Tank Help

TamrielSaviour215

I have never played as a tank in any MMO. I understand the role and what to do, I just have never done it myself. I am itching to finally do this after coming back to the game from almost 6 months away.

Can someone point me to a predominately PvE build (race, class, skills) that will get me started on the right foot? I know Sword and Board is the way to go or not. I was thinking Nord or Orc DragonKnight but if people have better combos, I am wide open to suggestions.

Also, I really don't want to run Vamp. Most builds I have seen online revolve around vampirism. Not really my thing. Thanks!

Lynx7386

I run a couple of khajiit tanks so don't think race is a make or break for a character. The best tank options are nord, imperial, and argonian for various reasons, but whichever you prefer playing will work.

Tanking gear and ability setup varies pretty drastically depending on what content you're doing. A 4 man vet dungeon pledge tank will not be set up the same as vet trials pledge tank or a PvP tank.

The easiest class to tank on, and the one still preferred for pretty much all content, is dragon knight. That said, wardens are about equally capable but are a little different / more complex to play. The other 3 classes are all capable of dungeon tanking but have significant difficulties with trials. For a first time tank I would recommend sticking to a dk.

Your build will always have a good amount of "flex" spots - I.e. ability spots on your bar that change based on what particular thing you're doing. However there are a few key abilities you always want to have at your disposal:

1. Pierce armor, from the 1h/shield line. This is the single most important ability for any tank in the game. It applies two major debuff to the enemy, and taunts (forces them to attack you) for 15 seconds. Don't over use it though.

2. Heroic slash, from the 1h/shield line. I sometimes do without this, but the main benefit is that it weakens the enemy and causes you to generate ultimate very quickly. Dragon knights gain a huge amount of healtg, magicka, and stamina back whenever they use an ultimate, so you should be able to discern why this ability is nice to have.

3. Choking talons, from draconic power. This immediately immobilizes all enemies around you and makes them deal less damage. This game doesn't have an area or multi target taunt ability, so your job on big groups of enemies is to lock them down with talons so your group can kill them.

4. Unrelenting grip, from the ardent flame line. This ability yanks any enemy at long range to you, allowing you to turn a spread out group of enemies into a nice little immobilized cluster for your group to nuke.

Other important skills for a dk tank are hardened armor for major ward/resolve (often replaced by balance in trials builds for the same buffs at no cost), green dragon blood which is a huge self heal and boosts your stamina recovery and healing received, and standard of might as an ultimate which increases your damage dealt and reduces your damage taken.

My dk mainly tanks vet dungeons for pledges and runs this setup:

5x ebon armory (boosts health for the group)
5x seducer (reduces my magicka costs)
2x grothdar (monster set that deals aoe fire damage)

Front bar (1h/sh)
Pierce armor
Unrelenting grip
Choking talons
Green Dragon blood
Igneous shield
Magma shell

Back bar (fire staff)
Engulfing flames
Elemental blockade
Eruption
Hardened armor
Molten armaments
Standard of might

This build is meant to help a bit with damage and also be able to self heal through quite a bit, and is not optimized for trials, obviously.

TamrielSaviour215

You are amazing. I didnt really think about using a staff on the back bar. Should all attribute points be dumped into Health? This is extremely helpful. I really do appreciate this!

Lynx7386

My dk actually runs 64 magicka but all health enchants (magicka recovery on jewelry). She has 32-33k health and around 22k magicka with over 2000 magicka recovery using orzorgas red frothgar(max health + magicka recovery food). I run that set up because every time you use igneous shield, molten armaments, or eruption you get almost 1000 stamina back from passives in the earthen heart tree, so when I need to block a lot I can hold block and spam igneous shield to get my stamina back.

TamrielSaviour215

Thats pretty interesting. I never would have thought to try only Magicka on a tank. You've given me more to think about.

Lynx7386

Most tanks run a staff back bar, though it's usually a lightning staff. The reason is because wall of elements (elemental blockade) has a high chance per second to activate weapon enchantments. You use wall of elements then swap to your front bar with a crusher enchant on your 1h, and the wall will activate it quickly.

