Completely Stoned: A Guide to Stone/Stone Tankers
By
Barata,
Posted on: 2005-06-12 10:34 in Player Guides
Suprising that no one said anything about this. It's a good guide. I had a Stone/something (I forget) as my first tank and hated it but, this guide has opened up a few things and shown me why people actually play it XD
Good job!
*stamp* Seal of Approval
GREAT JOB ESO!! Now I can quit bugging you about my little stoney questions!!
Great guide!!
My next tank is going to be a stone/ * for sure and this will be a great help.
Thank you
this is also posted in the tank section which has a few responses to it. however, this one is bit more updated on a few things, even though they were posted too far apart.
Good to see a tanker guide that isn't fire/* or inv/*. 
Nicely done.
CoH Codex : Demo Models/FX/MOVs : Demo Info
Arc 111022: "Doctor Geist and the Scientific Method"
Good guide! I wasn't as happy with Rexpendable's guide as other people were. He has it set in his mind there's only one way a stone tank should be built, and bases his guide upon that way. For example... he assumes you have Hasten. I don't because I haven't needed it yet. My toggles recycle plenty fast for me, and my defenses, along with rooted, lets me get by without Earth's Embrace (which I'm picking up at a later point). My own stone tank, Agatha Stone (I really love that character, she's probably turned into my favorite, and is one of the few I actually roleplay) is only up to level 27 at the moment, but I do have some observations that I've made while playing her....
Mud Pots is indeed a great aggro tool. When I've played alongside fire tanks, I notice their burning aura tends to pull mobs away from me, so it seems that it generates more aggro than mud pots. But other than that, it really keeps mobs centered around me. As my own personal choice, I six-slotted with 2 endurance reducers and 4 damage enhancers. Even then, the damage is not great. But Agatha isn't really a melee toon, and herding isn't as slow as you'd think it would be. I turn on rock armor and mud pots, then run through missions until I have a boatload of mobs centered around me. I'll then go into rooted and let mud pots take them down (supplementing it with a few AoE energy melee strikes). Sure, mud pots takes a while, but it's doing it for incredibly large groups of mobs, so I'm actually arresting the mobs at least as quickly as I would with my scrapper or blaster.
Once rock armor is six-slotted with SOs, it's really not difficult at all to tank large groups. There are so many misses that Rooted heals up your damage as it's happening. Only when I overextend myself do I notice my health dropping faster than it replenishes, but usually the mobs start dropping before it gets too low, and then I'm not taking nearly as much damage.
I also six-slotted Stone Skin. Because of mud pots, most mobs are in melee range and using appropriate attacks, so when they hit, the reduction in damage is sweet.
That leads to my next quandry. Rexpendable promotes living in Granite Armor, but with Weave and maybe Stealth, you can drop +2 or +3 bosses to the base 5% chance to hit. With Stone Skin and Tough, your resists won't be as nice as Granite, but your defense is going to be incredibly higher, and you'll get hit much much less frequently. And unless you turn on Rooted, you won't have the speed penalties associated with Granite. I plan on getting Granite (duh!), but am debating now if I want to invest in Tough/Weave. An advantage of having Tough/Weave is that it would seem that Granite is not necessary all the time, meaning you have more variety with what you can use at any given time.
Any thoughts on this?
Arc ID#30821, A Clean Break
The only problem with defeating the Tsoo is that an hour later, you want to defeat them again!
"Life is just better boosted!" -- LadyMage
"I'm a big believer in Personal Force Field on a blaster. ... It's your happy place." -- Fulmens
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That leads to my next quandry. Rexpendable promotes living in Granite Armor, but with Weave and maybe Stealth, you can drop +2 or +3 bosses to the base 5% chance to hit. With Stone Skin and Tough, your resists won't be as nice as Granite, but your defense is going to be incredibly higher, and you'll get hit much much less frequently. And unless you turn on Rooted, you won't have the speed penalties associated with Granite. I plan on getting Granite (duh!), but am debating now if I want to invest in Tough/Weave. An advantage of having Tough/Weave is that it would seem that Granite is not necessary all the time, meaning you have more variety with what you can use at any given time.
Any thoughts on this?
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yeah, with weave and stealth you could significantly lower the chances of a boss to hit you. my problem with doing that is finding 4 powers to get rid of to get myself stealth and weave. it is much easier to switch to rooted and granite armor, and take a little bit longer to bring down the boss than to use 4 powers slots for 4 powers you really don't need. bosses can be one of those times that use granite armor if you don't plan on using it nearly exclusively. and from my experience, rock armor and rooted do just fine against those +2 and +3 bosses, and if it gets hairy, hit granite, heal up, go back to rooted. fighitng pool is not necessary at all once you have granite armor.
