Official Tanking Feedback Thread

Personofsecrets

Let's keep it up folks tell your tanking friends to post.

Ffastyl

PUGing a few early dungeons yesterday has reminded of part of the fun that's missing from endgame tanking, which I believe I have already touched upon in my original post: the necessity to block. In the earlier dungeons, blocking is something done for heavy attacks or when you cannot get out of the red in time. No matter the enemy, blocking is not required for every attack. This allows me to do something, such as party buffing, enemy debuffing, damage and/or heal.

It is partially to do with Heavy Armor's current state, the option to not block for any encounter in endgame is not there. For Dragonknights it can be there for about 10 seconds, due to the Magma Armor ultimate. The other classes have no such break.

Invictus13

I'm a dedicated PvE DK tank from the start of TESO playing on PC. I'm focusing trial content and am currently tanking vet MoL with my guildies and loving it.

1. What do you like best about tanking in ESO?
The tanking in TESO is more challenging than most MMO I've played as a tank, and that's a good point.
Having to block, to effectively reduce damage is nice. In short, having to interact actively during the fight.

2. What do you like least about tanking in ESO?
Packs with a lot mobs, single target taunt is a pain in those situations
Ressouce management when being low CP
Crappy tanking sets.. not a lot of choice there...

3. What is your favorite encounter to tank?
The Warrior in Vet HRC is very fun, boss placement makes this fight interesting and calls for a lot a situational awareness.
The Serpent trial was also fun before the full burst strats made it all about DPS.
The 1rst and 2nd boss of vet MoL are a lot of fun as well, I have yet to try the last boss in vet mode.
In general, boss placement is a good element to have in a boss fight, makes it interesting for the tank to have a job to do besides tanking punches.

4. What is your least favorite encounter to tank?
Definitly ranged tanking, such as Darkshade Cavern last boss. Sooooo boring.
Packs with 5+ mobs : I have to get in a frenzy of taunts that is ridiculous and not fun at all. just like in the normal dungeons.


5. Of the tools you have for tanking, which is your favorite?
Puncture and Defensive postures are excellent. I have them on both my bars.
I love the DK skillline for tanking, definitly suited for this role.
Heavy armor is a must, but it is only suited for tanking, it's a shame not to have heavy armor dps in raids.

6. Of the tools you have for tanking, which would you like to see improved the most?
No short duration AoE taunt (4-5 sec only).
Inner Fire needs a complete rewamp, who cares about a synergy on this skill ? Most tanks I know of do not even morph this skill.
Some of the 1H/Shield could be improved : I would love a low slash or invasion morph giving a short duration AoE taunt, would make some packs more fun.
The sets, the sets, and the sets !!! Basically, as tank I want :
- Pure health
- armor/spell resistance
- damage mitigation
- ultimate
- magicka regen
- block cost reduction since stam regen doesn't count for nothing
Please keep this in mind when designing PvE tanking sets. For a long time the BiS were Hist/Footman, now it is all about ultimate (heavy agressive warhorn spamming machine for MoL...) and none of the PvE tanking set have ever been effectively used in PvE HL. Not having worthy PvE loots is a damn shame, what's the reward of killing those big monsters ?
Also trinkets/ring/sword/shield sets would be nice, if designed effectively for tanking (ex : max health spell resist, armor, and chance to regen 9 ulti when blocking a hit) : That would be sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet !

I hope my ranting will be somehow of use to you Zenimax

Ffastyl

Invictus13 wrote: »

The sets, the sets, and the sets !!! Basically, as tank I want :
- Pure health
- armor/spell resistance
- damage mitigation
- ultimate
- magicka regen
- block cost reduction since stam regen doesn't count for nothing

One of the sets I have been looking for that is nowhere in the game is one with Health Recovery, Magicka Recovery as the 2 and 3 piece sets. With Endurance and either Morkuldin or Willow's Path, I have enough Stamina Recovery for my needs but am left lacking in Magicka Recovery (can always use more Health Recovery). There are sets with Stamina Recovery, Magicka Recovery and Health Recovery, Stamina Recovery yet no Health Recovery, Magicka Recovery in the 2/3 slots.

paulsimonps

So something else I have seen people mention and something that is often brought up in PvP more so than in PvE but still something tanks needs to think about is damage mitigation. So to explain it a bit I was thinking of listing all possible sources for increased damage mitigations and then what the hypothetical max would be and how that is calculated. Now I might have missed a few sources but these are those that I can remember of hand.

No blocking needed:

Resistance ~33150 Resist is cap so ~663 is 1% 0-50% = 0.5
Nord Passive Rugged 6% = 0.94
Minor Maim (applied on target) 15% = 0.85
Minor protection 8% = 0.92
Veil of Blade(basically Major Protection but never called that) 30% = 0.70
Nova (Major Maim, same as with Veil) 30% = 0.70

Blocking needed:

Blocking 50% = 0.5
One hand and shield passive Sword and Board 20% = 0.80
One hand and shield passive Deflect Bolt (only projectile) 15% = 0.85
Defensive Posture & Morphs 8% = 0.92
Dragonknight passive Iron Skin 10% = 0.9
Templar passive Spear wall (only melee) 15% = 0.85
Footman's fortune 12% = 0.88

To calculate how much any combination of mitigations are in total take the decimal number shown here and multiply them with each other and you will get the decimal form of how many percent of the original is left after all the mitigation has been applied. So as an example a DK blocking with Defensive posture, footman and capped resist would be:
0.5x0.5x0.9x0.92x0.88= 0.145728 which would mean only ~14.5% of the original is left aka ~85.5% got mitigated

Something to note is that getting to 80% mitigation is really simple and all you need is to block with capped resist with sword and board and that is a flat 80% mitigation. Now most people don't have capped resists but a small minor main and a defensive posture can usually pick up the slack. As well as you will notice as well there are severe diminishing returns on this and stacking to many of these would simply be a waste of resources.

The highest theoretical mitigation scenario I can come up with with these are using all of these listed with the exception of the templar passive and deflect bolt. So we are a DK Nord with a allied Templar and Nightblade that gives us Nova and Veil and we got capped resist and Footman's Fortune with all skills needed for the rest that would total to:

0.5x0.5x0.94x0.85x0.92x0.70x0.7x0.80x0.92x0.9x0.88=0.0524896 aka 94.75% total mitigation.