I use the fire staff mostly for matching the dk theme. My warden tank uses a similar setup with a frost staff, however my warden is more hybridized and has more investment in stamina as well, so he's not fully magicka focused

TamrielSaviour215

Sounds like I need to get a few more character slots and toy around with some things. I didnt realize how versatile the tanks could be. I was always under the impression it was mainly "Hey, hit me instead" with moderate damage capabilities. This actually sounds pretty fun.

ccfeeling

Dk, no vamp, u can tank everything

AcadianPaladin

I'm running my first tank also and it (Imperial DK) is a fairly classic tank build based mostly on Woeler's guides. I'm glad I went that way because it is a very solid tank and is letting me really get comfortable with the role. I found it to be a rather 'late bloomer' and the fun button didn't really pop until I could chain, talon and range taunt things. Still don't feel really ready for group dungeons but am finding that WBs are great training aids. Tanking a single WB, then gradually seeking out some of the WBs that are duos or trios and trying to lock them all down to focus on me.

TamrielSaviour215

Good look. I looked at Woeler's Beginner Tank. I think I am going to go with the Imperial purely for the health bonus. Once I have a good feel for it I might switch it up. I get that the Argonians are great because of their passives, but I have no desire to use one.

ValkynSketha

Argonian DK is the best combo as a tank atm, argonian simply provide better sustain, and dk have the best tools.

Gear: farm coh I on normal or vet for ebon armour set 5xbody pieces all sturdy, or reinforced large pieces and sturdy small with health enchant.

Farm mol on normal or vet for alkosh 3xjewls with reduce block cost or reduce stamina cost enchant, and sword or any other 1h infused with crusher enchant and sturdy board with health/stamina enchant

Farm spindle II on vet for heavy sturdy/reinforced bloodspawn helm and use undaunted keys to get the shoulder.

Frost staff infused with weakening enchant back bar in order to get higher uptime on both enchants from using elemental blockade.

Skills:

Main bar: Pierce armour-balance-unrelenting grip-heroic slash-green dragon blood-magma shell/barrier

Off bar: choking talons-inner rage-elemental blockade-overflowing altar-engulfing flames-agressive horn

Other skills to use in cases where there is no need to use chains, range taunt and talons or to replace altar: energy orb, igneous shield, deep breath, dragon fire scale, efficient purge, invigorating drain, echoing vigor, elemental drain, absorb magic.

Keep in mind there is many other gear sets to use depending on the situations and tanking exp.

RavenSworn

Lynx7386 wrote: »

I run a couple of khajiit tanks so don't think race is a make or break for a character. The best tank options are nord, imperial, and argonian for various reasons, but whichever you prefer playing will work.

Tanking gear and ability setup varies pretty drastically depending on what content you're doing. A 4 man vet dungeon pledge tank will not be set up the same as vet trials pledge tank or a PvP tank.

The easiest class to tank on, and the one still preferred for pretty much all content, is dragon knight. That said, wardens are about equally capable but are a little different / more complex to play. The other 3 classes are all capable of dungeon tanking but have significant difficulties with trials. For a first time tank I would recommend sticking to a dk.

Your build will always have a good amount of "flex" spots - I.e. ability spots on your bar that change based on what particular thing you're doing. However there are a few key abilities you always want to have at your disposal:

1. Pierce armor, from the 1h/shield line. This is the single most important ability for any tank in the game. It applies two major debuff to the enemy, and taunts (forces them to attack you) for 15 seconds. Don't over use it though.

2. Heroic slash, from the 1h/shield line. I sometimes do without this, but the main benefit is that it weakens the enemy and causes you to generate ultimate very quickly. Dragon knights gain a huge amount of healtg, magicka, and stamina back whenever they use an ultimate, so you should be able to discern why this ability is nice to have.

3. Choking talons, from draconic power. This immediately immobilizes all enemies around you and makes them deal less damage. This game doesn't have an area or multi target taunt ability, so your job on big groups of enemies is to lock them down with talons so your group can kill them.

4. Unrelenting grip, from the ardent flame line. This ability yanks any enemy at long range to you, allowing you to turn a spread out group of enemies into a nice little immobilized cluster for your group to nuke.

Other important skills for a dk tank are hardened armor for major ward/resolve (often replaced by balance in trials builds for the same buffs at no cost), green dragon blood which is a huge self heal and boosts your stamina recovery and healing received, and standard of might as an ultimate which increases your damage dealt and reduces your damage taken.

