Need help/direction with DK Tank PVE

dlatour_ESO

Need some help with my DK tank. I've only been playing just short of 2 months essentially. I don't really know where to go from here. I can get through some Vet dungeons like base game ones OK but when the DLC Vets come, I get crushed unless I'm in a group of 810s randomly and they are basically carrying me with their damage etc. Even on normal mode some DLC dungeons hurt really bad. I know my role is a tank but my damage is horrible too so even questing is slow. For example in Fungal Grotto 2 I couldn't even kill the spiders in the shadow realm at the end before the boss was down. My group was low 300s and high 200s for that run so it wasn't quick.

I don't have access to lots of friends for trials. I've used Alcast and Xynode sites to get ideas. Here is my setup and hoping I could get some good feedback to help me get to the next level. I'm on Xbox if that matters.

Race:
Orc

Attribute Points:
Magicka - 15
Health - 10
Stamina - 39

Boon: The Lord

Stats (unbuffed)
Magicka - 11836
Health - 32881
Stamina - 19713
Magicka Recovery - 586
Health Recovery - 386
Stamina Recovery - 534
Spell Resist - 28257
Physical Resist - 24594
Critical Resist - 249
Spell damage - 1132
Spell Crit - 19
Weapon Damage - 1390
Weapon Crit - 11.5

Skills:
Front Bar
Green Dragon Blood
Absorb Missle
Pierce Armor
Igneous Shield
Heroic Slash
Magma Shell

Back Bar
Sanguine Bar
Blockade of Storms
Inner Rage
Choking Talons
Unrelenting Grip
Dawnbreaker of Smiting

Gear
Main Hand - Fortified Brass Sword - weakening and decisive
Off Hand - Fortified Brass Shield - stamina and infused
Main Hand Backup - Fortified Brass Lightning Staff - crusher and Infused
Head - Lord Warden - heavy - health and impenetrable
Chest - Fortified Brass Cuirass - heavy - stamina and reinforced
Shoulders - Lord Warden - heavy - health and infused
Waist - Fortified Brass Brass Sash - light - health and sturdy
Hands - Plague Doctor Gauntlet - heavy - health and sturdy
Legs - Plague Doctor Greaves - heavy - stamina and infused
Feet - Fortified Brass - Boots - medium - health and sturdy
Jewelry - Plague Doctor - bracing and health

CP Level - 315
The Tower - Warlord 14
The Lover - Arcanist 43
The Shadow - Shadow Ward 48
The Apprentice - Blessed 100
The Atronach - Master at Arms - 5
The Ritual - nothing
The Steed - Ironclad - 49
The Lady - Hardy 27, Elemental Defender 27, Thick Skinned 2
The Lord - nothing

I was looking at combining Leeching Set and Plague Doctor perhaps as a next step?

Thanks in advance anyone taking the time to help give advise etc.

IonicKai

So hopefully this will give some insights as this is often at least close to how my tank is setup for content. There are some things that will change since you are an orc so you will have 4k less resistance but this setup puts me way over resistance cap and was more for the utli buff from bloodspawn (cap is 33,150 just FYI). The link let's you see bar setup, attributes, gear (trait and enchant), and CP setup. Honestly some dungeons especially dlc do require a certain amount of group damage and not all random queues will have it. There are plenty of other sets you can wear as well but the sight also let's you experiment. Happy hunting and lmk if you have questions or want to bounce other ideas off someone. I would say leeching is a better survivability set then most especially for dungeons.

https://en.m.uesp.net/wiki/Special:EsoBuildData?id=70346

IonicKai

Oh also just realized you said your CP level was quite a bit lower but I think you have a good distribution for your level. Also don't be afraid to use an ice staff for yourself as you won't lose as much resistance when on your back bar with an ice staff (CP grants like 1500 resistance).

Hati

The setup is not that bad, i would change the skills through, at least put Warhorn on the back bar

For magicka regen, change the boon to Atronach, and put barrier on front bar, for magicka aid passive

I did all DLC vet content on HM with battalion defender and leeching, if you want to try.

Oakmontowls_ESO

I would drop plague doctor for something like Ebon. As for not dealing much damage, in this game, tanks don't typically focus on damage and instead build for the minimum amount of survival they they can do and instead focus as much as they can on group support.

Icy_Waffles

Use mag recovery for Mundus. Orc is okay but I think argonian is far superior for easy sustain. I like sword and board front bar. Ice staff backbar. A really easy to get setup for tanking that works in all dungeons- crest of Cyrodiil (heals you on block) and defender battalion (heals you or another on block) and bloodspawn monster set. Using tri glyph for stats- two block enchants on jewelry one mag recovery, crusher on staff- stam recovery one sword- I use medium bloodspawn helm and light shoulders for undaunted passives. I have about 42k health and 20k stam and mag (with about 100 more stam so that synergies reward stamina)

This will make you a monster in both sustain and survivability as a tank and really help your team as many dungeons run three dps now- this makes that even easier.

