Trying to get an estimate of how off target my damage would be while wearing war leader gear instead of the vindicator set, and what HM's / OPS I should still be able to do, and what would be out of the question because of the lower dps.

So for example, if you had a two guardians with the exact same spec, but one was wearing the Columi tank set and the other the DPS set, approximately how much less dps would the tank set geared guardian do. And based on that lower expectation, what can be done in that mode.

Trying to get an estimate of how off target my damage would be while wearing war leader gear instead of the vindicator set, and what HM's / OPS I should still be able to do, and what would be out of the question because of the lower dps.

 

So for example, if you had a two guardians with the exact same spec, but one was wearing the Columi tank set and the other the DPS set, approximately how much less dps would the tank set geared guardian do. And based on that lower expectation, what can be done in that mode.

It can vary, if someone is going pure dps gear they are going to do more damage obviously, but their survival capability goes through the floor. DPSing with pure tank gear is foolish.

If you are constructing a hybrid gear set though, that can actually work and it will give you less dps than a pure dps, while giving you a little more breathing room in a fight, however the window to be able to do this successfully in my experience is very narrow.

Generally a player that is using tank gear or partially geared with tank gear is someone that is geared to be able to emergency offtank, which is sometimes the only way a guardian can get into a PvE ops group.

I don't think you should even waste time thinking about this, especially if this is pertaining to pve content. There are very few fights where you will need to be switching in and out of tank mode. Wear tank gear if you will be tanking the entire time, wear dps gear if you are going to be dps.

The only fight that I can think needs an extra tank is kephess, and the rest of your raid should be able to handle the dps drop if you are wearing full tank gear for the final phase.

----

But to answer your question, the difference is significant. You will lose a couple hundred dps in tank gear.

I don't think you should even waste time thinking about this, especially if this is pertaining to pve content. There are very few fights where you will need to be switching in and out of tank mode. Wear tank gear if you will be tanking the entire time, wear dps gear if you are going to be dps.

Except when there is the party que glitch that keeps reactivating the tank option in the que when you switched it off because you are a dps... Such as what happened to me last night...

If it wasn't for the fact I actually do have some tanking mods and enhancements in my armor with a shield generator, the group I was in would never have gotten through that HM Directive 7 with 0 deaths...

Oh have you ever seen a gunslinger offtank, I have in a lvl 50 hm fp...

The only fight that I can think needs an extra tank is kephess, and the rest of your raid should be able to handle the dps drop if you are wearing full tank gear for the final phase.

----

But to answer your question, the difference is significant. You will lose a couple hundred dps in tank gear.

You can still be an effective DPS though, but it's a very narrow window that you have to shoot for.

Also, I think other people should check this, but it seems that we do not get any buff from shien and probably not from shii cho to melee or force attacks, unless the charecter stat information is glitched.

Not sure I understand what you are saying there... I still think it is stupid to put tanking mods in dps gear. You shouldn't be getting hit. If you are, and you are using your aggro drop, then the tank is just bad. But by having a shield generator equipped as a dps, you are doing yourself, and you team a disservice. In scripted pve, it makes 0 sense. In pvp, fair enough.

You shouldn't even be worried about your numbers, period. Worry about the survivability, it's far more important for that fight in particular. If the dps is the problem, well, they are the problem, not you.

Now I am speaking in particular to raids, but fps are not too different.

And the forms modify damage dealt, they don't affect the bonus dmg, or main stat. That's why it is not reflected in the character sheet.

Not sure I understand what you are saying there... I still think it is stupid to put tanking mods in dps gear. You shouldn't be getting hit. If you are, and you are using your aggro drop, then the tank is just bad. But by having a shield generator equipped as a dps, you are doing yourself, and you team a disservice. In scripted pve, it makes 0 sense. In pvp, fair enough.

Depends, I'm actually using my own put together gear set, and considering how often Bioware messes up the que group, sometimes it's good to have the tank/dps mix. Especially when you get stuck trying to play tank, but are actually a dps due to the group que glitching...

You shouldn't even be worried about your numbers, period. Worry about the survivability, it's far more important for that fight in particular. If the dps is the problem, well, they are the problem, not you.

