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Any tips for a new Assassin tank?


JaysoTohl

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Having played a Commando Combat Medic up to level 42, I know that there are 2 types of Shadow/Assassin tanks: 1) the well-played tank Shadow/Assassin almost never needs healing and can pretty much take care of himself making my job really easy. 2) the poorly played Shadow/Assassin tank needs almost constant healing, dies several times despite your best efforts and generally causes the group a lot of frustration and inconvenience. Having just started an Assassin tank of my own, I definitely want to be type 1.

 

I really want any kind of tips/advice/suggestions/etc that you can offer. I've pretty much got my skill build worked out based on my research, but any help in that area is still much appreciated. Primarily I want to know what stats to gear for and what pieces in particular work best (PVP and PVE), what my rotation should be like, and I'd love any special tricks or tips anyone has to offer.

 

Note: I'm currently leveling a Shadow tank AS WELL AS an Assassin tank so any tips for either one are appreciated. I posted this thread in the Assassin forums because I'm focusing on that toon more than I am on my Shadow currently.

Edited by JaysoTohl
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If you want to be a #1, learn when to use your cooldowns, and use them often, theyre on short timers. A lot of bosses big special attacks can be resisted completely with a resilience, not sure of the assassin name for it, im a shadow. The other CD, deflection in my case, is good for giant pulls in flashpoints and trash in ops. you can go 15+ seconds without taking any damage against a boss with it up.
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also... The pull and knockback are great for positioning, i usually start a pull knocking back as many as i can where i want them, then ill step back a bit to pull the farthest guy out closer to the pack. and if you can get it right, all of the grp will get hit by your aoe threat abilities. shadows should rarely need to use taunt on their main focuses, i like to use mine as little as possible so i have them when i need them
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I would recommend as an assassin to use the combination of stealth and mind maze in order to stun one non-droid enemy for one minute. In harder fights in PvE environment that may mean the difference between life and death. Learning to use that effectively will give you a chance to stun the strongest opponent and when he is stunned, to finish off weaker ones.
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I would recommend as an assassin to use the combination of stealth and mind maze in order to stun one non-droid enemy for one minute. In harder fights in PvE environment that may mean the difference between life and death. Learning to use that effectively will give you a chance to stun the strongest opponent and when he is stunned, to finish off weaker ones.

 

This is very good advice. (I just recently came back, Finnish, do the changes they made awhile back to CC not being broken by AoE also apply to that ability? I would assume so, which makes it rather awesome if this is the case.)

 

Another thing to bear in mind is smart timing. If you see you're about to be heading into a big group and your Deflection is down or you're not wanting to use it for some reason, re-pop your Dark Ward and wait a few seconds before charging in, so that if your charges get used up a few seconds in you won't have to wait on the cooldown to finish in the meantime-- it already will have by then, making it safely re-applicable.

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Having played a Commando Combat Medic up to level 42, I know that there are 2 types of Shadow/Assassin tanks: 1) the well-played tank Shadow/Assassin almost never needs healing and can pretty much take care of himself making my job really easy. 2) the poorly played Shadow/Assassin tank needs almost constant healing, dies several times despite your best efforts and generally causes the group a lot of frustration and inconvenience. Having just started an Assassin tank of my own, I definitely want to be type 1.

 

I really want any kind of tips/advice/suggestions/etc that you can offer. I've pretty much got my skill build worked out based on my research, but any help in that area is still much appreciated. Primarily I want to know what stats to gear for and what pieces in particular work best (PVP and PVE), what my rotation should be like, and I'd love any special tricks or tips anyone has to offer.

 

Note: I'm currently leveling a Shadow tank AS WELL AS an Assassin tank so any tips for either one are appreciated. I posted this thread in the Assassin forums because I'm focusing on that toon more than I am on my Shadow currently.

 

 

Ok, before anything, you need to l know with dark charge nerf, assassin tanks are no longer viable imo unless geared like heck at lower levels. They have barely more armor than a dps in heavy armor, self-heals got cut in half, and until you get deflection you lack any defensive cooldowns.

 

Furthermore, Dark Ward only gets good once you get access to some absorb, thats 27 or so for enhencements.

 

They pick up quickly then tough. So at low level no matter your skill, you'll be the tank requiring constant healing, altough with good damage.

 

My suggestion as things are right now is deception till 30 and respec then.

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Shadows/assassins have always been under powered while leveling. The rebalancing in 1.3 had really no effect on that. The only important thing really is how classes are balanced at 50. Despite what most people claim, assassin tanks are just fine at 50. I think the OP put it best: there are only two types of assassin tanks, the amazing and the terrible.

 

The best advice I can give has already been given: learn to abuse your cool downs. This means learning fight mechanics and damage types intimately. During progression, I will often parse my logs mid-raid just to find attack types for particular abilities. Know swing timers, and be proactive about popping the appropriate cooldown (and only the appropriate cooldown) to handle burst moments (eg Toth's smash ability). Know when to use Dark Ward and when to leave it alone (similarly for Discharge). Use pull prolifically, and don't be afraid to creatively apply lesser skills like Whirlwind and Overload. (The best assassin tank I've ever seen uses Overload non-stop for mob repositioning)

 

On a more prosaic note, know your priority queue cold and execute it flawlessly. Your active self heal (Force Lightning) is a huge component of your mitigation. Maximize its value. Be careful with Force management and apply your buffs appropriately. Use and abuse taunts following high-threat abilities if you're tanking against rabid DPS and aren't confident in your ability to stay ahead of their threat.

 

Overall, I would say that the most important component of good assassin tanking is simply having a head on your shoulders. Take an active interest in improving. Study fights before/after raids to understand what damage you're dealing with and what sort of timing it has. Learn to judge your own performance in combat logs and always try to improve. Assassins have a very high skill ceiling, and you can almost always do better than you did last time.

 

Good luck!

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