Onlyasandwich

After venturing into the lands of Dominatordom for my past few builds, the time has come yet again for another Tanker! I'm going Dark/KM here not because it has any particular synergy, but because I just want to try these two sets generally, and am therefore squishing them together. 🙂 In this pursuit, I'm also wanting to witness first-hand how effective Invoke Panic is in combination with Cloak of Fear. I see others have found it basically adequate. If you have experience and perspective here, I'd love to hear! This is also my first build with the slightly weird KM, so welcome wisdom from that angle as well. My goals: A broad base of defense with enough melee defense to hit softcap with a purple easily when needed. Not trying to softcap. A proccy, efficient attack chain for both ST and aoe. Good slow resist, as my survival does rely on a couple clickies. Strong resists across the board without sacrificing the above priorities. Max hit chance against +4's. Concerns about my current iteration: I'd love to find a way to swap to musculature radial instead, but feel the end hunger is too much otherwise. Cardiac does good work here, and helps with resist as well of course. At least the current iteration leaves some good room to benefit from the kins of the world. Will this be enough end support? Obviously I have foregone a lot of the end uniques, instead choosing to rely on heavy end reduction and ToE proc in Dark Regen. The Rec/Use numbers are not great, but my active powers are very cheap to activate with all the redux, so I'm thinking it may be workable. Can always go Ageless in high level content as well. Accuracy! Holy cow why does Cloak of Fear have such low accuracy? It doesn't seem justified. As it stands, everything is good except Cloak of Fear when Power Siphon is down, but I do rely of Siphon for max chance against +4's for Cloak. Less of an issue once level shifted. For those of you that have used Invoke Panic before, did you find it fun? Are there any little eccentricities you found in practice that weren't obvious at first? Finally, It would be nice to find room for Unrelenting. If only Invoke didn't require 2 power picks. : ) Note that the current version of Mids is wonky with KM for tanks and scrappers. It automatically adds the Power Siphon buffs in some cases, so the damage totals shouldn't include the extra ~80% global. Should be fixed in the next release. Also I have two FFback procs, so toggle those off for more perspective on totals. Build: Totals: Visual of build:

In singy, you need a sudden acceleration instead of overwhelming force, as the overwhelming won't change the repel power to kd. This IO only impacts aspects of the pet that do damage.

This my basic thought on electric armor as well. Basically it is great on both tanks and brutes, but brutes have less wasted potential in over capped resists. The EM side of things could go either way, and falls down to more traditional brute vs tank arguments. Overall I would go Brute for this combo.

Even the minions were scoffing at it. 😃 Fun mission though! My first run through was not bad, as mentioned, but second time around the purples weren't dropping at a good enough pace. The difference is pretty stark. When my purples run out, it feels pretty safe for a while, as the mobs are typically sapped or otherwise controlled. However, all it takes is once errant volley with the wrong timing and away I go. Definitely not an easy mission for someone who has ignored defense entirely. Any situation I can anticipate I can prepare for and make it through, but the ambushes especially present a challenge to this type of character. Oddly enough, my gremlins didn't really die much! Even in overaggro situations, my sleep fields scattered nearby kept them running okay for the most part, and they were welcome on the bosses once numbers were whittled down.

So uh - did you make these guys immune to teleport? Perhaps I am missing some element of the resist mechanic. I ran this mission today on +4X8 and they weren't being fold spaceded at all. I was using my gremlin/psy scream build, and it actually held up well! I had to mess with map geometry to get them to clump though, as Fold Space couldn't do its work. I had a face plant at the opening scene where everything is super wide open, but otherwise cutting corners, dropping sleep patch, and go to town did the trick. I do have to be careful to keep weaving in confusion to mitigate return volleys, as sleep is not 100%.

