SWTOR 4.0 Vigilance Guardian DPS Guide by Rydarus

SWTOR 4.0 Vigilance Guardian DPS guide written by Rydarus of The Ebon Hawk.

NOTE TO JUGGERNAUTS: Vengeance guide isn’t up yet due to finagling with the tables.

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Introduction to the Vigilance Guardian

Hey, Rydarus here, rewriting this guide for another go around. You’ll notice a lot of information remains the same, but I’ve adjusted a lot of crucial points that I feel I failed to bring up in prior versions of the guide, and solidified my mentality in running the spec.

A few notes:

I’m now focusing full time on an “Alacrity” based guide. It may very well be not the only way to run this Discipline, but it’s the way I do it, and it’s what I’m going to teach. Guardians have transitioned from being a very decent Melee dps in 3.0, to being more of a Focus Sentinel during the 2.0 tier. We have amazing AOE, but weak single target and higher immobility. We have mediocre burst and mediocre sustained DPS, but again, we have very strong AOE. The spec is still immensely fun to play however, and with a bit of upkeep and work, you too can bring it into HM and NiM raiding.

Defensive Cooldowns

Cooldown: 45 seconds Range: 20 Meters

Blade Blitz Increases your Defense and Resist chance by 100% and dashes you forward 20 meters, dealing minor damage to everyone in your path. Sends you where your body is facing, not where your camera is facing.

	Duration:10 seconds Cooldown: 1 minute	Enure: Increases your maximum HP by 30% for a short period of time. Commanding Awe (from Vigilance): Enure grants the character 15% Damage Reduction True Harmony (Heroic Utility): 50% movement speed and immunity to movement impairing effects.
	Duration: 12 seconds Cooldown: 3 minutes	Saber Ward: Increases Melee and Ranged Defense by 100% for 2 seconds (Blade Turning) and Melee Ranged Defense by 100% for 12 seconds at the same time, as well as granting 25% Damage Reduction to Force and Tech attacks.
	Duration: 3 seconds Cooldown: 1 minute With Daunting Presence Duration: 5 seconds	Saber Reflect: All Ranged, Force, and Tech direct attacks are reflected back at the attacker.
	Duration: 10 seconds Cooldown: 2 minutes With Through Peace Cooldown: 1.5 minutes	Focused Defense: Heals for a significant amount upon damage taken. Every time you take damage, one stack of Focused Defense is consumed. Has 12 charges.
	Cooldown: 20 seconds With Intercessor: Cooldown: 15 seconds	Guardian Leap: Leaps you at any targeted Ally, reducing their damage taken by 20% and reducing their threat by an insane amount. Damage reduction and threat reduction increased with the utility Intercessor.

Cooldown: 45 seconds Duration: 15 Seconds

Challenging Call (Commanding Awe) Decreases your threat by a moderate amount and decreases your Area of Effect Damage taken by 60% for the next 15 seconds.

Discipline Utilities

Utilities can vary, but these are a few recommended basic builds. You will never need a build outside of these. None of the new 4.0 utilities are useful at all for PVE. Not a single one.

Skillful / Masterful / Heroic

Traditional Build (Sparky, Malaphar, Sword Squadron, Revanite Commanders, Underlurker SM, Master Blaster, Revan SM, Coratanni SM)

• Republic: Battlefield Command, Unremitting, Narrowed Focus, Trailblazer / Purifying Sweep / Through Peace, True Harmony
• Empire: Warmonger, Unstoppable, Deadly Reprisal, Pathcarver / Crushing Fist / Through Passion, Through Power

The Reflector (Bulo, Torque, Karraga The Unyielding)

• Republic: Battlefield Command, Unremitting, Narrowed Focus, Trailblazer / Purifying Sweep / Daunting Presence, True Harmony
• Empire: Warmonger, Unstoppable, Deadly Reprisal, Pathcarver / Crushing Fist / Intimidating Presence, Through Power

The Slayer of the Ruined World (Colossal Monolith)

• Republic: Battlefield Command, Unremitting, Narrowed Focus, Second Wind / Purifying Sweep / Daunting Presence, True Harmony
• Empire: Warmonger, Unstoppable, Deadly Reprisal, Payback / Crushing Fist / Intimidating Presence, Through Power

