Help making the best defensive tanker :)

Ok, I use to play this game all the time when it came out, then took about a 5 year break from the game. I come back to alot of new stuff, when i played invul. tank was the strongest defensively. My question to everyone is that I want to make a tank that is mainly on extreme on defense and extreme on hitpoints and little offense. I want to be the tank on the team that can walk into any group of baddies and keep their aggro and never die. Basically the strongest defense in the game, what would that be, is it still invul, cause i heard Will power now is?

Please also fill me in on what softcap means, and is 6 slotting all defense on Single orgin enhanments stronger or weaker than 6 slotting on invention enhancements?

Any help or thoughts would be appreciated.

That's a complicated question . I don't use defense much but I have dabbled in io's and sets and this wiki page will tell you what sets can give you. Right now you need to carefully look at the different power sets and their info to make sure you will have what you want once you reach 50.

edit:Actually this is the intro page probably better to look at this first .

If survivability at the cost of damage is your goal, you really want to play a Stone Tank and sit in Granite forever.

Yeah, survivability is really what im looking for i guess, something to keep all aggro and take all aggro the best, better than any other defense. So is granite armor the best for survivability compared to invul. or will power or any other? Now what about getting extreme high amounts of hit points. Also I do plan on getting to pool powers like tough, weave, and combat jumping and other powers for defense.

Also the question about the enhancements from first post anyone and what does softcap mean? is there a hard cap?

What is the maximum defense cap then, cause thats what im shooting for i guess, is the maxiumum on defense cap for a tanker, i dont want offense that much, all defense. thanks again guys for your help

There was already a pretty big thread about Ice tanks recently. I've never been able to get into stone, but haven't taken one into the 30s, so what do I know? I levelled up an ice/dark fast and can proudly say he has never gotten one AE ticket or PL in any way.

[In fact, most of his TFs were done as Ouro flashbacks in the 20s, so he has an exemp friendly build.]

Ice/Dark has three end recovery and three self heals. [Hibernation counts as both.] And it's super easy to cap it to S/L and hit the 40s with E/N. I do so with only my main toggles, set bonuses, and CJ. I keep Maneuvers around for the team, but rarely turn it on.

Ice/ has two auras. One damage and the other slows. It has a fear melee [which I don't take] and can pull aggro also with it's build-up power and it's two endurance recovery powers. Ice can hold aggro like a bucket.

[Edit: I also have a toolbar of macros to make inspirations for resistance and damage. I really don't think it makes much difference, but I get paranoid around fire.]

Once you settle on an powerset combo, there is really good advice here, but when we talk theory, we tend to be a little too much of min-maxers.

Edit again: The Softcap is linked to Enhancement Diversification, but as far as defense goes, anything over 45% doesn't count. Check out the player guide section of the player help section here for some well written explanations.

The tankiest you will ever be is a Stone/Kinetic Tank with Darkest Night and Aid Self.
You have a massive Psi hole but other than that, you have capped defense to everything, your lowest resists is in the high 70s (high 80s if you take Cardiac) and a nice regen of around 60HP/Sec.
Between Darkest Night and the KM -dam debuffs, your opponents will be inflicting around -50-60% damage easily.
A mob that inflicts an average of 1000 damage per attack to the defenseless will inflict an average of 36 damage per strike to this Tank. That is some serious mitigation - he probably won't need Aid Self but if you want to be as Tanky as can be, you are probably going to want it.
Another option is ignoring Aid Self and taking Dark Melee over Kinetic Melee for Siphon Life but the KM debuffs are pretty nasty and I think more suited to your needs. Plus KM has better AOE than DM, not by much but it exists...

Also worth mentioning is the fact that a Granite Tank has the best Mez protection in the game.

Most of what I said was with reference to Kinetic Melee and their -Damage secondary. Not Dark Melee and their -ToHit.
Dark Melee was just mentioned as a side note because of the positives of Siphon Life.

You might be right about my math - there could be something I am missing.
The way I figured it was: 1000 damage -60% due to -Dam effects = 400 damage
400 Damage /10 due to a 5% hit chance Vs the 50% hit chance against someone with no defense = 40 damage.
40 x 10% due to 90% resists = a total incoming damage of 4 out of the 1000.

So good catch I was wrong lol, I accidently reduced the damage by 10% instead of 90% in my previous attempt at the math.

Interestingly enough, just with the regen of 60 HP/Sec a Granite Tank can easily achieve with Rooted, he would be able to stand there being wailed on by 15 mobs who all average 1000 damage per attack and have no net loss of health.

