Sovera

Sanguinesun is spot on. Personally I never bother with Fault but your mileage may vary. I find it costs too much, recharges too slowly, and hits like a noddle. I don't need the CC (again, mileage, variance, etc). Because it does all of this Fault needs actual slotting instead of proc bombage. I notice you don't have Stone Fists. Annoying as it is to fit another attack and actually use a T1 the rotation has gaps without it. In my experience with Stone Melee the ST rotation goes something like Seismic Smash, Stone Fists, Heavy Stone Mallet, Stone Fists, Heavy Mallet, Stone Fists. Depending on recharge you can remove one of those Stone Fists. Six slotting the purple in Seismic Smash gives you no dividends. 5% defense to psi? You have no defense to psi so what's 5% more going to do? That's actually 6% to T/P, maybe worth it. But I'd still put in the purple damage proc since it adds to the ST damage that Tankers are lacking. Replace the Damage one for a purple damage proc from the Hold sets. I would also five slot Armageddon in Tremor and the 6th slot a FF. You have WAY too much S/L res so you don't need both 6th slots in Stone Mallet and Heavy Stone Mallet. Replace one for a FF proc. I'd six slot Bombardment into Fault tbh. And of course you're well aware by now that the Tanker ATO adds 13% so no need to aim for 90%. You want 77%. If you want to account for Barrier it's around 73%. You can shave a lot of your slotting away and put those in more useful places.

Recharge and straight up damage from Brimstone. Granite isn't used. Personally I either pick the lava skins or the crystal to colour it to look like ice.

The damage of StJ is mainly funneled to the T9 where with MA it's more spread around. The AoE of MA is just sad though though it plays well with supporting another AoE once you reach the epic pool (not that I really see anything there fitting your concept except perhaps the cone in Energy Mastery as being a wing buffet gust thing). But it does have a capable ST rotation with Storm Kick, Cobra Strike, and Crane Kick.and the AoE by level 20. Crippling Axe Kick is barely more damage than Cobra Strike and not worth the wait of leveling/exemplaring with just two attacks IMO. The extra 10% from Storm Kick is not really adding much to Super Reflexes since that set oozes defences. You could consider making it a Brute since their lower defences would make the combo actually pay off, but on a Tanker it's just overkill in defences. The differences in toughness between both shouldn't be huge considering how early the Brute would come online from the pairing of SR and Storm Kick. On the other hand since StJ funnels the damage to Crushing Uppercut AND has a combo system you want to spend those combo points there, but CU has bad recharge making it super awkward to make a ST rotation going. You'll need something like four ST attacks so that three of them can be juggled until CU is back up. At best CU will be up every 7 seconds which is a really long time to wait. Sweeping Cross is a finisher and will eat your combo points, so that leaves either leveling to to 20 without a second attack in order to take Shin Breaker and combo it with Rib Cracker and Heavy Blow, or you play it safe and take Initial Strike, Heavy Blow, and Rib Cracker Sweeping Cross remains a possibility since you can do Initial Strike, Heavy Blow, Initial Strike, Sweeping Cross, then Initial Strike, Heavy Blow, Initial Strike, Crushing Uppercut. It's not a damage heavy combo because using T1 and T2 in the attack rotation, but it's safe and simple and should not require tons of recharge. Initial Strike is not an interesting attack though. With (a lot) more recharge Initial Strike could be swapped for Rib Cracker and become Heavy Blow (does KD so can fit a FF proc), Rib Cracker (does -res), Heavy Blow, Sweeping, repeat but finish with CU. If you REALLY don't think you will ever exemplar you can add Shin Breaker since Shin Breaker takes a -res proc that helps, but that means one attack at level 1, one at 20, and the third at 28, but Sweeping is another AoE and that does help. Overall MA is much simpler to set up and play but it depends on what you'd like to go for.

Hasten, the IO bonuses, the LotG, are global. Spiritual, Musculature, etc from the alpha are local and hit the ED. The more a recharge has slotted the less chance for procs to go off. For powers with extreme cooldowns like Ground Zero the extra recharge won't matter, but if you check the damage of Gloom or Tremor or Stone Mallet or anything else really other than GZ they take a hit. If that hit matters or not considering the power will be up to be used more often is up to the player to decide.

I mean, not really. All my Fire Tankers even have Tough toggled off and I don't even split Gauntled Fist for more E/N like I do for Stone Armor. I do play on the idea of having two stacks of ATO and Barrier because those are normal things to have for a max level character but that already accounts for 18%, and one -KB IO has also served me well and now there is even a little bit more. Fire breath is one of those things that looks nice on a spreadsheet but has no value in actual gameplay. There's a reason it is so reviled. But yeah, immobilize and fear CAN be a problem though. Best way I found to use Burn was actually at the end of the AoE cycle. Fire Sword Circle, Combustion, then when minions are dead from those since they were empowered by BU + Gaussian and there are only ailing lieutenants and a boss, is when Burn is dropped. Using Burn first just has a good chance to hit the minions who were going to died from the other two AoEs anyway. But of course if they wanted a defence/resistance layered build it's not Fire Armor 😄 Pairing EM and FA does prop their shortcomings, a bit like my favorite FA/MA where MA's weak AoE was propped by Burn and Burn got to be spat out more often by Dragon Tail's FF proccage.

