G_Tanker

Smurph I got hung up on the son wanting to blast... OP, do you think he'd be fine playing a corr (or defender) and buffing?

Don't get me wrong, I think it's the best route, but I stopped having suggestions around the time I saw that the son basically wants to play a blaster as it limits styles a good bit.

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Careful you don't pull a hammy with all that back pedalling

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I'm amused that you view qualifying my statements as backpedaling. Like I said in the AV thread, this is what differentiates a napkin-calculating dilettante from someone that knows what they're talking about.

I called you out as wrong. I explained why. I have not changed my position: A fire or dark armor tanker that 'knows how to play' can Tank an ITF without IO investment - but desperately needs their holes covered. You can fill your holes easily without massive IO investment by grabbing an appropriate support set.

On the flipside, a tanker with massive IO investments can be a terrible tanker. You can't fill in a skill gap with another teammate's powerset.

Without looking at the build too closely, are you 7% over the softcap with 1 foe in range or with 10?

I've had no issues on my invulns (scrappers and brutes) tanking 54's and ITF's with a build that only softcaps with 1 opponent in range for S/L. If you're aiming to hit the softcap with no opponents in range, it is certainly doable, but I wouldn't really view it as a justifiable expense. Of course, it depends on what you're planning to do - you want 70% defense to energy to hang with LR, and having a lot before buffs and insps certainly makes it easier.

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I think one of the biggest issues is auto SK... take that away and many of the issues of AE may also go away... When you have 7 lvl 9's seeking a lvl 50 to unlock the mission that is not a good thing. Yes, go back to the old fashioned farming where to have to have a SK for EACH and EVERY character if you do not fall into the correct lvl range for that mission.

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Oh heck no. I love auto-sk. If a friend logs on and wants to play, I don't need to worry about finding a mentor. I don't need to worry about searching for a level-appropriate mission.

Auto-sk is hands down one of the best things about AE, farming or not.

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I love the idea that you have to unlock the AE content... The Devs can write a tutorial that you MUST complete to access AE. Write a short arc about the game and make it the first mission you can access in AE...

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I have no problem with this. I make everyone I meet do the midnighter arc so I can drag them on ITF's. I see no issue with an arc to open the AE.

Paired Emp/Sonic defenders is a big hit lately...

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And I am going to call you on this.

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Or try anyhow Let's see!

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The worst tank in the game can tank the ITF if he has the right support so long as he knows how to walk from spawn to spawn and use taunt.

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The worst tank in the game can survive the ITF this way, sure. Tank it, that's arguable - in groups the last few days the other tank is sometimes the *last* person into the fight. That's *exactly* what I mean when I start differentiating between a "good tank" and a "bad tank". A good tank will keep the ITF going at a great clip and manage agro well, a bad tank won't, but either can be made to survive it regardless of their primary without ridiculous IO investment - which is where I corrected Krunch. Yes, you don't need melee for an ITF, so sure your regen could tank it if you really wanted to... lol @ heals tho.

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The real test of how well the Player/AT/Build performs is not when you are with an optimal group but how well it performs in a group that isn't loaded to the gills with Defense buffs and healers.

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The real test of how a player/build performs is whether they can do their job well. Which is in this case, tank an ITF. Note that I don't say "tank an ITF with no support"; You don't need to have put 500MM into a fire tanker to tank the ITF, and it's stupid to suggest that without the 500MM inf the tanker is somehow not well built or poorly played. That's just silly. I meet plenty of tankers with tons more inf invested that are terrible players. Regardless of how survivable their toon is, they aren't a good tank (although in some cases, very sweet farmers!).

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Despite having had a Level 50 Fire tank for nearly 5 years, skill or no skill, if I tried to take a "generic" Fire Tank with only SOs into the ITF with one healer and a bunch of Blasters then I don't honestly think there is a chance in Hell of our succeeding.

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Which was exactly my point. Knowing the mechanics of the ITF is key - Fire will not do "just fine" without support or massive IO investment, but it can do "just fine" without massive IO investment as long as you cover your holes with 1-2 support chars.

Also, "one healer" ? You seriously look for a "healer" for an ITF? Right....

