Dragon Knight Tanking in ESO

jasdistefanob14_ESO

I did not play WoW @drgneb, so I cannot compare ESO to their mechanics. I think for tanks, hitting the main tanking softcaps is important. I'd say getting your armor, health, stamina, magicka, and regens to the soft cap is most important. I would probably focus these stats in the following order:

1. armor/spell resist - (you will probably need two sets of armor for min/max)
2. health
3. health regen
4. stamina
5. stamina regen
6. magicka
7. magicka regen

If you are going to get serious than you will benefit most from having two sets of gear - one for weapon based damage and one for spell based damage. Wykkyd's Outfitter addon will help manage the gear swaps between fights. Getting all of the above to softcap might be a little difficult based on the numbers that I have run. I plan on crafting gear that focuses on flat stat boosts (health, stamina, and magicka), and using jewelry to boost my regen stats.

During fights you will use abilities that buff many of these same attributes pushing your into overcharge. This is not bad in my opinion because these abilities is what will buff you during fights.

drgneb

Thanks for that Jas, good info that I will definitely use as I approach 50 (48 now, ah yeah!!!) I struggle a bit with my regen's but will try what you mentioned and use my jewelry chants to help out a bit there. What weapon enchants do you aim for with tanking and such? I like the hardening which adds a shield or the one that reduces the targets armour. Like I said, so much to start really thinking about as I get closer to what is at this point considered "end-game", meaning vet ranks and such and doing dungeons at that level. I am sure its a whole new ball game at the Vet ranks, with "one-shot" becoming a common term...lol.
Again, thanks for all your input and tips and help, its very much appreciated and I look forward to you (and others) sharing more as you and the game progresses!

yake82

jasdistefanob14_ESO wrote: »

I did not play WoW @drgneb, so I cannot compare ESO to their mechanics. I think for tanks, hitting the main tanking softcaps is important. I'd say getting your armor, health, stamina, magicka, and regens to the soft cap is most important. I would probably focus these stats in the following order:

1. armor/spell resist - (you will probably need two sets of armor for min/max)
2. health
3. health regen
4. stamina
5. stamina regen
6. magicka
7. magicka regen

If you are going to get serious than you will benefit most from having two sets of gear - one for weapon based damage and one for spell based damage. Wykkyd's Outfitter addon will help manage the gear swaps between fights. Getting all of the above to softcap might be a little difficult based on the numbers that I have run. I plan on crafting gear that focuses on flat stat boosts (health, stamina, and magicka), and using jewelry to boost my regen stats.

During fights you will use abilities that buff many of these same attributes pushing your into overcharge. This is not bad in my opinion because these abilities is what will buff you during fights.

1. Impenetrable gear
2. Max health
3. Health and Magicka food
4. Magicka regen
5. Stamina regen

Thats how i focus my tanking stats.

drgneb

yea, I just started to swap mine to Impent and infused since reinforced isn't really needed what with me capping armor without it. Rather have something that adds more bang for the buck than just a little improvement. How do you reach your max health, chants,food etc or all attribs in one stat? I went almost all in stam with some in magicka and health and then chanted my gear for health. So far is working really well.

yake82

I've 49 points in health. Gear has mostly health enchants on them. Only stamina enchant i have is Hunding Rage set, +11 stamina regen.

Stats are something like this:
2600 hp
1500 magicka
1100 stamina

Its been working just fine. Enough stamina to block the power attacks and stab the boss every 15sec. With excess magicka you can keep pumping that Green Dragon Blood.

Potions i use are 3stat.

drgneb

Yake, if you get the chance show us your build, be interested to see what you are running and such, ie., 5 heavy/2 light or medium, that sort of thing. I have bounced around with that as well but keep going back to full heavy as the armor gain outweighs the measly 2 point gain in mag regen. But at 50 who knows, I might still play around with different builds, that's half the fun of it!!
And I'd say that from the look of it you are more of a magicka based attack kind of tank? Saving stam for taunt/blocks and that's about it? Keen to see what you are running for sure!!

yake82

All points in health
The Lord-stone
Orc racials

3 Warlock jewels
3 set Twilight Embrace
5 set Hunding Rage

Green Dragon Blood makes hp and stamina regens go orange. Regens:

Mag 81
Hp 42-> 50
Stam 66-> 80

All gear Impenetrable, enchanted kinda randomly, big enchants are usually health though (cuirass, helm, greaves and shield)


1s ability bar, onehander and shield:

1. Burning Talons / Burning Breath
2. Draw Essence / Unstable Flame
3. Pierce Armor
4. Absorb Magic / Cinder Storm / (Reflective Scale)
5. Green Dragon Blood
U. Flawless Dawnbreaker


2nd ability bar, dual wield:

1. Burning Talons
2. Draw Essence
3. Whirlwind
4. Inner Fire
5. Green Dragon Blood
U. Flawless Dawnbreaker


I keep swapping first ability bar depending on the situation.
I've never fancied the Spiked Armor, always preferred Ring of Preservation.

