Introduction
This guide is meant to be a rather objective look at the Fiery Aura primary power set coupled with the Ice Melee secondary power set. Keep in mind that, while I do look at both sets and ways to use them together, there is enough information here to give you a solid understanding of the Fiery Aura and Ice Melee power sets on their own, in case you just want to know more about them so that you can pair them with some other power set. I'm sure I'll add some commentary along the way as to what I deem to be the "best" way to do certain things, but I'll do my best to remain objective. As an obsessive number cruncher, expect to find plenty of numbers here. Some folks may like that - for those that don't, feel free to skip over the numbers and get into the meat.
I have thoroughly enjoyed playing my Fire/Ice tanker and I think a lot of people join me in my love for these two power sets together. In my opinion, these two power sets together can make you one of the nastiest tankers in the game to deal with. The damage capability provided by Fiery Aura, coupled with the defensive capability provided by Ice Melee puts a different spin on how you play your tanker (all other sets obtain defense from their primary and offense from their secondary) but, at the same time, if you use it well, you can be a very competent tank. My biggest knock against Fire/* tankers is that, in order to be really effective, you need to take a large number of specific power pool powers and that doesn't leave much room for experimentation. I've found that most high level Fire tankers end up with very similar builds. Certainly, it's not necessary for you to follow such a "template," but I've found that many Fire tankers do.
Some notes about what you'll see here. For each power, I've tried to break down some of the details so that they're more easily comparable. Damage numbers are according to the latest "Brawl Index" numbers. If you're unfamiliar with the Brawl Index, you can read more about it
here. Very simply, the Brawl Index assumes that the Brawl power, unslotted, has a power rating of 1. If a power does twice the damage that Brawl does, it will have a rating of 2. If a power does half the damage Brawl does, it will have a rating of 0.5. For toggle powers, I'll refer to the costs of those powers in EPS (endurance used per second). These numbers come from the
Toggle Cost Calculator, which I believe to be quite accurate. Also, for each power, I'll try to give some suggestions for slotting. These suggestions are often much less objective than anything else in the guide and are usually skewed toward the slotting most useful for a Fire/Ice tanker. Take these suggestions with a grain of salt. When referring to the effects of enhancements, I'm generally going to assume even level SO's to keep numbers simple. If I refer to some other type of enhancement, I'll say so specifically.
I hope you enjoy this guide and learn a little something about Fire/Ice tankers. I expect I'll probably learn a few things along the way, myself.
Fiery Aura
Fiery Aura is often seen as a bit of an "offshoot" tanker. They're often referred to as "squishy" tankers (referring to their lower defenses when compared to other tankers) or as something closer to a scrapper than a tanker. After playing my Fire/Ice tanker for so long, I firmly believe that a Fire tanker is just as much a tanker as any other and is especially unique in their ability to deal great amounts of damage. Unlike the other tanker primary power sets, the Fiery Aura power set has multiple offensive powers. Blazing Aura, Burn, and Fiery Embrace are all purely offensive powers found in the Fiery Aura primary line.
With the addition of these offensive powers, the Fiery Aura line provides less defense than the other tanker primaries, which is why they are often called "squishy" tankers. Fire tankers can not reach the resistance cap (90%) for any damage type except for fire without augmenting their primary power set with power pool powers. Nonetheless, the resistances you can obtain through the Fiery Aura power set are not bad. You can build up some hefty resistances. The biggest deficiency in the Fiery Aura power set is the complete lack of additional defense buffs. Without leaving the Fiery Aura primary power set, a Fire tanker will have decent resistances and absolutely no defense. In addition, not all status effects are accounted for in the Fiery Aura power set. It does handle Disorient, Sleep, and Hold, but it does not handle Immobilization or Knockdown. For these reasons, Fire tankers tend to rely heavily on the various power pools.
Now, let's take a closer look at the actual powers:
Blazing Aura
Power Type: Toggle
Range: PBAoE
Damage: 0.6111 Fire
Recharge: 4
Duration: N/A
Activation Time: 2
Endurance Cost: 0.83 EPS
Secondary Effects: Obtains Aggro
This power pulses rings of fire in a 360 degree ring around your character, impacting any and all foes nearby. It deals some damage, but not a great amount - 0.6111 on the Brawl Index (so it's a little less than having punched each villian with Brawl). However, there are two major strengths to this power.
First, it affects all foes near you. If you're in the middle of a large number of enemies, this damage can really add up quickly. The more enemies around you, the more total damage this power will do.
Secondly, and possibly even more importantly, this power will grab aggro from anything it hits (note that it does need to actually hit a target to have an effect - Blazing Aura can miss). In solo situations, this means that you can easily hold aggro on everything around you without taunting them, which is useful when you get Burn. In a team setting, you can use this power to hold aggro on foes around you and then use your Taunt ability to grab aggro from foes at range, keeping your team safe from harm. Many have said that this power is all you need to hold aggro and, while in a solo setting, that is probably true, relying on only this power in a team setting is likely to get your teammates killed and upset at a tanker that is unable to hold aggro. Remember that any effects that lower your accuracy or buff your foes' defense will cause Blazing Aura to hit less often and, in turn, lower its capability to hold aggro.
One additional note is that, early on (especially early on as a Fire/Ice tanker), Blazing Aura will represent the best attack you can have. For many, this power is their key to getting to level 18 at which point you can get Burn.
On the downside, Blazing Aura is a real endurance hog and the damage it does is pretty minimal. Your normal endurance regeneration is 1.6667 EPS and at a cost of .83 EPS, Blazing Aura will eat up about half of that all on it's own. Also, the damage it does is pretty minimal so, if you're counting on Blazing Aura to take down foes all by itself, you'll be in for a bit of a wait. While the damage of Blazing Aura can really add up over time, each tick does only a small amount of damage and occur appoximately every two seconds.
