to filter and highlight data that is of importance to you, just accept that you won't be able to do so with the SWTOR UI.

Edited March 23, 2014 by DawnAskham