PvE tanking, need some help

Daemons_Bane

So.. I have been creating dps classes pretty much since classes existed.. They were my style, simple as that.. Now I thought the time might actually be, to try my hand at tanking.. I have a DK in tanking armor, but that's pretty much it so far.. Can someone give me some advice on skills/morphs, CP, HP/stam spread and all that? Also another question.. Seeing as, from what I can see, there is no real aoe/group taunt, are you just attacking dungeon mobs along with the rest of the group, and only "tanking" the bosses?

jeedrzej

Well...
A lot of explain...
For aoe you have Talons.

Then... In my opinion minimum stamina is 20k. You can have more of course. Hp should be 30k+

Morphs? Depends what do you want to use.

Skills? Depend of build...

Just I need more information

Rayya_Blackheart

For us, tanking is about how many buffs you can give to the group and how many debuffs you can do while keeping the boss still. Igneous weapons, aggressive war horn, chains, low slash, etc.

I have Alkosh on my tank with Hist currently, which will soon be changed to Tavas/Alkosh with 2pc Bloodspawn. I'm still on the newbie side of tanking though. I'm sure some more can be shared by others more advanced than I am.

failkiwib16_ESO

Do you plan to tank group dungeons or trials?
Do you plan to play with guildies, or do you go with pugs and randoms?

Dubhliam

Daemons_Bane wrote: »

So.. I have been creating dps classes pretty much since classes existed.. They were my style, simple as that.. Now I thought the time might actually be, to try my hand at tanking.. I have a DK in tanking armor, but that's pretty much it so far.. Can someone give me some advice on skills/morphs, CP, HP/stam spread and all that? Also another question.. Seeing as, from what I can see, there is no real aoe/group taunt, are you just attacking dungeon mobs along with the rest of the group, and only "tanking" the bosses?

Yes, this is pretty much the way to go - taunt the most dangerous targets, CC the rest.

I'll just re-post this post from Curra's How to Tank Guide:

I tank with all classes, with only one class specced into stamina - sorc.

I highly suggest making a magicka Dragonknight tank, the sheer amount of crowd control it can provide is unprecedented.
Imagine pulling EVERY long range mob, and keeping all mobs pinned to the ground non stop.

Magicka Dragonkinghts don't have trouble permablocking because of their class passives - Battle Roar and Helping hands.
You can focus your build to ultimate generation, and your group will have a constant War Horn buff that also replenishes your resources each time you activate it.

I chose to go for a more crowd control approach - which requires stacking a lot of magicka regen. With enough regen, you can cast Igneous shield after every other skill, which will restore 5% of your stamina each time.

It's important to note that even if you build your DK tank with magicka regen and spell cost reduction, you also need to have a large stamina pool.
Prismatic Defense enchantments and tri-stat food will help you build a large pool of all three of your resources, all of which are important for a magicka tank.
If your character does not swap into DD or Healer roles, you may also split your attributes between stamina and magicka.
Usually, I aim to have around 20k+ stamina, 25k+ health, and rest into magicka.

Try mag DK tank out, I assure you you'll have fun

Also, here is an image I made a long time ago for my DK:

While there have been some changes to it lately, most of the build is exactly the same.

Daemons_Bane

@jeedrzej What information is it that you want For skills I am currently leveling up Earthen Heart and Draconic, 2H and 1H&Shield

I have not really morphed anything as I don't know what to go for

@Dubhliam thx for that one I like how I can see everything, so I can study up on it

mildlylucid

I would say that health stops being useful after 30k and you'd be better to put the points into stamina or magicka. For the mobs you can tank the more annoying ones like the 2handed guys that can stun you, and inhale's morph deep breath is useful for interrupting casters. Boss is definitely priority for taunting, but if you have resources to spare then you should taunt other enemies. Talons are incredibly useful and Chains works well with them. Your build really depends on how you want to play, I recommend trying out your abilities, with what you think will make you a good tank and then finding a build and using it as a guide but ultimately using your experience to make your build.

Liofa

Hey . I have tons of guides on my channel ( you can find it in my signature or searching for Liofa in Youtube ) about PvE tanking and a pretty good build that I can tank everything with (Horny Tank is builds name) . There is this thing called animation cancelling . You MUST learn it . I have a video for that as well special for tanks . It would take lots of time and writing to tell you everything . Just watch videos and ask if you have anymore questions . I tried to cover everything in those videos so I don't think you will have any but still ^^

For your specific question , there are no AOE taunts . You only taunt the ones that does CC and/or heavy damage and root/snare others which DK excels at with usage of chains , talons and cinder storm .