My dk mainly tanks vet dungeons for pledges and runs this setup:

5x ebon armory (boosts health for the group)
5x seducer (reduces my magicka costs)
2x grothdar (monster set that deals aoe fire damage)

Front bar (1h/sh)
Pierce armor
Unrelenting grip
Choking talons
Green Dragon blood
Igneous shield
Magma shell

Back bar (fire staff)
Engulfing flames
Elemental blockade
Eruption
Hardened armor
Molten armaments
Standard of might

This build is meant to help a bit with damage and also be able to self heal through quite a bit, and is not optimized for trials, obviously.

You know, I would have told him to tank with a nb for a beginner since if you can learn how to tank with a nb, you can tank anything in the game lol.

But to op, this guy knows his stuff.

Lynx7386

RavenSworn wrote: »

Lynx7386 wrote: »

I run a couple of khajiit tanks so don't think race is a make or break for a character. The best tank options are nord, imperial, and argonian for various reasons, but whichever you prefer playing will work.

Tanking gear and ability setup varies pretty drastically depending on what content you're doing. A 4 man vet dungeon pledge tank will not be set up the same as vet trials pledge tank or a PvP tank.

The easiest class to tank on, and the one still preferred for pretty much all content, is dragon knight. That said, wardens are about equally capable but are a little different / more complex to play. The other 3 classes are all capable of dungeon tanking but have significant difficulties with trials. For a first time tank I would recommend sticking to a dk.

Your build will always have a good amount of "flex" spots - I.e. ability spots on your bar that change based on what particular thing you're doing. However there are a few key abilities you always want to have at your disposal:

1. Pierce armor, from the 1h/shield line. This is the single most important ability for any tank in the game. It applies two major debuff to the enemy, and taunts (forces them to attack you) for 15 seconds. Don't over use it though.

2. Heroic slash, from the 1h/shield line. I sometimes do without this, but the main benefit is that it weakens the enemy and causes you to generate ultimate very quickly. Dragon knights gain a huge amount of healtg, magicka, and stamina back whenever they use an ultimate, so you should be able to discern why this ability is nice to have.

3. Choking talons, from draconic power. This immediately immobilizes all enemies around you and makes them deal less damage. This game doesn't have an area or multi target taunt ability, so your job on big groups of enemies is to lock them down with talons so your group can kill them.

4. Unrelenting grip, from the ardent flame line. This ability yanks any enemy at long range to you, allowing you to turn a spread out group of enemies into a nice little immobilized cluster for your group to nuke.

Other important skills for a dk tank are hardened armor for major ward/resolve (often replaced by balance in trials builds for the same buffs at no cost), green dragon blood which is a huge self heal and boosts your stamina recovery and healing received, and standard of might as an ultimate which increases your damage dealt and reduces your damage taken.

My dk mainly tanks vet dungeons for pledges and runs this setup:

5x ebon armory (boosts health for the group)
5x seducer (reduces my magicka costs)
2x grothdar (monster set that deals aoe fire damage)

Front bar (1h/sh)
Pierce armor
Unrelenting grip
Choking talons
Green Dragon blood
Igneous shield
Magma shell

Back bar (fire staff)
Engulfing flames
Elemental blockade
Eruption
Hardened armor
Molten armaments
Standard of might

This build is meant to help a bit with damage and also be able to self heal through quite a bit, and is not optimized for trials, obviously.

You know, I would have told him to tank with a nb for a beginner since if you can learn how to tank with a nb, you can tank anything in the game lol.

But to op, this guy knows his stuff.

You're right, and I started tanking on a nightblade myself, but I didn't want him to just get frustrated with it and give up when he realizes they can't really handle trials =p


As far as knowing my stuff, I've got a lot of experience tanking on most classes (not much on templar, plenty on the others) but I'm not a min maxer and I don't do meta builds. 90% of my game time is spent in vet dungeons, not trials, and when I do tank trials its usually for helping new guild members learn the encounters.

My builds aren't acceptable for most endgame leaderboards pushing guilds, but that's fine for me since that isn't my primary focus in the game. I do enjoy making versatile tanks that can heal and dps well enough to make vet dungeon pledges a breeze, though.

RavenSworn

Lynx7386 wrote: »

RavenSworn wrote: »

Lynx7386 wrote: »

I run a couple of khajiit tanks so don't think race is a make or break for a character. The best tank options are nord, imperial, and argonian for various reasons, but whichever you prefer playing will work.

