Twist on a Tank

[Xandyr]

Hey all!

  We all know Tanks are awesome, and can take a lick and keep on tickin'.  And as such, we typically build one with 2 priorities....1) be able to withstand about anything and 2) do as much damage as possible.

  Well....I think I'm gonna challenge myself and throw a curveball into the equation.  Hear me out.....

 

  I think I'm going to build a tank that ,obviously, can take whatever. HOWEVER,  to push the envelope that a Tank also protects the team,  I want to focus on that.

   How about a tank that also focuses and secondary effects? A specialist, per say? 

   For example,  Shield and Bio can lower the enemy's damage. Maybe try to focus on that aspect and pair it with Kinetic Melee (and Darkest Night from the epic power pool!) to REALLY debuff damage?

  Or focus on To Hit Debuffs? Or Regen or Defense Debuffs? There's quite a few combinations that one could pair to "double up" on said Secondary Effects.

 

 Now, I know what you're thinking. "If you want to focus on eggects, just roll a Defender/Corruptor/Mastermind!". True...I could. And get better debuffs. BUT,  those ATs don't have the stats that a Tank has (HP,defense/resist/etc). Plus, I'm up for a challenge. We can still do damage, but we're also focusing on keeping our team alive and helping them survive.

 

  So......thoughts? Comments? I keep coming back to running Bio/Kinetic/Soul for the resist/damage/to hit debuffs. Or maybe a Rad/Dark/Soul to focus on to hit debuffs, defense debuffs, and the ally heal.

 

 Thanks all,

- x

[Maelwys]

Shield Defense for Grant Cover and Against All Odds.

Likely paired with Dark Melee (-ToHit) or Ice Melee (-Rech and IcePatch).

Soul Mastery for More -ToHit.

 

Or a VEAT Night Widow/Crab...

[One IV All]

I have messed around with the idea of a pure team tanker using Shield + Kinetic Melee for the stacking -dmg. I guess you could do the same with Ice Armor…

 

For the Shield/KM, I’m just having trouble with how some of the attack animations look with the Shield (burst has a kind of weird one handed thing). On paper though, could be a great tanker for a team, functionally making enemies hurt your teammates less.

 

Repulsing Torrent is also kind of sweet for a longer range “taunt” that does KD.

[One IV All]

ANOTHER option @Yomo Kimyata brought up a while back was Dark Armor/Kinetic Melee. The stacking disorients could work very nicely, but this would be an endurance hog haha.

[StriderIV]

@Sir Myshkin has theorized a Shield/KM Tanker before. Not sure if he has ever done the build in practice though.

 

I could see Ice/KM being good for similar reasons.

[StriderIV]

I guess technically Bio Armor has synergy as well, since Generic Contamination does -dmg as well. @Xandyr and @Maelwys both know how to build that pretty well =P

Edited Sunday at 11:08 PM by StriderIV

[Biff Pow]

My Inv/Psi Tank leans into Confuse effects- Contagious Confusion in Boggle, Cognitive Interface, now just added the new Chance to Confuse IO. It mitigates damage, adds some damage, but mostly it's for entertainment value.

[Nemu]

Other considerations:

Ice/Spines for the slows

Elec/Staff/Mu + Whirlwind for the SPINs and the knockdowns and the Saps

 

Edited Monday at 02:41 AM by Nemu

[StriderIV]

31 minutes ago, Nemu said:

 

That’s right! Dark/Elec could function similarly to Dark/KM.

[twozerofoxtrot]

Dark/Ice is your true tanktroller.

[Naraka]

You could also do a sapper using Ice or Electric armor and Mu and focus on draining END bars instead of HP. Make it a game to sap their endurance before the team can finish them off.  With the melee, you can kinda pick whatever like picking up psi or ice to hinder foe rech more, stone, mace or SS if you want to control, etc. 

[Mopery]

My Dark/Elec Tank "Monster Magnet" is basically a Controller.

59% Melee Def, capped to all resists but Energy and Toxic(65ish% each) after a couple procs of the ATO, 8sec cd on Dark Regen, no Cloak of Fear.

It's like a moveable zone of disorient, and when I start Thunderstriking them even the AV winds up wandering about stunned until they are saved by the ptod.