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If I take a Fire tank into that same group optimized with IOs for Defense, HPs, Recharge and Regen, then our chances increase exponentially.

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Or instead of 500MM inf spent, you can grab a bubbler and get more or less the identical end result - an easily beaten TF (easier, actually, given your setup relies on pure damage to go through the healing nictus and has one agro and no buffs/debuffs to protect blasters ... ugh, I'd not be inclined to ITF like that). Or you can get a sonic. Or you can get a cold. Or you can take two. Throw a rad or a dark in while you're at it. You'll be safer and kill faster to boot.

While your statement is certainly *true*, for a team oriented environment it's rather irrelevant unless you specifically choose to play on poorly built teams just so your build can shine like a superstar. There seems to be this aura of "my tank must be able to stand alone unsupported to be awesome", and while I also build chars along those lines, I hardly need all the IO's to build and keep a team moving at a fast pace.

On the flipside and to counter my own argument, sure the ITF run on my scrapper I mentioned a few posts ago would have been a lot harder without my IO build. Of course, at that point I wouldn't have put it on CL 4 and would probably have grabbed a non-network member for an 8th slot. Knowing mechanics, and all.

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The odds are far better that the tank with the 500+ million build will not only be better equipped to handle what is thrown at him but will probably know a fair amount about how to play that character as well.

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The odds are far better is a *much* better statement than a sweeping generalization that a $500M build must mean this guy's good and a tank without that investment is 'poorly built'. And I've run into plenty of high inf builds that are terrible tanks by my standards. Not understanding how to taunt. Not understanding agro caps. Trying to hog the second spawn and losing the first. Being slow. Not understanding their own sets weaknesses. Etc, etc, etc, etc. I could care less that a willpower fire tanker is "an awesome tank, my friends say so" and has 3 mostly complete purple sets, they're still faceplanting against 54s and not adapting to the incoming pulls, choosing instead to sit in a corner and fight the last 3 of the previous pull. The stoner with 4 LOTG rech, 4 GOTA runspeed that just can't keep up the pace and complains we're going too fast. Etc, etc, etc, etc, etc....




I'll just quote myself:
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IO Build is not a good meterstick for player skill. It is not a good meterstick for team success. It is not the same as "knowing how to play" your character.

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They definitely reduced ally interaction. Probably a good thing.

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Would definitely have to have character level customization to be a true sidekick.

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Given the level of customization in the MA, players would loooooove making all sorts of sidekicks and backstories for them.

Again, as long as they disappear when you're on a team, I think this is a great idea. I'm a little concerned by buffing sidekicks given how powerful buffs/debuffs already are, but I'm sure the devs know this.

Abuse example: After I-16 where I can customize mission size, what's to stop a fire/kin controller from getting a fire/rad sidekick and milking drops/inf in missions set for 8 people? In fact, higher level sidekicks... who wouldn't want a fire controller along for more damage?

I think the idea has merit. I'm just thinking about the balance issue potential.

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well the xp goes to you..but yea like a one pet mm ...well just throwing it out there lol thanks for your response )

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I think sidekick damage should probably net you less than full exp if they're not increasing the mission size.

I think this would be a great idea, frankly. Diablo 2 did it somewhat well. It could be the cure for soloing "low damage" defenders (scrapper-esque sidekick), soloing "squishy" blasters (tanker-esque sidekick), etc.

I'm not sure I'd want to see it outside a solo environment for balance purposes, but this would be a very neat feature. You can somewhat do this in the MA, but this is more interesting.

I like to softcap ranged defense on my defenders if possible.

I usually IO for +recov, but not heavily. Defenders do just fine on SO builds.

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Just out of curiosity....

If fire control didn't have imps, and illusion didn't have phantom army, would we be having this discussion?

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Fire Imps are hardly the bread-winner of a Fire/Kin. They're helpful surely, but their randomness and single-target nature with only one attack means they aren't the biggest contributors, especially now that SB doesn't make them attack any faster.

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Taking FS out of the equation, what is then? I also agree FS has needed a nerfbat for ages (so has rage) but given popularity it's unlikely.

