Looking for build advice for my first level 50 tanker! (Willpower/Staff)

[Feyheart]

As my first level 50 tanker rapidly approaches my delicate unprepared facemeats, it occurs to me that I really have no darned idea what I should be doing in order to "Slot" the kind of tanker I've made? I have no issues with influence currently, thanks entirely due to the incredibly helpful guide on the matter written by Sovera, but I just am not familiar enough with all the different IO sets and whatnot to know whether or not I'd be missing something really useful.
 

The Tanker in question is Willpower/Staff, I've been enjoying the setup quite a lot. If anyone has any nice builds for that sorta setup, I'd love to check it out. If I haven't been detailed enough in what I'm looking for, I apologize, please just let me know what would need to be clarified >.<

[Maelwys]

Whilst I don't have a Willpower/Staff Tanker, I do have a Willpower/SS Tanker and a Bio/Staff Tanker.

So rather than give you a full build to work from (I'm sure others can post those and there's likely to be at least one in IceSphere's Dropbox) I'm going to show you some numbers and explain why I'm shooting for them.

First, the WP/SS build: zTanker - WP_SS IOed (CrossPunch).mbd



With a single foe within range of Rise to the Challenge, this character sits at a hair under 105HP/Second Regeneration.

...and this is what happens with a fully saturated RTTC:


This is a /SuperStrength Tanker, so they need a bit of help to make a good Single Target attack chain (hence Cross Punch; slotted with a -res proc!) and the bulk of their AoE damage output comes from Rage + Foot Stomp; so Foot Stomp gets slotted with Procs; including a Force Feedback: Chance for +Recharge (in order to get Footstomp up sooner).

The bulk of the attacks are slotted for set bonuses - a mixture of Defense and Damage Resistance; plus a smattering of +MaxHP. Willpower/ can't get anywhere near the Tanker Maximum HP Cap by itself; and it needs a bit of assistance reaching the Defense Softcap (45% for regular Content) and the S/L Damage Resistance Hardcap (90%) even on a Tanker instead of a Brute. The "Superior Might of Tanker" ATO Proc in KO Blow adds another 1-3 stacks of "6.4% resistance to all damage types" on top of the totals listed; meaning that their S/L resists will end up getting hardcapped.

Note the Power Transfer: Chance to Heal Self procs in Stamina, Quick Recovery and Physical Perfection plus the Panacea Proc in Health. These do not buff your regeneration or recovery rate - instead they grant a flat amount of health (and endurance in the case of Panacea). This is an important distinction as you'll gain full benefit from them even when you're up against substantial -Regeneration debuffs. The Superior Entomb: Chance for Absorb proc in KO Blow and the Preventive Medicine Chance for Absorb global in Physical Perfection operate similarly.

Focused Accuracy is present in the build; but left switched OFF unless the character encounters any substantial -ToHit debuffs.

Next up, the Bio/Staff build: Tanker (Bio Armor - Staff) (CT + Taunt + SS).mbd



The peak achievable Regeneration and Recovery Rates for Bio blows WP out of the water; but at baseline it's sitting around 64HP/Second Regeneration.

...and this is what it can look like with a fully saturated DNA Siphon and Parasitic Aura going; even in Offensive Stance:


Anyway. The two big things here to do with /Staff are the stances - especially Form of the Body; and Guarded Spin.

With the Form of the Body stance enabled, each Staff ability you activate grants you a stack of "Perfection of Body" (up to three stacks maximum).
Each stack gives you a +4% damage buff; but the real benefit comes when you've built up three stacks and then activate either Sky Splitter or Eye of the Storm.