If you want to be a trials tank past normal trials that is a whole other ballgame with the need for multiple tanking sets and options. Fact is most people show builds for end game trials tank buffing damage... really not needed unless competing vet trials.

dlatour_ESO

Thanks everyone for feedback. I see some consistent comments regarding Mundus and staff. I have some of the Ebon pieces I'll try switching those out for an easy change.

@Icy_Waffles For the two sets you mention, they are earned in PvP, how much time do I have to spend there to get those? Not a real big fan of PVP. Any alternatives? I have a free race change token that I got somehow, worth switching to Argonian? I just don't like they way they look. The first guy that commented showed a Nord, how do they compare?

Not sure where my path will lead me in the game, trials seems so far away and I hear you need like 12 people. I don't have 12 people playing this game, I sometimes have enough for a dungeon group. I'm sure I'll pick up a friend or two along the way. While that would be amazing to do that content just not sure. Doing Vets easily, Maelstrom arena maybe and getting to 810 is the short term focus.

Icy_Waffles

dlatour_ESO wrote: »

Thanks everyone for feedback. I see some consistent comments regarding Mundus and staff. I have some of the Ebon pieces I'll try switching those out for an easy change.

@Icy_Waffles For the two sets you mention, they are earned in PvP, how much time do I have to spend there to get those? Not a real big fan of PVP. Any alternatives? I have a free race change token that I got somehow, worth switching to Argonian? I just don't like they way they look. The first guy that commented showed a Nord, how do they compare?

Not sure where my path will lead me in the game, trials seems so far away and I hear you need like 12 people. I don't have 12 people playing this game, I sometimes have enough for a dungeon group. I'm sure I'll pick up a friend or two along the way. While that would be amazing to do that content just not sure. Doing Vets easily, Maelstrom arena maybe and getting to 810 is the short term focus.

They actually can be found really inexpensively in guild traders. Sturdy on all pieces. You could get away with infused chest legs helm. Sturdy shield. Infused staff decisive 1h. Can be sword, mace, dagger or axe, whichever is cheapest.

With Nord you will have more ultimate- more resistances. Less recovery. So what you could do is try for stonekeeper set instead of bloodspawn BUT it’s insanely hard to get- hard dungeon.

I prefer argonian with bloodspawn because for most dungeons I use magic trash pots and have amazing sustain and using a tri pot incredible sustain for harder content due to argonian passives.

Again, Nord may be better end game vet trials tank- a lot of the advice you are given is for this. I run DPS on vet trial content. My tank is for other content like dungeons and normal trials if need be.

Hotdog_23

Good general advice so far. First, do not quest as a tank. Questing in full tank mode is not fun. Look up stamina DK builds for ideas on dps. Get some damage sets and use that for questing. If you need to level skills put a few on the bar where you kill stuff and turn quest in to get experience for those skills.

Vet DLC’s are hard to do when learning. Do not beat yourself up over having troubles. Tanking has a lot to do with managing your own resources. I have roughly 35k health, 24k stam and 22k magic I think but I am maxed CP.

You are buffer are de-buffer for your group your job is not to dps. Staying alive and holding the boss’s agro along with the hard hitting adds is. You cannot taunt everything if there is a lot of adds. Go after the big hitters who will hurt your team if you do not. Most importantly have fun.

dlatour_ESO

Icy_Waffles wrote: »

dlatour_ESO wrote: »

Thanks everyone for feedback. I see some consistent comments regarding Mundus and staff. I have some of the Ebon pieces I'll try switching those out for an easy change.

@Icy_Waffles For the two sets you mention, they are earned in PvP, how much time do I have to spend there to get those? Not a real big fan of PVP. Any alternatives? I have a free race change token that I got somehow, worth switching to Argonian? I just don't like they way they look. The first guy that commented showed a Nord, how do they compare?

Not sure where my path will lead me in the game, trials seems so far away and I hear you need like 12 people. I don't have 12 people playing this game, I sometimes have enough for a dungeon group. I'm sure I'll pick up a friend or two along the way. While that would be amazing to do that content just not sure. Doing Vets easily, Maelstrom arena maybe and getting to 810 is the short term focus.

They actually can be found really inexpensively in guild traders. Sturdy on all pieces. You could get away with infused chest legs helm. Sturdy shield. Infused staff decisive 1h. Can be sword, mace, dagger or axe, whichever is cheapest.

With Nord you will have more ultimate- more resistances. Less recovery. So what you could do is try for stonekeeper set instead of bloodspawn BUT it’s insanely hard to get- hard dungeon.

I prefer argonian with bloodspawn because for most dungeons I use magic trash pots and have amazing sustain and using a tri pot incredible sustain for harder content due to argonian passives.

