New Dawn

yeah in the quote you have taken from my post it also says "providing you assist them in doing their job effectively"
that means keep aggro, hold aggro and sustain some of it so you dont die.

To do that temp invuln, invincible, dull pain and unyielding, are pretty much must haves with some defenders you will need dull pain and unyielding as not every defender compensates for that.

If i was on that team, well i wouldnt be on that team i dont tank for tanks or with tanks and especially naff tanks. In fact when i play any set if people arent goin to play to assist me in doing my job i log. Reason being i dont play for xp, i dont play to leech, i play to play a toon as near enough intended, otherwise why would i make that toon? Some people have deleted certain sets because the sets werent assisted by other players to even be close to being effective which is a shame.

Invulnerability can be either resistance or defence you could make it one or the other, 50% of the time you could be nothing but solid resistance and the other 50% of the time you could be "with weave stacking" practically live of hp and defence.

Defence is great because its better to not be hit than be hit and you miss out on so many secondary effects which makes technically 1% def = quite a bit more than 1% of resistance. But things will vary depending on the tohit calculation versus what you are up against, if your a typically cookie cutter built firetanker a sonic defender should to my logic be more worth it than a forcefield bubbler although coping with secondary effects is more down to you and you are more likely to feel them.

When it comes to alot of things you can tank with the build you enjoy just because enough of the survivability your after should come from the other people in the team anyway, providing you also assist them in doing their job more effectively. A trick archer isnt going to be that much good if you dont herd, the trick archer by laying debuffs on untaunted mobs could be the one always dead in every mob.
Tank says "Trick archery is pants", the trick archer says "call yourself a tank?" In this scenario the trick archer is correct.

Weave really does help invulns and ice but you dont actually need it to tank.

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For instance: You are a male, playing a female character. You join a PuG and decide you'd like to roleplay during tbe missions, without knowing whether or not your teammates are roleplayers. The trusty Tanker (a real life male, you assume) starts to chat-up your character.

Do you:
a). Play along?

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Maybe they are roleplaying, their toon happens to be a sexual predator who would turn their heads at corpses given an opportunity and you turning around saying you really of the opposite sex will blow it for them. I cant imagine why a guy would chat up a girl with just the knowledge that she is female without real evidence. But i know it happens alot.

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b). Send him a /tell explaining you're roleplaying?

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Nah keep on roleplaying dont ruin it for youeself, its much better to be able to stay in character as much as possible. He is a bit silly to even bother chatting you up just cos you have to sit down on the loo.

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c). Stop roleplaying immediately and excuse yourself from the team?

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Nope keep on roleplaying, bear in mind some people just like to get in and out of a mission with minimum fuss so your *bites lip* comment *looks over at the guy who needs tender loving heals* followed by *what should i do* is not as good as getting on with the heal. I quit teams the moment i as a hero discover the rest of the team must be villains becaise they play in a way to try and get eachother killed. Which is almost everytime i log on heroes. More so on defiant than union but barely ever on vigilance so far. No wait once on vigilance people didnt play the best way for my dark defender to support them so i got my forcefield bubbler out instead.

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d). Explain to the whole team you're roleplaying and risk embarrassing the Tanker?

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If he was worried about embarressment he wouldnt take any risks.

If you ever hear on defiant or union Arena "No <ADD NAME> I will not PL you!" that'll be me

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Yeah I think with the scaleble defense they took the risk out of an Inv/ tank. I herded a good chunk of a CoT defeat all mish against +1's and just stuck my AoE attack on auto and made a cup of tea, came back and I was still in green with most of them half dead.

[/ QUOTE ]Back to pre-I5 style then

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Tanks took a bat and defenders became more useful (as useful as intended) in teams. It is with (all def) powerpools stacking to sometanks versus some enemies reminiscent of Ye Olde Days. I quite like having everyone in the team being important even though it can be frustrating when people in the team play in a way that makes certain sets less effective than they are supposed to be. According to Stateman tanks arent actually supposed to take it all i believe, and i agree with that, thats why you have debuffers, buffers, controllers and scrappers with taunt to pull of the bosses and blasters who can only mainly kill despite most having useful secondary effects.

Yeah win/win builds are impossible, but then you have people who share a team with you can help overcome certain hurdles. Being /ice (least damaging) and having -rechg from granite doesnt help with attack chains so you may find you dont need end redux slotting in attacks because your end recovery rate versus end use rate covers it, you shouldnt need an end slot on conserve, you resist end drain with rooted to an extent go with the powers but feel ya way up just have a 6 slotted autohit taunt when ya do AVs.