Doing so with Sky Splitter will inflict a little extra damage and also grant you +13.3 Damage Resistance to everything for 15 seconds (which can easily become permanent)
Doing so with Eye of the Storm will inflict a little extra damage and also inflict a -10% Damage Resistance debuff for 6 seconds (much tougher to get perma; but still useful)

Guarded Spin grants +15% Defence to both Melee (positional) and Lethal (typed) for 10 seconds. This is enhanceable, so in the build above it's providing +22%. And it's STACKABLE - so you can double or even triple stack it to temporarily push you beyond the 59% Incarnate Softcap and/or help counter things like Defense Debuffs.
A typical Staff Single Target Attack chain includes Guarded Spin, so you can probably safely assume that one stack will always be active. Mine uses SrptsReach > SkySplitter > SrptsReach > MercBlow > GrdedSpin at 10.164s duration (this also gives the SMoT Proc in Serpent's Reach lots of activation opportunities; typically sitting at 3 stacks!)

Staff's not wonderful at Single Target Damage output (except on Stalkers) but it does have two Cones and a PBAoE (Guarded Spin, Innocuous Strikes and Eye of the Storm) which all benefit greatly from the Tanker Gauntlet inherent's buffs to Radius and Target Cap. Eye of the Storm also provides a very substantial -resistance debuff when slotted with a Fury of the Gladiator -Res proc and used with 3x "Perfection of Body" stacks (which you'll be building up between activations anyway!) and it takes that all-important Force Feedback: Chance for +Recharge proc.

Combining Willpower and Staff does have some synergy. You can make good use of Guarded Spin to help shore up Willpower's lackluster native Smashing/Lethal/Melee Defense (I'd push for 45%+ to both Melee and Lethal with a single Guarded Spin stack) and factoring in the extra 13.3% Damage resistance from 3x Perfection of Body stacks + Sky Splitter will help you hit the Resistance hardcaps. So compared to my WP/SS build you'll not need to invest in anywhere near the same amount of mitigation-centric Set Bonuses; which will free you up to add more Damage Procs or Global Recharge.

You won't be breaking any Damage Output or Survivability records, but it should still perform pretty decently across the majority of content and not be a total slouch whenever it comes to AoEing down hordes of mooks.
 

Edited November 21 by Maelwys

[Gobbledigook]

With Willpower/Staff you could bump the resists instead of defense, which without decent DDR wont last long anyway. With 2 MotT procs and the Body Sky splitter buff i am sitting at around 70% resists minimum to all damage. Throw in Strength of Will or the Melee core Hybrid and that bumps it to 90% resists to all. Plus i have barrier giving more resists and defense. Defenses are 46% fire/cold and 43% Energy/Denergy but Barrier will add to that. I dont bother with GS but you could.

 

My regen with 1 target is 100hp/s and with 10 it's 172hp/s. Melee core will buff this even more. 

 

I also have 96% recharge.

 

That might give you an idea what can be done but you wont be a damage dealer lol.

Edited November 21 by Gobbledigook

[Maelwys]

31 minutes ago, Gobbledigook said:

instead of defense, which without decent DDR wont last long anyway.
...
I dont bother with GS but you could.

Guarded Spin bumps Lethal and Melee by 15 to ~24% per stack.
Guess what Position and Type most attacks that contain Defense debuffs are? 😉

I find if you aim for 45% without GS (or with just a single stack) then by just layering an extra stack I'll have few if any issues with the vast majority of non-autohit Defence debuffs. These typically inflict -10% Def per hit. WP gets 21.6% DDR via Heightened Senses reducing that to -7.84%. So it'll take 2-3 successful hits to eat through each additional stack of GS (at a 5% hit chance - assuming that you stacked GS before getting hit; or at least before getting hit twice!). Hardcapped S/L resistance and high regeneration will help you weather the odd unlucky streak; and there's always Barrier and Ageless to fall back on too...
 

[Gobbledigook]

21 minutes ago, Maelwys said:

Guarded Spin bumps Lethal and Melee by 15 to ~24% per stack.
Guess what Position and Type most attacks that contain Defense debuffs are? 😉

I find if you aim for 45% without GS (or with just a single stack) then by just layering an extra stack I'll have few if any issues with the vast majority of non-autohit Defence debuffs. These typically inflict -10% Def per hit. WP gets 21.6% DDR via Heightened Senses reducing that to -7.84%. So it'll take 2-3 successful hits to eat through each additional stack of GS (at a 5% hit chance - assuming that you stacked GS before getting hit; or at least before getting hit twice!). Hardcapped S/L resistance and high regeneration will help you weather the odd unlucky streak; and there's always Barrier and Ageless to fall back on too...
 