Tanking gear and ability setup varies pretty drastically depending on what content you're doing. A 4 man vet dungeon pledge tank will not be set up the same as vet trials pledge tank or a PvP tank.

The easiest class to tank on, and the one still preferred for pretty much all content, is dragon knight. That said, wardens are about equally capable but are a little different / more complex to play. The other 3 classes are all capable of dungeon tanking but have significant difficulties with trials. For a first time tank I would recommend sticking to a dk.

Your build will always have a good amount of "flex" spots - I.e. ability spots on your bar that change based on what particular thing you're doing. However there are a few key abilities you always want to have at your disposal:

1. Pierce armor, from the 1h/shield line. This is the single most important ability for any tank in the game. It applies two major debuff to the enemy, and taunts (forces them to attack you) for 15 seconds. Don't over use it though.

2. Heroic slash, from the 1h/shield line. I sometimes do without this, but the main benefit is that it weakens the enemy and causes you to generate ultimate very quickly. Dragon knights gain a huge amount of healtg, magicka, and stamina back whenever they use an ultimate, so you should be able to discern why this ability is nice to have.

3. Choking talons, from draconic power. This immediately immobilizes all enemies around you and makes them deal less damage. This game doesn't have an area or multi target taunt ability, so your job on big groups of enemies is to lock them down with talons so your group can kill them.

4. Unrelenting grip, from the ardent flame line. This ability yanks any enemy at long range to you, allowing you to turn a spread out group of enemies into a nice little immobilized cluster for your group to nuke.

Other important skills for a dk tank are hardened armor for major ward/resolve (often replaced by balance in trials builds for the same buffs at no cost), green dragon blood which is a huge self heal and boosts your stamina recovery and healing received, and standard of might as an ultimate which increases your damage dealt and reduces your damage taken.

My dk mainly tanks vet dungeons for pledges and runs this setup:

5x ebon armory (boosts health for the group)
5x seducer (reduces my magicka costs)
2x grothdar (monster set that deals aoe fire damage)

Front bar (1h/sh)
Pierce armor
Unrelenting grip
Choking talons
Green Dragon blood
Igneous shield
Magma shell

Back bar (fire staff)
Engulfing flames
Elemental blockade
Eruption
Hardened armor
Molten armaments
Standard of might

This build is meant to help a bit with damage and also be able to self heal through quite a bit, and is not optimized for trials, obviously.

You know, I would have told him to tank with a nb for a beginner since if you can learn how to tank with a nb, you can tank anything in the game lol.

But to op, this guy knows his stuff.

You're right, and I started tanking on a nightblade myself, but I didn't want him to just get frustrated with it and give up when he realizes they can't really handle trials =p


As far as knowing my stuff, I've got a lot of experience tanking on most classes (not much on templar, plenty on the others) but I'm not a min maxer and I don't do meta builds. 90% of my game time is spent in vet dungeons, not trials, and when I do tank trials its usually for helping new guild members learn the encounters.

My builds aren't acceptable for most endgame leaderboards pushing guilds, but that's fine for me since that isn't my primary focus in the game. I do enjoy making versatile tanks that can heal and dps well enough to make vet dungeon pledges a breeze, though.

I hear ya, it's the same with me as well. I'm happy enough to get through the vet dungeon content, trials aren't that important to me. Weird thing is, a lot of the bis gear sets are crafted or in dungeons so take that as you will OP.

TamrielSaviour215

ValkynSketha - Thanks for the gear recommendations. I did go Imperial purely because I don't like the Argonians lol. I know their passives are amazing for a tank, but I will sacrifice it so I don't have to look at him.

RavensSworn - I have a NB and its been a while since I played but I remember how weak they were when I was playing last time. I never thought to use a NB for a tank but I guess if you want the DPS in a tank it would be cool. But for my first play through I stuck with the DK. Can't wait to hit some dungeons with this thing when I get some taunts unlocked.

Alqu

Lynx7386 wrote: »

RavenSworn wrote: »

Lynx7386 wrote: »

I run a couple of khajiit tanks so don't think race is a make or break for a character. The best tank options are nord, imperial, and argonian for various reasons, but whichever you prefer playing will work.