Your dps also determines your threat generation. Note, I'm a dps that has tanking modifications in my gear as well as dps modifications, I'm not a tank. That said, there are times you will need to be able to act as a tank in order to do dailies.

Now I am speaking in particular to raids, but fps are not too different.

I never said it is easy to do, nor is it inexpensive. Far from it.

And the forms modify damage dealt, they don't affect the bonus dmg, or main stat. That's why it is not reflected in the character sheet.

Wouldn't it qualify almost as a buff though.

You should just have a tank set and a DPS set instead of a mix.

I queue for hard modes as full Vigilance, if I end up the tank I just throw my tank gear on and I have no issues, I've tanked Lost Island hard mode in full Vigilance with tank gear. If its an easy hard mode, I'll only wear a few pieces of tank gear so we can kill stuff faster and get through it quicker.

If you're DPSing, only wear DPS gear, no reason to have any tank gear on at all.

 

Your dps also determines your threat generation. Note, I'm a dps that has tanking modifications in my gear as well as dps modifications, I'm not a tank. That said, there are times you will need to be able to act as a tank in order to do dailies.

 

From the perspective of a Defense Guardian Tank.....

DPS output isn't as important to threat generation as a lot of tanks like to think. My guardian in less than Tionese has no problems holding threat away from a Sent in full Columi. It's just a matter of using my abilities correctly, having my talents in the defense tree that reduce the cool downs on my high threat abilities, others that increase their dps, having hilt strike & guardian slash. A defense guardian tank doesn't lose aggro because of poor dps. My Seer Healer toon can out dps a Defense Guardian by a W I D E margin.

From the perspective of a Seer Healer.....

On the note of a dps player wearing tanking gear ~ you're only nerfing your own dps. A Vigliance tank in dps gear can offtank long enough as it is. It's the talents that make a tank, not the gear. If you're able to tank a HM as a full vigilance spec, it's because your group is overgeared ~ not because of your minor defensive stats from a few pieces of tank gear. I've ended up "off tanking" a few HM bosses myself. Without some damage mitigation talents and a full set of tank gear, you're not really an off tank. And with a full set of tank gear ~ you're not a dps either.

I'd gladly heal for Defense Guardian in PvP recruit gear over a vigilance or hybrid Guardian in Columi tank gear. And I always check to see if I've drawn a tank in dps gear, because it's not any fun at all.

You should just have a tank set and a DPS set instead of a mix.

 

I queue for hard modes as full Vigilance, if I end up the tank I just throw my tank gear on and I have no issues, I've tanked Lost Island hard mode in full Vigilance with tank gear. If its an easy hard mode, I'll only wear a few pieces of tank gear so we can kill stuff faster and get through it quicker.

 

If you're DPSing, only wear DPS gear, no reason to have any tank gear on at all.

This.

It is essentially a buff, but it doesn't affect the stats... So why would it show on the stat sheet dude?

I cannot understand how people don't understand that, especially in pve, attempting to be a jack of all trades, unless it is a very specific fight, is a not good idea.

"I am gonna have a shield generator to dps just in case the tank dies!".

-Tank survives - You lost a good amount of dps for nothing

"I am gonna tank with a focus, just in case a dps dies!"

-Seriously, as stupid as this may sound... it's the same thing as the other example.

Raids, FPs and PvP are all team oriented. If everyone does their job, then gg. Do your part, and do it well. Help others do their part, not try do it for them.

If you're able to tank a HM as a full vigilance spec, it's because your group is overgeared ~ not because of your minor defensive stats from a few pieces of tank gear.

This is wrong. As a full Defense spec in my tank gear my stats would be around 25% defense, 43% shield, 41% absorb. When I put that gear on in full Vigilance, those stats are 19% defense, 39% shield, 41% absorb. I lose 4% elemental/internal reduction as well but gain 4% damage reduction to ALL types of damage, and 20% damage reduction along with CC immunity for 4 seconds after every leap (boss fights with a knockback you can be looking at 20+ seconds of 20% damage reduction).

Fact is, most of your mitigation as a Guardian comes from gear. This is why the Vig/Defense hybrid is arguably better for tanking the toughest content than full Defense is. And no skill in the Defense tree lowers the CD on any of your high threat moves, not sure where you got that from.