I know 😙

 

I am at softcap defense, just never found the need for GS. I would rather bump damage. Each to their own though.

[Spaghetti Betty]

I actually fiddled around with one of these not too long ago! I have a spectacular toon concept that I can't stand watching collect dust, so I made a better build for it!

 

Tanker (Willpower - Staff Fighting).mbd

 

@Maelwys did an outstanding job of breaking down the combo to its essentials, so definitely refer to that before diving into this! My approach is always going to be to see how much static mitigation I can get away with sacrificing to pursue damage and hopefully fill in the gap with some active mitigation options. This is also a build for a magical pegasus knight, so I did take a few liberties to fit that!

 

As such, my resistances will seem lax at first, but I don't mind cycling a bunch of stuff during combat to make it better! Things like Rune of Protection, Strength of Will, and Melee Core Embodiment provide a near seamless layer of active Resistance buffs, so a keen player can use this to their advantage if they don't mind having to manage clicks!

 

Here is what my build's resistances look like with Rune up

This is also not taking into account Sky Splitter's buff or the SMoT proc, because Mids things!

 

I know some of my build directions are very chaotic at a glance, and it does require a lot of focus to drive, but I hope it's helpful study work!

[Feyheart]

Mkay so I toyed around with mids for a bit, and cobbled together something of a build... Any suggestions on how it might potentially be improved?

 

I'm still not entirely sure of what I'm doing, since this is my first time using Mids, and my first time using IOs in general, so any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Tanker (Willpower - Staff Fighting).mbd

[Gobbledigook]

7 hours ago, Feyheart said:

Mkay so I toyed around with mids for a bit, and cobbled together something of a build... Any suggestions on how it might potentially be improved?

 

I'm still not entirely sure of what I'm doing, since this is my first time using Mids, and my first time using IOs in general, so any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Tanker (Willpower - Staff Fighting).mbd 40.75 kB · 0 downloads

First thing is you have too many Luck of the Gambler 7.5% globals. 5 is max, anything more is wasted. Drop one in Heightened senses and put another shield wall for some more energy resist from set bonus.

 

Not a bad start though.

 

Vigor core incarnate will work nicely with that build for some good regen.

 

 

Edited Saturday at 08:15 AM by Gobbledigook

[Feyheart]

19 minutes ago, Gobbledigook said:

First thing is you have too many Luck of the Gambler 7.5% globals. 5 is max, anything more is wasted. Drop one in Heightened senses and put another shield wall for some more energy resist from set bonus

 

 

Ohh. Thanks, I had no idea what the cap was for them. I'll edit the build to do that, later.

[Sanguinesun]

6 hours ago, Feyheart said:

Ohh. Thanks, I had no idea what the cap was for them. I'll edit the build to do that, later.

 

The 5 cap 

14 hours ago, Feyheart said:

Mkay so I toyed around with mids for a bit, and cobbled together something of a build... Any suggestions on how it might potentially be improved?

 

I'm still not entirely sure of what I'm doing, since this is my first time using Mids, and my first time using IOs in general, so any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Tanker (Willpower - Staff Fighting).mbd 40.75 kB · 1 download

 

As I always ask, what specifically are your intended goals for this tank?  Goals really define how to build a toon.

[Feyheart]

10 hours ago, Sanguinesun said:

 

The 5 cap 

 

As I always ask, what specifically are your intended goals for this tank?  Goals really define how to build a toon.

Main goal for it is for just general somewhat casual use, really. Just something really sturdy that I can use either for solo play or for tanking while running content in small groups with friends.

 

EDIT: Made some adjustments to the setup. How's this?

Edited Sunday at 01:55 AM by Feyheart