Great guide, bro!
I have one comment about the usefulness of Brimstone and Crystal armor:
As I was leveling (mostly fighting CoT and Council rather than NEmesis) pre-granite, I found that Crystal helped a lot more than Brimstone. I think that these shields are somewhat situational per what type of mobs you're fighting, and I seem to have avoided Fire/Cold dmg a lot more than you did, and vice versa for energy.
Not a correction, just an observation.
I think your guide is excellent! Great job and thanks for all of the info!
;-D
mmrrr ill chim in and say that yes nrgy and neg nrgy are more common than fire/cold usually. as for tough i am going to be getting it until i have granite armor at 32. ill be running tough stone skin rooted health, rock armor plus EE all 6 slotted( maybe not EE) for a solid defensive plan til i get granite at which point id probably drop stone skin and tough for 3 more attacks.
I am an ebil markeeter and will steal your moneiz ...correction stole your moneiz. I support keeping the poor down because it is impossible to make moneiz in this game.
Question regarding Stone Melee:
I'm still a lowbie level 6 Stone/Stone tanker, but find that when I have a tight group of guys in front of me.. I'll take a swing at one with Stone Fist and (occassionaly) "MISS" will appear over the heads of the guys behind or next to the target. Same thing seems to be happening occassionaly with Stone Mallet.
What the HECK is that?! There's NO description or info about it that I could find in the power description field, nor in any Stone Guides.
Anyone know? It's driving me batty thinking I have something I can't take advantage of, because I don't KNOW about it!
If you have Mud Pots going then this is the auto-fire feature of that power missing some of the bad guys.
If you are not running pots then I don't know what it is.
Arc 52555: Tower of Darkness
Arc 139668: Bob's Crazy Car Dealership
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If you have Mud Pots going then this is the auto-fire feature of that power missing some of the bad guys.
If you are not running pots then I don't know what it is.
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Note I've only got for powers:
Stone Armor (The level 1 power?)
Stone Fist
Stone Mallet
Earth's Embrace
Swift
In the situations I'm talking about, I'll have Stone Armor running, maybe have Earth's Embrace buffed on. Beyond that NOTHING. I'll take a swing at a guy, and no matter if I hit or miss the TARGET... guys NEXT to the target will get "MISS" above their heads.
Happens pretty regularly, and I noticed it IMMEDIATELY from level 1. You could make a test tanker and see what I'm talking about.
Im Told that The "Miss" is the punchvoke missing. This only came up after punchvoke was introduced. Also Mud pots is autohit it never misses in my use of it and ive sat next to +10's with granite and rooted on and Mudpots and it hits everytime.
"You know it takes more energy to Frown than it does to smile?
""You know it took more energy to point that out than to leave me alone..."
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Im Told that The "Miss" is the punchvoke missing. This only came up after punchvoke was introduced. Also Mud pots is autohit it never misses in my use of it and ive sat next to +10's with granite and rooted on and Mudpots and it hits everytime.
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That means that both Earth Fist and Stone Mallet have a small AE Punchvoke effect on them? That's pretty uber if it's true, but I thought that Punch-voke effects were auto-hit?
Seems to be the case in my experience, I've had the 'unaffected' pop up over CoT ghost heads if I attack their buddy while they've gone intangible.
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Seems to be the case in my experience, I've had the 'unaffected' pop up over CoT ghost heads if I attack their buddy while they've gone intangible.
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Ok I got some further experience from this last night, while being SK'ed to L35 Spines/Regen friend of mine (Yo Pilesener!).
He could be wailing AE Damage on a group of badguys for a good chunk of time, and I walk upto the group and land a hit on ONE of their buddies.. the WHOLE group swivels and starts swinging at me. After last night I really can say, Stone Tankers really are hardcore aggro magnets.
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Im Told that The "Miss" is the punchvoke missing. This only came up after punchvoke was introduced. Also Mud pots is autohit it never misses in my use of it and ive sat next to +10's with granite and rooted on and Mudpots and it hits everytime.
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That means that both Earth Fist and Stone Mallet have a small AE Punchvoke effect on them? That's pretty uber if it's true, but I thought that Punch-voke effects were auto-hit?
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There is Punchvoke, and then there is the bug.
