Note: I forgot the numbers and source, but I remember someone worked or the 4 piece set bonus for jugs as being one of the best in game, will try to dig it up later or do independent math. I wouldn't touch the tech tank bonus.

It is really really good. The vanguard/powetech 4 piece is quite significant as well, but not in the same league.

Take a look at the values in the OP again Kitru, the tech tanks have an unusually high optimal shield, an average absorb, and a very low defense value as their sweet spots.

The most you would need to do, assuming you're not using the passive stat relics, is 4-5 (full 27 unlettered mods, full Bastion/Bulwark enhancements, and high mitigation ear and implants provides you with 600 Shield exactly, with a stat budget of 1648 without using passive relics). I've also got a bit of a problem with using those exact numbers because their interplay with the various relics and debuffs: the presence of the acc debuffs, especially the 20% from Smoke Grenade, is gonna do some wonky things to those numbers when factored in (especially when factored in when weighed based on uptime rather than averaged for effect). It's one of the reasons why, even though I know about these calcs and think they're a respectable guideline, I don't follow them explicitly (my Shadow optimal loadout is 532/600/516 rather than the 500/525/600 that I "should" be aiming for).

Note: I forgot the numbers and source, but I remember someone worked or the 4 piece set bonus for jugs as being one of the best in game, will try to dig it up later or do independent math. I wouldn't touch the tech tank bonus.

The reason why it's so awesome is the same reason why self healing is so awesome for Shadows: it's post mitigation flat damage reduction. Post mitigation incoming damage is low enough thanks to high tank mitigation that the comparatively minute increases to abs/sec equate to truly impressive decreases to required healing, especially for the hybrid spec which gets 25% more out of it.

I do find it amusing that the 4 pc set bonuses for VGs and Shadows are designed to offset the weakest point of mitigation (Defense for VGs; DR for Shadows) whereas Guardians just get an outright improvement to an already potent mitigation mechanism.

I've got a Guardian tank, but my Shadow is my main so I don't focus as heavily on gearing her perfectly as I do my main. As such, I do actually try to follow the general gist of the optimal weights, mainly because it's true that defense is substantially useful to a Guardian than Shield/Abs.

 

 

 

When calculating spikiness, you first have to look at each of the comparative chances of mitigation: with 29/50/50, you've got a 29% chance of taking no damage, a 35.5% chance of taking half damage, and a 35.5% chance of taking full damage; with 30/45/45, you've got a 33% chance of taking no damage, 30.15% chance of taking half damage, and a 36.85% chance of taking full damage. Since your DR should be completely static (same talents and same armor rating), the only difference in spikiness arrives from the difference in those percentages (Shadows have higher spikiness than either of the other tanks specifically because they have *way* lower DR). You're only 1.35% more likely to take an unmitigated hit so you're *slightly* spikier, but it's such a small amount that its not likely to be noticeable. In the same vein, you'll end up taking less damage over the entire course of a fight: the first setup would have you take ~53.25% damage pre-DR; the second would have you take ~50.42% damage pre-DR. That nearly 3% difference is pretty massive, so you're trading off a bit of spikiness for a pretty large increase in total mitigation.

 

The reason that Guardians care so little for Shield/Abs is pretty simple actually: Shield and Absorb are synergistically useful. To make Shield useful as a mitigation stat, you need a lot of Absorb; to make Absorb useful as a mitigation stat, you need a lot of Shield. Shadows and VGs both get plenty of Shield and Absorb from their respective tank specs. Guardians, on the other hand, do not. In fact, they get a lot of Defense, which ends up just making Defense even more valuable (the higher a mitigation stat gets as a percentage, the more valuable from a comparative mitigation standpoint further increases get). Once you realize that, it becomes pretty obvious that Defense stacking is the way to go.

