Unthing

Tankers do not play like Brutes. Brutes are all about damage, damage,damage. Tankers get very little in the way of good attacks until late in the game.

If you like being the first one into combat,
If you want to take the hits for an entire team,
If you like to be the centre of attention ( of the ememy ),
If you will be overprotective of anyone in your team and sling a taunt their way if a mob even sneezes at them,
If you want to pick up almost all of your primary,
If you are happy taking your 3rd attack at level 22,

then a tanker is for you.

Ignoring the slotting.

I would personally get Hasten instead of Permafrost, how much do you need less than 20% extra fire resistance. 3 slotted Hasten on auto will improve the recharge of Ice Patch, Hoarfrost, Hibernate, Energy Absorbtion and all attack so it will probably improve your survivability overall.

I don't know the Ice secondary very well, but Frozen Aura is an AoE sleep and so will get broken by your Icicles, It may not suit you.

As far as slotting is concerned, I would recommend 6 slotting Hoarfrost, Icicles ( which will be your main damage dealer ) and Energy Absorbtion.

Slotwise, I started off aiming to 2 slot all the toggles with end reds. I've found it pretty unnecessary and it looks like you will be burning endurance slower than me because. So plan for 4 slots in the 2 armours, 1 in Wet Ice. I have 2 slots in Chilling Embrace, 1 for taunt and 1 for end red.

Currently I have 1 recharge in Hibernate. As I run Hasten I think you don't need much more although it would be nice to heal quicker when it's activated.

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Also, Stamina at 20 isn't that much of a golden rule if you want to primarly tank - at least not in all builds. Of course it will be useful when you can fit it in, but given that you need, when tanking for a team, to attack very little your End usage doesn't need to be any more than running the necessary subset of your toggles - Taunt being a Zero End cost power (another reason why it's far better than relying on Gauntlet...). There is, for instance, no way on Earth I'd put Ice Patch off until 22 to allow for picking Stamina at 20.

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Yes but I like to be able to solo too, which means I would probably get stamina before Ice patch. However if I was rolling an /Ice I may have a different attitude because they are meant to do the worst damage.

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Ok, corrupter it is, I'll have a look when I get home from work, but if someone can tell me the benefits of ice/ fire/ and /dark /cold /is kin different?, that would be superb!

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/Dark is a great debuff set. Highlights are:-

Twilight Grasp: the heal, starts off rubbish but when you get SOs starts to shine. You need to hit an enemy to heal, but unlike the kinetic heal it doesn't matter if they die before the power runs out and the heal is centred on you. It has a good Area of effect and the heal is reasonably strong. It also does a 10% damage buff and about a 10% to hit debuff for a good 10 seconds after hitting. So helps debuff AVs, bosses and lts.

Tar Patch: The positional debuff, another power that needs SOs to get good. This is a -30% res debuff so you do more damage ( x1.3 ). It also is a slow. With 3 recharge SOs it has a 1-2 second downtime. It's duration is 45 seconds. Note that the -res makes damage debuffs more effective ( by x1.3 for evens ). The slow might make rain powers very effective.

Darkest Night: The alpha strike absorber toggle debuff. 30% damage debuff and 30% to hit debuff. This has a slow animation but it doesn't aggro enemies or suppress stealth for about 2-3 seconds so you have 2-3 seconds to go hide round a corner if you want to. Good out of the box, but best slotted with 3 to hit debuffs and end to taste ( I have 1 end red ).

Howling Twilight: Group res + AoE disrionet I think, I never picked this.

Shadow Fall: Stealth any allies within 40ft, give them 20% resist to energy, negative energy and psi damage in the process ( + puny defence to all ). With this you can get within 10ft of an enemy and put darkest night on his firend at the back of the spawn and leg it and not be noticed.

Fearsome Stare: Wide Cone Fear power. Also provides a to hit debuff of around -10%. Very fun power.

Petrifying Gaze: Single target hold.

Black Hole: Enemy Phase shift.

Dark Servant: A pet that uses hold heal and various other powers ( as well as having a -acc debuff aura ).