Until Cryptic gets around to fixing it some attacks will hit multiple enemies who are stacked on one another. (2+ Enemies occupying the same space. Which happens more frequently if you like to gather up groups of enemies. I like to taunt a small to medium sized group fall back to a corner and then my wife and I tear them up.) More then once I have done a single target attack and watched it effect more then one opponent.
And afaik Punchvoke is not an auto hit ability, it works kind of like Provoke does. But each Tanker secondary has some kind of Punchvoking action.
I sam impressed...you told exactly in every situtation...Good Job Bud...you helped me alright
Just made a stone/stone tanker and this is really helpful, good work.
thanx man always need the help
I just came in to read this because the title made me go....
waaaaAAAAAAAAAA?
That being said...great guide, man!
Be well, people of CoH.
Great guide eso. After playing my stoner to a reasonable level (34), I finally broke down and decided to read how others were doing it. Between the bits that I asked you when we teamed once a long while ago and what I learned, it all seems to be in agreement.
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Good guide! I wasn't as happy with Rexpendable's guide as other people were. He has it set in his mind there's only one way a stone tank should be built, and bases his guide upon that way. For example... he assumes you have Hasten. I don't because I haven't needed it yet. My toggles recycle plenty fast for me, and my defenses, along with rooted, lets me get by without Earth's Embrace (which I'm picking up at a later point). My own stone tank, Agatha Stone (I really love that character, she's probably turned into my favorite, and is one of the few I actually roleplay) is only up to level 27 at the moment,
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The key to needing hasten is that if you run granite and want to be able to kill anything, you must have hasten. The recharge debuff is crippling, I have 7 attacks and still run out of ready ones. Not having got to that level, you don't see it.
A point not really made in the guide is that if you're meeting psionic AVs, they often have minions that do other sorts of damage with them, hence if you want to stop psionic clocks punching you or seneschals burning you, you need to run minerals with the relevant lower level armor(s).
The guide also doesn't address end issues. I actually run granite with 3 res/3 end in it as well as having rooted and mud pots slotted for end reduction (and many of my attacks). My reason for doing this is that against awkward things I use focussed accuracy, and the combination of FA and GA chews through end really quick.
I also slot earth's embrace 1 heal/2 dam res/3 recharge
GA is supposed to have some toxic res in it, but I'm not sure how much, as when I use EE, the toxic damage reduces markedly.
Mud pots is the only power I'm not sure how to slot. I lean towards 2 end redux, 1 taunt, 1 slow, 2 damage. While it may not do much damage per click, overall it may well deal more damage than all your other attacks (particularly in teams) due to it hitting lots of targets all the time, so slotting it for damage is not a bad idea.
Mr Minotaur 50 stone/axe tank Freedom
It's true. This game is NOT rocket surgery. - BillZBubba
really great guide. How about an i5 update. 
INTRODUCTION
This guide is for those interested in being an incredibly tough tank, as well as having the feel and sound of real power. Stone armor seems to be slightly underestimated, as Ive not seen very many high level stone armor tanks, even fewer stone/stone. However, due to the interest Ive noticed lately and the many questions Ive seen asked, I thought it was time to put my thoughts into writing. Please remember as you read this that these are my thoughts and opinions, not the outright rule. I want to share what Ive seen and experienced in 50 levels of tanking with stone/stone. And keep in mind that I primarily fight in granite armor, so the information below is geared toward a build which uses granite often.
Things to note:
*cost = endurance cost for each power
*activation time = time for each power to activate
*recharge = time for each power to recharge without the use of hasten
*range = the range in which a certain power can be used
*brawl index = damage compared to brawl when the respective powers are unslotted
*usefulness = how useful Ive found each power based on a scale of 1-5, 5 being the most useful and 1 being the least useful.
*suggested slotting = how I think these powers should be slotted (additional note: any slotting or percentages I give assumes +2 SOs, as that is the most common and easiest to achieve at level 50.
STONE ARMOR
One of the cooler looking primaries of the tank sets, at least in my opinion. You will be quite tank, regardless of your secondary. You have the option of defense or resistance on top of the fact that stone has the only psionic protection offered to tanks as well as health regeneration.
Rock Armor: Your skin becomes stone while this power is active. Stone armor makes you highly resistant to smashing and lethal attacks. They are less likely to land and affect you. Cannot be active at the same time as granite armor.