I'm finding it very hard to match the numbers, I'm trying to lower my shield/abs evenly to those levels, absorb I can drop easily, but shield comes with every piece of enhancement so it seems like I will always have more shield than absorb. I'm at roughly 656/689/387 (def/shield/abs). How can I swap shield for defense? Is there a workaround I'm not seeing?

I'm trying to lower my shield/abs evenly to those levels

Don't do this. More mitigation stats are always better. If you're lowering your shield/absorb arbitrarily without directly increasing your Defense to compensate, you're operating counter to the intended purpose of the stat budget: more is always better, even if it skews the optimum ratios a little. You want to maximize your budget while getting as close to those ratios as you can.

How can I swap shield for defense? Is there a workaround I'm not seeing?

You can't and that's one of the reasons why I don't feel the need to tell people to follow these numbers explicitly. Defense rating doesn't compete with Shield/Absorb rating on anything but augs. No matter what, the Shield rating for *every* tank class, assuming maximum mitigation ratings, barring the PvP passive relics, will have 600 Shield rating. Shield rating is, functionally, a value with a static minimum based on specific tiers of gear. These calculations don't really factor that in (not that they couldn't, but it would make the math way more complicated).

Like I've been saying all along, don't work too hard on following the values *explicitly*. They're a guideline for what the optimum ratios are at various stat budgets, but they don't account for the numerous other factors, like situational effects and the complexities of sectionalized itemizations (since Shield/Absorb/Defense rating come in discrete chunks at a time rather than in perfectly fluid quantities and aren't universally interchangeable in every way).

The most you would need to do, assuming you're not using the passive stat relics, is 4-5 (full 27 unlettered mods, full Bastion/Bulwark enhancements, and high mitigation ear and implants provides you with 600 Shield exactly, with a stat budget of 1648 without using passive relics). I've also got a bit of a problem with using those exact numbers because their interplay with the various relics and debuffs: the presence of the acc debuffs, especially the 20% from Smoke Grenade, is gonna do some wonky things to those numbers when factored in (especially when factored in when weighed based on uptime rather than averaged for effect). It's one of the reasons why, even though I know about these calcs and think they're a respectable guideline, I don't follow them explicitly (my Shadow optimal loadout is 532/600/516 rather than the 500/525/600 that I "should" be aiming for).

I'm using passive pvp relics in all fights with except ones where two tanks transfer a single boss (both versions of Kephess and TFB actual). I'm working on a calculator that calculates mean mitigation factoring in uptimes for cool downs and relics, the formula for relics is very much in favor of the PVP relics in fights with high tank uptimes. I'm using one shield and one defense pvp relic usually.

The math for relics is a bit complicated and an eyesore, it can be found in one my my spreadsheets posted earlier however.

The built in tech tank accuracy debuff is a very good point that I'm going to adjust my spreadsheets and the program I'm writing to account for. Should be mathematically equivalent to adding the debuff to the total defense percentage.

Edit: the relic formula I am using is weighted for uptime, I agree 455 absorb on a 6 of 20 proc relic does not equate to 455 * 3 / 10 added to your absorb. Rather it is (MMactive * duration / cycletime) + (MMpassive * (1- duration / cycletime)). This can be extrapolated out to include multiple relics and cooldowns. You can see where the formula gets huge with multiple cd's and the fact that MM numbers are a really long formula themselves.

Edit: the relic formula I am using is weighted for uptime, I agree 455 absorb on a 6 of 20 proc relic does not equate to 455 * 3 / 10 added to your absorb. Rather it is (MMactive * duration / cycletime) + (MMpassive * (1- duration / cycletime)). This can be extrapolated out to include multiple relics and cooldowns. You can see where the formula gets huge with multiple cd's and the fact that MM numbers are a really long formula themselves.

Yeah, my tanking spreadsheet has these formulae. It's…horrible. Very annoying to maintain those expressions. Fortunately, the on-use (and proc shield) relics have now fallen significantly behind the PvP passive and proc heal relics (well, for a shadow anyway), so I rarely have to deal with updating their values.