I use Darkest Night on a member of a spawn, run to a corner, put down a Tar Patch and then when they come round the corner jump out and Fear them. Then start blasting away, with Twilight Grasps on the most dangerous foe! With Tar Patch and Darkest night you can take an alpha for ther team, something that is very rare in CoV.

I would go for a set with synergy, either Fire ( for AoE damage ), Ice ( more control ), Sonic ( -res to stack with Tar Patch and make the -dam more effective ) or Dark ( more -acc ). I have a Sonic/Dark and am very impressed, especially as I'm not a fan of CoV. It scares me how good the defender version would be.

Personally I don't like it because when I want to maneuver in the middle of 12 enemies, I really need to be able to see exactly where I am so I can use Combat Jumping to reposition.

Transparent self + AoEs exploding = invisible character.

Given that suppression is as you say it is ( I remember reading the same thing ) my other objection is unfounded, that not as many enemies will see me when I'm aggroing.

Personally I think the recent change to make the 3rd attack available at level 4 was a huge boost for low level tanks and really helped lots. It meant that you can get a decent attack early enough not to waste a power on a second rubbish one.

I think the best thing to give low level tanks is advice, both in terms of build and what sort of teams to get into.

I tend to avoid the low-level 8 man teams because they are debt magnets. Tank for teams of 2-4 of your current level and you should be okay.

Plan for stamina at 20, which generally mean you should only pick 1 additional attack, one travel power and one travel power prerequisite and then divide the rest between primary powers and taunt ( not essential pre 20 unless you are inv ).

Aggro management is certainly possible.

My thoughts on your post.

1. Aggro Aura.

These are the bread and butter of tanking, not taunt. Unfortunately Inv gets shortchanged here as it is their level 18 power. Ice's Chilling Embrace is the best as it debuffs and so makes them REALLY angry. Inv used to be amazing an aggro generation too because of it's high tick rate however I think it is about the some as the others. Fire has the disadvantage than it's aura isn't Auto-hit.

2. Gauntlet.
I tested this and in the mid twenties Gauntlet was not enough to keep aggro against a -2-3 AV from the aggro generated by a single blaster. Don't rely on it. However it does help keep aggro of enemies between Aura ticks ( 2 seconds generally ) and so keeps them in your Aura.

3. Surviving the aggro.
This is the real issue. A good tank will know his/her limits. This should be done by choosing the correct difficulty levels, being generally careful and using powers/inspirations wisely. The I5 changes also mean there are less ways to build a tank to be able to do this, see below.

4. Solo vs team-only meatshield builds.
This is the real killer, a solo build ( heavy on attacks in the pre 20s ) is not going to be that great at keeping a team safe.
IMO the only way to make a tank workable is to only get 2 attacks pre 20, these are the one you get at level 1 and the 2nd or 3rd attack ( level 2 and the one that used to be at level 10 and is now at level 4 ). This means you have pain in the mid to late teens but can deal with the 20s.
I do not find team-only meatshield tanks that fun, I have only made one when testing I5 defence reductions. Instead I go for the middlish ground, soloable team-builds. So I plan to take most if not all of the Primary and/or pool powers to replace them. This makes for a very tight build and that means one important thing, beginners are going to need build advise.

5. Tactics.
Thes have been mentioned countless times but you need to know the enemy AI in order to tank and use tactics accordingly. Most tanks don't.

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Icicles are there for antstalker defence mostly and to test if fleas comment about them begin highly damaging is correct.

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Icicles are only worthwhile damage in PvE. In PvP no-one is going to be so dumb as to stand 8 feet away from you for extended periods of time.

Looks like a decent build though.

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It isn't as good as Blazing Aura from Fire but is better than Mud Pots.

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Not as good for DoT on fiery aura and not as good for the secondary effects of mudpots but then most icetanks would have chilling embrace anyway. Just clarifying cos its bad enough i misread my own posts

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Yes, I wouldn't use it as a Taunt area. I picked it as an AoE attack, something it is very good at. Chilling Embrace is clearly the taunt Aura for Ice and is part of their defences too.

Ice tanks are fun.