Due note that that would only last for about 10sec and after that the Veil and Nova would run out and they cant be sustained and also the Circle of protection which is the minor protection also costs a lot so it would also go fast and be unsustainable.

TL;DR or in conclusion: People complain that there are to few things to up damage mitigation and I say no there are plenty of stuff to use and stacking too many of them is a waste of time and resources.

BEZDNA

1. What do you like best about tanking in ESO?

What i like the most that it is not that simple as most ppl think. When you dive deeply into tanking you realise that you can not only be just a simple "damage sponge" as ZOS_Finn sad, but there are also lots of things you can do like providing buffes to your groups, debuffing enemies, rooting, dpsing, searching for best way for positioning even healing. I like that there are so many different ways to build your tank and they all can be very unique!

2. What do you like least about tanking in ESO?

That fact that you don't necessarily need tank in a ESO. From my personal experience with a good group you don't need tank (a player who specifically built himself for tanking) to complete any type of group content, furthermore in most cases going with 4 dps is the most beneficial way of doing dungeons. But that is more PvE dificulty issue, then a tanking one. Thanks ZoS new trial on vet mode looks challenging for now!

Then it comes to tanking specifically, i don't like that there is no some sort "hold agro" ability and no stamina while blocking, that is a huge limitations to many existing tanking builds which makes as much sense as no magicka/stamina recovery while dpsing.

3. What is your favorite encounter to tank?

Here is an example of how far can experienced players push definition of being a tank in ESO. That is a true story about the best tank i ever saw David Zero One, who sadly quited the game, but he's tanking skills remain to be a role model for me and whole my guild. We wanted to get top 1 spot in vDSA leaderbords and made a group of 4 DKs, 3 magica full dps with zero self healing and sustain and 1 DK stamina tank. As a Tank David was taunting every single ad on a battle field, chainpulling all ranged ads, he was providing us War Horn and speed buff when needed, keeping alive whole group with just igneous shield and vigor and on top of that he was applying Elemental Drain on big ads and bosses from his swap bar. That is a perfect example of how complicated tanking can be!

4. What is your least favorite encounter to tank?

The Planar Inhibitor and The Engine Guardian

5. Of the tools you have for tanking, which is your favorite?

Extended Chains!!! These skill used to be my the most favorite skill in the whole game, until ZoS implemented too high / to low restrictions. That change ruined all the fun of Chain Pull both in PvE and PvP. Likely ZoS seems to pay attention to our requests lately and with the upcoming changes to Fire Grip and it's morphs, i cross my fingers and hope that one day they will get rid of that restriction (But ofc will take care about still not being able to pull people into keep walls in Cyrodiil).

6. Of the tools you have for tanking, which would you like to see improved the most?

There are a few actually i can think off:

First, as i sad above my favorite tanking tool is Extended Chains. When it comes to competitive raiding, DK tank is your obvious top and only chose mostly because of there ability to pull ads, what saves a lot of time and make many different tactics much easy to implement. I feel that it is totally unfair for all the other cases to not have access to same tink of tanking tool. So what i suggest is please make Fighters Guild skill Silver Leash work on all types of enemies, not only on undead and daedra as it is right now.

Second, there is one tanking tool that i miss in ESO and it is a small AoE RETAUNT ability. I have to make it clear here, I don't want ZoS to implement AoE taunt, no, i actually like that there is no such ability in a game, but there are often situations when i have more then 5-7 ads on me as a tank, especially in a new trial (i do a lot of tanking on pts atm) and it is extremely hard to constantly hold agro of all of them due to many reasons (targeting - usually you can't see anything when you have that many ads, resource limitation due to no stam regen while blocking, wery hard to keep track of agro on all enemies at the same time and do other tanking work like positioning, debuffing, resource management etc). So what i ask for is an ability in an Undaunted tree, which would retaunt (taunt will be only aplied to those enemies who are alredy afected by taunt ability and still do have agro on a caster) all enemies (6 target cap) in a small radius of 5 meters around caster. The cost of these ability could be significantly higher then usual puncture/inner fire - like 3 times higher (numbers can be tweaked i'm not an expert in that). So basically with these ability you will not be able to taunt enemies but that would give you a tool to hold agro.

Thierd, ability to regenerate stamina while blocking if you have 5 parts of heavy armor slotted. I know it is a very debatable issue, but for me personally no stamina recovery while blocking is a huge limitation in what i can do as a tank. If as a tank you only taunt 1-2 enemies and then hold block till the end of a fights, it's not an issue, but when it comes to the high lvl tanikng skill when you single target taunt almost everything that moves around and keep holding agro till the end of a fight, chainpull ranged ads, root or snare the who battle field, take care about poisoning, provide buffs to your group and debuffs on enemies to maximize group dps outpu not having recovery on one of you main stats is a HUGE limitation to what tank can be (and used to be in a past). And on top of that I think that heavy armor need a serious buff, so allowing steam recovery while wearing heavy seems to be a good move in general.

Helluin

hrothbern wrote: »

Lefty_Lucy wrote: »

What about PvP tanking? I might be fooling myself hoping that this angle is even considered, but I miss having flexibility in PvP as a tank.

After update 1.5 I haven't found a good reason to use Heavy Armor in PvP, and that breaks my heart. I love tanking, but when medium armor offers 75% of the resistances as heavy armor (along with significantly better passive abilities), why even run heavy armor in PvP?

Why is it that I don't feel like a tank when I put metal armor on my face and chest? I can't even feel a difference in tankiness in PvP between Heavy and Medium builds.

I want to have PvP tank build options other than high health regen. I made an Imperial to be tanky, so I can't even optimize these high health regen builds. My race choice and armor choice is just plain garbage in PvP compared to the other options. Why?...

Heavy Armor should not be only 25% tankier than medium armor. The difference should be significant. Either that, or the passives should be useful. The passives were almost competetive with the other armor types in update 1.5 (Constitution was stronger, and we had a CC break cost reduction passive too). I shouldn't have to make 12 different build decisions outside of wearing armor made of steel (instead of cow skin) in order to actually feel tanky in PvP. I didn't have to do this in update 1.5. Now there's just no reason to run Heavy in PvP.

Agree, that PVP balancing of HA must go also in the overhaul of Tanks, the overhaul of HA, S&B.