Avenger (Underlurker HM)

• Republic: Battlefield Command, Unremitting, Narrowed Focus, Trailblazer / Purifying Sweep, Gather Strength / True Harmony
• Empire: Warmonger, Unstoppable, Deadly Reprisal, Pathcarver / Crushing Fist, Pooled Hatred / Through Power

Revanchist (Revan HM)

• Republic: Battlefield Command, Unremitting, Narrowed Focus, Defiance / Purifying Sweep, Gather Strength / True Harmony
• Empire: Warmonger, Unstoppable, Deadly Reprisal, Unyielding / Crushing Fist, Pooled Hatred / Through Power

Rating

• Single Target Dps: 6
• AoE Damage: 10
• Group Utility: 6
• Rotation Difficulty: 7.5
• RNG Dependant: Somewhat on a few abilities.
• Burst: 6
• Sub 30% Talent or Ability Buffs: No (Execute available before 30% and execute very marginal in increase of damage)

Gearing Methodology:

My gearing method is upon which my guide is based. I make no claims that it is optimal, it’s just how I play. (However I highly suspect it’s close to optimal if it isn’t already.)

• 6PC VINDICATOR Set Bonus from 4.0 (The old bonus is NOT WORTH KEEPING). No other set bonus is superior, keep it, love it.
• 684 Accuracy is the cap, not 682. 685 gets you to 100.01% Accuracy.
• I dislike going under the accuracy cap because it’s not raid realistic, as such I do not use Bant’s numbers. (Though otherwise I think they are fine.) Note that one lucky crit will more than make up for the difference between Bant’s numbers and my numbers, but my gear gets you raid security.
• This gear is for RAIDING, not DUMMY PARSING. I don’t give two shits if your gear gets you 8k DPS, if you can’t pull good numbers in a raid, that dummy parse is meaningless to me. Capeche?
• No Alacrity isn’t bad, yes, Mastery Augments are shit. No I’m not doing a Basic gearing build this time around.
• Crit isn’t bad. Seriously. It’s amazing. No Power or Mastery Augments.
• Please no defense mods. Should be self explanatory but people ask me these things. All mods are power. Plz.
• Unlettered Lethal Mods, Adept, Initiative, and Quick Savant Enhancements are all the modifications you should ever have. If you have ANYTHING else, you’re doing it wrong.
• About the Suggested Setup: Only the 224 and the 220 are actually optimal, the goal is to get you to the optimal gear ASAP with minimal hairpulling and pain on your part. If you get different drops and stuff, adjust your gear accordingly, but as long as you are approximate to these ratings, you’re fine. (except for accuracy, that needs to be what it is in the guide).

Enhancements and Augment Setup to get to BiS in 224s:

208 Goal

2 Initiative Enhancements + 6 Accuracy Augments = 712 Accuracy Rating

3 Quick Savant Enhancements + 6 Alacrity Augments= 849 Alacrity Rating

5 Adept Enhancements + 2 Critical Augments = 831 Critical Rating

216 Goal

2 Initiative Enhancements+ 6 Accuracy Augments = 742 Accuracy Rating

3 Quick Savant Enhancements + 6 Alacrity Augments = 894 Alacrity Rating

5 Adept Enhancements + 2 Critical Augments = 902 Critical

220 goal

2 Initiative Enhancements + 5 Accuracy Augments =685 Accuracy Rating

3 Quick Savant Enhancements + 5 Alacrity Augments =845 Alacrity Rating

5 Adept Enhancements + 4 Critical Augments = 1092 Critical Rating

224 goal

2 Initiative Enhancements + 5 Accuracy Augments = 701 Accuracy Rating

3 Quick Savant Enhancements + 6 Alacrity Augments = 869 Alacrity

5 Adept Enhancements + 2 Critical Augments = 1132 Critical Rating

What you need to know beforehand

Before we begin to learn the rotation of the Vigilance rotation itself, you first have to commit to memory the various “Procs” that generate various outcomes and abilities in Vigilance. There are 4 Major Procs and Passive Effects in Vigilance and 1 Minor Proc.

