Tanking in 2.1 : it is possible, managable with explainations and proof.

Kupoking

With all those posts on the forums asking to revert the change to blocking in 2.1 I decided to try to education people on the change and how it affects tanking in PvE.

I will debunk a lot of false statements, bad assumptions, feared situation that a lot of people who are against it might use to confuse the masses or use fear tactics to gain support of their cause.

Note that all my tanking experience on pts are on veteran mode of the two new dungeons, which mean the hardest content in the game right now; super hard hitting and unforgiving bosses and trash mobs who arent trash at all.

1- There is no way to tank without constantly blocking especially in raids.
False. Since I experienced pts Ive reran most endgame raiding and content. All bosses have certain patterns in which tanks can memorize and use to know when to drop block and land 1 or a few heavy attacks. Some of them are very slim or short gaps between attack(might be where ZoS could adjust for less exp tanks).

The serpent of serpent's image is one of them. His pattern is 6-7 light attack that will kill you if unblocked followed by a cleave aoe attack you must avoid. I was able to land an heavy attack during the cleave most of the time. I would use a bubble in case I missed and got hit. Would picture it being good practice for what's coming.

Other than that, being a templar tank, I would often use puncturing sweep in dungeons for fun. Made me learn when I could drop block to use this channel ability without gettng rocked. Found out you could easily drop block most of the time.

2-As soon as I receive a few hits i'll be at zero stam and remain there all the fight.
The truth is, you can drop you block cost so low that with a stam pool of 15k you will have plenty of time to make actions to make stam go back up before it is completely depleted. Rarely Ive seen blocked hits drain more than 1-2% of my stam.

At the beginning of a fight, you will see that your stam will drop slowly. If you play right you can maintain it in between 50-75% which is your safe zone.

Here is a video as reference to this : http://youtu.be/mDYgjH8AINY

Takes place on 2nd of of white gold tower vet mode. You tank 3 bosses at the same time so getting the right timing is hard for heavy attacking in there. At the start of the fight I die and rez at zero stam, your nightmare in this patch. Look how I pull my way up to 70% stam while still doing my job. Also look at how much stam is drained by each attacks. The dual wield boss use rapid strikes. Watch how my stam isnt dropping that whole much during this attack.

3-even if stam drains slowly, there is no way to regen it so youll get to zero and stay there.
Another false fear that people have. Not that IF you decide to block all the time, you can still manage to pull it through somehow. The armor set of the black rose give you nice stam regen while blocking. 700 stam every 5th attack blocked. People underestimate this set. Will not keep you up all the time but will definately help alot as you will last a lot longer, will pardon periods in which you cant of didnt heavy attack.

Also, shards will regen stam like monster. You will definately notice it. Having a good healer or templar dps drop these will solve all your stam *** ups and even more, allow you a smooth run. I almost think you can block 100% of the time if you run block cost redux enchants and champ passive.

Another smart way to reduce stam cost is to run dodge chance. Hist bark set, med armor ability, etc. Will give you 20% chance to completely avoid an attack and its stam cost if blocking. 1/5 attacks in the mix means near 1/5 less costs more or less.

Note also that DKs got some nice stam restoration with passives. Ill let you check it out and theorycraft on this.

Note2: have not tested it, but Im pretty sure the stats restored on hit passive in heavy armor works while blocking too.

4- I cannot use a single stam ability on my bars.
I though that after my first few pulls. But I was wrong. Although I use way more magika based abilities, the stam taunt costs nothing. Low slash is quite useful with a templar and is also managable. If course, rather use rune focus, DKs spiked armor rather than immovable. Note that the stam abilities still has to be low cost and have a long enough effects. Took caltrops outta my bar for example, although I know a tank who still runs it on its templar tank in 2.1.

I will conclude here as the post is long enough. Feel free to try to destroy my arguments as much as you want. My hope is that some tank uses this post to guide them and help them adapt, improve, evolve, make them become great tanks in 2.1. As of me, I dont mind anything that happens. Zos stated that the change is here to stay. Therefore that means Ill be a tank in high demand next patch since I was able to adapt and is able to tank all that content. Now question is, what will you do next?

Videos of tanking experiment on same content on NB tank with no shards, no dmg shield and no engin guardian
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-yG6DJ4iA0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqrVi7wfhBQ

Good Luck
Red'ak

Wing

Im glad you have tried to do your best with what was thrust upon you ^_^

I must admit your tanking style is just not for me, though I tank on a DK so slight variations.