Slotting Suggestions:
As I mentioned earlier, this power can miss and it is a huge endurance hog. Based on those facts, you'll probably want at least one accuracy enhancement and at least one endurance reduction enhancement in there. Beyond that, fill it with whatever suits your taste and playstyle. Additional accuracy or endurance reduction enhancements are often desired and some damage enhancements are thrown in, as well. You can also slot this power with taunt duration enhancements, if you so choose. Most choose to 6-slot this power. I believe it really needs at least a couple slots to be effective (to get the accuracy up and the endurance cost down). How many slots you put into it after that is really up to you. Personally, I have 6-slotted it.
Fire Shield
Power Type: Toggle
Range: N/A
Resistance: 30% Smashing/Lethal/Fire, 10% Cold
Recharge: 2
Duration: N/A
Activation Time: 2
Endurance Cost: 0.41 EPS
Secondary Effects: Provides Disorient Resistance
Fire Shield is the cornerstone of your defenses. This is the only power in the Fiery Aura power set that provides resistance to smashing and lethal damage, which is the most common type of damage in the game. It also provides strong resistance to Fire damage, which is also fairly common, and minimal resistance to cold damage, which is actually pretty rare. In addition to the resistances, Fire Shield provides resistance to Disorient effects. Once you get this power (which should be at level 1 or 2), you should never enter a fight without it turned on.
The endurance cost on this power is considerable (roughly 25% of your normal recovery rate), but that cost doesn't come without a great deal of reward. In addition, as this is the only power in your primary power set that provides the very desired S/L resistance, I urge people to slot this power heavily for damage resistance. 6-slotted with SO's for damage resistance, this power can get you to 66% resistance to Smashing/Lethal/Fire damage and 22% resistance to Cold damage. Note that the 66% S/L resistance is still well below the cap of 90%.
Slotting Suggestions:
I recommend 6 damage resistance enhancements to really make the most of this power. If you're really concerned about endurance usage, you can remove a damage resistance enhancement and replace it with an endurance reduction. This technique is generally only used by people that also use the power "Tough" from the Fighting power pool. I'll get into this a little more later. As a Fire/Ice tanker, you probably won't have endurance issues so 6-slotting this for damage resistance is most likely a very easy task.
Healing Flames
Power Type: Click
Range: N/A
Resistance: 20% Toxic
Recharge: 60
Duration: 60
Activation Time: 3
Endurance Cost: 15
Secondary Effects: Self Heal + Toxic Resistance
I listed it as a secondary effect but the real purpose of this power is its healing capability. While Fire tankers may have lower resistances than other tankers, in Healing Flames, they have the capability to heal very effectively. Healing Flames is a very potent heal and, for just about every Fire tanker, a real staple of the power set. Keep in mind that healing damage taken is just another way to mitigate damage. The most important aspect of that is that even damage types that you have little to no resistance against (i.e. psionics) can be mitigated in this way.
In addition to the healing capability of this power, it also provides some Toxic resistance and is the only power in the Fiery Aura power set that does so. The resistance is only 20% but it can be stacked if you can get the recharge rate of Healing Flames down a bit. By default, the recharge rate and the duration are identical (60 seconds) so, without some way to reduce the recharge rate of Healing Flames (such as Hasten, recharge reduction enhancements, etc.), the effect can not be stacked.
Slotting Suggestions:
How you slot this power will probably be greatly affected by the other powers you have. As a Fire/Ice tanker, I found that I'd rely on Ice Patch to prevent me from taking damage in the first place so I opted to slot this power later rather than earlier. Just a few slots saw me well into the 30's. Other tankers that don't have the additional defense provided by Ice Melee may very well want to slot this ealier and more heavily. In general, a mix of healing and recharge reduction enhancements is normally used. I generally recommend keeping at least one more heal enhancement in it than recharge reduction enhancements. This ensures that you get a nice strong heal and that you're not using excessive endurance to do many "lesser" heals. Also, whether or not you have Hasten will impact how many recharge reductions you put into this power. With Hasten, you probably don't need many. Without Hasten, you'll definitely want more recharge reductions.
By level 30, I had a few slots in this power - all Healing enhancements. By 40, I had it 6-slotted with 4 Heals and 2 Recharge Reductions. As I said earlier, Fire Tankers that don't benefit from the additional defense of Ice Melee might find that they want to slot this power much sooner in their careers.
Temperature Protection
Power Type: Inherent
Range: N/A
Resistance: 30% Fire, 10% Cold
Recharge: N/A
Duration: N/A
Activation Time: N/A
Endurance Cost: N/A
Secondary Effects: None
Temperature Protection provides additional protection to Fire and Cold damage through the form of inherent resistance. On the up side, the amount of Fire damage resistance is pretty high, especially for an "always on" power. Also, this is the only other power in the Fiery Aura power set that offers cold resistance than Fire Shield - it's unfortunate that it's only a 10% resistance. In addition, this power costs no endurance and is always in effect, even if your toggles are dropped.
Now for the bad news. This power is virtually never taken for a couple reasons. First of all, Fire Shield and Plasma Shield offer enough Fire resistance to put you well over the cap and, while those two powers will be staples of your defense, the fire protection found in this power is nearly useless. The only time it will come into effect is when your toggles are dropped. In such a case, a little resistance to Fire and Cold damage isn't going to save you as most of the damage coming your way will be of the Smashing/Lethal variety. The cold resistance is actually quite nice as Fire Shield offers only a max of 22% resistance to cold damage. Of course, this power adds only another 10% (up to a max of 22%) so the benefit opposed to the cost is relatively low. In addition, with the number of powers most Fire tankers want to get in order to shore up defenses, the thought of grabbing a power for some paltry cold resistance (which is relatively rare in CoH), is not one most Fire tankers like.
Slotting Suggestions:
Like I said, not many Fire tankers find this power useful. However, if you do take this power, it takes only one type of enhancement: damage resistance. Put as many slots in it as you'd like - each SO enhancement will grant you an additional 6% fire resistance and 2% cold resistance.
Consume
Power Type: Click
Range: PBAoE
Damage: 1.1111 Fire
Recharge: 180
Duration: N/A
Activation Time: 2
Endurance Cost: 2
Secondary Effects: Endurance Recovery
Consume is a utility power. It does some damage but the recharge on it is very long so it can't be used reliably as an attack power. Fortunately, that's not the real purpose for this power. The real purpose is to deal some damage to all enemies around you and recharge your own endurance at the same time. Striking just a few opponents will fully recharge your endurance bar.
