Blade Guardian & Brace of Impact

[Bibi]

hi wars,
any one using these two aa? find them useful?
i am at 5kaa, trying to see what i am missing in the tanking department before i put more aa into offense and stats. My magelo below, not 100% updated, but close.
much appreciated if anyone let me know anything i should have that is missing
thanks in advance
http://eq.magelo.com/profile/2262763

[Aldier]

I use Blade Guardian quite a lot.

In groups, its nice if you have a big pull that you want a little safety net in case the healer is half asleep or a merc.

On raids, I use Blade Guardian if my DI fires. I think of it as a small stopgap effect to try and bridge me until the DI is refreshed.

I have not gotten Brace for Impact, because if I am reading it correctly and the spell data, it would overwrite Shining Armor and it is not worth losing SA for this.

[Beneden]

I haven't done any homework on it, but I was told that Shield Topple knocks off Shinning Armor. Shield Topple has an auto effect called bracing stance. Bracing stance blocks 45% of melee damage up to a total of 525 damage. Not as good as Shinning Armor as long as you have a cleric keeping that on you.

Also, Druids who use adrenaline blast/flood will over write it as well as Paladin's protective devotion. All have similar melee mitigation with a heal component added.

[pulvarien]

Tanking harder raid bosses these days i usually stack multiple defensive discs/skills at the same time to raise survivability. Its a mess of mini discs, skills, aa, clickies [10 to 12?] but constant usage allows some sense to be made of them since of course some dont stack with others.

Though we do have one warrior who still is a hp warrior over ac and nothing will change his opinion even his constantly dying early doesnt!

[Thraxnor]

Blade Guardian - yes all the time. I never wait for DI to fire... Usually this is there as a backup after all other discs/effects are down and I'm still up.

Brace for Impact - Very Rarely just rezzed and no buffs but back at tanking sort of time... give that little bit of survive-ability but really not worth it till all the rest are done... Note this does not have stacking issues with Shining Armor according to spell data.

Shining Armor
1: Mitigate Melee Damage by 10%, 0 total
7: Add Defensive Proc: Crippling Glare III rate mod 400

Brace for Impact
1: Add Defensive Proc: Brace For Impact Effect rate mod 300

As you can see these sit on separate slots in the buffs.. As such both can be up at the same time. Proc from Shining is a Stun on mob.. Proc from Brace is a mitigate type effect buff (slot 5) so watch out for stacking issues there.

[Desthin]

Just take the obvious route, and buff block the spells that have stacking issues with Shining, you can block that recourse effect from shield topple etc, I'm fairly sure shining will always trump them.

[Aldier]

Originally Posted by Thraxnor

Blade Guardian - yes all the time. I never wait for DI to fire... Usually this is there as a backup after all other discs/effects are down and I'm still up.

Brace for Impact - Very Rarely just rezzed and no buffs but back at tanking sort of time... give that little bit of survive-ability but really not worth it till all the rest are done... Note this does not have stacking issues with Shining Armor according to spell data.

Shining Armor
1: Mitigate Melee Damage by 10%, 0 total
7: Add Defensive Proc: Crippling Glare III rate mod 400

Brace for Impact
1: Add Defensive Proc: Brace For Impact Effect rate mod 300

As you can see these sit on separate slots in the buffs.. As such both can be up at the same time. Proc from Shining is a Stun on mob.. Proc from Brace is a mitigate type effect buff (slot 5) so watch out for stacking issues there.

Yes Brace for Impact is a defensive proc but if you look at what it procs...

Maxed out:
[32182] Brace For Impact Effect
Target: Self
Beneficial: Blockable
Casting: 0s, Recast: 1.5s
Duration: 12s (2 ticks), Extend: Yes
5: Absorb Melee Damage: 10% Total: 60000
Text: You crouch low.

So you have 2 abilities with the same %age based effect. They do not "stack". Yes you can have both buffs on you, but you are only receiving the benefit of the higher percentage effect. Since they are both 10%, there is no benefit to using Brace for Impact if you have Shining Armor on you.

Similar to having Hastening of Aransir and Talisman of Celerity. I have left it towards the end of my aa buys because I did not see a use for Brace. Yet if it does stack, then I will probably get it sooner.

And in response to the person mentioning Shield Topple and druid Adrenaline Burst/Blast line, I have those recourses blocked. Shining Armor is 10% with no cap for 9 minutes vs a MAX of 525 total damage from Topple. I will stick with Shining Armor. Adrenaline Flood (95/dru rk3) is 15% with a max of 8087.

Do not block the whole spell, just the recourse portion so that way the druids can still heal you with it, you just do not get the 35% of the time that the recourse would fire.

Paladins also have a spell that has a similar recourse mitigation that is a higher %age than Shining Armor, but has a max damage cap. You do not want to be on a raid where you are using an ability every 15-20 seconds that requires the cleric to redo a buff on you instead of healing.

[28463/10433] Protective Dedication Rk. III
Classes: PAL/95
Mana: 1571
Target: Targets Target
Range: 200
Beneficial: Blockable
Casting: 1s, Recast: 5s, Timer: 9
1: Increase Current HP by 4455
3: Cast: [Spell 28466]
Text: You are inspired by someone's protective dedication.

[28466] Protective Dedication Guard III
Target: Single
Range: 200
Beneficial: Blockable
Casting: 0s
Duration: 60s (10 ticks), Extend: Yes
1: Absorb Melee Damage: 15% Total: 24564

Also, because of the Crippling Glare proc, paladins get heals for everytime they cast a stun.

We had a paladin on Windsong raid that ended up with several, 6-7 maybe, of the muses attacking him and because of all the crippling glare procs firing that healed him, he was not dying.

[Thraxnor]

I have almost all AAs finished so I decided to see what use it was.

As I said the buffs can be up at the same time and if you dont have Shining Armor it can be useful (I often group without a cleric so more useful for me).

The effects do not boost each other they just overlap so yes not the best of options but great when no-one else around.

[Silthrix]

Thanks for that info Aldier, I was clicking them both out of habit when the shit was hitting the fan. I will wait til one is down before I do the other from now on. THanks for the text also, will make some AT if I remember! I also try to save knuckle strike or whatever it's called now when DI fires as well.