Hi All,

I'm looking at playing a tank at endgame, but I am unsure which will be the most fun. I have a Vanguard at 37 which is ok but they seem to lack cool downs compared to the guardian which I have at level 20.

Just to give you a bit of background I used to raid tank in WOW on a DK and loved it, due the amount of control and cool downs at my disposal. This is why I am thinking that a guardian may be better for my play style. I just find the vanguard a little too easy to play. What are your opinions?

Thanks

If you want a tank with a large number of incredibly strong cooldowns, go with a guardian. However, if you want a tank that actually uses its cooldowns frequently, roll a shadow. In tight content, I use my cooldowns (especially resilience) nearly on CD, and the CD timers are very short. Guardians have fantastic cooldowns for dealing with enrage (or other terrible moments), but they can't use these cooldowns as frequently or precisely as a shadow can use theirs.

Regarding general control and management tools, shadows and guardians are pretty competitive, with shadows getting the slightly better tool chain overall. (One more stun, an OOC mez and *both* a pull and a push). Vanguards are pretty lacking in this department as well.

In reference to rotation and threat generation (which is a serious role in this game, unlike WoW), shadows have an immensely simplistic rotation on live (arguably simpler even than a vanguard) and an immensely involved rotation and proc set in 2.0. Guardians have the most challenging rotation on live, and they are mathematically under-powered to boot, which lends a nice challenge to the class. Their rotation is mostly unchanged in 2.0, but it is much more effective. Vanguards are faceroll tanks on live, and they remain so in 2.0.

In terms of steady-state survivability, shadows have the most active mitigation of the three tanks by far. Vanguards are at the other end of the spectrum, with nearly all their mitigation falling into the passive category. Partially because of this, shadows are the most RNG-sensitive tanks with a fairly high spikiness. Vanguards are the opposite, and guardians sit right in the middle. In exchange though, shadows are the most efficient tanks to heal by a decent margin, while vanguards require the most healer output to remain HP neutral.

Overall, if you want a high-skill tank with a fantastic toolbox, roll a shadow. They great on live and even better in 2.0 (with a much higher skill floor to boot). Vanguards have been and will always be faceroll tanks, while guardians provide a nice challenge, a decent set of tools and a much lower skill floor than shadows (especially in 2.0). Guardians have the best cooldowns, but they don't get to use them very often. Shadow cooldowns are fantastic and on much shorter timers, but far more specialized. Vanguards have no cooldowns worthy of the name.

All three tanks are balanced, both on live and in 2.0. Honestly, roll the one you like the best!

Well, while the post before me is mostly correct, i think it lets the shadow/assassin look too good and the vanguard too bad (just my opinion). So i will add what i think what is missing.

While shadow/assassin is currently the best in theory, in 2.0 he is more spiky than before(keep in mind nothing is final yet).The problem with being spiky is that it can be really annoying to heal. So if u dont want to rely on good healers, shadow/assassin is maybe not the best choice for you.

Also shadow/assassins are not good in tanking large groups due to the dark warding mechanic.

One of the big threats while tanking can be wide spread groups(or dumb dds that atk anything in range) and vanguard has by far the best utility to deal with it.

Thats because they have a pull like the shadow, a charge like the guardian and the possibility to deal really good damage on 30 meter range(even good aoe on 30m).

Their active migation skills are bad no doubt, but in 2.0 this gets addressed, so this will be no weakness anymore in the future.

I never liked my guardian, but the post before is right in anything about them in my opinion.

 

Just to give you a bit of background I used to raid tank in WOW on a DK and loved it, due the amount of control and cool downs at my disposal.

 

Thanks

If this is the case, then you would enjoy Shadow/Sin. The extremely similar. Force pull = Death grip. Wither = Death and decay, Kinetic Ward = Bone Shield, etc. It also uses an active mitigation system. Assassin self healing does work a little different than Blood Shield did, but the results are the same. That's what led me to start with assassin at launch.... How similar it was to my DK

Don't you know? There isn't a fun tank to play. They all have to be down to a tenth of a decimal point to the perfect mitigation with the perfect rotation and priority system or you're a crappy tank.

At least that's the truth according to the number crunchers.

Don't you know? There isn't a fun tank to play. They all have to be down to a tenth of a decimal point to the perfect mitigation with the perfect rotation and priority system or you're a crappy tank.

 

At least that's the truth according to the number crunchers.

Welcome to every modern MMO these days . Math will always be king. People will always find the best way to play the game and others expect you to play that way, even the developers.

Welcome to every modern MMO these days . Math will always be king. People will always find the best way to play the game and others expect you to play that way, even the developers.

