Learning to Tank without being "That Guy"

[MTeague]

So, I've tanked in other MMO's. Specifically, Warcraft.  Expectations were kinda sky-high there. 

 

Tanks were expected

• to know every mechanic of every boss in every raid
• to know the maps of every instance, small group or raid
• to have full court vision at all times to pickup adds
• to properly manage every cooldown so as to not faceplant and not be the tank with the spiky healthbar.
• to know and mark killzones and priority mobs to kill.

 

Clearly, quite a bit of this does not and cannot be expected to carry over into City of Heroes.  It's a far more casual game, and very little even rises to the content of "Progression Grinding Endgame Encounters".  I know of nothing in the CoH that can consistently wipe an experienced premade group for 3 hours a night for 2 weeks straight while they learn how to get their execution down perfectly.  (And this is a GOOD THING, I am SO DONE with the WoW treadmill).

 

But... I find myself massively gunshy at joining any group with my Tanker. 

I don't want to be complete Faily McFailtank by not even being AWARE of what groups are expecting from me in this game. 

 

So.... what are fair expectations of a CoX Tanker, in your view?

 

=====

By G'Quan, I can't recall the last time I was in a fight like that! No moral ambiguity, no hopeless battle against ancient and overwhelming forces! They were the bad guys, as you say, and we were the good guys! And they made a very satisfying thump! when they hit the floor.

    - Citizen G'Kar, Babylon 5, Season 3, *A Late Delivery From Avalon*

[Hedgefund]

1.  Take the alpha and be quick about it

 

[biostem]

42 minutes ago, MTeague said:

But... I find myself massively gunshy at joining any group with my Tanker. 

I don't want to be complete Faily McFailtank by not even being AWARE of what groups are expecting from me in this game. 

I think what will help you a lot is to be aware of what powers are kind of key to your success and what others likely expect of you:

 

1. Every attack of yours should emit a small "taunt aura", that taunts enemies nearby.

2. Most armor sets have some sort of PBAoE click power or toggle, which, beyond whatever primary effects it has, also taunts enemies.

3. Some primaries or secondaries may have a "damage aura", which in addition to dealing some damage to nearby enemies, also aggroes them onto you.

4. You should have a dedicated taunt power in your secondary, which is probably the most direct way of getting enemy aggro.

 

Assuming you've sufficiently slotted your defensive powers so you can actually survive the enemies' opening attack, then just keep their attention on you, and everyone on your team should be happy.  Some groups may want you to "herd" multiple groups of enemies, but that's a topic for another thread...

Edited October 30, 2019 by biostem

[Call Me Awesome]

56 minutes ago, Hedgefund said:

1.  Take the alpha and be quick about it

 

This is really the expectation of most groups.  Learning to quickly clump the mobs for AOE's and hold aggro puts you in the above average category.  Paying attention and picking up adds moves you into the top 10%.

 

Most groups won't wait for you to position mobs so learn to get to the next spawn quickly and get their attention ASAP.  The few special mechanics are fairly easy to learn, like the BAF incarnate trial's need to trade aggro with other tankers and the Apex TF's need to avoid the appearing patches of doom.

[Infinitum]

2 hours ago, MTeague said:

=====

By G'Quan, I can't recall the last time I was in a fight like that! No moral ambiguity, no hopeless battle against ancient and overwhelming forces! They were the bad guys, as you say, and we were the good guys! And they made a very satisfying thump! when they hit the floor.

    - Citizen G'Kar, Babylon 5, Season 3, *A Late Delivery From Avalon*

I just watched that episode yesterday.

 

Thats one of the best lines in the show.

 

Along With "I will put a bucket on my head and pretend to be the ancient vorlon god booji."

 

As far as tanking goes, jump in, take the alpha, punch them all till they no longer stand.

 

Doing that effectively has more to do with your build and your team buffs than anything else but especially build.

[Kruunch]

4 hours ago, Hedgefund said:

1.  Take the alpha and be quick about it

 

QFT

[Haijinx]

Is it that bad on Wow? Lol

[Kruunch]

26 minutes ago, Haijinx said:

Is it that bad on Wow? Lol

Kind of is. You can settle for very casual normal and heroic dungeon crawls you can easily over gear and most pugs will blow through, but higher end content gets very mechanics focused. 

