An in-game conversation about tauntless Tankers

Just to throw in my two cents. I've had tanks with taunt and tanks without it. No one has ever commented one way or another. I can honeslty say it hasn't made one bit of difference. My playstyle and technique adjusts to whichever situation I tank in. And that's what the game is about... diversity, options, unique playstyles. No one has the right to tell anyone how to build their toons. No one has the right to tell them what powers they have to have. (feel free to insert snarky comment about empaths without heals) If someone were to tell me that I'd have to be a tank with taunt to be on their team, well then that would be their loss. And for the nay sayers who have a problem with tauntless tanks, one could always use the counter argument, if you built your toons with better survivability, then you wouldn't have to rely on the tank so much.

When the forums were split, US and Euro. I was on Euro, you could guarantee that the person who professed to have it all being tauntless would be on one of two servers. Then you could guarantee that you will run into them sometime and see how they did things. Then you could pretty much guarantee that you could change their minds. Rather than have 49 page long debate over it, things were simple. You could even offer to meet ingame for a tank off only to end up in an argument on what Tanking should look like. They might have ideas from other games when other games don't belong here.

This thread isn't about people saying to people they should get taunt or even that they would definitely be better off with it. I keep repeating that just because you have it doesn't mean that you will excel with it. What I believe is simple : the most competent Tanker will have it.

If people have an idea of what Tanking should look like in anygame and wish to stick to it then by all means do because Taunt isn't needed.

Conceptually I have no idea why the power Taunt is so powerful in terms of turning an improbable endeavour or a trainwreck of an effort around.

First to be fair its fairly obvious said tanker was a new player anyways. And likely a solo player. Solo tanks dont need taunt hate to tell you OP. With 3 builds per character now, nothing says a new player has to have his first build be other thena fun to play solo build. You should keep those aspects in mind when speaking with new comers and not attack them for not choosing a power YOU want all tanks to have.

As others have mentioned in the thread, some tank sets also give solid alternatives like aura effects or constant pbaoe dmg to really take advantage of thier gauntlet effect.

Nor can you discount the superior aggro holding power of a serious DPS tank. Alot of people forget that one of the reasons DPS tanks are legendary when done well is that when your dishing out dmg equal to the best scrappers and even blasters, then they cant ever pull aggro off you. Unlike tanks who rely to much on taunt, which actually has a habit of not keeping aggro off of top dealing dmg builds.

I run with alot of tanks on my blaster. most ask me how I out tank them I infact only know a handful that do the actual role of tank when i am blasting, most of them are super strength builds capable of multi stacking rage, using abilities like vet shadow maul during thier crashes, and never waste a power slot on taunt.

The fact is I dont even see tanks as essential in protecting teams on the vast majority of regularly played content. I run TFs frequently and rarely if ever say hm we need a tank for this guys. In fact the last time I had a fellow blaster say that, and then witness me doing that, they quit the tf feeling utterly impotent next to a blaster who doesnt need a tank. Ofcourse Ive done the same to scrappers while playing supposedly less optimal scrapper set comboes. Ah the tears of the kat/regen are eternally sweet I do tell you.

Anyways its late and I am ranting now so night

I don't know why these types of threads don't end at this:

Taunt is a good tool for gathering aggro. If you find that you want/need to gather more aggro on to you, it is one of the best tools around for doing that. If you don't want/need to gather more aggro (i.e., you do a good enough job at it without Taunt), then it isn't necessary. It is a great tool for holding aggro, but not the only tool you will likely need. A Tanker with Taunt is not gauranteed to be a better Tanker than a Tanker without it, but it might make things easier.

I took Power Surge on WEI DIAN QI and I hate it and will respec it out one day when I have 3 hours to spend respecing him LOL - the crash is ridiculous and leaves you empty of end and health with all your toggles shut off. I used it maybe twice that I can remember. With WEI TAI TAN I skipped it completely as it's a waste of a power choice and unnecessary imo.