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Now, Shannon.. sigh. pftt. *facepalms* sigh.. Okay, two questions. One, prove why this is a bad build for taunting and Two, provide me with a solution. Go on. hehe.

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Whilst in granite your recharge is slowed and the higher the lvl you face the lower the taunt duration and so without proper taunt duration between recharges you are allowing a window of no taunt effect. provoke isnt auto hit and there isnt enough taunt duration in mudpots to keep taunt between taunt pulses. The build above is better but on a stonetanker id rather have 3 rechg 3 taunt in 1 autohit taunt than 3 taunt in one that autohits and one that doesnt. i am planning on 2 taunts tho, i wont have the toughest tank but it should given time and space be good for aggro.

I did tests with taunt using every type of tanker versus eachother on and off and the taunt duration of the secondary power taunt is better than that of an auras but having said that if one tank has been in the mob a while and has been applying gauntlet + damage to the foe(s) your taunting results might vary. The basic unslotted taunt outgunned the aura anyway with no other effect involved.

All tanks level 22 and we even had green jets firetank sharing half a mob with my icetank, literally sharing!

I wouldnt want to be a blaster your tanking an AV for with that build i really wouldnt. I can imagine it being like it was with my New Dawn in RV and 2 granite tankers were on 1 AV and the AV starts ignoring them and comes for me. Normally i see that with just 1 granite tank but 2 was kinda extra taking the ****. Your level of taunt control is horrible. Another very self centred build imo. The game is called "City of Heroes" and the word "hero" is something most people should be looking up in the dictionary from what i see.

When it comes to one versus one (ie AV wants you or some guy in pvp zone) as an invuln resists id say are better (although thats not to say not getting hit at all is nice) but it can take quite a bit of defence.

But if your more toward a herding tank (and especially if you lack interest in how defenders work best) then get as much defense as possible, you will suffer less secondary effects as a consequence too which is an additional bonus.

Scaleable defense and the changes to power pools being def to all has made considering defense seriously worth it.

I made my invuln with weave on test and it was wow easier against +2 to +3 carnival, i could herd 17 and solo the lot without looking at an inspiration! To do that normally solo id of had to chew on 2 or 3.

If a power is described as a defense to all, its a defense to all and so it stacks with all types of defense.

If you do get weave and tough, and then go and get focused accuracy take conserve energy prior to foc acc. All them heavy toggles + attack chain + -end effects = not good

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EndRdx Slotting - I see you're putting end slots in attacks but are light on them in toggles. Personally, I'd rather put them in the toggles. The simple reason for that is that if I'm running low on end, I can stop attacking as BA along with taunt will allow me to control aggro. Attacks I don't have to use if end is low, toggles I do so I prefer my end benefit in those. I normally open up with big end AoE's to get everything on me then just concentrate on taunting and mopping up stragglers when it's not going to cripple my end for toggles.

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The less endurance you use whilst attacking the longer it takes to get to low endurance allowing consume to kick in. My firetank will not need conserve energy. Attack chains have higher eps and they reduce fight duration so its important to be able to extend the time on how long you can attack for. I wouldnt slot fire shields with endurance till after i have slotted attacks. Certainly slot blazing aura though. Kinslayer is right imo about acc and taunt in blazing aura being better you have chance of keeping teams more economical in their attacks versus -acc enemies.

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I assume it is this you are referring to earlier.
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13) Duration and AoE for Gauntlet are hard coded but vary from power to power using the End costs and/or Levels (Tier) of the powers as a guideline, but not a hard and fast rule because there are exceptions. Example: Total Focus has a radius that is 50% larger than Energy Transfer.

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By adding the and/or he is saying that "guantlet is based on the tier of the power, with the possibility of a modification by the endurance cost of the power"
and that only as a speculation as all powers dont even follow that as a general guideline. But saying that: [ QUOTE ]

Gauntlet applies to any attack a tanker will make. The greater the amount of endurance the attack costs the greater the level of gauntlet. High endurance attacks are usually of long recharge and the only decent gauntlets you would have providing they dont miss.

[/ QUOTE ] where only the endurance cost is mentioned as deciding the level of gauntlet is clearly a oversight.

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Go out turn off your aura and jab, box and brawl something and see how easy it is to keep aggro with that off a blaster, then imagine that when your blazing aura misses because of a tsoo sorceror or a storm shaman or even your out of endurance due to gauntletting so much and having -end effects you cant use anything.