[VV]

6 hours ago, Hedgefund said:

1.  Take the alpha and be quick about it

 

This is basically it.

 

For more advanced tanking, keep your head on a swivel so you can keep track of where everyone is. You are not a blaster or scrapper, so you do not need to mashing buttons continuously. Take a few seconds here and there to look around. Watch the HP bar on your teammates and help anyone who seems to be getting low.

 

Keep things moving. You jump into a group, fire off a couple good AOEs to get their attention as the teams moves in and starts mowing them down. When you are down to the last few and you know that nobody is in any danger, head off to the next group to get it all gathered up. It should be nice and packed about the time your teammates get there and unleash. This will greatly speed things up.

 

Next step up is maximizing AOEs. Related to that is minimize movement. This is optional, but appreciated. For example, you run into one of those big rooms with like 18 spawn groups. Once the team locks down the first one and drops all their AOE DoTs, you can go get more. Do not try to herd up the whole map, unless you are sure your team can handle it. Bring them in a group at a time. Your team can just sit there and chew through them without wasting time running from one to another.

 

When fighting a boss, keep their attention. There are very few bosses that have any ridiculous tricks to them that a decent tank cannot handle. A few of the top-end TFs set on high difficulty need actual tactics, but for most bosses, just go in and start pounding.

 

Despite some people whining that tanks are irrelevant these days, I can tell you that the vast majority of players do appreciate having a good tank along.

[Myrmidon]

On 10/30/2019 at 8:37 PM, Infinitum said:

I just watched that episode yesterday.

 

Thats one of the best lines in the show.

 

Along With "I will put a bucket on my head and pretend to be the ancient vorlon god booji."

 

As far as tanking goes, jump in, take the alpha, punch them all till they no longer stand.

 

Doing that effectively has more to do with your build and your team buffs than anything else but especially build.

“Not many fishes left in the sea. Not many fishes, just Londo and me.”

 

Use your attacks to draw Agro with Gauntlet, glide among the enemy with your taunt aura while attacking and use Taunt to grab outliers and hold the aggro  of AVs. Control the flow of the engagement and adapt to unpredictable allies/enemies.

[Papaschtroumpf]

On 10/30/2019 at 5:06 PM, Hedgefund said:

1.  Take the alpha and be quick about it

 

OK, I'm going to disagree about that. Partly.

Squishies need someone to soak the alpha, although with IOs and incarnates, that's not as needed as it may have been in the past.

My warsahde can soak the alpha, my two corruptors can soak the alpha, my brute can soak the alpha, my scrapper can soak the alpha. My controller can't soak the alpha because the alpha never comes due to crowd control. All those character can solo +4x8 without breaking a sweat except for the occasional special mob (Psi, CC resistance, etc... each AT has one or two enemies that it must work a little harder at)

 

I soak the alpha all the time on group, but I never think of it as Tanking. The one thing I expect a tank to do that none of those characters do well is to hold aggro even when the blaster is hurting them, or make sure adds come to me and ignore the rest of the group. In a word, it's all about Taunt. Not only taunting auras, but a way to grab aggro and supersede any other player that might be getting aggro, often without wanting it. I was running a on a MAria Jenkins +4x8 team last night and my corruptor would jump in, soak the alpha, double-nuke and generally play no differently than when I'm solo. But when another player overextended themselves, maybe aggroed a second group, etc..., I usually couldn't save them and so wished I had taunt on my corruptor  (I never tried Provoke but I hear it;s not great). Later in the evening a tank joined the group. I could still jump in ahead of the tank if I wanted and soak alpha and nuke, but the second the tank caught up, all enemies has eyes on him.

 

Now if you can't soak up the alpha, you can't tank. if you call it on you, you need to be able to take it.

 

[Procellus]

Speaking as a guy that plays primarily as squishes, if I die it's typically my fault. All I need from a tanker is for him or her to herd the bad guys and maintain the aggro. Tankers make things easier, faster and safer.

[Infinitum]

1 hour ago, Myrmidon said:

“Not many fishes left in the sea. Not many fishes, just Londo and me.”

