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New tanks please read before posting


Grumpftard

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OK. So I'm sitting here at work, doing my lunchtime stroll thru the forums. I play a Sin tank....have since launch. So I'm always scanning for little nuggets of info I can use to up my game. Almost every day or so, a new thread pops up of "new tank need help can't hold aggro why am I so squishy etc." The thread is then filled with a wide variety of comments. Some replies are laughable, but most of them contain good info and advice. But then, here is where it starts to poke at me and make me want to write a long drawn out post that most people aren't going to read and those that do will probably just flame.

 

There are a lot of good threads that knowledgeable people have posted, with good information and the math to back it up. Most "help me" thread posters (for whatever reason, ie: don't know where to look, to lazy to look, don't know what to look for, or whatever the case may be) have not read through the information that is out there. But depending on who happens to be reading your "help me" thread that day is going to determine what kind of advice you get. It could be that guy that swears by having 31k health, or the guy with 24k health that has gone above and beyond to squeeze every last mitigation point he can into his gear. A lot of people will give you stat percentages and be ready to flog the first person to suggest that they might possibly be half a percent point off. And really....to an extent... they are all right.... and all wrong. That's what makes it interesting.

 

Now, I am a believer in math and theory-crafting. In the tanking threads you will find formulae for everything from determining squish to proc relic up-time, what-have-you. This is where you will find your 90% solution. But here is where I start to have an issue with theory-crafting. It's theoretical! There are some things that can not be figured in mathematically.

 

Example: At my apartment, I have a higher end computer with a middle rate IP. At home, it's my wife's middle rate comp with fast internet. By the time we kill the first boss in EC NiM my healers will start grumbling in ventrilo. "You're at home this weekend, aren't you? I hate you!" It factors into it. Things like individual reaction times, your decision making process (should I force lightning now, or wait a couple seconds to time it with damage), choosing just the right time to pop a CD, how well you know the fights... Your individual play style factors in. The more aggressive I tank, the easier I am to heal (so sayeth my healers.)

 

Another thing to consider is that relationship with your healers. A lot of the threads are full of arguments about the value of Endurance vs. Mitigation. Not gonna debate that here. I personally use the lettered "B" mods, and have all 48/60/24 enhancements. I have 28k health. Some people will say "That's just wrong!" or "But the math says this other way is optimal!" But guess what... My HEALERS say this is the best for them. My Ops group has spent many a night in EC and TfB.... "OK... Wipe it and tanks switch your gear!" I have geared on both ends of the spectrum and several variations in between. We have spent the time and effort (and a **** ton of credits) to find what works for us.

 

Bottom line (and I will get off my soap box): Before posting another "Help me" thread, go to the tanking forum and read. Read a lot. There are some sharp folks posting. The abundance of info there has been refined and will get you to that 90% solution. But don't forget, it's not gospel. YOU and the human factor still account for that last 10%.

Edited by Grumpftard
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I agree with everything you have written, I am also a reader/researcher when I play a new game. I devour everything I can on the class/mechanics constantly trying to pick up new things. It's why I decided to write a guide for Assassin levelling because there just wasn't enough solid information around. On the way to 50 I have read and re-read the tanking forum over and over to see what I need to be aiming for at 50.

 

That said, I think what it stems down to is that there are plenty of posts that give you the stat numbers to aim at but the ones telling you how to get there are few and far between. I definitely have seen some saying to use "this type" or "that type" of mod etc but in a largely customisable gear setting it's easy for the new tank to get lost, especially if he doesnt read as much as others. It's not necessarily that they are too lazy to read, it's that they may just not comprehend HOW to achieve what they have read.

