Now that sustain tanking is dead, what are some tanking/healer builds that people have come up with in the wake of the rebalance?
Here’s a template to get started:
Viable Alternatives:
- Chaos Focus: Dark Mysteries of Efficiency Mk II or III
- Chaos Focus: The Cause’s Effect of Efficiency Mk II or III
Note: It’s imperative to have at least Efficiency Mk II for the New York raid so that you can have Immutable off cooldown every time you aggro the boss. - Glyph: A third Stalwart glyph instead of a Fierce glyph. It’ll provide more mitigation with no significant downside.
- Wrist Signet: Nemain
Note: Increases the number of targets your AoE abilities can hit from 6 to 9. Can help in gathering large groups of mobs in Polaris, Darkness War, and Occult Defence. - Agent: Jayesh Suresh is one of the best Agent in terms of damage mitigation as long as your Defence Rating is below 4066 (4565 is the softcap). Replace Jayesh Suresh with either Jack Boone, Dividiacus, or Faction Recruit if your Defence Rating is higher than 4065, which is possible when you have three max-leveled Elaborate Stalwart glyphs.
Note: the only gear necessary for tanking are five defensive glyphs, generic signets or Chaos Magic signets, and Efficiency Mk II on your Chaos Focus. All the extraordinary talismans and the remaining signets are bonuses to help bolster your defensive capabilities without being vital for your survival.
Abilities
| Actives | Passives |
|---|---|
| Twist Fate | Out of Phase |
| Anomaly or Immutable | X-Factor or Incongruity |
| Distortion | Veil of Deformity |
| Deconstruct | Multidimensional Threads |
| Invoke Self | Long Term Chaos |
| Pain Suppression |
Note: if you have Dark Mysteries, you have room to include the Displacement; No Pain, No Gain; and Probability Protection passives in place of Out of Phase, X-Factor, and Long Term Chaos.
Utilities
| Ability or Gadget | Use |
|---|---|
| Blindside | Purge and short-range interrupt that, when combined with Beatdown, can provide extra Energy to allies if you successfully interrupt a spell. |
| Cleanup | Group cleanse for the Hell Dimension dungeons. Requires Shotgun. |
| Evulsion | For interrupting spell-casts and, when coupled with Mass Evulsion, aggroing mobs. |
| Tumultuous Whisper | Purge. |
| Effigy O33 Reconstructor | Low-cooldown heal over time. |
| Electrogravitic Attractor | Long-range, low-cooldown interrupt. |
| Electromagnetic Destablizer | Low-cooldown purge. |
| Fey Ley Line Stone | Teleport for the Ankh. |
| The Mistress’s Bashosen | Low-cooldown interrupt. |
| Manticore X27 Agitator | Ranged force taunt for the New York Raid and the Penthouse. |
| Unification Susceptibility Module | Low-cooldown mitigation buff. |
Build Usage Tips
- It’s best to engage with Twist Fate to apply Debilitate and proc the Evade Chance buff. Either cast it off cooldown for greater uptime on Debilitate and Out of Phase; save it to remove the sting from a large hit; or use it to gather a group of mobs.
- Choose Anomaly in encounters where you take frequent, steady damage or need help aggroing mobs. Choose Immutable when you need to reliably mitigate large, predictable hits or a flurry of unavoidable damage.
- If you have no need to use your Elite for utility, prefer using it to mitigate damage over a Special, since it has the lower cooldown of your defensive abilities.
- Save a defensive ability for when you anticipate a large hit or your health is below 66%.
Edit: Updated the SWLCALC build to incorporate Mk IV affixes, Vitalization, and Anima Allocation.
5 Likes
This is a dps-tank build. Suitable for running content below your or the healer’s level. I’m in essentially maxed out gear as a dps and I can run this in E11-13, with a typical healer (that’s zero tank glyphs). I haven’t had an opportunity to run E14-16 tank role enough to say about it yet.
Damage output is high enough that it’s safe to run as low as 200% threat AA (37% dps/63% tank) with same level dps, use your discretion as far as the amount of HP/threat you need between there and 100% tank. I run E11-13 at 15/85% and have seen no problems, but as mentioned, IP1690 dps gear gives me big hp/prot.