 

Use your attacks to draw Agro with Gauntlet, glide among the enemy with your taunt aura while attacking and use Taunt to grab outliers and hold the aggro  of AVs. Control the flow of the engagement and adapt to unpredictable allies/enemies.

GKar and Londo stuck in the elevator.

 

"CAN ANYBODY HEAR US"  small voice GKar. "I hear you"

 

And that's tanking in a nutshell what you described.

[nihilii]

Everyone ITT has already made the most important points about the Tanker role: a cushion helping the team, rather than stiffling them.

In that spirit there's one thing I see many Tankers unaware of, overtaunting has negative effects.

 

This is especially true against enemies with special mechanics, most prevalent in iTrials.

In BAF, if you overtaunt Siege or Nightstar, aggro might stay on you after your first ring, your second ring, and sequester you (and any unfortunate ally in range). This could happen even if you pull back.

On the other hand, if you don't taunt at all, another Tanker or even a Brute or Scrapper could snatch back the aggro from you by using Taunt themselves once they see the second ring on you. In practice, expecting this level of coordination is utopic; but at least it will let you lose aggro the moment you move away, someone else will snatch it, and the AV won't move.

 

For Marauder in Lambda, this is less important, but I find it annoying to see Marauder superjump away, then slowly move from all the melee characters and damage patches to run towards the slooow moving Tanker who's still running to the new spot.

Tankers have the greatest power to affect the flow of battle. Taunting everything at length and herding groups when unnecessary can turn the experience into a miserable slog. Soaking alphas swiftly and efficiently, using Taunt on a need basis and applying Bruising on key targets can greatly speed up the pace.

[Call Me Awesome]

14 minutes ago, nihilii said:

Everyone ITT has already made the most important points about the Tanker role: a cushion helping the team, rather than stiffling them.

In that spirit there's one thing I see many Tankers unaware of, overtaunting has negative effects.

 

This is especially true against enemies with special mechanics, most prevalent in iTrials.

In BAF, if you overtaunt Siege or Nightstar, aggro might stay on you after your first ring, your second ring, and sequester you (and any unfortunate ally in range). This could happen even if you pull back.

On the other hand, if you don't taunt at all, another Tanker or even a Brute or Scrapper could snatch back the aggro from you by using Taunt themselves once they see the second ring on you. In practice, expecting this level of coordination is utopic; but at least it will let you lose aggro the moment you move away, someone else will snatch it, and the AV won't move.

 

For Marauder in Lambda, this is less important, but I find it annoying to see Marauder superjump away, then slowly move from all the melee characters and damage patches to run towards the slooow moving Tanker who's still running to the new spot.

Tankers have the greatest power to affect the flow of battle. Taunting everything at length and herding groups when unnecessary can turn the experience into a miserable slog. Soaking alphas swiftly and efficiently, using Taunt on a need basis and applying Bruising on key targets can greatly speed up the pace.

This is what I was referring to when I mentioned that there were a few enemies that needed different tactics.  Good point on the BAF since it's so popular once you hit 50, the AV's in it have an AOE hold mechanic that will hold the tank and everyone nearby once it's hit the same character 3 times so you MUST hand off aggro to another character before you reach 3 rings.  It's fairly easy to see, for one you'll see a large ring around yourself (or two, or you're held at 3) and you get a big popup saying "First Warning" and "Second Warning".  Never taunt once you have the First Warning, you have to allow another character to take the aggro before you get the entire Raid held.

 

Frankly, you won't need to really worry about special tactics until you reach higher levels; offhand I can't think of any AV's below 50 that can't be handled by standard tanking tactics.  There may be one or two but they don't come to mind right now.  Incarnate trials are different and many require different tactics.

[ninja surprise]

On 10/30/2019 at 11:24 PM, VV said:

Keep things moving. You jump into a group, fire off a couple good AOEs to get their attention as the teams moves in and starts mowing them down. When you are down to the last few and you know that nobody is in any danger, head off to the next group to get it all gathered up. It should be nice and packed about the time your teammates get there and unleash. This will greatly speed things up.

 

Exactly. You, as the Tank, are not there to defeat every last critter. And just about any player character should be able to defeat a single mob so you don't have to stay and help.