Funny thing is, I DON'T and still do an adequate job. I still hold most threat on mobs, never lose threat on bosses, and still have fun playing. Imagine that.

At least that's the truth according to the number crunchers.

Because it couldn't *possibly* be that the number crunchers actually *enjoy* the mathematical aspects of the game and aren't just out to ruin everyone else's time by adding math to a game. There's mathematical truth behind optimal play and performance. When people ask for the way to get the most out of a class, they call on number crunchers because the number crunchers can actually provide an answer (which is what I'm guessing your problem is).

Of course, no number cruncher is ever going to be able to answer questions of "fun" to any reasonable level of satisfaction, mainly because "fun", as I alluded to earlier, is both subjective and unquantifiable (since some people find the math/theory aspect of the game to be incredibly fun whereas others find it dull beyond belief). Everyone has different answers to what is "fun": some people like simple, some people like complex, some people like certain special effects. The only way to answer the question is to elaborate as to what aspects of play functionally define each class so that each person can make an educated guess about what they'll enjoy (which is pretty much exactly what's being done here). Some people find fun that their fun correlates with the effectiveness of their class. As such, it stands to reason that bringing up comparative performance would matter (especially since I've known more than a few tanks who stopped playing a tank specifically because the class they chose didn't live up to their expectations).

Because it couldn't *possibly* be that the number crunchers actually *enjoy* the mathematical aspects of the game and aren't just out to ruin everyone else's time by adding math to a game. There's mathematical truth behind optimal play and performance. When people ask for the way to get the most out of a class, they call on number crunchers because the number crunchers can actually provide an answer (which is what I'm guessing your problem is).

 

Of course, no number cruncher is ever going to be able to answer questions of "fun" to any reasonable level of satisfaction, mainly because "fun", as I alluded to earlier, is both subjective and unquantifiable (since some people find the math/theory aspect of the game to be incredibly fun whereas others find it dull beyond belief). Everyone has different answers to what is "fun": some people like simple, some people like complex, some people like certain special effects. The only way to answer the question is to elaborate as to what aspects of play functionally define each class so that each person can make an educated guess about what they'll enjoy (which is pretty much exactly what's being done here). Some people find fun that their fun correlates with the effectiveness of their class. As such, it stands to reason that bringing up comparative performance would matter (especially since I've known more than a few tanks who stopped playing a tank specifically because the class they chose didn't live up to their expectations).

While you may find number crunching to be enjoyable, and I have no problem with you doing it, it shouldn't be considered "standard" or "needed" in order to play the class. Like I said, I play my own way, and while it may not be optimal I still get the job done, and I still have fun while doing it.

And I'm sorry that I took a swing at you number crunchers, but I just got reamed by some DPS who looked at my stats and started calling me a crappy tank because I didn't have the optimal 30/50/50 mitigation split, even though we didn't wipe and I held threat the whole time. The healer even told him it was fine, but this guy really raised my hackles, but I shouldn't take it out on you. (And it was you specifically Kitru that this guy quoted.)

While you may find number crunching to be enjoyable, and I have no problem with you doing it, it shouldn't be considered "standard" or "needed" in order to play the class. Like I said, I play my own way, and while it may not be optimal I still get the job done, and I still have fun while doing it.

 

And I'm sorry that I took a swing at you number crunchers, but I just got reamed by some DPS who looked at my stats and started calling me a crappy tank because I didn't have the optimal 30/50/50 mitigation split, even though we didn't wipe and I held threat the whole time. The healer even told him it was fine, but this guy really raised my hackles, but I shouldn't take it out on you. (And it was you specifically Kitru that this guy quoted.)

Who ever said it was standard or needed? 80% of players probably never even look at the forums or for a class guide, and are happy to do things their own way. Some are effective, some aren't.

There will always be a handful of bonehead elitists who just spam on about numbers as the be-all, end-all, and those people usually reveal themselves to be sorely lacking in the "skill" category. They over-focus on numbers to direct focus away from shortcomings in ability.

That said, there *is* an advantage to knowing what the theorycrafters have done, even if you don't care to do everything exactly the same way. For example, it's pretty well known that significant investment in Accuracy (or Alacrity or Surge) over Shield rating for a tank yields basically no tangible benefits but sizable drawbacks.

It's probably a bit less important to worry about the exact split of Defense vs. Absorb if you're a more casual player, and if you like a more HP-heavy build because of a lack of confidence in random PUG healers, you at least have a reasonable justification for doing something the theorycrafters might consider sub-optimal.

If you're doing something that's just flat-out silly, your groupmates are within their rights to call attention to it, as their time and effort is equally valuable compared to yours. If your gear or tactics drastically increase their time investment (with no corresponding increased reward for doing so), you're putting your own needs ahead of the group's and that breaks the basic social contract you implicitly enter into upon joining said group.