Tanking gear and ability setup varies pretty drastically depending on what content you're doing. A 4 man vet dungeon pledge tank will not be set up the same as vet trials pledge tank or a PvP tank.

The easiest class to tank on, and the one still preferred for pretty much all content, is dragon knight. That said, wardens are about equally capable but are a little different / more complex to play. The other 3 classes are all capable of dungeon tanking but have significant difficulties with trials. For a first time tank I would recommend sticking to a dk.

Your build will always have a good amount of "flex" spots - I.e. ability spots on your bar that change based on what particular thing you're doing. However there are a few key abilities you always want to have at your disposal:

1. Pierce armor, from the 1h/shield line. This is the single most important ability for any tank in the game. It applies two major debuff to the enemy, and taunts (forces them to attack you) for 15 seconds. Don't over use it though.

2. Heroic slash, from the 1h/shield line. I sometimes do without this, but the main benefit is that it weakens the enemy and causes you to generate ultimate very quickly. Dragon knights gain a huge amount of healtg, magicka, and stamina back whenever they use an ultimate, so you should be able to discern why this ability is nice to have.

3. Choking talons, from draconic power. This immediately immobilizes all enemies around you and makes them deal less damage. This game doesn't have an area or multi target taunt ability, so your job on big groups of enemies is to lock them down with talons so your group can kill them.

4. Unrelenting grip, from the ardent flame line. This ability yanks any enemy at long range to you, allowing you to turn a spread out group of enemies into a nice little immobilized cluster for your group to nuke.

Other important skills for a dk tank are hardened armor for major ward/resolve (often replaced by balance in trials builds for the same buffs at no cost), green dragon blood which is a huge self heal and boosts your stamina recovery and healing received, and standard of might as an ultimate which increases your damage dealt and reduces your damage taken.

My dk mainly tanks vet dungeons for pledges and runs this setup:

5x ebon armory (boosts health for the group)
5x seducer (reduces my magicka costs)
2x grothdar (monster set that deals aoe fire damage)

Front bar (1h/sh)
Pierce armor
Unrelenting grip
Choking talons
Green Dragon blood
Igneous shield
Magma shell

Back bar (fire staff)
Engulfing flames
Elemental blockade
Eruption
Hardened armor
Molten armaments
Standard of might

This build is meant to help a bit with damage and also be able to self heal through quite a bit, and is not optimized for trials, obviously.

You know, I would have told him to tank with a nb for a beginner since if you can learn how to tank with a nb, you can tank anything in the game lol.

But to op, this guy knows his stuff.

You're right, and I started tanking on a nightblade myself, but I didn't want him to just get frustrated with it and give up when he realizes they can't really handle trials =p


As far as knowing my stuff, I've got a lot of experience tanking on most classes (not much on templar, plenty on the others) but I'm not a min maxer and I don't do meta builds. 90% of my game time is spent in vet dungeons, not trials, and when I do tank trials its usually for helping new guild members learn the encounters.

My builds aren't acceptable for most endgame leaderboards pushing guilds, but that's fine for me since that isn't my primary focus in the game. I do enjoy making versatile tanks that can heal and dps well enough to make vet dungeon pledges a breeze, though.

I may have to try your approach with my DK. I am running a true hybrid stam/magic. Basically, bigger stam pool, but all magic regen. Can do bursty stam damage (which is good for PvP), and no sustain issues for either stam (with heavy attacks) or magic with the gear/enchants. Other thing I have going is much focus on ultimate generation. Use variously Warhorn, Standard, or Magma.

But flat out being magic, able to swap to DPS when solo or for more sustained PvP, seems appealing.

TheRealPotoroo

Lynx7386 wrote: »

My dk mainly tanks vet dungeons for pledges and runs this setup:

5x ebon armory (boosts health for the group)
5x seducer (reduces my magicka costs)
2x grothdar (monster set that deals aoe fire damage)

Which traits? My Ebon Armory is nearly all Sturdy (based on an earlier Alcast build) but otherwise I can craft. I've been wondering about how to rejig my Orc stamdk tank given I need a "hybrid" that can solo.

