So granted its been a long time since i played, the rotation just doesn't flow as nice as it used to. I find my skills coming off CD together and/or having all my skills on CD and me having to hit slash once or twice. I've tried looking at some of the rotations but I'm generally confused. Is there a priority of skills that go before the other or am I just overthinking it? Just frustrated with how different the rotation is and not being able to grasp it since coming back. Any help appreciated so I can better understand my bread and butter again.

Vigi is a priority rotation, so you will need to use a filler quite often.

 

Try to use these 5 "free" fillers: Sundering Strike (builds focus), Blade Barrage, Saber Throw (builds focus), Vigilant Thrust, and Whirling Blade (if procced or enemy below 30% health). Only use Slash if you have excess focus (which should be rare).

 

Your main abilities that you want to use on CD to maintain DoTs are: Overhead Slash, Plasma Brand, and Blade Storm. Make sure you have enough Focus to be able to use these when they come off CD.

 

This guide is still pretty accurate: http://dulfy.net/2016/12/30/swtor-5-0-vigilance-guardian-pve-guide-by-rydarus/. Just ignore the part where he mentions Freezing Force. That ability is no longer viable for PvE as it was heavily nerfed.

Edited August 13, 2018 by Rion_Starkiller

Ah okay thanks for the info man. Much appreciated.

Vigi is a priority rotation, so you will need to use a filler quite often.

 

Try to use these 5 "free" fillers: Sundering Strike (builds focus), Blade Barrage, Saber Throw (builds focus), Vigilant Thrust, and Whirling Blade (if procced or enemy below 30% health). Only use Slash if you have excess focus (which should be rare).

 

Your main abilities that you want to use on CD to maintain DoTs are: Overhead Slash, Plasma Brand, and Blade Storm. Make sure you have enough Focus to be able to use these when they come off CD.

 

This guide is still pretty accurate: http://dulfy.net/2016/12/30/swtor-5-0-vigilance-guardian-pve-guide-by-rydarus/. Just ignore the part where he mentions Freezing Force. That ability is no longer viable for PvE as it was heavily nerfed.

 

Thrust is NOT a filler.

 

Correct rotation:

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=944120

 

Or take a look at the 5.9 rotation someone posted here. While the post itself has many mistakes in it, i wrote a reply with Dos and Donts for guardian/jugg rotation.

Don't question my art, man.

 

Direct quote from Rydarus:

When taken as a whole, the rotation fits together like the solution to a complex puzzle, a solution that suddenly explains that the puzzle is simple after all.

Edited August 14, 2018 by Rion_Starkiller

Don't question my art, man.

 

Direct quote from Rydarus:

 

Cant argue with that, but only if you use Thrust/Slam on the same Level as your 3 Dots

Cant argue with that, but only if you use Thrust/Slam on the same Level as your 3 Dots

 

It's actually on the same level in Rydarus' rotation as well. Though I would argue it's the one you would delay the easiest out of those four abilities.

You could, but why would you.

Its one of your hardest hiting abilities and if you delay it, the pieces of the puzzle just wont fit together again, untill you delay the whole rotation.

It would **** up your resource management if you replace it with a resource consuming filler.

Gotta have Enrage/Focus ready to bounce back from there without loosing to much dps.

 

I would agree if you delay it after a downtime, movement phase etc. to start the rotation with the 3 dots all over again.

Edited August 15, 2018 by mrphstar

I think you're thinking in terms of dummy parses. In raids and pvp, sometimes you need to time your Thrust DoT spread.

I think you're thinking in terms of dummy parses. In raids and pvp, sometimes you need to time your Thrust DoT spread.

 

Yes but that doesnt make it a filler. Vigi aoe is even easier:

Plasma brand --> smash --> cyclone slash until smash is almost off cd --> overhead slash --> smash --> repeat using sundering strike and combat focus as needed for focus.

 

Over simplified a bit obviously. But its not worth delaying vigi thrust for a PB spread.

Yes but that doesnt make it a filler. Vigi aoe is even easier:

Plasma brand --> smash --> cyclone slash until smash is almost off cd --> overhead slash --> smash --> repeat using sundering strike and combat focus as needed for focus.

 

Over simplified a bit obviously. But its not worth delaying vigi thrust for a PB spread.

 

Exactly. Theres only one encounter i know where i would agree to delay it: Tyth HC.

If you want to kill all adds at the same time you should wait till all are in range to spread the dots.

