Tanker Discussion

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Dark/Fire here. I play the same way regardless of the skill level of the team I am on: lead the fray (first one to engage a spawn). In tightly grouped spawns I will aggro a second, or even 3rd spawn. Until we start dying . Essentially I just look for what amount of aggro the team can handle. On strong teams, where people are more likely/capable of soloing spawns, I keep an eye on the squishies - so I know who to expect to be near me, or off by themselves. I push the pace (often beating superspeeders), even at the risk of running out of endurance . When there is a teammate with some kind of taunt as well (aura or power), I will try to "pile on" spawns as well. Enemy types, and levels, matter, but it's pretty rare that we can't handle 2 spawns at a time.

In terms of actual combat tactics, it goes something like: AoE, taunt south, AoE, taunt north, AoE, taunt west, single target attack on strong enemy (boss, etc), taunt east, AoE, single target, etc etc etc. moving around to keep as many enemies in my aura as possible. Nothing "fancy", but pretty effective. Never had any complaints anyway, even when I didn't join as the primary tank . Fire's got a good mix of PBAoE, and ranged AoE (Pyre epic pool too), so it's not uncommon for me to pull aggro off of other tankers/brutes. Psi damage proc in taunt helps too.

Im glad so many people post here. Well I have never been a Dark Armor type of person but it is a fantastic set with great stats so I may give it another shot. I want a tanker with a little more single target abilities so I will probably make a DA/Energy tanker. Anyways, what impact do you guys think i19 will have on Tankers? Will the new systems and changes boost tankers up, keep them the same, or make them less required on average teams? Share your opinions. Auto fitness will give us the ability to boost our defense with more defense based powers or allow us to take on more offensive abilities to have greater damage output. I have read about the Incarnate system but I guess not enough because it is still fuzzy to me, so I don't know exactly how that will change tankers.

I think I19 unsettles the "standards" that have developed over the years of travel power/fitness/fighting/ 2nd travel power or whatever and makes things that much more interesting. Maybe more tankers end up taking taunt? Maybe the new standard tanker builds take a more offensive stance at earlier levels than they do right now as the need to grab stamina by 20 goes away. It will make the next year or so fun to be a part of anyway.

My mains are blasters but I'm becoming more attached to tankers as I play them more. I've mostly played Fire and Invuln tanks up into the mid levels and Fire just fits how I like to play - lots of offense, decent defense, a heal, and End recover - maybe it's easier to grasp than some but it's a lot of fun to play, especially with Burn turned back into a nice power from the fear patch that it was before. I'm slowly working some stone, shield, and electric tanks up with the kids but I already know Fire clicks with me.

I don't think any AT is useless on any team. Sure, at 50 a maxed out scrapper may be almost as tough as some tankers but on the way up there's not much comparison. It may be time to learn some new strategies if you're on a really sharp higher-up team as the traditional "gather aggro and take a beating" approach may not be needed but that doesn't mean there's not a job for you to do. At that point maybe you become "melee character built for defense" so get out front and go beat on something.

With the Incarnate system kicking off in a week or so I suspect the standards for high-level play are going to be in a state of flux comparable to that of low level play as inherent fitness becomes a factor. Time to unlearn some of what we have learned.

In my opinion the Devs really screwed up when they made the tank AT. Or, more properly, they have modified the game so much from the beginning that now it just looks stupid, like a guy in tights and poofy pants from the French 17th century court in downtown NY today.

When a tank could taunt an entire map, and pull a parade through Perez Park, that was when not doing much damage was a reasonable trade off. With every change they have made in the game, from taunt caps, to ED, to you name it, they have consistently bent Tanks over the Dev fun time table.

In every other video game, seriously, every other game. The biggest guy does the most damage. Period. He may have an attack rate that would make a turtle yawn. He may miss more than most. He may lack cool stuff that other characters get. But, big guy = big damage in the videogame world. Heck, in one particular X-man game you cannot unlock Colossus until halfway through the game because he is so awesome compared to the rest. Tanks always do the most damage. Think of the freaking name even. Armored, slow, big punch. They should have named these guys Armored Police deterrent wagons with no guns. Guess that would be too long though.