I make my own potions and food. 3 stat restoring potions are must.

drgneb

Awesome! Thanks for that! Good info, I SOOO want that Twilights Embrace!!! I to swap around based on Boss/fight but that ultimate "Flawless Dawnbreaker" is the first time I have seen as tanking, how is it? On paper looks great. Also love Inner Fire and having 2 taunts just in case one stat is lower than the other at a taunt moment and yea, I was never a huge fan of the spiked armor either even though "everyone" swore by it...lol, but Ring of Pres is just great and it ticks all the buttons, health,stam and resist! At 50 (half way there!!) I plan on running with a mix of infused/inpent but the jury is still out on whether Bosses crit or not. Any input to that?
I am still trying to drop my WOW mentality of having to worry about doing uber dps as a tank and focus more on me staying alive and blocking and taunting when its needed. Have learned to not pull the whole room so I should be getting the rest of it soon...haha! Talons is fantastic for pulls and locking them down allowing for dps to do their "job" while I grab the healers or whatever ranged I can find.
Again, thanks for your quick replies and input, very much appreciated and useful!!!!

Oh, and damn you guys and your Orc racials!!! There are some nice ones for tanking in there for sure but no way am I re-rolling!!!

BTW guys, toon is "Drgnknight" on the NA server if you ever wanna say HI!!

yake82

Usually Green Dragon Blood and potion will help through tight spot, Magma Armor feels so overkill.
So i've used the Flawless Dawnbreaker since it has nice passive bonus on it.

I was once hit by Roost Mother for 1800dmg, i had max 1700hp. It was a normal firebolt attack. I didnt have full Impen gear back then.

edit. Forgot to mention that when using the Dawnbreaker you get more out of the Battle Roar passive

drgneb

Think I'll give that Ultimate a try just for something different. Like I said, I'm a tweaker and love trying out different options and builds to see what I can get from my toon. WOW became very linear in that it stopped offering "new" things and just offered more ways to do the same thing, only with like more damage. The amount of health the mob have in that game is nuts, as is the amount of dps expected from a player to progress! So nice to play something a bit more realistic,if that word even applies to an MMO...lol
I went ahead an put all my points into health and im liking what I see. Hell, I'm still close to what I had in terms of Stamina and magicka back when I had points in them. Now all I have to do is enchant and such and I'll be rockin. Im going to give Dual Weilding a shot as I just wasn't feeling it with a 2H and got tired of seeing the "this target is immune" notice all the time. Plus I like what I see with some of the morphs so will be fun to level it up quickly and give it a go. I have some nice epic weapons waiting for me and now with DW I can show them off!
In terms of taunts and threat, do you guys ever have any issues and feel the need for having 2 taunts on your bar? I have been running with both for the simple reason that it gives me an option if I say run out of stam and need to taunt and have the magic, i'm good to go. But I do lean toward Inner Fire more so of the two because I like having the range. No need for a charge (and a huge stam drain!) when I can just use Inner Fire on the pull and the Boss or whatever mob is locked on me at the start. But I have a question that maybe you guys or someone else can answer, and one I am very curious about.
Dp you know if our taunt actually does "lock" that mob on us for the whole 15 seconds, or can we lose threat from a dps or a healer? I ask because many times I will have taunted and he/she/it is coming my way only to have it head off towards a dps or healer! Now I know the 15 secs isn't up and I also know that my spell did go off, based on response and animation and all that. So what is causing the drop in threat? Do with have thresholds like other games ( I reference WOW here) in that threat can be taken away based on someone doing higher damage or heals (they do proc alot of threat in any game) and therefore we have to be sure that we are topping the damage in order to maintain said threat? I hope not, I really do hope that this game is not designed that way. That would suck in that it would mean that we as tanks do have to put more focus into dps, and just when I was getting used to using more defensive abilities!
I am hoping that's its something that I am seeing wrong and perhaps my taunts aren't going off on that first cast like I assume. Also hope that our taunt is all we need to "maintain" and get back aggro, albeit we do have to refresh it every 15 secs. I know that when I first started playing as dps I was having problems with me pulling threat off the tanks in dungeons, and just figured it was me doing a bit more damage or the tank just wasn't using his taunts.
So if anyone can shed some light on this and maybe squash the whole misconception I have that would be most awesome! Perhaps its just the way the mobs fight and such and on some you may have to taunt more than once at the start, who knows? Its not a game ender that's for sure, but certainly an issue that has had me pondering.
OK! Patch is done so now its time to see what new and exciting things have been brought our way!! Sorry for the wall of text but what the hell, good way to kill time while it updates, no?
I am looking forward to seeing more of your builds and would really like to see what you all are running at Vet levels and what you find to be working the best and such.
Peace out all!

UPDATE!! Im 50...or Vet Rank 1...ah yeah!!!! lol.

imam start a new thrad with this threat thing...

yotanut

@‌ yake82
Are you in full 7 Heavy Armor or are you mixing it?

yake82

7/7 heavy