I'd gladly heal for Defense Guardian in PvP recruit gear over a vigilance or hybrid Guardian in Columi tank gear. And I always check to see if I've drawn a tank in dps gear, because it's not any fun at all.

I think this is silly.

First of all, 80-90% of how good a tank is is an individual thing, because you have to understand how to hold threat, how to approach a pull, when to pop cooldowns, have a tight rotation, etc.

Second, Vigilance in Columi tank gear, if he knows how to tank, is easily going to outperform Defense in recruit. He's going to have better damage mitigation most likely thanks to the huge edge in stats, do more damage (which at the level of PUGing hard modes is important because you have no idea who you'll get stuck with in your group, which can include mediocre DPS), and he only truly sacrifices a single defensive cd. Which if he truly needed that cd, the recruit geared tank probably wouldn't have cut it either.

The truth is, most of a Guardian's ability to tank is tied to 2 things, the tank stance Soresu form, and their gear. The skills you get in Defense tree are decent but comparable to the ones in the Vigilance tree, and the best ones for tanking are in the bottom of the Defense tree. The only true benefit for going full Defense is an e-z mode rotation thanks to huge amounts of Focus, you have to be more on your game if you tank in Defense/Vig hybrid or full Vigilance.

I have tanked all of HM EV in focus spec... Just saying.

Edit:

This was in standard non augmented rakata gear.

You should just have a tank set and a DPS set instead of a mix.

 

I queue for hard modes as full Vigilance, if I end up the tank I just throw my tank gear on and I have no issues, I've tanked Lost Island hard mode in full Vigilance with tank gear. If its an easy hard mode, I'll only wear a few pieces of tank gear so we can kill stuff faster and get through it quicker.

 

If you're DPSing, only wear DPS gear, no reason to have any tank gear on at all.

This. I run into the LFG role bug pretty often, and prefer to full gear swap depending on what role I've been saddled with. That being said, when I'm DPSing and the group is... "less than ideal," shall we say... I will usually take a small hit to my performance by equipping a shield generator and perhaps bracers and belt from my tanking set. If the group is having issues such that I may be tanking at a moment's notice, then dishing out every last erg of DPS isn't my priority - getting the group through the instance is.

This is wrong. As a full Defense spec in my tank gear my stats would be around 25% defense, 43% shield, 41% absorb. When I put that gear on in full Vigilance, those stats are 19% defense, 39% shield, 41% absorb.

How did you quote me and still not read the quote? A FEW pieces of tank gear is not going to give you those defensive stats. The difference in sheild is small enough to be lacklustre, but 19% defense is not enough to call yourself a tank for HM. My defense guardian had 22% as a fresh 50. If you can't tell the difference between 19% & 25% defense ~ you've never played a healing class.

IT IS HUGE.

Your defense is not 6% less than a defense specced tank it is (6/25 x 100) = 24% LOWER while vigilance specced in tank gear.

Coming at it from the other direction - by respeccing from vigialance to defense you are boosting your defense by 31.5%

From a healers perspective, by running full vigilance you are taking...(6/75 x 100) = 8% MORE damage than a defence specced tank. We'll just ignore the damage mitigated by warding call, because terribad defense guardians don't use it anyway. But we also have to ignore Blade Barricade & Blade Barrier, which are passive, and every defense Guardian uses these. I doubt very seriously running vigilance specced in tanking gear is boosting your dps by anywhere close to 8% - because you're still not stacking crit/surge. Every bit of mitigation stat you abandon to boost dps only increases the amount of dps gain needed to offset the mitigation lost..

Yes the base damage of Overhead slash is higher than Guardian slash- but the difference between these 2 abilities shrinks greatly after you apply bonus damage. Every point of strength only makes it shrink further. By taking Overhead slash you're giving up both Guardian slash AND Hilt Strike. By taking Plasma brand- you're giving up Warding call/ Blade barrier/ and Blade Barricade as well.

If you're not defense specced- you are a fake tank.

And no skill in the Defense tree lowers the CD on any of your high threat moves, not sure where you got that from.