Making HA suitable for tanking in PVP will be much more difficult.
three big technical reasons imo are:

1. The resource issue of HA: LA/MA give a good resource platform allowing to use a wide variety of sets doing something special.
2. The penetration issue of HA: Vanilla HA, without Reinforced, Armor Resist sets, offers hardly more Armor Resist. Without passives LA<->HA is 7.5k<->15k. Including Resist/Penetration passives this becomes 10k<->12.5k !!! (the free 5k spell penetration of LA is not balanced with the 2.5k Armor Resist passive of HA). The other kinds of Spell penetration from CP, weapons, abilities are balanced... but NOT the LA<->HA passives !!!)
3. The HA synergy with Block, Bracing, has less value: In PVE NPC's attack every 2 seconds. In PVP this is every second AND incl weaving up to 2 attacks per second. This makes Blocking a less frequent occurence (very expensive if countered) and therefore the value of Bracing is much lower. All the more a reason why taking away the cost reduction of HA for Break Free was so detrimental.

The non-technical reason why making HA viable for PVP is more difficult is that it will stir up emotions around "unkillable" builds.

Coming back on this vanilla comparison of a LA-HA fight, whereby the vanilla effective Resist is 10k<->12.5k.
(comparing 7/7 LA with 7/7 HA. when LA goes 6-1 with HA Chest, the difference becomes even smaller !!!)
THIS MUST BE ADRESSED.
I think that the rate of 2:3:4 of LA:MA:HA is fine, but should be applied to the Armor INCLUDING the static passives (incl static Penetration)
So back to LA<->HA "as is":
Without passives: LA:HA is 7.5k:15k, the official statement of the 2:4 rate between LA and HA.
Including the passives increasing Resist, Spell Warding 2.5k and Resolve 2.5k, this becomes 10k:17.5k
Including 5k Spell penetration from passive Concentration, this becomes 10k:12.5k

My suggestion for the "to be" is:
Without passives: LA:HA is 7.5k:20k
Including passives increasing Resist, Spell Warding 2.5k and Resolve 5k, this becomes 10k:25k.
Including 5k Spell penetration from LA passive Concentration, this becomes 10k:20k.
So... "overall", only from static Armor effects, the rate of Resistance between LA and HA becomes now 10k:20k, or 2:4.

This suggestion is factual not asking for more... it is factual getting what ZOS stated as the difference between LA and HA !!!


On this 2:4 base, builds can add more penetration or more resist from CP's, from traits, from abilities, that are consistently balanced, because there is a plus for every minus.

I agree with your points of view and partially with some suggestions PvP wise.
Imho the rate 2:3:4 for LA:MA:HA is not really fine and that's the difference with many other games.
Considering Damage Shields, Dodge Roll and improved Block we see that just the last two had big changements.
Without a changement to Damage Shields, MA could gain Minor Evasion (5% dodge) when using a MA set, HA could gain or a partial stamina recovery while blocking (at least in PvP since there players can weave and so a tank blocks more attacks) or a buff to Constitution.
Otherwise, since LA provides too much armor/spell res when compared to MA and especially HA, according to me a rate 1:2:3 could be better.

spoqster

BEZDNA wrote: »

1. What do you like best about tanking in ESO?

What i like the most that it is not that simple as most ppl think. When you dive deeply into tanking you realise that you can not only be just a simple "damage sponge" as ZOS_Finn sad, but there are also lots of things you can do like providing buffes to your groups, debuffing enemies, rooting, dpsing, searching for best way for positioning even healing. I like that there are so many different ways to build your tank and they all can be very unique!

2. What do you like least about tanking in ESO?

That fact that you don't necessarily need tank in a ESO. From my personal experience with a good group you don't need tank (a player who specifically built himself for tanking) to complete any type of group content, furthermore in most cases going with 4 dps is the most beneficial way of doing dungeons. But that is more PvE dificulty issue, then a tanking one. Thanks ZoS new trial on vet mode looks challenging for now!

Then it comes to tanking specifically, i don't like that there is no some sort "hold agro" ability and no stamina while blocking, that is a huge limitations to many existing tanking builds which makes as much sense as no magicka/stamina recovery while dpsing.

3. What is your favorite encounter to tank?

Here is an example of how far can experienced players push definition of being a tank in ESO. That is a true story about the best tank i ever saw David Zero One, who sadly quited the game, but he's tanking skills remain to be a role model for me and whole my guild. We wanted to get top 1 spot in vDSA leaderbords and made a group of 4 DKs, 3 magica full dps with zero self healing and sustain and 1 DK stamina tank. As a Tank David was taunting every single ad on a battle field, chainpulling all ranged ads, he was providing us War Horn and speed buff when needed, keeping alive whole group with just igneous shield and vigor and on top of that he was applying Elemental Drain on big ads and bosses from his swap bar. That is a perfect example of how complicated tanking can be!

4. What is your least favorite encounter to tank?

The Planar Inhibitor and The Engine Guardian

5. Of the tools you have for tanking, which is your favorite?

Extended Chains!!! These skill used to be my the most favorite skill in the whole game, until ZoS implemented too high / to low restrictions. That change ruined all the fun of Chain Pull both in PvE and PvP. Likely ZoS seems to pay attention to our requests lately and with the upcoming changes to Fire Grip and it's morphs, i cross my fingers and hope that one day they will get rid of that restriction (But ofc will take care about still not being able to pull people into keep walls in Cyrodiil).

6. Of the tools you have for tanking, which would you like to see improved the most?

There are a few actually i can think off:

First, as i sad above my favorite tanking tool is Extended Chains. When it comes to competitive raiding, DK tank is your obvious top and only chose mostly because of there ability to pull ads, what saves a lot of time and make many different tactics much easy to implement. I feel that it is totally unfair for all the other cases to not have access to same tink of tanking tool. So what i suggest is please make Fighters Guild skill Silver Leash work on all types of enemies, not only on undead and daedra as it is right now.

Second, there is one tanking tool that i miss in ESO and it is a small AoE RETAUNT ability. I have to make it clear here, I don't want ZoS to implement AoE taunt, no, i actually like that there is no such ability in a game, but there are often situations when i have more then 5-7 ads on me as a tank, especially in a new trial (i do a lot of tanking on pts atm) and it is extremely hard to constantly hold agro of all of them due to many reasons (targeting - usually you can't see anything when you have that many ads, resource limitation due to no stam regen while blocking, wery hard to keep track of agro on all enemies at the same time and do other tanking work like positioning, debuffing, resource management etc). So what i ask for is an ability in an Undaunted tree, which would retaunt (taunt will be only aplied to those enemies who are alredy afected by taunt ability and still do have agro on a caster) all enemies (6 target cap) in a small radius of 5 meters around caster. The cost of these ability could be significantly higher then usual puncture/inner fire - like 3 times higher (numbers can be tweaked i'm not an expert in that). So basically with these ability you will not be able to taunt enemies but that would give you a tool to hold agro.

