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Concentrate on your Primary role first and fit in your Secondary role when you can or if its seriously more needed.
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Shannon is right on this - really it is all that needs to be said... for most people.
Sadly others would find the second part of that quote very arguable ("when you can or if its seriously more needed") because of misunderstanding how a certain powerset combo works. You might chuck in a blast while waiting for a heal to recycle, but to another player that might look like wasting End or they might not understand the heal is in cooldown. Heck I've had both of those thrown at me by some ignorant chump while playing a character with the heal in the secondary (my MM and corr from my sig).
Some people just find it hard to re-adjust to different gamestyles when they've come from a game where you just do one thing on raids e.g. Everquest 1 SoV-era raids, where Clerics would only cast Complete Heal on the main tank, Shaman would only use slows, Enchanters would only use tash, the primary Monk would only FD-pull, etc. I think that is what's to blame in many cases, like the weird insistence on Empaths just being pure-healers in CoH and neglecting secondary completely.
Oh and the quote doesn't really apply to most dominator builds where taking more secondaries than primaries, and concentrating on them accordingly, is the way to success.
I wonder if the differences of opinion in this area are due to the changes that have happended post ED.
I mention this becasue when I first started, Tankers in particular were Gods, almost nothing could touch them and if they died, it was due to a mistake i.e not clicking on a shield etc
Tankers were invaluable to most teams by fulfilling a vital role; protecting the rest of the team by consilodating ALL aggro.
Changes have occured that have meant this is less likley to happen except with the most attentive and skilled tanker; not overherding, corner pullng, spacial awareness and a sense of responsibilty to their team mates.
Tankers are now less likley to fulfil those old roles as quite simply, there are an excess of slots to go around now, no longer needed to 6 slot shields - why not put some in the secondary pool and slot up attacks. Now I have slotted attacks, why not use them from time to time.
Indeed, having your shields properly slotted around the 20s, sometimes earlier and also having an attack chain slotted engenders a playstyle which in an earlier age might have been termed as scranking, but has, (as has been mentioned previously in another post) become almost universally utilised and so in effect has become the norm.
Fair enough.
I used to hold the view that a tanker's role is what it was before, but after teaming with multiple tankers over recent months, the tankers that I would desscribe as fulfilling my expectations of tanking has in the majority fallen to the wayside and have become relics of a bygone age. I count myself as one of them when I play on my tanker as I can conceive of no other way to play them.
I guess then, Tankers have evolved - most of those I have encountered do their own thing in their own way and have a marginal impact upon the team's effectiveness. I've had to accept that or otherwise I'll be tearing my hair out and muttering under my breath how awful such and such tank is.
In addition, its telling how much tankers roles have changed as when playing as a tanker, some teams do not appreciate how much safer they can be if the tanker has been given time to consilodate aggro and instead firing off as the tanker is pulling etc
I've adjusted my playstyle in some cases and if the tanker does not tank in the way I expect them to, then my toon will have to play differently, withdrawing when necessary, avoiding aggro inducing attacks or having ways to avoid return fire etc
Perosnally, I think its pointless to harp on how a player should do this, or do that as things have moved on, not necessarily in all aspects for the better, but we have to adjust and make do with the situation as it is, rather than thinking we can change it beyond an indiviual level, such as rolling a tanker and playing it 'old skool stylie' 
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Actually, if the tank is holding the aggro, and there arent many AoEs flying about, the scrapper CAN normally turn of armours (best to keep the mez one on I guess!). In a solid team with a solid tank, a scrappers armours ARE pretty useless (whereas every other AT will have fairly helpful secondaries).
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Yes thats correct if your a super reflex you can turn off all shields except the aoe shield and practised brawler and the empath pretty much only has to heal the tanker and no-one else except perhaps meleers who may need it from being aoe'd no matter what is faced including any lone AV (usually after mob is done) and CM anyone that has to be within 30ft of melee (a tank can always offer enough range aslong as the teams never up the tanks **** and people if not invised are 40ft back from herdpoint during a herding process should i prefer one). There are tons more other stuff but they are often too difficult to get through so many experienced/inexperienced peoples heads and some people dont want all that, which is understandable....My tank is only going to be played on teams that arent xp craved now. I have no reason to play her. 1100 hours is enough. She isnt my first option anymore, only new game content or friends that are gonna give me some courtesy on allowing me my terms would bring her out.
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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Oh and the quote doesn't really apply to most dominator builds where taking more secondaries than primaries, and concentrating on them accordingly, is the way to success.
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My quote dont apply to villains at all afaik. Defeat leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to a nice accolade. I'd say with villains they can be 50/50 in builds more, well heroes can, but your free to be more uncaring about your role to team mates or caring (cos if they go down you go down) or for Lord Recluse regard failure as not an option.