Again, Nord may be better end game vet trials tank- a lot of the advice you are given is for this. I run DPS on vet trial content. My tank is for other content like dungeons and normal trials if need be.

Oh didn't realize you could buy them. What set do you recommend for the weapons and jewelry vs. the armor? Or does it matter as long as I get the bonus?

dlatour_ESO

Hotdog_23 wrote: »

Good general advice so far. First, do not quest as a tank. Questing in full tank mode is not fun. Look up stamina DK builds for ideas on dps. Get some damage sets and use that for questing. If you need to level skills put a few on the bar where you kill stuff and turn quest in to get experience for those skills.

Vet DLC’s are hard to do when learning. Do not beat yourself up over having troubles. Tanking has a lot to do with managing your own resources. I have roughly 35k health, 24k stam and 22k magic I think but I am maxed CP.

You are buffer are de-buffer for your group your job is not to dps. Staying alive and holding the boss’s agro along with the hard hitting adds is. You cannot taunt everything if there is a lot of adds. Go after the big hitters who will hurt your team if you do not. Most importantly have fun.

Would I need to get another gear set to juggle back and forth? Assuming I need the skill points to support having the additional skills unlocked. Still work to do there then.

Icy_Waffles

Whichever is cheaper. As far as question. Just changing to sets that add dps without changing skills or attributes is fine honestly

dlatour_ESO

Icy_Waffles wrote: »

Whichever is cheaper. As far as question. Just changing to sets that add dps without changing skills or attributes is fine honestly

Ok thanks I'll see what I can piece together from the vendors. Just glancing seems like Battalions is cheaper on weapons and jewelry. But a lot of vendors to shop around on.

You mentioned attributes. I have a split right now, is this ok or should I be looking into shifting?

Attribute Points:
Magicka - 15
Health - 10
Stamina - 39

Slothylicious

As was already suggested, Ebon armory is an excellent set for group support.

You typically don't need any set that will give you more survivability. You can do all the content in the game with sets that give group support.

Two other sets are really good for that, Roar of Alkosh and Claw of Yolnahkriin. No other sets in the game will provide the group support that these two do. They are acquired in two different trials, Maw of Lorkhaj and Sunspire respectively. You can get those sets in the normal version of the trials, no need for vet.

If you have trouble gathering the people to do trials, consider joining a PvE guild that accepts new players, there are plenty of them. Look at the forums or in the guild finder in game. Even in some social guilds they run trials sometimes.

Torug's Pact can also be used to get more out of your Crusher enchantment and provide more penetration, although it is worse than Roar of Alkosh most of the time. The good thing about it is that it is craftable, so very easy to obtain.

Lord Warden is fine and will do for the majority of content. There are lots of other options for monster sets. Blood Spawn gives you some ultimate generation. Symphony of blades, from the Depths of Malatar dungeon, can give a lot of sustain to your group. Earthgore, from Bloodroot Forge, can help with healing. Although, for the last two you will need to complete the dungeons in vet, and it's no easy task. Some other sets can help you survive in situations where you need less group support, like Mighty Chudan or Engine Guardian to name a couple.

As many other people have said, The Atronach mundus stone is a better boon than The Lord.

Attributes are kind of flexible, but I run 64 in health myself. You don't really need a massive resource pool, just good sustain. Igneous Shield and Balance (from the mage guild skill tree) are great for that. Balance will also give you Major Resolve (more resistances) for basically free (the 5k health cost is nothing when you have a healer). If you want a bit more resources to be more comfortable, use food that gives you max health, max stamina and max magicka (aka tristat food).

You will need to use Aggressive Horn to give your group a stat boost and Major Force, it is the best support ultimate for damage in the game. Barrier can also be useful for hairy situations, and as somebody else said slotting it gives you a magicka regeneration boost. For both those ultimates, you'll need to do a little bit of PvP. If you don't like PvP, do a bunch of battlegrounds, you might not have much fun but you get 7k AP even if you lose. Or go to Cyrodiil and try to join a big group, if you manage to capture some keeps/resources you can get quite a bit of AP that way.

Paramedicus

Get more health, u want that if u pug. U need to be as self reliable as possible. Doing dmg isnt your job. Get leeching plate set (free stamina regen and healing for DKs). Second set as you wish (may be ebon). Invest CPs in mag recovery and HA recovery. Get balance (mages skill) to use them on fights where u use much magicka. Get mundus recovering magicka. Get pair of rings with magicka recovery and pair with block cost reduction. Use diffrrent food (red frothgar or two stat or tri stat).

You will want to switch food/rings/skills depending on fight or dungeon. Being vet tank is all about sustain (to have stam for fights with lots blocking or magicka for multiple adds or self heals).