Thierd, ability to regenerate stamina while blocking if you have 5 parts of heavy armor slotted. I know it is a very debatable issue, but for me personally no stamina recovery while blocking is a huge limitation in what i can do as a tank. If as a tank you only taunt 1-2 enemies and then hold block till the end of a fights, it's not an issue, but when it comes to the high lvl tanikng skill when you single target taunt almost everything that moves around and keep holding agro till the end of a fight, chainpull ranged ads, root or snare the who battle field, take care about poisoning, provide buffs to your group and debuffs on enemies to maximize group dps outpu not having recovery on one of you main stats is a HUGE limitation to what tank can be (and used to be in a past). And on top of that I think that heavy armor need a serious buff, so allowing steam recovery while wearing heavy seems to be a good move in general.

Well put! I agree with everyrhing 100%.

vladimilianoub17_ESO1

Im going to make the big post later answering all the questions but for now I just want to say the the big problem with tanking in ESO at the moment is the fact that in many encounters we are not needed at all.Thats a flaw in the mechanics put in dungeons.But the real culprit is how all encounters has evolved to just DPS.People can stack so much DPS to the point that in many encounters the bosses dont even have time to do all their mechanics.Add to that the fact that those DPS have some OP survival skills and well,you end up not needing a Tank and in many cases not needing a healer.Until ZOS address that issue there is no point in modifying skills and armor ect ect.

This thread points out the big issue of tanks not needed.

http://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en-GB/discussion/249660/tanking-healing-and-dps-inflation-discuss/p1

vladimilianoub17_ESO1

Also this thread should also be stick into the General session.I didnt knew it exist until another played pointed me to it.

caperon

3. What is your favorite encounter to tank?

Not as encounter but as a mechanic, bodyblocking the projectile atacks in the last boss of imperial city prision feels great. It would be cool if more atacks coud be blocked this way, making feel you as a real wall between the danger and your teammates. The rest of the fight is kinda meh.

NBrookus

ZOS_Finn wrote: »

1. What do you like best about tanking in ESO?
2. What do you like least about tanking in ESO?
3. What is your favorite encounter to tank?
4. What is your least favorite encounter to tank?
5. Of the tools you have for tanking, which is your favorite?
6. Of the tools you have for tanking, which would you like to see improved the most?

1. The need to actively choose priorities and manage mobs, and to provide buffs and debuffs.
2. The senseless nerfs to resistance and stam regen. More on that below.
3. & 4. I love to hate Grobull. The adds are chaotic, and grabbing and CC'ing them so they can be quickly DPSed is both fun and frustrating. Otherwise I like most of the tank and spank encounters because it tests my mitigation and resource management... plus standing in fire and laughing at it is fun. Provided your healer has your back.
4. Planar Inhibitor. We don't expect stam blade DPS to switch up and be a full healer; that would be silly. Why should a tank have to switch on the fly to DPSing? Also any boss where I'm totally useless as a tank (Mezeluth, Engine Guardian, Volenfell, etc.)
5. Talons. Chains. Igneous Shield.
6. Heavy armor. It's a joke right now, as so many other posters have detailed. Our health stat pretty much means nothing except having high health means you get low damage... in a dungeon or out of it.

Tanks have taken so many hits lately. For all the QQ over the materials for V16 gear, tanks had to do it TWICE just to complete vWGT. You nerfed our stam regen, making many of us have to pay to respec and/or become unhealthily reliant on templars. In IC, we can tank like crazy, but we won't get as much TV. We were functionally locked out of Maelstrom unless we respec'ed again. Hakeijo is great new rune for tanks, but it's painfully expensive and difficult to farm.

Meanwhile DPS is soaring ever higher and tanking skills are left languishing and viable tanking sets are rare and/or under-leveled. I hope this thread is an indication we will get some love soon, because my tank mostly does writs and crafting anymore while I play my sorc. I'd love for her to have a good reason to come out of semi-retirement.



P.S. PC NA. And me to the list of those who don't want an AOE taunt. I prefer to prioritize and work for it.

Dubhliam

NBrookus wrote: »

... standing in fire and laughing at it is fun. Provided your healer has your back ...

I agree with everything else you said, but this is not something I agree with.
This is poor tanking and a pure indicator that the difficulty of current veteran dungeons is broken.

Also, I must point out that i very much like the no-stam recovery while blocking and would prefer to keep it that way.

Granting stamina recovery to tanks would just push both the tank role and the healing role into more DPS builds.
This should be avoided at all cost.

Instead, the devs should focus on improving HA passives and providing all classes with a skill for tanking resource management.
DKs have Helping Hands and Battle Roar passives that are doing the job fine as is.
NBs should get an improvement in the Leeching Strikes morph, to grant resource and health each time that player takes damage.
Sorcs should get an improvement in the Dark Deal morph. Perhaps make it an instant buff that grants health instantly and X stamina for each blocked attack.
Temps should get a reworked Radiant Aura morph, also dedicated to tanking. Make it that this morph grants the player a fixed amount of X stam recovery while blocking.

Also, to address the real problem of tanking in ESO: dps inflation.
I heard they might de-correlate resources with damage and I fully support that idea. Somebody mentioned that max magicka should still scale for healing, so that healers don't stack the same stats as dds, making them just another off-heal damage dealers in the group.

yake82

1. What do you like best about tanking in ESO?
Short queues

2. What do you like least about tanking in ESO?
Chaos. No aoe control or taunt. Especially when dmg dealers are not top notch, a normal trashpulls end up huge mess.


3. What is your favorite encounter to tank?
No particular encounter stand out i think.


4. What is your least favorite encounter to tank?
Untauntable bosses. Final bosses in Arx Corinium and Direfrost Keep ignore taunts. And what about Volenfell or vet Darkshade? And Planar Inhibitor....
Afaik there is no situation or mechanic that favors melee instead ranged. Tanks are almost always melee ranged.

