Question about tanks

First, I love playing tanks. Second, they can be frustrating at times, and heres why. Tonight as I am playing my tank and taking damage, I was missing at least 50% of the time, and compared to others, I don't do a ton of damage. So I thought, why is that. Yes I get better resistance, yes I have more hitpoints, and yes I can draw aggro..........but is that all I am good for. I want to fight, and I want to at least do some damage, which I do, but not enough. I am just at the beginning of starting to enhance my tank, but it can be a bit frustrating.

So I guess my question is this, am I only good for drawing enemies from my teammates? I think the answer is yes, but I want to be all that I can be, lol.

Some sets, such as Super Strength and Fiery Melee have great potential to become decent damage dealers (both ST and AoE), especially if paired with offensive primaries such as Shield Defense and Fire Aura

Depends on the primary and secondary combination. F'rinstance, my Fire/SS can be a monster. Fire/EnM, I feel, is a bit "eh."

See my Guides and Tutorials

Welcome to the slowest maturing AT around!

Can you do respectable, even good damage? Yes. Some better than others, but not till later on.

Can you take a lickin' and keep on tickin'? Yes. Some better than others, but not till later on.

I think you can see where I'm going with this. Many tanks get great powers early, but without SO level enhancements, they just don't impress. On the flip side, many tanks get great powers very late (35, 38). Basically you're boned either way.

Just be patient and have fun.

Also, the fire alarm in my apartment just stopped, so either the fire department showed up and turned it off, or the part of the building with the control panel was consumed in the conflagration. At least it's quiet.

Because of the tanks inherent taunt ability, a tank gets hit with everything thrown at it. Its not all damage, it is quite often a debuff attack. Sometimes that debuff makes him miss more of his attacks. Thats why the power taunt is important. When you are accuracy debuffed and your punches dont land you can still hold the bad guys attention. The power taunt is autohit in most instances against PvE opponents. Except for AVs. A taunt can miss an AV. The reason you can slot acc in your taunt is to make you more effective against AVs and in PvP taunt is not autohit.

Hmm. I'm thinking the inherent taunting of Tanker/Brute attacks only triggers when they actually hit? [ie, +acc probably being more important than +dam if you're the type who teams a lot?]

yeah. nice catch. i read to fast and thought there was a 't at the end of the word can. lol. i retract my post.. nothing more to read here........

I have a level 50 Shield Defense/Super Strength tanker, and yes, I can do pretty good damage... I have two AOEs (Shield Charge and Foot Stomp), and some strong attacks. When I pop Rage, I do a ton of damage for the next two minutes (and then there's the crash), but it works a lot better, IMAO, then Build-Up does. (Build-Up is usable for 10 seconds every 90 seconds, baseline, and Rage is usable for two minutes every four minutes, baseline. Rage has that crash at the end, but overall, it's far better.)

Now, yes, I do still have Accuracy problems. Nothing sucks more then having Knockout Blow miss. Twice in a row. Or not affecting as many enemies as I could when using Foot Stomp or Shield Charge (although part of that is from the fact that I'm generally fighting enemies at +1 or +2).

To be honest, to solve my accuracy issues, I'm thinking about re-speccing to drop the Flight pool entirely (with Ninja Run, I really wouldn't need a travel power), and picking up Focused Accuracy and Physical Perfection out of Energy Mastery. I wouldn't gain any net Defense out of it, as I couldn't six-slot both Rage and Focused Accuracy with Gaussian's, but the Build-up proc would have a lot more chances to trigger in FA then in Rage.

Regardless of the "tanks don't do squat for damage", "tanks are just meatshields", "tanks are a low damage AT" naysayers out there, the truth is that tanks do very respectable damage.

As much as a Scrapper or Blaster or Brute (with big fury)? No, of course not. But very respectable damage. [Of course I also believe that Controllers do just fine even pre-32, assuming you've built them correctly].

As to your issues:
1) Tanks are more of a late-bloomer than Scrappers and Blasters. Until you get SO's and sufficient slotting in place, they can feel a bit lackluster. I personally think it's more due to the endurance problems that most tanks have pre-stamina than anything else.