Dont bother using staff. I use lighting on base vets because i dont have anything better to do there. Some ppl use ice staff for CC but it is too expensive and just uneffective (much better to use talons and turn evil). Crusher enchant doesnt give rly that much. You may use ice staff sometimes to bring ele drain or crushing shock on need (and if your team is too bad to take care of it).

Get shield discipline uli. It is cheap (good for resource regen) and gives u free perm block and free taunting/ slashing for few seconds (very reliable on hard trash pools or bosses with hard adds).

Slothylicious

Paramedicus wrote: »

Dont bother using staff. I use lighting on base vets because i dont have anything better to do there. Some ppl use ice staff for CC but it is too expensive and just uneffective (much better to use talons and turn evil).

First, lightning staff is still a staff.

Second, the reason to use an ice staff over a lightning staff is because of damage mitigation, not for CC. Blocking with an ice staff will give you much more mitigation than blocking with a lightning staff, so in difficult fights where the boss uses a nasty heavy attack it can save your life.

On the other hand, using a lightning staff can be useful to provide a better Off-Balance uptime, which will give more damage to your group through the Exploiter CP passive.

Paramedicus wrote: »

Crusher enchant doesnt give rly that much.

This has to be the wrongest statement I've seen. Crusher is absolutely essential as penetration is a massive DPS boost for your group. And you need infused on that staff to get the most out of it. You can keep it up easily by using Wall of Elements.

dlatour_ESO

Ok now I'm getting confused, seeing more advise which I do appreciate but seems like everyone conflicts with each other. I'm a new player, I don't know what everything means and the synergies with each other so now I feel like I'm more confused than before. I started going down the road of what IcyWaffle was saying but now back to Leeching plate, ebon etc. I don't have gold to try out all these different things from vendors and collecting all this gear will take forever and a day for me. The RNG from the monster set put me over the edge already 0-7 on the Lord Warden shoulders before I got a pair. I can't do that when I'm only getting 3 keys a day. I don't expect to be a beast over night but was open for more consistent information to go towards for my next steps.

IonicKai

Staff/bow is required to be optimally helpful to your group so that you can apply full value crusher (should be infused trait as well which is about 2100 pen which is a flat like 4-5% damage increase). The favor towards ice staff is because it gives you more resistance so you aren't as likely to die caught on your back bar blocking an attack (think heavy from a strong boss). Beyond that there are plenty of sets you can use but as some have said the goal is to build in a way to help group damage. There aren't a lot of good ways for tanks to get damage that don't rely on riding the survivability line like a tight rope. That largely relies on knowledge and resistance from CP (greater that 600) to even work and it's not good for learning. That kind of setup is really for pushing score runs as hard as possible in situations where you need two tanks for some parts but not others in a trial.

Slothylicious

dlatour_ESO wrote: »

Ok now I'm getting confused, seeing more advise which I do appreciate but seems like everyone conflicts with each other. I'm a new player, I don't know what everything means and the synergies with each other so now I feel like I'm more confused than before. I started going down the road of what IcyWaffle was saying but now back to Leeching plate, ebon etc. I don't have gold to try out all these different things from vendors and collecting all this gear will take forever and a day for me. The RNG from the monster set put me over the edge already 0-7 on the Lord Warden shoulders before I got a pair. I can't do that when I'm only getting 3 keys a day. I don't expect to be a beast over night but was open for more consistent information to go towards for my next steps.

What you need to take away from all this is that your main functions as a tank are:

1) Keep aggro while surviving. This is achieved mostly with a high health pool (from attributes, armor enchantments, food, CP, and maybe a tiny bit from gear), and high resistances (from equipping heavy armor, CP, Major Resolve).

2) Never run out of resources, which is achieved with Mundus stone boon, Igneous Shield, Balance, your healer synergies (Luminous Shard, Energy Orbs), heavy armor passives, potions, and your ultimate (as a DK it gives you a huge amount of resources).

3) Give your group some support: survivability through Igneous Shield and Ebon Armory, damage through Crusher enchantment and gear bonuses (Roar of Alkosh, Claw of Yolnahkriin, Torug's Pact)

That is it.

Everything else I said are just more options for you.

Torug's Pact is extremely easy to acquire, so I would suggest that as your first set. If you have some pieces of Ebon Armory already then it should be your second set, getting it is not very hard either (you can run normal Crypt of Hearts).

Keep in mind that regarding the sets that drop in trials, you'll have a group of 12 people instead of 4, so if you're the only one needing the pieces you'll have a much better chance of someone in the group getting something.

If you have Lord Warden then for now you don't really need any other monster set. All the ones I listed are just to give you more options if you happen to run those dungeons so you keep them.

Paramedicus

Slothylicious wrote: »

Paramedicus wrote: »

Dont bother using staff. I use lighting on base vets because i dont have anything better to do there. Some ppl use ice staff for CC but it is too expensive and just uneffective (much better to use talons and turn evil).

