Yeah, I went defense with a touch of dps talents thrown in... and made sure I have tank gear on. Works very well.

 

For me, using a dps partner that can kill things while I stay alive is working perfect, but you could really use any companion and do the job fine, with maybe the only thing changing is the time needed to kill the mobs.

 

I have seen tanks in game that complain about their leveling and their performance, only to inspect them and see that they are not geared to tank whatsoever, and I have to laugh at some folks that don't even run a shield in their off-hand. But that is another story.

 

Gear right, talent right, and you are golden.

 

I am liking the tone of this thread and I going to re-spec my guardian the same to feel it out for a while. I have a pure vig. spec right now but I find w/ elites I have to frequently switch to the defense stance to have a chance.

 

You spoke about gearing right so I'm wondering what you think about my gear: I'm running w/ mostly endurance favored mods and a shield in the off hand. The exception is that I mix in roughly 25% strength/DPS customized gear. I'm wondering if the little bit of offense I am gaining is causing me to miss out an a disproportionately greater amount of defense.

I leveled as a Tank with Kira. I only needed my friend to help me on 2 occassions. End of Chapter 1. And the end of the Final Chapter (probably not as hard now since the needed nerf to it)

Is there a nice build with Guardian Slash in it?

 

I got one that works great for me. I don't remember all the points in the defense tree, but, you have 5 points in vigilance for Force Sweep damage and extra Sundering Strike sunder armor. In the defense tree, I remember not having Solidified Force and something else like on the second tier. I'd have to check. And only 2 points in the thing that increases Hilt Strike's, Force Sweep's, and Cyclone Slashes damage increase

 

Here's the exact setup

 

Defense (Top to Bottom)

 

_|_|1|_

_|3|2|_

2|1|1|1

2|2|_|2

2|0|1|3

_|0|2|3

_|2|3|1

 

Vigilance (Bottom to Top)

 

_|0|3|2

 

Focus (Bottom to Top)

 

2|0|0|_

Edited January 26, 2012 by FalcoLombardi

Here's my take. Got a 41 Guardian and I played as a straight Defense spec up until level 40. I switched to a full Vigilance spec and here is my synopsis.

 

Defense Spec Pros

More defensive abilites

Higher defence chance

Excellant long-fight survivability

Can take down champ mobs with Doc and using all defense abilities

Blade storm creates a damage shield

Riposte raises total defense by 6% for a few seconds

 

Defense Spec Cons

Low burst damage

Less damage reduction

 

 

Vigilance Pros

Higher total Endurance (More HP)

Higher total strength (More DPS/Accuracy)

Higher Damage Reduction than Defense spec (Not sure how that makes sense. But I had about 5% more in this spec while in Soresu form)

 

Vigilance Cons

Less defense chance than Defense spec by about 6%

 

 

My opinion is this. If you want to be able to solo quests at your level, even champion mobs, be a defense spec. It gives you a better long term survivability rating but makes the fights last longer do to the lessened DPS. You'll do better vs multiple enemies since your defense chance and defense abilities are more often. Less medpacks.

 

Vigilance spec is only marginally worse when in Soresu form and you do quite a bit more DPS due to Plasma Brand and Overhead Strike (and their accompanying DoT's)

 

I've found that it's easier for me to keep aggro on multiple mobs by being in the vigilance spec due to having abilities that do more damage on quick cooldowns, not to mention I killed faster. Defense spec was nice for those long haul battles when healing is scarce...but if you have a healer or Doc....my opinion? Go Vigilance. Yea, I have to sit there and channel force stasis for 3 seconds as opposed to hitting it and continuing my rotation, but that's just an annoyance. I'm having fun with my Vigilance spec....but try them both, see what you prefer and go from there.

 

 

As to the stats on the guys build that he posted....Damage reduction looks good. Endurance could be higher. And you definiately need to raise your shield chance and shield absorb rate. In Soresu form my shield chance is 32% and my absorb rate is 33%. Damage reduction when in soresu form is 48.xx%. When I have a healer, I'm unstoppable. I was in a group the other day where the pull went bad and I was still able to stay alive vs 4 elite mobs, with 1 CC'd for a total of 5 mobs in the group. I had to keep bouncing between them to hold aggro and use my defense abilities, but we managed.

 

Learn the class. Learn how to play it and pay attention to your surroundings and what the mobs are doing. Use your interupts appropriately. Force Kick is your friend, as it Force Stasis and Force Push...they all interupt. On Strong or weaker mobs, Force leap can stun (in Defense spec), and Bladestorm also stuns. As does Force Sweep. Use that ability that slows their movement speed by 50%, followed by our backhand ability. Hilt Strike followed by Pommel Strike is also a good combination. Take advantage of every ability you have...except cyclone kick. I never use that....like..ever.

I'm L29 and this is what I do:

 

On gold elites, I send in Kira and taunt off her when she gets to below 50% health.

 

I dual silver elites, I send Kira to one and I take the other. She can usually kill hers without dying and helps me finish off mine. (it's sad when your companion has the better dps)

 

I have to heal up after every encounter but the pace and speed is exciting and keeps me on my toes.

I'm L29 and this is what I do:

 

On gold elites, I send in Kira and taunt off her when she gets to below 50% health.