Major Procs and Passive Effects

Abilities (Not a priority system. Cooldowns are an approximation and ARE AFFECTED by Alacrity)

	Cooldown: 8.2 seconds Requires: 4 Focus Consumes: 3 Focus Range: 0-4M	Overhead Slash: Does high Melee Kinetic damage with a 6 second Force Elemental Damage over Time effect that does moderate damage. This Damage over Time effect can be spread by Burning Storm! Generates one stack of Force Rush. Each tick of the Damage over Time effect has a 30 percent to generate Keening.
	Cooldown: 11 seconds Requires: 5 Focus Consumes: 1 Focus Range: 0-4M	Plasma Brand: Does high force elemental damage on initial application with a 12 second Elemental Damage Over Time Effect that deals high Damage. This Damage over Time effect can be spread by Burning Storm! Generates one stack of Force Rush and resets the cooldown on Blade Dance. Each tick of the Damage over Time effect has a 30 percent to generate Keening.
	Cooldown: 8.2 seconds Requires: 4 Focus Consumes: 3 Focus Range: 0-10M	Blade Storm: Does moderate Kinetic Force damage on initial application with an elemental force damage over time effect of 6 seconds. This Damage over Time effect can be spread by Burning Storm! Each tick of the Damage over Time effect has a 30 percent to generate Keening. With the 6pc Set Bonus, Blade Storm grants Vindicator’s Critical Bonus, increasing critical chance of your next Overhead Slash by 100%.
	Normal: Cooldown: 16.4s Activation Range: 0-4M Channel Time: 2.74 seconds With Zen Strike proper usage Cooldown: 11s	Blade Dance: Is the Traditional cornerstone of the Vigilance Guardian and deals a significant portion of your single target damage. Plasma Brand resets the cooldown on Blade Dance.
	General: Range: 0-10M Cooldown: 9.1 seconds Without Keening: Focus Cost: 3 Focus Requirements: Sub 30% With Keening: Focus Gain: 1 Focus ICD: 18.2 seconds Requirements: N/A	Dispatch: Is used both in the execute (sub 30% phase) and every 20 seconds after Keening is procced. It deals high kinetic weapon damage.
	Range: 0-4M Cooldown: 11 seconds Focus gain: 7 Focus	Sundering Strike: Your primary filler. It’s a core rotational ability in the fact that it’s the quickest method for generating Focus you have in a single GCD. In addition, if you have your 2 pc set bonus, every 27.3 seconds, it generates a 15 second buff that increases all damage you deal by 2%!
	Cooldown: 41.1 seconds Focus Gain: 6 Focus	Combat Focus: Instant ability off the GCD. Generates 6 focus. Should be used only when Sundering Strike is on Cooldown and you NEED focus.
	Focus Gain: 1 Focus Cooldown: 8.2 seconds Target Maximum: 8 AOE type: 360 degrees	Vigilant Thrust: Is your primary AOE and secondary filler, and is HIGHLY damaging, doing almost as much damage as Dispatch! Due to Burning Storm, Vigilant Thrust can be used to spread your Damage over Time effects to multiple targets. When specced into Purifying Sweep, Vigilant Thrust applies an armor debuff to it’s victims.
	Focus Gain: 3 Range: 0-30M Cooldown: 22.8 seconds	Saber Throw: Saber Throw generates 3 focus. It is a very effective filler, and applies an armor debuff in Vigilance.
	Focus Gain: 3 Channel Time: 1.5 seconds Stun Duration: 4 seconds Cooldown: 1 minute	Force Stasis: Does low damage over 4 seconds and stuns the target. Generates 3 Focus OVER TIME.
	Knocks back: 10M Range: 0-10M Cooldown: 1 minute	Force Push:Knocks the target down for moderate damage.
	Focus Requirement: 3 Focus Cost: 2 Radius: Within 5 M Type of AOE: Cleave	Cyclone Slash: AOE ability that does moderate damage to multiple targets. Does more damage to burning targets.
	Focus Gain: 3 Focus Range: 10-30M Cooldown: 13.7 seconds W/ Battlefield Command, the cooldown is highly variable based on damage intake.	Force Leap:Closes the gap between you and your target instantly, cannot be used if character is under cover. Grants Unremitting.
	Cooldown: 3 minutes	Adrenals: It’s an adrenal. It gives stats. Buy them, use them on CD / when necessary.
		Strike: Junk ability – dump them
		Slash: Junk ability – dump them

