now up

Hello everybody, I've been asked to respec for the guild so we can get this going so I've decided to try out Madness! I will update the OP with what I'm doing currently as well as bump when I'm streaming. Current Stream Hard Mode EV 8 man I'm on a pretty limited schedule so this post will be updated only when I'm streaming. I hope you enjoy! Website twitch.tv/fiercecypriot

Hello everybody, I've been asked to respec for the guild so we can get this going so I've decided to try out Madness! I will update the OP with what I'm doing currently as well as bump when I'm streaming. Current Stream Hard Mode EV 8 man I'm on a pretty limited schedule so this post will be updated only when I'm streaming. I hope you enjoy! Website twitch.tv/fiercecypriot

Based on his level of intellect I'm pretty sure I could beat him while keyboard turning and running a 0/0/0 spec...

Don't need to pay for an overexpensive mouse like that to perform well. There are cheaper alternatives.

I'm using a defense rating on use relic and a shield/absorb on use relic.

I guess the main difference between us is that I'm sitting here with the following stats (I'll bold the big differences): 21160 HP 6721 AC 42.36% DR 24.33% Defense 45.71% Shield 44.83% Absorb So my defense and shield are a bit less than you but my hp pool is larger and I have a higher base DR. With stats like what you have though I really think that's an issue with your party and not you. You might just want to check your cooldown usage and see what you can interrupt to avoid incoming damage.

Deception will have no reason to use lightning charge in the coming patches assuming these changes go through. If you want to use lightning charge then you'll have to stick with madness.

I'm going to assume these are proposed changes that just happen to be reflected in the trees. They changed a few things like induction no longer working unless you have surging charge up but it still works with any charge on. The changes just haven't gone through yet and I imagine they're doing some internal testing with it first then putting it on the ptr.

I don't really know what those numbers you have add up to but I'll give my input. I've tanked every flashpoint so far on hard mode and I've solo tanked Karagga's/EV 8 man normal and EV 16 man Hard so hopefully this will give you some insight of where I'm at. When I hit 50 I switched to a tank spec because we needed one that was online often enough to run our members through flashes. My hp was maybe 15k when I started and my tank stats weren't any better. We basically farmed HM Black Talon for gear at first and I ended up getting my gear from pvp for tanking. It was always hard to keep me up at first but once you actually get some gear your tanking will really take off. With high hp comes higher defensive stats too so right now I sit at close to 22k hp unbuffed with my stim on. I actually did all three of those raids last week for the first time ever. All the gear I had on was acquired through pvp or hard mode flashes. You don't have to have raid gear in order to go straight to hard mode and additionally, for 16 man EV, you're doing your group a favor for solo tanking it because that's another dps they can bring instead. Healers can always be a burden. I've had plenty of instances where the healer really just couldn't do it. When Kaon came out we went straight to hard mode for that and brought a nearly fresh 50 healer with us from our guild so he could get some gear. We tried the bonus boss multiple times and couldn't do it because our healer just couldn't control his heat. He couldn't dish out healing fast enough because of lack of gear. If you want to help your guildies out then run them through the stuff you know you can tank easily. We all started small somewhere and eventually you'll end up just carrying people through these flashes. I run some of these hard modes in 30 mins or less (false emp, ilum, BT). You say you're already geared to the teeth but you should check to make sure your friends are also geared enough to support you. Cooldown management is also crucial. I use dark ward every time I can on a boss fight unless I know there's a phase where they start bursting. I save deflection for times when a boss has an enrage (3rd boss of Karaggas). I save Force Shroud for special boss abilities (too many bosses to count how useful this is). Between relic usage and cooldown usage we're definitely competitive in the tank scene. Many will argue otherwise but I haven't noticed any downsides of using me as a tank over the powertech and juggernaut we have in our guild.

You forgot to mention how skill doesn't mean that you'll win. Class comp > skill in so many arena matches. Once you have the correct class comp then your skill level will kick in. All arenas do is show the horrible imbalances that exist in a game hence why balancing arenas was basically impossible without affecting every other aspect of the game. I don't mind arenas but let's make sure that the classes are on an even playing field first. Sorcerers and Sages are able to heal as fast as other healers without even being the proper spec for it while still being able to dish out more damage than 75% of the advanced classes.

That's 0/23/18 btw. Might want to rephrase the title if you can. I actually posted a legit 18/23 build in another thread. Looks interesting but you'll be missing a bit of burst that's provided from the remainder of the Deception tree. I've been a tank myself so I can't comment much. I usually just outlast or 1v1/1v2 people.

If you're interested in more of a hybrid build you could try this: 0/18/23 This still gives you come burst as well as some good dot damage from Crushing Darkness. When I used this build I had the 2pc set from the Force-Master's set so every time I'd get a proc from Raze I'd get healed between 5-6% hp from parasitism and the 2pc set. Additionally, your Mauls hit harder with this spec and your thrashes hit harder with this spec due to Unearthed Knowledge. There's a lot of ways you can go with Madness but I felt this one provided a lot of offense as well as some strong ranged abilities. This spec, with the awesome changes to Darkswell, provides 3 forms of added energy regen, one from Surging Charge, one from Dots, and one from Blackout. Additionally, the lower cooldown on Force Cloak and lower CD on Unbreakable Will allows for you to have your get out of jail free card and most important combat breaker up more often.

Live streaming nao!

Streaming the new Flashpoint on hard mode