 

I dual silver elites, I send Kira to one and I take the other. She can usually kill hers without dying and helps me finish off mine. (it's sad when your companion has the better dps)

 

I have to heal up after every encounter but the pace and speed is exciting and keeps me on my toes.

 

That's pretty much exactly my experience with L10-33 in the Focus tree, too. Am about to play with Vigilance for a bit until I get doc and then play with Defense while I have Doc.

 

The only thing I can't solo (+ Companion) in Focus spec is Gold+Silver Champs.

I got to lvl 37 just in the tanking tree around the planet where the Zerg are attacking and you get doc...Balmoraa? It got so boring, nothing like leveling a tank in that OTHER mmo..don't understand why the DPS AC gets a "ret aura/holy shield" and not the tank..but anyway..

 

I specced Vig last night and love it. Def needs to be buffed AND stream lined, I didn't find myself too squishy as Vig but it depended on the the mobs I fought but I rarely was overwhelmed. I'll trade durability for faster killing seeing how dense and tightly packed some of the areas are with mobs.

 

As tanking spec it felt like chore just to go from point a to point b, now i can kill groups at a decent pace where I don't start to fall asleep at the keyboard.

 

Another thing...on my server, not only does it suck being Repub and there being 14 people on hoth but of those people most of them are guardians and most of the guardians are tanks. It feels like in TOR leg as a tank is like leg as a hunter in WoW

Edited February 1, 2012 by Sabii

I currently have a level 40 Guardian. I tried leveling as a Vigilance Spec then changed to almost full Defense tree with 5 points on Vigilance (http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#500GzRrdbMRMzZcM.3). I'm also am now using Doc more than Kira - haven't died yet and basically just trying to get all the mobs in one place and do spam aoe damage. Having fun so far using Defense tree.

Some interesting experiences and builds on here. Presently I'm level 21 and going straight up the defense tree, this isn't my first character - so a few things I've learned that might help the leveling experience of others.

 

1.) Professions make a huge difference during the leveling experience, whether you're DPS, Healer or Tank. My first character was a Shadow (DPS) and I did synthweaving. I found myself in the same boat as a many people - broke and struggling to keep up with mobs of equal level. In my experience, the most beneficial professions while leveling is cybertech, biochem, or artifice. More on this with #2.

 

2.) Take advantage of adaptive armor. Who cares what you look like, get on the GTN and pick up adaptive/moddable armor pieces for all of your slots. Most of the adaptive gear on the GTN is relatively low cost (it is on Jedi Sentinel). Unless you're crafting and upgrading with purple gear, you can generally get better stats if you use your planetary commendations to buy enhancements, mods and armoring. I'm leveling cybertech on my Guardian and am usually able to stay ahead of the curve with my gathering professions so that by the time I level, I have a full set of prototype armor and mods waiting for me. As a bonus, If you're cybertech you only need to worry about using to buy enhancements and/or hilts with your planetary commendations.

 

3.) Gear your companion. I can't say this enough, gear your companion just as you would gear yourself. If you have Kira or Doc, again, take advantage of cheap adaptive armor form the GTN. If you have T7 (my preference), Coruscant Commendations and Specialty Goods vendor has moddable Core's and Sensor units that you can use, Nar Shaddaa has moddable shield generators, Tattoine has the moddable motor. It's a while to wait to gear your companion; however, I can't stand Kira and would much rather listen to the occasional beep than constantly listening to.. "I'm about to beat your record boss".

 

Anyways, just my $.02 on this conversation.

 

Cheers!

FYI to all readers,

 

This thread was a year ago. prior to 2.0, immortal tree was probably one of the worst built trees in the game. 2.0 is much better, and a night and day difference, so you need to take everything here with a grain of salt. most of these posts were even before 1.2 (the big post-release patch).

 

Immortal is a very smooth spec right now. Leveling a new guard as immortal with HK as my comp, and doing quite well.

 

Vigilance/Vengeance is also very good. It was good even prior to 2.0...my first Juggernaut was Vengeance, and I soloed more then a few champion mobs on my way to 50 in full Vengeance with quinn. Both quite viable leveling specs.

 

aaaaannnnnd....Necro alert! It was a nice discussion though.

Guardian and Vanguards (Tank specced) are the easiest class to level with . I used Kira from the start , her DPS is amazing and I can take down Elite's in a few seconds , even w.o using any Cooldown's . I don't have any 'down-time' nor do I/You have to keep recovering after every Fight . Keep fighting , when your HP is bellow 50-60% throw a Enure and you're fine for the next 5-10 minutes , easy . Doc might be 'safer' to level up with , but you'll waste a LOT of Boost's and Time .

 

Tank + Healer ; is always the 'safer' choice , but it's 'boring' (at least for me ) .

 

Tank + DPS ; I prefer having that extra DPS and wipe T-moobs/Elites in no time, rather than waste 5-10 minutes with a Healing comp .

 

 

P.S Post might be 'late' (Gosh , we're in 2014 , WAKE UP MEN!) but I seen a lot of Ppl 'discouraging' new Player's to play the 'Tank + DPS' combination .

Edited May 27, 2014 by ahzecklawd