The Rotation

This section features openers, priority, rotation strategy, clipping master strike, tips and tricks, and AoE priority

Openers

Since 2.6 and the major Vigilance improvements, plus the changes made in 3.0, the Vigilance rotation is far more set in stone. Vigilance has very little RNG besides crits, but most players have an inaccurate or simplified rotation. The general BiSRAID opener in Vigilance is:

You can always do this opener of you experience downtime, provided they are all off cooldown, so for example if you have downtime on the boss, afterwards, you want to use some combination of the pre Overhead Slash abilities, generate enough focus, then Overhead Slash, Master Strike, Plasma Brand, etc.

After the opener, you then flow into the priority system.

Priority System

1: Plasma Brand, Overhead Slash, and Blade Storm all ABSOLUTELY on cooldown, no questions asked. Priority flows from top to bottom in worst case scenario (IE everything is off CD) UNLESS Blade Dance is off CD, then repeat opener beginning from Overhead Slash.You should be using Plasma every 11 seconds, Overhead Slash and Blade Storm every 8.2 seconds. This means that occasionally Blade Storm will be used with only 1 stack of Force Rush. That is fine in most cases. The very best Vigilance Guardians keep all 3 on CD and never lose a Blade Storm crit by delaying Dispatch until the stack is actually needed and using Vigilant Thrust in it’s stead. If you delay one DoT by a GCD, what happens is the one that was delayed will collide with another, forcing you to delay one DOT again in order to realign the rotation. If you use all 3 abilities, the maximum you spend is 8 focus, therefore the magic number of Vigilance is 8. Make sure you have 8 focus every time you start a DoT cycle, but at the same time if you are at a position where Plasma Brand is your first attack and you already have Blade Storm on cooldown, you only need 5 Focus to use Plasma Brand and Overhead Slash, but you need 8 to use Overhead Slash THEN Plasma Brand. Also, every 32.616 seconds, Overhead Slash is used twice in one Plasma Brand, and the window after,  Blade Storm is used twice in one window. This is the most resource intensive of the rotation, and where you ABSOLUTELY need extra resource in order to come out still rotationally sound.

2: Blade Dance is the second most important ability on the list if you are following the above priority system down to the very millisecond. If you can keep all 3 dots on cooldown with no delay, WHILE using Blade Dance every 11 seconds, and making sure to use Dispatch every time Keening is up to keep your stacks of Force Rush up, you have officially accomplished the main goal of the spec. In order to do this, you want to try and make it so that Blade Dance is only activated when Plasma Brand, Overhead Slash, and Blade Storm all have more than 2.74 seconds left on the CD.

3:The Floating Force Rushers (Dispatch+Keening and Vigilant Thrust)These two abilities, I have named as such because they are the abilities that you use to round out your force rush usage. During the double Blade Storm window, you still only have 1 Force Rush Stack from Overhead Slash and and another from Plasma Brand. In this 11 second window, to get the 4 stacks required for Blade Storm, in that 11 you need a combination of luck and skill to MAXIMIZE Force Rush generation, otherwise you will end up with only 1 stack. If you tank at all, this is similar to the taunt -> AOE Taunt “Taunt opener,” you use lower CD abilities before longer CD abilities (in this case an ICD) staggered across the rotation in order to maintain DPS. When first learning the rotation, do not occupy yourself with this. The idea goes that you never want to use Dispatch immediately when it procs, because if the Blade Storm sandwich window appears, you don’t have dispatch available. I consistently delay dispatch by 10 seconds or more for at least half of the ICD, generally if you just procced dispatch and feel like using it, don’t. Vigilant Thrust instead. Prioritizing Vigilant Thrust over Dispatch will fix the Force Rush issue as well as humanly possible, after that it’s pretty much getting lucky keening procs. 3A: Vigilant Thrust is your primary high damage filler and does extreme damage, but the rotation is too tight to use it on cooldown. It should be used when there is MORE THAN 1 opponent or when you are not in dire need of resource and need a filler. It also spreads DoTs via Burning Storm. Generally you want to use Vigilant Thrust as often as possible without disturbing resource regeneration. 3B: Dispatch with Keening is very important. When getting the proc, you have 20 seconds to use it, so while you don’t need to activate it immediately, as there are other more important abilities, you need to make sure you don’t accidentally drop the buff. You should almost never use it when it immediately procs. See above.

