Innigo

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Good question. I guess it's because my Stone/Fire is at 15, and atm I haven't got any other armours than Stone Skin and the passive one, so I rely on Rooted's regen (plus EE) to keep me alive. Plus, I absolutely hate knockback. I've actually gotten quite used to turning Rooted on and off quickly when it's necessary to move.

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Ah, I spent most of my time rooted at that lvl as well. You should have taken sprint and at least be working towards 3 slotting it. By the time you hit 22 and SO territory you can move at a respectable pace.

Just had an interesting discussion with a fire tank (without taunt) who claimed that in RV she was able to hold agro with only gauntlet and Blazing aura. From what I understand of the post i7 game mechanics this shouldn't be possible. Anyone want to comment. I can only say, with any autority that the PvE AVs *only* respond to taunt, but this as a stone tank and even then I've lost control a few times.

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Granite is overpowered. There is no need for it to have any defence for a start. It doesn't gain that much from it though. Granite is not a way of gaining great xp it's just a way of avoiding debt. A GA tank can happily go on a mish against +5s but the rest of the team will probably die so whilst the tank has avoided a few k of debt he has to sit there waiting for everyone to get back from hosp. Best xp is usually against +2/3s and you don't need GA for that.

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I avoid +5 mishes as you're right, it's not fair on the rest of the team. There' no way you can hold aggro if mudpots isn't hitting and so all you're being is a very ineffectual scranker. I wonder what it was like before the defence revision of i7.

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This is why I'm seriously considering getting into the Presence Power Pool with my Stone/Fire. Seeing as I'm rooted a lot of the time, I figure that some extra means of taunting at a distance would compensate for the difficulty of moving around. Does this make sense to any of the vets here?

(I appreciate the teleport thing, but - maybe I'm just a klutz - while teleporting around in-battle is ok in outdoor maps where I can zoom out, I find it difficult to use in enclosed indoor maps.)

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1st question; Why are you spending most of your time rooted? Even against +3 or 4 mobs rooted isn't need that often. Hell, even against +5 mobs I never found I needed it very much.
Secondly, teleporting around can be dangerous on the team as you may lose the agro gathered around in your mudpots. I try to stay still and, if possible, stand in a chocke point so the mobs have to run through the mudpots to get to the rest of the team.
Taking the 2nd taunt is not unreasonable, but just remember there's a to-hit roll required on the presence pool version so slot of accuracy.

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Granite is number one top of my needs to be nerfed list. I cant think of more spectacularly unbalanced power in the whole game...

Risk vs Reward? pfffft! Try telling a fire blaster and a granite tank that...

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Granite armour comes with -acc -dmg -spd and -recharge. Killing any mob of consequence takes a looooong time.
Beating down an even lvl minion takes 2 runs through the attack chain, which isn't even a chain and there's a pause after I go through 5 attacks (including brawl) before brawl recharges again.
If I remember from the hero builder, granite fully slotted with 3 and 3 gives around 30% defence and 78% resistance to all but psionic attacks.

They excel against certain mobs, like the Crey, but are put under sever pressure by the likes of the Carnies. Even the rikti mentalists can cause problems.

It's easy to look at granite and think; risk versus reward? Pfft!! But always every AT can organise themselves some risk free XP, fire blasters included, and could gather that risk free XP at a rate that would make a stone tank drool. I remember when I was bored with my PB I'd find a big even spawn, hover above them, hit build-up, shift into squiddy form and 2 shot the whole spawn. Hows that for fast, risk, free XP?

Yup, 3 slots defence, 3 slots resistance is the formula to become an unkillable wall of stone.

10lvls and no debt

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If I found myself alone in RV and someone was doing something like badge hunting or testing or so on I would leave them alone. Simply put I would sooner pvp with someone who wants to thank grab a kill from an unprepared target, wheres the sport?

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There's some merit to that attitude, but badgehunters must accept that enemy players are an inherent hazard of and and all zones and should NOT expect other players to accept "I'm PvEing!!" as a free pass.

I dont generally PvP anymore, except in base raids, but still do the missions in Sirens and Warburg. When I'm doing this I go from the safe zone to the mission as fast as humanly possible because I'm EXPECTING someone to jump out the woodwork and thump me at any moment. If badgehunters had that attitude perhaps they wouldn't get so upset when it actually happened.

The simplest and perhaps most popular (certainly with me) solution would be to STOP charging SGs to place items they've built themselves.

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The fact that you can slot form powers before you get the form?

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Aaaaah, no wonder I wouldn't notice. My PB is tri-form.

Not really arguing the point, just trying to clarify; that the margin between the best and worst theoretical tank is WAY smaller than the margin possible between good and bad player.

Stone offers certain challenges that need to be overcome, but can be overcome, although certain mobs will cause an involentary shudder. CoT with their acc debuffs for example.

I must admit i7 appears to have been awfully kind to ice tanks. Was doing a Nem mish with one and it all went completely pear shaped and the two of us ended up surrounded by 3 spawns which included 3 warhulks and 3 Fakes. I thought the ice was dead for sure (our empath appeared to be playing a different game altogether - I dont think he actually managed to heal anyone the whole mission) but although he didn't do quite as well, he survived it, which I was surprised at.

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And thats precisely when you are up a certain creek without a certain barge pole in granite armour.