Cost: 0.35
Activation Time: 1
Recharge: 4
Usefulness: 5/5
Suggested slotting: 6 defense SOs
One of your two choices from your primary at level 1, this provides 25% base defense (58% when 6 slotted) to smashing and lethal attacks, and will be the main armor you will use for the first 31 levels of the game. This is DEFENSE, not resistance. That means it will lower the chance of you being hit by smashing and lethal attacks. If you are hit, you will take the full damage. This will come in handy in the late game as well, as you can use it when soloing or fighting smaller mobs when the damage you are taking can be healed reasonably by rooted.
Stone Skin: Your tough skin is naturally resistant to smashing and lethal damage. This power is always on and costs no endurance.
Cost: NA
Activation Time: NA
Recharge: NA
Usefulness: 1/5
Suggested slotting: 1 resist SO if you take it
The other of your two choices from your primary pool at level one. Stone skin gives a base of 12.5% resistance to smashing and lethal damage, and 6 slotted with +2 SOs will give you 29% resistance. One advantage to this power is that it is always on, you never have to worry about. This could be useful early on, as you will have no other source of smashing and lethal resistance until level 32.
Earths Embrace: You are so connected to the earth, you can draw upon its power to add to your own health. Activating this power increases your maximum hit points, and grants you resistance to toxic damage.
Cost: 15
Activation Time: 1
Recharge: 360
Duration: 120
Usefulness: 5/5
Suggested slotting: 4 recharge SOs
This is stone armors version of dull pain, and has by far the best animation for a dull pain-type power Ive seen. Earths embrace boosts your number of hit points by 40%. This is good for several reasons: one, more hit points are always good; two, combined with rooted, it will increase your regeneration of hit points over what rooted will do on its own. Also, early on, this will help you in your fights against the vahzilok.
You might wonder why I only suggest 4 recharges for this power, so allow me to give some reasoning. Four recharges will allow you to keep it up all the time when you are not in granite. When you arent in granite, you will mostly be relying on defense, which means if you get hit, youll take the full damage. Perma-earths embrace will allow for more hit points and faster regen of your health.
However, in my experience with granite armor, Ive not found the need to keep earths embrace in a permanent state. I had it slotted at one time so that I could keep it as close to permanent as possible, but I didnt find myself needing often enough to warrant keeping those last 2 recharges in it. Granite provides you with amazing resists, and combined with rooted, you wont need earths embrace too often. However, slotted with 4 recharges, should you need it, will be there.
Mud Pots: While this power is active, you draw upon the geothermal power of the earth to create a bubbling pool of hot mud around yourself. All foes within melee range will become snared and entrapped in the mud, immobilizing some and slowing others. The boiling heat from mud pots also deals some damage over time to the snared foes.
Cost: 1.13
Activation Time: 2
Recharge: 4
Brawl Index: 0.4167 fire damage
Usefulness: 5/5
Suggested slotting: 2 or 3 endurance reduction SOs
I really like this power, mainly for its ability to taunt anything in melee range and keep its attention focused on me. Ive never really noticed the slow or the immobilize effects on the mobs, but I dont see that as the biggest reason to take this power. The main reason to take it is to keep the guys in melee range of you mad at you. I highly recommend this power, but being end-heavy that it is, I would put it off until after you get stamina.
Rooted: While this power is active, you merge with the earth and draw forth its power to become resistant to knockback, immobilize, sleep, hold, disorient and endurance drain effects, and increases your hit point regeneration rate. You must remain in close contact with the earth, so you will move extremely slow and you cannot activate fly powers, sprint, super speed, or jump powers while this power is active.
Cost: 0.35
Activation Time: 2
Recharge: 4
Usefulness: 5/5
Suggested slotting: 6 heal SOs
Dont let the negatives stop you from getting this power, in fact, take it right away. Stone armor is the only tank primary that has the ability to regenerate its own health, and rooted provides a base heal rate of 100% and according to Rexpendable, will fully heal you in 55 seconds with unslotted health. The movement speed can be countered by taking swift and slotting it up a bit. I have yet to be drained of endurance while running rooted, which makes sappers and carnies less of an issue. Use with granite and youll be amazed at what you can tank.
Brimstone Armor: While this power is active, your skin becomes encrusted with cracked magma. Brimstone armor makes you highly resistant to fire and cold damage. Cannot be active at the same time as granite armor.
Cost: 0.35
Activation Time: 1
Recharge: 4
Usefulness: 2/5
Suggested slotting: 4 resist SOs
This armor grants you a base of 50% resistance to fire and cold attacks, and 4 even level SOs will give you 90% resistance to those two types of attacks. This armor looks really cool on top of the nice resists that it grants.