Daemons_Bane

@Dubhliam.. On your chart there, it says multi-effect enchantment what are those

Knightpanther

Its prolly best if you have a DK answer your questions on skills as I have only played as a Sorcerer Tank.
Firstly my experience of tanking in ESO is limited, as I have sporadic time to play I converted to a casual dps build some time back, however I have played a Main and raid 'plough' Tank in every major MMO since EQ1 started in the Jurassic period.

My observations;
Forget everything you knew about tanking before ESO
Its clear you are not expected to hold agro on every mob (trash) as there is literally no safe mechanic.
our taunts are single (although reliable) mob only which means a lot of mob switching.
So for trash just use a CC that's stuns/roots/snares, as a Sorcerer I used Restraining Prison (Dark Magic) and occasionally Volcanic Rune (mage guild). some folks I have seen also use the web jobby from the Undaunted skill line.
Basically anything that can help keep mobs off healers etc.

For taunt I used the 1h/shield skill pierce armour (helps reduce mobs spell resist), I couldn't get on with the Inner Fire skill.

My hat goes off to any tank in this game as the lack of an AE taunt seems Ludacris to me as a seasoned player.

I still believe full heavy armour is the way forward, I loaded mine up with stamina glyphs and used reinforced on most pieces and Divines on the smaller items that offer only marginal increases.
All points into health which gives around 45k hps.
I put a drain life enchant on my sword and stamina enchant on the shield.

Hope this helps a little.

Be safe

jeedrzej

DON'T USE 2H
This is the most common failure.

2x one hand and shield.
5x1x1 (heavy/medium/light)
The best sets for trials:
Tavas favor + blood spawn + ebony/alkosh/dragon

For dungeon they are fine.

Supporting team:
Aggresive warhorn(Ultimate)
Igneous weapons(Skill)
Pierce armor(Skill)
Reduce armor enchantment(enchant) or poison

Survivaliblity:
coagulated blood(Skill)
Hardened armor(Skill)
Absorb Magic(Skill)
Vigor(Skill)
Evision(Skill)
Magma Shell(Ultimate)

Three stat potions
Three stats food

Thats basics

Daemons_Bane

Don't worry the only reason that I have leveled 2H was because I had a slight hope that it would be possible to make a dps/tank hybrid tossed that idea though

phermitgb

as some have said above, it's...complicated. But, there are a few simple things that I can cover...

there ARE two taunts in the game. 1h and shield has a melee taunt, undaunted line has a ranged taunt. It's up to you to decide if you need both, or only one - the 1h+s taunt includes an armor piercing debuff on the target that can be nice - the undaunted taunt has something also, I forget what it is.

most importantly though, you ARE penalized for over-taunting your target. I don't remember what the precise number is, but up to 2 simultaneous taunts on the target still seem to work properly (you don't *need* two overlapping, but sometimes you hit the wrong target with the wrong skill), but more than that, and you risk giving the target immunity to taunting for a certain period of time, which is bad bad bad for a tank.

General threat control for tanks in ESO - monsters seem to trigger off proximity first, then damage/healing at roughly the same rate. For trash pulls in dungeons, I generally find that if the tank is allowed to charge in first, and do some quick aoe's, you can hold on to aggro for a good 4-6 targets for at least a brief period of time. After that, you mostly have to pick one or two big ones to taunt, while the rest of your party cleans up the pile, then come back for the ones you have taunted.

Unfortunately, this basic strategy depends on the rest of your group waiting a whole 4 seconds before they start piling in the damage, which many groups don't seem able to do. And, of course, some groups don't *need* to either. Some groups, experienced players, have such high aoe-dps that they can afford to wipe most trash mobs without need for a tank really at all.

But most dungeons have major boss battles, and most major boss battles "need" tanks (I put need in quotes because I like ESO character/build versatility, and I'm pretty sure if you worked hard enough at it, you could probably find a way to do most dungeon bosses without a strictly traditional tank).

In those cases, the tank usually keeps the main boss taunted (obvious) - depending on adds, the tank might try to keep one or two more taunted - but that's about your limit. In general, you keep the boss where the boss needs to be, the dps mostly grab whatever other targets need to be dealt with, and the healer tries balance between the two of you.

If you can afford to (depends on boss mechanics), you'd like to keep yourself and your dps relatively close to each other, so the healer can heal all of you without having to switch targets often, with the boss facing away from the dps - obviously, specific boss mechanics might require totally different layouts.