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I don't know if I can agree. I'll give an example; when the nrg blaster who's at the bottom end of the lvl spectrum for the mish lets off his nova and manages to blow the group you've carefully herded apart without actually managing to kill any of them, then you've got a problem. Irrespective of what class of tanker this is a major headache and I;ve never seen a tank successfully gather all the agro back up any better than I do with my stone/stone. Mudpots is atm 2 slotted for annoyance factor and if no one hits any of the scattered mobs they'll run back to me and not the blaster, he has to hit them again before they'll turn on him.

The bottom line is this is all anecdotal, I've never seen anyone tank noticeably better than I do with my stone. And as horribly arrogant as that sounds it's also true. I rolled a tank because I was annoyed at the dismally small number of skilled tanks that are out there and given the pivotal role a tank plays in a team I felt one more tank people could rely on was needed.

To be honest, I find the biggest problem isn't someone with knockbacks, it's another tank on the team who doesn't know how to tank as they could agro off you far better than any blaster can and pull the herd all out of shape and in doing so increases the likelihood of strays going after the squishies.

You may be right, it may be harded on the stone to regain agro after the worst happens but player skill is still the biggest factor.

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Correct me if I'm wrong but I thought the Mud Pots taunt and slow was auto hit now... Just the damage needs a to hit roll.

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Nope, mudpots needs a to-hit roll.

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I would still say Fire is a better aggro keeper than Granite though.

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I don't know if I agree, but don't disagree enough to make an issue out of it. What I will say is if there's a scale of aggro grabbing it's small enough that player skill (in terms of play and slotting) can more than compensate.

As someone already said, playing a fire tanks isn't much different from playing any other tank, it's just fire can't take the same lvl of beating and should be wary of large teams and pay closer attention to defender powersets.

IN general the proper place for a tank is at the front of the group. The tank should lead and lay down the law. My friend whom I went from 1-50 standing beside her fire tank had a couple of rules. She insisted EVERYONE say Ready before starting the next battle and routinely explained to people that if they were standing in front of her then they were standing in the wrong place.

Putting 2 end reducers in Fire Shield is probably a waste of slots IMO. Fire Shield has a really small end drain.

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Double XP weekend = long hours playing and less sleep

Fire is uncommon largely due to its relative weakness to the other tank classes. A stone can walk into a +2 mission and herd up a spawn for an 8 man team and hold it relatively easily. A fire tank can't do this, not without a defender backing them up. If they try without a defender, a faceplant follows fairly soon afterwards.

As for tanking itself, just remember your job isn't to dish out damage but to shield the squishies on your team from it. I can onyl comment from a stone point of view but quite often I find myself surrounded by mobs looking about trying to gather up the few errant ones who escaped my grasp and harrassing the squishies.
So when it comes to slotting, damage isn't your cocern, damage resistance is. I've heard the fighting pool is of particular use to a fire tank.

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What change to form slotting?

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Uuuuuum THIS one.

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I have no idea what I'm supposed to be looking at. This looks normal to me and I've had a Kheldian from well before i7, like 3 months before.

What change to form slotting?

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So, my point is, can anyone offer me any help/advice/constructive insults on tanking as a PB?

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Yeah, don't do it, basically because you can't.
Dwarfs just can't hold agro well enough to tank, so just think of it as your im-out-of-my-depth-for-nova-or-human power,

Duplicate post.

My initial thought was; Hmmm, combining the lowish recharge speed of stones, end heavy and lowish damage attacks with fire's lowish resistence. Why?
A stone/fire tank would be much more potent addition to a team.

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i think a da scrapper can drop rooted ang granite.

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With what?

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it is about getting the particularly bit of aggro ( normally 1 or 2 enemies ) that is going after a teammate who can't handle it without losing control of the aggro you currently have ( 4+ enemies ).

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My own tank, a lvl34 stone/stone will attempt to hoard ALL the agro, even in a spawn balanced for an 8 man team. That means 10+ mobs, more than the mudpots can handle - especialy if they're big foes like DE which may not pack in around you very tightly, so taunt become essential for keeping the herd together.
Then of course you team may include a PB or nrg blaster who blow your carefully constructed herd all to buggery and you have to gather up the agro again.
Then of course, there's pulling. Without taunt you have to rely on someone else with a ranged attack to pull and then grab the agro off them.
The bottom line is simply this. You *can* tank without taunt, but if you want to be a very good tank then it's a must.
Personally I like to known to be very good at something - it makes getting on teams SO much easier.

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Also from what i've heard ancillary powerpools don't have AoE taunt but only have brute like single target taunt, so for serious ranged aggro control you have to wait until Fireball at level 47.

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That's what I was thinking, but then, you can't be too hard on fire tanks, given their relative fragility, if I was a fire tank I wouldn't want to be pulling too much agro either.

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use my powers and use my fire mastery to get the aggro of enemys out of melee range

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Well, fire mastery isn't available until 41st lvl. So up until then what did you use? AFAIK a fire tank has no other ranged attacks.

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Does a fire/fire tank need taunt?? remember they have blazing aura, combustion, burn and fire swoard circle which are all PBAoE

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No, a tank, no tank NEEDS taunt, but for however good a tank you are without it, you'll be even better with it.

Compare it to a PB, who in Nova form and running SOs can 2-shot an even level spawn.

Or how about a stone tank in granite armour and running rooted who is completely indestructable to even lvl mobs (unless they have psi).

So no, I dont think a fire troller is overpowered. I don't think either of the above 2 are overpowered either.