Can the taunt cooldown reduction from the 4 piece not be rocket punch? Rocket punch has a 7.5 second cooldown which procs their set bonus 2x faster than the jugg set bonus and 25% faster than the sin set bonus. Not to mention that they're already the best tanks in pvp by a huge margin (and also pve for a lot of the boss fights) they also can taunt much much faster than either of the other tanks. You could put it on rail shot.

Love them so far, but maybe add something to reduce Oil Slick or Carbonize cooldowns?

Using ion pulse generates a debuff on the target right now.

 

Let's have 2pc - adds 3 seconds to the duration of ion pulse's periodic (damage reduction debuff) every time stockstrike is used.

 

4pc - fine as it is

 

6pc - increases the overall damage absorbed by your shield by 5% for its duration instead of its 3 extra seconds

Edited July 15, 2015 by royhenderson

The vanguard has always lacked extra cooldowns compared to the other tank classes, and I am ok with that because they are so good at mitigating dmg. With that said, I would like set bonus that lowers the cool down times on Reactive Shield and Battle Focus (Since the 3.0, I've used it more as a Defensive CD since the 40% def chance).

 

So maybe find a way to take 30 secs off timer for each in tank spec bringing both from 2mins down to 90 secs each. Just a thought.

Edited July 14, 2015 by JowyBlight

2-Piece: Heat Blast or Energy Blast refreshes the cd on Firestorm perhaps?

4-Piece: While Ion Gas Cylinder or Ion Cell is active, Rocket Punch or Stockstrike reduce the cooldowns of Neural Dart and Sonic Missile or Neural Jolt and Sonic Round by 2 seconds.

This good.

6-Piece: Increases the duration of Oil Slick or Riot Gas by 3 seconds and the duration of Energy Shield or Reactive Shield by 4 seconds.

This is good.

Can the taunt cooldown reduction from the 4 piece not be rocket punch? Rocket punch has a 7.5 second cooldown which procs their set bonus 2x faster than the jugg set bonus and 25% faster than the sin set bonus. Not to mention that they're already the best tanks in pvp by a huge margin (and also pve for a lot of the boss fights) they also can taunt much much faster than either of the other tanks. You could put it on rail shot.

 

No. VG/PT Sonic Rebounder adds survivability for the whole raid / team. Hence, this change will influence not only the toon, but a whole raid group.

This MAY be good for PvP, but will gimp the VG/PT tank in PvE, where they are already lagging behind the other tank classes in survivability while being min/max 198 geared.

 

Mind also the relative lack of the PT/VG comparing to (especially) Jugg/Guardian and Sin/Shadow concerning defensive cooldowns, I think it is just that this class has slightly more taunt possiblities then the other two.

 

The fact that the VG/PT "are the best for most fights in PvE" is just because of their higher base mitigation, and that is only because they lack the def CD the other classes have.

 

That being said, I am still kinda missing the extra 2% Def for all kinds of damage we had pre-3.0. That may replace the actual 4-set bonus, add the 6 set bonus, and get the following :

 

- 2 set : stays as it is.

- 4 Set : Gives 2% to Def for all types of incoming damage and the use of Rocket Punch / Stockstrike reduces the cooldown on Sonic Round and Sonic Missile by 1.5 sec (down from 2, no more reduction on Neural Jolt / Neural Dart).

- 6 set : Stays as it is

Edited July 14, 2015 by ron_harmeling

2-Piece: Heat Blast or Energy Blast refreshes the cd on Firestorm perhaps?

 

But we are the tanks and not dps. Don't you like our current 2 piece set bonus?

I've always thought that Set Bonuses should be additional customization, and that we should be able to "mix-and-match" the pieces for each to give our characters a unique feel.

 

For example, maybe for Shieldtech, there would be three set bonuses:

Bastion(Reactive Defense-based):

2-piece: being critically damaged reduces CD of Energy Shield by 1.5 seconds. Internal CD of 3 seconds

4-piece: Using Heat Blast with three stacks of Heat Screen gives an absorption shield equal to 5% of your health

6-piece: Kolto Override no longer needs to be activated(It always activates after you go below 35%) but retains its CD

 

Pragmatist(Based off giving utilities):

2-piece: gives the "Reactive Armor" utility

4-piece: gives the "Accelerated Reel" utility

6-piece: gives the "Automated Suit" Utility

 

Traditionalist(A more traditional set bonus)

2-Piece: Heat Blast or Energy Blast increases damage reduction by 2% for 5 seconds.

4-Piece: While Ion Gas Cylinder or Ion Cell is active, Rocket Punch or Stockstrike reduce the cooldowns of Neural Dart and Sonic Missile or Neural Jolt and Sonic Round by 2 seconds.

6-Piece: Increases the duration of Oil Slick or Riot Gas by 3 seconds and the duration of Energy Shield or Reactive Shield by 4 seconds.

 

For Advanced Prototype, you might have:

 

Pragmatist(Based off giving utilities):

2-piece: Gives the "Pneumatic Boots" utility

4-piece: Gives the "Torque Boosters" utility

6-piece: Gives the "Overdrive" utility

 

Striker(Critical damage-based):

2-piece: Increases Shoulder Cannon critical damage by 3%

4-piece: Reduces Heat cost of Energy Burst by 5. Critical hits cost no Heat.

6-piece: Rocket Punch critical generate an Energy Lode. Increases maximum capacity of Energy Lodes by 1.