A Tanker/Brute's agro aura keeps mobs in Burn 100% of the time. Personally I think Fire/Fire is better than EM because it is gorgeous to be in the middle of enemies and throwing three PbAoEs, but even Stone/Fire remains my balanced pick as per the link in the signature since it is substantially more survivable than Fire Armor and only slightly slower in clearing a mission because, as Sanguinesun pointed out, while Burn is great it is still only hitting 5 mobs. The changes to Fire Armor watered Burn enough that it lost the bursty aspect it used to have. I've clocked around 10% faster clearing times with FA, but is it worth the loss of a good 50% survival? Plus all the good side-effects from dodging all the debuff charged attacks coming our way.

I suggest Fire/EM since Burn will fill the weak AoE of EM while EM brute forces through the Tanker's lower ST damage. Otherwise you can't go wrong with Stone Armor

I have pictures of their location but good catch.

Glad you got it back, Snarkums. I remember once mailing to the wrong person by typoing. Fortunately they were online and nice and when I asked they sent it back. Very nice of them. Then there was this time I was in front of the AE and someone tries to trade me. I usually cancel these but on a whim accepted. They start transfering chunks of of something... Not sure if merits or catalysts, but we're talking chunks. I cancel, they try to trade again, I cancel, they do it again. Aghast I accept the trade and that obscene sum of wealth. ....a minute later someone sheepishly whispers me saying they through they were transfering to their alt account and if they could have it back 😄

Not to pull shade on Tidge because A) they mean well, and B) they are correct. But in actual practice, especially for things of such dubious difficulty as Yin and Posi as the examples cited, can and are done without a Tanker or Brute in the team. It's a case of spreadsheet theory VS actual in-game practice where a taunt can help but is not necessary. The game is not difficult and we are fightning +0 or +1 normal mobs that are not difficult either. But, this is my opinion which has as much weight as Tidge's in that we all play as it fits our playstyle. I'm never going to say my playstyle is the correct one and everyone should do as I do. More than a specific power what makes a Tanker a Tanker (no matter the AT) is how they play. I treat my team mates as my chicks and me the momma chicken. Unrelated this thread made me want to level the Stone/MA I posted a few days back. It reaches softcap defenses without uniques or even amplifiers by level 12-13 so its a good test subject for an ironman challenge of not transferring any IOs or inf and not use the AH other than to buy attuned IOs and sell what drops.

Expected. In some narrow cases. Depends of what content you'll do. I got laughed at being on my tanker and joining an Hami and asked to taunt. Other than that one time taunt never came up. Some people will swear by it. I never noticed its lack, or its presence.

Nein. You do need to be on the ground to activate it, but once activated we can Fly and everything and its effects are still on.

There are no movement penalties with Stone Armor. Granite is a thing of the past, almost a filler power. But not liking the aesthetics is understandable, and yes, it's a bit endurance heavy, but it only means starting endurance early like adding two slots to Crystal Armor and Health/Stamina, or relying on Recovery Serums once in a while. It starts by having 40% defence by level 13 and ends with 45% without Weave, 50% with Weave. 55% with Barrier (all of this psi defence too which is rare for armors to have) , and 76% to all resistances with two ATO stacks, 81% with Barrier. Then Crystal Armor does endurance recovery, Mineral Armor gives recharge, and Brimstone gives a damage boost with a fire proc to all attacks. Not trying to change your mind though, just a bit of 'splainin'.

Pity you don't like Stone Armor since Stone/Fire is still what I consider the most balanced in terms of offence and defence. But I am re-leveling a Fire/Fire Tanker and let me tell you few things beat the dopamine of putting the difficulty at 0x8 at level 10 and then go to town on Posi 1 and forward. Most tough? Heck no, died a few times both on Posi 1 and 2 where the Stone Armor would just cruise. But by Synapse I was dumping three PbAoEs and it is glorious to be surrounded by mobs covered in napalm. A perfect palate rinse after my previous Scrapper who neither was damagey nor could increase the difficulty so much so early.

Hello again, Dian. Up to level 25-30 SOs are much better, the lower level the better. By level 7-10, which is when we can start wearing IOs, the numbers are crushingly in favor of SOs. But by level 25-30 they catch up and surpass IOs just on raw stats without even talking about the bonuses. You can respect and save the IOs for your next alt instead of buying them. Or don't and stick with IOs, it'll work out too.

