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Tell about all 3 tank class difference in gameplay.


Varlak

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Gaurdian/Juggernaut has some of the best defensive cooldowns (not to slight Hold The Line/Hydraulic Overrides).

 

Vanguard/Powertech has a few mechanisms to improve dps that the other two tank archetypes lack, mostly because those rely on being hit more so than VG/PT. They do have access to one of the best cooldowns to ignore knockback/snare/root mechanics with Hold the Line/Hydraulic Overrides.

 

Shadows/Assassins have stealth, with all of its attendant benefits, and they have access to Resilience/Shroud which allows you to ignore many boss mechanics, but I find its one of the squishiest (at least since the force speed nerf).

 

Personally I think the set bonuses options are the best for VG/PT. The Guardian/Jugg options are kinda lackluster especially for tanking. Of course, the new design for gear is that under the concept of horizontal progression there shouldn't be a clear-cut, best-in-slot, set bonus. Whether or not that's true in practice, I just think the options for VG/PT that can be easily obtained are a little better than G/J.

 

Right Price is still a good set for optimizing your tank damage output, even though Emergency Power is considered the best in slot as far as mitigation goes. VG/PT can also use Squad Leader with another 2-pc as an additional option, and the Strategist set can be helpful against lots of adds. Don't get me wrong, I love Descent of the Fearless, I just find it procs a lot more often when I use it on Vigi/Veng rather than tank spec ... I'm guessing its because the dot ticks can proc, and because I'm at a 1.4 second global cooldown in dps but 1.5s in tank spec.

 

 

I think the dot-dps specs for Guardians/Juggernauts ... in the form of Vigilance/Vengeance ... are the most fun to play, with the dot-dps spec for VG/PT ... in the form of Plasmatech/Pyrotech ... an extremely close second. I just find those two dps specs to be a little more fun to play than Infiltration/Deception (and I have never tried Serenity/Hatred). So, if being able to swap between tank or dps is important to you, then perhaps this is something to consider.

 

Story is very very personal, of course, so the following is only my opinion. I prefer the Force-user stories over the non-Force users, at least considering the entire game as a whole.

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First of all I play Assassin most and longest, but also have a Jugg and a PT.

 

For me playing Assassin/Shadow is the most active way of tanking, as in it's necessary to keep track of dark ward/bullwark stacks, build stacks of harnessed shadow and use them is a constant throughout the fight. I have to know when to use which CD because most work only against specific kinds of incoming damage. Though it isn't as bad as it once was, in comparison as relying more on avoidance in general, the assassin still is a bit spiky. If attacks get through your defensive stats without being mitigated it can really hurt and is harder to predict for healers when they need to focus on you, because one time your defensive rolls are good you get next to no damage, the other time you get unlucky and suddenly get rather big hits. But as I said it's better than it was, the better you manage your various stacks of the active defensive buffs, the better your damage income profile is. Mess up there though the healers will notice it fast.

Threat generation especially against groups is rather easy, single target is good too. Stealthing out off fight has some interesting uses here and there, though you need to know when and how to do it or bosses will run amok at the worst moment.

 

The other force related tank can keep up active defensive buffs too of course but it is not as essential as with the Assassin, you abilities give you defensive buff and you should keep them up, but it's not stack management like the assassin that you can mess up.

The classic Jugg works very well with the defense stat and has generally a bit more damage reduction through armor and sort of more passive reductions built in. His defensive CDs have a bit more general use and are a bit like fire and forget compared to the Assassin. From my experience, if you have a player either still new to tanking or just bad they will take less damage with a Jugg than an equally played assassin. Threat generation on single target is good, personally I often have trouble catching add spawns, but them I'm used to the easy Assassin there and probably am just bad at it with the Jugg.

From a healer point of view the Jugg is more predictable to heal than an assassin and using CDs in the right moment literally is invincible for a short time, giving healers time to heal you up, take care of the group or the other tank.

 

I don't play PT very often and not much at all since 6.0 so some of this might be a bit outdated.

Threat generation on groups is similar to assassin and single target also not much of an issue. In general due to doing a bit more damage while tanking the PT supposedly has it easiest to built threat without much use of taunt and has a small advantage with bosses you can't taunt or need to reserve taunt for specific moments.

The PT has even more passive damage reduction built into the spec/abilities than the Jugg. Coming from the Assassin for me it often feels like just standing there and soak up the damage though, which works great and throwing all those punches and fire at bosses is fun, but a lot of what you are doing there is more for dishing out damage than for increasing your own defenses, which as a principle just isn't for everyone. As phalczen already mentioned, the PT is less reliant to get hit for his resource management so more fun to play when being on off tank duty.

The following also is to be taken with a grain of salt since I haven't healed that many PTs lately, but in general PTs are heavier relying reducing damage through shielding, they'd get more attacks in but the damage that comes through is lower and smoother to heal as it is simply more predictable/constant even if it is more damage over all. 6.0 finally got rid of the big weakness PTs had for a long time, significant defensive CDs, so special attacks from bosses aren't an issue any longer.

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