First, lightning staff is still a staff.

Second, the reason to use an ice staff over a lightning staff is because of damage mitigation, not for CC. Blocking with an ice staff will give you much more mitigation than blocking with a lightning staff, so in difficult fights where the boss uses a nasty heavy attack it can save your life.

On the other hand, using a lightning staff can be useful to provide a better Off-Balance uptime, which will give more damage to your group through the Exploiter CP passive.

Well thx for those truths cpt obvious. I hope we still remeber that OP is struggling to survive in DLC, so going with light staff is still bad idea for him. But it is good that you mentioned big disadvantage of lighting staff: it makes blocking harder.

So as I suggested, OP, save light staves for dungeons where you feel comfortable. You may bring ice staff sometimes with crushing shot (if you got bad team where nobody interupts some nasty ranged boss) or for ele drain (if your healer is bad and you rly want that magicka regen and have free slot or it s 3 DD run).

Slothylicious wrote: »

Paramedicus wrote: »

Crusher enchant doesnt give rly that much.

This has to be the wrongest statement I've seen. Crusher is absolutely essential as penetration is a massive DPS boost for your group. And you need infused on that staff to get the most out of it. You can keep it up easily by using Wall of Elements.

If this is wrongest statement you ever seen then I guess you didnt read OP post about him having problems in DLC dungs and you just like to copy/paste some BiS folklore truths. Gold crusher enchant on gold infused staff gives like ~4% more damage (?). You wont be able to have it 100% uptime, so realistically it will be more like 2-3% on harder fights. WOW what a massive DPS boost!!

Beside that, it s worth noticing that it will only proc on single target, so it is useless on trash or chaotic boss fights with many adds. So yeah OP, DON'T bother unless you have good team and fight is easy to single target and you feel comfortable. Save crusher for raiding. Get Turn Evil from fighters guild, it is amazing (hard aoe CC + damage reduction) - it saves lives on hard trash pulls or bosses with tons of adds.

dlatour_ESO wrote: »

Ok now I'm getting confused, seeing more advise which I do appreciate but seems like everyone conflicts with each other. I'm a new player, I don't know what everything means and the synergies with each other so now I feel like I'm more confused than before. I started going down the road of what IcyWaffle was saying but now back to Leeching plate, ebon etc. I don't have gold to try out all these different things from vendors and collecting all this gear will take forever and a day for me. The RNG from the monster set put me over the edge already 0-7 on the Lord Warden shoulders before I got a pair. I can't do that when I'm only getting 3 keys a day. I don't expect to be a beast over night but was open for more consistent information to go towards for my next steps.

It's not your fault that you feel confused. Just some people who write here are bit confused and post you BiS advices for vet raids, while you asked for tips for doing DLC dungeons with unreliable team. I.e advice to get Roar of Alkosh or Torug's Pact for dung with PUG (is that trolling?).

Get that leeching plate, it will be your main set for dungs, for second one pick whatever you want (best something for team like ebon which is easy to get, or Battalion Defender mentioned ealrier [but only if you block a lot, otherwise it gonna be useless]).

As for monster set, warden is cool but works only in dungs where you are stacking a lot (like CoS maybe?). You gotta remeber that actuall dmg reduction which your team will get is like 5,7%, so it isnt THAT great (i.e. they will get 8% from turn evil, but radius is much much smaller). For other dungs you may find other sets more reliable (even 'selfish' Bloodspawn in dungs where you take lots of damage, for better ulti uptime and resources [as DK you get resources for casting ultis]). Later you may get other monster sets for tanks which are mentioned on forums often (engine guardian [bit unrealiable for my taste], two different set parts for resources and sustain or even sentinel, earthgore, symphony [last 3 ones best used with some HoTs, like altar)

My main two points are:
1) your sustain is crp - you must fix it ASAP. DLC dungs are all about managing your resources.
2) you gotta be flexible. You will find that for some dungs or boss fights you need better magicka sustain and in other fights your stamina will run out quickly, because you have to almost perm-block. It is easy to fix by changing food, skills and jewlery enchants (and monster sets later [im looking at you Stonekeeper].

And if you get into serious vet raiding, then it will be different story for you. Get all BiS raiding gear then. In raids you are working like little cog in big mashine: you need to supplement your team best as possible.

Septimus_Magna

For questing you need different gear thats focused towards dealing dmg instead of mitigating dmg.

In vet Fungal Grotto 2 the tank needs to stay away from the portal, the closest person gets pulled in if nobody goes in by choice. So thats a mistake on the part of the DDs in your group.

You can run normal trials with PUG, just go to Craglorn and check the zone chat. Start with nAA and nHRC and work your way up to the more challenging trails. Its good watch a video for the tactics and boss mechanics before you start.

