Today’s video includes two 1v1 fights from Star Wars: The Old Republic with my 50 Trooper Vanguard @ Valor Rank 57, 16.1k HP.
My opponents:
- Sith Warrior Juggernaut, tank spec’d, with 16k HP
- Sith Inquisitor Assassin, tank spec’d, with 17.5k HP
In this video I am using my “Iron Fist” 25/14/2 PVP tank spec:
- Powertech: http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#301GRGozRroMZMcrroZb.1
- Vanguard: http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#801GRGozRroMZMcrroZb.1
For more information about Powertech / Vanguard PVP, please refer to my free in-depth Guide.
To see me PVP’ing live, check out my TwitchTV channel. My stream features real-time commentary – and to the extent possible interaction with the Chat Room.
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Taugrim's MMO Blog 
Interesting fights. I don’t tank spec but don’t know why the Assassin wouldn’t at least escape from you – and then open on you when you are not ready.
Force Cloak + Force Shroud = he gets away.
Am I forgetting something?
You know the Assassin class better than I do.
He might have thought he would wear me down, as it looks like he has the better gear, and his tanking stance procs a heal. IIRC the tooltip at 50 for the heal is ~1.4k, and while there is an internal cooldown of 4.5 sec it is a significant amount of healing in a 1v1.
He might have thought he could win, but, especially between two tanks, this is not fast exchange. He should have (easily) recognized the fight was lost 75% into it and reset it.
Lets face it. If you get the jump on an assassin you should “win” or at least force them to retreat. But that’s one of the giant strengths of a stealth class is choosing the time and place of your fights. Given that he still got you to 20% health, I think a stealth + reset of the fight should have resulted in a win for him.
It reminds me of some of the forum wars in Rift in which rogues complained about cleric survivability. And I answered “yes but I can’t kill you unless you let me. A rogue can always get away”. And its the same case here. He “let” you kill him.
Currently there is quite a bit of complaining about assassins being underpowered on the forums but I find it hard to evaluate if people are not going to actually play to the strengths of their class.
Hi Taugrim, impressive video. Keep up the good work. I am specced almost in the same way than you and I am currently lvl 49 wearing basically the lvl 40 pvp stuff. What would you recommend in terms of armor when I am 50 (beside the Champion, centurion stuff)? Should I do a lot of questing on Correlia (have not been there yet) to improve my equip or skip that and try to find stuff in the AH (which is not easy since there are only afew vangurad pieces at ridiculous prices)?
As you are 49 it’s a bit late now but, after getting level 40 gear and your 1000 merc comm, you should buy level 46 weapons to steal the enhancement mod out of it. Triumphant Enhancement 20. It gives 25 expertise and require level 45. They will last you a long time as purple PvP armors don’t have expertise in that slot and you’ll want at least 500 expertise.
BM set has 24 endurance, 51 accuracy and 37 critical rating (or 40 endurance, 51 accuracy and 20 power). The weapon enhancement is 25 expertise, 16 endurance and 23 power. Accuracy is not really useful, especially the tons you get so that’s not a real loss. -8 endurance and -37 crit rating vs 25 expertise and 20 power is, imho, a good deal.
That said, some Champion parts (helm and gloves) have +38 Endurance +19 Power +48 Surge Rating which probably is the best enhancement for us past 500+ expertise.
You shouldn’t have to buy anything. Level 40 pvp gear is fine and you’ll get a token for the slot you just spent credits on (see murphy’s law). All I did was to replace armor/mods with lvl 49 blue ones (I was cybertech which helped though) and, obviously, use the level 45 expertise enhancement. Having ~4% expertise at level 49 is quite nice so enjoy it while it lasts :D
NoGoal thanks much for this and other very helpful comments you’ve posted on this blog.
Absolutely love following your pvp tips, Taugrim. This is the first MMO I’ve really gotten into pvp and I am learning a lot from watching you. I realize you mostly play your trooper but is there a chance we could get some more Juggernaut tips from you as well?
Wall of text crits you for 10k!
I would be in a better position to give you tips on Juggernaut if I played that or Guardian.
Right now my focus is getting to Valor 60 which is only 1.5 ranks away.
After that I’ll be playing my Sentinel.
lol wall of text or not it still speaks the truth man and truth crits u back for 20k:P !
Hey Taugrim!
lol dont get me wrong man but after watching this video i am urged to speak my opinion about it. its my personal opinion and only and i dont itend to offend or whatever. as i see in ur first fight with the juggernaut u finished the guy easier than u finished the assassin. Though i noticed that this juggernaut didnt rly know how to play his class as he didnt throw his saber to u at all, he used his bubbles in a wrong way(bad coordination), he didnt use any ccs to u unless force choke- correct me if i am wrong here and most importantly he didnt use his slow on u in order to close the gap come closer to u and start nuking. he did so only for 1 time but it was too late. Plus u used a strong healing pot when he dropped u at like 63% of ur hp whereas he had abit more than u like 71% to get healed for like 25% and go near 90%. My point is i believe that u would have lost this fight without the use of pot against low skilled player cause ok anyone can see that this guy sucks big time from the point he didnt use his aoe slow on u to close the gap and nuke. I wont talk about the second fight at all but i want to say that alright anyone can make a vid in which he is slaying low skilled players and post it on the web and that i never seeing u playing a class which actually takes skill to be played (rb/pally warrior was a joke back in rift and i could see u running with a healing bot most of the times in ur videos-healing cleric was rly good at healing which was all u could do with it, prot pally back in wow was faceroll and now trooper vanguard aint skill-demanding tbh. i meet loads of troopers in wzs most of them do well not because they are rly good at them but cause the class is op and lets face it ur class is op- sick burst dmg, high surviveability with a few heals, loads of crowd controls and bubble=god modexD). like already said above this is just my opinion mate dont want u to get me wrong but thats what i believing by watching ur progress since u gave a guide for prot pally. Still a huge fan of urs but how to put it…i would like to see u playing a class which will take a bit of skill to get it going… Thanks!
Hey dude, don’t know if you remember me but its Sinnyil (Sinnzerbib, Sinnzerbig) from WAR. Just wanted to drop you a note that the assassin you fought there was just..bad. Like made me cringe bad. As a (mostly) full time shadow tank, I can tell you right away that that guy had no idea what he was doing. Two big tells: He used force lightning more often than was absolutely necessary (you can heal after 3…shocks? I think that’s what its called). And he used maul (the backstab). Either he has the talents that make maul worthwhile, in which case he has a terrible build for an assassin tank, or he just decided to deplete half of his force for very little damage for no reason. More likely the latter.
A shame we can’t copy characters to PTS so I can show you how a real double bladed tank works :)
Oh, and as others said, the fact that he didn’t cloak out of there and reengage is also a big sign, not to mention his footwork. Painful to watch.
good to know that the public opinion also believes that:)
Does guard apply the same type of damage as that being received by the guarded target?
Also I am going the Iron Fist build, and I wondering what is the comparison between 1 point in Shield Vents vs 1 point in Rebraced Armor. It seems like small chance to vent heat, 21% chance to shield.. then 25% chance of that. So approx. 5% chance to vent 8 heat. Seems rather weak.
Not sure, still haven’t tested.
Invest 2 points in Shield Vents, that is what I’ve been experimenting with, and it’s worthwhile in 1.1.3.