I watched the video and I have the following comments to make:

with the amount you actually blocked it seems worthless to actually build for it, you spent a lot of time simply not blocking and using blazing shield to mitigate damage, you did as you mention die and at one point and were unable to keep only 3 mobs taunted leading to the death of one of your party members.

but you got em up eventually and continued on.

as we continue very little actual blocking, relying mostly on heals and blazing shield and your innate armor to mitigate damage. I saw a lot of light attacks in there and that is just unfortunate, they do like 0 damage least of all from a tank but you did manage to get off heavy attacks.

and then at the end you were not even necessary, you sat on the edge of the bosses aoe just strafe walking back and forth a few times unable to contribute in any meaningful way.

T_T

in the end I appreciate that you did in fact try to be the tank, but it looked so disappointing that if I was new and saw that I would never touch tanking.

I did give you an awesome for trying and I hope you continue to make it work! im deeply sorry for what ZoS has done to you and us all.

BuggeX

I already Tanked all Vet Dungeons, vDSA and AA/HR with my DK and his 350 Stam Reg, well its not 0 but low enough to say all Dungeons on the live atm are doable with 0 Stam reg while block.


The passive from DK to restore 7% Stamina when use a eard spell is the key.

with 10k Stamina, my DK has 14k, you can restore 700 Stamina when you use your ignious shild.
The only think you will need is a good magicka regen.

Sharmony

I entirely agree with this post from what all my friends have tested on the PTS while I was hiding away counting numbers... Moreover, they informed me it's still possible to do some form of dps while tanking, like it is currently, which was an added bonus!

Kupoking

Wing wrote: »

Im glad you have tried to do your best with what was thrust upon you ^_^

I must admit your tanking style is just not for me, though I tank on a DK so slight variations.

with the amount you actually blocked it seems worthless to actually build for it, you spent a lot of time simply not blocking and using blazing shield to mitigate damage, you did as you mention die and at one point and were unable to keep only 3 mobs taunted leading to the death of one of your party members.

as we continue very little actual blocking, relying mostly on heals and blazing shield and your innate armor to mitigate damage. I saw a lot of light attacks in there and that is just unfortunate, they do like 0 damage least of all from a tank but you did manage to get off heavy attacks.

I did give you an awesome for trying and I hope you continue to make it work! im deeply sorry for what ZoS has done to you and us all.

You know, Tanking isnt just about blocking hits.

Somethimes just taking aggro and position yourself in a manner nobody gets hit is a good way to Tank. Of course Ill use other means to block damage other than blocking. Those are my tools.

That being said the video was to show the percpective of how you can get from zero (more like 20% stam) to 70% stam after a death and block costs from hard hitting attack. And believe me, those 3 dudes hit hard.

As of the light attacks, they are heavy attack I had to not complete because I'm still learning and expected a big hit. Very hard to split your attention in between 3 bosses and your own ressources at the same time while keeping aggro of everything. Tried to find my pase to be able to heavy attack in for stam. Was my 1st time tanking them, the learning curve was pretty steep.

Apokh

WITCHCRAFT! BURN HIM!!!!


T(h)anks so much @houimetub17_ESO ! Finally ONE to come around with factes and not fiction. I doubt it will convince the troll-faction but it will be hard for them to refute.

@Wing although you try to dismante the OP it does not change the ke messages in thes thread i guess. Sure he did avoid blocking over vey long times of the fight - but if you can do better... no prob. DKs have more survivability as a Templar has - so the consens could be when a temp gets it tanked, you DKs *bows deep* will easily do But his contribution is worth much more than the theoriecraftiung of those "Well, I actually did´t tank by myself on pts..but I know someone, who had seen a tank who said..."

Kupoking

Apokh wrote: »

WITCHCRAFT! BURN HIM!!!!


T(h)anks so much @houimetub17_ESO ! Finally ONE to come around with factes and not fiction. I doubt it will convince the troll-faction but it will be hard for them to refute.

Kupoking

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Since Launch, could you give me a list of nerfs to tanks?

Wing

houimetub17_ESO wrote: »

Since Launch, could you give me a list of nerfs to tanks?

is there a list of eso updates somewhere?

I know we have had block cost increased a few times, bash damage reduced, damage bonuses removed, passives toned down, etc.

I don't know everything because I only in the last few months started being the tank for my group, I was dps before that. oh and heavy armor, I don't think its been nerfed recently but I think given the state of it heavy armor itself can be called a nerf LOL.

Kupoking

Go through old patch notes.