Some say that this power can replace Stamina entirely. I tend to disagree (warning - personal opinion here). I effectively used this power to "put off" taking Stamina until a later time, but I still felt the need for Stamina, even with an endurance friendly build such as Fire/Ice. Less endurance friendly builds, such as Fire/Fire or Fire/Axe would probably feel the need for Stamina even earlier. The problem with Consume is that it required multiple villians as "fuel" and it can miss. If it misses, you gain no benefit. So, as you fight tougher opponents, you'll find that Consume becomes less useful as it tends to miss more often. In addition, when fighting a single tough foe, Consume is all but useless as the endurance gain you get from a single affected villian is minimal.
On the other hand, Fire tankers tend to use plenty of endurance in their many toggles. Stamina will help with that but, if you want to use additional attacks from your secondary line, Consume can help greatly to offset that endurance usage.
One final note about this power is that, because it deals damage, it can help maintain aggro to all of those around you. It's seldom, if ever, used for such a purpose, but it does create a bit of "hate" toward your tanker each time you use it.
Slotting Suggestions:
I find that an accuracy enhancement is just about necessary or this power will consistently miss most foes, especially those at a higher level than yourself. Beyond that, the most common thing to do is to add recharge reductions in order to get this power recycling more quickly. Seldom does this power get 6-slotted but it's often "given a little love" in the form of 2-4 slots. Just put in as many slots as you want. Adding endurance recovery enhancements can make this power marginally more effective against a single foe, but it's generally done at the detriment to the power, as a whole.
Plasma Shield
Power Type: Toggle
Range: N/A
Resistance: 32.5% Energy/Negative Energy/Fire
Recharge: 2
Duration: N/A
Activation Time: 3
Endurance Cost: 0.41 EPS
Secondary Effects: Provides Sleep and Hold Resistance
Another cornerstone power of the Fiery Aura power set, you'll want to get this power. This is the only power in the line that offers resistance to Energy and Negative Energy damage and it comes with some additional Fire resistance, to boot. In addition to the damage resistance, this power supplies your resistance to Sleep and Hold effects. In the past, it was often considered "safe" to put this power off until the mid 20's when energy/negative attacks became more prevalent. With Issue 3, resistance to Hold and Sleep was moved into this power and, with that, this became a "take it ASAP" power. Due to the added resistance, this is a power you'll seldom want to turn off.
Slotting Suggestions:
This is your only chance at Energy/Negative Energy resistance so don't skimp out. My best suggestion is to 6-slot this with damage resistance enhancements. Endurance reduction enhancements here only jeopardizes your defensive position. As a Fire/Ice tanker, you'll have the means to make up the endurance elsewhere (Consume). While I consider this to be a power that you should take as soon as you can, it doesn't really need to be fully slotted until the mid-to-late-20's. The Sleep and Hold resistance is effective out of the box and additional resistance enhancements don't really help until you start facing more attacks of those types.
Burn
Power Type: Click
Range: Close (Location AoE)
Damage: ~10-11 Fire DoT
Recharge: 10
Duration: 10
Activation Time: 3
Endurance Cost: 7
Secondary Effects: Removes Immobilization Effects, Foe Scatter
As much as Fire Shield and Plasma Shield are the cornerstones of your defense, Burn is the cornerstone of your offense and, for most, the reason to become a Fire tanker. Burn has some quirky attributes to it that you'll want to make sure you're very familiar with.
First of all, Burn does it's damage in DoT (damage over time). So, while Burn does a great deal of damage to all foes in its area of effect, it deals that damage over its entire duration, 10 seconds. One of the most important things to understand about Burn is that it is treated as if it were a "summoned, unbuffable" ally. By that, damage or accuracy inspirations used on yourself have no impact on your Burn patch. Outside of damage enhancements, there is no way to make Burn do more damage outside of debuffing your foes' damage resistance and for that, you'll need a teammate. As Burn is a "summoned" power, you don't actually get to see the amount of damage it does in your combat tab - all you have to go on are the red numbers floating over your enemies' heads. Because of this, it is nearly impossible to rate this power according to the Brawl Index. Overall, the sum of the damage done appears to be roughly 11 times Brawl, but that is not a solid number, unfortunately.
This power is listed as a Location AoE because it isn't anchored to you like a PBAoE such as Blazing Aura. When you place a Burn patch, it is centered on you, but you are free to move thereafter and the Burn patch will remain where it is, rather than coming with you.
In order for Burn to damage enemies, they must be near the Burn patch (it's roughly large enough to damage enemies 3 deep around the patch). Unfortunately for a Fire tanker, enemies are afraid of the fire of a Burn patch. Therefore, it is most often used in a way that the tanker standing in one place (in the middle of the foes) and drops a Burn patch while holding the aggro of the foes in some way, either though Taunt or some sort of "punchvoke" effect, such as Blazing Aura. Without some way to hold their aggro, foes will flee the Burn patch.
As a summoned ally, Burn has a great accuracy bonus, roughly 100%. That said, Burn can miss targets within the Burn patch. You'll notice this more greatly with enemies that have some sort of defensive bonus, such as a force field or invincibility. Such foes will last longer against a Burn patch.
Burn patches can be overlapped. With only Hasten, you can achieve a few seconds of overlap between two Burn patches. During that time, enemies in the Burn patches will take full damage from both patches, which is generally a great deal of damage. Without Hasten, this can be achieved by adding recharge reductions to Burn.
Burn also frees you from any Immobilization effects. If immobilized, you can drop a Burn patch and the patch will "burn up" the effect, leaving you free to move about. Note that it only works on immobilization effects. Attacks that have multiple effects (such as the -Fly/-Jump/Immobilize of Web Grenade) will still stick after a Burn patch is applied. The immobilization effect will be removed, but you won't be able to jump or fly until the effect has worn off.