Here's one vote for Ice Melee, though all of these will be great. Ice has strong aoe between Frost and Frozen Aura. Single target has good burst, but will rely on an epic attack for good sustained ST. Very good extra mitigation in Ice Patch of course. Rad Melee will still do more aoe damage as long as irradated ground is a broken power with procs - it is really strong, though only because of its unusual behavior with regard to the summoned pets and procs. The set otherwise is still good, and adds some healing, though less mitigation from the secondary here. Staff is whirly twirly fun, but from the straight numbers inferior to both of the above. Overall, Rad has the most DPS potential of these with a couple caveats: Irradiated ground is a super weird proc outlier, and likely to be patched to normalcy at some point. Rad's better DPA single target attacks take a long time to animate, which can lead to hitting corpses. Theme rules all here though - just pick the one that sounds the most fun for your concept. : ) I'll copy below my own Stone/Ice for reference. This is a build geared towards shoring up E/N and Psi resist where possible while still devoting a lot of attention to maximizing damage.

I'm still rolling with the original Gremlins build for now, and will fully evaluate once I'm 50 and slotted up after diving into a few different scenarios in depth. Meanwhile, below is what I'm thinking as an alternate "bye bye Psy Scream and Gremlins" version. The more I look at it, the more I like it. I spend enough time cycling my immob, Static Field, Drain Psyche, etc that Psy Scream may not be adding all that much to my typical rotation, especially given its animation time. Having a resist steroid in my back pocket also gives me a good reset button for trouble, or extra tool to get more aggressive if against enemies that don't take well to my normal approach. Layer Power Sink on top and now sapping is not just a passive strategy, but one I can use proactively when needed. Thank you again for the insight, @oedipus_tex! Your thoughts on this combo are making even more sense as I progress.

As many here have mentioned, these sort of rankings are very subjective, and will depend on primary synergies, as well as what you are really measuring against. That being said, here is my very broad feeling on only the secondaries I have actually played on a Tanker: Super great I love it: War Mace - Single Target smashy slam slam, outstanding aoes. Just a great crunchy feel with plenty of mitigation. Martial Arts - Smooth attack chains, super efficient aoe power that is better on a Tanker than other AT's, diversity in style (kicks vs chops!), outstanding defensive buffs. Stone Melee - Smashy smash - then more smash. Similar to WM, I love the crunch. This one is weaker in aoe damage, but makes up for it in superior mitigation through chained knockdowns. Super Strength - A classic, and rage gives you a lot of slotting flexibility due to lower need for acc/tohit. I'm not a double stacker, but who can deny the love of Foot stomp and Haymaker in any situation? Ice Melee - Great damage type, Ice Patch is a real gem if you need mitigation in your secondary, Essentially frozen foot stomp, an amazing melee hold damage power, and Frost is way better than you would expect. Hard to make a really great single target rotation, though good ST burst. Fun and effective: Claws - Claws is good as always. Not perfection as it is on Scrappers, but still a fast and efficient set with some added personality. Savage Melee - Excellent aoe - smooth as butter. Very fun teleport power that is good in both ST and aoe situations. Titan Weapons - Still strong after the "adjustment," though not my daily driver for sure. It is rather satisfying to get into the rhythm of a good momentum rotation and smack a mob around. Dark Melee - this is actually a great set, but I just like it more on a scrapper. Tanker Shadow Maul is beautiful though. Great to layer with a defense based armor set or those that lack a heal. Good enough: Battle Axe - it works, but lethal is pretty heavily resisted. Gets a bad rep but not actually bad. Similar to War Mace in many ways, but inferior damage type and no Clobber. 🙂 Fiery Melee - It does slightly above average damage, and will get you there. No interesting effects to make up for the fact that it isn't damage king by a far shot. Street Justice - It's actually pretty good by the numbers for ST at least. Very sorely lacking in aoe, and just doesn't have the right feel for me. The uppercut feels great though. Electrical Melee - Not as good as you might hope for, but boy is Lightning Rod a blast! Otherwise pretty mediocre single target and aoe damage, though it has some decent mitigation built-in. I prefer this in a Stalker. I know many would find the low rating contentious on this one! Actually sort of disappointing: Spines - I know it's used for farming and by no means objectively bad, and it works great for some themes. Single target is abysmal, and the aoes are awkward to use or slow to animate. I guess I haven't been disappointed by many? If it's not listed, I haven't played it yet on a Tanker, so don't feel fair enough to judge. I think it's time for me to make a Rad Melee and maybe Staff!