Since Launch, I cannot remember a major nerf.

But, without research I remember those buffs:

List of Buffs:
-Lower Cost to Pierce Armor/Ransack
-1.6 Rework of Heavy armor passive removing damage components, adding regen component on hit
-Upgrade to armour sets in 1.3 buffs to Whitestrake and emergence of Hist bark set.
-Update 4 in which DSA came out, therefore emergence of Footman's set.
-Champion System's reduced block cost/regen passives in update 6.
-Removal of caps, especially health, update 6.
-Buff to templar's rune focus: Reduced Cost + Effect staying for a few more seconds after eaving the circle.

Kupoking

[[Moderator Note: Removed moderated quote]
[/quote]

I am a tank, and I kind of pulled a huge, but subtle, L2P post right here.

Contraptions

@ OP,

Nice vid.

I noticed that after you were killed and resed, you were trying to heavy attack to regain stamina, which was smart. However, I also saw that you were using the Engine Guardian set, and that your healer was using the Master's Resto staff and shards too. While the heavy attacking restored a modest amount (5-8% ish) of stamina per hit, your stam bar shot up significantly the moment Engine procced. The small ticks of stam from the Master's Resto were small but significant as well. In your opinion, will the EG set be a must have for all tanks? And is a templar with MR the new must have for groups?

I also wonder if that death could have been prevented if you had blocked the entire time lol. But good job nonetheless.

Thalmor-Nordmaster

Good Game OP Nicely done and awesome video

you Improvised, adapted and overcame to situation.

Instant

houimetub17_ESO wrote: »

MaximusDargus wrote: »

houimetub17_ESO wrote: »

......
My hope is that some tank uses this post to guide them and help them adapt, improve, evolve, maie thek become great tanks in 2.1. ...

Untill ZOS will come up with another "genius" idea to make tanking "fun" and "challenging" just because some DPS whined in PVP section. Of course all for "good long therm health of game" and "we make this change because we (ZOS) are happy with it".

Yeah, lets just let ZOS take away each thing from tanks one by one, and lets all just adapt and sit idly.
A little nerf to tanks here -> L2P, Adapt, stop whining; Another nerft to tanks there-> Just adapt, over 9000 DPS claim its nothing, everyone but tanks say L2P; ZOS pulls out another nerf-> Duh, just adapt, its tanks job. Tanks should adapt to every zos nerf and stop complaining, ZOS cut off your legs and hands? Adapt! Its for good of long term health of game.

I am a tank, and I kind of pulled a huge, but subtle, L2P post right here.

I don't see how this is supposed to be a L2P post. Watching your video i see you failing in basically every aspect of tanking. The amount of support from your heal you need is incredible.

ssewallb14_ESO

Now try that on the Axes in AA HM.

nordsavage

All you did was poke and soak and pop shields, you even died. You did little in the way of damage or buffing/debuffing. All I see is that tanking will be about keeping the gas tank full instead of actively steering the fight and supplemental dps. To any true tank your video is a point against the regen nerf.

Nifty2g

post vid of mantikora or any trials

Rinmaethodain

Tanking in 2.1: it is possible:

- "LF1M healer"
Healer joins,
Healer not templar with shards
"player XYZ kicked from group"

- "LF1M healer"
Healer joins
- "healer link your weapons"
Anything but not Master Resto staff
"Player XYZ kicked from group"

All for the good of long term health of game.

Bashev

BuggeX wrote: »

I already Tanked all Vet Dungeons, vDSA and AA/HR with my DK and his 350 Stam Reg, well its not 0 but low enough to say all Dungeons on the live atm are doable with 0 Stam reg while block.


The passive from DK to restore 7% Stamina when use a eard spell is the key.

with 10k Stamina, my DK has 14k, you can restore 700 Stamina when you use your ignious shild.
The only think you will need is a good magicka regen.

It is not 7%, it is 5% and this will be the next nerfed skill for DKs. Remember my words. Cause in PvP you can use a skill every second and restore 1.5k stamina (from 30k pool) and just drain your opponents stamina while you block everything. When they dont have resources you can kill them and then they will cry in the forums.

Armitas

My problem with this update to blocking was never about tanking, or even permablockers in PvP. My problem with this change is that to reach the people at the permablocking end of the spectrum, they have to hurt everyone else along the way. This is the consequence to a 0 cap system. Everyone pays for the people at the far end of the spectrum.

There are ways to hit the people at the end without hitting everyone in between, but they take much more effort, and it's easier for the player base to bare the weight of the 0 cap system.