Hotfeet is a terrific power, but imps are mobile, don't require close grouping, do terrific damage that scales well with -res debuffs. I might see the point that a solo f/k gets more damage out of hotfeet, but if any controllers want to run some hero-stats on large runs and see what the breakdown of damage is from their powers, I'd be very curious.

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Keep rereading this until the light bulb goes off. Semantical misdirection bores me.

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*chuckle* To quote a man, "I accept your apology."

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I agree with Kruunch: you are systematically misreading what he wrote.

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I understand his point, I just have a first-hand experience in a number of counterpoints, so making a sweeping generalization is foolish and I've called him on it. I've seen plenty of players do fine with little to no IO'ing (either they're still leveling or just don't need IO's on a build) and there is a 'skill' factor that is completely separate from your build. Furthermore, you tend to build for a specific activity, so a great+dam/rech fire/ss/pyre farmer build is going to get reamed in the ITF without support.

On the flipside, I don't need an IO build on my shield tanker to tank 53-54 boss farms. I don't need an IO build on my dark or fire tankers to tank the ITF. All I need is right type of support. I had a friend who loved to farm the storm palace on his fire/fire/pyre back when RCS still existed, and he had an insane IO build for the time, but he never went without an emp.

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What I understood from what he said is:
If you meet someone level 50 who took the time & effort to fully equip the toon with something else than SO, you can assume that the player has at least some clue about the toon.

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Again, I have firsthand experience this is not true, and that in many cases the opposite can be true. My new shield/fire tanker leveled roughly 30 levels in the last two days with a cold defender and a rad defender, and none of the three had any enhancements period other than the shield's defenses and sleet's recharge. (and stamina and hasten on the shield. Attacks? Empty. Hitting 679 shield charge on a 53 boss with no enhancements? Hilarious.)

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I have seen enough toons to say that is true even for Fire/Kin controllers. Purpled-out fire/kin => dedicated player.

You can always find counter-examples but IO-ed out toons are a sign of dedication from the player behind the keyboard.

And if you pick up someone else build... it's one thing to select the powers, it's another to buy all the necessary IOs.

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Buying the IO's isn't exactly difficult. There are purpled out fire/kins that are terrible, ones that are amazing, and there are purpled out fire-kins that are very good at one specific type of activity and have little to no skill in other activities. Do you think they're "good" at playing fire/kin because they've got a very specific activity down pat? Similarly, I brought up the example of the typical tanker that just can't work with other taunt auras - it's incredibly common. Congratulations, a terrific build doesn't make you that good!



It might feel like semantics, but I feel that it's important, especially with the rate of new 50's, the proliferation of builds on boards, and the influx of new players - judging a player by their build is foolish. Suggesting that a dark or fire will do "just fine" tanking an ITF is a false statement without calling out that your generalization suggests they have heavy, heavy IO investment (checked the price of oblits, KC's and TOD's lately?) or support buffs, since the ITF hits some major holes in their defenses.

I'm not aiming my rhetoric at Krunch - there's little point. However, I feel the urge to correct his generalizations because most players probably don't view a "well built" fire armor or dark armor as one with severe IO investment.

Just out of curiosity....

If fire control didn't have imps, and illusion didn't have phantom army, would we be having this discussion?

There was a guide to one floating around... mine's stalled out at 37 (blasters just aren't that fun to me) but it's a great combo.

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So...you left your teammates below dying while you and your buddy went on? Great teamwork!!

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I think you're confusing teamwork and leadership; we'd cleared a path to the elevator and the defenders (including the team leader) went up. If the scrappers want to get lost on the first floor and tackle other spawns, I'm completely fine with that - I have many scrappers, and scrapperlock is good times.

I'm big on personal responsibility; getting in over their heads is their own problem at that point, and is part of the learning curve. It's not my responsibility to run around enabling people who are going the wrong direction when the team lead is pushing toward the objective. They did benefit from the exp we were generating on the floor above... and on the plus side it gave my friend the opportunity to work on toggle pulling without any banzai scrappers around! Eventually they figured out where the 'm' key was (after dying twice each trying to handle one spawn in a different hallways), found the elevator, and no more deaths the rest of the mission. Running the opposite way from your debuffers is not really wise at level 8. At level 40+, I would have done the same thing, except they would have actually been wiping spawns out without my help

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Why would someone not recommend an empath? They are pretty darned useful. They offer a huge complement of buffs and some of the best healing in the game (if you are into that).