Don't do this. More mitigation stats are always better. If you're lowering your shield/absorb arbitrarily without directly increasing your Defense to compensate, you're operating counter to the intended purpose of the stat budget: more is always better, even if it skews the optimum ratios a little. You want to maximize your budget while getting as close to those ratios as you can.

No I am, I had a mix of shield, absorb and def augs to reach 29/50/50, I was just swapping augs basically. So, sorry I think I'm confused now...I should follow the ratios, but shouldn't mess too much with mitigation?

For my specific case, I'm hovering around 29.40% defense, 50.4% shield, and 49.8% absorb. If I were to swap 3xshield augs, and 1xabsorb aug all for defenses, I would be at 30.6/49/49. Which would then be the farthest I can go (i think) because like you said defense doesn't compete with shield/absorb and I only have def and absorb augs left. This is just an attempt at getting closer to your earlier explanation that defense is our most valuable stat. It's not much of a change, only 1% shield/abs for 1% def so not sure if it even matters. But did I understand it wrongly?

So, sorry I think I'm confused now...I should follow the ratios, but shouldn't mess too much with mitigation?

Maximize your stat budget by using high Shield enhs and unlettered mods. This, combined with your augments, provides you with your total stat budget. However, because Shield never competes with either Defense or Absorb rating except on augments, you should never lower your Shield (except by removing Shield augs) to get to the appropriate ratio because the only way to do so is to use high End enhs, which would end up lowering your total stat budget. Shield is, functionally, a static value because it's a set value based upon your gear level rather than based upon your choice of Defense or Absorb stacking mods.

defense doesn't compete with shield/absorb and I only have def and absorb augs left.

*Shield* doesn't compete with Defense and Absorb. Defense and Absorb compete with each other because any time you could be getting Absorb, you could be getting an equal amount of Defense instead. As such, if you want to get to the appropriate ratio, you should be replacing all of your Abs augs with Defense augs because of the massive value of Defense to your spec.

Of course, the problem with those numbers is, once again, that they don't take into account the fact that Shield is a functionally static minimum value at specific stat budgets. No matter what you do, you will *always* have at least 600 Shield rating if you are using unlettered mods, Bastion/Bulwark enhs, and the highest mitigation ear/implants. The only way to reduce your shield is to reduce your total stat budget, which you shouldn't be doing. What makes the numbers unreliable, especially for Guardians, is that the higher your Shield chance gets, the more comparative value you get out of Absorb. By stacking roughly 200 more Shield rating than you should hypothetically be stacking (assuming that all of the mitigation stats are perfectly and equally interchangeable, which they're not) at the 1600 stat budget (you'll get 600 shield rating and 1048 divided between Defense and Absorb with the prescribed mods/enhs/ear/implants) your stats are skewing what the ratios *should* be by having enough additional shield to make Absorb more valuable than it would be at the lower hypothetical optimal Shield rating.

I really don't recommend matching those exact values unless you're explicitly using predictable relics (i.e. passive relics or the proc heal relic; the use relics and the proc abs relic both mess with the numbers thanks to uptime/downtime and DR contributions making things screwy) *and* those values are explicitly possible within the confines of the game. For Shadows, unless you're using 2 passive Defense relics and a skewed mod/aug loadout in favor of Absorb rating to offset the 226 additional Defense you're getting from them, you'll always have more Shield than the optimal hypothetical would intend you to have (assuming you're gearing for max mitigation). For Guardians, you'll always have more Shield rating than you "should" have simply because Shield doesn't compete with either of the other stats. The only class that *can* reach the defined values are VGs and that's because they're the only class that needs more Shield rating (barring the acc debuffs and situationals reversing some given trends) beyond the static minimum.