Hammer/Chaos (dps hammer, Dark Mysteries chaos)
- Smash - single target hammer Basic
- Blazing Fury - hammer Signature, basic mitigation
- Invoke Self - chaos cooldown, strong mitigation on longer cooldown
- Eruption - hammer Elite, AoE/expose/purge/dps
- Demolish - hammer 5energy Power
- Distortion - chaos 3energy Power
For full AoE fights swap Demolish to Burning Wrath, partial ones swap Distortion to Winds of Change
- Veil of Deformity - Distortion’s companion, gives the 30% hp buff
- Rock Hard - Blazing Fury’s companion, debilitate+protection
- Bullheaded - generic hammer tank move
- Fast and Furious - generic hammer dps/movement
and then a choice
- Annihilate - buff Eruption damage (for dps)
- Displacement - buff Invoke Self (for mitigation) - to be specific this increases it from 60% of your HP in the barrier to 90%, and it expires in 7 seconds, so unless you take >60% in that time, and are seeing the clones die, it’s not needed
Dark Mysteries adds to the build
- Long Term Chaos - chaos tank passive, strengthens Aegis of Parallelism and buffs Invoke Self. It also buffs Twist Fate, I have not yet experimented with using crossweapon Signatures so I can’t say if that has an upside over Blazing Fury so I can’t say whether that’s recommendable.
Normal selection of gadgets apply, cleanse/impair/mitigation as required. I use hammer dps Agents, for me that’s default Queen Ranavalona IV, Petru, and Lydia Darling. Blazing Fury is basically “use off cooldown if at 75% or less hp”, Invoke Self is “use before damage spikes” (think DW2 concuss or getting hit by 10 adds at once), otherwise just burn energy on both weapons and cast Eruption off cooldown to help out group dps.
Rotation is kinda “spend all your energy” but if you’re worried, lead the fight with Distortion to gain the 30% hp buff soonest.
4 Likes
With the new numbers on Heal Rating and lower native protection which extraordinaries would be better for healing? Those that add HoTs or those that add protection? A combination of them? Or maybe they all do so little it’s of no importance?
15300 protection is 38.4% damage mitigation, 16070 is 39.6% mitigation, these are typical full tank AA prot levels for me. So 1% of damage from 770 protection (sounds normal for talis, I don’t know which you have in mind in particular) for the duration of the buff.
On a boss doing 2000 dps to the tank that’s 20hps effectively, I don’t know if any heal talis are better or worse but it’s minimal anyway.
2 Likes
Here, now, is a Fist healing build template:
Note: What is truly necessary to fulfill your role as healer are Bladed Gauntlets, four Fierce glyphs, two Devastating glyphs, a Signet of Zeal, a Shotgun for cleansing, and a Blood Magic Focus for Expunge Blight. (The Blood Magic Focus you use doesn’t matter, so long as it is well leveled. Expunge Blight scales on your Healing Power.) Everything else, including the extraordinary talismans, are optional bonuses to enhance your utility and healing output.
Viable Alternatives
- Replace one Fierce and one Devastating glyph for two Accurate glyphs. Makes completing solo content more bearable without dampening your healing capabilities to any significant degree.
- Replace the Signet of Amelioration for the Signet of Cruel Delight. Makes for more efficient self-healing when doing solo content. Amelioration’s proc is too easy to trigger and its cooldown lasts too long to be a reliable means for delivering a massive injection of healing to your allies when it’s needed.
- Occult Talisman: the 1,000,000 Likes may be just as beneficial, if not more so, for both healing and solo content, once you have sufficiently high critical hit chance.
Abilities
| Actives | Passives |
|---|---|
| Regeneration | Natural Remedy |
| Renewal | Recuperate |
| Nurture | Second Wind |
| Invigorating Wrath | Serenity |
| Feral Regrowth | Outgrowth |
Utilities
| Ability or Gadget | Use |
|---|---|
| Cleanup | Group-wide cleanse over time. |
| Expunge Blight & Antibody | Group-wide barrier and cleanse over time. Especially good for the Ankh 6 and Polaris 5, but also useful as a bonus mitigation ability for your tank. |
| Opening Shot | Group-wide Critical Power buff. |
| Savagery | Single-target damage buff. Can also be used to empower your own healing. Preferably, give to your favorite DPS off cooldown. |
| Wild Surge | Primarily useful as an area-wide hinder for Hell Raised 5 and Darkness War. |
| Concentrated Anima Jet | Massive single-target heal. |
| Electromagnetic Destablizer | Low-cooldown purge. |
| The Mistress’s Bashosen | Low-cooldown interrupt. |
| Purification Drone Model UW0 | Low-cooldown group-wide cleanse over time |
| Phoenecian Support Strategem | Self-cleanse for crowd control that makes you immune to further crowd control. Ideal for Polaris 5. |
Build Usage Tips
- Aim to reserve your Energy for when it’s most needed. Weave in Renewal every now and then more as a means to generate Fury than to sustain the health of the tank. Nurture will suffice when the tank’s health is above 75%.
