Solo pve melee / Group tank Specialization dilema !

I have been reading a lot of posts about Specs, tank and melee.

But, the more I read, the more I doubt my choices.

Lets see the choices out there

Blades/Bludgeon/Polearm spec (depending on your weapon of choice).
Heavy armor
Shield
Tactics
Earth
Death

I am actualy Blades and tactics spec.

But after reading all those posts, I see many options.

Blade/Tactics
Balde/Earth.
Blade/Death
Tactics/Earth
Tactics/Death
Earth/Death
Heavy Armor/ Earth

I do not consider Shield as an option, Shield being used only when wearing one so, boss fight or tanking but, when you run solo/dps, you'll be Dual wielding.

Earth and Death : Large increase in Strength and avoidance/hp with shield of crystal. Also, you get a great hp regen if you go with death shield.The loss of damage from tactics spec or weapon spec would probably be negated by the increase of strength from earth spec and, better regen with death shield !

**** I have reconsider Heavy armor, with backstab, the increase duration of body slam stun could be worth it, also the increase duration of inner strength and the initial boost in avoidance from glancing blow....

What would be your choice ?

 

I personally prefer earth for both melee dps and tanking, and your weapon skill, there are many viable options, but strength and more HP is very useful across the board. However, I don't find it necessary to spec in earth to reap the bulk of the rewards. I really only use stacked crystal shield and strength most of the time and focus on taunt and defensive skills with some attacks. Speccing in earth will allow you to raise those things higher with less decay accrued.
I personally am specialized in focus and bludgeon at this time, I find the reduced fizzle rate helpful regardless of the build I'm using, and the focus regen is actually better for physical dps becuase high end weapon glyphs use so much focus.
Tactics specialization gives you a lot to work with for both tanking and melee dps, your most important mitigation skill when tanking is defensive stance as it makes all your other defensive skills better

 

Have you considered life spec for solo healing? Useful also in group cause you have an high sustain.

 

I play mostly solo melee pve. My thoughts on the different specs that I've tried:

Blades: The extra rend stacking, healing mod debuffs, and bigger coup window makes a really big difference in solo damage vs. bosses and other high hps mobs. Against more normal stuff, the damage gains are pretty modest, although you do get a little boost from extra double slash damage and extra glyphs.

Polearm: I wouldn't switch to polearm just because of the spec, but I think having the spec is kind of a must for anyone already using polearm for most of their damage. It's a pretty decent damage boost in just about all situations.

Tactics: Pretty good all around. Modest damage boost in all situations and pretty good damage boost wherever berserker stance is a possibility. Extended window parry can also be a very strong defensive option, and the little things like extra offhand glyph and offhand parry bonus are nice.

Earth: Probably not the most powerful spec, but very convenient. You get a decent amount of free avoidance on shield of crystal, which is low fizzle and easy for anyone to use. The carry capacity bonus is pretty big and reduces time wasted running back and forth to town.

Death: Maybe the best defensive option if you wear gear that's too heavy for using death shield without swapping out. Good for long/continuous fights, but can be a wasted spec in situations where swapping is no problem or less damage mitigation is fine.

Life: Pretty good if your gear is hybrid enough that your heals don't suck. Also has the benefit of being useful when grouped since your life attunement increases other players' heals on you.

I've never tried heavy armor spec, but I'm sure 50% extended stun body slam stuns probably save a lot of damage vs. normal mobs. The extended window glancing blow is probably pretty decent if used well also.

I was blades/tactics for a long time, and I think it's pretty good, because more damage is always good. There's definitely some things I can solo now that I have one spec that's more defensively oriented, that I couldn't before. Out of the defensive options available, I prefer death, but part of the reason for that is that I'm pretty lazy when it comes to swapping and short duration buffs.

edit: My specs are polearm and death btw. I wear full constantan plate and dual spears. I actually like blades more than polearm, but I use spears simply because I spent a lot of time farming uber handles and have some really nice ones.

 

I did but I am not sure this would be so good in solo against liches and death spells casters tho

 

Well, -8 death resistance it's not a big problem since you can cast celestial blessing for 20 death res + purify burst charged 6x ( if you have life spec) for +24 death res. About liches you can still use some searing rays and your blade skills, even if you are not sun spec.
You can boost your life healings socketing your gear with life gems and looking for the related enchants and adding a bit of int.

 

My choice of specialization:

Bludgeon: higher damage from knockback and better stun from crushing blow, my main skills. I find it very useful.

Earth: convenient for reduction of exp decay because I have a lot invested in the tree. Nice avoidance bonus to shield of crystal. Earth’s embrace (DR) becomes useful since movement penalty is largely negated. Carrying capacity on Strength of earth is a bonus but not too big a factor since my str is high anyway.

 

I have to admit that earth is attracting me. Not sure i want to drop Blades for it, it would be tactics. But tactics (berserker stance and Defensive stance) has it perks too. And then' heavy armor could be usefull too.... See so many options lol

 

Tactics spec isn't very good for defensive purposes, don't get anything aside from the 6th stack on Fortify Defense.

Earth spec seems to give the highest defensive boosts for a specialization, some decent utiltiy (carrying capacity) and a tiny bit of offense (extra strength). Stone fist is also a decent-ish melee skill if you needed to fill in a couple extra glyphs in your deck.

I was earth spec for a while, but what made me spec out of it was the earth shield visual effects. They are too over the top lol.

 

Yes I do lean more and more toward earth, Looks to me an all around solution, More Str, HP, better crowd control with earthquake, more avoidance and resistance.

Heavy armor is appealing only for the added time to the stun effect of body slam which can give you time to kill ennemies without them being aware you were there but that is about it.