5. Of the tools you have for tanking, which is your favorite?
Encase. Talons require player to stand in the middle of the mobs so its not as good as Encase imo.


6. Of the tools you have for tanking, which would you like to see improved the most?
-Class armor skills, can those be toggleable? Or passive like the critical buffs. Why tanks need to recast their buff while dmg dealers just need to slot Expert Hunter or Magelight?
-Templar Rune Focus, maybe other morph could be non-stationary.
-Can we have tooltip somewhere saying "your resistances mitigate xx% of incoming damage"?

There was talk making stamina DK poison based. If this was to happen then maybe Trapping Webs and Fiery Grip could swap places. Trapping webs could deal poison damage and Chains physical damage.
Maelstrom Arena has miniboss like poison Dragon Knight in Spiral Shadows, Xivilai Toxicoli. Those 2 attacks he performs could be how DK Trapping web morphs could work: frontal cone aoe or crystal blast-like poison bombard.


I play PC

elantaura

Relatively new to tanking and it's my 3rd character on console and have lots of tanking friends ( why I am doing it so they can play a DPS alt) so my experience is different as it a role I picked to help my tank friends and have listened to them and taken much on board.

1. What do you like best about tanking in ESO?
Tanks have the most friends . Seriously though I made a tank as it was needed for friends to complete content. I know several tanks and they wanted to have a go at DPS so I made one so they could. I do like being the last one alive the ability to revive etc. it is fun to be hard to kill. Being hit in pvp and sent messages why won't you die!

2. What do you like least about tanking in ESO?
Under appreciated, e.g we can run this with 3 DPS people only think to ask tanks for hard stuff.
It is painful to level, I have had epic battles with harvesters leveling and other things getting up levels.I did not have these problems with a DPS it's honestly off putting. I did it that way to level the skill and get some skill points - I can see why people change there spec, give up and get over it. I can see why people would not want to play it otherwise. I have respec to up levels and now can't tank untill I respec to come back - it's a silly situation right now.

3. What is your favorite encounter to tank?
maw of the infernal when there is a healer...its sentimantal. easy but sentimental I used to threaten to turn the tanks into his chew toy on my healer ( my healer hangs out with the tanks a lot as both are in short supply)
also we like to Drag our tanks into DSA at level 2 or 3 vet for fun as the dungeon does not level but our tanks survive (so also sentimental, initiation thing lol)
We try to look after our tanks in our group by exposing them to abuse and keep them included and interested. people struggle to find a tank I have at least 4 good tank friends I have not levelled enough to really tank as I mentioned is a PIA to level.

4. What is your least favorite encounter to tank?
Any thing where you taunt and the boss still flys about hitting others, I mean what's the point of taunting you make a skill specifically for this, then you make the bosses do there own thing anyway? And it's not just me I have had bosses fly at me with great tanks while on my NB and healer. I now belive people when they say they are taunting.

5. Of the tools you have for tanking, which is your favorite?
magma armour, to res and be invincible lol dragons blood to heal,Chains to drag in the escapes, talons to trap the annoying things (like mud crabs, banelings) I have not tried both morphs yet so sticking with those names

6. Of the tools you have for tanking, which would you like to see improved the most?
The taunt I would like to see a morph of say the undaunted magic taunt get more than one target, does not need to be Aoe and grab 15 targets but it's two targets asking that much really. why is that not an option generally I use the sword and shield one except for specific circumstances -as the undaunted one just takes a spot.
Some stam regen thought or better armour buff to not block especially after Bol nerf as.... I am guessing That means by default less shards, so that Bol can be spammed twice as much to stop the DPS dying in boss fights. I am thinking. So better resourse recovery - that's a preemptive call but we will see.
I would love for there to be something else a buff to having a tank - this is solely due to the 3 DPS mentality. For my tank friends more than me make having a tank count. Groups At times have no room for tanks... Then a few pledges later want to be friends. Drives me mad( more so for my tanky friends)

Deceptive_Yoshi

1. I love the feel of holding off a powerful enemy from my group and using my abilities to stop him from hurting my allies.
2. My damage output makes me feel like I'm not contributing much especially in fights where they randomly attack my allies despite the taunts.
3. For some reason Ash Titan is fun to me but I just like the fact that I have spinning blades of death trying to gut me.
4. Vila Theran on my v1 nightblade tank didn't feel like a good time since I don't have enough skill points to use a bow. While I did keep her taunted and help the group by not letting them get hit as much I was literally just standing there occasionally activating Defensive Stance.
5. Since the great nerf of stamina regen while blocking I've greatly enjoyed using Siphoning attacks since I can restore my stamina without relying greatly on a templar to toss me shards.
6. Vila Theran on my v1 nightblade tank didn't feel like a good time since I don't have enough skill points to use a bow. While I did keep her taunted and help the group by not letting them get hit as much I literally was just standing there occasionally activating Defensive Stance.

NBrookus

Dubhliam wrote: »

NBrookus wrote: »

... standing in fire and laughing at it is fun. Provided your healer has your back ...

I agree with everything else you said, but this is not something I agree with.
This is poor tanking and a pure indicator that the difficulty of current veteran dungeons is broken.

I think it's a lot easier on the DD's and Healer than filling the room full of fire at Maw of the Infernal, especially if damage is low. And the fight is over in half the time.

I agree that the fact I CAN stand there in Healing Springs spamming Igneous Shield is an indicator that the dungeon is really too easy for a V16 with a few hundred champion points. But this dungeon was also pretty hard once upon a time pre CP and good gear, so I I'd rather they create new, harder dungeons (that can be tanked!), or even a third "Extra Hard" version rather than lock newer players out of it.

helediron

Dubhliam wrote: »

...snip...
Also, I must point out that i very much like the no-stam recovery while blocking and would prefer to keep it that way.

Granting stamina recovery to tanks would just push both the tank role and the healing role into more DPS builds.
This should be avoided at all cost.

Instead, the devs should focus on improving HA passives and providing all classes with a skill for tanking resource management.
...snip...

That nerf led to current state where tanks are wheezing through dungeons contributing too little. What does it help to keep no-stam recovery and add resource management? That is the time sink that keep tanks tinkering with stamina.

