Non-Tanker toons that can actually hold aggro and taunt like a tank

I'm curious what other characters can really tank? No archetype is supposed to irreplaceable, but Tanks do a great job of well tanking... what else can?

By tanking I mean:

Pulling large amounts of toons, to one tight location, and then hold them there so the Area of Effects can unless heck. And live to see another day against the toughest mobs?

I'm betting we'll see some TankerMind builds that are pretty good at the job. What else would surprise us?

Brutes.

Well built scrappers and brutes can do that. Or they could just kill everything on their way.

MMs ... with debuff aggro.

scrappers for sure. My main corr can kiiiinda tank. He pulls +0/x6 groups and takes them out before most of them get to him, if they make it out of the RoF/tar patch. Brutes can tank almost as good as tankers.

Brutes are the closest analogue because all of their secondaries (sans EA) have taunt auras and all of their attacks have taunt effects added to them. They have the same threat modifier as Tankers (4.0) and the same taunt durations. A few differences between Brutes and Tanks:

1) Tankers have Gauntlet, so their single target attacks (from their secondary) have splash taunt. This helps hold aggro a bit, but I think it's a little overstated.
2) Tanker Taunt has -range applied to all 5 foes is hits, which makes it an excellent tool for clumping mobs together. I've heard that Brute Taunt only applies -range to the primary target. (I have not confirmed this.)
3) Brutes obviously do more damage. What isn't obvious about this is it increases their threat generation significantly. If a Brute and Tanker are playing the exact same (Taunting with the same frequency, same duration, etc), the Brute will win due to dealing much more damage.

Some Scrappers can hold aggro decently, namely those with strong taunt auras (Invuln, Shield), but they don't quite compare to Tankers/Brutes. They have a lower threat mod (3.0), their attacks don't taunt, and their Confront is a shorter duration/single target version of Brute/Tanker Taunt.


Other sets/ATs can generate a lot of threat, but they can't hold/control it like the above can. (Taunt effects are pretty much strong enough to override anything but other taunt effects.)

They don't herd, but Regen Stalkers are sometimes used to tank Hami during villain raids. This is normally much faster than setting up a stream of suicidal MM henchmen.

It all depends on the skill of the player and the powersets he's playing. I can quite easily main tank the ITF with my BS/Shield scrapper. Admittedly I can do a better job with a true tanker but a shield scrapper built to the soft cap can do a pretty good job of tauntless tanking thanks to a very good aggro aura in AAO and some pretty phenomenal damage output. The only thing that scrapper's lacking is a ranged attention getter... that's occasionally problematic if you get loose aggro.

I suppose I can be probably 90% as effective as a tank with that scrapper as opposed to my tankers.

Another AT that can tank are Kelds... both Peacebringers & Warshades can do a decent job with their Dwarf form. They lack an aura, but they do get an adequate taunt... it does need to hit however. Both of them also have a decent AOE attack to assist in aggro. I can tank probably 70% as well with a Keld as with a tank.

Several controller builds can, well, not tank exactly but serve the same purpose in preventing the team from being attacked. A few well-built 'trollers can easily take the place of a tanker.

For that matter there's a number of defenders who can "tank" via debuffing mobs into the dirt; Dark is a classic example of this. Fearsome Stare can neutralize an entire room by cowering them in terror and hitting them with a huge -tohit debuff.

GOOD tankers are always an asset to a team, but there's many alternatives. In most cases a tank is useful, but not essential. If you lack a tank then adjust your tactics and keep on.

Every character can eat inspirations and take the Presence Pool.

SoA Crabs can tank well but there not as good on holding aggro.

Just about any well played MM can tank well.

I think with certain powersets other ATs can do a good job of being a crowd control mage.

I tank consistantly with my Energy/Energy/Force Blapper, my FF/Dark/Dark defender, my Fire/FF/Ice controller, my Fire/Storm/Stone controller, and my Ice/Rad/Ice controller.

I'm in he process of leveling a Rad/Fire/Force blapper that will be tanking also.

If the spawn is reasonably tight to begin with, you can just kill 'em in place with [e.g.] a Fire/Mental blaster. No gathering the group up while everyone else knits a sweater...

My experimental tank (a FF Defender) almost fulfilled all your criteria.

I could survive pretty much anything (without PFF, I was softcapped to almost everything), and allow the AoE blasters to shoot with impunity due to the 45% Defence and mez protection they were packing thanks to me.

But I couldn't keep the enemy tightly in one place that easily.

If they were melee types and I took the alpha, I'd be fine, they bunch around me, but I couldnt stop CoT mages or Council running off and attacking from range. Repulsion Bomb was the best I had for that - mass knockdown every 15 seconds or so.

Was I tanking?

Most of the time tanking is just about being the first into the spawn and taking on the alpha. Then everyone unloads and after 10sec only the bosses remain, that pretty much anyone can survive anyway.

Now for AVs it's different and requires a bit more work as well as well played characters. That happens rarely enough that a tank if more often than not *needed*.

If you want a tightly packed herd, my Dark Defender can do that better than any Tanker with an AoE debuff anchor and Tar Patch and then either hiding or backing out far enough. Even the ranged-shooting foes will run into the patch. Nothing aggravates me more than watching a Tanker standing in one spot Taunting a range-using foe over and over again with that range-using foe continuing to stand far away because...

IT'S A RANGE-USING FOE -- IT'S NEVER GOING TO COME RUNNING TO YOU NO MATTER HOW MANY TIMES YOU TAUNT IT SO STOP TAUNTING IT AND DO SOMETHING USEFUL LIKE GOING OVER TO IT AND HITTING IT!!

Now, while herding a spawn into a tightly pack group on a Tar Patch won't satisfy the usual whine of "That's not Tanking because you're not locking down aggro and I might actually take some damage so therefore, you're useless to me!", I can also throw about 100% -ToHit on that tightly packed group and Immobilize them so that it's unlikely they'll ever hit you or run up to you, and if they do, I got that covered with -Damage and a powerful AoE Heal.