Tanking Goals

[Havok.cry]

Does cloudkill still apply it's miss chance to bosses? Does solid fog still debuff boss reflex saves?

[Scraap]

Would you please explain this further. Are you saying:
A-You can actively shield block and use the cleave/great cleave/(I assume)supreme cleave abilities without lowering your guard

or

B-You can actively shield block and use the cleave/great cleave/(I assume)supreme cleave abilities however your guard is lowered, but only like wand casting while actively blocking

or

C-something else entirely?

From the results I've gotten, believe it's B for the physical damage portion. That elemental blocking bit is either bugged visually, or has a bit of a lingering amount of time after it flips off. Still not 100% sure there.

[Havok.cry]

Yes, it's a build that's came out after the onset of MoTU. DDD stands for the Dire Defender Dreadnought. Essentially, it was a cleave-tarding sword and board build that took advantage of the large bonuses to Doublestrike that were granted in the expansion. I personally believe it works best with the bastard sword Nightmare, however the best alternative weapon was the Duergar Dwarven Waraxe. From a straight damage principle, the Waraxe is the clear winner with both the bonuses from Dreadnought and the overall damage properties of the weapon. However the Nightmare was so useful because of everything else on it. The whole point of the build was taking the offensive abilities we gained in the expansion, and applying them to a build with high defenses. When I was running mine, even when I was just S&Bing I was doing as much damage, or even more, than the Juggernauts in melee.

For Reference:
http://ddowiki.com/page/Duergar_Wara..._Weapon_Master

http://ddowiki.com/page/Nightmare,_the_Fallen_Moon

The sideways hop I mentioned has to be seen to be understood, more or less. During the attack chain, your third basic attack is a spin move that for some God awful reason hops you to the left each time. Like the other guy said, it's best to take the cleaves and alternate using them. Also you can get Supreme Cleave with only 3 levels of barbarian, which would potentially help this problem due to it's incredibly short cooldown and also because the only time this becomes a problem is when you're actually tanking a boss.

Also, for reference:

Doublestrike:

30% Action Boost (Druid, t2, Nature's warrior)
25% Block and Cut (t5 Stalwart attack, 10 sec uptime with 20sec cooldown)
8% Improved Shield Mastery
8% Skirmisher's Bracers OR
15% First Blood (one or the other)
5% Perfect TWF
3% Black Dragon bonus (Black dragon armour set)
4% Strike with no thought (Kensai core t3)
7% Legendary Shield Mastery


90% with Skirmisher's
97% with First Blood

Hope this assists you for any future reference.

Thank you very much!

[lugoman]

Something else not mentioned is agro managment of other players. Think Turbine wants everyone to participate in tanking by getting threat reduction and timing their burst dps.

[Havok.cry]

Something else not mentioned is agro managment of other players. Think Turbine wants everyone to participate in tanking by getting threat reduction and timing their burst dps.

Yeah, but there is little one can do about other peoples actions. It is pretty universal across any MMO i have played to have players bragging about how their DPS is so uber, because they can take aggro from the tank. Every time I hear it I can only think, "Good gosh what a noob, learn some freaking aggro management!" I doubt that will ever change. I have noticed it is far less prevalent in DDO than in other games though.

[Wipey]

Yeah, but there is little one can do about other peoples actions.

Time travel to elite ToDs, VoDs in 2011 : "Oh what a nice shiney axe you got and big crit you did, too bad you are dead now, that ugly devil just 3 shotted you because you didn't give your 85 ac tank 5 secs ."
Your hjealer might not healed you by horrible accident..

Please continue

[Havok.cry]

OP updated with some more stuff.

[Bridge_Dweller]

Is AC useful for at level tanking of bosses in at level/bravery runs of heroic quests/raids before you reach the endgame?

For heroic? Yes, AC was/is useful.

If so what AC thresholds should you try to achieve for those instances?

You'll be fine at 100. More is better.

[Scraap]

What bugs should I be looking out for in tanking:

Should note the agro-tables are more than a little fubared right now, to the point of
a) watching generic mobs attack soulstones.
b) watching scroll-summoned summons attack pets, hirelings and protection npcs.
c) getting pegged by lolths eye-beams after rezing back at the shrine.
d) the guildies and I are still refining how much threat-gen shoots you over to the point of it apparently wrapping (No really. Some of our tanks have had to take threat amp gear *off* to maintain agro lately...).

All in all, take your time getting one going at present.

[Bridge_Dweller]

Well none of the heroic raids need a tank if you are running them with epic characters in the party. However if you are trying to get bravery bonus and are running them at level, I can only imagine that you would really really want a tank for raids like ToD, VoD, and Hound. If this assumption is wrong please set me straight.

You're right, with epic destinies you really don't need a tank in any heroic raid.

[Bridge_Dweller]

Time travel to elite ToDs, VoDs in 2011 : "Oh what a nice shiney axe you got and big crit you did, too bad you are dead now, that ugly devil just 3 shotted you because you didn't give your 85 ac tank 5 secs ."
Your hjealer might not healed you by horrible accident..

Please continue

If you're talking about Update 11 where the raid bosses all got buffed, yes those were good times indeed

[Havok.cry]

d) the guildies and I are still refining how much threat-gen shoots you over to the point of it apparently wrapping (No really. Some of our tanks have had to take threat amp gear *off* to maintain agro lately...).

When you do narrow it down, would you share with us here, I would love to have that kind of info.

[Scraap]

When you do narrow it down, would you share with us here, I would love to have that kind of info.

Part of me hopes they fix it before I have to, but... it's been a nice thread, so I'll save the snark, and will just say will do.

[Havok.cry]

Part of me hopes they fix it before I have to, but... it's been a nice thread, so I'll save the snark, and will just say will do.

Hehe, yeah. I will update the OP as I become aware of things getting fixed too.

[Havok.cry]

New question to add to the list: Do all sources of PRR stack or are there some that do not stack?