For DLC dungeons its important to know the mechanics, often dmg can be avoided if you know what to do. Its also important to debuff the boss and stronger adds, try not to overcast you own buffs. Some attacks you dont have to block, during block there's no stam regen so perma-blocking is not always an option. As DK you can convert mag to stam with igneous so make sure to have enough mag regen.

I run a sorc tank so my setup is a bit unconventional but it works pretty well.
5x Ebon (must have for all tanks)
5x Powerful Assault (back bar - procs off War Horn and Vigor)
2x vMA S&B (front bar - to increase mag/stam sustain)

For the monster set I use 2x Swarm Mother because I dont have chains, as a DK you can use something else here. If you want more resist you can run 2x Lord Warden or 1x Pirate Skeleton + 1x Chudan. Or you can use a monster set to improve sustain if you struggle with that.

Asardes

Never used either Fortified Brass of Plague Doctor. The former is overkill on tank since you have 30K+ resistances - 33K is the resistance mitigation cap at 50% - and most mitigation comes from blocking anyway. Most unblockable resistance are magic/elemental DoTs and DK has 3K spell resistance from class passives, meaning you're most likely capped there already. The latter is also kinda useless since you can easily get to 40K HP even splitting your attributes. Past 40K any extra HP will not really help you survive, if you get one-shotted with 40K you're probably doing something wrong, and you will most likely die even with 50K+ HP. So it's about tactics, not gear. Leeching Plate is helpful if you are fighting multiple mobs, since you get health from each one hit, but for boss fights it's not that good.

For dungeons I use Ebon Armory + Torug's Pact + [monster set]. The first 2 sets are easy to get, first is from Crypt of Hearts 1&2 which are really easy even on veteran so you'll get a set of purple jewelry quite fast, Torug's Pact is crafter so it's easy to fill the gaps for a complete setup. The monster set is a more nuanced choice. You can stick with Lord Warden since it's a nice resistance buff for the group, but Bloodspawn is also a solid choice for ultimate buidup, others are more niche. What I have now for dungeons is Earthgore since I'm also the healer - Echoing Vigor + Fragmented Shield heals for quite a bit over a large area, Earthgore will proc on whoever is in trouble for a burst heal. I use infused on big pieces (head, legs, chest, shield) and sturdy on small ones, but that's because I use prismatic defense glyphs on the former. If you use simple glyphs probably sturdy overall is better.

https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Special:EsoBuildData?id=52256

BejaProphet

@dlatour_ESO

You are getting conflicting advice because the advice is coming from divergent opinions on WHAT a tank is suppose to be about, and second because they don’t all have the same content in mind as well.

My building theory is entirely explained in my tanking guide linked in my signature.

Here is my immediate observation.

1. You are too squishy to Random vet DLC dungeons. Many might respond and say, “I do vet PUG’s with such and such.” But they don’t RANDOM with that. With your health and mitigation there are heavy attacks that probably can take half your life through your block. Won’t matter to them if they brought their guild’s best trial healer or a 150k+ triple DD team but it WILL matter to you not knowing who you will be with.

2. Don’t try to do personal damage as a tank doing random vet DLC’s. The spiders you referenced, the answer is for a DD to jump in so the tank isn’t taken.

3. Your Regen is fine if it is fine. I’ve randomed every vet DLC in game as tank with 525 Magicka Regen. There are other tools to manage resources. I’m partial to deep thoughts. Others have mentioned balance and that is valid also.


It’s going to come down to WHAT you want to do, and WHO you intend to do it with. My tanking advice is specifically tailored to doing vet dlc dungeons with RANDOM groups.

In 2020 I tested it by PUGIng every vet dlc daily in one single pledge cycle and I PUG cleared all 14 vet dlc dungeons with only 4 failed groups the entire two weeks. (1 couldn’t beat Lord Warden, and 3 failed at Dro Zakar in moon grave fane.)

But you can not do that going in optimized for trial tanking. You have to be a friggen TANK, when your healer is random and might be clueless, and you have DD that might not realize they can even bash. Get rid of your lightning staff, put on a full 7 heavy, keep your lord mundus, harden up.

Slothylicious

Paramedicus wrote: »

If this is wrongest statement you ever seen then I guess you didnt read OP post about him having problems in DLC dungs and you just like to copy/paste some BiS folklore truths. Gold crusher enchant on gold infused staff gives like ~4% more damage (?). You wont be able to have it 100% uptime, so realistically it will be more like 2-3% on harder fights. WOW what a massive DPS boost!!

Beside that, it s worth noticing that it will only proc on single target, so it is useless on trash or chaotic boss fights with many adds. So yeah OP, DON'T bother unless you have good team and fight is easy to single target and you feel comfortable. Save crusher for raiding. Get Turn Evil from fighters guild, it is amazing (hard aoe CC + damage reduction) - it saves lives on hard trash pulls or bosses with tons of adds.