4: Sundering Strike is your highest priority filler. Use it on CD as long as you don’t cap out or waste the majority of it’s resource gain. In certain situations, Sundering Strike is the most important ability in your rotation, at least in priority. Consider this situation: Sundering Strike is off cooldown, and Master Strike is off cooldown,and you have 4.5 seconds until you need to use Plasma Brand. Following the priority system verbatim, would mean this ability queue would occur: Master Strike->Sundering Strike->Plasma Brand But this isn’t optimal! Because you can reset the CD of Master Strike anyway, you can actually push it back a little farther! Therefore, the actual optimal rotation prioritizes Sundering Strike in this particular pass of the rotation, because you can’t reset sundering strike, and it’s your primary focus builder! The actual optimal rotation would be: Sundering Strike->Master Strike->Plasma Brand Same outcome, but the next time you do Sundering Strike, you get it 3 seconds earlier! In addition, it also generates 2% extra damage for 15 seconds every 30 seconds! (2pc Set Bonus)

5: Saber Throw is your Secondary Filler/Ranged Move

6: Combat Focus should be used when you absolutely need focus and Sundering Strike is on CD or you don’t have another GCD to spare.

7: Force Stasis is a weak damage filler but should be used when you need more than 1 resource in the next GCD due to abilities coming off CD and none of the above focus generating fillers are available.

8: Force Push mediocre filler but has a range, also useable as a knockback. Good when topped out on focus and Vigilant Thrust is NOT AVAILABLE.

10: Dispatch (Non Keening) This is absolutely your last priority fillers on a dummy, as it damages the stability of your rotation. Using this will ruin your DoT application. On a boss, it should be used when you are being outranged. The only time this is good to use is in heavy AOE phases that guarantee you receive 2 focus every 9 seconds (9 seconds is the CD on Dispatch.)

Full Boar AoE Priority (3+, preferably 4+)

AOE in Vigilance is fairly simplistic, and contrary to popular belief, is NOT based on a priority system, NOR a set rotation. This system is designed to swap all damage towards AOE. The principle behind this is to increase your cyclone slash / sweeping slash damage using your DoTs, and keeping at least one DoT on all encountered enemies at once.

As Plasma Brand / Shatter is your longest DoT, you use Plasma Brand / Shatter to maintain the Cyclone Slash / Sweeping Slash Damage Buff. Alternate with Plasma Brand / Shatter with Overhead Slash / Impale to maintain the debuff the entire time, use Vigilant Thrust / Vengeful Slam on cooldown, and Cyclone / Sweeping spam for days. It’s important NOT to delay Vigilant Thrust / Vengeful Slam for Plasma Brand / Shatter, as this lowers your aoe, this is why you cycle Overhead Slash in to cover the alternate DoT cycle, because Vigilant Thrust / Vengeful Slam does not actually refresh DoTs, only spreads them if they are not already present.

Rotation Strategy

The Vigilance / Vengeance Rotation lasts 11 seconds for a minor rotation, and every Major Rotation is 32.616 seconds long, and a full circuit is 65.232 seconds assuming the rotation is carried out perfectly. Every major rotation, the DoT’s realign in a way similar to the opener for another pass at the rotation.

In every Vigilance/Vengeance minor rotation, you will perform:

1 Plasma Brand/Shatter

1.3 Overhead Slashes/Impales (The decimal is because the cooldown for Overhead Slash / Impale and Blade Storm ‘/ Force Scream is 75% of the CD of Plasma Brand / Shatter, every few Plasma Brands / Shatters there is an extra Overhead Slash / Impale and Blade Storm / Force Scream inside the cooldown of Plasma Brand.