You are absolutely right on this. Having reread that, I'm not sure where I got that either. Only the CD on Push is reduced. Which is actually a great mitigation ability for any fight with melee mobs, but doesn't really generate a great deal of threat. What defense spec gives you IS two more high threat abilities.

First of all, 80-90% of how good a tank is is an individual thing, because you have to understand how to hold threat, how to approach a pull, when to pop cooldowns, have a tight rotation, etc.

 

Second, Vigilance in Columi tank gear, if he knows how to tank, is easily going to outperform Defense in recruit. He's going to have better damage mitigation most likely thanks to the huge edge in stats, do more damage (which at the level of PUGing hard modes is important because you have no idea who you'll get stuck with in your group, which can include mediocre DPS), and he only truly sacrifices a single defensive cd. Which if he truly needed that cd, the recruit geared tank probably wouldn't have cut it either.

It sounds like a great theory. But I've seen no one pull it off consistently. And being someone who is trying to pull it off, doesn't make you 733t, it makes you a person stacking a great deal of self absorption. Most of people trying to do this in PvE don't even realize just how often they are losing aggro. That when they lose aggro to a ranged DPS, somebody else just got busted HARD. Or just how squishy they are, and how much more healing they require. The only thing that makes a vigilance guardian in columi tank gear even passable as a tank, is the larger health pool from their gear. It's not any fun to heal a dps trying to fake tank, anymore than it is trying to tank when dps are making pulls.

Warding Call is not for emergencies....you're thinking of Saber Ward. Stack them both, and a defense gaurdian is God mode for 10 seconds.

Healer - FUN = group without any experienced healers - I'll requeue before I carry a fake tank through an entire HM.

The only reason why it's FOTM to try this is because of Shadow tanks with dps gear PvPing. It works for them only because of the self heals built into the class. If you want to heal yourself through a HM as a vigilance Guardian fake tanking - be my guest.

The truth is, most of a Guardian's ability to tank is tied to 2 things, the tank stance Soresu form, and their gear. The skills you get in Defense tree are decent but comparable to the ones in the Vigilance tree, and the best ones for tanking are in the bottom of the Defense tree. The only true benefit for going full Defense is an e-z mode rotation thanks to huge amounts of Focus, you have to be more on your game if you tank in Defense/Vig hybrid or full Vigilance.

I LOVE THIS - this is the succinct description of why Vigilence spec Guardians in tank gear fail so hard as tanks. Being a good tank isn't about having an "optimal rotation" ~ that's DPSing. If you're trying to dps as a tank......you're missing the point of the spec entirely. leap/ guardian leap/ Awe/ Push/ Stasis/ Sweep/ cyclone slash/ Guardian slash/ Warding call/ Hilt strike/ Interrupt are what a guardian tank does. It's about positioning the mobs for cc & AoE hits, absorbing damage, better passive mitigation, kiting, and applying armor debuffs. The melee and single target light saber hits, are just filler while the improtant abilities are on CD. The best talents for tanking are NOT in the bottom of the tree - and if you are taking plasma brand- you are not a tank. If you think full defense is overflowing with focus, then you are not doing it right. And if you think tanking properly even in full defense spec is EZ mode- then your not doing a very good job of tanking.

A 20/21/0 hybrid would still out tank a full Vigiliance build.

If you really want to know how your performing as a tank you should ask your healer if they had to heal you & the dps more/ less after changes to your gear or spec.

You guys realize that the generator only gives you a 20% chance to reduce damage by 20%, right. That ends up being a grand total of... 4%! Not worth the loss of dps for a... DPSer. Switching to soresu give you enough to fill the tanking capacity in an emergency situation.

I think you mean shield generator...

Well first of all, about mixed gear, part of how I got my set to work is that I actually have augmented gear, I managed to offset some of the downsides of having mixed gear by shoring up the shortcomings with augments.

The second thing is that all of my gear that can be orange gear, is orange gear. I have found that one has greater lee-way with orange gear where you can mix and match the stats you want.

Since I'm not a tank, I have focused only on defense (and any shield buff that I get along with the defense buff in an enhancement is nice). However, I actually have at least 32.35% crit (that's for melee, I get over 39% with buffs for force power attacks) when I have the knight buff active with someone giving me a smuggler buff), and a 69.27% surge rating.