Considering the aggro cap and the fact nothing (afaik) inflicts that kind of damage, a Granite Tank who is actively attacking and keeping their enemy's damage floored with kinetic melee and Darkest Night is completely immortal unless fighting enemies who ignore defense, resistance or have Psi damage.

So we all agree that stone tank's granite armor is the strongest armor in the game? also please dont do acronyms, or abbreviate cause i dont understand some of the lingo sorry, been a long time for me.

It is the most resilient but not the strongest.
The -recharge and -damage penalties of Granite are very severe but from your posts, not something you are overly concerned about.
Also they have a significant movement penalty. Even with heavy slotting for runspeed, I can only get a Granite Tank to about 2/3rds the speed of a regular Tank when both Granite and Rooted are toggled on. Also the inability to move over even the smallest terrain without Teleport is a pretty significant drawback.
Granite Tanks are rocks. When coupled with a good mitigating secondary like Kinetic Melee they are immune to death but playing one and trying to compensate for all their penalties isn't fun.

Shameless plug: There's a lot more to tanking than just surviving.

I ought to mention that a lot of this discussion is theoretical. ALL Tankers can get the job done, and there are some sets that are absolute monsters with the right build, without suffering any of the penalties for Granite or Rooted. For most circumstances, sets like Invulnerability, Willpower, Shield, Electric, and Dark are more than enough tank.

Stone is sturdier, but for most content that sturdiness will not make much difference -- a live Stone Tanker is not defensively better off than any other live Tanker -- but a Granite Tanker will always be enduring Granite's penalties.

It's only for theory, edge cases, and deliberately seeking out hard challenges that Stone's extreme durability really comes into play.

It has been mentioned above, but don't underestimate the importance of mobility when tanking. Patrols and adds will come out of nowhere, and even the best groups get split up.

While it feels cool to go up against a dozen or more mobs at a time, I find nothing as satisfying as swooping in and saving a blaster's neck from the group of enemies chewing his face.

So, Stone is not for me, as it doesn't fit how I like to play. That doesn't mean that it won't fit your playstyle and be what you want. From what I have seen, there are no terribly gimped or totally overpowered sets. You just need to read up and figure out what works best for what you want.

When you say something like defense. Only 1 tanker comes to mind. Ice Armor. Gives you great defense to Smash/Leth/Eng/NegEng/fire/cold. The def to fire and cold are less but the resistance makes up for that. It also has a good self heal that just so happens to be a hit point booster. My hit points cap every time I hit that power. The only real problem it has is psionic damage, but your hit points and "Oh cap" button "Hibernate" easily counter this disadvantage. MoStatesman before incarnates on mine. Ice Armor is underrated and overpowering.

And 100% Recharge time resistance!!!!

I see what you guys are saying about granite, well since we got that out of the way, what about will power, vs shield, vs the soon super reflexes. What are the pro's and con's as a tank when selecting those primaries? Those are the 3 im thinking about right now.
yeah, i'll admit i dont want to be immobile but i want a tank that can just take an insane beating and keep going and tank that a team can hide behind.

Will Super Reflexes, be that good for tankers? When I think of super reflexes, i think scrappers. Correct me if im wrong but isn't super reflexes for a tanker kinda squishy, i understand they will have a tough time hitting you, but if they do land a punch, can you take it?

Also is willpower better than invul.?

By the way heavenly, i love that piegon avatar everyone scroll up one and look at it.

yes to everything but psychic attacks a granite tanker will survive the best. however you heard the penalties. with proper slotting other sets can get close and not have as much psychic weakness or the penalties of granite. I have an elec/km tanker that will be pretty amazing. very high resistance perma energize or a few seconds from it (still think they need to reduce its recharge to 90 seconds or increase the regenerate portion to 60) and has resistance to slow end drain etc. bed the damage reduction from km and its a beast that never runs out of end.

I also like SR and can imagine it for tanks but it can have its holes especially le the enemy has to hit buffs

Well, this is a discussion we've had before, and there's a LOT of strong opinion on the subject. For your reading pleasure:

In you personal opinion (Toughest w/o Tier 9)

How Good is Willpower?

Toughest possible combination for hardcore play?

Selecting a primary

Willpower vs Invulnerability

My general sense of the consensus, such as it is, about the primary sets has traditionally been:

1. Stone
2. Invulnerability
3. Willpower

With the proper IOing, any tank in the game can be viable for any of the content...

In other threads I have seen magical slotting done to make stone tankers in Granite run around about 20mph and have a little recharge and base damage besides...