Slotting Suggestions:
General concensus is to slot this power entirely for damage. However, that might depend slightly on your build. If you have Hasten, I would suggest slotting entirely for damage or, possibly, using a single recharge reduction enhancement. Without Hasten, you'll probably want 1 or 2 recharge reductions in Burn. With that in mind, Burn has a rather long activation time - approximately 3 seconds. If you're constantly laying Burn patches, you'll have little time between those patches to do anything else (i.e. taunt, heal, or attack). Slot this to taste but err on the side of additional damage enhancements. 6-slotting this for damage is a popular and very effective way to go. Whatever you decide to do, be sure to 6-slot this power as soon as you can - expect to use all of your slots at level 19 and 21 and one slot at 23 to get this power 6-slotted.
Fiery Embrace
Power Type: Click
Range: N/A
Damage: N/A
Recharge: 180
Duration: 30/10
Activation Time: 1
Endurance Cost: 11.5
Secondary Effects: Boosts base damage and accuracy for attacks
Fiery Embrace is like a modified version of the well known power, Build Up. This power increases the base damage of your attacks and significantly improves your accuracy during that time. The recharge time on Fiery Embrace is much longer than Build Up, but it adds an extra twist. Fiery Embrace boosts your Fire attacks for 30 seconds while it boosts everything else for only 10 seconds. So, it essentially acts like Build Up with a little something extra thrown in.
Keep in mind that this power does not affect Burn. Because Burn is considered a "summoned ally," it is not buffed by Fiery Embrace, which affects you directly. Fiery Embrace does, however, affect Blazing Aura. As such, Fiery Embrance is generally loved by Fire/Fire tankers and shunned by all others. For anyone else, Build Up would be a better option as it has a shorter recharge time.
As a caveat to that statement, if you decide to go with the Pyre Mastery epic power pool, you stand to pick up Fire based attacks just as Fire Blast and Fireball. As those are fire based attacks, Fiery Embrace would enhance those attacks. So, even for a Fire/Ice tanker, Fiery Embrace may hold some benefit if coupled with Pyre Mastery.
Slotting Suggestions:
Slot this entirely for recharge reduction. The base recharge rate is too long and the duration too short to get this power near "perma" status, but additional recharge enhancements will help considerably so that you can run it more often. The only other enhancement type it takes is an endurance reduction enhancement. With how long the recharge is and, thusly, how seldom you'll be using it, endurance cost generally is not an issue.
Rise of the Phoenix
Power Type: Click
Range: PBAoE
Damage: 4.0278 Fire
Recharge: 300
Duration: N/A
Activation Time: 5
Endurance Cost: N/A
Secondary Effects: Self Rez, Foe Knockdown, Foe Disorient
The top power in the Fiery Aura set, some view this as a let-down. The down side is that, in order to use this power, you have to be dead. The upside is that this may be one of the "coolest" powers in the game (in terms of how it looks and the rush it gives you when you use it).
When you're defeated, you can use this power to raise yourself, rather than going to the hospital or using an inspiration. Every foe near you will be knocked to the ground, take a good amount of damage, and be disoriented (it will disorient bosses, as well). You'll have roughly half of your max hit points and max endurance and will start recovering immediately. The animation of you "rising from the ashes" is wonderful (in my opinion) and it's something very unique that Fire tankers can do. The knockdown/disorient effect is very useful in that it gives you a second or two to get your toggles back up and running so that you're not immediately defeated once again. Just be sure to be on the ball - the disorient doesn't last all that long so, once you're back on your feet, start getting those shields back up immediately.
Certainly, this is a situational power as it's only useful when you're killed and it does not prevent you from taking debt. Nonetheless, many Fire tankers will take this power to "top off" their characters with something unique and cool.
Slotting Suggestions:
This power probably doesn't need any slotting. You can slot it for Healing or Endurance Recovery so that you come back to life with additional health and/or Endurance. You can also slot this power for Disorient duration, giving you a little extra "breathing room" in order to get your toggles back up. You can also slot this power for damage, if you want it to pack a little extra "punch" when you use it. You can also slot this for recharge to bring the recycle time down but, if you're finding that this power isn't available when you need it, you might want to look at the rest of your build. My personal suggestion would be to put a Healing enhancement into it to make sure that you come back with a little extra life. You can always use Consume to get all of your endurance back right away. Slotting one disorient duration in there doesn't seem to be a bad idea, either.
Ice Melee
The Ice Melee line is easily the weakest of all tanker secondaries in terms of damage. Do not take this power set if you want to be a heavy damage dealer. You simply won't be. If that's what you're after, the Ice Melee line will simply frustrate you.
So what is the Ice Melee line good for, you ask? Well, Ice Melee sacrifices damage potential in order to obtain some control powers, much like Fiery Aura gives up defense for offense. Ice Melee is full of powers that include -Speed and -Recharge effects on them, as well as some "pure" control powers such as knockdown and a hold.
It is my opinion that, overall, the Ice Melee line is one of the weakest in the game. The entire power set is really built upon two powers. The rest of the powers are either horrible or subpar. Note that the preceeding was entirely opinion. Others may disagree and that's fine. Nonetheless, even though I feel that the Ice Melee line is a weak set, overall, I feel that the wonderful happy place that Ice Patch will put you in can make up for a whole lot of shortcomings.
In general, I've found that very few tankers that aren't Fiery Aura tankers take Ice Melee. Why is that? Well, like I said, Ice Melee is a very weak power set in terms of damage. Fiery Aura offers tools to help you deal damage, offsetting that weakness. The other tanker primaries have no way to offset that weakness. A Fire/Ice tanker won't be the damage dealer that a Fire/Fire tanker will be, but a Fire/Ice tanker can "tank" (in the classic sense of the word) a lot better than a Fire/Fire tanker, as well. Similarly, a Stone Armor/Ice tanker will be a very poor damage dealer, but would be nearly impossible to kill.
With that in mind, let's take a closer look at the powers that make up the Ice Melee line.
