Hi,

Does anybody know a good tank build with retractable blade?

Thanks

Good tank and retractable blade has a truth value of false due to retractable blade

Thanks

Are you saying Retractable blade is no good for a tank?

Yes. It comes at the cost of Energy Blast which is a loss of both damage *and* ammo, not to mention the fact that it does nothing to generate Power Screen stacks. Energy Blast deals just as much damage as Gut (Retractable Blade is for PTs, not VGs) but does it immediately rather than over 15 seconds while regenerating 1 point of ammo rather than costing 2. As such, if you're taking Gut, you're purposefully gimping yourself in doing so (not to mention that, in taking it, you have to take Frontline Offense rather than Heavy Stock which is another drop in DPS since Ion Pulse is a *way* smaller portion of your total DPS than Stockstrike is).

If I go tank & Armstech am I able to take a spec ops vibroknife or is that a bad idea?

Thanks:sy_havoc:

If I go tank & Armstech am I able to take a spec ops vibroknife or is that a bad idea?

You can't equip vibroknives at all as a VG so it's not even possible. Even if it were, it would be a terrible idea because that Vibroknife would take the place of the Shield Generator you need to have as a tank (without it, you increase your incoming damage by 50-75% in the endgame).

Yes. It comes at the cost of Energy Blast which is a loss of both damage *and* ammo, not to mention the fact that it does nothing to generate Power Screen stacks. Energy Blast deals just as much damage as Gut (Retractable Blade is for PTs, not VGs) but does it immediately rather than over 15 seconds while regenerating 1 point of ammo rather than costing 2. As such, if you're taking Gut, you're purposefully gimping yourself in doing so (not to mention that, in taking it, you have to take Frontline Offense rather than Heavy Stock which is another drop in DPS since Ion Pulse is a *way* smaller portion of your total DPS than Stockstrike is).

Thanks

Noxxic recommends this is Noxxic wrong?

Thanks

I'm not sure what they're suggesting with that build. If you are tanking you need to go all the way up the tanking tree, as the last few talents are the best there. It seems like what they've put together is a hybrid utility kind of tank for pvp, but it still looks quite weird and you would get more utility out of going higher in the AP tree.

Energy Blast deals just as much damage as Gut

This simply just isn't true. Not only does Gut do far more overall total damage by the end of its dot but also does not have that animation delay.

Energy Blast allows you to get an extra move in once every 30 secs but you lose the ability to keep multiple strong dots on enemies if you have to switch. Gut creates sort of an "aggro maintenance" on mobs you have to switch off of. The downside of Gut is that you 1. lose the ability to give your Stockstrike a damage buff from talents and 2. after using Gut for a while I found that there's usually other things off CD to be used that help your overall tanking in its place. Its about the equivalent of "when I get a free minute while I'm cleaning the house I'll read a book". You never get to the book because you always find other things you still have to do around the house. EB is off the global CD so to its credit, you can use it in that split second and provide yourself with some ammo utility you wouldn't have otherwise.

Just a note: If you're one of those people that likes to use 1 spec for both PVE and PVP you hands down want to use the Gut tanking spec.

Noxxic recommends this is Noxxic wrong?

Thanks

That build is indeed wrong in several ways. It's just pretty generally bad. I guess it's going for pvp utility? I dunno?

Don't use noxxic. It's pretty wrong in most cases.

That build is indeed wrong in several ways. It's just pretty generally bad. I guess it's going for pvp utility? I dunno?

 

Don't use noxxic. It's pretty wrong in most cases.

It's a pvp build is what it is. It's not necessarily wrong.

This simply just isn't true.

For pure damage, I compare the nominal worst case: Energy Blast + Hammer Shot (the lowest damage GCD you should be using) to Gut used on a full cycle. Energy Blast + Hammer Shot actually deals in something like 20% more total damage than Gut will on a single target. If you're talking about target cycling (the Gut DoT isn't actually all that strong unless you go deep Tactics and are running in the proper Cell), you're screwing yourself over by draining your Ammo way faster than you should be. 1 target alone puts you pretty heavily in the red for Ammo maintenance, especially when you consider the required costs associated with Stockstrike and HiB on CD. While you might be able to do more damage with Gut in a *vacuum*, the practical limitations of VG tanking and the need to conserve ammo mean that you'll actually do substantially *more* damage with Energy Blast, even in AoE or multi-target situations where you could conceivably roll Gut on multiple targets.

For pure damage, I compare the nominal worst case: Energy Blast + Hammer Shot (the lowest damage GCD you should be using) to Gut used on a full cycle. Energy Blast + Hammer Shot actually deals in something like 20% more total damage than Gut will on a single target. If you're talking about target cycling (the Gut DoT isn't actually all that strong unless you go deep Tactics and are running in the proper Cell), you're screwing yourself over by draining your Ammo way faster than you should be. 1 target alone puts you pretty heavily in the red for Ammo maintenance, especially when you consider the required costs associated with Stockstrike and HiB on CD. While you might be able to do more damage with Gut in a *vacuum*, the practical limitations of VG tanking and the need to conserve ammo mean that you'll actually do substantially *more* damage with Energy Blast, even in AoE or multi-target situations where you could conceivably roll Gut on multiple targets.

Does Energy Blast trigger HiB?

Thanks

Does Energy Blast trigger HiB?

No, but it doesn't need to since Stockstrike, which is your biggest hitter, highest priority attack, and on a wonderfully short ~4.5 sec CD as a tank, has a 100% chance to apply it.