Author: marinex
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Marine's Guide to Tanking 101
Part 1 ( Tanker Builds )
The first thing you have to decide is how you want to play, if you're not sure, go ahead and start a test tank to see how it works, making sure to both solo and team with other players. By seeing where you want to be and what you want to be able to do, you can tailor how you proceed. Unlike any other Archetype, except Defenders, How you build your Tank will determine his overall strengths and weaknesses much more dramatically. These apply regardless of powersets, except herding which would be difficult at best for Stone Tanker.
1. Solo Tanker
If you choose to build a solo Tank, each time you select Powers you need to keep this in mind. You need to balance the offensive and Defensive sides as evenly as possible, because there won't be a defender/controller there to keep your health up and buff you before a big mob in a mission. One of the most important things to keep in mind is endurance cost, if it has a high or extreme damage output, at the lower levels it will also cause your endurance to drop dramatically. If you can, stick to the basics and then slot them well ( remember to focus on Accuracy and Damage, you already went low endurance by not taking the biggest sticks ). On the defensive side you will need to stick to what will get you the highest Damage resistance for the lowest cost, ( always take always on powers as they can't be detoggled by foes ) and with toggle powers, avoid having them all running if you don't need to. When the power pools become available, get the Stamina set as a given, but also look at the others closely, Fly and TP are cool but use a lot of endurance, Leaping Pool power Super Jump has a very small endurance cost and very fast. Once you pass 20, you can begin grabbing more powers on each side, watch the endurance cost and slot them carefully.
2. Herding Tanker
Choosing to be a Herder comes with a whole different approach. You are a team oriented Tank, you can still Solo ( carefully ) but the focus of your build is on Defense. From the word go you are going to want to get every defensive power that is not nailed down, and focus your slotting on the defensive side to build it quickly, I recommend you limit yourself to only 2 attacks till level 20 ( along with Brawl and Mutagen/Taser/Charm etc ), this allows you to slot them well but spend most of your effort on the defense. Herding, for those unfamiliar, means you lure a group of villians out of line of sight of where they were, to where you team is waiting to ambush them or you attack them where they stand and taunt all of there attention onto you till your team can finish them off.Taunt as a herder is almost mandatory, and much more reliable than having someone sniping, once they have the aggro, it is hard to control it while taunt pulls them to you All the Time. Make sure once you have a mob to keep changing taunt targets to keep them. If you see a teammates health dropping, Select their name on the team roster, this will use their target to aim the taunt without you losing your herd. With a herder it is important to let people know what you are going to do, I recommend you bind an emote to key to do this, something like " I'll herd them here, Back up a Little and be Ready ". You be suprised how quickly you can clear large rooms and with very few problems.
3. Scrankers
They'll never be a scrapper but they can be fun to have around. A Tank built around minimal defensive powers and all the offense they can get. This build is easy, each time you can choose a power, pick something that does damage. All Tanker powersets give you natural defense but this is more extreme. Fire / Superstrength seems to be the best build for this because of the offensive output of the defenses. At lower levels you'll want to make sure you slot attacks with Damage and Recharge Reduction, you need to finish them off quickly before they can get thru your defense, if possible including endurance cost reducers as possible. This build can be a lot of fun, but be sure to let a team know that you aren't exactly a tank, but about the best compliment to a herding tank ever ( after a good Empathy Defender of course ). Working in tandom with a traditional tank they are impressive, Soloing is possible but you will have to crafty, so getting stealth as a Power Pool would be an excellent idea, as well as the health pool
In Closing
By the later levels you will have had a half dozen chances to respec minimum, so powers can always be tweaked. By the time you hit 40, no matter how you built when you started you'll probably all be at about the same place power wise. This guide is mostly to tune your first 30 levels to fit how you want to play, much as the costume creater allows for millions of possibilities, so do the archetypes and power sets. So don't feel limited by this, expand upon it, there are always shades of grey.
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