Crystal Armor: While this power is active, your skin becomes encrusted in various quartz crystals. Crystal armor makes energy and negative energy attacks less likely to hit. Cannot be active at the same time as granite armor.
Cost: 0.35
Activation Time: 1
Recharge: 4
Usefulness: 1/5
Suggested slotting: 6 defense SOs
This armor acts much like rock armor, only crystal armor provides a base 25% defense to energy and negative energy. Slotted the same way as rock armor, you will gain a defense of 58% to those two types of attacks. I originally picked this armor up with the intentions of using it to deal with the enemies that drain endurance, as those attacks tend to be energy attacks. But with the recent changes to rooted, crystal armor became obsolete to me, so I respecd it out, and Ive never missed it.
Mineral Armor: Activating this power summons several rare earth rock minerals to orbit around you. These minerals can disperse though patterns and make psionic attacks less likely to hit. They also bring clarity of mind and increase your perception to see hidden foes, and grants resistance to confusion. Cannot be active at the same time as granite armor.
Cost: 0.35
Activation Time: 1
Recharge: 4
Usefulness: 5/5
Suggested slotting: 6 defense SOs
Yet another armor with a base defense of 25%, but this time to psionic attacks. Yes, thats right, psionic attacks. Stone armor is the only tank primary that grants any kind of psi protection. Six-slotted you will have 58% defense to psionic attacks, of all types. Get it, slot it, love it. With the number of psionic villains in the late game, you should really take this power. Ive awed people by what I could do with this armor combined with rooted and earths embrace. Ive herded up 40+ psi villains and stopped to have a conversation with teammates. Stone is highly sought after for tanking psi villains in the late game, dont miss out on getting the chance to drop some jaws.
Granite Armor: When you activate this power, you are transformed into a massive bulk of unyielding granite. Your incredible mass makes you almost completely invulnerable. However, you become quite heavy, cannot fly, your attack and movement speed are slowed and you do less damage. Cannot be active at the same time as the other armors in the set, fly powers, sprint, super speed or jump powers.
Cost: 1.5
Activation Time: 1
Recharge: 8
Usefulness: 5/5
Suggested slotting: 4 resist SOs
Finally, the level 32 power. It has a base resistance of 50% to everything EXCEPT psionic attacks and a base defense of 20% to everything EXCEPT psionic attacks. Four even level SOs will get you to the resist cap. On top of the penalties that rooted has, there are a few more. While in granite, you also have a recharge penalty, slowing the recharge rate of all your powers. You will also have a damage penalty, roughly equal to that of 1 SO damage.
Now, while the penalties may look harsh, think about what you are getting in return for granite: max resist to everything except psionic attacks, some defense, status protection all for a total of 4 slots in this power. The damage penalty isnt all that bad, especially if you like to team, and considering tanks arent meant to be the damage dealers. The recharge penalty can get a bit annoying, but it can be countered to some extent with hasten (which Ill explain later).
I highly recommend this power with 4 resist enhancements slotted in it. Some might want to add 2 defense SOs to granite or 2 endurance reduction SOs, but I chose not too. The endurance wasnt so much of an issue as granite is exclusive in terms of running it with other armors. I also chose to leave out the defense slots, because the net gain from them is about 1/3 of what you can get from a small purple inspiration. On top of that, the purple inspiration offers defense to more than what your two slots would grant you. I love this power, and it looks pretty cool to boot.
STONE MELEE
Stone melee is a very powerful looking and sounding set of attacks. Slamming enemies and shaking screens is what a tanks attacks should do, and you wont be disappointed in that aspect of this set. However, like most tank secondaries, it is endurance heavy.
Stone Fist: Your stone covered fists attack swiftly for moderate damage and may disorient your opponent.
Cost: 7.5
Activation Time: 1
Recharge: 4
Range: 5 (melee)
Brawl Index: 2.7778 smashing damage
Usefulness: 2/5
Suggested slotting: 1 accuracy in base slot
This is your basic starting attack, pretty good damage with a chance to disorient. Take it cause you have to.
Stone Mallet: Your control over the earth allows you to form a mallet of solid stone. This stone mallet deals heavy damage, and can knock down weak foes.
Cost: 13
Activation Time: 2
Recharge: 8
Range: 5
Brawl Index: 4.5556
Usefulness: 5/5
Suggested slotting: 1 accuracy, 5 damage SOs
The mallets are what make this set sound so powerful. You rip a mallet out of the ground and slam it on the heads of your foes with a chance to knock them down. It hits pretty hard, sounds great and will be one of your staple attacks throughout the game.