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.
Tanks were more independent pre ED and people were also less vigilant, certain things were a run through but all the game content with the right team can still be pwned as i am sure you know. People if they dont fancy hospital trips or want to up their game just need to talk more now, pay attention to eachother, cooperate more and actually become more of a team.
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.
War mace was bearable when you could 5 slot the attacks for damage.. Now it isnt. Thats my main grife really.
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War mace was bearable when you could 5 slot the attacks for damage.. Now it isnt. Thats my main grife really.
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maybe i should rethink my lv10 invun/mace tank then 
When rage drops a whole lot of defence imo is lost, its like its all gone and with it 35 points of end iirc. So although i dont like to have to worry about rage drop whilst tanking for teams (with all the panning (especially on maps with trees), tab hitting, taunting, planning, checking mobs, chatting, checking buffs etc, etc,). Rage drop is something i dont particularly have to like to add to the list of worries mostly versus carnie and malta (unless i am teamed with certain other sets) so that lowers my dps below that of mace especially with maces use of build up. Without build up mace would probably be less damaging than superstrength without rage (uninclusive of maces multihits) and due to the secondary effects and mace has more gains in survivability.
Now people will probably say that if i am not raged i am not pulling my weight as much as i could be or even if i am starting out as more of a tauntbot than a damage dealer but lets look at aoes for one of the reasons why taunt control can be effective:
Take a popular Rads debuffs, radiation infection and enervating field (there are more but just think of these 2 alone) both just 15ft of aoe, lets pack 16 foes into both of them through taunt control and get the 16 foes -dam,-def,-acc and -res all of which in the 30% region. (Packing them in is part of my job as a tanker, allowing me time to do so is a good idea.)
Then take damage aoes and how they can compare to single target attacks. An electrical blasters ball lightning 15ft radius aoe that hits 16. It does slightly more damage than the tier one, considered more useful as a chainfiller if anything of an attack charged bolts (despite is comparable dps on its own) but BL hits 16 so its worth 16 charged bolts on a group. Thats not even the best aoe about so when ya add up everyone in the teams aoe stacking at once on debuffed foes whilst using build up then omg!
Does it pay to have spread splintered groups for everyone to single target because the lack of targets in an area may not warrant the endurance cost of the aoe? Putting the fact that foes maybe undebuffed aside you still have blasters cone attacks, but can you always get the best position of use for them with safety as a blaster? And dont they hit only 10max and not 16 like aoes?
My tankers pbaoe will only hit 10 and i can only hope they hit more of those slightly out of my aura than in, i can only hope that my gauntlet isnt just effecting those mainly in my aura. In an egg shaped herd i may have to taunt the ones slightly out of my aura.
When thinking about all the different types of aoes theres nothing wrong imo with tanks who concentrate on taunt control from an early stage because with the right team behind them it can still make good sense.
Damage is important from the tank though especially as sometimes you dont have a healer and the buffs or debuffs only allow you so much of a fight duration in which to last in, and if you have got all the aggro needed or taunt is recharging what better else is there to do? (I do know that debuff zones can build to awesome areas of sanctuaries to some toons where ya think you could stay there all day).
With impatient teams i dont get things as whats the point in attacking before the tank has actually done enough taunt control? Whats the point in fighting plus levels only to get half the xp because you never waited that extra 3 seconds to be sure of some control? Or atleast for the tanker to make an opening aoe?
You can play without tanks but anyone else could get defeated in more of an instant than a tank might depending on enemy.
Despite all this i am not saying there is one drill to play to because i know there isnt but any variance for speed and the survivability of the whole of the team is good as long as hopefully all foes are getting debuffed, controlled and being hit by maximum damage in the minimal time with minimal casualties. Then if ya think that aint fun/dangerous/challenging enough just up the difficulty.
Old news to most people, just with some people i dont think they knew/could see why people played that way. From playing my squishies I do see that many people playing their tanks certainly dont think of all this when they play and even in the lower levels my blaster may run in and take the alpha just to get proper aoes off, with less hp than the tanks, because the tanks are worryingly standing back waiting for a snipe which will end up in scatter. My less hp blaster often still easily survived.
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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War mace was bearable when you could 5 slot the attacks for damage.. Now it isnt. Thats my main grife really.
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maybe i should rethink my lv10 invun/mace tank then
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Mace is poor single target damage but 'potentially' great multiple target damage if my maths is right and with good additional survivability. Still not as good damage as axe though.
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.
Very good point. Perhaps I should consider...
If it has eyes, you can blind it, if it has blood, you can make it bleed, if it has a mouth, you can make it scream.