 

Destroyer(Standard Damage-based)

2-piece: Increases energy damage dealt by 2%

4-piece: Magnetic Blast has a chance to reduce an enemy's defense by 5%. Stacks up to 2 times.

6-piece: Retractable Blade's Bleeding does 2% more damage.

 

There would also be:

Fixer(Reactive heal-based), Physician(Critical heal-based), and Stalwart(Active Defense-based) bonuses. The item would have these as a prefix(i.E. Pragmatic Revanite Field Tech's leggings).

 

There would also be exclusive PvP and PvE set bonuses that would drop from that Operation(Or, in the case of PvP, purchasable from a vendor in a random lockbox with the set bonus on it). These are not different for or class, but differ in Discipline(And are adaptive, and have "Main Stat" instead of Aim/Strength/Cunning/Willpower and would be Adaptive). For example:

 

Black Bisector(Terror From Beyond):

2-piece: (Damage Disciplines)Deal bonus damage to Elite and above enemies in Terror From Beyond (Tank Disciplines)Increase threat generate against enemies in Terror from Beyond by 10% (Heal Disciplines) Increase Resource Regeneration while in Terror From Beyond by 10%

4-piece: Increases Movement Speed in the Operator-IX boss fight by 10%

6-piece: (Damage Disciplines)Increases damage to Grasping Tentacles and Hypergate Irregularities by 10% (Tank Disciplines): Decreases Taunt Cooldowns while inside the Hypergate by 20% (Heal Disciplines): Decreases resource cost of Healing Abilities while in the Hypergate by 25%

The 2-piece Set Bonus is the same for all Op Set gear, but changes where it applies(For example, the Feareater set- from the Dread Fortress Op- only applies to Dread Fortress, while the Dreadkiller set- from the Dread Palace Op- will only apply to Dread Palace). The 4-piece and 6-piece Set Bonuses are there to assist with mechanics from the Operation it comes from(This system was inspired by Destiny's Raid Gear, which I thought was cool).

 

Pitfighter(Huttball):

2-piece: Gives a small shield while carrying the Huttball

4-piece: Decreases damage dealt by flame traps by 60%

6-piece: Increases damage dealt to the Ball carrier by 5%.

 

-Duran'del

I'm quite happy with the powertech tank set bonus. We can proc the 2piece and 4piece, which are both quite nice, more often than the other tanks. And the 6piece adds some more time to our defensives, which is always good.

2: Shield X%

4: Absorb X%

6: Defense X%

As of right now I think we are all nit picking an already functional set bonus system. It's all about how you play the class anyway. Throw all the defensives you want at a class and it doesn't mean squat unless your tank is competent. I've been playing this game since beta and everytime the devs start screwing with things it's all because a bunch of PVP'ers are ************. Then the devs conform the classes to fit what they want. Take Jugg tanks for example. Completely ruined for so many reasons I can't even begin to list. Worst tank in the game. Always has been. And the devs do nothing about it except keep ruining it. Don't do that to Powertech/Vangard PLEASE!!!!! The idea someone had above about finally sepparating pvp set bonus from pve is briliant and should have been done years ago. SWTOR is basically two separate games, PVE and PVP. You devs have always catered to the pvp crowd and it is time you stopped. You have already dumbed down this game enough (skill trees anyone? hybrid builds?). Leave well enough alone. Separate pvp from pve completely!!!

I've always been a fan of choosing your own set bonus. In the pre-3.0 era I would run Combat Medic and/or Combat Tech bonuses when tanking, though it would usually be one or the other in combination with the Supercommando two-piece. Removing the 4-piece bonus from tanks that increased damage while someone was guarded was a good call because nobody who saw the other options used the tank 4-piece. It wasn't bad, but each tank had a better option from dps gear [intercede heals for another exampe].

 

I still use my Combat Tech set bonus in my main tanking setup because the cooldown on Determination/Tenacity and is so valuable as a tank and synergizes well with Iron Will. The extra half a second on Carbonize is also pretty nice. If I wasn't a fool who deleted the armoring I would probably run a hydraulic-centered build with the old Combat Medic 2-piece making HO only have 10s of downtime between activations. I leveled from 55-60 with that setup and don't know why I abandoned its possibility.

 

The current set bonuses aren't bad. The 4-piece is wonderful for tanks across the board and the 2-piece / 6-piece for Shieldtech are both great bonuses. I just wish for the ability to chose different set bonuses for different teams I'm facing. Extra time on my shield isn't useful when I'm not taking damage and the extra time on Oil Slick is laughable versus ranged-heavy teams who can easily kite out of it. Our 2-piece is invaluable; while I miss the cooldown reduction on Jet Charge and Heat Blast I can live with more mitigation to make up for it. That bonus was more useful in 8v8 games anyway and the prime focus is a 4v4 scenerio so more mitigation is more useful.

 

I'm pretty sure you won't be bringing back the Combat Tech bonus on newer gear since Iron Will exists as a utility and 1m 15s on a cc break combined with Kolto break is a little ridiculous, but more control-countering set bonuses would help tanks settle more into their role of being a constant annoyance in the enemy team's sides. If a tank is comfortable sacrificing mitigation for more control-oriented gear than I think he or she should be able to. That being said, keeping the mitigation-centered bonuses is a great thing for those who wish to focus more on survivability. While eliminating cross-set-bonus use between dps/tank/healer roles makes for easier balance, it eliminates the factor of choice, which is what an MMORPG is all about.