I stand by my statement. I feel if you tried these in practice, half of them would not be used (or used very infrequently), mostly for the reasons that Eetabeetay articulated.
The sweet spot for safeguard intervene:
- Boss can be moved without impact to raid. If you intervene a boss that cleaves, has frontal AOE, that is the epicentre for sonic waves (!), that melee dps are trying to interrupt, etc then you risk breaking something else. If raid positioning in general needs to be precise then moving the boss has the chance to force dps to shift (costing dps, causing risk). Alternatively, fight has periods when you aren't actually tanking.
- Tank is not taking very heavy damage himself (i.e. can afford the risk of extra hit from the intervene and taking a swing in the back that might have otherwise been blocked/avoided)
- Intervening a target doesn't put the target at additional risk. For example, you wouldn't intervene at Chimaeron outside of a feud as the offtank, as it would risk getting a double hit of caustic slime.
I was a big fan of safeguard in WOTLK, after picking it up for lich king I found ways to make it useful in a number of encounters... but more often than not, you introduce a new set of risks if you start moving things around that are best kept stable. I am not a 'safeguard naysayer'. I just don't think the list of places that safeguard would be really useful is anywhere near as long as you imagine. This then raises the question: 2 talent points for an ability which is useful in some situations, or in something with is useful in all situations...
That's exactally how i see it! I understand that progression raiders may respec for every fight, but I just can't bring myself to do that. I would rather grab something that will help either me dps or take less damage for every fight than have the posibility to occaisonally help for a couple fights sometimes.This then raises the question: 2 talent points for an ability which is useful in some situations, or in something with is useful in all situations...
It's hard to build a spec consisting only of talents that are useful in all situations. It would probably consist mostly on single target threat talents. I doubt that such a spec would be optimal for most situations. Single target threat is not a real problem at the moment. It is probably better to take at least some "situational" utility talents.Originally Posted by swelt
The question is if other talents bring more or better utility to your raid. In nearly all encounters, noone but maybe tanks should need external CDs to survive. Sure, sometimes it may be better to use one on someone else than to let someone die when he did something wrong. But there are other external CDs from other classes who are quite less dangerous and can be applied instantly and without changing positions.
- if someone stands in the fire, priests can life grip
- paladins have melee bubble
- paladins have lay on hands
- prot paladins have raid shieldwall to cover high raid dmg
- some classes have instant heals they can assist with
- hunter pets can taunt an add from someone
- dks can grap an add from someone and probably near to a tank
- dks (all?) have this magic shield - well it has a positioning problem, too
There are probably more. So there are many options to save other players in different situations which may be even better to solve the problem. (If someone stands in the fire, pulling him out of the fire is better than someone else charging near or even into the fire to apply a dmg reduction debuff. If someone has aggro, its better to redirect the aggro than to reduce incoming dmg...)
So the main targets for speccing Safeguard are probably tanks. There are just better external CDs to cover them. You may not have all of them in a raid. So there may be some setups where the warrior tank speccing safeguard may be the choice to go. But I doubt that it is the obvious solution (or the recommended solution) for most setups. Chances are high, that other talents may be at least as usefull for the raid as Safeguard is.
50% of the time where you are tanking a tron, no DPS should be on it, ergo, I dont even understand, with all due respect, how you can say a statement such as Safeguard is almost 100% useless. Not only do you reduce the damage on the target being flamed, but you ALSO reduce your damage taken by being away from your mod who shouldnt even take hits because of his shield.Unless you're bringing an extra tank just for intervenes, then this will never happen. Both tanks will be tanking something and positioning is important for 2 of the trons, and possibly the other 2 if there's a poison cloud out. Combine that with the fact that a lot of classes have their own damage mitigation CDs, Safeguard is almost 100% useless on this fight.
On Maloriak, this is one of the fight where a warrior SHOULD tank the boss because of the sub 25% with victory rush and charge/intercept/intervene to not take fall damage. During the red phase everybody is stacks on each other, you do not even move the boss to intervene someone who will get hit hard with the debuff.
Warriors makes such a powerful OT at the moment on most fight, and with safeguard, its even more noticable. Another example is Nefarian phase 2 where 30% reduce of an electrocute is VERY useful on allies on ur platform AGAIN without moving.
On normal mode this is true. On heroic mode (which is what I was talking about), boss positioning is very important, and not due to dps.
Again, people with the debuff need to be moving out.
Not that it's relevant to this discussion, but the tank shouldn't be getting hit by the fire.
I think the primary issue with Safeguard is that raid damage broadly tends to happen in two flavors:
1) The entire raid takes a lot of damage (something like Caustic Slime during Chimaeron's Feud, Incineration Security Measure from Magmatron, etc). Safeguard is largely useless here because you're reducing 1/25th of the damage by 30%. I mean, every little bit helps, I guess, but it's hardly going to make or break anything.