What i want from tanking is pretty much reversal of stam regen and NB regen nerfs, so i can craft powerful PvE tank builds. That includes enough resources to support group and decent DPS, if i choose so. Yes, this is even more DPS inflation, but it is my share of it. In pledges it is surely semi-DPS builds, as in vMA. In trials it's full tank with support skills.

It is ZOS task to update old dungeons so that they can't be run in all four skirts.

paulsimonps

NBrookus wrote: »

Dubhliam wrote: »

NBrookus wrote: »

... standing in fire and laughing at it is fun. Provided your healer has your back ...

I agree with everything else you said, but this is not something I agree with.
This is poor tanking and a pure indicator that the difficulty of current veteran dungeons is broken.

I think it's a lot easier on the DD's and Healer than filling the room full of fire at Maw of the Infernal, especially if damage is low. And the fight is over in half the time.

I agree that the fact I CAN stand there in Healing Springs spamming Igneous Shield is an indicator that the dungeon is really too easy for a V16 with a few hundred champion points. But this dungeon was also pretty hard once upon a time pre CP and good gear, so I I'd rather they create new, harder dungeons (that can be tanked!), or even a third "Extra Hard" version rather than lock newer players out of it.

That dungeon was never difficult. Even before I realized that I could just stand in the fire just fine it was still easy. But I would love it if they increased the dmg by the fire a bunch forcing us to use the old strat where you moved the flames around the room to avoid it from doing a lot of dmg. Actually you wouldn't even need to increase the dmg just make them stack like the fire's from the Daedroths in vWGT.

But like people have said, even though I do it myself I hate the fact that I can do it. There needs to be a rescaling/redesigning of normal and veteran dungeons, or at the very least the veteran dungeons. Its just to simple to tank them right now cause 99% of all mechanics can either be out dps'ed or out healed to skip them completely or partially. Give us a reason to be tanks!

Dubhliam

helediron wrote: »

Dubhliam wrote: »

...snip...
Also, I must point out that i very much like the no-stam recovery while blocking and would prefer to keep it that way.

Granting stamina recovery to tanks would just push both the tank role and the healing role into more DPS builds.
This should be avoided at all cost.

Instead, the devs should focus on improving HA passives and providing all classes with a skill for tanking resource management.
...snip...

That nerf led to current state where tanks are wheezing through dungeons contributing too little. What does it help to keep no-stam recovery and add resource management? That is the time sink that keep tanks tinkering with stamina.

What i want from tanking is pretty much reversal of stam regen and NB regen nerfs, so i can craft powerful PvE tank builds. That includes enough resources to support group and decent DPS, if i choose so. Yes, this is even more DPS inflation, but it is my share of it. In pledges it is surely semi-DPS builds, as in vMA. In trials it's full tank with support skills.

It is ZOS task to update old dungeons so that they can't be run in all four skirts.

It is all about the mindset of the player playing the tank.

I contribute. A LOT.

But not with damage. I root, I snare, I debuff, I shield, I pull etc etc.

To a real tank, that kind of contribution to the group is much more rewarding than just adding a few more Ks of dps to the overall damage.

And that is the reason I get invited into groups much more often.

If ZOS did not implement so much mechanics that can just be bypassed by pure damage, this kind of contribution that tanks can provide would be the go-to meta.
Instead, every role just seeks to improve their dps even further.

ub17_ESO

ZOS_Finn wrote: »

Calling all Tanks!

The Dungeon and Gameplay teams would love to get some feedback from all of you damage sponge, block mastering, mitigation kings out there. This thread is going to mainly cover PvE encounters specifically in group dungeons or Trials. If you like to play a tank in ESO and want to have your voice heard, or you don't and want us to know why, please answer the following questions. Please make sure you mention if you primarily play on console or PC.

1. What do you like best about tanking in ESO?
2. What do you like least about tanking in ESO?
3. What is your favorite encounter to tank?
4. What is your least favorite encounter to tank?
5. Of the tools you have for tanking, which is your favorite?
6. Of the tools you have for tanking, which would you like to see improved the most?

Thanks a lot for your feedback. We look forward to hearing what you have to say!

I play on PC

1. easier to find a group, something different to do....playing all the roles makes you better at the game, tanking will make you a better healer, healing will make you a better dps, dps will make you have more fun p)
2. not many fun fights with the exception of the ash titan and valkyn skoria, i have not tanked wgt or icp but I will say the vast majority of vet dungeons are all tank and spank, hold block eat shards keep taunt up yawn...
3. by far for me the ash titan and valkyn skoria in vCoA are fun fights! Also the last fight in vDSA very fun!
4. nothing sticks out as OMG i hate that fight...
5. hard to pick one favorite...if i had to pick a #1 and I have tanked with all but sorc, DK chains is king kong in this zoo! there are other strong skills, repentance, blazing shield, sap essence, blur, channled focus,talons, etc
6. i have tried to use silver leash as a poor mans chains and it is very clunky...how about you remove the silly 2nd click and just give me stamina chains!! I miss blinding flash soo much, my favorite templar skill that in conjunction with i cinder storm or maybe it was the other morph of the ability, but stacking nps miss chance was super strong and good in pvp too. Templar really lacks an AOE CC, dont count spears...

WolfingHour

helediron wrote: »

Dubhliam wrote: »

...snip...
Also, I must point out that i very much like the no-stam recovery while blocking and would prefer to keep it that way.

Granting stamina recovery to tanks would just push both the tank role and the healing role into more DPS builds.
This should be avoided at all cost.

Instead, the devs should focus on improving HA passives and providing all classes with a skill for tanking resource management.
...snip...

That nerf led to current state where tanks are wheezing through dungeons contributing too little. What does it help to keep no-stam recovery and add resource management? That is the time sink that keep tanks tinkering with stamina.

What i want from tanking is pretty much reversal of stam regen and NB regen nerfs, so i can craft powerful PvE tank builds. That includes enough resources to support group and decent DPS, if i choose so. Yes, this is even more DPS inflation, but it is my share of it. In pledges it is surely semi-DPS builds, as in vMA. In trials it's full tank with support skills.

It is ZOS task to update old dungeons so that they can't be run in all four skirts.

The nerf to sta regen had nothing to do with dps. I have no doubt that it had to do with PvP. Im not saying a change in pvp was not necessary, but it did throw many tanks builds, especially the stamina ones, under a bus.

#neverforget lol

paulsimonps

WolfingHour wrote: »

helediron wrote: »

Dubhliam wrote: »

...snip...
Also, I must point out that i very much like the no-stam recovery while blocking and would prefer to keep it that way.