A Fire/Fire Tanker.

That Seismic Smash slotting hurts my soul. It's the strongest attack and can take two purple damage procs, and four slotting the purples in Gloom to squeeze another toxic proc is a bit oof too. Either go full in with the procs or finish slotting a fifth purple for the 10% recharge. Without touching too much on your power picks I would at least aim towards 77% resistances since the ATO in Heavy Mallet will give 6.7% and it stacks reliably two stacks. This could be lowered to 72% if considering Barrier adding another 5%. I removed several of the slotting aiming for defence since it was not nearly close to reach the softcaps anyway. Ground Zero takes a hit in damage but is up every 25 seconds allowing it to be synced with Build-up and trying to be up for every spawn instead of every two spawns, Seismic Smash got a nice bump up, Tremor takes a small hit but will be up faster and better slotted. Everything but cold should be hardcapped when Heavy Mallet has hit twice-ish. Rad Hammer X - Tanker (Rad - Stone).mbd

The early solo was terrible due to no AoE. I took Fault and the START grenades to make up for it but the grenades were downright better than Fault and they themselves were crappy. Then I barely squeaked a win against Vhaz despite having to go and refuel my insps mid-fight, and even so it came down to having no endurance, toggles not up, Vhaz on the red, me on the red, no endurance to attack, but managed to squeak it. Synapse I teamed for and then at Yin the damage just wasn't there. A single AoE with mediocre damage even six slotted was not putting the enemies down. By level 30 the build was solid though. All endurance problems were solved with Energy Drain with a use as the fight started to boost defence and another to recoup endurance around mid way. But that really shows the slowness as EA was recharged in 40 seconds at the time and I had time to use it twice per +1x8 fight. Despite the lack of slotting the build was coming together at 30 with the AoE only having a small gap where I'd go Heavy Mallet (fish for proc), Tremor, Seismic Smash with small gaps. Bit more slotting and it would seamless. ST was still weak since I took slots from Stone Fist and Stone Mallet but was putting slots in there so it was getting close. But the lack of enjoying is always from crits. When they happen it's great, when they don't happen it always feels like I 'missed'. Brutes with their always on damage just feel better and even when the early leveling is past it's just always on. I'm going to make a Fire/Fire Tanker today to rinse my mouth 😄 AoE at 6, 18, and 24 is just what the doctor ordered.

Persevered to level 30 but wasn't enjoying the character so stopped there, but here's the version with the minor edits: Scrapper (Stone Melee - Energy Armor).mbd

No, you're right, it's peanut damage and comes late to boot. I kept pushing mine but it just wasn't fun and parked it at level 30.

Started it today as well, my brethren. Already noticed a mistake in having a 6th LotG slotted in Weave, ugh, also some other minor edits. Will probably dump a leveling build with some insights for those newer to the game.

One thumb down = forum PvP rant. Yeah, not sure who is coming off as a cultist in here.

I think we all do since the boxing gloves fit with Seismic Smash and Tremor. I've been toying with the idea of one but the lack of early AoE (26) is holding me back since I mostly solo and hitting things one by one is drab. And the last time I leveled one it was a Brute and it couldn't get past the big tanker AV at the end of Manticore. Huge S/L resistances, ugh, one of the few times I had to go pick daggers. I suppose a Scrapper would have a better time with the crits.

That's Sovera, not Sovena! But yes. That said while everyone tries to run away from using Granite I can see the appeal of going around as a big bulky golem with a huge ass axe. But, remember that when you toggle Granite on all your other Stone Armor toggles go off so they are just mules. No point in taking them other than for the purpose of muling. Which is a pity when Minerals gives recharge and will cap Psi defence (which Granite does not have), Brimstone gives damage, and Crystal Armor gives endurance recovery. You could tweak a few things to increase your E/N defenses to the softcap, and Granite has a -30% recharge penalty but you skipped Hasten, and Fly without Evasive Maneuvers/Hover is slow so you might as well just super Jump around. Even with Tough toggled off you're still way overcapped so it could be good to find further ways to transform S/L resistances into something more useful. Your attacks are pretty badly slotted but I'm sure you're aware of this. It's a case of thinking if a Brute would not suit this concept better. You don't need to resistances from the Tanker ATO as you're at 90% already anyway, and a Brute's Fury would at least cover the damage aspect. But it's all null and void if you're playing in teams since stuff will be arrested in a seconds anyway. but if solo this will be a slog. I also predict your endurance will greatly suffer as Axe is endurance heavy and the mostly unslotted attacks will do the job of a Sapper by themselves. It's a good proof of concept but you should play it and see how it feels and then try to balance it out a bit more. Or if it's feels fine just ignore us and carry on 😄

And then you take the Stone Mallet(s) option to be Big Rock Boxing Glove instead and all your attacks including Tremor are Big Rock Boxing Glove to the face! Glorious!