In a magicka build I have nothing to support break free, dodge roll (now nerfed), or block. I can't build far into stamina regen because I'm in a magicka build and yet I need all of these things to survive because I get CC'd every 5 seconds in Cyrodiil and rooted halfway in between. I used to be able to rely on WW to give me stamina recovery for free and now thats gone and I have nothing for stam recovery in DK except an already nerfed battle roar, and a 5% max stam return in a magicka build that will necessarily have low max stamina and nothing in my nord racial for stamina either. All this on a Class that is built for S/B. I can't even bash without losing stamina recovery. I just wish they would consider every person they have to run over just to get the guy at the end of the road.

Kupoking

Contraptions wrote: »

@ OP,

Nice vid.

I noticed that after you were killed and resed, you were trying to heavy attack to regain stamina, which was smart. However, I also saw that you were using the Engine Guardian set, and that your healer was using the Master's Resto staff and shards too. While the heavy attacking restored a modest amount (5-8% ish) of stamina per hit, your stam bar shot up significantly the moment Engine procced. The small ticks of stam from the Master's Resto were small but significant as well. In your opinion, will the EG set be a must have for all tanks? And is a templar with MR the new must have for groups?

I also wonder if that death could have been prevented if you had blocked the entire time lol. But good job nonetheless.

I place that in the Theroycrafting Department for the Engine Guardian.

Wanted to test if it was good or not due to the change and it is. Its like the Black Rose set. Its a question of preference I think.

Like you said, Shards regen stam like crazy. BUT if my healer isnt great on shards, I might consider E.G.

Personally, on templar: I go with E.G since I cant regen stam like DK does by using Igneous Shiled every 5-10 secs.<<

Still is a solid theorycrafting option for stam regen, glad you pointed it out.

Kupoking

ssewallb14_ESO wrote: »

Now try that on the Axes in AA HM.

Their attack speed is so slow its laughable. Can use jabs in between for trolling purposes.

Kupoking

nordsavage wrote: »

All you did was poke and soak and pop shields, you even died. You did little in the way of damage or buffing/debuffing. All I see is that tanking will be about keeping the gas tank full instead of actively steering the fight and supplemental dps. To any true tank your video is a point against the regen nerf.

You know what, you sound like you didnt even test this dungeon out in vet mode. Go ahead and do it before you can come here and lecture me.

Instant

houimetub17_ESO wrote: »

ssewallb14_ESO wrote: »

Now try that on the Axes in AA HM.

Their attack speed is so slow its laughable. Can use jabs in between for trolling purposes.

I guess you have a heal constantly spamming healing spring on you, no?

Kupoking

MaximusDargus wrote: »

Tanking in 2.1: it is possible:

- "LF1M healer"
Healer joins,
Healer not templar with shards
"player XYZ kicked from group"

- "LF1M healer"
Healer joins
- "healer link your weapons"
Anything but not Master Resto staff
"Player XYZ kicked from group"

All for the good of long term health of game.

If your healer has no shards, you could have a templar dps use it.

If not, use engine guardian/black rose.

Did the same boss 3 times with 3 different class tanking. In this video I had a healer with master resto staff but in the 2 other cases I had none since we had to sue templar and resto staff was inaccessible. Cleared in all 3 occasions that boss.

Also, didnt run E.G the two other tiems to test the new Helm/Shoulder with spell resist.

Never used the black rose once.

Kupoking

Nifty2g wrote: »

post vid of mantikora or any trials

Trying to setup a raid of experienced ppl for PTS Serpent. Kinda hard to organize right now. If I do and fix my OBS, I'll try to make one.

Kupoking

Instant wrote: »

houimetub17_ESO wrote: »

ssewallb14_ESO wrote: »

Now try that on the Axes in AA HM.

Their attack speed is so slow its laughable. Can use jabs in between for trolling purposes.

I guess you have a heal constantly spamming healing spring on you, no?

90% of tank does. If I would run it with only 1 Healer, Would not be doing it with biting jabs. Would most likely slot a heal myself, use engine guardian, ask for a dps templar 1 or 2 spears every 10 secs or so.

But there is a way to block only their huge and slow attacks.

AhPook_Is_Here

houimetub17_ESO wrote: »

MaximusDargus wrote: »

Tanking in 2.1: it is possible:

- "LF1M healer"
Healer joins,
Healer not templar with shards
"player XYZ kicked from group"

- "LF1M healer"
Healer joins
- "healer link your weapons"
Anything but not Master Resto staff
"Player XYZ kicked from group"

All for the good of long term health of game.