Lynx7386

Infused on large pieces and divines on small

Saphayla

I don't have much to say in terms of advice, as I'm also fairly new to tanking (I have a level 27 Dragonknight), but a lot of things here sound really interesting. My main knowledge of what I am supposed to do as a tank comes from being a Healer in Veteran Dungeons and observing what the Tank is doing, then trying to replicate it. When I decided to become a tank, I (wrongly) assumed that it's just a matter of having enough Health and resistance to survive blows from bosses, and having enough Stamina to taunt everyone and block incoming attacks. In reality, there is a surprising amount of versitality associated with tanking, described by people above. You can even use an Ice Staff as your main weapon, since fully charged heavy attacks give you a damage shield and taunt the enemy, making it viable for a Magicka-focused tank, however I heard it isn't too viable in Trials, especially on Veteran mode.

This game is really good when it comes to flexibility. My main character is a Khajiit Sorcerer Healer. Khajiit have no racial passives that benefit healers, and Sorcerers aren't nearly as good for healing as Templars, and yet I still manage to do Veteran Dungeons and Normal Trials without much problem. So you could probably have the worst race for tanking, coupled with the worst class for tanking and still do well enough, provided you know what your job is and how you can go about doing it.

VonSwaego

What is this? I’ve run a destro staff on my tank sinc I made him, and took nothing but loads of crap. Now a new tank is getting told to run one? Ive been waiting along time to hear this. Was starting to think There was no off meta tanks left anymore.
I run a dunmer DK in 5/5 pelinals/ trainee, endurance S&B on front bar, fire destro on back. I have 32k majicka, 33k health, just under 22k stamina, and when buffed 3k weapon and spell damage. Self heals are crazy, and the extra dps in dungeons is noticeable. I have successfully tanked a few vet trials with it, and even soloed a few vet dungeons just to see if I could.
The real fun though was that I ground myself numb to make 4 of these suits the first week Tamriel one dropped. There’s a sorc/ lightning staff, nightblade/ frost staff, and a Templar/ healing staff. Only got to see them altogether once before the massive trainee nerf, but man talk about some off meta fun. Made vet dungeons a breeze. Really see how well the classes could compliment each other.
Fun tank setup to run. Won’t get you into any trial guilds though. Lol

EriskRedLemur

I'm not an experienced tank in THIS game - I went Khajit DK - DPS is fun but really love tanking with DK and games. Now DK/stamina some builds vary with where points go; so Khajit isn't the worse race for DK tank. I also think DK is the most forgiving tank if you don't choose the ideal races that are best at tanking. If you're min/maxing speed/etc. where racial matters most then you should think Argonian, Imperial, Nord imo. Otherwise, with practice/gear/specs you can do vet content for sure.

Others add a lot of the basic skills, I'll just add - there's not ONE build for ALL content that's important - Dungeons, Trials, Vet - your group make up will determine gear/skills you use. There's situations where you want double s/b - others having a staff/other is fine/preferred. You may need to dish more DPS given group make up or focus completely on tanking/living.

alcastHQ is a great place/person for end-game strats for every class with tanking. And there's definitely ppl who go different ways tanks in this game really can be diverse per class. Some DKs go magicka some go more stamina or more magicka then stamina no health or all health. You make up rest with gear/stats. Anyways - imo most important thing is practice; knowing class/abilities AND the fights; when to debuff/taunt/COMMUNICATE with healers/group - that's more than half the tank battle there for any game, long as you aren't running weird gear like DPS set while trying to tank, you'll be fine (again, the hardest/min/max content aside).

TheRealPotoroo

Lynx7386 wrote: »

Infused on large pieces and divines on small

And so we come full circle. That's how it was when I began. Do you have a CP breakdown?

TheRealPotoroo

Lynx7386 wrote: »

5x ebon armory (boosts health for the group)
5x seducer (reduces my magicka costs)
2x grothdar (monster set that deals aoe fire damage)

The Ebon Armory is heavy but what about the Seducer? 1 Medium and 5 Light?

RavenSworn

TheRealPotoroo wrote: »

Lynx7386 wrote: »

5x ebon armory (boosts health for the group)
5x seducer (reduces my magicka costs)
2x grothdar (monster set that deals aoe fire damage)

The Ebon Armory is heavy but what about the Seducer? 1 Medium and 5 Light?

Seducer is crafted so you can custom made it. So the setup would be like this: ebon jewelry 3 pcs, any two more on the body or the weapons (though its harder to get 2 one handers and two shields from the dungeon). The rest are seducers heavy with either the grothdar being in light and medium or light seducer belt and medium grothdar helm.