Also, as a tank, you REALLY need to be on top of your blocks, interrupts, and dodges. You should expect to be the primary target of the boss at all times, so you're *usually* going to be the first in line for interrupts, which can make a huge difference, and if you have any champ points in the major advantages of blocking heavy blows (the gold shiny skill telegraph) you really want to milk those bonuses as well. And of course, DON'T STAND IN THE RED!!

I'm personally divided about major/minor evasion skills (skills that give you a % bonus to dodge incoming attacks) - they're a great way to avoid incoming damage, but you lose out if you try to block a heavy attack that misses you entirely - I find it kinda distracting - but yes, major/minor ward, major/minor...erm...whatever-increases-physical-mitigation, major-minor evade - these are all fantastic buffs that if you have a skill that gives them, they're great for tanking. Also, the 1h+shield line has a very nice forward arc attack that both slows enemies and reduces their outgoing damage - another nice way to reduce your incoming damage. Also, heavy armor has a single skill that not only creates a very large wards, but also makes you temporarily immune to CC effects, which I have a hard time remembering to use on demand, but can be very useful for certain boss fights where CC is a problem.

So, that's hopefully a quick line of advice - hope it helped.

Dubhliam

Daemons_Bane wrote: »

@Dubhliam.. On your chart there, it says multi-effect enchantment what are those

Tri- stat enchantments.
You get those via the Prismatic Defense Glyphs. Those are made with Hakeijo Runes.

Daemons_Bane

That damn Hakeijo again XD I have looted every damn zone and leveled zone over and over for over a year.. never found one hehe

failkiwib16_ESO

@Daemons_Bane it is bought for 5000 tel var stones in Imperial City sewers, from the NPC merchant, or comes as rare drop from Throve Scamps, Cunning Scamps and Molag Bal.

You can't really get it anywhere else...

Dubhliam

failkiwib16_ESO wrote: »

@Daemons_Bane it is bought for 5000 tel var stones in Imperial City sewers, from the NPC merchant, or comes as rare drop from Throve Scamps, Cunning Scamps and Molag Bal.

You can't really get it anywhere else...

Other than buying them from Guild Stores.

Daemons_Bane

That would explain quite a lot So I need to start grinding them damn stones

Dubhliam

Daemons_Bane wrote: »

That would explain quite a lot So I need to start grinding them damn stones

It's not actually that hard.
Hakeijos used to be far more expensive than they currently are (they weren't sold for Tel Vars until DB update), now they sell for 10k each.
Since you spend around 7k for a Kuta to make an enchantment, the price of a Prismatic Defense Glyph compared to a regular Stamina or Magicka Glyph is not that drastic.

Still, if you have trouble with gold, you could only enchant the 5 large pieces of equipment for the maximum effect (chest, legs, head, and two shields).

Hellbender27

[quote="Liofa;3220634"
For your specific question , there are no AOE taunts . You only taunt the ones that does CC and/or heavy damage and root/snare others which DK excels at with usage of chains , talons and cinder storm .[/quote]



This is basically it. I personally use Magicka as my main resource, it allows me to Keep mobs CCed, self heal and crank out dps for burning down trash you'll soon realize that 80% of your spells you use are magicka based. I use dark elf for the free stam/magicka and added fire dmg.
As Liofa stated talons/cinder storm will be your main go to every pull along side Inhale it's a free heal plus aoe, and interrupt all in one. You want spell/physical resistance so you have a cushion for incoming dmg you want at least 19K resistance. I always keep up Igneous shield, Coagulating blood, volatile armor up (I like his morph best for the added aoe). Magma shell ultimate is heaven for rezzing, heavy dps phases where you need to parks boss and quck resource return on use thanks to Battle Roar!
If you get lucky and healers are running repent and shards you'll be able to blaze through content and hold a lot more mobs in trials. And you debuff mobs and buff group swap standard for Warhorn in trials rest stays the same. Hope this helps there was a lot of great feed back from other tanks above.

sekou_trayvond

I'm a proponent of stamina based tanks running caltrops.

Yeah, gotta PvP to get it but it just makes dealing with Undaunted trash so much easier.

After that, just make sure boss is taunted/controlled and you keep buffs up (igneous, a group shield, etc). In between, light and heavy attack to generate ult and maintain stamina.

I like Armor Master and Malubeth's combo, but there's good build variety for tanks. (Footman's, Endurance, Hist, Bulwark, Tava's).