Now, if the OP or someone else does a calc that factors in the static minimum for mitigation maximized loadouts at specific stat budgets, those numbers would be perfectly appropriate to follow (assuming that the relevant situationals are sufficiently accounted for), since they would be attainable without directly reducing your stat budgets to arrive at the given ratios. Of course, I follow the general mindset that there is enough randomness, especially between specific boss fights that end up having variable tank uptime ratios and swap rates, that it's really hard to suitably account for all the of the variability and provide a truly optimum loadout with all variables accounted for.

It's because of this that I've been saying that the numbers here are useful as a *guideline* but shouldn't be considered the gospel of optimal stat allocation. As long as your stats are something within a reasonable approximation of the ratios, you're golden. Like I've said, even with these numbers provided, the optimal loadout I'm aiming for is is still 532/600/516 def/shield/abs, which is quite a bit different than the 500/525/600 ratio that is listed here.

figuring out which PvP relics to get is very helpful to reaching the stats you are shooting for. lucky for me i can always compute the best def/abs for a given shield value... and it is a much faster calc.

I would also like to mention that using the high endurance enhancements (steadfast 27) will offer you a higher time to kill at the expense of taking more dps.

The tanking spreadsheet is an excellent tool. However, it only solves the problem of how to minimize the damage you take from someone. What is more important in an operation setting is the stress on the healer.

A tank at full health incurs very little stress on a healer. A tank close to death incurs a lot of stress on the healer. So Healer Stress if a function of (Total HP - Current HP).

At any point in time, the average change in HP is described by (where t denotes time)

HP(t) = HP(t-1) , when you parry/dodge/deflect

HP(t) = (HP(t-1) - (Damage * (1 - absorb)), when you shield

HP(t) = HP(t-1) - Damage, if you neither shield or defend.

The healer will react based on the HP

1) When HP is full or close to full, do nothing.

2) When HP is between 60-80%, HoT and smaller, efficient heal

3) When HP is between 30-60%, use the big heal

4) When HP < 30%, relic/adrenal + biggest heal, without regard to resource.

Once you add in the resource level and the action of the healer, and you can build a Markov chain from it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Markov_chain

The full model is pretty complicated, but you can still draw some conclusions.

1) Having more HP is a good thing.

2) High Defense is better for the healer since you take no damage

3) Shielding more often with lower absorb is better than shielding less with higher absorb, even though amount mitigated is the same.

4) A good tank is one who can stay in stage 1 and stage 2 most of the time.

1) When HP is full or close to full, do nothing.

2) When HP is between 60-80%, HoT and smaller, efficient heal

3) When HP is between 30-60%, use the big heal

4) When HP < 30%, relic/adrenal + biggest heal, without regard to resource.

You're assuming a lot about the psychology of healers here. A good healer will know, based upon the phase and state of the current fight, what the relevant incoming damage rate is and adjust their healing to compensate for it. It's called precasting, and it's the hallmark of a good healer, especially on fights like Warlord Kephess, where damage comes in hard and fast and doesn't provide you with a large window to be reactionary about things, even with a large hp pool.

This model works for healers that don't know fights and only ever bother to react to incoming damage, which is why, if it generally gets said when discussing the merits of high hp v. high mitigation loadouts, you should tailor you hp and mitigation to the abilities of your healer. I've always found it questionable at best to stack hp because, even with the most reactionary healer, if you tell them to dump heals into you for a specific phase, you can get them to start precasting when it's needed, largely circumventing the need for a larger hp pool.

You're assuming a lot about the psychology of healers here. A good healer will know, based upon the phase and state of the current fight, what the relevant incoming damage rate is and adjust their healing to compensate for it. It's called precasting, and it's the hallmark of a good healer, especially on fights like Warlord Kephess, where damage comes in hard and fast and doesn't provide you with a large window to be reactionary about things, even with a large hp pool..

Defense chance and shield chance are random. A healer can expect the damage is on a boss like Stormcaller , but then shield/parry/absorb is moot since you're taking every single hit.