2) Obviously, if you want to do "good" damage you have to concentrate (at least a little) on your offensive powers and not just your defenses.

3) If you were REALLY missing 50% of the time (rather than it just seeming like it), then you need to either look at how you've got your attacks slotted or stop fighting those ultra-purple-con mobs until the character is matured some.

I love Tanks, in fact I'll usually build a Tank (as a Scranker) over a Scrapper when the powersets mesh. I've got Tanks of almost every combination. Trust me, Tanks are plenty powerful.

(On a side note, I hadn't played with my War Mace tank since before the last round of tweaks that Castle gave them. All I can say now is WOW, he was OK before, but now he's just BRUTAL).

A couple of thoughts;

(1) make one build focused on fighting. Slot attacks first, shields second, and run that build solo or on a team where you don't need max survivability (good buffers on the team, a second tank, etc.).

(2) Have another build really focused on survivability, with Tough/Weave etc. On a large team, with high difficulty foes, in end game content, the places people REALLY want a tank, they will be perfectly happy if you set a good pace, hold the attention of the most dangerous foes, and stay upright without ever defeating one single bad guy.

The single biggest determiner I've seen for how quickly and smoothly a pickup group can get through a mission and get good XPs is having a good tank, not just because "you need a tank to hold aggro" but because people are used to following one so they don't tend to split up, and you can control how fast the team is moving through enemies by staying out front. Strong team, move faster, go on to the next spawn to get it prepped while the team is mopping up stragglers, use Taunt for its -range to force foes into clumps, and everyone will have a good time.

If you want to deal damage and (ALMOST) tank, you want a Scrapper or Brute. Tankers are not about putting up the greatest red numbers above the foes. If you've got to be the primary source of damage for your team, then you probably won't be happy with a Tanker.

The short answer is, if could deal damage like a Scrapper, you'd faceplant like one. A Tanker may not deal the big numbers, but he DOES contribute to the damage, and more importantly, he keeps foes off his allies. And Gauntlet is the vast majority of that, which means that while you may not be doing the greatest damage, every punch you throw DOES help the team. You don't want to stand there like a bump taking damage, holding aggro is an active job, and your team will appreciate you doing it.

Maybe some advice will help. First off, I don't know how you're missing 50% of the time (at most you should miss 25% of the time) but slotting your attacks for Accuracy can help. Even at the low levels, when you get a bonus to hit (up to 90% at really low levels) it can still help to slot as much Accuracy TOs in your attacks as you can. Don't worry about Damage, that's negligible at that level, but Accuracy will go a long way towards preserving your sanity, if not actually giving you any significant improvement.

Second, unlike the Brutes and Scrappers, you have less choices of attacks at low levels. While they're taking attacks, you're opening up defenses. If you want to deal damage, or even just hold aggro, grab up every attack you can the moment it opens up. You can always go back and get the shields after level 22, when you can slot them with SOs and they'll do MUCH more good. Remember that in general, Tanker attacks are slower but deal more damage per hit than Scrappers. You won't take out your foes any faster, but you CAN get those high red numbers -- when you get up in the 30s and those final attacks start opening up.

Third, I'll repeat some advise from the previous posters. If you're fighting purples, understand that's likely why you are missing and slot accordingly. (If you're low level, being PLed by highbies, just live with it. Maybe stock up on Insights) Firey Aura and Shield Defense have high damage and lower defense, making for a more Scrapper-like feel. (Super Strength and Stone Melee also do lots of damage, but as I said it'll really be the 30s before you feel it, while damage-oriented Primaries give better results early on. Also, Willpower is known for its offense, not because of a damage boost, but because it has Quick Recovery)

And finally, if you want to pick a Scrapper, and build for really strong defenses, you should be able to get the ability to take damage like you want, and deal damage. But understand, without Gauntlet or a Brute's ability to punchvoke, you won't hold aggro for your team anywhere like a Tanker can. If you want to tank, tank, if you don't, then don't think that you can do both. Even a Brute can't tank like a Tanker can.