In other threads I have seen (and made) elec/ tanks that can and do waltz through Incarnate Trials/Apex/Tin Mage/Lady Grey/Statesman/Lord Recluse end game content and be amazingly fast and mostly impregnable to everything but Toxic Damage.

My main toon, my first 50, Invul/Energy tank Beorn (Virtue) has tanked everything in the game save the Shadow Shard task forces and villain content (being resolutely a hero) and has done so (relatively) cheaply.

My fire tank, Electric Briquette, obscenely slotted and IOed, can tank 2-3 Lts. on the Statesman Task Force, but the amount of inf I've had to spend to get him there would build 3 willpower tanks fully decked and better in spite of it. So, your mileage may vary.

When Super Reflexes gets to tankers, I think you could give that a whirl. I have a SS/SR brute that, when he had only SOs, was capped to melee, 1% from capped ranged and 3% from AoE defense. Now, he is over 48% on AoEs and in the low 50s for melee (never know with Incarnate trials). However, IF he gets hit, he really feels it.

Good luck!

Well, the tank im wanting to make is a tank that has the ability to jump in a massive group of baddies lvl's higher than me. Protect the team by crowd control. I want to be the tank that protects the team. I feel that ice armor might be the best for that, cause ice can survive and crowd control by armor that slow's the enemies recharge rate down and slows their movement speed from be able to reach your teammates and keeps them by you, where you want them. Ice patch will work for crowd control, cause you can't fight if you can't stand, and icesicles keeps hitting them keeping aggro on you. Is this logic wrong?

Looking for that tank that survives and crowd control that keeps his team alive. other armor's keep YOU alive maybe not the team. Ice seems to have powers that do more than keep you alive, they keep the baddies from having the ability to reach your teammates, and attack at a normal rate.

Is this the best armor you think for survivability and protecting your team? anyone please comment and yes ice patch is sec. i know that with that being said you think ice/ice is the best for those reasons above listed?

For pure survivability nothing else in the game (except Phantom Army) equals a Stone tanker in Granite+Rooted. Even on SO enhancements with a decent build that's an unkillable brick wall. On the other hand you pay for that durability with penalties to recharge, damage output and especially mobility. I've taken Stone to 50 twice, once as Stone/Energy (do yourself a favor and avoid this combo) and once as Stone/Fire, a MUCH better choice. I enjoyed the set but I admit the drawbacks get frustrating at times.

Second to Stone with none of the drawbacks is a well built soft capped Invuln tanker; in my opinion the best all around tanking set. It combines 90% Smash/Lethal resistance with decent defense to all damage types but Psi (which is rare enough to be a non-issue 99% of the time). Adding a moderate amount of IO sets raises your defenses to the 45% soft cap creating something almost as tough as Stone with full mobility, recharge and damage output. Invuln is my favorite tanker set and my namesake was my first 50 and is my go-to character for a tough tanking job.

Willpower can be quite durable but it suffers from by far the worst aggro abilities of any of the tanker sets... it's aura is 10% as effective as any other set. I wouldn't suggest WP if you intend to be a team meatshield tanker; it's much less suited to the task. I've not played one myself to any significant level but I've never teamed with one who could do more than a mediocre job at aggro control. Unfortunately Willpower offers great durability yet lacks the tools to make use of that durability in protecting the team.

Shield with very minor IO sets can soft cap it's defenses and it does have moderate resistances to back them up. It's one of the most offensive builds with a damage boosting aura and a massive AOE attack. Durability wise it falls in somewhat below Invuln but it's quite capable of handling most anything you'd throw at it. I've taken a Shield/Fire to 50 and while it isn't as tough as Invuln I've managed to tank most everything in the game with it.

Ice is your aggro king; you get the fastest cycling taunt aura in the game to instantly grab attention and another damaging aura to lock it down hard. Once an Ice tanker gets aggro nothing is going to get it away. On the other hand Ice comes with a bit less durability than Shield so you can occasionally get in over your head. Still, while my Ice/Electric tank is only 39 right now I'm not having any real issues with him. I see no reason why a well built Ice shouldn't be up for nearly any challenge... it'll just need a bit more care than a Stone or Invuln.

That's the sets I have much experience with; I know of a couple of Fire tankers who are incredibly durable but they've dumped many billions of inf into their builds. With a more realistic build Fire's going to be a good bit squishier than the leading sets. I hear good things about Dark but it's one of the rarer sets so I haven't seen it in action much at high levels. Electric has good resistances and with a high end build adding considerable amounts of defense it's another beast... at it's base levels of performance it's a middle of the pack set.