- When AoE healing is not called for, use Invigorating Wrath for Serenity. Your primary means for healing the tank ought to be from Nurture and Serenity. Whenever the tank’s health dips below 75%, press Invigorating Wrath twice in quick succession for a massive burst of healing. Supplement with a Renewal as necessary for additional healing and Fury build up.
- While Regeneration is an excellent secondary source for replenishing the health of your tank in an emergency, its importance for cleansing Lifeburn in the Hell Dimension, cleansing roots in the New York Raid, or healing your group in a pinch must be taken into account when assessing its typical usage. It’s better to condition yourself in using Serenity as your foremost emergency heal so that you don’t mistakenly cast Regeneration in a panic when it’s needed for another purpose.
- Starting in Elite tier 14, the Hell Dimension dungeons inflict Soulburn to everyone also affected by Lifeburn. Soulburn prevents the affected players from being cleansed for five seconds. In the encounter with the Machine Tyrant, Lifeburn can be applied to the party so frequently, that Regeneration will not suffice for keeping the group cleansed. Equip a Shotgun and pair it with Cleanup. Alternate cleansing Lifeburn first with Regeneration, then with Cleanup. To keep your entire party alive, begin with Feral Regrowth, enter into Invigorating Wrath, cast Invigorate, Revivify, repeatedly cast Invigorate until you exit out of Wrath, and then finish with your group cleanse once Soulburn has dissipated. If you have not generated enough Fury to enter into Invigorating Wrath upon the next application of Soulburn, cast Feral Regrowth twice in the time Soulburn is active.
- The AoE healing rotation explained above works equally well in any situation where your group needs sustained healing.
- A healer is best equipped to assist the group on matters of utility when the need arises. For encounters that do not call for such rigorous cleansing and group healing, consider using Opening Shot at the start of an encounter and off cooldown to improve the group’s DPS or bring a purge or two in Elite 14+ dungeons to help respond to Nightmare+ mechanics.
- A Wild Surge (or even Flash Freeze or Crystallised Frost, paired with their passives) can be an invaluable aid to controlling crowds in Polaris, Darkness War, and the Hell Dimension. For such encounters with a lot of respawning mobs, it is effective crowd control that matters above all else, not DPS.
- Ankh 6 has a new Nightmare mechanic starting in the Elite 14 tier, where, every 45 seconds, Melothat unleashes Akhenaten’s Assistants, who will latch themselves onto your allies and deal filth damage over time. Additional Assistants are summoned alongside the others if stacks of Primordial Coil from Melothat are not purged from him when he sends out his allies. Anyone within about one to three meters of an ally who is taking damage will receive additional splash damage. Because the Assistants deal filth damage, only barriers can mitigate it in some fashion. Save Expunge Blight for these moments and try to keep your distance from others to prevent inflicting inadvertent splash damage onto your allies. If necessary, also take with you the Electromagnetic Destabilizer to assist the group in purging stacks from Melothat.
6 Likes
This is for Tank?? Anima 100% damange ? Im new in this game.
The one you replied to is for Tank geared, yes.
DumbOx was most likely using SWLCalc to show you what the gearset looked like, not to recommend 100% Damage as a choice.
On SWCalc, you can switch the anima allocation to 100% Damage/Healing/Survivability to see how it changes the numbers. In game, however, you would shift the balance of anima allocation around to meet the demands of the particular challenge you are facing. If you want more tanky, you shift into Survivability, more DPS you shift into Damage.
Look at Onevia’s example
To get an idea of how that can/should be shifted around.
1 Like
It seems the SWLCALC website doesn’t save the Anima allocation through the export feature. I recommend 100% Survivability when tanking dungeons at your Elite level.