Your aggro cap is 17 and no single spawn will be larger than that. So jump in, pop a PBAoE or two. The critters will fire an attack then start to crowd you. This takes them 2 - 3 seconds, so you have to get to the spawn about 3 seconds before the rest of the team to have them clustered on you.

While the team's arresting critters, keep an eye on how many are left. Minions melt first so when it's down to the last 3 or 4 bosses and lieutenants (and they'll be lowish on health already), take off running down the map to the next spawn.  You'll typically arrive 3 or 4 seconds before everyone else and the spawn will be nicely clumped and taunted and the team can lay waste.

 

Just watch the team window to make sure everyone's still alive and has some endurance and fly through them maps.  If two spawns are close to each other, taunt the second spawn when the first is half gone.

 

Per your points: the Tank doesn't have to know every map or villain. CoH is pretty simple: Maps start at the door and the boss/glowie is at the end. Elevators at the beginning and end of each floor. Some wide open "outdoors" maps or super long cave maps.  Boss or glowie or captive at the end. Some critters are more troublesome and should be defeated first, like Sappers, Ruin Mages, or the Devouring Earth that drop those defense-killing poops.

 

It drives me nuts when the Tank thinks they personally must defeat every critter in every spawn and their knockout blow is still winding up while the 7 other teammates already landed attacks on the last critter and it's on the way to the floor.

 

[Papaschtroumpf]

glad to know every one of my characters, regardless of AT, is a tanker, then!

 

 

 

 

 

[Infinitum]

13 hours ago, Papaschtroumpf said:

glad to know every one of my characters, regardless of AT, is a tanker, then!

 

 

 

 

 

Tanking is not exclusive to the Tanker AT.  Any AT can do it but nothing is as good at it as a Tanker.

[Papaschtroumpf]

>nothing is as good at it as a Tanker

What makes a tanker better? I'm not trolling, I'm genuinely trying to understand what my Tanker can do or bring that surpasses other ATs.

Taunting to grab aggro back form a teammate in trouble is the best I can comes up with. And possibly having some much HP that tanking AVs is simpler than on say a corruptor.

[Erratic1]

Tanker armor abilities start with higher base values meaning they take less damage out of the box, get more value form enhancements, and have an easier time reaching defense/resistance caps. All secondary set attacks provoke, so a Tanker has an easier time holding aggro. At any given level with similar investment before IOs come into play a Tanker will be more survivable and hold aggressive better than another AT*.

 

*There may be a few edge cases where another AT may equal/surpass a Tanker in a particular aspect, but as a total package with equal resources, I think they would fall short.

[Infinitum]

32 minutes ago, Papaschtroumpf said:

>nothing is as good at it as a Tanker

What makes a tanker better? I'm not trolling, I'm genuinely trying to understand what my Tanker can do or bring that surpasses other ATs.

Taunting to grab aggro back form a teammate in trouble is the best I can comes up with. And possibly having some much HP that tanking AVs is simpler than on say a corruptor.

Easier to hit higher HP capability

 

Better baseline Resists and or Defenses

 

Better Agro control

[Call Me Awesome]

2 minutes ago, Infinitum said:

Easier to hit higher HP capability

 

Better baseline Resists and or Defenses

 

Better Agro control

In a nutshell this.

 

Brutes can reach very high durability and they can hold aggro, but a tanker is simply better at it due to higher modifiers in all their taunt auras (apart from Willpower which has the weakest aura in the game by far).

 

I had a Broadsword/Shield Scrapper on Live who was quite capable of tanking the ITF strictly on the strength of the taunt aura in Rise to the Challenge.  Even with that taunt aura, which was tanker level, I lacked the other tools a Tank has so I had to work harder and couldn't snag loose aggro as well as a tanker since my attacks had no taunt component beyond simple damage.  Every Tanker's attack also taunts the mob hit and mobs close by, even the Tanker's ranged attacks.

[Gulbasaur]

14 hours ago, Infinitum said:

Better baseline Resists and or Defenses

 

Better Agro control

After levelling a peacebringer, I noticed that I would have to off-tank a lot more while teaming with brutes who have okay-but-not-great survival until they've IO'd out.

