Unfortunately tanks are fairly squishy in the early levels. The defences are nowhere near complete, they're hitpoints are not much higher than other ATs and they're damage is usually a fair bit less, resulting in much longer fights (and more damage taken).
By about level 15 a good tank can start to show how well they can take a punch. I've been playing an empath down in the Hollows and I have been watching how well the tanks on my teams do. Yes they need healing but it's usually not the mad scramble to keep tham alive as it is with other ATs. 
They do get better, just not godlike like they were before.
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Hell Now I understand why my empath ends up welded on to the teams tanker on missions 
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FWIW, if you're the only one on the team the Empath needs to heal I'd say you're fulfilling your role as a tank rather well. As Faultline says, you will get less squishy later.
By my 50s shall ye know me:
Tundra, DVM, The Late, Neutrino Ghost, Sir Clanksalot, End Of Days, Prof. Migraine
Howler Monkey
to avoid bein instantly squished now taunt is a must have, hell to me it was a must have before so now its a must must have and if u tank so that u r the only one in the line of fire then a healer only has u to worried about which is a good thing.
note i know a blaster pull and tanker intercept may help around not having taunt but getting 5 pps of a blaster in a duo without taunt is just dangerous
He will honor his words; he will definitely carry out his actions. What he promises he will fulfill. He does not care about his bodily self, putting his life and death aside to come forward for another's troubled besiegement. He does not boast about his ability, or shamelessly extol his own virtues. - Sima Qian.
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Ive only been playing a tank in my spare time, and I must admit I was suprised at how easily they drop.
Albion flame is a I/fire tanker ,and he cant take on the same odds thay my blaster , empath,controller or scrapper could at that lvl.
I expected to be able to take serious punishment and leap into combat and mash hellions to pulp (like my scrapper but with less withdrawing to heal and longer fights due to less damage).but after my third trip to the hos in Atlas I've given up playing him for a while.. Hell Now I understand why my empath ends up welded on to the teams tanker on missions
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Yep I've given up on my flame/stone tank too. Just too boring nowadays and much less soloable than my Controller. How weird is that?
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to avoid bein instantly squished now taunt is a must have, hell to me it was a must have before so now its a must must have and if u tank so that u r the only one in the line of fire then a healer only has u to worried about which is a good thing.
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Hmmm, not sure I totally agree with that (although I'm just assuming you are talking about the early levels?). Playing an empath has given me a much better understanding of what I put healers through when I play my other alts. I would agree that having one healing target is good, however tanks in the early levels can't hold agro and can't take huge amounts of damage anyway. I much prefer Fort'ing the tank and knowing he is fairly safe for a while as it leaves me free to focus on the real squishies (where one hit sends them into the red). If the tank goes in first, gauntlet will ensure they have all the aggro they can cope with without having to use taunt. I built an empath purely for healing and if the damage comes in too fast I still can't cope. I'm not sure how those healers that take a lot of their secondary would cope with a tank that had all the aggro on him...?
As for soloing with a tank, I never could (or at least it was too dull). If you build a scranker, they aren't good on a team but if you build a team tank, they can't really solo. Fire tanks were one of the few exceptions to that, not sure they still are? If you want to solo, a tank is really not the way to go. Well, that's just my opinion anyway.
Best way to solo a tank is to do it on rugged you get an amazing XP per sec ratio as you are fighting yellows and oranges. Actually its probaly the best way to solo any thing. 
I had thought that Tankers were pretty much superfluous on a team post I6 and ED but after watching a couple of the Armoured Corps yesterday I have changed my mind. They need a lot more TLC from the team but they are still viable.
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Best way to solo a tank is to do it on rugged you get an amazing XP per sec ratio as you are fighting yellows and oranges. Actually its probaly the best way to solo any thing.
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I prefer Unyielding. The smaller spawn sizes on Rugged are just Dull, Dull, Dull. I tend to depose of the larger spawns just as quickly as the smaller ones due to a large amount of my damage output being AoEs.
@Unthing ... Mostly on Union.
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to avoid bein instantly squished now taunt is a must have, hell to me it was a must have before so now its a must must have and if u tank so that u r the only one in the line of fire then a healer only has u to worried about which is a good thing.
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Hmmm, not sure I totally agree with that (although I'm just assuming you are talking about the early levels?). Playing an empath has given me a much better understanding of what I put healers through when I play my other alts. I would agree that having one healing target is good, however tanks in the early levels can't hold agro and can't take huge amounts of damage anyway. I much prefer Fort'ing the tank and knowing he is fairly safe for a while as it leaves me free to focus on the real squishies (where one hit sends them into the red). If the tank goes in first, gauntlet will ensure they have all the aggro they can cope with without having to use taunt. I built an empath purely for healing and if the damage comes in too fast I still can't cope. I'm not sure how those healers that take a lot of their secondary would cope with a tank that had all the aggro on him...?
As for soloing with a tank, I never could (or at least it was too dull). If you build a scranker, they aren't good on a team but if you build a team tank, they can't really solo. Fire tanks were one of the few exceptions to that, not sure they still are? If you want to solo, a tank is really not the way to go. Well, that's just my opinion anyway.