The Ice primary only has one meh power ( Permafrost ), all the others are good. Energy Absorbtion is lovely, top up defence + endurance recovery. Hibernate sounded rubbish until I got it and started using it, it has a really short animation time and is up quite often, I find it is more useful than Unstoppable from Inv as there are no real downsides to it, it just means that you have to be prepared to come out of it prematurely ( when/if aggro starts leaving you ).
The other power that is often maligned is Icicles which is a good damage dealing power that does more damage on my Ice tank than any of the other powers. It is lethal damage, but it is still a more endurance efficient AoE than anything in your secondary and does more damage over time too. It isn't as good as Blazing Aura from Fire but is better than Mud Pots.

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Leveling up new characters thru 20 i've seen tanks with and without the taunting central role, some are new players who just havent learnt the skill well enough yet to realise how it can work.

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The problem is that new tanks rarely learn that role. Before I5 tanks were hard enough for that to be a relatively natural thing to do without a min/max build. Now they are still the best AT to do it, but without a min/max build or an above average team to support them they can't fulfill that role until SOs ( mid to late 20s for new players ).

Also one thing most new players do not realise is that you do not need an 8 man team for missions. In fact a low level tank is best off playing in smaller teams because it is easier.

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I dont think its totally down to the tanks. Nowadays it seems teams wont give you just even 2 secs to consolidate the agro b4 they begin there AoEs.

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Yes and then when you try to ask the team to hold off with thier attacks until you have the stuation under control you get nasty comments about how your telling everyone what to do, and in come some abuse playing on the word "tanker" and people saying how i am being bossy and i should just let the team get on with it, this has happened a couple of times to me. Having said that i have had alot of fun with my tank in teams who are prepared to let me do my work first.

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If they won't let you do your job well just make your excuses and leave or just scrank depending on whether you are enjoying yourself or not. Sometime teams don't want you to control all of the aggro.

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In this guide it mentions it has -Speed, -Damage, -Resistance. But I'll check the in game description and Sherksilver's planner too when I can, but I think they both mention it.

I've never heard anyone mention that -Resistance affects resistance to debuffs and mez effects too.

[/ QUOTE ]Well, resistance debuffs are resisted by damage resistance, and since resistance and damage are technically the same one could assume that foes with lowered resistance would have lowered resistance to damage debuffs as well.

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I guess it could, depending exactly how they have implemented it. If -res is a pre damage multiplier as I've heard people state this would not be the case. If it is an actual reduction in res this would.

Edit:
I just checked my /Dark corruptor. No mention of -Dam at all anywhere apart from Sherksilver's hero planner. Given that they got the base duration wrong ( 30s rather than 45s ) I will not believe them. So much for feeling safe because I was standing in a tar patch... Although as others have pointed out it may improve the effectiveness of Darkest night.

In this guide it mentions it has -Speed, -Damage, -Resistance. But I'll check the in game description and Sherksilver's planner too when I can, but I think they both mention it.

I've never heard anyone mention that -Resistance affects resistance to debuffs and mez effects too.

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This works because Darkest night is the best alpha strike absorbing power in the game short of some of the defensive set's tier 9 powers, -ACC and -DAM means that the enemies aren't going to hit you much and when they do they won't do much damage. Once on the tar patch they get even more -DAM.


[/ QUOTE ]Tar Patch is -RES, not -DMG.

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I don't have a source to check it at the moment but I am pretty sure it is -RES, -DAM and -SPD.

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OK, the only reason why I did not pick darkest night is because I mostly work in teams, and when you kill the guy I used darkest night on the whole power shuts off (sucks don't it). I don't know about black hole though, some people say it's awesome and some people hate it, can some1 tell me exactily what it does?

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Darkest night is one of the best powers for a group corner pull and clump together. I am doing this with my level 26 Sonic/Dark corruptor.

Go in with shadow fall, find the boss/lt. Put Darkest Night on him so he aggros the entire spawn and run behind the nearest corner ( you have about 3-5 seconds until he realises you are there ). Slam a Tar Patch on the corner and the whole spawn groups up near the corner. Pop out and use Fearsome Stare on the spawn* and then proceed to wipe them out with your primary.