Hah, fair enough! Pandas will have their way, after all.

Very fun build with a unique approach, @Nemu! Given the acc stats in mids against +4's, you could safely drop literally all the 4th lotg slots (9% acc) and still be at max hit chance on every attack. You could then just go lotg global + a couple Red Fortunes for a bit of a S/L resist buff and 3 free slots to do with as you please. I do wonder a bit at the lack of Geode! Wouldn't a cowardly Panda want a rock to hide in and regenerate?

Outstanding input altogether, but I would differ on this one. ToE is a great proc generally, but I'd be hard pressed to ever run out of end on any of my Rad armor characters even without the proc. Rad Therapy already returns end without a proc, and you also have big input from Gamma Boost, Stamina, and Particle Shielding. Even more if you go with an alpha that buffs end. I'd rather just throw an extra damage proc in or save the slot for something else.

None of these are really easy drops for sure! CJ is your in-combat maneuverability, which is hard to give up. If you're just sprinting into melee for all of your aoes though, perhaps less needed. Definitely a "play and see" situation. I'd be interested to hear anything you might discover regarding how the ranged damage procs translate, if at all, to Tesla chains. I only have one Eblast character myself (sentinel), but extra discoveries can be inspiring for new builds. : ) My personal approach would be to drop Power Sink, grab glue, and redistribute slots elsewhere. Sapping is just not really needed on a good TA. Fun and concept trumps all, in any case! You might simply enjoy the approach.

Looking pretty solid! My own build does run a bit tight on end at times, so Power Sink is not uncalled for. I played without Glue for a while, but regretted dropping it and added it back myself. You'll get a feel for your preference in practice of course, but I found that mob scatter was a bit too chaotic in solo work without it when OSA was down. The fact that it adds a bit of mitigation and can be procced for meaningful damage is great too. One thing I do see missing is the Gladiator +def unique, would be an easy sub in for the third slot in maneuvers siphoned off to Tough instead.

I must admit it feels really weird to consider skipping a pet! What other control set would seriously do so except out of thematic or noise concerns? Awoooo! There is something to be said for having more of your power invested in the character itself rather than uncontrollable little glowy scamps, especially when teleporting around. Looking at their stats, they have a decent best case scenario, but their survivability is just too poor for the damage they dish out. Surge of Power is a neat idea! I am moderately annoyed by crashes though, even if mitigated by a blue and power sink. I may change my tune once I get ball lightning and slot it up fully. As it stands, I can see being too busy in my normal rotation to worry about the third aoe, and may yet drop Psychic, leaving me with a flex power and chunk of slots to redistribute.

Power choice looks great here! It's really hard to skip any of the TA powers. This is one that I would really consider on a Defender instead, as you'll find it easier to build defenses, and so many of the debuff numbers are meaningfully different. Even on a Defender, the TA element will provide ample damage alongside your blasts, especially if you give it some proc love in the right places. Defenders also get a powerful ATO that provides meaningful quantities of healing. This does a great job at healing away any chip damage that makes it through. I wouldn't sweat hitting softcap too much though. Flash arrow is an outstanding power, bridging the gap very nicely, and you have a wealth of other soft control at hand. If you can hit baseline ~20% or so to everything, Flash arrow will be plenty in the vast majority of situations, especially on a Defender. Backing off of a defense focus for IOs really frees you up to cram in procs and other goodies. The sapping strategy is going to be a tough sell here, and I think you sacrifice too much even with marginal slotting devoted to it. I'd consider the Shocked damage as more of a happy bonus that happens in the right situation - same with the Voltaic chain damage. It is a neat trick, but a bit underwhelming if trying to leverage it specifically. There really isn't anything in TA that inherently demands ranged operation, as none of the powers are cones. You can just as easily bloop out all the arrows at pbaoe range. In fact, you actually want to be in melee range for EMP arrow's buff field. Despite the aforementioned annoyance of detoggling, I'd be hard pressed to skip Voltaic. It's essentially free damage, as it requires no animation time, and does really respectable damage when down to a single hard target, while also finishing off low health enemies here and there not quite blown away by your aoes. Consider that you have built-in mez protection with reasonable uptime in EMP arrow, though it isn't something to count on in every battle. Pet sets also have strong bonuses for the slots invested. For comparison, here is my own TA/A Defender. The slotting philosophy is transferrable between AT's and blast sets to a decent degree. Perhaps you will find some bit of it useful! So many TA powers have solid midrange proc potential. It's not so much that any one of them is a huge bomb save for Ice arrow, which is of course like any other hold, but that you can squeeze a ton of incidental and fairly reliable damage into fundamental actions you need to be doing anyhow.

