STR/WIS... Really thinking about it.... Opinions?

[SpineDoc]

<p>I am 69, almost 70 and have been STR/STA my entire life.  Now I really started thinking about STR/WIS and talking about it with one of our guild raid guards who has this setup.  I see so many advantages, do they outweigh the loss of dps from STA?</p><p>So.... STA versus WIS.  STA has increased dps, some avoidance, and the end ability to regain power.</p><p> WIS seems juicier the more I look at it though.</p><p>Increased resists with inc wis, and increased power pool, no small thing for a guardian.</p><p>belly smash seems nice with the mitigation reduction for mobs, maybe more useful than executioners strike which I could never tell if it was working, it may get mixed in with the crits from my slaughtering end ability</p><p>Straight up DPS increase (I wonder how much in relation to STA)</p><p>Mitigation increase (I have been told it is substantial, opinions?)</p><p>The final ability just seems to rock IMO, at least on paper.  Use defensive stance with no offensive penalties.  Plus think about the hunker ability here, at level 69 and adept 3 my hunker grants 966 of mitigation.  With 5 AA point into the hunker ability that means you can have hunker on for 45 seconds out of every minute, thats an extra 1k dps 75% of the time!!  Dont forget no attack/speed penalties with hunker, so this is a free 1k of mit.</p><p>Last, we get to be guardians again, using our tower shields again with the increased mit it brings, and with the now damage free tower of stone it's that much better.  Some may say TOS is a class defining ability.  But for me the best thing maybe just being a guardian again with a tower shield.</p><p> This is not a debate about STR at all, but rather about STA versus WIS to complement STR.  What do you guys think?</p>

[Sir_Halbarad]

IMO WIS is still the weakest line to choose if you plan on tanking... especially raid tanking. Let me try to answer your questions in order... _ Increased resists. Resists work like Mitigation. Everything beyond 6k is a waste. Besides... Normally the 28 (?) WIS you get from WIS1 isnt producing that much. _ Belly Smash Belly Smash would be nice if it worked on epic mobs. The Belly Smash in itself works but the knockdown it requires normally doesnt. _ DPS Increase The DPS increase is nice, but compared to 60ish double attack, imo it is [Removed for Content]. Besides, there are so many other ways to get your dps up. Adornments, items, buffs from grp. _ Mitigation increase With legendary gear you are where you need to be in a right grp for grp stuff... For Raids you just need Set Gear or Relic to get started... You enter the diminishing curve so early, mitigation shouldnt be a worry. Sad, but true. _ Final WIS ability May Rock on paper. In reality, I think this AA was made for dumb zerkers. As a Guard, you have your own melee skill buff and there are so many classes buffing melee skills that you should be able to get one of those in your grp. Or even better, get a defensive (Templar, Defiler, Warden, Mystic) and an offensive (Fury, Inquisitor) healer in your grp and run in offensive stance (You shouldnt pair clerics and druids of course). Offensive Stance ups your dps by quite a bit while not crippling your survivability by much. If you have problems, as a Guard you have enough tools to help spike damage anyway. Things you can use pre-pull as well (Command, Wall of Force, Tower of Stone, Stone Sphere). Don't forget you can switch dances very fast as well. Offensive stance means dps = aggro. If you have the right grp, you can use Wall of Force without needing to worry about the - dps you get. And you shouldnt worry about the slow... because... well, you pull - so you shouldnt need to move when people start attacking. Oh, and that 1k mitigation wall of force (hunker down as you called the level 14 (?) spell) gives you relates to a really [Removed for Content] amount of "real" mitigation if you have more than slacker treasured gear and a half way balanced grp. _ Tower Shield / Tower of Stone Tower Shields don't bring mitigation unless they have + Crush/Slash/Pierce. The Shield Factor you may be relating to is just modifying block chance. Oh, and Tower of Stone isnt damage free yet (at least it wasn't in MIS tonight). For me, my Guardian doesn't feel less "guardian'ish" by not having a tower shield equipped. I feel like a Guardian when I keep the mob's hate on me against insane dps numbers. SOE chose to design it that our (all fighters) taunts are gimped (1 damage = 1 hate) so you cant really rely on those. You need to do damage to fill your role: Keeping the mob's attention. To survive the damage the mob deals, you have enough tools. Personally, I chose dps. Because I have enough options to go very defensive on pulls if needed (defensive stance, command, tower of stone) and make sure our dps classes do not have to hold back when the debuffs are in (offensive stance, buckler, reinforcement). Not sure whether this is what people here agree with, but my guild and me are happy campers <img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

[SpineDoc]

Thanks for the great points halbarad.  It's one thing to see things on paper, quite another to hear someones experiences.  I know WIS is not mentioned much around here and was wondering why.  The 1k of mitigation with the hunker ability seemed to look good on paper, does it scale to much less at high mitigations?