This works because Darkest night is the best alpha strike absorbing power in the game short of some of the defensive set's tier 9 powers, -ACC and -DAM means that the enemies aren't going to hit you much and when they do they won't do much damage. Once on the tar patch they get even more -DAM.

If the anchor dies early you still have used Darkest night in the most danagerous part and you still have the debuffs from Tar Patch and Fearsome stare ( + possibly Twilight Grasp ) protecting the team whilst it recharges.

*I usually duo with a Plants dominator so we usually use Seeds of Confusion for this, but Fearsome Stare does work too.

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Permafrost does give Slow RES, but so do Wet Ice and Energy Absorption - i.e. Unless you've got several stacked slows on you, you're never going to notice the extra from Permafrost.

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That's kind of what I was getting at. But you put it more eloquently.

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Hmm your build seems really really toggle heavy and there are a few unecessary toggles like tough and icicles, personally i feelt these powers for what they do are a waste of endurance. You missed perma frost which gives res to slow which is really handy.

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For the record I rate Icicles. For PvE it does better DPS and has better DPE than the PbAoEs in the Fire Secondary.

Wet Ice already has slow resistance, I don't notice the slow-down running on caltrops so that means that Permafrost only gives Resistance to fire...

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It's more single target harder hitting build which is from PvP. Basically i was going to include medicine but theres no point in having that if you have hibernate which is a great power in PvP imo. For PvE in my experience of teaming with ice tanks they can hold aggro perfectly with CE, taunt is there for PvP which is really annoying to have in PvP. I also included focussed accuracy as i think that power is fantastic its one of the most powerful self buff powers. and you can even slow 1accuracy 3damage 1recharge1endurance redux with it and hit fine. I slotted shields for 3endurance redux just to completely hack down endurance costs those slots can easily be transferable. Also included CJ and hurdle with ss that travel power is great. You could even get rid of conserve power and have SJ, as i doubt with this build you'll have endurance problems.

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Why are you talking about PvP he said he is PvE only?

@Cuddles
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True, it's probably not a great solo powerset choice. It's also not as high damage as, say energy because oft he resists as I mentioned. But it does have disorient and two good aoes.

I just got all defensive because if you just dismiss it as being [censored] then it belittles my 50 levels :P

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If anything the opposite is true. If you had got 50 levels with an obviously overpowered secondary you would deserve less respect than with a less good one.

@Cognito
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My only comment is that if you want to solo, you are looking at a high Single Target / AoE ration. Hence, battle axe comes out well, Fire poorly (cant recall the other sets to well). Ice is fantastic as a team tank (Ice slide will improve your survivability like nothing else on the secondary or even primary!), but has low damage so prob not solo friednly

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Fire soloed far better than Battleaxe in my experience. I found the only way to clear missions quick as a tank is to herd a few enemies together and use AoEs. Battleaxe fared pretty poorly for me here, having to rely on stacking with a knockback/up set is just painful. However these were both Inv tanks so were missing damage auras.
If you get enough attacks early for soloing using single target attacks the chances are you may have messed up your build for teaming anyway with most primaries.

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It's a much maligned set that might be less favourable to a power gamer but it's still damn usefl and I would place it above axe so please dont dismiss it like that.

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Sorry. That was the general consensus I got from mace users on the forums. I have never played Mace so you are better off judging it. The OP did suggest soloing.

Apart from defences tankers have a few aggro control tools that should not be ignored.

Taunt Aura ( Blazing Aura, Mud Pots, Chilling Embrace, Icicles or Invincibility ).
Taunt
A Damage Aura ( Blazing Aura, Mud Pots, Icicles ) and/or PBAoE ( Combustion, Whirling Hands, Foot Stomp, Whirling Axe etc ).

As far as soloable characters I would say most do well, Ice Secondary is a bad choice for solo but it is good for teams. Mace is generally considered a bit rubbish, the others are all okay.
Super Strength, Good single powerset, good control, good single target damage, AoE comes late. Has Rage that is a permable build up so ideal for use with Damage Auras. Knockup/down/back and stun as a secondary effect.
Stone, hit things with a big brown lollipop. good single target damage, slow but good control. Knockback/up/down based control.
Axe, Pitiful control, knockback/down/up, good single target damage.
Energy, amazing 35+ single target damage, average before that, but has stun as a secondary effect.
Fire, late blooming single target damage, AoE king. No control.