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this is a attack chain of a level 6 (in a level 20+ enviroment)
Whenever someone builds a herd tanker, only picking the basic attacks and commenting on how poor gauntlet seems to be my only response can be summarized as "well, duh!"

Compare this with a /em tanker with Build upped ET and/or TF that generates high levels of "hate" or "threat" with the gauntlet of a level 35 and 38 tier power.

(i know, maybe its sounding like im biased here, its just that its the secondary with which i have the most experience.)

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By only mentioning endurance costs i am speaking of a general rule, my knockout blow is also a hold, the enemy is going to need to feel that hold and remember me better as with total focus being a disorient these powers have durations for secondary effects they realistically deserve a better kind of duration or aoe effect. Footstomp is going to have a large aoe effect as it hits so damn many where as haymaker hits one so will have a smaller aoe effect to be more realistic. Gauntlet at low level would be poo at lvl 6 and i brought up why it would be. At that level attack chainage isnt always there especially if your enhancing your primaries first as you should do and taunt itself is a far more effective power to keep aggro as you level up than gauntlet. Gauntlet can miss or be made to miss and after all that missing you do you succumb to no endurance and then you are just a fat lump of lard on a team. You could have moments where you ran to help the only defender keeping you alive and oops gauntlet missed and too late where as taunt would of cut out running time, got there quick enough and didnt miss under any condition.
imo gauntlet isnt great it doesnt make choosing between whether or not to get taunt any different by and large your gauntleting what your aura is taunting anyway.

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Compare this with a /em tanker with Build upped ET and/or TF that generates high levels of "hate" or "threat" with the gauntlet of a level 35 and 38 tier power.

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They can miss, leaving out taunt and waiting till 35 for a decent gauntlet is just sad and you would need to continuously be stacking things.

i liken gauntlet to a kid tugging mummy on the trouser leg and mummy turns around and says "just a minute mummy is talking" and she turns back to the person she is talking to. The kid would have to tug mums trouser leg harder to be more effective, or if not hard enough, the more it happens the better cos then mum finally turns around and gives the kid a scorning.

I liken taunt to offensively telling a guy across the pub how good his wife was last night in which case you know your number one public enemy.

i have done enough testing to turn around and say omg is that all gauntlet does no tanker in their right mind would solely rely on that and repeated tests for taunt aura and taunt itself to reach the same sentiment. but anyway this link as first brought to this forums attention by Faultline should work and from all my personal experiences, what is said is basically believeable cos they ring true and explain things.

LINK

At lower levels you basically have lowest end costing powers that dont chain up well to even look good making gauntlet look particularly bad, when my aura hits 10 and i taunt 5 thats outside of my aura i am looking to hit any spare 2 foes for gauntlet and glad for it other than that im not looking to gain from it unless coming off an aoe attack such as footstomp which is and should be as unthing says a great opener.

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I felt I could hold aggro reasonably well so far (level 6) and it should get easier once Gauntlet starts working and I get some better acc enhancements slotted.

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No it shouldnt get easier, it does in fact get harder depending on who you come up against as your aura will miss. Gauntlet applies to any attack a tanker will make. The greater the amount of endurance the attack costs the greater the level of gauntlet. High endurance attacks are usually of long recharge and the only decent gauntlets you would have providing they dont miss. Go out turn off your aura and jab, box and brawl something and see how easy it is to keep aggro with that off a blaster, then imagine that when your blazing aura misses because of a tsoo sorceror or a storm shaman or even your out of endurance due to gauntletting so much and having -end effects you cant use anything.

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Hi guys,
I still have that respec from issue 7 for my main character, Blue Rush.
I'd like to know:

1) if you think I should respec out the Whirlwind from the superspeed pool, since I already have Repel from the Kinetics power set.

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I actually think repel in the right hands (ie MINE!!!111!!) is a truly awesome defensive power and by far (due to chance to detoggle). Dont use it near a comfortable tanks herded mob!

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2) if you think that I'd need to get the fitness pool now. I made it until lvl 30 with no problems and I have fairly well enhanced Transference and Transfusion powers. Do you think I can go on like this for the last 20 levels, considering that I've opened the leadership pool, or do you think I should take fitness anyway?

Thanks for any answer, cheers

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Yeah carry on as you are!

I find the amount of -recharge a spines scrapper can create quite astonishing personally, it just seems to lower dps a bit too far.