Taunt: Taunts a foe, and all foes around him, to attack you. Useful for pulling villains off an ally who finds himself in over his head. Taunted foes tend to ignore other heroes and focus on you for quite a while, so use this power cautiously.
Cost: NA
Activation Time: 3
Recharge:
Range: 70
Brawl Index: NA
Usefulness: 4/5
Suggested slotting: 1-2 recharge SOs, 2-3 taunt SOs
Well, its taunt. Its autohit and has an area of effect that ticks off everything close to the guy you used it on. Those affected by this will focus their attacks on you and is a great help in keeping agro on you.
Heavy Mallet: A more impressive form of stone mallet, the heavy mallet deals more damage, but is slower to swing. It has a greater chance of knocking down opponents.
Cost: 23.5
Activation Time: 2
Recharge: 13
Range: 5
Brawl Index: 6.3333
Usefulness: 5/5
Suggested slotting: 1 accuracy, 5 damage SOs or 1 accuracy, 4 damage, 1 end. reduction SOs
Similar in looks to stone mallet, but that is about it. Its an uppercut-type attack with a knockdown effect, but it hits really hard compared to stone mallet. The chance to knockdown a foe is greater than that of stone mallet, but its end cost is higher as well.
Build Up: Greatly increases the amount of damage you deal for a few seconds, as well as slightly increasing your accuracy.
Cost: 6
Activation Time: 1
Recharge: 90
Duration: 10
Brawl Index: NA
Usefulness: 3/5
Suggested slotting: 1 recharge SO
Boosts your base damage by 100% and your base acc by 62.5% for 10 seconds.
Fault: This powerful stomp can cause a seismic disturbance. This will crack the earth itself and send a fault toward a targeted foe, throwing him and nearby foes into the air and possibly disorienting them. Fault deals no damage on its own.
Cost: 14.5
Activation Time: 2
Recharge: 20
Range: 20
Brawl Index: NA
Usefulness: 3/5
Suggested slotting: 1-2 accuracy, 1-2 disorient SOs
A footstomp on the ground that causes rock to come up from the ground to knockdown foes within its short range, with a chance to disorient them, but does not deal any damage. Early on I took this power to use as a filler in my attack chains, but later respecd it out, mostly cause I wanted a bit more damage in my build since I soloed a decent amount. Definitely a useful power for controlling the mobs close to you.
Hurl Boulder: You are able to tear up a chunk of ground beneath your feet and hurl it at an enemy. This attack deals moderate damage, and can knock foes back and even drop them out of the air if they are flying.
Cost: 13.5
Activation Time: 4
Recharge: 8
Range: 40
Brawl Index: 4.5556
Usefulness: 2/5
Suggested slotting: 1 accuracy, 5 damage
This has a short range (about 1/3 less than a blasters first few attacks) but deals pretty good damage and does knockback as well. It also has the added benefit of bringing down flying enemies. The animation time is a bit long, which can be both good and bad. Good because it can help you recover a bit of endurance, bad because you can be attacked during the animation. I took it to add a bit of ranged damage to my arsenal.
Tremor: You can cause a localized earthquake immediately around you. This will deal moderate damage to every foe in melee range, while knocking them back.
Cost: 19.5
Activation Time: 4
Recharge: 14
Range: AoE of 25ft around you
Brawl Index: 2.7778
Usefulness: 5/5
Suggested slotting: 1 accuracy, 5 damage SOs or 1 accuracy, 4 damage, 1 end. reduction SOs
Tremor is your only source of AoE damage in the set. Its damage is comparable to stone mallet, but it affects everyone within melee range, assuming it hits everything. Again, another animation that will make you sound and look powerful. Also, tremor has a knockdown effect.
Seismic Smash: This massive attack hits with all the force of the earth itself. it deals tremendous amounts of damage, and may immobilize the target if they are not defeated outright.
Cost: 26.5
Activation Time: 2
Recharge: 20
Range: 5
Brawl Index: 9.89
Usefulness: 5/5
Suggested slotting: 1 accuracy, 5 damage SOs or 1 accuracy, 4 damage, 1 end. reduction SOs
The capstone of your attacks, seismic smash slams your opponent on the head with incredible force, with a chance to land a hold on them. I love this power. The animation, I think, should be the same as what tremors is, but I like it still.
POWER POOLS: The first three I feel are necessary I will go into a bit of detail about. The rest I will mention a bit about.