1.3 Blade Storms/Force Screams

1 Master Strikes/Ravages

1-3 filler GCDs, 1 of them being Dispatch/Vicious Throw when it procs. Due to the nature of Dispatch drifting in the rotation, SOMETIMES you will use it, sometimes you will not. The reason for the variable number of filler GCDs is due to the way Overhead Slash / Impale and Blade Storm / Force Scream drifting inside the CD of Plasma Brand

In addition, every 11 seconds of a Vigilance / Vengeance rotation requires 8 Focus/Rage throughout the entire cycle. 8 is the magic Vigilance / Vengeance number. Usually, a Sundering Strike/Sundering Assault or Combat Focus/Enrage with a Force Sweep/Smash or Saber Throw will fulfill this purpose. Combat Focus/Enrage can also be used while using an ability (besides Master Strike/Ravage) so that a filler in the filler window can consume resource rather than burning it.

Also, every 32.3 seconds or so, there’s a double Overhead Slash window and a double Blade Storm window. These windows are far more resource intensive, and the latter window spends 2 more Force Rush than they normally do.

Hitting a Boss (Tips and tricks)

Many players, especially players who aren’t raiding in bleeding edge content, are told that “Dead DPS do no damage.” This is WHOLLY TRUE. However, there is one caveat: A DPS that is not doing as much effective damage as he or she can, is less than optimal.

DPS Myths:    

Myth 1: You will never be able to translate your dummy DPS to boss. FALSE. Every iota of damage you do on a dummy is POSSIBLE on a boss. Every DPS should do as much damage as possible without endangering the health of the group, and on most boss fights you should be losing very little DPS when compared to dummy, and if there are adds, you should be GAINING DPS!!!

Myth 2: Melee DPS useless FALSE. Melee are disadvantaged, however, we are fully capable of doing competitive damage. Great MDPS can match or exceed their RDPS cousins, it’s all in the uptime. Uptime must be seized and taken advantage of. Every DPS must learn how to stick to the target, adjust to the circumstance, and flow back into combat smoothly and seamlessly.

“You must be shapeless, formless, like water. When you pour water in a cup, it becomes the cup. When you pour water in a bottle, it becomes the bottle. When you pour water in a teapot, it becomes the teapot. Water can drip and it can crash. Become like water my friend.”

– Bruce Lee

Ask yourself:

• When leaping to kill an add like the Jealous Male in TFB, how often do you Force Push and leap back to boss to keep your uptime seamless? (Sometimes Guardian Leap is better, NEVER USE ON A TANK. Healer is best)
• When DPSING, do you often have points in time where you don’t know what to do? ALWAYS. BE. PUSHING. BUTTONS.
• Know your abilities and their ranges and cooldowns, and use these abilities to get around faster.
• Do you know when to Guardian Leap out of AOE’s? (NEVER USE IT ON A TANK)
• Do you know when to use Blade Storm/Force Scream at two stacks or forgo it and use 1 stack?
• Do you know that a basic attack is better than no attack, DPS is always better than nothing.
• Do you know when to ignore your own DPS and use utility talents? (Taunt the boss when tank dies or guardian leap to a dps with threat or use stasis to stun an add?)
• Do you know when AOE is better than Single Target?
• Don’t be a Rydarus, don’t stand in cleaves
• Use your aggro drop when you get threat(Challenging Call/Threatening Scream ONLY in Shien and Shii-Cho Stance in 2.7)
• Use Focused Defense/Enraged Defense as your first defensive CD in these situations: Heavy AOE, Dots, etc. Think of it as a trauma probe, if you are taking damage in the next 15 seconds, this CD is the bomb.
• Uptime is the absolute most important thing about this build. You must learn to think in combinations and DPS bosses with low downtime, if you perform singular attacks, the benefits of alacrity are wasted. Always chain abilities together. EVERY BOSS BECOMES ALL ABOUT HOW MUCH UPTIME YOU CAN GET. APM. IS. LIFE.

• Blade Dance has a shorter channel with Alacrity. TAKE ADVANTAGE.

Saber Reflect Tips and Tricks:

• Malaphar: Red Circle
• Revanite Commanders: Purple Circle
• Revan: Heave, Core, Overcharge Saber
• Bulo: Mass Barrage, Scatter Blaster
• Torque: Turrets, Shoots Lasers, Dangerous Fire Devices
• Master & Blaster: Rain of Pain
• Karraga: Everything fire related, Exploding Mouse Droids
• Foreman Crusher: Circles

Parsing

How to analyze a parse?