If crusher is crap then what do you suggest instead, genius?

You say a weapon enchantment is useless, then go on talking about Turn Evil which is a different matter entirely.

The only two enchantments useful for a tank are Crusher and Weakening, and of course both will only hit a single target. Nobody cares about the enchantment in trash fights.

Asardes

Crusher w Torug's Pact infused is 2.75K resistance debuff which is a ~4.2% damage increase for the group. Which is not negligible. The only alternative I can think of is running Lightning Damage for more concussed/off balance but normally the healer runs that.

mobicera

Ok if you knew me you would know just how many vet randoms I do...
80+% of my play time is spent in vet randoms mostly with random people I don't know as oddly its what I find most enjoyable...
75% of this is done on a tank of one class or another...
My pug set up that I run in randoms are 1 of 2 set ups these don't really change unless a specific dlc hm is being attempted, requires it and is actually conceivable...
1 is most common...
1 masters sword decisive, weakening enchant
Masters Shield sturdy tri stat glyph
Olorime ice staff infused crusher
Olorime jewelry healthy with magical recovery enchant
Symphony of blades monster set both heavy both sturdy both tri stat
Yolnahkriins body all sturdy all tri stat glyph
Front bar buffed stats
Purple tri stat food and major resolve
Magic 20607
Health 33611
Stam 22961
Magic recovery 1590
Spell resistance 33193
Physical resistance 32731
Note I don't recommend this low health while learning when experienced you will find it's fine for 99% of content...
Front bar
Pierce armor
Unrelenting grip
Choking talons
Heroic slash
Sanguine altar
Warhorn

Back bar
Inner rage
Blockade of frost
Igneous shield
Hardened armor
Green dragon blood
Magma shell
Race of my dk is nord

If I get one of the more difficult dlc dungeons and it's a real healer wearing olorime or spc I will swap out olo and masters for torugs pact or if burn and synergies are good alkosh.
Little changes to my stats as all my gear is enchanted the same way tri stat glyphs
Alkosh bit less mag regeneration
Torugs bit less mag regeneration bit more hp...
All my staffs for use in 4 person content is infused with crusher enchants...
I have tanked every 4 person dungeon with pug randoms in this exact set up so many times....
Vdsa pug runs 3 dps same set up...

Funny thing is my set up doesn't really change in preformed groups its just in those with these set ups everything just melts lmao...

Yes to learn go a bit more selfish
Do a mix of selfish and buff/debuff

Best recommendation for starting in vet dungeons is farm nicp for leeching sadly
And pair that with torugs pact bonus being crafted so you can just make what doesn't drop... and bloodspawn monster set...
Use an infused ice staff with crusher enchant its very easy to hit near 100% with wall of elements...this will both help you survive and sustain with dk passive with ultimate as well as increasing overall dps a bit...

BejaProphet

@mobicera

You are reporting a physical resistance of 8k higher than OP. That plus him having 315cp makes your 33k health monumentally different from him. And even then you agree that a new player shouldn’t go that low in health when pugging vet dlc.

So I think we are in agreement that HE is too squishy for what he hopes to do as a new player.

As a side note, don’t think I advocate going all selfish. I run Ebon/Alkosh.

And mad respect to you for being a vet dlc pugging tank and getting it done ✊.

zvavi

DLC is harsher, thats where the real tanking begins. My best advice would be, it is experience. Learn to use block less. Roll dodge more. Manage your resources(learn to know when you can heavy attack).

Longer answer:
Gear: Your traits are all over the place. Infused is only good on big pieces. Impen is useless. Fortified+plague+warden is fine for the beginning, you dont need everything gold, purpling everything is pretty cheap (excluding rings, but plague rings are kinda cheap too, 10k~ each). I would also recommend getting gold tri stat enchantment on all big enchant pieces (legs, chest, head) and then balancing your resource pools+hp through attributes.

Bars: tbh tank bars should be flexible. For different encounters i will have different things. But. But. You dont have major defensive buffs on your bars. Thats 5k resists. Which will give you a lot of resistances. A lot.

Cp: since your magic resist is much higher, probably a bit more points hardy and less in elemental defender.

Mag regen: wayyy too low, is your utility, get some more. Atro mundus is recommended.

dlatour_ESO

@Asardes Thanks for the build link. That was helpful for slots etc. How does being an Orc, non Vampire (I had it maxed but dropped it because of the fire damage intake), and only CP 315 impact your suggestion? I'm going to try and model this as its seems Ebon/Torg has been mentioned a few times, I always have a hard time to determine which pieces to get in which slots. My BS, Clothing, and Woodworking are at 50, just need to make sure I have enough research and the right traits.

@BejaProphet I read through the guide, helpful tips and reminders. I would say that I was doing most of the basics around taunt the big nasties more and not focus on the trash that the dps can clean up, some of the math was helpful as well to understand what was going on. I wasn't given mitigation enough credit even though it was there. I got to the part where you mentioned dps contribution to the group and you pulled out Alkosh. Alkosh is not reachable for me so when I'm trying to get advise I don't want trials gear in mind right now if that makes sense. Its a strong set but I can't count on what it will bring to the table because I won't have it if that makes sense. 'll stick to the tank aspects and do what I can to buff the group with what I have.

Slothylicious

dlatour_ESO wrote: »

@Asardes Thanks for the build link. That was helpful for slots etc. How does being an Orc, non Vampire (I had it maxed but dropped it because of the fire damage intake), and only CP 315 impact your suggestion

I would suggest being a vampire. The added fire damage has minimal impact, and both the magicka regen and the undeath passive are useful. If you encounter a fight with a lot of fire damage, you can always decrease your vampire stage.

Other people also mentioned that learning mechanics of the fights have greater impact than your build itself, and I agree. Knowing when and when not to block or roll dodge, proper positioning, slotting unusual skills, etc, will often be the decisive aspect of being successful or failing a fight.

Paramedicus

Slothylicious wrote: »

Paramedicus wrote: »

If this is wrongest statement you ever seen then I guess you didnt read OP post about him having problems in DLC dungs and you just like to copy/paste some BiS folklore truths. Gold crusher enchant on gold infused staff gives like ~4% more damage (?). You wont be able to have it 100% uptime, so realistically it will be more like 2-3% on harder fights. WOW what a massive DPS boost!!

Beside that, it s worth noticing that it will only proc on single target, so it is useless on trash or chaotic boss fights with many adds. So yeah OP, DON'T bother unless you have good team and fight is easy to single target and you feel comfortable. Save crusher for raiding. Get Turn Evil from fighters guild, it is amazing (hard aoe CC + damage reduction) - it saves lives on hard trash pulls or bosses with tons of adds.

If crusher is crap then what do you suggest instead, genius?

You say a weapon enchantment is useless, then go on talking about Turn Evil which is a different matter entirely.

The only two enchantments useful for a tank are Crusher and Weakening, and of course both will only hit a single target. Nobody cares about the enchantment in trash fights.

I think that i made my point clear: he should use crusher on staff, but he shouldn't bother using staff in dungs where he doesn't feel comfortable. He will waste magicka for wall of elements and prolly will kill himself while trying to acomplish this great goal of 2% damage boost in PUG with medicore DPS.

Asardes wrote: »

Never used either Fortified Brass of Plague Doctor. The former is overkill on tank since you have 30K+ resistances - 33K is the resistance mitigation cap at 50% - and most mitigation comes from blocking anyway. Most unblockable resistance are magic/elemental DoTs and DK has 3K spell resistance from class passives, meaning you're most likely capped there already. The latter is also kinda useless since you can easily get to 40K HP even splitting your attributes. Past 40K any extra HP will not really help you survive, if you get one-shotted with 40K you're probably doing something wrong, and you will most likely die even with 50K+ HP. So it's about tactics, not gear. Leeching Plate is helpful if you are fighting multiple mobs, since you get health from each one hit, but for boss fights it's not that good.

For dungeons I use Ebon Armory + Torug's Pact + [monster set]. The first 2 sets are easy to get, first is from Crypt of Hearts 1&2 which are really easy even on veteran so you'll get a set of purple jewelry quite fast, Torug's Pact is crafter so it's easy to fill the gaps for a complete setup. The monster set is a more nuanced choice. You can stick with Lord Warden since it's a nice resistance buff for the group, but Bloodspawn is also a solid choice for ultimate buidup, others are more niche. What I have now for dungeons is Earthgore since I'm also the healer - Echoing Vigor + Fragmented Shield heals for quite a bit over a large area, Earthgore will proc on whoever is in trouble for a burst heal. I use infused on big pieces (head, legs, chest, shield) and sturdy on small ones, but that's because I use prismatic defense glyphs on the former. If you use simple glyphs probably sturdy overall is better.

https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Special:EsoBuildData?id=52256

It is true that leeching plate is less usefull on single target, but it s still usefull on trash and bosses with adds (which are plenty in dlc).You can also boost healing from leeching plate by investing spare CP in mighty (blue tree). My 40-70% of self healing comes from leechnig plate (and i dont use cinder or vigor because i dont have to). It is also worth noting, that as DK you get stamina from leeching plate. Comparted to that Torgus just don't give you any serious advantage. Better crusher, which translates to like 1%+ dmg in real life scenario? WOW? I have no idea why people treat this set as something default for tanks. It is so lazy advice. If OP gets good team then he can min/max with them all he wants. But for PUG? Give me a break.