2) One person gets targeted with an effect. Anyone else near them also gets hit, but they're either intended to move away from your raid (Maloriak red phases, Magmatron's targeting laser, Electron's...uh...static charge thing, etc) or you're intended to already have positioning that ensures no one else takes damage. Either way, Safeguard isn't likely to be that useful, because any gains you get by reducing damage on them are mitigated by the additional damage you take when you zoom next to them.
It's useful in some places, of course. I'll probably continue to spec into it because it's not as if there's much competition for the two points. But I don't really think it has a lot of usefulness in an era where powering through raid damage with Divine Guardian/Divine Barrier/Aura Mastery/etc is largely how things are done.
EDIT: And I should add that tank survivability simply isn't that challenging in this tier of content. There's no Lich Kings throwing Soul Reapers around; the closest analogues tend to be far less frequent (meaning everybody, even fellow warriors, can mostly cover themselves with personal cooldowns).
Other than a few particular fights (Chimaeron, Maloriak) I've found Safeguard's best usage to be as a lifesaving ability for non tanks primarily. Use of it goes up alot vs heroic bosses where safeguarding someone who is low and about to eat a massive AOE (Electrocute, Omnitron Fire Nuke/Cone, Atramedes Engulfing Flame with high sound, etc.) seems to be the best use I get out of the skill. I mean its basically 30% reduction for 6 seconds on a 30 second timer, that is one of the best shielding abilities out there when you compare it to some of the lifesaving cooldowns folks gets.
If you use it on the right people at the right time, Safeguard can both be the difference between life and death and a healer mana/cooldown saver.
Remember its not necessarily that reducing 1/25th of the damage by 30% that matters. Its "Would that person have died if he didn't have 30% damage reduction for whats going to hit him? Did I remove the need for Guardian Spirit to be cast on someone? Did I just save us a BRes?" that matters. Theres plenty of times where not quite everyone is topped off when they should be and it gets cut close. There are plenty of individual attacks you can take advantage of it on without getting hit yourself too. It is just a matter of learning exactly when to use it and not eating damage in the process.
As for the tank side it definitely has it's uses. Unfortunately I've found this works best with two warrior tanks. Safeguard is nothing to scoff at on a hard hitter like Cho'gall during Flame Orders or while dealing with the Green Vial vs Maloriak. It is incredibly effective when used on the add tank while they gather up for a stun. Phase 2 Chimaeron is probably my favorite usage of it though as you can intervene a double attack and really reduce it's effect.
Last edited by Lightmgl; 01-16-2011 at 01:21 AM.
I don't see which 2 points you guys desperately need in your build in order to not be able to pick Safeguard up to be honest. What are people losing out on?
This can definitely be used on Chimaeron during Feud, if someone looks too low before a tick, Safeguard can save them from dying, or as has been mentioned, at least save a Guardian Spirit or combat res being used.
It might be because I spent the last few months of ICC healing rather than tanking, but I'm almost certain the single GCD spent safeguarding is better effective healing than a healer's GCD spent casting a shield or hot.
Don't think it has anything to do with that. An appropriate rephrase of the question is, if they do not see the value in its situational usage, what are they gaining by taking it? Personally, I recognize the situational value of the talent but did not see it prudent to add it into either of my protection specs and I am aware of plenty of tanks who are raiding the current content quite successfully without it. I do not hold that it is a talent without merit, but I do hold that it is an optional talent (flavor talent if you will); one that you can do without.
I agree with Danny. at the end of the day its optional. currently, both of my specs are prot and neither use safeguard.
"Dear Santoro, Your wisdom has enlightened me. Thanks!"
I honestly do not see where else you could put your points in that would be more useful than safeguard. That high in the tree, the only points remaining are in threat and more DPS talents, which seems to me rather optionnal considering our threat is overall soo strong at this point in the expansion.
i find safeguard very nice. i use it in both my specs, the damage reduction is really nice
i cant find any other talent to choose over it
Narph:
If ever I would maybe include it in an OT spec. Because as MT there are even less options to zoom around randomly. OT is often about
- collecting / tanking adds
- kiting
- breaks in between and hitting the boss from behind
For the first part it's usefull to take both Blood and Thunder and Thunderstruck. Same goes for Gag Order. It just helps to get casters where you want them to have or to collect them. For having breaks in between Vigilance is quite good, if you put it on the MT. For kiting it's really good to have Piercing Howl, so it's at least 6 points into fury.