For those who have problems with Vigilance and the hallmarks of a good parse, I have included a list of simplistic equations to determine how to know whether your Vigilance Rotation is good:

• Convert the length of your parse into seconds (5 minutes is 300 seconds)
• Be in the Damage dealt tab of parsec and be looking at “Damage Dealt Broken Down By Target”

Time Conversion equations (Outdated, just use Parsely’s Ability Usage Tool)

• D= Duration of Parse
• A=Abilities amount of times used
• G=Gap Between Use

Equation for detection of abilities usage per second:

• D/A=G

Example: Ability A was used 34 times in 300 seconds. Using D/A=G we end up with: 300/34=8.8235 second gap between ability activation.

Master Strike/Ravage/other 3 tick ability Specific equation:

• D/(1/3*A)=G

In this case, if D=300 and A=99, the equation would be 300/ (1/3*99)=9.09 second gap between ability activations.

What to Check For?

(Note that it is impossible to actually meet these numbers due to lag, but getting within .1 seconds is a good target)

1. Plasma Brand / Shatter every 11 seconds
2. Overhead Slash / Impale and Blade Storm / Force Scream every 8.3 seconds
3. Master Strike every 11 seconds
4. APM at 39-39.5

How to Practice?

The former highest skill Vigilance/Vengeance Guardian, Westfall, claims to parse for the duration of the “Today Show.” This generally means he parses for a grand total of 20 minutes a day in one straight parse.

“In order to fully commit your rotation to memory for usage on a boss, you must first learn every single way to screw up your rotation” (Credit to Antonica/Daharel)

This means you go through with every parse you have regardless of mistakes to learn your rotation inside out. Vigilance is an easy to learn but hard to master spec, and the rotation SEEMS easy to pick up but has some of the most ruthless dot reapplication rotations in the entire game.

Sample Parse (Analyzed and highest)

Sample Parse (Note: Gear used was optimized 216 and 220s with 216 left side and a Revanite Relic. I also had a 224 offhand.

(Note2: I have a higher parse available, but as dissecting each parse I put up, which is relatively frequent, for a parse analysis is fairly inefficient, I will always analyze a parse of my own every month, but keep a link or image of my ABSOLUTE MOST RECENT parse.)

Note 3: Parsely can misround a lot, don’t be shocked if there’s .1 or .2 seconds off in your usages.

Parse Analysis:

6400 on the 1.5 million health dummy.

http://parsely.io/parser/view/81100/10

Ability usages:

Blade Dance/Ravage every 10.86 seconds

Plasma Brand / Shatter every 11.2 seconds

Overhead Slash / Force Scream every 8.392 seconds

Blade Storm / Force Scream every 8.392 seconds

APM at 39.34

Videos

twitch: http://www.twitch.tv/rydarus/profile (3.0)

1.5 mil dummy parse: http://www.twitch.tv/rydarus/v/12856552

HM Underlurker (3.0)

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jHSlDILsCg&w=448&h=252&hd=1]

HM Torque (3.0)

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qgkVbgNa_q4&w=448&h=252&hd=1]

About the author (and special thanks)

If you don’t know who I am, I’m Rydarus, AKA “Alácrity.” I was one of the more outspoken proponents of alacrity as a stat in 3.0, and 4.0 has only solidified my obsession with the stat. I’ve perfected and tinkered my approach to Vig/Veng under the principles of DoT uptime, and I hope to spread the “proper” way to run Vigilance/Vengeance to other players. I hope you find the guide useful.

This guide has and will always be written about how I play this spec.

I’d like to thank many people for helping me write this guide:

• Fedara, for carrying me (Those dank rescues in Core Phase).
• Gyrfalcon, for being the first person who saw me raid in Alacrity Augments.
• Mattmonkey, for inspiring me to write a guide all those years ago.
• Westfall/Westfaller from Underworld Alliance, for being to this date the most precise and skilled Vigilance  Guardian this game has seen. He may not have cleared much, but for his time he revolutionized the way the spec was run and was the only person I’ve ever met who performed the perfect rotation for Vengeance.
• A’jantis, for /ginviting me and putting me on a raid team.
• Tam/KBN, for being… well… KBN…
• Bioware, for making Alacrity a not useless stat
• PVP, for teaching me to be a better DPS
• Training Dummies, for teaching me to be a better DPS for a longer period of time.