The effect of HP actually comes in tiers, which corresponds to the stages. It is hard to establish exactly where the points are, but each tier is around the size of a normal attack form a boss (~ 2k). Increasing your HP pool have rather limited effects until you can reach the next HP tier.

Defense chance and shield chance are random. A healer can expect the damage is on a boss like Stormcaller , but then shield/parry/absorb is moot since you're taking every single hit.

 

The effect of HP actually comes in tiers, which corresponds to the stages. It is hard to establish exactly where the points are, but each tier is around the size of a normal attack form a boss (~ 2k). Increasing your HP pool have rather limited effects until you can reach the next HP tier.

They may be random, but the boss phases themselves largely are not.

For the most part, it's an acceptable sacrifice to risk overhealing in the face of a largely deterministic attack string capable of large burst damage.

Nearly every boss fight that has a major "oh s**t" wallop in it has some blatantly obvious cue that said attack is incoming, which gives plenty of time for the healers to be casting proactively and minimize the odds of panic reactive response.

When a boss (e.g. Warlord Kephess) just has sustained high DPS, it's on a single target, so 2 healers can share the burden and work together to conserve resources and meet the HPS requirements.

Thanks to BioWare's raid design practices (thus far), gearing around reactive healer mentality just isn't necessary unless your healers are subpar, as Kirtu said. The lack "gamble attacks" like OHKOs or highly unpredictable damage spikes means that the ideal gearing strategy is simply minimizing healing required (maximized mitigation, or a balance between maximized mitigation and self-healing if applicable).

Edit: Just to reiterate what Kirtu was saying... naturally there is some need to account for objective reality, but if it is the case that the healers + tanks are a competent quartet, then simple math rather than psychology becomes the driving force behind optimization.

I can't speak for anything but the Guardian calculations, but it appears to me that the OP does not factor in diminishing returns. Stacking that much defense is a terrible idea. After about 600 or so defense you start to barely gain anything at all.

The OP does indeed take DR into account. Read his formulae. Stats like defense are definitionally on a DR curve from the very beginning, so it is impossible to get accurate predictions at any point without taking DR into account. The stat allocations given by the OP are correct and optimal, even for guardians.

i calced for hybrid since many agree that the 4% decrease to all damage is better than the full tank spec which gives 4% decrease to internal/elemental or some such. some argue that the shield you get from scream or soemthing (i dont have a jugg tank) makes full tank better, but i havent calculated if such is the case.

the numbers for 32/7/2 jugg build:

pool def shld abs

1400 769 290 342

1500 775 345 381

1600 786 392 417

1700 800 448 452

1800 818 498 485

1900 858 546 516

2000 860 593 547

so, the def numbers are lower for a full jugg tank

The OP does indeed take DR into account. Read his formulae. Stats like defense are definitionally on a DR curve from the very beginning, so it is impossible to get accurate predictions at any point without taking DR into account. The stat allocations given by the OP are correct and optimal, even for guardians.

No he doesn't, because going from 600 to 700 defense only increases your defense chance by around 1%, think about what you are getting above that. At more than 750, do you even gain ANY defense chance with rating?

There is no reason for a guardian to be going above 700, let alone the 800 he is suggesting for even his lowest gear pool.

Also, guardians want about a 2:1 ratio for shield rating to absorb rating until diminishing returns starts wrecking shield at around like 1200ish

http://mmo-mechanics.com/swtor/forums/attachment.php?aid=293

maybe if I explain a bit more....

so the diminshing returns are mathematically decribed by the equations for the particular stat. Take defense chance as a function of defense rating, dr, for example:

( 1 - ( 1 - ( 0.01 / 0.3 ) )^( ( (dr) / 50 ) / 0.55 ) )

if you take the derivitive of this function, you will find it has a decreasing slope with increasing dr. that is what diminishing returns means.

once i have all the equations for all the stats (by taking stim, skill tree and debuffs/buffs into account), and i have the equation for squishiness based on these equations, I then determine the lagrange points of the squishiness function. this means i am finding the points for which the squishiness value is minimized.

a simple example of what is called the lagrange multiplier method can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagrange_multiplier

that is what i am doing. the comstraint on the system is that dr+shr+abr=N, and i just changes N from 1400 to 2000. each of these calcs took between 5 and 15 minutes for my work computed to compute... so each table took around 2 hours to make. maybe solver in excel would have been faster, but i dont typically rely on excel for optimization problems.