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14) --> Super Speed==> Run(14) Run(46)----id end slot it incase u leave it on plus the amount of runspeeds in swift are stacking

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I don't really see the point in more than 1 run speed in Super Speed. After all it stacks with Sprint ( or Prestige Power Quick / Prestige Power Slide depending on preference ) for an extra speed boost.
1 slotted swift + 1 slotted Super Speed + 1 slotted Prestige Power Quick is VERY fast!

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I am with you as I am on a lot of things, what i meant was change one to an end slot. For my personal preference no travel power unless sprint on a stone tank will ever, EVER, get more than one slot as the more slots that has to do with actual tanking the better.

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For PvP imo you should drop dmg and endrdx slots from icicles

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doing that may as well be drop icicles

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(i would drop icicles myself, but it's just a matter of opinion),

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It isnt high burst admittedly and i dont know but i doubt its enough to always interrupt someone from using their aid self.

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=and 1-2 ToH buffs from BU. I'd get tactics and drop body epics (that way you would be able to see a stalker with hide+stealth in sirens too) for the Ice ones (ranged -speed -rech attacks that DO deal real dmg is much a better reward IMO),

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foc acc is +per and +tohit

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2 Slow slots hit the slow cap on chilling embrace, but just 1 and any other ice attack stacking would do that anyway. I'd pick aid self too.

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interesting point, its good to slow even though you may miss with /ice attacks or even /stone as pious is.

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Not tried aid self yet on my tanker but I do have it on various other alts who can use it while under DoT attacks so I should manage. Currently I have RPD and clobber in place of those and while clobber is useful it doesnt provide much survivability in big teams. Im gonna use my free respec from i7 at lvl 32 to get new enhances and respec into this build at the same time. My only worry with the build is how late the resist energies and elements are and whether they would be better sooner and other powers later.

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At the moment i would be transfixed at putting uninterruptable powers before the interruptable as i do have faith in the defender ATs and controller ATs although some you might watch in action as your in the red for 10 seconds wishing you had a first rate blaster and not a second rate blasting defender however when it comes to sonic, forcefield and trick archery defenders you may actually be better off for it at times.

I had Raziels invuln tank herd +4 to his invuln on a mission with my trick archer "in a way" which allowed my trick archer to complete her role satisfactorily and he was totally and utterly completely 100% safe (i dont think any 1 type of defender is really all that ftw at least i hope not as i am playing all types as it is, so there is definately no need for me to even want to be biased).

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The bonus you get on the resists isn't that great tbh.....if you picked other powers I doubt you'd miss em.

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I am so glad you pointed that, it is kind of here and there anyway with the more minor resists, good day playing a tanker, bad day playing a tanker, offense versus defense, what the team brings to the table, compensatable build plus buffs and a very reasonable use of playstyle combining secondaries a large amount of the time. id even go as far as you could sufficiently tank on passives alone with the right support (because i know so) but not for everyone I will say that the right support isnt always there.

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Judging by all the Stone Tanks I've seen, it seems that Jump Kick is the most awesome power EVER!! It's strange really, because I've always found it [censored], apart from the amusing animation.

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I was talking about the stone primary and the stone secondary sets to clarify. Just because you have a stone doesnt mean you should be running out and getting jump kick because other people do and what makes people bother with that power as a stone tanker i will never know.

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Oh Shannon comeonnn. With an attack chain of BU > FA > Siesmic Smash > Heavy Mallet > Stone Mallet > Siesmic Smash and finally another Heavy Mallet dropped Shin Kage.

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With that you dropped a stalker and as i said if i was a stalker i wouldnt bother going for you or any tanker really. Playing other ATs i could debuff and/or stay at range or as a brute get bored fast with you going into hibernate.

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You never played a high level Stone Melee Shannon? People often underestimate it, especialy when compared with Super Strength. The two melees really are quite equal in sheer damage output. You'll see if you have a look at your Hero Planner. Energy Melee could actually be the bestest choice what with Energy Transfer's . But years ago, when I made this tank, I chose Stone for concept reasons.

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Rage can stack and energy lacks -fly hurl in itself so i am not keen on it.

All of its good depending on your level and your objectives at that level. Different builds that people could suggest could all be good depending on your playstyle and mindset. Just dont waste slots.

It looks like a build that cant kill anything in pvp to me and with so few attacks the tohits moved to become accs may actually offer better dps by way of complete chance of hitting.
i can only see that build being hard to drop unless i was mastermind/corrupter/dominator and some brutes from a villains point of view and if i was a stalker id be looking at other ATs to take out mainly.