That way you still be able to use the undaunted passive.

kringled_1

I've repeatedly heard not to use ebon on weapons/shield, as the group health buff will fall off and reapply as you switch bars. So for that setup, use the crafted set for weapon/shield, ebon for jewelry and 2 body pieces.

Oreyn_Bearclaw

Some pretty good info here. If you are really trying to min/max your race and class for tanking, I would really only consider two options. Argonian DK (Best), Imperial DK (Second Best). If you love tanking, then branch out and make some other classes, but DK is certainly the meta and has been pretty much since launch. Argonian resource passives are honestly too good to pass up, but imperial is also pretty strong. The real argument for imperial is that it's a better DPS race, in case you ever need to do that, but Argonian is absolutely the BIS race for pure tanking.

People will love to also include Nord in this debate, but it's wrong. I dont understand the math as well as some people, but essentially their damage reduction passive gets buried in the mitigation formula, and ends up being far less effective in actual combat than what the tooltip would suggest. Nord is the most garbage race in the game unless your main goal is to RP drinking games with skyrim fanboys.

Number one mistake people make on tanking once they get past the character selection screen is to focus on mitigation. Mitigation is important, but you certainly dont need to be anywhere near the cap. Focus on sets that support your group. The most obvious ways a tank does that is to focus on Group buffs, armor penetration, or ultimate generation (warhorns). A few very obvious sets to look at for these Ebon (buffs group health), Torgus Pact or Alkosh (buffs Penetration), Dragon (Ulti cost reduction).

I think the best gear combo for the vast majority of the playerbase in the most amount of content is 5 Ebon, 5 Torugs Pact, 1 Chokethorn, 1 Shadowrend. 7 Heavy or 5/1/1 is a judgement call, but I think 7 heavy is superior. Torugs Pact with infused weapons and crusher enchantments is a VERY easy way to give your group a lot of penetration. Alkosh is more, but its more difficult to acquire and more difficult to use (better since they fixed synergies). All that said, if you get serious about tanking, you are going to carry a half a dozen sets on you most of the time. I just think this is the best place to start.

Next lets talk about what stats are actually important. First, you need a lot of health (duh). Most Meta tank builds have you somewhere in the high 30's low 40's. You do see people with more than even that, but at some point, you are making too many sacrifices else where. Second, you want to make sure your stam pool is higher than your magic pool, even if it is just by a few points. This will make sure that all things that return resources and scale off max stats will give you stamina. On my Argonian DK, i believe i put 9 into stam and the rest into health, as this makes my stamina pool just a hair higher than my magic. Third, you want to focus on high magic Regen. This will allow you to really do three things. Spam chains and Talons (CC), and Spam Igneous Shield (can be block-casted to return stam while blocking). A lot of tanks go as far as to use their monster sets to focus on magic regen and run 1 shadowrend and 1 chokethorn (each give magic regen as a one piece). I think this is better than most two piece bonuses in most situations, but again, tank gear can get very situational at end game if pushing score. This is also the main reason a lot of tanks go vampire, as it gives more regen. That one is up to you. If you really want to go all out, you can front bar Barrier (PVP skill) for more regen as well. Stam regen is really not that important as its ZERO while blocking. Fourth. Focus on block cost reduction. Jewelry Glyhphs and CP are really your only options here, both are really important. The better your block cost, the less stamina you lose when taking damage. Pretty simple really.

The best thing about learning to tank is that groupfinder is your friend. You will never have to wait for a group, as your queue will pop almost immediately. Your DPS will also be terrible, so it's good practice. Haha.

Focus on a few things:

-Most importantly, dont die.
-With bosses, do your best to hold them still.
-With adds, do your best to group them up (chains) and lock them down (talons).
-Spit out warhorns as fast as possible.
-Keep high priority enemies taunted AND debuffed (crusher glyph, light attacks to proc).

Do that and you will be WAY ahead of the game.

Also, people will plug Alcast, and he certainly puts out a lot of solid builds, but I think your actual best tank resource is Woeler. His website is a little slow, but here is his recent DK build:

https://woeler.eu/spartan/


This is also a really useful thread if you want to dive into some of the math, courtesy of @paulsimonps .

