auras are great and are usally enough..
BUT! what about that one boss picking your friend off from 20 feet away not aggro'd from your aura?
guess thats a question youll have to live with...myself i have it on all my tanks. but thats just the tank in me,
plus hami raids with tanks need taunt or else your on the scrapper team..and seriously..who wants to be there :/
lol ok well i dont really do the hami raid all that much only a couple times with my controller but i see what youre saying about the boss thing. would it be just as effective if i always make the boss my primary target (if theres only one of course) and if theres more than one alternate between them?
and if theres no way to not get taunt is there any kind of necessity to add slots into the power and if there is how should slotting be done?
BTW thanks for the advice 
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I was leaning towards not taking taunt but would that get me crap from other people?
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You'll get crap automatically from STUPID people. Anyone with a clue about tanks will consider your build, goals and skill before criticizing you about Taunt.
If you're using a Willpower tank (with a very weak taunt aura) and volunteer to tank AV's for a full team and you don't have Taunt - you SHOULD be criticized.
If you're using Ice Armor with two taunt auras and multiple AoE attacks, you can do wonderfully without Taunt.
I have an ice tank with no Taunt, who has both taunt auras, 2 AoE attacks (one PBAoE and one location AoE) and 3 single target ranged attacks. I have an invuln with 1 PBAoE and 1 ranged attack and who was specifically built for tanking AV's and GM's - he has Taunt. I have a shield tank with 2 PBAoE's and no ranged attacks at all - he has Taunt also.
The issue with AV's and GM's is that your taunt auras and gauntlet effect have to roll to hit them. Taunt is auto-hit (but not in PvP). If you're attacking steadily, odds are that you'll never lose aggro against a single enemy. But if you have Taunt, you don't have to play those odds and gamble with teammates lives.
Historically, any question about whether a tank needs Taunt ignites a massive flame-fest. There will be people who say you suck if you don't take Taunt. There will be others that say you only need Taunt if you're completely incompetent. I would like to preempt both sides as being UTTERLY CLUELESS because they don't know *YOU*. My advice is very simple: if this is your first tank, take Taunt. Unless someone teams with you constantly and discusses your build and tanking goals, no one can tell you if YOU need Taunt for a particular tank. Try it and see. Then you'll have an informed opinion on it and can judge for yourself whether a particular tank will need it.
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Reasons I take Taunt:
*) AVs/GMs have a bad habit of shrugging off auras and Gauntlet. You may hold aggro most of the time, but it's not a guarantee. If you're doing the STF, you'll pretty much need Taunt due to their higher level.
*) It's a way to keep aggro off others with taunt effects - the most problematic of these are Invuln and Shield Scrappers. If you don't have Taunt and you fight an AV, you won't have aggro.
*) While auras and Gauntlet work well for mobs in melee range, as Coldmed said, it doesn't help mobs that somehow get outside of your melee range. Whether it's knockback, AI quirks, or an ambush.
Taunt is too useful of a tool, for me, to pass up on; it handles too many situations. I don't PUG much, but I suspect it would be more useful there than in a group of friends. You can always give it a try without and play it by ear. (I normally pickup Taunt in the 20s, since I start teaming more then compared to 1-20. You also get SOs and finally start feeling like a Tank.)
mk sounds good yeah I do enjoy taking on AV's, havent had much exp with GM's though. I think I'll take it and see how it goes. At least even if i dont use it as much as others do i dont automatically get flamed for it missing in the build lol
thanks everyone!
If you want to tank on an Invulnerability tanker prior to level 18, you will need Taunt: You don't get your taunt aura until level 18, and Gauntlet won't cut it.
For me I always have Taunt on all my tankers for the reasons Sarate and Coldmed went into. While a tank with a good aura, and Invincibility is arguably the best aura (Ice tics faster but Invincibility has longer duration), can do fine against the majority of the baddies in the game even the best, most skilled tanker will sometimes have a mob that's out of melee with him and aggro's on someone else in the team... those moments are when you need a ranged attention-getter.
And of course AV's and above have a strong tendency to ignore your aura and turn around and attack the blaster pounding on them, Taunt is a guaranteed aggro getter vs AV's, even on ones you can't hit reliably because they've just hit Elude... I'm looking at YOU, Mako.
For the majority of the tanking I do it's true that Taunt isn't needed; I'm generally able to get and hold aggro with just my aura and attacks. However, it's absolutely invaluable when the unexpected happens... like that ambush that just came up from the other direction, or the other group that suddenly aggro's on the blaster. When things get chaotic you've the choice of running around like crazy trying to use your aura to gather loose aggro or you can just toss a Taunt on that loose aggro.
On a chaotic PuG I frequently find myself gathering a group here with my aura while tossing taunt at some mobs there and tossing a ranged attack on yet another mob on the other side. Taunt is just another tool available to me to do my job. And as a ranged, autohit, zero end tool it comes in remarkably handy.
You can check out the guides in my sig for some more detailed info on the Invuln tanker set; they apply equally to any secondary you may pick up.
COH has just been murdered by NCSoft. http://www.change.org/petitions/ncso...city-of-heroes
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I usually play trollers but I had a character concept that works better as a tank so I'm trying one out (I have a tendency to stick with a particular character if i like the concept). It'll be invul/*, not sure yet on the secondary. Anyways, I've read before that most tanks if not all normally take taunt and if they didn't would get chastised for it. Are the attacks in tanker secondaries and taunt auras just not enough with gauntlet to maintain aggro?
I was leaning towards not taking taunt but would that get me crap from other people? I primarily spend my time with PUGs and I really only solo for the costume missions (which I just drop nowadays)
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I've taken Taunt on about half the Tankers I've made and it usually sits there and does nothing at the end game, besides hold IO's for good set bonuses.
However when you absolutely need it, there is no substitute (i.e. relying on Gauntlet with a ranged attack for instance).
My general rule of thumb with Taunt is what I plan on doing with the Tanker. Is he going to be a full team and TF Tanker for the most part? If yes, take Taunt.
Is he going to be a soloer and/or mission farmer? If so, don't take Taunt.
Is he going to be a mix of both? That's where you'll have to weigh the pros and cons. For beginning Tankers, I'd usually suggest taking Taunt who aren't soloers/farmers.
As far as getting crap from other people: only if the other people die a lot in your group (whether deservedly so or not) 
I usually play trollers but I had a character concept that works better as a tank so I'm trying one out (I have a tendency to stick with a particular character if i like the concept). It'll be invul/*, not sure yet on the secondary. Anyways, I've read before that most tanks if not all normally take taunt and if they didn't would get chastised for it. Are the attacks in tanker secondaries and taunt auras just not enough with gauntlet to maintain aggro?
I was leaning towards not taking taunt but would that get me crap from other people? I primarily spend my time with PUGs and I really only solo for the costume missions (which I just drop nowadays)