FITNESS:
Definitely a pool you will need, and for once, your choices will actually be quite useful to you. Swift will be your best friend, especially slotted at least 3-4 times, as it will help to overcome the speed penalty associated with rooted and granite. Health will improve your heal rate, and combined with rooted, youll heal a touch faster. Stamina, of course, youll be hard-pressed to go without. Stone melee is very endurance heavy and youll see your blue bar disappear quickly without stamina.
SPEED:
Hasten will help counter the recharge penalty of granite, but not completely counter it. The penalty is more than the benefit from hasten, so even 6 slotted, hasten will not be permanent in granite. However, it will still be helpful, as it will keep you from gouging your eyes out waiting on powers to recharge. Taking this too early will only add to your endurance woes, so fit it in somewhere so you can have it 6 slotted prior to getting granite. I took it at 28 and devoted the next 5 slots to it.
TELEPORT:
I chose recall friend to open this pool as it is quite team friendly. Either this or teleport foe will open up the teleport pool. Other than running, teleport is the only way you will get anywhere in decent amount of time in either granite or rooted, especially if you have both running at once. You could use this as your primary travel power if you like, and open up another couple power slots for other power pools, but I hate traveling with teleport. Getting around places like Dark Astoria is a pain, and lagging while teleporting can get you in some big trouble.
CONCEALMENT: Seems kind of pointless for a tank. Our job is to maintain agro, not hide from the bad guys.
FIGHTING: This might help early on when you have a lack of resists, but in the late game becomes more of a waste of powers (remember, this is my opinion), especially when you have granite armor. With granite, tough is not needed and the defense from weave can be obtained from defense inspirations.
Some, however, may say that you need the extra defense/resist when fighting psionic opponents, which Ive never found to be the case. While it IS helpful against minions and lts who have psionic attacks, it's still not necessary for those encounters. During the psi babbage fight I did the other day with a 7 man team, me, being the stone tank, took off straight for babbage. The rest of the team (who had no psi protection at all) mowed through the groups of +1-+3 minions and lts without much problem. Simply stated, while those attacks do hurt, they don't hurt a lot and can be avoided to an extent by purple inspirations and even weave. Minions and lts rarely, if ever, fire off aoe or cone attacks.
But the problem lies in the cone/AoE attacks that bosses/AVs/monsters use in abundance. Weave offers ZERO protection to those types of attacks, while minerals and purples offer defense to ALL types of attacks. AVs and monsters rarely use single target attacks. I feel safe in saying this for one reason: tank a psi AV or monster with your team behind you and then tank a psi AV or monster with the team on the opposite side of what you are tanking. The ONLY time teammates of mine die while on the opposite side from me in psi AV or monsters encounters is because they are close enough for the massive AoE to hit them. However, if they are directly behind me, they will take much more damage and the deaths will be far more numerous.
I've done many psi fights, and I am comfortable saying that minerals is all you need in a psi AV or monster fight (well, I'm assuming you have rooted up, and maybe even earth's embrace as you can't be too careful). The most common attacks done by the big boys are the ones weave does not protect against. I don't see weave being needed to fight minions either, as I've herded psi minions/lts/bosses up to +3 and not gone below 50% health, most of the time staying well above 80% health, and that is without using purple inspirations.
FLIGHT: My travel power of choice. I took air superiority early on for an extra attack, and after a respect, swapped it for hover.
LEADERSHIP: The low bonuses for a tank do not make this pool too appealing.
LEAPING: My least favorite mode of travel, and combat jumping doesnt stack with rooted or granite.
MEDICINE: As a tank, you should have to worry about healing and rezzing others. And, to make it more difficult for a tank to do this, the heals are interruptible.
PRESENCE: You could take this pool for the extra taunt if you like, but I chose not too.
One thing to note on traveling is how to travel. If you have to move in granite, I suggest using teleport. However, if you have rooted running, you can get away with using other travel powers. Here is why. The recharge time on rooted is far shorter than that of granite. What this allows you to do is turn rooted off, travel to where you want to go, and turn it back on. With granite, you might be left waiting for a bit.
'EPIC' POWER POOLS:
BODY MASTERY:
This is the only epic power pool Ive used thus far on my stone tank, therefore the only one I can comment on. All through my playing time with my stone tank, I have had endurance issues, which is part of the reason came so late in my build. Even then, if not for the recharge penalty on granite, I wouldnt have taken hasten. Still, endurance was an issue, so I chose to take conserve power. While its not always up, when it is, I can have a minute or so where I dont have to worry about my endurance. 90% of my deaths since getting granite have come via the toggle drops.
