PvP Tanks: Their Roles & Viability

[archangella]

Greetings, RoR community!

I played WAR when it come out back in the day, but ended up never advancing far enough to get a better idea of the game with regards to a number of its aspects.

Now that I've found this server, my intention is to advance as far as I can manage this time around. Thus, in thinking about what class i should invest myself into, I've thought it wise to make use of these boards to inform myself.

I'm interested in playing a tank, but I'm hoping to get some feedback before I make my choice. What I'm wondering is what kind of role can a tank class expect to have in PvP. The obvious answer in my head would be to tank, of course, but how useful are tanks in the battlefield when push comes to shove? How are they different from each other and what is the contribution they provide in the ranks of battle? Why would you roll a tank instead of rolling a pure DPS class for PvP?

Thank you everyone well in advance for your patience and time; I look forward to reading your replies.

Cheers!

[Eathisword]

Tanks are the most impactful class of PvP in this game. Without at least a decent tank on your team, you cannot win any meaningful fights.

This is mostly due to an ability called 'guard'. When this is active on a tank ally, this ally take only 50% of all incoming damage that is transferred to the tank. The tank can then roll to mitigate that other 50% damage by either blocking it with his shield or parrying it. Shield wearing tanks also posses 'Hold the Line' which grant a 15% chance to avoid all range damage to ally behind him. So 3 different tanks, can boost the range avoidance of their ally by up to 45% (iirc), which is massive when you try to march on an enemy warband to get in melee range. There is more, but it would be too long. Simple answer, tanks are very very very important.

As far as which one to pick, each have their own pros and cons. For example, Sword Master is more an offensive tank, whereas Knight of the BS Sun are king of defensive shenanigans. Browse around, check out video on youtube. Plenty of info to make an informed choice.

And about your final question, you roll a tank if you want to help a DPS kill stuff by assisting and protecting him and by controlling the battlefield. You roll a DPS if you know a good tank that will help you kill stuff without dying every 3 seconds :p

[gke96]

Well yeah like most games there are 2 types of tanks; utility tanks, and bruisers.
Almost every group use 1 utilitytank and 1 bruiser for 6mans, there are also setups bruiser is replaced by extra rdps.

Kotbs, Chosen, Blackguard can be played as utility tanks,

Swordmaster, Blackorc, Ironbreaker, Blackguard can be played as bruisers

Ironbreaker and blackguard aren't prefered for warband(24man) play

IB and especially utility BG is much harder to play compared to other so dont start with those

(as volgograd said kotbs is indeed best utility tank in game by far)
(Im only talking about current meta)
(not sure if full utility IB exist?)

[Acidic]

Well my take on tank role is rather simplistic but fun.
Break up the structure of enemy.
Harassing healers
Throw guard

[szejoza]

Just my two cents about classes
Pretty much what gke96 wrote but...
Pick whichever class appeals to you the best (be it looks, lore, whatever reason), don't chose class based only on their current state (KoTBS/Chosen being the easies and most profitable atm) as there will be changes, devs balance the game as much as they can, so if they see one class is overperforming, they will look for a solution and nerf it. And you don't want to end up playing nerfed class which you don't even like

But overall, tanks are important, and a good tank who knows his job about guarding/pushing/body blocking/harrasing is priceless, no matter what class

[daniilpb]

Feel yourself self confident?
Try to play a tank
That's what I always do with my BG.
Just find yourself a group or a friend dps and you will feel the weight of responsibility. Guard and debuffs management, punts - these things will make your tank life shine.
But again try to find a group because tanks are amazing to play mostly in group synergy and quite stressful in pug environment.

[Serbiansword]

Pretty much, everything has already been said. I'm guessing that you are interested in a tank class because you like to play tanky and hard-to-kill characters which can help their team a lot.
I would just like to add that if you have any desire for dealing high damage, tank class isn't really for you. Nothing personal, just being honest here. Because there's already more than enough DPS tanks running around these days.

[lefze]

Tank is the hardest archetype in the game imo, just have to put it out there. Takes a lot longer to master than anything else I've played in this game, which is more or less everything. But nothing has been as rewarding as playing a BG, so there is that.

[peterthepan3]

Pretty much, everything has already been said. I'm guessing that you are interested in a tank class because you like to play tanky and hard-to-kill characters which can help their team a lot.
I would just like to add that if you have any desire for dealing high damage, tank class isn't really for you. Nothing personal, just being honest here. Because there's already more than enough DPS tanks running around these days.

If you have a desire for dealing high damage, Swordmaster is for you ** (fixed).

Just because there's a lot of people playing SM (usually suicidal), doesn't mean we don't need DPS tanks. The realm needs more tanks in general - DPS or otherwise. You should have said that we need more defensive/utility-based tanks (like KOTBS, or IB).

Agree with lef: playing the IB is like playing a grand piano when compared to the SM, which is more akin to playing the triangle.

[Serbiansword]

Pretty much, everything has already been said. I'm guessing that you are interested in a tank class because you like to play tanky and hard-to-kill characters which can help their team a lot.
I would just like to add that if you have any desire for dealing high damage, tank class isn't really for you. Nothing personal, just being honest here. Because there's already more than enough DPS tanks running around these days.

If you have a desire for dealing high damage, Swordmaster is for you ** (fixed).

Just because there's a lot of people playing SM (usually suicidal), doesn't mean we don't need DPS tanks. The realm needs more tanks in general - DPS or otherwise. You should have said that we need more defensive/utility-based tanks (like KOTBS, or IB).

Destro aside, Order needs healers foremost. But yes, you are right. Let me rephrase my previous statement: If you are going to roll a tank please play as defensive-utility tank because we need those more than we need DPS tanks.