[Sir_Halbarad]

Going from 6k to 7k (in raid grps) adds what? 0.5%? Not sure since I am not in game...

[Ferunnia]

You shouldn't pair clerics and druids? Why the hell not? <img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> We druids mix well with either of the archtypes. Even mix decently with wardens, whereas shamans or clerics paired with their good/evil counterparts take a real healing hit.

[Ep]

wis line is a waste, unless your pvp for that debuff otherwise ignore the line, treat it like the crusaders treat that horse required aa, they don't even bother.

[Sir_Halbarad]

<cite>Ferunnia wrote:</cite><blockquote>You shouldn't pair clerics and druids? Why the hell not? <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY<img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />" /> We druids mix well with either of the archtypes. Even mix decently with wardens, whereas shamans or clerics paired with their good/evil counterparts take a real healing hit. </blockquote>What I meant is a Templar/Inquisitor or Warden/Fury Combo <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />Of course a Cleric and a Druid are a good combo <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

[Kasar]

I used str/wis for a while.  The primary reason was the 328 or something like that in mitigation I didn't have the gear to make up for.  If you're starting out with just xegonite and have a regular group to help you get gear, you might use it purely for the mit, then as soon as possible respec to something else.  Soloing with that build was just sad.  The DPS difference compared to the buckler line's obvious without a parser.

[Wilin]

<cite>SpineDoc wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>The final ability just seems to rock IMO, at least on paper.  Use defensive stance with no offensive penalties.  Plus think about the hunker ability here, at level 69 and adept 3 my hunker grants 966 of mitigation.  With 5 AA point into the hunker ability that means you can have hunker on for 45 seconds out of every minute, <b>thats an extra 1k dps 75% of the time</b>!!  Dont forget no attack/speed penalties with hunker, so this is a free 1k of mit.</p></blockquote>It looks that way on paper, but it's not. The recast timer on buffs (and Wall of Force is a buff) does not start until the buff expires. So, at the end of the 45s buff, you have to wait 1 minute for recast.

[Edori]

<p>I have tried a multitude of different scenarios and mixtures of the AA lines.  I am just going to explain my own AAs and my reasoning behind them, and please feel free to let me know of any minor adjustments you might recommend<img src="http://forums.station.sony.com/eq2/images/smilies/e8a506dc4ad763aca51bec4ca7dc8560.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" width="15" height="15" />.  </p><p>Of course I took the strength line 4/4/6/8/1:  First two is self explanatory, just working to get too the last three.  The strength line of course is all about aggro/hate gain, and the Executioners Fury is always a nice kick during pulls to build that initial aggro while letting the dps/support classes debuff away.</p><p>For my second line I ended up going with 4/5/6/8/1 Intelligence line.  Primary reasoning behind this is because Acceleration Strike and Slayers Speed are great to have in order to speed up attack speed, therefore gaining even more aggro faster.  Guardians should never have mitigation issues in a raid situation so I felt that a full 8 points into increasing my parry (aka avoidance) would be the best bet.  Lastly the increase to recovery and reuse timers rocks.  I used it for awhile testing it out and then respecced and though the difference is only a second or two faster, over long named fights all of those little seconds build up and make a drastic difference.</p>

[Bantel]

<cite>Edori@Everfrost wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>....I took the strength line 4/4/6/8/1:  </p></blockquote><p>From a raiding perspective:If you have a Dirge and a Coercer in your group, then I wouldn't go past str 4,4,8. This would be 16 points spent to get the crit boost. To maximize this AA choice, you need a slow weapon with a large spread between the min damage and max damage, with the max damage as high as possible.</p><p>It is generally accepted, based on old Dev posts, that there is a maximum cap of 50% hate buff, and 50% hate transfer.</p><p>With a Coercer and Dirge buffing hate, you are over the 50% hate buff cap already, which makes any points spent in the STR 4th ability wasted points.</p><p>The STR end ability assumes you are under 50% health. Your healers should never allow that to hapen for more than a second or two, so you will get very little, if any, use from this ability.</p>