Frozen Fists
Power Type: Click
Range: 5
Damage: 0.5556 Smashing + 1.7778 Cold
Recharge: 3
Duration: 5
Activation Time: 1
Endurance Cost: 6.5
Secondary Effects: -Recharge, -Speed
The first power in the Ice Melee power set, you must take this power at level one. That said, this power is rather simple, your hands are covered in blocks of ice and you swing them at your opponent in a one-two punch attack. This attack deals little damage but, to its credit, that damage is split between Smashing and Cold damage so the damage from this attack is resisted less than purely Smashing attacks.
While this power is listed as doing "Minor" damage, it does provide more power than power pool attacks, such as Boxing, that are listed as "Moderate." If you really want to know which power does more damage, always be sure to check the Brawl Index. As it is such a fast activating and quick recharging attack, this power retains some of its appeal even late into your career as a "finisher" attack or as a quick bridge to use while you wait for other powers to recharge.
Supposedly, this power also provides -Recharge and -Speed effects on your foe. The duration and impact of such effects is very minor. The duration lasts only about 5 seconds and the -Recharge will buy you only about 1 additional second before your target's next attack. In short, don't count on this power as a defensive power.
Slotting Suggestions:
Many choose not to slot this power at all but, as you're required to take it, you might want to use it. Honestly, it's not that bad of a power - it does poor damage, but it recharges quickly. As a Fire/Ice tanker, you'll find you're always cramped for powers so getting some utility out of this one isn't a bad idea.
Standard slotting for attacks is 1 accuracy and fill with damage to taste. That would probably hold true for Frozen Fists. You can enhance this power for -Speed effect, but the effect is so minor that I wouldn't recommend it. Even 6-slotted for -Speed, the use of such an effect is minimal as the duration gets no longer - it remains at 5 seconds - and it only impacts the -Slow portion of the power, not the -Recharge. Another option would be to slot this power for Taunt duration and use it to "punch-voke" villians into attacking you. Such a slotting would be a purely team-oriented slotting as it would do you little good while running solo.
Ice Sword
Power Type: Click
Range: 5
Damage: 1.3889 Lethal + 2.2778 Cold
Recharge: 6
Duration: 5
Activation Time: 2
Endurance Cost: 10
Secondary Effects: -Recharge, -Speed
With Ice Sword, your character creates a sword made of ice and swings it at your foe. Ice Sword is the most potent single target damage attack in the Ice Melee set until you reach level 35 and Greater Ice Sword. Nonetheless, as with all attacks in the Ice Melee line, the damage dealt is not spectacular.
Again, this power has -Speed and -Recharge effects on it, but the magnitude of such effects is minimal.
As the life of a Fire tanker until level 18 is a rather rough one, many people tend to take this power early on and then respec out of it later. There are other powers that you may want over Ice Sword to fill out your tanker and, after you get Burn, the additional damage from Ice Sword is not that impressive. Nonetheless, if you're looking for a single target damage attack with some punch, this power is your best bet.
Slotting Suggestions:
This power is normally only used early in your career when slots are tight. If you want to use this power, get as many slots into it as you can afford, without marginalizing your defenses. Go with 1 accuracy and fill the rest with damage enhancements.
Taunt
Power Type: Click
Range: 70
Damage: N/A
Recharge: ?
Duration: ?
Activation Time: 3
Endurance Cost: 0
Secondary Effects: Acquire Aggro
A standard power found in all Tanker secondary power sets, Taunt is generally considered a "staple" power of an effective tanker. The whole purpose of this power is to grab and hold aggro, meaning that villians will attack you, as a Tanker, rather than your squishier teammates. This power is a targetted AoE, meaning that it will affect all foes surrounding the one you've targetted and it never misses. It will always affect all foes within the area of effect. Also, keep in mind that this power requires 0 endurance. So, even if you're dangerously low on endurance, a Tanker can still "Tank" by keeping his/her shields up and using Taunt to hold aggro.
With the release of Issue 3, any Tanker attack that deals damage will help the Tanker acquire aggro. PBAoE powers, such as Blazing Aura, can be used to great effect to grab aggro. Many Tankers out there claim that such tactics are "enough" to acquire and hold aggro. I am not in that group. I'll let you make up your own mind, but here are a few things that I consider to be large benefits of Taunt.
<ul type="square">[*]Taunt costs 0 endurance. Other powers, such as Blazing Aura, cost endurance to run. Your attacks cost endurance. If you're relying on such powers to grab and hold aggro, you must have endurance to do so. As Taunt costs no endurance, as long as you have enough endurance remaining to keep your shields up, you can grab and hold aggro indefinitely, even if you're not dealing damage.[*]Taunt never misses. "Punchvoke" powers require you to actually strike a target to grab aggro from that target. If you miss, you don't get the effect. While this isn't normally a problem, if you're fighting villians well above your level or villians that can either buff their defense (force fields and the like) or debuff your accuracy, you'll have difficulty landing blows and holding aggro.[*]Taunt works at range. While PBAoE powers such as Blazing Aura are great from holding aggro from those villians around you, it does nothing for the villians across the room attacking your teammates. In addition, without Taunt, if a villian were to approach your teammates, the only way to get that villian to come after you would be for you to approach that villian and strike him/her. That, of course, means that you'd be bringing the other villians that are currently attacking you (as well as any AoE attacks that they might have) along with you, closer to the teammates that you're "protecting."[*]An addition to the previous benefit, punch-voke effects can be nullified by snares (Caltrops, Quicksand, etc). If you're rendered unable to move around effectively, it becomes much more difficult, if not impossible, to grab aggro from foes not immediately near you.[*]Other players tend to prefer a Tanker with Taunt, regardless of what you can do in combat. It just makes the "feel" safer to see their tanker using Taunt. So, whether you can hold aggro well or not, you'll probably find you have an easier time finding teams that will accept you if you have Taunt.[/list]
All that said, you can decide for yourself if Taunt is necessary or not. If you plan to play solo most, if not all, of the time, Taunt may not be required. Nonetheless, in order for Burn to work effectively, you'll need to find some way to hold the aggro of the villians within the Burn patch. Burn causes them to run so you need some other force in place to keep them from doing so. Taunt certainly fits the bill but, in a solo setting, Blazing Aura is plenty to keep the villians in a Burn patch. I have found, though, that, even while playing solo, I'll throw a Taunt or two in there along with Blazing Aura if I find myself fighting villians well above my level or villians that have defensive buffs that are causing Blazing Aura to miss.