I will say getting a working mixed gear set is a pain in the neck, and is a real balancing act, in fact the balance is so tight that if I used a +41 endurance crystal instead of a +41 crit crystal, the set up wouldn't work.

Primary reason I use mixed gear is that I have had to solo a lot of things before/or I've been in a group with quite a few tanks with a tendency of flying to their doom.

Since I'm not a tank, I have focused only on defense (and any shield buff that I get along with the defense buff in an enhancement is nice). However, I actually have at least 32.35% crit (that's for melee, I get over 39% with buffs for force power attacks) when I have the knight buff active with someone giving me a smuggler buff), and a 69.27% surge rating.

 

I will say getting a working mixed gear set is a pain in the neck, and is a real balancing act, in fact the balance is so tight that if I used a +41 endurance crystal instead of a +41 crit crystal, the set up wouldn't work.

 

Primary reason I use mixed gear is that I have had to solo a lot of things before/or I've been in a group with quite a few tanks with a tendency of flying to their doom.

 

You've sacrificed a good bit of surge, but not enough to completely wreck your dps, and your crit is certainly good enough. But I am curious- what have you gotten your defense up to?

I can understand your sentiment for doing this. I've accidentally solo'd Colonel Daksh in Maelstrom Prison HM from 10% - 0%, for a group who decided the "right" way was just to get in his face ~ with my sage healer. My Healer is my main, and I leveled my Guardian just to figure out why the AC seemed to be so broken for tanking.

I'll add this just for those who still want to boost their dps as a tank - Feel free to swap your Guardian armorings for Might armorings later on, because your healers don't experience too much difference as your health grows beyond 20K or so. Just, please don't drop your defensive stats & mitigation talents. It's not the amount of damage you can take before falling that is important, in most cases it is really only the RATE at which you take damage. Tanks with smaller health pools are only slightly more difficult to heal without overheal. It can be violently spikey, and prone to failure because of interrupts, but it's a lot more fun than healing a squishy dps pretending to be a tank.

A full Vig can tank HM FP's with tank gear. The vast majority of your defense stats comes from your gear. You don't even need to overgear to be able to do it.

But you never be be better than Full Defense and Hybrids.

lots of words...

I'm not talking about tanking hard mode EC. I'm talking about regular flashpoints. If you can't do it in Vigilance with tank gear on, you're probably bad. If you can't heal that same person, so long as they hold aggro, you're bad. The flashpoints in this game are easy, they are balanced for people in level 50 blues to Tionese gear. 90% of the groups you get in group finder are geared Columi or better, because people are doing it for their Black Hole comms.

Now if you want to talk about a full group of fresh 50's without any gear, yeah, you're probably better off with a full tank spec. I don't think that's what we were talking about, you yourself brought up the Columi comparison. Personally I wouldn't queue for a hard mode daily as a fresh 50 without gear because half the time you have to carry your group anyways because they aren't very good and don't know what they're doing.

Btw, your defense comparison is wrong, because a lot of bosses have a lot of attacks that do yellow damage, and defense chance has no effect on those. While the Vigilance Guardians' constant 4% damage reduction always counts, even against internal/elemental.

Also, 20/21? *** are you even talking about, nobody specs 20/21. I'm wondering if you even play a Guardian now.... 18/23 or 16/25 is the standard hybrid (18/23 for PvE, 16/25 for PvP), and there are lots of numbers that support the hybrid being the superior damage mitigation tank on EC HM, as well as the superior threat tank, with its only drawback being more difficulty in managing focus.

A full Vig can tank HM FP's with tank gear. The vast majority of your defense stats comes from your gear. You don't even need to overgear to be able to do it.

 

But you never be be better than Full Defense and Hybrids.

That's exactly what I've been trying to say. I think Xia believes I'm saying Vigilance = full tank or hybrid, which I'm not. But at least compared to the other tank AC's, Guardian has the easiest time of being able to switch to tank stance, throw on tank gear and still make an effective tank, we are way less dependent on skills in our tank tree (which is why we complain so much about it).