Granting stamina recovery to tanks would just push both the tank role and the healing role into more DPS builds.
This should be avoided at all cost.

Instead, the devs should focus on improving HA passives and providing all classes with a skill for tanking resource management.
...snip...

That nerf led to current state where tanks are wheezing through dungeons contributing too little. What does it help to keep no-stam recovery and add resource management? That is the time sink that keep tanks tinkering with stamina.

What i want from tanking is pretty much reversal of stam regen and NB regen nerfs, so i can craft powerful PvE tank builds. That includes enough resources to support group and decent DPS, if i choose so. Yes, this is even more DPS inflation, but it is my share of it. In pledges it is surely semi-DPS builds, as in vMA. In trials it's full tank with support skills.

It is ZOS task to update old dungeons so that they can't be run in all four skirts.

The nerf to sta regen had nothing to do with dps. I have no doubt that it had to do with PvP. Im not saying a change in pvp was not necessary, but it did throw many tanks builds, especially the stamina ones, under a bus.

#neverforget lol

I'm a stamina tank and the removal of stamina regen while blocking actually opened me up to more ideas of how to be a stam tank that I'm actually a lot more successful while tanking now compared to before the removal of the regen.

dodgehopper_ESO

Lefty_Lucy wrote: »

What about PvP tanking? I might be fooling myself hoping that this angle is even considered, but I miss having flexibility in PvP as a tank.

After update 1.5 I haven't found a good reason to use Heavy Armor in PvP, and that breaks my heart. I love tanking, but when medium armor offers 75% of the resistances as heavy armor (along with significantly better passive abilities), why even run heavy armor in PvP?

Why is it that I don't feel like a tank when I put metal armor on my face and chest? I can't even feel a difference in tankiness in PvP between Heavy and Medium builds.

I want to have PvP tank build options other than high health regen. I made an Imperial to be tanky, so I can't even optimize these high health regen builds. My race choice and armor choice is just plain garbage in PvP compared to the other options. Why?...

Heavy Armor should not be only 25% tankier than medium armor. The difference should be significant. Either that, or the passives should be useful. The passives were almost competetive with the other armor types in update 1.5 (Constitution was stronger, and we had a CC break cost reduction passive too). I shouldn't have to make 12 different build decisions outside of wearing armor made of steel (instead of cow skin) in order to actually feel tanky in PvP. I didn't have to do this in update 1.5. Now there's just no reason to run Heavy in PvP.

I did the same thing as you Lefty. I play an Imperial Templar Tank, who is really just a Imperial Stamplar in leather. I don't like the notion that we are expected to respect every time we move back and forth between PvE an PvP. I don't like Heavy Armor at all really, @hrothbern above made some excellent points about that issue in this thread, regarding why the numbers side by side are ridiculous. I feel like in this game for every 1 unit of mitigation you receive, they take away 3 units of damage output. Its not balanced at all. I'm also frustrated that some people have this throw out the baby with the bathwater outlook with regard to pvp. This is very frustrating to me because really I suspect most players do both. They really ought to balance pve around pvp, in the way DCUO did. I've said it before but I really like how they did that in that game.

One of the biggest complaints I have with Templar as well is that while mitigation in general has taken a back seat, the Templar class itself has the worst proper mitigation possible (mostly because of its BoL I suspect).

paulsimonps wrote: »

WolfingHour wrote: »

helediron wrote: »

Dubhliam wrote: »

...snip...
Also, I must point out that i very much like the no-stam recovery while blocking and would prefer to keep it that way.

Granting stamina recovery to tanks would just push both the tank role and the healing role into more DPS builds.
This should be avoided at all cost.

Instead, the devs should focus on improving HA passives and providing all classes with a skill for tanking resource management.
...snip...

That nerf led to current state where tanks are wheezing through dungeons contributing too little. What does it help to keep no-stam recovery and add resource management? That is the time sink that keep tanks tinkering with stamina.

What i want from tanking is pretty much reversal of stam regen and NB regen nerfs, so i can craft powerful PvE tank builds. That includes enough resources to support group and decent DPS, if i choose so. Yes, this is even more DPS inflation, but it is my share of it. In pledges it is surely semi-DPS builds, as in vMA. In trials it's full tank with support skills.

It is ZOS task to update old dungeons so that they can't be run in all four skirts.

The nerf to sta regen had nothing to do with dps. I have no doubt that it had to do with PvP. Im not saying a change in pvp was not necessary, but it did throw many tanks builds, especially the stamina ones, under a bus.

#neverforget lol

I'm a stamina tank and the removal of stamina regen while blocking actually opened me up to more ideas of how to be a stam tank that I'm actually a lot more successful while tanking now compared to before the removal of the regen.

That is wonderful. You have to admit though that races like the Bosmer with their high stamina regeneration, paid a big price in this change. People built around that. Skills like Green Dragon Blood had a use because they kept your blocking sustainability up. Classes that weren't Dragon Knight were able to use skills like Caltrops as a cc without completely draining their stamina. The nerf to Nightblades siphoning skills in this upcoming patch is going to see NB's become worse tanks, and I'm sure a lot of people are going to quit tanking due to frustration with their NB tank.

Sorcerers and Templars already have some severe problems with Tanking right now, related to some obvious functional problems with the class design. In the case of Templar they have no real cc skills to speak of, and *** poor aoe skills to pick up Adds with. This forces the Templar to jump out of class for those skills, and the costs and effects are prohibitive. Even if the cost of caltrops were cut in half, with the nerf to regen while blocking would still make this stamina-based skill too inefficient to use in most cases. In a game where everyone is becoming a proper healer, I have watched the Templar class become less and less of a tank. Sorcerers have their own problems in the tanking role, because their bubble is reliant on magicka, a resource that a tank can not afford to pump as high. The Mines are expensive but can be used well proactively as a cc. Encase is a decent 'path shaped' cc but requires a bit more mobility. The baseline regenerations of a Sorcerer are fantastic, but ironically you can't take advantage of the Stamina regeneration because of the blocking nerf. You can't take advantage of dark exchange for obvious reasons. I'd love to see Sorcerer tanks be a good thing but the way the game functions right now they get a raw deal.