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if a tank goes in first with 2 groups close to eachother u r most likely to get both groups and anarchy in which case id wanna controller, taunt can be used to split groups and i am talking at any level from whenever u can get taunt, i got it after i got mezz protection and a snipers pull was ok upto lvl 16, but anyway i have a 50 empath too and with the experience of being a tanker prehand helped me know certain things most empaths need to be told so yep with those tankers tanking so that they were the only ones getting hit my job was the easiest in the world had to go do hamidon for debt badges
He will honor his words; he will definitely carry out his actions. What he promises he will fulfill. He does not care about his bodily self, putting his life and death aside to come forward for another's troubled besiegement. He does not boast about his ability, or shamelessly extol his own virtues. - Sima Qian.
gauntlet helps in a way but even if i try to fulfill my role not many baddies attack me most of them think its fun to pick on squishys . I say bugger taunt its almost rendered obsolete we as tanks still need to stick to what we do best and ignore any nerfing.
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gauntlet helps in a way but even if i try to fulfill my role not many baddies attack me most of them think its fun to pick on squishys . I say bugger taunt its almost rendered obsolete we as tanks still need to stick to what we do best and ignore any nerfing
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You obviously not insulting the enemy enough. Seriously though I haven't had this problem. Everyone loves beating Maxy up. If you are having problems controlling aggro its probably down to either 2 things. You are not taunting the enemy or you team mates are targeting the wrong ppl, maybe another mob or something.
Tell you team mates to go for a particular enemy e.g. boss and make sure you taunting him and starting hitting other enemies or get team mates to target the enemies through nominated person (doesn't have to be you). That should allow you to control the aggro abit better.
P.S. By the way, you say baddies pick on the squishies. Had a particular squishy decided to fire off a Nova by any chance and then find themselves surprised they are number one target?
Heros
Max Powerz: Lv 50 Tanker
Villains
Max Khaos: Lv 50
Overlord of E.V.I.L.
My Brute - http://maxy-khaos.mybrute.com/
LF SG! Arc ID# 193083
Not if they know how to Nova correctly
One word - Cliff
Heros
Max Powerz: Lv 50 Tanker
Villains
Max Khaos: Lv 50
Overlord of E.V.I.L.
My Brute - http://maxy-khaos.mybrute.com/
LF SG! Arc ID# 193083
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One word - Cliff
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Ha ha! Cliff is the master of the Full Auto faceplant 
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gauntlet helps in a way but even if i try to fulfill my role not many baddies attack me most of them think its fun to pick on squishys . I say bugger taunt its almost rendered obsolete we as tanks still need to stick to what we do best and ignore any nerfing
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You obviously not insulting the enemy enough. Seriously though I haven't had this problem. Everyone loves beating Maxy up. If you are having problems controlling aggro its probably down to either 2 things. You are not taunting the enemy or you team mates are targeting the wrong ppl, maybe another mob or something.
Tell you team mates to go for a particular enemy e.g. boss and make sure you taunting him and starting hitting other enemies or get team mates to target the enemies through nominated person (doesn't have to be you). That should allow you to control the aggro abit better.
P.S. By the way, you say baddies pick on the squishies. Had a particular squishy decided to fire off a Nova by any chance and then find themselves surprised they are number one target?
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i totally second this
He will honor his words; he will definitely carry out his actions. What he promises he will fulfill. He does not care about his bodily self, putting his life and death aside to come forward for another's troubled besiegement. He does not boast about his ability, or shamelessly extol his own virtues. - Sima Qian.
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P.S. By the way, you say baddies pick on the squishies. Had a particular squishy decided to fire off a Nova by any chance and then find themselves surprised they are number one target?
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Certain enemies have always targetted Blasters (maybe other squishies) over all other enemies unless under the effect of a Taunt like power or in direct combat.
Gunslingers and Totems are ones that come to mind.
Compare the activities of a tank to a mastermind with 6 pets or even with a brute... thier roles blur considerably. :/
i didnt play the game b4 ED so i havent noticed ne thing different exept that instead of taunt i get one from the presence power pool if u slot it right it is very good and many people say that unstopabble isnt worth it but i say get it i can help ALOT! wen your over whelmed with the bad guys
i mean i can stand foot too tentacle with lusca for 2 mins but im more of a take aggro tank for now!
when i play my corrupter in a team with a mastermind and a brute i get aggro so im not really seeing the roles blur considerably unless u r comparing to a tanker without taunt
He will honor his words; he will definitely carry out his actions. What he promises he will fulfill. He does not care about his bodily self, putting his life and death aside to come forward for another's troubled besiegement. He does not boast about his ability, or shamelessly extol his own virtues. - Sima Qian.
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Compare the activities of a tank to a mastermind with 6 pets or even with a brute... thier roles blur considerably. :/
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I agree that Masterminds(their pets, duh) can tank in PvE. Even robots, who can be forced to close combat by using GoTo command. This is good.
When I was playing mastermind in beta i had a GoTo-button bound for every one of my robots. I could finetune the formation perfectly. Nice.
Just a random 2 inf from me..
observing it in PVP..Tanker's gauntlet really has no effect so Taunt still would solve some purpose. Now i think about it..Kheldian taunt still works..only major diff being no gauntlet..
Gah!
'runs off to go test things out'
Ive only been playing a tank in my spare time, and I must admit I was suprised at how easily they drop.
Albion flame is a I/fire tanker ,and he cant take on the same odds thay my blaster , empath,controller or scrapper could at that lvl.
I expected to be able to take serious punishment and leap into combat and mash hellions to pulp (like my scrapper but with less withdrawing to heal and longer fights due to less damage).but after my third trip to the hos in Atlas I've given up playing him for a while.. Hell Now I understand why my empath ends up welded on to the teams tanker on missions