Yeah, I think it's goodbye gremlins. I really want them to work better than they do, but they are rather unreliable!

It takes a ton of procs, but they aren't super impactful. The energy font proc works out pretty well, but regular damage procs will not contribute much due to proc rates. It's a fun place to throw them if you have extra slots, but would be a lower priority if other damage opportunities are under slotted. You also want to be sure it has the accuracy to hit.

That would be a solid choice. Honestly it's a tossup. Barrier and rebirth would both add a lot here as well.

I actually put together a bit of a rough draft build. Note that there are two FFBack procs on, so turn these powers off if in Mids and wanting accurate recharge totals. I'm sure there is as always more optimization, but here are the features: Softcap S/L/E/N defense (assumes only 1 EA target hit). Enough F/C def to hit softcap with Shadow Meld when needed. Moderate baseline S/L resist, attempted to shore up Psi resist as the slots are available and it is otherwise not well covered. FFback incorporated into both ST and aoe chains. Very super mega proccy Seismic Smash. (Turn on build-up and swoon - what a power!) ATO proc in the relatively proctimized Heavy Mallet for good up time. Not sure if maybe it would be worth swapping it to Seismic and eating a proc there - Crit ATO placement is both crucial and a bit tricky for best performance. Max hit chance against +4's with everything but Fault, which is fine with +3's so good if considering incarnate shift. Considerations: Will be sucking wind hardcore before EA. With EA, you will be spamming it on cooldown. If you're not okay with this, you may want to re-optimize for more end reduction. Personally I'm cool with it on Ice armor. When in Bastion you are fully juiced of course. When proccing fault, KB procs will hit the whole aoe, while targeted aoe procs only hit the tiny cone. Current slotting makes it an okay damage power, an accelerator for more Tremors, and good soft control. You could eat some global recharge and go more proc crazy on Moonbeam. I went for a more moderate approach here, but this leaves ~100 damage on the table. Power strategy: In heavy aoe scenarios where you're having trouble with survival, fire off tremor right when mobs are leaning to stand up after your Fault - this will cause them to fall right back down as soon as they are on their feet. With FFback firing, you can continue this back to back. Your Fault target should be one of the tougher mobs, as it does more damage to the target and a small cone. Heavy Mallet > Stone Fist > Seismic > Stone Fist > Moon Beam is a good rotation, and Stone Fist is a pretty solid attack to fill gaps wherever needed if FFback isn't hitting in a given cycle. Note the order here is important for squeezing in all damage possible for Crit ATO procs. The buff lasts 3.25 seconds, allowing the first 3 attacks here to be covered if fired quickly, with a slight bit of leeway for lag. Maybe Heavy Mallet > Seismic > Moonbeam would be better in burst? This would have more gaps though, even with FFBack firing. A hyper-optimized chain might somehow pick up a heavily procced Dark Blast, or even Cross Punch, but at the cost of other slotting priorities. As you mentioned, rotating Shadow Meld and Bastion as needed should work pretty well. Shadow Meld also keeps you up for the alpha against Psi enemies. If attempting to face mass psi, you better get in there quick and establish KD control before meld wears off though. The build:

SM is indeed pretty heavy on end. /Ice is however well-equipped to handle it - Energy Absorption really is that good. Unlike some other +end powers, it comes back quickly, animates quickly, and you have other reasons to spam it anyhow (more defense). Shadow Meld is indeed a really strong idea for rotation as needed. Alternately, you could find a way to fit in Rune. This depends on how much you find yourself needing the extra layer of mitigation and what you're trading off to get it. You might be happy enough with just Bastion alongside defenses and soft controls.