GENERAL TACTICS:
Pre-32 and Granite Armor:
The first 31 levels, youll be without granite armor, and mostly relying on defense to get you through. It might seem a bit tough at times, but it can be done. I dont bump up the difficulty on my missions until I at least have SOs, that way I can keep up damage-wise with my opponents. Another thing this will help you to do is survive on your defense. The higher level the mobs, the more likely it is they will hit you.
These early levels, as I said, are mostly about defense, your main source of which will be rock armor (6 slotted) and rooted (slotted as best you can early on, hopefully at least 3-4). Another thing you may consider is brimstone armor, which will be useful during the respect taskforces. Crystal armor wont be needed quite as much early on. Stone skin may help you early on as well, since it will be about your only option for smashing/lethal resist, unless you opt for the fighting pool. However, if you plan on taking brimstone, crystal, stone skin and/or fighting pool, I suggest you plan on getting rid of all of those with a respec once you have granite slotted up to cap your resists.
As for your offense, youll basically have 3 attacks: stone fist, stone mallet and heavy mallet. The mallets will be useful to you throughout your entire career, and I would slot those more generously than stone fist. Keeping an endurance reduction in them would be a good idea as well, because you will run out of endurance. Also, put hasten off for a while. You might like to have your attacks a bit more often, but I prefer keeping my endurance.
Post-32:
Once you get your slots in Granite armor, you become and damage absorbing machine. With capped resists and a great health regeneration rate, youll be able to take more damage than anyone else. However, youll move slower than molasses at the north pole. Ok, maybe not that slow, but its slow.
Teaming, I suggest becoming friends with kinetics defenders, as their speed boost will make your movement much faster. Granite is probably the best option for teaming, as mob sizes tend to be a bit larger in teams, and you wouldnt want to be the first to fall. I highly recommend running mud pots at all times while teaming. Yes, I know it might suck away at your endurance, but it has an amazing ability to attract and hold agro. Mud pots appears to have a double taunt to it, one being the aura-voke and the other the punch-voke. Combine that with taunt, and nothing will move to far from you.
When you solo, you can run rock armor and rooted and be just fine in most cases, even running missions on invincible. Occasionally Ill have to switch to granite and rooted to heal up a bit, but for the most part, rock and rooted will suffice while solo.
Psionic fights are where you will really start to shine. Some villains who are psi-based also will have other types of attacks, but you can adjust your tactics accordingly. Some rikti will have psi attacks, but what I have found is that if you close to melee range, they will quit with the psi attacks and go with smash/lethal or energy, in which case you can switch to granite. Other villains, such as psychic clockwork, will use a combination of smash/lethal and psionic, so running rock armor, rooted and minerals will suit you just fine, and topping it off with earths embrace wouldnt hurt either. Pure psychic villains, like those in the outdoor mother mayhem mission, can be fought with rooted, minerals and earths embrace.
Now, when you are teaming for psionic battles, keep a few things in mind:
1) You have psi defense, not resistance. If you get it, you will take the full effect. However, youll take few enough hits that youll be able to heal it up before you take another big hit.
2) Do everything you can to keep the psionic attacks focused at you, especially against monsters and AVs. This means running and using all you can to keep them taunted. What I do in those big fights is run mud pots and stay in melee range of the AV or monster, using taunt every time it is up. Keep in mind that most attacks from AVs and monsters are cone or AoE, so politely as your teammates to stay on the opposite side of what you fighting. That way, they only thing they might have to worry about is the big AoE Avs and monsters like to use.
3) Never turn down buffs of any sort, except maybe stealth/invisibility. DUH!
HERDING:
You might look at the limitations of this build and scoff at the idea of herding, but it can be done with a bit of work. Yeah, it might not be the fastest herding around, but it is herding no less. Generally, I will start off with Granite and mud pots and go after a couple mobs that way. Run in taunt them, run to the next group, taunt them, etc. I will do that until I start taking a good bit of damage. At that point, I will turn on rooted, and teleport from group to group, taunting as I go. One thing to remember, is to back track every little bit to make sure you dont lose too many, and use corners to your advantage. Corners will allow you to bunch up the mobs and taunt them again, keeping them with you a bit longer. Now, you wont be able to take them down very fast alone, so bring a team along and have some fun.
I think Im done if not, Ill more at a later time. Ive opted to leave a sample build out of this guide, mainly to encourage you to try some things out for yourself. Many thanks to all of those Ive teamed with through the course of leveling up my stone/stone tank. Good luck!