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A) Because they're pidgeonholed by poor players into "healer" when that's not their main strength,
B) Because they're not a [u]force multiplier[u] like a dark or rad,
C) Because all they do is buff and blast, whereas dark and rad have significant CC-like abilities.

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And who asked about farming? Please keep your PLing away from the newer players to this game.

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So forget farming. I was teaching a friend how to play dark, and I was on a rad. We started a level 8 group with 3 scrappers, 1 troller, 1 dark 1 rad defender. We went into an AE mission full of big spawns of level 9 Council.

Scrapper agro'd early and wiped the team while dark was zoning in and rad was afk. Dark and rad cleaned the spawn, went up a floor and cleaned out 2 more spawns while the rest of the team got lost on floor one and died repeatedly. 2 defenders were shredding full spawns of +1's (sitting safely in a crowd of ~14 council at a time and tearing into them with sands of mu) at level 8 while 3 scrappers and a controller were getting torn up below. That's *hardly* the most amazing example I can give you, but it is a recent one.

Swap both the dark and the rad for empaths and you'd go slower, die more often, etc.

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Ended up on a team tonight whose leader was deliberately looking for as much damage buffing as possible -- Fulcrum Shift + EF + Tar Patch + /sonic defender AoEs. Much lovely melting of mobs.

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Chuckle, and I didn't think it was that optimal a team, either!!! Other tanker was terrible, someone kept KBing mobs, and we kept getting folks immob'd out of camp which took longer to kill. Still, we clocked in at a decent pace.

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Do all Tankers really have this ego streak? I don't believe I do with my one level 40 Dark Armor/Mace Tanker, but I'd be willing to chalk that up to being a Defender and having that mentality. Any else have this problem recently?

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I rather loathe playing with tankers for this reason. The tanker boards are, in that way, a guilty pleasure to me - lots of hard heads, lots of ego, general diva mentality. As someone that's been tanking content in every raiding MMO I've played at the top tier, I'm used to dealing with the prima dona mentality, but it's annoying nonetheless - especially because the majority just don't have the skills to back up the ego.

I have a few tankers. I just got a new one to 50 yesterday. I think the AT has become much more desirable since the AE came out, but it's still a subpar AT in my opinion. I've run plenty of PUG 54 boss farms blue side with no tanker. Every TF in the game has been completed (at breakneck pace) with no tanker. etc, etc.

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He then said he was waiting on his Healers before jumping in. I responded "Healers?" He asked if I were new, to which I responded "No. Are you?" He said no and that Empathy are Healers, to which I responded that Defenders do more than heal.

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This kind of player lets me build the teams I like. Please don't disabuse them of the notion.

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Slot your attacks before slotting anything else. Slot your attacks with endurance reductions before anything else. Turn off Mud Pots as often as possible.

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it startes with recovery bonus's..if your running a stone tank..you dont need anything else but recov,recharge and +damage and some speed

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It does NOT start with recovery bonuses. These bonuses are relatively insignificant compared to the awesome power of slotting commonly used click powers (meaning attacks) with endurance reduction.

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QFT.

I've only used the temporary phase shift power on my spines/fire during the third wave of robots on the ITF... but it's DARN useful there

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Keep rereading this until the light bulb goes off. Semantical misdirection bores me.

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*chuckle* To quote a man, "I accept your apology."

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Ok ... since you're obviously wanting a lesson in character building / playing (coulda just asked nicely) ...

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I don't feel I learn a lot when I visit here, but feel free to surprise me!

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I said the *most* amount of skill in this game is building your character. You don't build your character by copying another build ... but by understanding what the build does from experience.

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See, the lesson I'm seeing here (and since your first post on this particular tangent about 'knowing how to play') is that you really should consider qualifying your generalizations instead of just throwing them out there.

In response to your statement "You don't build your character by copying another build", I've seen quite a few people hop to a new board and say, "I want to play an 'X', give me a build", so your suggestion seems inaccurate. I've PUG'd frequently when I have time to play in the last 2 months, on the two highest pop servers (iirc), and I've run into a gamut of skill levels. Some of which are literally, "my friend told me to build it like this". Build = Skill again makes little sense. You're not going to get far with that line of argument.