(There are fights were you stay in single target rotation on the boss while you gotta handle add waves like izax, but its not important to kill them all at the exact same time. Thus no need to delay Thrust or switch to aoe rotation.)

 

Ofcourse you can kill adds faster by timing Thrust, but in all other fights it just doesnt have an impact on the outcome of the try (Unless you got very weak heals which cant handle 4-5secs more add damage in the group). Meanwhile you lose single target dps or even **** up your whole rotation as mentioned earlier.

I don't use saber throw in my opener, and I use Whirling Blade immediately assuming it procs -- in place of Thrust or BB. The reason I do this is because WB deals far more damage than Thrust, and is particularly important later in the fight during execution.

 

On my parses, I'm not seeing a benefit to using Thrust as part of the core rotation except when Whirling Blade doesn't proc in the opener. Though I may need to rethink my whole thought process on it. However, the dps difference between Blade Barrage and Thrust is 200-800 dps depending on gear and RNG.

 

The way I view it is, after the 3 dots--

 

Opener priority filler:

Whirling Blade, then Thrust, then BB

 

Regular priority filler:

Thrust, BB, Whirling Blade

 

Execution priority filler:

Whirling Blade, Thrust, BB

 

At any time during these 3 priority fillers, a player may need to use Sundering Strike or Saber Throw if Combat Focus isn't up. Combat Focus is your priority focus builder since it is not on the GCD.

 

----------------------

 

So if I'm understanding correctly, you guys are using Thrust on CD (except when DoT's are up)? I'm going to give that a try. Sounds interesting! I'm always looking to improve.

Edited August 19, 2018 by Rion_Starkiller

Basically try to sequence your abilities like

Impale - Other - Scream - Other - Slam - Other

 

Where Shatter always occurs during the "Other" GCD (will never overlap because its 12 seconds cooldown makes it shift two up in the next block, always landing itself on another "Other" GCD). From here you want to fill in the rest with your Sundering Assault, Ravage and Hew with the occasional Saber Throw or Vicious Slash. What's important to realise is that outside of execute there's no rush to use Hew. Its cooldown reset has a 20 second ICD. So as long as you use it before the buff runs out, you're not losing out on any dps. Even in execute it's not really worth delaying slam to use Hew, since Hew is going to collide with your DOTs and you'll have to delay it anyway, leading to no dps gained. Slam on the other hand can be used on cooldown without interfering with your DOTs, nets you with 3 more rage compared to Hew and does only 3k damage less at worst (if critted during adrenal or something). I also recommend making sure that you use Ravage before Shatter comes off cooldown again (not worth delaying the core 4 though), its damage isn't as impressive as before, but it's still a decent amount of damage for a zero rage cost filler.

Edited August 20, 2018 by AdjeYo

I don't use saber throw in my opener, and I use Whirling Blade immediately assuming it procs -- in place of Thrust or BB. The reason I do this is because WB deals far more damage than Thrust, and is particularly important later in the fight during execution.

 

On my parses, I'm not seeing a benefit to using Thrust as part of the core rotation except when Whirling Blade doesn't proc in the opener. Though I may need to rethink my whole thought process on it. However, the dps difference between Blade Barrage and Thrust is 200-800 dps depending on gear and

 

200-800dps is the difference between a hc and NiM player, tho.

Anyway according to your rotation:

What do you do if WB doenst procc, SB is on cooldown and you have no focus/rage for Slash?

You cant just put Thrust on the WB spot, neither could you use BB imstead of WB and replace the original BB spot with Trust since it will be still on CD cuz you just used it too late in your previous sequence. So you gotta use auto-hit and lose dps.

Thats what i mean with *********** up the rotation.

You can indeed replace BB with WB, its even recommended to do so, when it proccs. Since PB resets BB and you can place it anywhere in your rotation.

But you cant do that with Thrust cuz you gonna get trouble in the following sequence and or lose dps.

I think was I thinking too highly about BB from the clippable Master Strike/ Ravage days where it was dealing 12-ish-k over 3s channel.

 

I will focus more on Thrust since it is FREE, grants force, and is a top 3 hard hitting non-dot ability. Still pondering. Thank you for the rotational suggestions. I think I PvP too much where rotation isn't necessarily key when you need to choose between dot spread or root. And where you gain focus every time you take AoE dmg.

Edited August 25, 2018 by Rion_Starkiller