Seriously, the only hope for the Devs with this AT is to bring the damage to the exact same level as Brutes, no Fury though. Otherwise, the class is only rolled by newbs. Take a Brute blueside, and you got a Tank that does damage. Or just take the Scrapper, as has been posted above, and really kill stuff (and still survive)

the only thing Tanks are good for IMO is for tourists to the city who want a toon that they can walk around the most dangerous places to check out whats going on without fighting/dieing. Its a tourist bot. The way it is written it cannot compete with any other AT at any level (except perhaps level 1, and even then, probably not) Take equal cash, equal level, on any other AT, and given equal level of play, any other AT is a better teammate/soloer/PvPer/you name it-er.

Hmm, interesting. It does seem like most tanks accept what they can do and settle for that. I have always been more of a survive now, kill later kind of person. Two blasters will have more risk in a team than two tankers. I have seen it happen in many video games where the 'tank' role is generally underpowered with the exception that they have a sliver more defense and health then the big guy who does the real damage. I have not played blasters, scrappers, and brutes enough to state fact about this but based on what I hear, a brute or scrapper can, in many cases, drop a blaster very quickly. It is usually like this in other games as well which should not be the case, the guy with the most melee damage output generally has better defense/resistance or better armor capabilities making them not only lethal in combat but incredibly tough. I also notice how many tanker abilities are usually self-affecting, has no effect on team behavior. Shield Defense brought some team-oriented abilities into play but I think tankers need more abilities that help his/her team. Widows/Soldiers get leadership abilities even though they appear more as assassins than team players.

Your point about the blasters is good, but if the two blasters are smart and hae the right sets, they would do better (and much faster0 as well. devices and ice would both have enough mitigation to have 2 blasters going nuts on spawns.

If you're talking about comics and movies, to some degree you're right - the big guy usually hits hard too, he doesn't just suck it up. To go further, this type (Colossus, Thing, Hulk for example) is usually resistance based in COH terms - you can hit them fairly easily it just doesn't do anything.

The scrapper type (Nightcrawler, Captain America, various Kung-Fu types) tends to be damaging plus hard-to-hit, or defense based in COH terms.

Maybe the designers for COH2 can use those guidelines rather than reducing the offensive power of the "tank" versus other melee types. I think it would be an interesting way to go about it. Then you could throw a regen option in there as a 3rd path to survival and keep it interesting.

hmm, interesting opinions. I have been on and off with CoH for many years, haven't been around since i2 like many people but I been around for awhile. Always missing some gap though when I return.

I love my WP/Fire tanker but (maybe its just me) I feel he isn't doing what I want him to do in ST situations like against AVs. I am tweaking with my char's build but Im thinking of making an alt to change the pace since i19 is when I can make the major difference. I am thinking SD/Energy or or maybe Ice/Energy for a strong ST yet have a few AoE powers to balance out. Paired with a solid defensive.

/Fire's strengths are AoE and DoT. When it comes to AVs, focus more on your DoT (damage over time) attacks. You won't see any BIG numbers, but your actual total damage will be fairly significant. DoTs have the added benefit of "sticking" on phased targets (provided they're applied before the target phases).

I will have to agree with Obitus. After having leveled almost every tanker powerset to 50 the hard way (KM is currently 22 all other sets finished) I have found complaints regarding tanker damage exaggerated.
As with every other archetype there is a range of performance. At on end there is extreme survivability at the other extreme damage output. Adding IOs and player skill allows us to push the build further...in either direction.
There are a few perks for tankers that we cannot build into the other melee ATs.
We cannot grant to the brute, scrapper, stalker, a tanks hp caps.
We cannot give the average meleer a tank's aggro control capacities.

When this question comes up I frequently see folks say "I can IO my scrapper/brute to be plenty tough enough for *insert supposedly difficult content here* why would I roll a tank?" My response is "I can IO my tank to do more than enough damage for any content I want to play, why would I settle for any other AT?"

By the way Severe, you have a Fire/Fire tanker correct? I just made one and speeded through sewers and the hollows and am close to getting Burn which will only make leveling quicker. If you do have a Fire/Fire I was hoping you could post your build to see what you went for (S/L defense, all around, global recharge, a mix, etc) so I have a sort of guide to help me (I'm no pro at builds).