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Along those lines, the overwhelming vast majority of players who actually *build* their toons well (i.e. not just copy from the boards and throw a ton of influence at it) also tend to play their toons well (at least when focused). The whole time and effort thing. I've yet to meet a person who put that much time and effort into a really well built character, who didn't play well.

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Yet perhaps the reverse is true. I've been playing shields for about three days. There's not much mystery to the set. Yet I run into willpower tankers (at 50!) that don't understand what their toggles do, dark scrappers (at 50!) that don't know obsidian shield doesn't protect from knockback when it says so right there, fire/ss tankers (at 50! with TONS of IO's!) that don't understand that their big +recharge/+dmg build is totally crap for handing 54 boss pounding as lead tank... etc etc etc.

The only piece of your quote up there I agree with is that there is a correlation between skill and experience. As the mgmt phrase goes, "Experience trumps talent every time".

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So they almost go hand in hand. The other big part to this equation is knowing what you're facing and how that will effect your build. That comes from experience and/or doing your homework. Finally, a smaller part to the equation is being able to handle the unexpected. I say small here because this game from a content perspective just doesn't throw a whole lot of curves at you.

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Ah, so we're somewhat in agreement that experience has something to do with this 'skill' thing. That's a much wiser line of argument than build.

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If your assertion here is that the order in which you are mashing your buttons requires a certain amount of concentration on your part ... well ... (trying really hard to not offend you again) ... it shouldn't.

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Um. Previous post, I was main tanking 53's at 15. I had combustion, brawl and the magic thrown thing as buttons to mash. (oddly enough I didn't take my vet powers till 35ish, was too busy) Edit: Scorch! How could I forget scorch?! 4 glorious buttons to mash.

On the flipside, knowing how to position my taunt aura, how to cluster mobs, how to work around the other tanker to keep the multiple spawns saturated, how to keep the pace near the max the team was capable of - I suppose mashing movement buttons counts? (Edit: And perhaps most importantly, 'knowing how to build myself an awesome team to cover my holes and melt bosses from available puggers' ?)

Heck, example from last night, I finally pick up Taunt (going to IO mule it later) at 38. I immediately start using it to grab mobs outside the main group if they harassed squishies, and to retrieve running anchors. The willpower tank along for a run A) Had taunt because someone told him to take it B) didn't know how to use it beyond taunting the things in front of him C) had a relatively good IO build if his bonuses were anything to go off of. Heck, don't get me started on tanks who don't know how to use taunt (I don't insist people take it, but if you take it, it's not for the stuff right in front of you, folks.)

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Experience (part of that whole character building thing) will make going through the motions more of a reflexive act then a conscious one.

P.S. - Part of making a great build does include dipping into IOs yes. This should be taken as a given (again).

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Ok. So back to my original beef , your quote: "Fire and Dark Tankers do just fine in the ITF. Badly built Tankers of all varieties do not."

Fire and Dark players can have *experience* and *skill* and be *well built* without major IO investment and do great in other parts of the game, but still need *support* and/or *Heavy IO's* to do well on an ITF. This is due to game mechanics. They do not do "just fine" without one or the other of the above. I put far less weight on IO builds because I tend to travel with a lot of support, but that is reverse of the average PUG team that I see formed. (Recent stats bear that out as someone posted in archtypes a few days ago - still far more blasters and scrappers than any other AT)

Therefore, you might be a skilled fire or dark tanker that *really* knows your characters powers well. And you might be a great tank. But you still won't handle the ITF well without IO's or support. This illustrates the difference between mechanics and 'skill'. Edit: And build is separate from either... and I don't consider "well built" to really include "heavy IO investment". You don't need heavy IO investment to do a great job as a tanker, but you do need to know where your holes are and have a plan for covering them.

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Your ability play the tanker is one thing, how much influence is invested in it is another. This is not a skill gap issue.

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The largest amount of skill required in this game is building your character. "Well built" today means investing time and money into acquiring IOs. That should be a given ... if it isn't, then welcome to 2006.