I really don't see how people feel that it is fun to play a character that can do one thing: Hold your Shield up. I admit you can dodge roll, but I hope you realize there is a moment between dodge rolling and blocking when you can get one shot by bosses, even with ludicrous levels of health.. and as has been made clear time and again, capped health really just means you have horrible mitigation in this game. It was much more entertaining to have the wherewithal to reverb bash, taunt, caltrop, etc. The Stamina tank is garbage right now, and a more hybridized magic-centric tank feels a lot better to me in the current setup, because in the current design you can't afford to take advantage of stamina utility. You can't build the whole game around what people are able to do with gold hakeijo runes and gold v16 set gear. Well you can, but I don't see how that makes the game very fun. Gear is already an unavoidable slice of nonsense that we have to keep dealing with every cycle. I just want to go out and fight, I don't want to have to keep picking up the latest gear-cheese that gets pawned off on us every 3 months. The gear grind is why games like the SWG emulators out there continue to have a strong following. SWG's core design is amazing, and for the life of me I can't understand why more designers don't try to duplicate what that game had.

Sentinel_Of_Sentinel

1. I love to be able to take damage no one else in the group would comprehend. It makes me feel important and heroic!
The fact that there is no AoE taunt makes Tanking strategic, fun and dynamic. I love when someone tell me to get someone off their back, cause I can take whatever that mob hands to me.

2.When I solo a delve or doing solo content, every battle takes soooo long. A Tank isn't suppose to have high dps and I cherish "authenticity" more than "making everyone happy" so giving Tanks more dps isn't something I would want, I think. But this is definitely the downside of Tanking.

3. The more strategic a battle is, the more fun. I love to figure out the mechanics of a boss and after several tries, you get it, and WIN! I'm a Tank, and I really like it, when I feel like they wouldn't win without me.
My favorite battle so far was the Nerien’eth with his Ebony Blade in Crypt of Hearts. And this hasn't do with me being a Tank, but with everyone needed to play their part, and we really had to figure out a strategy to get the Gold Key.

4. The Engine Guardian, Darkshade Caverns Veteran mode because I felt like this boss had nothing to do with the group build. It was so confusing and plain chaotic. When we won, I felt nothing, cause I didn't know what we did wrong/right.

5.A lot of things!
Power Slam - Great for crowd control
Imperial Heavy Pauldrons - Big pauldrons for my Tank.
Sturdy Horn - It's a way for me to feel like I contribute resource wise to the group.
Ransack - One Target Taunt makes dynamic gameplay
Trial by Fire - The only set which grants Elemental
Resistance.

6. I would like more Heavy Helmets to be opened. I don't like that ALL Heavy armored Helmets are closed.
Also, I can only find ONE set of gear which gives Elemental Resistance, Trial by Fire. I would like to see more possible ways and builds to prepare your Tank for Elemental damage.

yake82

@dodgehopper_ESO

Sorcs make excellent tanks:
Great class armor skill (altho the sound is annoying)
Bound armaments
Encase
Storm Atro

My Khajiit sorc tank uses Morkuldin + 2-Glorious Defender and Blood Spawn pauldron and weapon dmg enchanted robust Endurance jewels.
He has +32k hp, 31k resistances, 26k stamina, 1500 stam regen, with shield.
With 2hander 3100 weapon power, buffed. Resistances almost 30k.

This one is right now my favorite tank.

WolfingHour

paulsimonps wrote: »

WolfingHour wrote: »

helediron wrote: »

Dubhliam wrote: »

...snip...
Also, I must point out that i very much like the no-stam recovery while blocking and would prefer to keep it that way.

Granting stamina recovery to tanks would just push both the tank role and the healing role into more DPS builds.
This should be avoided at all cost.

Instead, the devs should focus on improving HA passives and providing all classes with a skill for tanking resource management.
...snip...

That nerf led to current state where tanks are wheezing through dungeons contributing too little. What does it help to keep no-stam recovery and add resource management? That is the time sink that keep tanks tinkering with stamina.

What i want from tanking is pretty much reversal of stam regen and NB regen nerfs, so i can craft powerful PvE tank builds. That includes enough resources to support group and decent DPS, if i choose so. Yes, this is even more DPS inflation, but it is my share of it. In pledges it is surely semi-DPS builds, as in vMA. In trials it's full tank with support skills.

It is ZOS task to update old dungeons so that they can't be run in all four skirts.

The nerf to sta regen had nothing to do with dps. I have no doubt that it had to do with PvP. Im not saying a change in pvp was not necessary, but it did throw many tanks builds, especially the stamina ones, under a bus.

#neverforget lol

I'm a stamina tank and the removal of stamina regen while blocking actually opened me up to more ideas of how to be a stam tank that I'm actually a lot more successful while tanking now compared to before the removal of the regen.

Thats not the point. We all had to adjust and make it work. And make it work we did. However, we didn't change for the sake of the pve tanking experience but for the sake of PvP.

Point in fact, as a stamina NB tank, I found caltrops for agro + block + multiple silver leashes not be feasible anymore.

Personofsecrets

Less is more! Woo

dodgehopper_ESO

yake82 wrote: »

@dodgehopper_ESO

Sorcs make excellent tanks:
Great class armor skill (altho the sound is annoying)
Bound armaments
Encase
Storm Atro

My Khajiit sorc tank uses Morkuldin + 2-Glorious Defender and Blood Spawn pauldron and weapon dmg enchanted robust Endurance jewels.
He has +32k hp, 31k resistances, 26k stamina, 1500 stam regen, with shield.
With 2hander 3100 weapon power, buffed. Resistances almost 30k.

This one is right now my favorite tank.

I like boundless lightning for sure. Bound Armaments is good too, and I did list Encase. I actually feel like Negate could be an awesome Tank ultimate if they would just let it be, but Negate is not what it use to be at all.

Savos_Saren

I've previously posted on this thread- but I wanted to touch base about another improvement:

Make the last passive of Sword and Shield more like the Dual Wield passive "Twin Blade and Blunt".

Currently, there is no difference between equipping a Shield with a Mace/Sword/Axe/Dagger. There's no reason to choose one over the other other than aesthetic choice.

Why is there no bonus to equipping an Axe and Shield over a Mace and Shield? It'd be nice if the Axe caused a bleed effect or the Mace ignored armor. Sword and Shield could increase spell/weapon damage slightly and a Dagger and Shield could increase critical damage.

Just spit-balling here... but I thought it should be addressed. Cheers, mate.