When I take all this, I'm left with only one point. It can go into Incite, Rude Interruption, Blitz or Safeguard. But it's only 1 point, not 2. All this talents are somewhat situational. 3 of them are real utility talents and can be helpfull as OT. At least Rude Interruption and Incite can be used quite often. Well they give you "only" threat. Blitz can be used quite often, too. You can probably argue against each of them (as you maybe can argue against Gag Order but a silence instead of an interrupt is really usefull in many situations). But they only compete with a 15% Saveguard. And I just doubt that you can use this Saveguard more than any of the other 3 talents.
If you have a special boss in mind, one maybe don't want to take all the above mentioned stuff so you may have another point for Saveguard. But as an overall OT/Trash-build I would not find the points to include Saveguard.
heroic halfus is the best fight i've found for safeguard so far, pretty much an amazing out for a drake tank on each furious roar
i find gag order pretty much useless, in a 25 man guild, compared to safeguard.
I never interrupt to begin with since we have rogues, shammies, mages, dk's, pallies...and every other class. and the CD on HT being lowered would only be a bonus if i had threat issues. even on my aoe spec i have safeguard
I find myself using intervene at least once on every fight just to throw up a safeguard. that reduced damage is nice. I call it out on vent and the healers can focus on other people for a few seconds. especially on P3 of council....at ~13% we have our healers stop healing the tanks and i we cycle our CDs and i use safeguard to take a hit and lower the other tanks damage, then use my enraged regen to heal em back up b4 he gets killed and im up
I definitely agree with your proposed uses for it. But it's often hard to judge whether the person has enough incoming heals to live without Safeguard, and if they can live without Safeguard, you're often just creating additional work for your healers as you go charging into Magmatron's flamethrower/whatever.
Similarly, there are times when there's a cost associated with doing that. You can go charging into Magmatron's flamethrower and probably live - but you just moved Toxitron out of his poison cloud. Or moved him just before he's about to spawn poison bombs, which aren't positioned ideally now. Or put Arcanotron right by Magmatron, and he's about to do a power generator. Etc.
That's my basic problem with Safeguard. It can get away with having a 30s cooldown because its use is heavily limited by other factors instead, and a lot of those times the 'other factors' don't just make it difficult to use Safeguard, they make it nigh-unto impossible (or at the very least extremely questionable in terms of net gain). That's the reason people don't take it.
I like the ability, and I've got it in one of my specs. But it has some pretty serious limitations counterbalancing the "it's a 30% reduction every 30s, that's like 4 times as good as Pain Suppression!" picture people are painting.
The best usage I found was on nefarian phase 2 and, pretty much any time. before an electrecute on the shaman healer, or anyone who gets hit by many many shadow volley at once due to RNG.
Second, I have the strong beleif that for most fights, warriors are by design, the best offtank there is. One exception, by example, is maloriak, where the burning phase is really much smoother with a warrior since we can charge, intercept, leap out of fire, and to not take fall damage, also with the victory rush to help the healing
You know what makes people get "hit by many many shadow volleys at once"? It's not RNG. It happens when people are too close together, which is exactly what happens when you intervene someone.
That is incorrect. Shadowflame Barrage is a single target spell cast on multiple people using RSTS. It does not splash. It certainly can target the same person over and over and over again.
I will repeat what I've said numerous times. If you do it right you aren't getting hit. Lock on gives you plenty of time to intervene someone and move away before the flamethrowers. You are right and there are bad situations where you can use it. It is up to the tank who is Intervening to be smart about that. There are plenty of good times to use it where no additional damage is risked. It is unbelievably good in dual tank situations where threat is not an issue either where the two tanks can intervene each other with minimal risk.
We've started our heroic progress too and boy it is one of the best abilities in the game for Heroic Chimaeron, Heroic Halfus, and Heroic Maloriak. I'm not gonna preach for people to take it, but there are fights it makes alot easier when it is used for specific things and then on top of that there are fights where its nice to have as a lifesaving ability. For me it came down to threat vs safeguard, and threat is certainly not needed.
Last edited by Lightmgl; 01-20-2011 at 06:46 PM.
I never take safeguard nomatter which specs i roll with mainly because of 2 things;
- The skill isn't usefull in every fight. Sure there's phase 2 Nef, Maloriak red phase, Chimeron feud and possibly a few others. But thats basically it. In most other situations the tanks are either tanking something themselves making the extra hit taken too deadly. Or they have some sort of a debuff that warrents the tank switch and taking that extra hit = dead tank.
- Ultimately it's not my job as a tank to lessen the damage taken on none-tanks other than positioning mobs and possibly interrupting. While i agree that it would be nice to help out on that, it's not worth 2 talent points and especially not on such a situational talent that isn't critical at any point in any fight.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks