Are Bretons Viable For Tanking?

VeritasWaits

I want to make a Frost Staff/Sword and Shield Warden, but I'm stuck on whether to roll as a Nord or a Breton. I'm planning to solo a lot with this character, so the Breton magicka passives seem like they would be helpful. But I'll be building towards a tank role, so I don't know if I should go with Nord and just make my peace with doing a little less damage when solo.

Bretons have some spell resistance, and wardens have a lot of defensive/healing spells to use magicka on while tanking, so my question is how sub-optimal are they really for a tank? I'm not interested in the ultimate 99.5% super endgame, but I want to be fully viable for vet dungeons, maelstrom runs, world boss soloing, etc. I've never played tank before so I'm not sure how important the racial passives are at the end of the day.

Help?

RogueShark

You can do any role with any race.
Some will be better, but the racials aren't so world-shattering that you HAVE to be one or the other or you're going to fail. Play what you want to, if you aren't worried about top tier meta chasers dictating your build.
My khajiit healer has cleared all HM trials.

On the other hand, if you're looking at breton mostly for more damage when soloing, that's also kind of negligible. If you prefer nord but are worried your damage is hindered, don't be. I overland/solo in healer gear and just swap out skills and sometimes CP and I never have an issue. Solo content is easy enough. Even vMA, your race isn't going to make or break you.

Tommy_The_Gun

Well.. yes. Bretons have 7% cheaper magicka abilities and also ults - so that is a big boon if you are using heavy armour.
They also have higher Spell Resistance - and it is definitely useful for a tank.

Technically even if you are using One-Handed and Shield on a Breton you should be even better tank than Argonian for example.

Sure, Nords will be still tiny bit better but I think if you are attempting to play solo, Bretons will be better choice (since Nords will get more ulti generation and it will not be as useful solo as it would have been in a group environment).

Corpier

Is Breton optimal for tanking?
No, there are better races for strictly tanking such as Nord or Imperial.

Is it viable?
Absolutely, more so than the majority of other races in fact. It actually is an especially good race if you want to heal/tank dungeons, and it will be superior to better pure tanking races for things you list like Maelstrom and other solo play due to their spell resistance and greater self-sustain.

yooqi

Breton's cheap magicka cost is nice for tanking, since it makes it easier to buff and heal yourself.

A lot of tanks use the magicka recovery mundus, but with Breton you might be able to use something different. So I think their passives are quite useful for tanks, even if not the "meta best".

idk

First, as pointed out you can tank with any race and any class though some races have better passives for it that will not make a huge difference. Some classes are better than others and Warden is a decent tanking class.

Further, it really depends on what your goals are. I have seen unfavorable race/role combinations in vet trial clears but these were not runs going for top leaderboard scores. They were training runs so it mattered less.

In the end you should be fine and unless your goal is to push more the challenging vet trials you will be absolutely fine. You will be fine in all 4 man dungeons, even DLCs, all normal trials, vDSA and many vet trials.

Most of anything comes down to player skill.

IonicKai

Tanking is a lot more flexible when it comes to race selection as they use all three resources and benefit from anything that gives raw stats. That said if the goal is tankiest tank then as others have said some races are more optimal (Nord sturdy with extra ultimate generation and solid stat pools for health and stam, imperial high stats for health and stam and some sustain from both passive recovery and 3% reduced ability cost, Argonian for potion passive, increased health and magic, and increased self heals).

MartiniDaniels

Nord - best tank overall for ultigain
Argonian - easiest to sustain
Imperial - middle ground between those two
Orc - best for off-dpsing..

Other races are all sub-optimal, since they don't give nothing "special" to group like nord, imperial and orc and are harder to sustain then argonian. But of course you may tank on any race, same as you may heal or dps on any race.

WrathOfInnos

@lassitershawn Tagging you here since IIRC your Warden tank is a Breton. The one with Tick Tock, Gryphon Heart, and Immortal Redeemer.

VeritasWaits

Thanks for the answers! I'm new enough to the game that the extra sustain support from Breton sounds like it would be helpful. I just wanted to make sure I wasn't making a mistake before sinking a few dozen hours into the character.

DoonerSeraph

Just be aware that blocking with Ice Staff cuts out you magicka regen, so favor blocking on the SnB side of the spectrum if you can 😊

John_Falstaff

DoonerSeraph wrote: »

Just be aware that blocking with Ice Staff cuts out you magicka regen, so favor blocking on the SnB side of the spectrum if you can 😊

That's only if you have Tri Focus passive, no? I don't actually think it's a nice passive to invest in, unless you're trying some kind of unorthodox magicka-based tank build.

BejaProphet

Any race can do anything.

But...if you desire to optimize, then do so towards the harder content. Don’t be a worse tank because you are worried about soloing. Soloing will be easy unless your controller runs out of batteries. Even then odds are good that you can swap them in time.

Joosef_Kivikilpi

Perma block Breton DK with Frozen Watcher soaking Igneous Shields for stamina.

Alsaroth

I have a nord, mag.sorc as a tank. Workss just super.

Alsaroth

Alsaroth wrote: »

I have a nord, mag.sorc as a tank. Workss just super.

Sorry, a nord, sorc. mag/stam hybrid tank. Frost staff and sword and shield. Works well.

Liofa

Optimal? No. Viable? Yes.

Kesstryl

DoonerSeraph wrote: »

Just be aware that blocking with Ice Staff cuts out you magicka regen, so favor blocking on the SnB side of the spectrum if you can 😊

I'd recommend not taking Tri-focus, then you will always block with stam and not worry about this. The ice staff taunt is useless with the long wind up, the undaunted ranged taunt is instant and way better, and not hard to get if you do a few random normal dungeons and Borgul quests at the undaunted places.

CHM228

I'm gonna pick breton for heal and dps necro, but i think i can also play as tank with breton.

eliisra

I love it for tanking VR dungeons and more casual content, where you don't need a full health tanky tank. It's a really great and fun magicka tank, if you're doing content that allows that build.

If you play warden or templar, you can also make a solid tank/heal build using Breton.

It's not an optimal race for tanking harder content though, where you need a proper punchbag with high health. If i was making my character a main tank I wouldn't pick Breton tbh. Than I'd go Nord or maybe Imperial.

lassitershawn

WrathOfInnos wrote: »

@lassitershawn Tagging you here since IIRC your Warden tank is a Breton. The one with Tick Tock, Gryphon Heart, and Immortal Redeemer.

eliisra wrote: »

I love it for tanking VR dungeons and more casual content, where you don't need a full health tanky tank. It's a really great and fun magicka tank, if you're doing content that allows that build.

If you play warden or templar, you can also make a solid tank/heal build using Breton.

It's not an optimal race for tanking harder content though, where you need a proper punchbag with high health. If i was making my character a main tank I wouldn't pick Breton tbh. Than I'd go Nord or maybe Imperial.

Yeah, breton is actually a really solid tanking race, especially for warden imo (I tend to cast more skills on my warden than on my DK). With the exception of sometimes spiders and really cheap melee taunt (which honestly I don't even use in all fights as OT, think I used it only for trash and triplets in HoF), tanking takes a LOT of magicka skills and especially as OT you can be expected to offer additional support skills like extra purges on raptors or orbs on AG. I run lord mundus to make up for the lack of HP and in the case of wardens always having minor toughness active is nice. A nord trying to get comparable sustain would have to run the atro mundus (far weaker than breton passives) and would probably end up with less sustain and equal HP since not running lord, though nord is a very nice tank race and my favorite on DK. Imperials are OK especially if you are permablocking as MT but a lot of OT roles don't really even require that much blocking anymore and stamina skills are far less common and much cheaper in the first place than magicka skills on a tank. The spell resistance on breton is usually enough to get you capped fairly easily.