Slotting Suggestions:
There doesn't seem to be a real strong argument to slotting this one way or another. While most folks agree that Taunt is good enough without any additional slots, what is put into that default slot tends to vary. I use a recharge reducer. Others use Taunt Duration enhancements so that they don't need to Taunt as often. Still others use Range enhancements to ensure that they can reach out and grab any villian. It's really up to you and your playstyle.
Frost
Power Type: Click
Range: Close (Cone)
Damage: 0.75 * 6 Cold
Recharge: 11
Duration: 5
Activation Time: 3
Endurance Cost: 16
Secondary Effects: -Recharge -Speed
The first multi-target attack in the Ice Melee line, Frost is a very short, but wide, cone attack that deals cold damage to all foes within the area of effect. Keep in mind that the depth of the cone is very short - it's really only useful for foes that are in melee range or awfully close. The animation is simply outstretching your hands while a blast of thin blue cold extends through the villians. It's actually somewhat difficult to see. While the damage is in DoT form, the sum of the damage is actually greater per target than Ice Sword. Unfortunately, the DoT is not particularly fast. Like Frozen Fists and Ice Sword, the -Speed and -Recharge effects on Frost are barely noticeable.
Frost has a rather hefty endurance cost and a longer recharge than Ice Sword but, if you're fighting multiple villians often, it may prove to be more effective than Ice Sword for dealing damage.
This is another power that is often taken to help out a young Fire tanker and is then respecced out once it's no longer needed. Once you get Burn, you'll find that your fighting strategy changes somewhat in a way that doesn't really complement Frost very well. With Burn, you'll always wants to be right in the middle of your enemies so that you can keep as many as possible in your Burn patch. With that in mind, you're seldom going to have the "perfect" shot with a Cone attack, such as Frost. Nonetheless, this is your most damaging attack until you Greater Ice Sword.
*/Ice Tankers might find this power to be more useful than a Fire/Ice tanker as it is one of the most damaging attacks in the Ice Melee line. Fire/Ice tankers don't particularly need the additional damage, especially after they have Burn.
Slotting Suggestions:
Just as with Ice Sword, this power is often used early in your career and respecced out later. Slot it with one accuracy enhancement and as many damage enhancements as you can afford. As with the previous powers, Frozen Fists and Ice Sword, slotting for -Speed is nearly useless.
Build Up
Power Type: Click
Range: N/A
Damage: N/A
Recharge: 90
Duration: 10
Activation Time: 1
Endurance Cost: 7.5
Secondary Effects: +Damage +Accuracy
This is the same power found in many other power sets throughout the game. Build Up boosts your damage and accuracy greatly for 10 seconds - just long enough to get off a few attacks. Note that this power does not affect Burn. Burn is a "summoned" ally and, as such, buffs on yourself will not affect Burn.
That said, Build Up is somewhat of a "waste" for an Ice Melee tanker. None of the attacks you have do great amounts of damage so, even with the nice boost from Build Up, you don't do much damage. As Fire/Ice, you'll be relying on Burn and your teammates to do the bulk of your damage and, as */Ice, you'll be pretty much relying only on teammates. While Build Up is a nice power, it's impact is much more pronounced on other power sets than Ice Melee.
As a caveat to what I've said here, Build Up may become more useful very late in your career. The various epic power pools open some additional attack powers for you. The Pyre Mastery power pool, in particular, offers some increased damage potential. If you want to add damage late, Build Up might offer you some added potential.
Slotting Suggestions:
Slot for recharge reductions. Add as many as you'd like - usually 3 or 4 is good enough that Build Up will be available for most fights and, in the case of some long fights, multiple times within the same fight.
Ice Patch
Power Type: Click
Range: Close (Location AoE)
Damage: N/A
Recharge: 35
Duration: 30
Activation Time: 2
Endurance Cost: 15
Secondary Effects: Foe Knockdown, -Speed
Ice Patch - the crowning jewel of the Ice Melee set. This is the one power that makes this entire power set "worth it," in my opinion. Ice Patch creates a small patch of ice (slightly larger than a Burn patch) on the ground beneath you. Don't confuse this power with Ice Slick from the Ice Control line - it's much smaller than Ice Slick. It's exactly the same as Ice Patch from the Blaster Ice Manipulation line.
Any foes caught on and Ice Patch will have their speed drastically reduced and will be prone to falling down. In most cases, foes caught on the Ice Patch will seldom get to attack as they'll spend all of their time falling down and getting back up. This effect can really help the defensive capabilities of your tank. If the foes can't attack you, you don't need any resistance.
The endurance cost on this power is fairly hefty at 15 points, but it has a long duration so it doesn't need to be used often. Be wary of stacking multiple Ice Patches on top of one another - having two Ice Patches on the same location can sometimes cause foes to be knocked back instead of down, freeing them from the Ice Patch. With only a little practice, you'll get the timing down so that you're dropping the next Ice Patch right around the time the first one disappears. Regardless, the periodic knockback is intermittent and fairly rare, but I still notice it from time to time.
Without any enhancements, you won't quite be able to have an Ice Patch out at all times, but you'll come close. With Hasten and a single recharge reduction, you can easily overlap two Ice Patches with time to spare. This power can be slotted for recharge reduction to give you the ability to have multiple patches out at all times. With 6 recharge reductions, it's possible to have 2 out at all times (the third can be placed just as the first is vanishing). With 6 recharge reductions and Hasten, you can actually have 3 Ice Patches for a short time.
Slotting Suggestions:
This is one of those powers that is just great "right out of the box." You don't need to do much slotting in order to make this power effective. Most folks slot this power with one Recharge Reduction enhancement. If you're interested in having some additional "control" for your tanker, you might consider adding multiple recharge reduction enhancements, as pointed out above, to allow you to drop multiple Ice Patches in combat. Personally, I've never added a slot to it and use just a single recharge reduction enhancement.