That's exactly what I've been trying to say. I think Xia believes I'm saying Vigilance = full tank or hybrid, which I'm not. But at least compared to the other tank AC's, Guardian has the easiest time of being able to switch to tank stance, throw on tank gear and still make an effective tank, we are way less dependent on skills in our tank tree (which is why we complain so much about it).

Can you not see how you keep contradicting yourself here, by saying that they are not equal but then turning around and saying Vigilance is good enough?

The problem is, it's not effective. The differrence is obvious when you are healing. It only works for HM because the group is overgeared. Noobs are reading this crap, and thinking ,"Imma be a leet tank dat does teh big dps". Now half of the tanks dredged up by the group finder are someone trying to pull this hybrid garbage.

I can heal it, but it sucks the FUN out of healing. I.E. it is doable, but I get nothing from doing it. I will drop a group and requeue, not to have my time wasted. I will put players on my ignore list for being nasty about it.

With a goup of quality players in Tionese level gear ~ I have cleared every T1 HM FP boss without using my AoE heal at all. But if I respecced to bikini sage, and the same people knew it, they would vote kick me to the curb without batting an eye. & and I wouldn't blame them.

People playing healing specs are not rare in this game, not by a long shot. But during peak every 5 minutes in general chat it's "LF healer to finsh _____, from X boss" I will never again join one of these groups. Because their last healer, almost always, rage quit.

If the tool glitches and punts you into the tank roll when you queued as a dps,

the solution IS NOT to swap to tank gear.

It's to tell the group what happened,

ask them what they want to do,

and if necessary ~ requeue.

Quit wasting 3 other people's time because you're too impatient to requeue.

Parsers will not show you how many ignore lists you are on.

Cleet, please stop digging. You lost most of your credibility when you said that tank spec in DPS gear was better than DPS spec in tank gear.

I run a full BiS Guardian Hybrid tank. 18/23/0. I also run a 50 Assassin tank 31/0/10 and a 50 Sage Healer 31/7/3 so I also know about healing.

Going from Full Defence to Hybrid I lose:

- Guardian Slash

- Cyclonic sweeps (aka lol focus)

- Hilt Strike

- 4% Shield

- 4% Internal/Elemental resist

I gain:

- Blade Storm every 9 seconds instead of 15 - more uptime on Blade Barrier

- Free Force Sweep

- Overhead Slash which deals more threat per second than Guardian Slash and Hilt Strike combined.

- 4% Damage reduction against all damage including Elemental/Internal

- Unremitting (huge QoL increase, great for building initial threat and mitigation boost)

- Shien form for when tanking isn't required (Bonethrasher, Dailies, PvP, Infernal Council)

Despite those lists, what makes the biggest difference for a Guardian tank is tank gear. You can tank HM FPs as a Vig DPS in tank gear *IF* your tank gear is up to date. You CANNOT tank as a Defence spec in DPS gear past about level 30.

It is easier to heal a Hybrid Guardian because of the increased uptime of Blade Barrier. It is harder to play a Hybrid Guardian because Focus management becomes relevant.

All that said: DPS should never wear tank gear. The role of DPS is to kill quickly and tank gear works against that goal. If you need to emergency offtank just drop into Soresu, taunt and pop Blade Barricade at 50% hp. If the tank isn't back up or the boss isn't dead by the time you die its probably a wipe anyway. Faster killing prevents Enrage which prevents tanks being 1-2 shot. Do you job and DPS.

You've sacrificed a good bit of surge, but not enough to completely wreck your dps, and your crit is certainly good enough. But I am curious- what have you gotten your defense up to?

 

I can understand your sentiment for doing this. I've accidentally solo'd Colonel Daksh in Maelstrom Prison HM from 10% - 0%, for a group who decided the "right" way was just to get in his face ~ with my sage healer. My Healer is my main, and I leveled my Guardian just to figure out why the AC seemed to be so broken for tanking.

 

I'll add this just for those who still want to boost their dps as a tank - Feel free to swap your Guardian armorings for Might armorings later on, because your healers don't experience too much difference as your health grows beyond 20K or so. Just, please don't drop your defensive stats & mitigation talents. It's not the amount of damage you can take before falling that is important, in most cases it is really only the RATE at which you take damage. Tanks with smaller health pools are only slightly more difficult to heal without overheal. It can be violently spikey, and prone to failure because of interrupts, but it's a lot more fun than healing a squishy dps pretending to be a tank.