Perfect itemization isn't required for efficient play (especially on everything other than the absolute cutting-edge progression content), and should not be considered a table-stakes requirement. Complete ignorance of game systems, on the other hand, does tend to lead to drastically inefficient play and a negative impact on the fun the rest of the group is having. A happy middle ground is what everyone should strive for at the minimum (having an idea of what they're doing and how their gear & tactics contribute to group success), and if a small percentage of the population wants to swing for the fences, they are entitled to do so, but not entitled to hold everyone else to the same standards, especially in PUGged content.

"i was a death knight tank in wow and i find vangaurds to easy" the op said...to those of that come from wow i belive thats we would all agree thats an EPIC contradiction of terms. unless DKs got nerfed to death after cata(id left by then)

ok on topic fun tank, there all fun i play all 3 types here prefer the vangaurd as i find them very enjoyable to tank with and a good Mdps when the guild needs me to swich roles in ops

To the OP: overall KBN did an excellent job comparing the 2 but I'll make a few adjustments.

If you include out of combat utility the Shadow wins hands down. Stealth plus Sap is just amazing.

If you only look at in combat utility though, Guardians get a lot closer and IMO surpass Shadows. 2 stuns (Stasis and Hilt Strike) and an AoE 6s Mezz compared to Shadows Stun and knockdown. For knocking things off a ledge Shadow is better with its AoE KB and Pull is much easier to use for positioning mobs than Push but both tanks can deal with groups in their own way. That said, all that is only really for trash since stuns, push and pull have no effect on bosses.

For grouped up (and grouping up) mobs Shadow is king of AoE. If the pulls are infrequent and tightly bunched to start with Vanguard pulls ahead and Guardians have always and will always have more trouble with groups than the other 2 thanks to the 4m range and the huge number of ranged enemies in SWTOR. Shadow and VG can group up mobs and establish decent threat in about 5s, Guardians take about 9s before they're in a decent position group threat wise.

In terms of CDs: Guardians have always been the kings of clutch CDs and come 2.0 we'll be better able to use them more proactively as well. With Saber Reflect being introduced and the CDs on Saber Ward and Warding Call being reduced we're in a much better place. Shadows are also getting Combat Readiness buffed to be a real CD but the other Shadow CDs are mutually exclusive. Resilience is godly sometimes, Deflection is awesome sometimes but if you use the wrong one it does nothing. Resilience is really the biggest draw card for raiding Shadows and I'm yet to evaluate how well Saber Reflect really compares when raiding due to the ambiguous 'single target' description.

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And I'm sorry that I took a swing at you number crunchers, but I just got reamed by some DPS who looked at my stats and started calling me a crappy tank because I didn't have the optimal 30/50/50 mitigation split, even though we didn't wipe and I held threat the whole time. The healer even told him it was fine, but this guy really raised my hackles, but I shouldn't take it out on you. (And it was you specifically Kitru that this guy quoted.)

My personal expectation is that people like this are going to use anything to hand to justify a general a**hattery towards other players. If this guy didn't have any number crunching to fall back on, he'll find another excuse to belittle others.

In my experience, there isn't anything in this game that requires the most perfectest optimalest bestest to be able to beat. That said, I really happen to like the min-maxing approach of end game. I don't bother at all while leveling, it's all about the experience. But once I've got a hard-won drop and I have to decide which piece of gear I want to get with it, I really like to think my way through and not make bad choices I'll regret later.

I suppose it helps that I like math, and video games, so it all sort of dovetails.

While you may find number crunching to be enjoyable, and I have no problem with you doing it, it shouldn't be considered "standard" or "needed" in order to play the class. Like I said, I play my own way, and while it may not be optimal I still get the job done, and I still have fun while dlong it.......(break)......., even though we didn't wipe and I held threat the whole time. The healer even told him it was fine, but this guy really raised my hackles, but I shouldn't take it out on you. (And it was you specifically Kitru that this guy quoted.)

I actually kinda find this ironically funny that the DPS quoted Kitru when trying to bust you out about not being at the "optimal standard". Because *Kitru* doesn't even use a "standard" build. His is actually very customized to suit his preference and play style. There are other threads where these same number crunchers even discuss the fact that there is flexibility to it all and that personal preference (Kitru used the term ideology) comes into play. So unless you have some sort of MAJOR number disparity going on .....then "optimal" is "flexible". It's the lazy ones that are not willing to put forth any effort to read beyond the first set of numbers they find.... They're the ones that will be the first to criticize you for not having those numbers.

You said you didn't wipe.... No threat issues... Sounds like the only problem was the DPS was just an elitist douche.