Freezing Touch
Power Type: Click
Range: 5
Damage: 0.7778 * 6 Cold
Recharge: 16
Duration: ?
Activation Time: 1
Endurance Cost: 14.5
Secondary Effects: Foe Hold
Freezing Touch is a melee attack that encases your foe in a block of ice, rendering your foe helpless. This power does respectable damage for the Ice Melee line (even though that damage is in DoT form), but it's generally not used as an offensive attack. Rather, Freezing Touch is used to incapacitate especially troublesome foes, such as Tsoo Sorcerers, Malta Sappers, and the like.
Slotting Suggestions:
I prefer a mix of accuracy, recharge reduction, and hold duration enhancements. My preferred slotting consists of 1xAccuracy, 2xRecharge Reduction, 3xHold Duration. That combination seems to yield a nice medium in being able to hold a number of foes for a decent duration. If you find that you prefer to hold a single target for a longer period of time, simply remove some recharge reductions and add hold durations.
Greater Ice Sword
Power Type: Click
Range: 5
Damage: 2.6667 Lethal + 2.7778 Cold
Recharge: 10
Duration: 5
Activation Time: 3
Endurance Cost: 14.5
Secondary Effects: -Recharge -Speed
The advanced version of Ice Sword, your character creates an even larger sword of ice with Greater Ice Sword. This sword has bigger everything than Ice Sword - bigger damage, bigger recharge time, bigger endurance cost, and bigger activation time. This is the single best single target attack in the Ice Melee set.
This power also includes the same -Recharge and -Speed effects that are on virtually all of the Ice Melee attack powers. As usual, the effect from Greater Ice Sword is barely noticeable.
Slotting Suggestions:
1 Accuracy enhancement and 5 Damage enhancements is the way I like to go. You could slot for endurance reduction or recharge reduction, if you felt the need.
Frozen Aura
Power Type: Click
Range: Melee (AoE)
Damage: N/A
Recharge: 20
Duration: ?
Activation Time: 2
Endurance Cost: 19
Secondary Effects: Foe Sleep
The top power in the Ice Melee set, this is a melee AoE sleep attack. Unfortunately, this power is very situational. Other powers, such as Burn, Blazing Aura, or Ice Patch, which will all probably be staple powers in your build, will break the sleep effect from Frozen Aura. By the time you reach level 38 and Frozen Aura is available, nearly every character in the game has at least 1 AoE attack so Frozen Aura is not particularly team friendly.
Most consider this power to be a "let down" as the top power in a power set. I have to say that I agree.
Slotting Suggestions:
Slotting for accuracy and sleep duration would probably be the best way to go. I can't say that I've tested this power much.
Power Pools
Concealment
The Concealment pool contains some very useful powers in Stealth, Grant Invisibility, and Invisibility. Even Phase Shift is a useful power. For a Fire/Ice tanker, I don't feel that this power pool is particularly effective. In general, you want to garner as much aggro as you can get so Stealth effects may be just the opposite of what you're after. Nonetheless, the defensive bonus from Stealth is appealing.
Fighting
The Fighting pool is generally considered a "must have" for Fire tankers. Certainly, you can be an effective tank without the Fighting line, but the benefits offered by this line are particularly attractive for Fire/* tankers. For Fire/Ice tankers, it's probably not to that extreme as Ice Patch can help make up for a lack of defense. Nonetheless, I can say that this power pool is very useful for any Fire tanker, including a Fire/Ice tanker. Tough is required to cap Smashing and Lethal resistance and Weave is your best single source for defense, as the Fiery Aura power set doesn't provide any. Boxing or Kick (I prefer Boxing over Kick with its knockback) can even be used in your standard attack cycle with Frozen Fists if you're lacking with other attacks. Some folks like to avoid this pool and that's fine, but I strongly recommend this pool as it's one of the most useful out there for Fire/* tankers.
Fitness
Another power pool that nearly everyone seems to take, Fitness contains that ever-popular power, Stamina. While Fire/Ice tankers are fairly endurance efficient in the end, the number of toggles run by most will nearly require Stamina. With that in mind, you'll need two more powers from this set to get them. Swift and Hurdle are a toss up, in my opinion, and Health is actually quite useful for a Tanker. Note that, if you use Consume, you can effectively "put off" this power pool for some time without hindering yourself. Nonetheless, I find that the benefit from Stamina is very nice once you start loading up on toggles.
Flight
The Flight power pool contains some more useful powers, but not generally for Fiery Aura tankers. Air Superiority is a nice attack due to the knockdown effect. Hover is also nice but keep in mind that you must be on the ground to use Burn or Ice Patch - hovering near the ground just won't do. Because of that, Hover isn't really that useful for a Fire tanker. Fly, of course, is another travel power.
Leadership
The Leadership pool contains a number of toggle powers that will benefit you, as well as the rest of your team. Defenders get the biggest bonuses from using these power, followed by Controllers, followed by everyone else. The benefit you actually get by running these powers as a Tanker is fairly small while the endurance cost is fairly hefty. Most tankers avoid this pool as the benefit just isn't worth the cost.
Leaping
The Leaping pool is very often taken by Fire tankers, for a couple reasons. First and foremost, this power pool contains Acrobatics, which offers knockdown resistance, which can't be acquired in the Fiery Aura power set. In addition, this power set contains Combat Jumping, which has a 5% defensive bonus and Immobilization resistance (another status effect not well resisted by the Fiery Aura power set). And, of course, the set contains the travel power, Super Jump.
Medicine
Another power pool that just doesn't work well for tankers - Fire Tankers, specifically. The powers in this set allow you to heal others or yourself, but all of these powers are interruptable. With a Fire tanker's lack of defense and ability to draw lots of aggro, there's virutally no chance you'll be successfully using these powers in combat often.
Presence
While this used to be a staple power pool for all tankers because of the AoE aggro grabber, Provoke, such is no longer the case. Now that Taunt is an AoE effect (with Issue 3), the Presence pool is no longer needed. In fact, for Fire tankers, it's not a very good pool, at all. The Fear effects could be useful, but powers such as Burn and Blazing Aura, which inflict damage over time, would constantly break the Fear effects, rendering them nearly useless.