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Chuckle. I enjoy continued opportunities to correct you.

Counter-example A: "It takes smarts to design your build"
"Give me a build for X" "Fix my build for Y" -- threads litter this board. While it takes some skill to put together a good build, it takes none to duplicate it. Just time and effort to amass the influence. Assuming build = skill is foolish.

Counter-example B: "My build makes me a good tanker."
The insanely IO'd (insert any) tanker that can survive all day long in a spawn of (whatever) but with a second tank on the team just can't get the hang of managing two or three spawns at a time, fails at teamwork, and gets teammates killed. The tanker that brags about standing in a spawn all day long while his team wipes. The tanker that is just so darn survivable with amazing damage output but didn't take a travel power and thus refuses to do any task forces that involve travel. etc etc etc etc etc etc etc. Having a great build does not make you a great tank. Heck, I main tanked 53's on my level 15 shield/fire tanker 2 days ago with a 41 tank in the group - other tanker didn't know how to set pace or do anything else, and I had bubbles plus given a fort to softcap plus carried a tray of purples so I led. At 15. (47 as of last night)

Counter-example C: "My skill making an individual IO build makes for GREAT TEAM SUXCES!"
8 fire/rads with SO's.
2 emp/sonics with SO's.
8 dark/any's without any enhancements whatsoever.
Not a single IO in there, these teams will have massive success. I don't range softcap my defenders because I have to, I do it because I feel like it. The mechanics of the game make it nice to have good IO's, but not required.

IO Build is not a good meterstick for player skill. It is not a good meterstick for team success. It is not the same as "knowing how to play" your character.

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When you go into the water, you might get wet.

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oh and as far as the wall in cimora stands..its gravy to me.i really dont think its cause of fire or dark lacking to other sets

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My dark/fire/pyre and spines/fire/scrapper (and countless other chars) can solo the wall spawns just fine, farming them is not really the topic. The point I'm making is a dark or fire tanker that doesn't have significant IO's or support will not do well tanking the ITF because they can't handle 4-8 bosses and EB's in the mix with all the lts and mins. They have terrible innate defense and no defense debuff resist.

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its the abiltity to use the set you have better then the average joe ...ive always said one thing about tanks that holds true

anyone can play a tank..but not everyone is good at it.

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Skill is a separate issue. There is a mechanics gap for a fire or dark tanker in the ITF. I'm looking at taking my fire/fire/pyre tank to 45% s/l defense, but I would hardly claim I can tank the ITF with him and no support because "I know how to play a fire tank".

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As far as the ITF goes ... anything over an hour is a failure to me. Fastest ITF I've run is 37 minutes ... was with a Fire Tanker leading in fact.

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I've done some sub 30mins's but those were intended speed runs. This was a network leveling / merit team, ie: "Anyone want to do an ITF?". I also view anything over an hour as a failure, but given we took whatever folks wanted to bring (two of the vets swapped to their corrs to keep the speed up), I don't feel bad about that run. Folks got their levels and merits, and I probably shouldn't have set it to 4 with so many lowbies, but we did fine.

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Most Brutes I've seen make horrible Tanker substitutes ... mostly from the standpoint that they're built and played like Scrappers.

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Hmm. My scrapper didn't die the entire run and ended up soloing the last 8% of the computer. Darn those squishy little scrappers? *laugh* Seriously, the game isn't that challenging. I could care less what someone's main is as long as they understand the mechanics, which brings us back to my point.

The mechanics are that fire and dark armor don't handle the ITF well without significant investment or support. If people understand the mechanics, they understand what they need for success. If they don't, they'll die a lot and get blamed as a "bad tanker" on these teams - which is why I wrote the entire schpeil on mechanics up there. I don't want the average tanker thinking, "Well, Coldmed can do it, so my fire tanker must be able to do it!" ... which is why I reach out to correct you when you suggest people just don't know how to play a fire tank and that's why they're getting reamed on the ITF. That's not true at all. We can give you a level 50 fire tank with just SO's on a supportless team and see whether it bares out, if you want. SO's vs. IO's; you can have exactly the same powers taken and world of difference in performance. Your ability play the tanker is one thing, how much influence is invested in it is another. This is not a skill gap issue.