Oh yeah, and Lightning Rod for the BOOM!

Nigh unkillable, except for the double-tap from some of the iTrial AVs.

Edited Monday at 01:31 PM by Mopery

[Sovera]

Ice Melee. You're a pocket controller once you toss down Ice Patch.

[tidge]

18 hours ago, Xandyr said:

Hey all!

  We all know Tanks are awesome, and can take a lick and keep on tickin'.  And as such, we typically build one with 2 priorities....1) be able to withstand about anything and 2) do as much damage as possible.

  Well....I think I'm gonna challenge myself and throw a curveball into the equation.  Hear me out.....

 

  I think I'm going to build a tank that ,obviously, can take whatever. HOWEVER,  to push the envelope that a Tank also protects the team,  I want to focus on that.

   How about a tank that also focuses and secondary effects? A specialist, per say?

 

This isn't a prima facie bad idea IMO, but this isn't likely to end up with a Tanker that is very good at this. What follows isn't me pooh-poohing the idea, it is more of a list of things that I would focus on if attempting a more "support" Tanker that isn't focusing on more classic approach to Taunting, punchvoking, AoE to grab aggro and survive the aggro.

 

0) As noted: I think it would be necessary to lean into the secondary effects of primary/secondary, as there isn't much in the way of pool powers. The better pools for the task are IMO:

• Presence, for layered Fears
• Leadership, for team toggles
• Force of Will, for knockdowns (AoE cone is a fast recharge, PBAoE Takeoff) and a ST debuff

1) Most of the secondary effects are marginal. We can have different opinions about how wide those margins are, but many debuff effects are smallish, and the enhancement potential for the most common debuffs are also small.

 

2) Many secondary effects require accuracy (ehem, see the base accuracy of some of the Dark armor toggles), so this cannot be ignored if going this route.

 

3) Many of the 'auras' may be smallish... so for example Radiation's Ground Zero can heal teammates, but only those that are relatively close by.

 

Prior to (several rounds of) Energy Melee changes, I felt that it was a very good Tanker secondary for the disorientation. It isn't bad at this today, but it isn't as good at it as it once was IMO.

[Troo]

21 hours ago, Xandyr said:

So......thoughts? Comments?

 

Isn't this what a troo tank is? I thought the goals with a tank are to take agro and mitigate team damage.

 

Below is my order of preference:

-ToHit, Knockdowns, Stuns, Slows, -Rech... and due to the exp drain Confuse doesn't make the list.

Darkest Night is a favorite.

 

Tanks being damage dealers is a cherry on top which was enhanced by the Tanker buffs. (solo tankers not withstanding)

 

Edited Monday at 05:24 PM by Troo

[aethereal]

Nothing wrong with a concept build, but the practical problem with this is that it's overkill.  It's already Very Safe to team with a tank, aggro control is frankly all you need to keep your teammates from dying, and the marginal additional damage debuff or to-hit debuff or whatever is going to largely speaking just be overkill durability for yourself, because, stay with me, all the enemies are attacking you.  If you do do something like intentionally aggro significantly more enemies than the aggro cap, the small amount of durability that you provide through your secondary effects won't really make a big difference, and also the nature of Gauntlet is that it's going to be very hard to have "some enemies are only attacking me and other enemies are debuffed while they attack my team."  Instead, you'll have debuffed enemies attacking you while, if there are enemies that you aren't controlling aggros of, dominantly non-debuffed enemies attack your team.

[MrAxe]

At some point I'll be making my 'Tankroller' build. Protecting the team using mez found in psi melee, presence and earth pools.

[TTRPGWhiz]

I ran an Ice/KM/Soul and can confirm, does a bang up job keeping friendlies up. Works best with some -Res frens.

[Hjarki]

Debuffs intended to protect players aren't really all that useful - even on Defenders. In general, the more you need them, the less effective they become. That -5% hit or -8% damage is fine against even con minions. Against a four star AV/GM? They might as well not even exist.

 

Status effects, on the other hand, can be useful. Stone Melee is arguably a better Control set than actual Control sets, with an easily stackable AE Disorient and Mag 4 ST Hold.

 

And, of course, the status effect all Tankers have: Taunt.