Speed
This power pool is most often taken for Hasten. Many Fire tankers will take Hasten, but it isn't necessarily required. Is it helpful? Yes. Is it absolutely necessary? No, I don't think so.
Teleportation
While the Teleportation pool includes the travel power Teleport and the ever team friendly power Recall Friend, it offers little other utility.
Power Pool Summary
All that said, most Fire tankers take Leaping (for Immobilization, Knockdown, and Hold resistance, as well as a travel power), Fitness (for Health and Stamina), and Fighting (for Tough, which is needed to cap Smashing and Lethal resistance and Weave, which your best single source for defense). Many Fire tankers also take the Speed pool to get Hasten, but that's probably the least important of the 4 power pools I mentioned here.
Overall, the most often selected power pool powers for Fire/* tankers are as follows (in no particular order):
Swift/Hurdle
Health
Stamina
Boxing
Tough
Weave
Combat Jumping
Super Jump
Acrobatics
Hasten
Personally, I strongly recommend the Leaping and Fitness pools - they are nearly essential in the utility that they provide. I'm also a firm believer in the usefulness of the Fighting pool, but not everyone wants to go that route. Hasten, of course, is always nice and will be a great asset with your more slowly recharging powers, such as Burn, Ice Patch, Healing Flames, and Consume.
Epic Power Pools
The are 4 Epic, or Ancillary, power pools that become available at level 41. I'll briefly describe them and what they might provide for a Fire/Ice tanker. Each offers its own, unique, functionality, so it's really up to you to decide which direction you'd like to go. Finally, at level 41, you get a chance to make yourself unique.
I don't have a great deal of information on the various epic power pool powers, but I have included Brawl Index information for the damaging powers. I believe those to be accurate.
Arctic Mastery
This power pool offers a mix of powers and, as a major benefit, allows you to build up your Cold damage potential, which isn't resisted as well as Fire. Chillblain is a single target immobilize and not really very interesting. Block of Ice, however, which is also available at level 41, is a ranged single target hold and is really quite impressive. It also stacks with Freezing Touch - having both will allow you to lock down bosses instantly.
Ice Blast offers a ranged ice attack. And, just as the top power in the Ice Melee line is a let-down, so, too, is the top power of Arctic Mastery. Ice Storm will cause your foes to scatter, which, as a Fire tanker, is the last thing you want them to do. The core of Block of Ice and Ice Blast is where this power pool shines.
Chillblain: .5554 Cold * 5
Ice Blast: .8219 Smashing + 1.9445 Cold
Ice Storm: ?
Earth Mastery
If you want to build on your ability to be a controller, the Earth Mastery line really offers some great options. The opening combo of Stone Prison and Salt Crystals offers an interesting choice. Stone Prison is a single target immbolize which, while not impressive in itself, includes a -Fly effect that will bring annoying airborne foes down into your Burn patch. Salt Crystals, an AoE sleep, is situational, but can be used to lock down additional groups that have been "accidentally aggro'd" or a handful of villians that like to fire from a distance. The additional range of Salt Crystals makes it considerably more potent than Frozen Aura.
Fossilize offers a ranged hold which, again, stacks with Freezing Touch very nicely. The top power, Stalagmites, offers an AoE disorient and is very potent. Be sure to slot it with an accuracy or two in order to overcome the inherent accuracy penalty on it, but you can keep masses disoriented permanently (or awfully close) with it. The only drawback to this is that, currently, disoriented foes tend to wander about a lot and, sometimes, very quickly. Unless you have them caught on an Ice Patch, assume that they'll quickly wander out of your Burn patch. If you like to team a lot, though, being able to hold aggro on a lot of foes and disorient large numbers of them could turn you into a very potent teammate.
Stone Prison: .5554 *5 Smashing
Fossilize: 2.7779 Smashing
Stalagmites: 2.5001 Smashing
Energy Mastery
While most tankers covet this power pool more than the others, I don't feel that way with my Fire/Ice tanker. With both Stamina and Consume, I have very few endurance issues so Conserve Power, which reduces the amount of endurance you use and is very highly prized by Invulnerability tankers, just doesn't offer much benefit. Focused Accuracy will offer a large accuracy bonus, but that won't help your primary damage dealer, Burn. In addition, the endurance usage of Focused Accuracy is so high that its nearly unusable.
Laser Eyes offers a ranged attack and gives you an additional damage type in Energy. The last power, Energy Torrent, is the power that many Fire tankers hate most because of its AoE knockback.
Laser Beam Eyes: 2.7779 Energy
Energy Torrent: .8332 Smashing + 1.8334 Energy
Pyre Mastery
If you want to add damage to your build, this is your opportunity. Ring of Fire (a single target immbolize) can easily be passed up, but the other powers are all excellent.
Char is a ranged, single target hold which, again, stacks with Freezing Touch. Fire Blast offers a fire based ranged attack and Fire Ball offers a ranged fire based AoE.
The real beauty of the Pyre Mastery line comes in the fact that these powers can be enhanced with Fiery Embrace from the Fiery Aura line. Build Up helps, as well, but Fiery Embrace really makes this power pool shine. The down side is that, to make it work at top efficiency, you need to take 4 powers (Char, Fire Blast, Fire Ball, and Fiery Embrace). That will use up precious power slots. In addition, going with Pyre Mastery only exaggerates your dependence upon Fire based damage. If you run into a foe that has high Fire resistance, you might find that foe to be especially troublesome.
Ring of Fire: .6111 * 5 Fire
Char: .0277 * 5 Fire
Fire Blast: 2.7779 Fire + .2776 * 0-5 Fire
Fire Ball: .5554 Smashing + 1.9445 Fire + .2776 * 0-5 Fire
) If you want to be able to deal some damage, you might want to rethink that a little and get another attack in there - I'm a big proponent of Frost, but Ice Sword is another good one and available much sooner. Ice Sword gets outclassed later, while Frost better retains its viability, but you can always use a respec.