My defense is 15.66% currently while in shien stance.

My defense is 15.66% currently while in shien stance.

If you are going full dps, get rid of the defense. If you are doing this for the "Oh crap!" situation, simply switch to soresu and pop saber ward, taunt the boss. The tank should be back up and ready to go in those 10-15 secs. So that defense isn't needed at all.

While some hybrid builds are good, hybrid gear is bad. If you want to tank and dps, keep 2 seperate sets. Gearing is easy anyway.

My defense is 15.66% currently while in shien stance.

 

If you are going full dps, get rid of the defense. If you are doing this for the "Oh crap!" situation, simply switch to soresu and pop saber ward, taunt the boss. The tank should be back up and ready to go in those 10-15 secs. So that defense isn't needed at all.

 

While some hybrid builds are good, hybrid gear is bad. If you want to tank and dps, keep 2 seperate sets. Gearing is easy anyway.

Explains why my gear set has worked for me thus far...

I will be quite blunt, I've ended up getting stuck as the tank before due to the group que glitching, furthermore saber ward only lasts for a few seconds, while it is good to block off one hit or two, I would preferably like to be alive when the tank rejoins the fight.

Guardian DPS players in DPS gear are glass canons, you may deal a lot of damage but that doesn't do anyone any good if you die constantly from every large hit.

The defense stat for me will actually block some of those hits and the shield generator is always active, the trick is you want to use a shield generator with decent stats, not the cruddy one you can get as endgame gear.

My critical hit rate with buffs is 32.66% for melee, and over 39% for force attacks. I have a surge rate of over 69%. Plus my gear utilizes a mix of rakata, columi, and blackhole armor, hilt, enhancements, mods... It isn't full blackhole rated armor/hilt quality yet. Plus every piece of gear I have is augmented.

The gear isn't exactly inexpensive, but it is rather effective.

Explains why my gear set has worked for me thus far...

 

I will be quite blunt, I've ended up getting stuck as the tank before due to the group que glitching, furthermore saber ward only lasts for a few seconds, while it is good to block off one hit or two, I would preferably like to be alive when the tank rejoins the fight.

 

Guardian DPS players in DPS gear are glass canons, you may deal a lot of damage but that doesn't do anyone any good if you die constantly from every large hit.

 

The defense stat for me will actually block some of those hits and the shield generator is always active, the trick is you want to use a shield generator with decent stats, not the cruddy one you can get as endgame gear.

 

My critical hit rate with buffs is 32.66% for melee, and over 39% for force attacks. I have a surge rate of over 69%. Plus my gear utilizes a mix of rakata, columi, and blackhole armor, hilt, enhancements, mods... It isn't full blackhole rated armor/hilt quality yet. Plus every piece of gear I have is augmented.

 

The gear isn't exactly inexpensive, but it is rather effective.

It might work for you, but that doesn't mean it is optimal. I can DPS in my full tank gear. Why? Because its all 61 modded, augmented Rakata shells. However, I would put out MORE DPS in a Columi DPS set with my 61 MH and OH.

Similarly, a tank in Columi Tank gear is going to last longer than a tank in Campaign DPS gear.

Also the only thing that affects your shields effectiveness is how much Shield/Absorb you have. A higher tier shield is only going to prevent more damage IF it has more shield/absorb (or defence but that's not really the shield saving you damage). A higher tier shield just means more tech/force power.

Defence is a bad stat to stack. Its an all or nothing stat. You can die just as quickly with 90% defence as you can with 0% defence if you don't dodge anything. You're better off putting your extra 10 points into the Defence tree if you want to off tank. Pick up the cheaper riposte and Blade Barricade and you should get plenty of Defence. Chuck on a tank set (even Tionese) and your set. Maybe swap in some DPS pieces to help out with threat if your stuck with geared people.

Or you know, say: "I'm not actually a tank, GF just bugged again. I'll catch you guys later :)". Then ask them to vote kick you and requeue. Or just queue with an actual tank, then it doesn't matter if you get tagged as tank.