For sure! I bind this to lshift+f myself for easy access. Whatever fits you fingers. I'm typically using the target and the back binds most frequently.

I'm pretty sure they have "no hammer" animation options for all the powers now, so you're good. 😄 However, you may find the hammers a bit more enjoyable with an icy theme. My god, Icy Bastion looks so good! What an amazing power. I may have to share a build for this myself pretty soon.

Another consideration is Combat Teleport, assuming it fits your concept of course. Getting into range quickly for HoD is a neat trick, and being able to back out with a quick keybind womp womp is perfect for throwing your cones (Fearsome, Living Shadows). This lets you dance around as needed very smoothly. I personally use this set of binds to be able to pop in any direction around the battlefield however I please. Incorporating them was a real game changer! bind Lshift+W powexec_location forward:max combat teleport bind Lshift+A powexec_location left:33 combat teleport bind Lshift+D powexec_location right:33 combat teleport bind Lshift+S powexec_location back:33 combat teleport This lets you hold shift plus a directional key and instantly pop in that direction. I also bind lshift+f to "powexeclocation Target Combat Teleport" so I can pop straight to the target of my choice. Also good for playing catchup with the team through cave walls. 😄 You can play with the range numbers here to match your preference for best cone alignment. I find 33 back is pretty universally good.

@oedipus_tex's breakdown of overall controller damage potential is on point. @Two Dollar Bill's power highlights are also very accurate. For those they didn't touch on: Don't sleep on the potential to use your T1 immob as a blast, especially in early levels. It does equivalent damage to the blast power in most epics. Not required, but useful if you have room and aren't investing heavily in an epic pool or the blast there seems out of theme. Living shadows is never going to be a nuke, but you can do a deceptively useful amount of damage over time with a bit of acc and the Energy Font proc. Possess is an amazing solo tool, and really opens up with the Contagious Confusion proc. Still useful on teams to bring problem mobs like ffgens and Tsoo sorcs to your side, but a little slow. Your opener could either be Fearsome Stare or Heart of Darkness. I would grab both and rotate as needed. Both will also take some good damage procs, allowing you to incorporate respectable damage into your normal aoe control cycle. Shadow Field is a perfectly decent power, but actually one of the few aoe holds I might consider skipping if tight on powers. This is not due to it being bad, but because your needs will be quite well served elsewhere. Still useful as a backup. Darkest Night is less useful in this combo than on a Defender, as you will have not only strong lockdown, but also strong tohit debuff in your other powers already. Not a bad one slot wonder with an Enzyme Exposure for truly chaotic situations. Shadow Fall is of course always great - consider hybrid slotting for both defense and resist. Black Hole is poopoo garbage. I even like other powers like Dimension Shift situationally, but this power is obnoxious. I'd rather have jump kick. Proccing strategy for your pets will be a big part of your damage. Cloud Senses damage proc will go off for literally all of Dark Servant's powers, making it ideal. Other procs here will only go off on one power, and aren't so useful (hold procs, heal procs). Both tohit and fear procs are pretty decent on Haunt, as they have one power for each and rotate each decently well.

Scrappers just really match the extra smashy feel of SM. Whomp whomp whomp goes the hammer! I love it. Seismic Smash is a complete beast, super proccy, super fast, and holds as well. My SM/Ice is actually a Tanker (Ice/SM in that case) and one of my favorite characters, but I've had my eye on a Scrapper iteration since they proliferated SM. SM also has very nice soft control with both aoe and ST knockdown, helping push beyond the weaker defenses of a Scrapper. Not to say that Scrappers are squishy, but their survival potential is otherwise lower than Brutes and Tankers. You can chain KD everything around you if you time Tremor and Fault correctly, and incorporate plenty of FFback into your chains.