This is fantastic stuff, thanks OP. I found a calculator someone coded a while ago and it pretty much agrees with your formulas (don't ask for the link, no idea where I got it). I would like to point out a few points though:

1) You're going to have a ton of shield rating at full Campaign. For tank gear you only have the choice between Accuracy and Shield on enhancements, ears, and implants. At nearly full DG on my Jugg I'm stuck with 520 points in shield. For Sins and Powertechs your results hold up well, but for Juggs the suggested numbers yield shield ratings lower than what you can achieve.

2) People need to realize endurance stacking is intelligent to an extent for all tank classes. If you're taking the 61 mods with 32 endurance to get 10 more defense, you're only preparing yourself for 1 of 3 types of attacks. Force/Kinetic damage bypasses your defense/shield and goes straight to armor, and that kind of damage is all over TFB HM. Elemental damage doesn't care about either defense/shield or armor and hits for a roughly flat 20-25% damage reduction for each tank class, and this type of damage is all over NiM EC. For each of those two damages you can only increase your survivability by upping your armor rating (Full Campaign to Full DG adds less than 1% I believe), or by increasing your endurance.

Really, I feel bad for any healer trying to heal a sub 25k health Jugg on NiM Stormcaller. Balance your mitigation people.

2) People need to realize endurance stacking is intelligent to an extent for all tank classes. If you're taking the 61 mods with 32 endurance to get 10 more defense, you're only preparing yourself for 1 of 3 types of attacks. Force/Kinetic damage bypasses your defense/shield and goes straight to armor, and that kind of damage is all over TFB HM. Elemental damage doesn't care about either defense/shield or armor and hits for a roughly flat 20-25% damage reduction for each tank class, and this type of damage is all over NiM EC. For each of those two damages you can only increase your survivability by upping your armor rating (Full Campaign to Full DG adds less than 1% I believe), or by increasing your endurance.

 

Really, I feel bad for any healer trying to heal a sub 25k health Jugg on NiM Stormcaller. Balance your mitigation people.

Endurance is not mitigation. Endurance doesn't even contribute to survivability unless you're a shadow/assassin. All that you get from endurance is a cushion, no more or less. That cushion gives a healer time to bring you back up, but doesn't make it any *easier* for them to do so. It also dramatically increases the likelihood of getting yourself into a situation where your mitigation failed repeatedly (since your defensive chances will be lower).

As for your claim that unmitigable damage is "all over" TfB HM and NiM EC, that doesn't really hold up. 63.32% of damage in TfB HM melee/ranged + kinetic/energy. 29.29% is force/tech + kinetic/energy. Only 7.38% is force/tech + internal/elemental. I haven't update my spreadsheet for NiM EC yet, beyond the fact that it appears to be the same abilities and swing timers as HM EC but with 15%-ish more damage. Thus, the ratios remain 76.41% m/r + k/e, 8.38% f/t + k/e, 15.21% f/t + i/e. That's hardly "all over" anything.

Defensive stats are the most important thing. Use them and abuse them. Damage which bypasses defenses is usually minor and/or infrequent (e.g. Kephess's bleed turns out to be *very* infrequent when you actually put a timer to it). Endurance is nice when you get it incidentally, but you should *never* be stacking it with the assumption that it will make life easier in the face of "rampant unmitigated damage" (something this game just doesn't have).