 

In Rift, they had a stat called "Toughness" which once you hit a certain cap you became uncrittable in hard modes. The goal for a tank obviously was to hit this cap above all others, and then focus on the rest of his stats. With that in mind there was a fantastic gear progression guide written that basically went along the lines of "do this particular quest at level 47, take this particular reward and bank it. Then do this other quest at level 49, take that reward and bank it. At 50 buy these pieces of crafted gear and you have the required toughness. Then do this and this hardmode for these pieces to replace them" etc etc. It was an easy reference for new tanks to be able to gun straight for the correct gear to get them started and the customisation came later.

 

I realise that may not be completely applicable in SWTOR because there isn't one particular stat that must be met, and the gear is all customisable. I also understand that you get a free set of gear at level 50. What I don't know is whether that gear is enough to tank hard modes or not, or how to customise that to achieve it's best potential. I think a basic "tank gear for new assassins" guide would be a fantastic addition. It can cover which parts to use from the starter pve gear, which parts to use from the pvp gear, which items to buy from dailies and what items to buy to get the correct mods/enhancements from.

 

TLDR; A post/guide saying "when you hit 50 and get your free gear, wear this, this and that from this set, this and this from that set, do your dailies x amount of times and buy this and this from the daily vendors and you will be geared enough to do these HM's would be nice.

Edited by Darkscis
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I have posted up a tank guide here recently. I had planned on going into detail on the 3 different ways you can gear right now. 1 is full endurance(for 16 mans), 1 is a middle ground, and 1 is full mitigation/damage output. But, I just haven't had the time to explain the benefits and draw backs of each yet as I've been busy.

 

And yes, individual player skill cannot be accounted for in math, but how the class SHOULD be played by a skilled individual who doesn't have a reaction time slower than a second can be accounted for.

Edited by ckoneful
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I agree with everything you have written, I am also a reader/researcher when I play a new game. I devour everything I can on the class/mechanics constantly trying to pick up new things. It's why I decided to write a guide for Assassin levelling because there just wasn't enough solid information around. On the way to 50 I have read and re-read the tanking forum over and over to see what I need to be aiming for at 50.

 

That said, I think what it stems down to is that there are plenty of posts that give you the stat numbers to aim at but the ones telling you how to get there are few and far between. I definitely have seen some saying to use "this type" or "that type" of mod etc but in a largely customisable gear setting it's easy for the new tank to get lost, especially if he doesnt read as much as others. It's not necessarily that they are too lazy to read, it's that they may just not comprehend HOW to achieve what they have read.

 

In Rift, they had a stat called "Toughness" which once you hit a certain cap you became uncrittable in hard modes. The goal for a tank obviously was to hit this cap above all others, and then focus on the rest of his stats. With that in mind there was a fantastic gear progression guide written that basically went along the lines of "do this particular quest at level 47, take this particular reward and bank it. Then do this other quest at level 49, take that reward and bank it. At 50 buy these pieces of crafted gear and you have the required toughness. Then do this and this hardmode for these pieces to replace them" etc etc. It was an easy reference for new tanks to be able to gun straight for the correct gear to get them started and the customisation came later.

 

I realise that may not be completely applicable in SWTOR because there isn't one particular stat that must be met, and the gear is all customisable. I also understand that you get a free set of gear at level 50. What I don't know is whether that gear is enough to tank hard modes or not, or how to customise that to achieve it's best potential. I think a basic "tank gear for new assassins" guide would be a fantastic addition. It can cover which parts to use from the starter pve gear, which parts to use from the pvp gear, which items to buy from dailies and what items to buy to get the correct mods/enhancements from.

 

TLDR; A post/guide saying "when you hit 50 and get your free gear, wear this, this and that from this set, this and this from that set, do your dailies x amount of times and buy this and this from the daily vendors and you will be geared enough to do these HM's would be nice.

 

More importantly than that though, and it is missing from nearly all of the guides I've read so far, is the "why". Rally I feel it is less important to tell someone how to achieve something than it is to tell them why they want to do [fill in the blank here]. I say that because often times there is more than one way to get to a goal and often times there is a better way to get to the goal, but that almost always requires knowing the goal and the why you want to get to that goal.

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