Most tanker secondaries get 1 big damage attack available at level 4, make sure you take it. This should probably be your only attack pick until level 22!

Many get a PbAoE too ( often at level 28 ), these are essential for soloing as it means you get to herd a couple of spawns and do damage to them too, with 2 single target attacks spawns die really slowly. Damage Auras also work for this too and do more damage per second and damage per endurance than PbAoEs.

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I am always nervous around stone tanks because of their relatively poor aggro management. Taunt is a necessity

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Eake your pick:
...
<list of stone tank mistakes snipped>


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I agree. Those were the reasons why generally stone tanks make my squishies nervous.

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I was a lil wary at first, but now I <3 my tanker and his bald head lol. I get a load of aggro, but he's able to withstand all of it, plus it doesn't help having a trust worthy healer backing me up. (shout out to Arken)

....

My only prob with him thus far though is he tends to miss, not as much as he use to but still does which is annoying.

Any tips? His attacks have End Red, Acc and Damage at 5++ and his defence is damage resist at 5++

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My advice for tanker slotting is

Levels 1-11
Slot toggles with end reds and attacks with accs and end reds. Damage resistance and Defence enhancements make almost no difference at this level.
Make sure you have the basic armours and the self-heal. The self-heal is pretty important and I would aim to six slot it by the mid teens. Make sure you pick up the taunt Aura, Chilling Embrace ( Ice ), Blazing Aura ( Fire ) or Mud Pots ( Stone ). The last 2 are very endurance heavy but can be relied on to do most of your AoE damage later on and so extra slots in them are worthwhile. Don't get too many attacks from your secondary, I usually get only the basic attack, the 3rd tier attack and taunt.

Levels 12-21
Stock up on DO enhancements. Slot with end reds and damage/def in toggles. Put Accs, Damage and end reds in attacks.
You will be mainly getting travel powers and the fitness pool in these levels. Invulnerabilty tanks will need to pick up Invincibility at level 18 too as it is their taunt aura.

Levels 22-
Stock up on SOs. Put in your final slotting and then fill out your build with the powers you missed.

Level 32.
Really consider getting the final power. I made the mistake of not getting Unstoppable on my Inv until 44 and left Hibernate on my Ice tank until 35. Both are really good powers if used in the right circumstances.

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As you can see, easily past the cap and still good for pvp with -res buffs.

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However -res does not reduce res, it increases damage, so effectively res resists against -res. There is no advantage to being above the res caps.

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Or when the blaster is pulling (which make more sense btw) where the tanker should be to intercept the mobs chasing and once again gather them into a nice dense group and ready for nuking.

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That I am sorry is truly awful imo. The tanker pulling first and herding before people attack is a lot lot neater. I dont understand why blasters pull at all 99% of the time if there is a tanker on the team. The taunt and intercept has very few moments of necessity in the game. Id much rather taunt then make a nice dense group, having to gain the aggro anyway makes the blaster pulling for me a complete waste of time.

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I agree.

In my view there are 2 types of pulls, that I call spawn pulls and snipe pulls.

Snipe pulls are for removing one or 2 enemies from a spawn, these can be done by blasters, defenders, scrappers with confront or anyone with tp foe. Do not try with tanker taunt or an AoE. A badly executed snipe pull can turn into a spawn pull.

Spawn pulls are for moving a spawn ( or more ) to a better place for the team to fight them, ensuring that they are well packed for AoEs and that other spawns aren't accidentally aggroed during combat. Normally they are done around a corner. Tankers are best at these, but Dark and Rad defenders can also do these using their toggle debuffs with the right support, Dark are better at this than Rad as their one toggle has better damage mitigation. Spawn pulling is the primary reason for getting taunt on a tank.

If your blaster tries a Spawn pull and the tanker has to get the aggro back, then you are wasting a lot of time and adding a lot of risk to the blaster.