The only tanks who should be stacking endurance with an eye toward ease of healing are shadow/assassin tanks, since their self-heal is buffed significantly by their total HP. And even then, this really only comes into the fore as you get into the Dread Guard tier, since that's where you start seeing DR clamping down pretty hard on Absorb and Defense. Vanguards and Guardians should concentrate on defensive stats and not give endurance stacking a second thought.

My definition of survivability in an mmo includes a health buffer.

There are survival bottlenecks that require a certain amount of health. They're only present in a few fights but no guild will accept "savage arcing slash is only 2% of his damage output, not worth gearing for". I think I've even used some of your past work to help me determine sensible health minimums.

Just to be clear, for me these are minimums but I prefer to not overshoot them too much so I can have more room for defensive stats. I am on the mitigation/avoidance side of the debate but not as radically as your last post suggests you are.

This is fantastic stuff, thanks OP. I found a calculator someone coded a while ago and it pretty much agrees with your formulas (don't ask for the link, no idea where I got it). I would like to point out a few points though:

 

1) You're going to have a ton of shield rating at full Campaign. For tank gear you only have the choice between Accuracy and Shield on enhancements, ears, and implants. At nearly full DG on my Jugg I'm stuck with 520 points in shield. For Sins and Powertechs your results hold up well, but for Juggs the suggested numbers yield shield ratings lower than what you can achieve.

 

2) People need to realize endurance stacking is intelligent to an extent for all tank classes. If you're taking the 61 mods with 32 endurance to get 10 more defense, you're only preparing yourself for 1 of 3 types of attacks. Force/Kinetic damage bypasses your defense/shield and goes straight to armor, and that kind of damage is all over TFB HM. Elemental damage doesn't care about either defense/shield or armor and hits for a roughly flat 20-25% damage reduction for each tank class, and this type of damage is all over NiM EC. For each of those two damages you can only increase your survivability by upping your armor rating (Full Campaign to Full DG adds less than 1% I believe), or by increasing your endurance.

 

Really, I feel bad for any healer trying to heal a sub 25k health Jugg on NiM Stormcaller. Balance your mitigation people.

Really, there exists tanks tanking NiM Stormcaller with less than 25k health? Hehe, good luck bro. I feel your pain.

Keyboardninja makes valid points but as usual the mentality of "my way or you are clueless" shines here too. There are other benefits to endurance stacking such as an Enure being able to give you a whopping 10k additional HP which might save you, especially if you go full defense which increases the duration of the buff. It gives more room for a healer to err, and more room for a healer to heal other players, a lot of these numbers and scenarios revolve around Healers playing perfectly -- tanks and dps too -- that just is not realistically the case for a very big majority of the playerbase we encounter in this game. Your guild may have different experiences in their raids than the ones theorycrafting here. Don't get me wrong I don't disagree with their calculations and numbers --- mitigation stacking to 30/50/50 threshold for guardians / juugs is quite ideal and in many ways best scenario, but just because you have something like 30/50/45 with 3k additional hp to make up you are not gonna get this huge change where now you are a "noob" tank which is clueless -- the kind of atmosphere theorycrafters general make about their numbers. Both ways you will find accessible to all the content the game offers you.

Why on earth would I write that a post is incomprehensible if it actually wasn't?.. And yes, I can add numbers together, that doesn't make the post any more well written.

 

What's my statsbudget at any given point in the game? From the outside it just looks like a bunch of random lines with the numbers added up on the side..

 

So NO, it's not comprehensible or useful in ANY way.. And you writing "yes it is", doesn't make it so..

It is very comprehensible, as demonstrated by the discussions that follow.

I found the explanations and the table quite easy to follow, the OP did a great job.

Now, it's obviously not comprehensible to you. Rather than calling the whole thing incomprehensible, help us help you by telling us what you do not understand, and someone will attempt to clarify it for you.

The stats budget is explained, N is the sum of your ratings (defense + shield + absorption). Then you take the table and it'll give you the most effective distribution in those three stats.