If your healer has no shards, you could have a templar dps use it.

If not, use engine guardian/black rose.

Did the same boss 3 times with 3 different class tanking. In this video I had a healer with master resto staff but in the 2 other cases I had none since we had to sue templar and resto staff was inaccessible. Cleared in all 3 occasions that boss.

Also, didnt run E.G the two other tiems to test the new Helm/Shoulder with spell resist.

Never used the black rose once.

But then you would still need another templar dps to toss shards for the templar dps and repentance, otherwise the first templar dps won't do any dps without shards.

Personally I was thinking about just tanking in medium with caltrops, inner beast, roots and retreating maneuvers with a bow. Going to get a laugh out of DPS adapting to that, since stacking mobs up in one place is such boring game play, it will give them a chance to have some fun chasing things around in circles.

Instant

houimetub17_ESO wrote: »

Instant wrote: »

houimetub17_ESO wrote: »

ssewallb14_ESO wrote: »

Now try that on the Axes in AA HM.

Their attack speed is so slow its laughable. Can use jabs in between for trolling purposes.

I guess you have a heal constantly spamming healing spring on you, no?

90% of tank does. If I would run it with only 1 Healer, Would not be doing it with biting jabs. Would most likely slot a heal myself, use engine guardian, ask for a dps templar 1 or 2 spears every 10 secs or so.

But there is a way to block only their huge and slow attacks.

Synergies have a 20s cooldown afaik.
And yes of course there is a way but it's pointless because as soon as there are 3 axes because you won't get a single regen tick.

Kupoking

AhPook_Is_Here wrote: »

houimetub17_ESO wrote: »

MaximusDargus wrote: »

Tanking in 2.1: it is possible:

- "LF1M healer"
Healer joins,
Healer not templar with shards
"player XYZ kicked from group"

- "LF1M healer"
Healer joins
- "healer link your weapons"
Anything but not Master Resto staff
"Player XYZ kicked from group"

All for the good of long term health of game.

If your healer has no shards, you could have a templar dps use it.

If not, use engine guardian/black rose.

Did the same boss 3 times with 3 different class tanking. In this video I had a healer with master resto staff but in the 2 other cases I had none since we had to sue templar and resto staff was inaccessible. Cleared in all 3 occasions that boss.

Also, didnt run E.G the two other tiems to test the new Helm/Shoulder with spell resist.

Never used the black rose once.

But then you would still need another templar dps to toss shards for the templar dps and repentance, otherwise the first templar dps won't do any dps without shards.

Personally I was thinking about just tanking in medium with caltrops, inner beast, roots and retreating maneuvers with a bow. Going to get a laugh out of DPS adapting to that, since stacking mobs up in one place is such boring game play, it will give them a chance to have some fun chasing things around in circles.

Well, you would need constant shards if you tanks is not experienced and must be blocking most of the time. Good tanks will get to know how to manage their stam. I kind of gave the ''worst case scenario'' build/setup.

Note that you can kite even with a traditional tank build set up. Moving away from channeling bosses is an example, the time he takes to run back to you is time you an spend not blocking and not taking hits.

Caltrops for trash is a good one except with its huge costs it should take practice to keep it up while managing stam. But Talons is a great tool for trash (I use it a LOT on my DK in 2.1) you ''park'' enemies away from you and group mates.

Note also: some attack out there will hit you through block for 100% damage (like gots) or are ranged. You could get easily one shotted while running around kiting.

AhPook_Is_Here

Instant wrote: »

houimetub17_ESO wrote: »

Instant wrote: »

houimetub17_ESO wrote: »

ssewallb14_ESO wrote: »

Now try that on the Axes in AA HM.

Their attack speed is so slow its laughable. Can use jabs in between for trolling purposes.

I guess you have a heal constantly spamming healing spring on you, no?

90% of tank does. If I would run it with only 1 Healer, Would not be doing it with biting jabs. Would most likely slot a heal myself, use engine guardian, ask for a dps templar 1 or 2 spears every 10 secs or so.

But there is a way to block only their huge and slow attacks.

Synergies have a 20s cooldown afaik.
And yes of course there is a way but it's pointless because as soon as there are 3 axes because you won't get a single regen tick.

Try sorc tank wtih perma run buff, range taunt and bow and just kite the slow axes. pretty sure you can't snare them but they don't move that fast. You don't want a 2nd tank, will be a huge waste of dps.