 

Tankers are generally built to manage aggro, whereas brutes seem to treat it as an optional extra and let auras or pokevoke deal with it. It's a playstyle thing and as an off-tank, it's really obvious. It seems like the average tanker picks up Taunt but the average brute doesn't.

 

It was part of my usual playstyle to stay in DPS until the brute hit red then pop into dwarf form and immediately take almost all the aggro with one button because the taunt duration on Antagonise trumped the pokevoke or aura taunts. Tankers seem to take Taunt more as well as just being sturdier generally and I don't remember ever having to do that playing with a tanker. It's a night and day difference if you're playing a secondary tank AT like PB or WS. Tankers don't need watching. Brutes do.

 

Kheldians are rolling in damage resistance (3 L25 res IOs = 58% damage resistance + 10% from each DPS AT on the team - you can get that at level 22), so there is a period where they're several steps ahead of brutes and tankers, although tankers catch up and then overtake them much quicker. At 50 with IOs and incarnates, it's basically a moot point as brutes and tankers don't have too much difference in survivability, but while levelling it's really evident.

 

No-one can out tank a tanker with Taunt, but I could smack the aggro out of the average brute's hands in two button presses.

Edited November 5, 2019 by Gulbasaur

[Haijinx]

On 11/4/2019 at 4:31 PM, Papaschtroumpf said:

>nothing is as good at it as a Tanker

What makes a tanker better? I'm not trolling, I'm genuinely trying to understand what my Tanker can do or bring that surpasses other ATs.

Taunting to grab aggro back form a teammate in trouble is the best I can comes up with. And possibly having some much HP that tanking AVs is simpler than on say a corruptor.

Tankers are easier to reach the nigh-invulnerable stage of survival.  They also do it at a lower level.  And exemplar better for survival.

 

There are changes coming that will narrow the damage gap.

 

A high end incarnate build brute though has incredible durability and definitely can compete with a Tanker at higher levels. 

[Call Me Awesome]

10 hours ago, Gulbasaur said:

After levelling a peacebringer, I noticed that I would have to off-tank a lot more while teaming with brutes who have okay-but-not-great survival until they've IO'd out.

 

Tankers are generally built to manage aggro, whereas brutes seem to treat it as an optional extra and let auras or pokevoke deal with it. It's a playstyle thing and as an off-tank, it's really obvious. It seems like the average tanker picks up Taunt but the average brute doesn't.

 

It was part of my usual playstyle to stay in DPS until the brute hit red then pop into dwarf form and immediately take almost all the aggro with one button because the taunt duration on Antagonise trumped the pokevoke or aura taunts. Tankers seem to take Taunt more as well as just being sturdier generally and I don't remember ever having to do that playing with a tanker. It's a night and day difference if you're playing a secondary tank AT like PB or WS. Tankers don't need watching. Brutes do.

 

Kheldians are rolling in damage resistance (3 L25 res IOs = 58% damage resistance + 10% from each DPS AT on the team - you can get that at level 22), so there is a period where they're several steps ahead of brutes and tankers, although tankers catch up and then overtake them much quicker. At 50 with IOs and incarnates, it's basically a moot point as brutes and tankers don't have too much difference in survivability, but while levelling it's really evident.

 

No-one can out tank a tanker with Taunt, but I could smack the aggro out of the average brute's hands in two button presses.

You're not wrong about the relatively weak grip most non-tankers (and unfortunately Willpower tankers) have on aggro.  I'll tell you though if you team with an Ice tank you'll find that nothing will take aggro away from him, the reputation Ice has for aggro is no joke.  I've been on TF's with my Invuln/Stone tanker and an Ice tanker... it's an eye opener since nothing could ever steal aggro from me and I could usually steal aggro from another tank.  Well, that 'ain't the case with an Ice tank, even with me doing my damnedest to hold aggro an Ice is able to take that aggro.  Unfortunately Ice isn't as sturdy as Invuln and it's lead to problems when he got over his head and I couldn't take aggro from him.

 

Nothing in the game holds aggro better than Tankers.  And of tanker sets, nothing can come close to Ice in pure aggro control.