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/279426/damage-mitigation-explanation-updated-for-morrowind-new-calculator/p1

TamrielSaviour215

Holy Akatosh @Oreyn_Bearclaw THAT WAS INCREDIBLE! I think I should print that out and make a spreadsheet based on that info. That was extremely helpful and I am really stoked to get home and start tweaking a lot of this stuff. You are amazing!

Lynx7386

TheRealPotoroo wrote: »

Lynx7386 wrote: »

5x ebon armory (boosts health for the group)
5x seducer (reduces my magicka costs)
2x grothdar (monster set that deals aoe fire damage)

The Ebon Armory is heavy but what about the Seducer? 1 Medium and 5 Light?

3 ebon jewelry, heavy belt, heavy gloves
3 heavy seducer (chest, legs, boots) with 1h and shield (and Back bar staff, seducer drops to 4pc on back bar)
Medium grothdar helm and light grothdar shoulders.

code65536

To get started with tanking, just jump right into it.

A little story: I play on NA, but I dabble a little on EU. I wanted a Skoria helm on EU, but I only have DPS characters on EU and queuing for a tank takes too long, so I asked a friend to come tank vCoA2.

This friend had never tanked before in his life--only DPSed and healed. He had fewer than 200 CP on EU (like me, he plays on NA). And he had absolutely no tank gear of any sort. I drafted him into the tank role only because he has a level 50 DK on EU.

People will tell tanks, "Go farm Ebon and Alkosh!" And while Ebon and Alkosh is the kind of gear that a serious endgame tank would want, you don't need it get started in tanking. We weren't about to spend hours farming for gear just so he could tank a helm run for me. I gave him 5 pieces of Livewire (3x jewelry, 2x body; I had a bunch lying around from farming CwC motifs, and they can also be bought dirt-cheap from guild traders), crafted him 5 pieces of Torug's Pact (two infused swords, two sturdy shields, and 3x body pieces), and just told him to wear whatever he had in his inventory for the head and shoulders.

It took about 10-15 minutes to throw tank gear on his DK. We got a friend to come heal and picked up the 4th DPS from Group Finder. And we did pretty well--we got hardmode, no-death, and speed-run for vCoA2, and the DPS we had picked up from Group Finder was impressed at how well this first-timer tank with under 200 CP did (well, it helped that he was familiar with all of the fights from a DPS perspective).

Anyway, just jump into it. Tanking is fun, don't be scared, and the best way to learn to tank is to try it. Second, don't worry about farming for gear. One of the great things to come out of of the Clockwork City DLC is the Livewire set. It's easy to get and can be acquired very cheaply from guild traders. And it's a really nice well-rounded tanking set whose 5p is both supportive (AoE concussion) and selfish (procing heals on the tank). Combine that with Torug's Pact, which only requires 3 traits to craft, and anyone can jump into tanking with minimal initial investment. Of course, Livewire+Torug is neither meta nor competitive, but better setups will require a lot more time and effort to get, and as far as starter setups go, this is easily the best "bang for the buck".

Lynx7386

Tbh the only reason I still wear ebon on my dk tank is because of the pretty red lights. On occasion it will save some low health dd from Insta death but I've often considered swapping it for something else.

Actually tempted to back to using elf bane, especially if I can get the zaan set

TamrielSaviour215

code65536 wrote: »

Anyway, just jump into it. Tanking is fun, don't be scared, and the best way to learn to tank is to try it. Second, don't worry about farming for gear. One of the great things to come out of of the Clockwork City DLC is the Livewire set. It's easy to get and can be acquired very cheaply from guild traders. And it's a really nice well-rounded tanking set whose 5p is both supportive (AoE concussion) and selfish (procing heals on the tank). Combine that with Torug's Pact, which only requires 3 traits to craft, and anyone can jump into tanking with minimal initial investment. Of course, Livewire+Torug is neither meta nor competitive, but better setups will require a lot more time and effort to get, and as far as starter setups go, this is easily the best "bang for the buck".

Ya I am a loooooongggg way from getting to the endgame build. I just want something that I can get through in vet dungeons for now. Once I get the mechanics down, I will work on building different sets, but in all honesty, that is probably going to be a long time from now. This was good advice. I dont know anything about the Livewire set since I have been away for over 6 months so I will look into that this weekend. Is it crafted? I have a crafting toon that can do that stuff no problem.