How do I take my tanking to the next level?

Start with lunging skulls. No all are counterable but those are the most important ones. Also A LOT of bosses use handblasters. After skulls, try focusing on learning the handblaster counterable moves.

Toning down the graphics some does help a little but one of the best ways is to learn a team of players and have them let you know or one or 2 of them to be on long duties then you keep up with the counters

My biggest tip is to try not to stand there eating damage from all sides.

If you’re solo ranking DMn or MMn last boss, for example, there will be times where there will be a double digit number of enemies all hitting you at the same time. Try to skirt round the edges of the enemies, maintaining aggro and juggling and stunning where you can. There’s no reason to stand there eating everything they all throw at you.

I would also say - stand up to the damage farmers. If they keep engaging enemies before you can get there, making your job more difficult, say so. Don’t put up with it.

What u asked has already been made:
https://forums.daybreakgames.com/dcuo/index.php?threads/bests-mega-huge-tank-guide.304740/

When pulling adds, have your auto target lock set to “off”. When taunting bosses, have it set to “on”. I’ve never been the sharpest tool in the shed, so this wasn’t common sense for me. But after I started doing those adjustments, my tanking went up a level.

I wish I could find a funny gif of a little kid kicking someone in the shins and then running away.

That is modern DCUO tanking. Everything you fight will kill you in a straight-up fight, so you just hit it and then run away.

OK, so in the process of trying to get the "defeat archons" feat in Antimonitor Metropolis, I thought it would be useful to pick fights with said archons to see how long I could last. There were a few reasons for this:

1. I have a tendency to get two-shotted by those stupid things
2. There are parts of the map a lot of people don't go to much, so I'd have ample opportunities to try to survive it on my own
3. Those things spawn all the time, so there's plenty of chances to try again after I get myself killed

The idea was there'd be a big strong thing that I could pit myself against to see how long I'd last, and try to see if I can figure out how this countering thing works, or if I can at least learn to recognize what it's about to do before it does it.


Short version:

I didn't figure out how this countering thing works, though I did occasionally get the big guy to fall down. I just couldn't figure out specifically why the times he fell were any different than any other time when *I* fell. I'm a bit hopeless with pvp counters, apparently.

Longer version:

That said, I learned that I could actually tank the jerk! I had to rotate through Proton Remedy, Neutrino Blast, and Density to stay on my feet as much as possible. It was mostly switching between Proton Remedy and Density, using Neutrino Blast any time I got knocked down while the others were refreshing. I do have one of those breakout charms, but I found it was easier not to use it because the refresh time on it is... 60 seconds, I think? Making it 42 seconds longer than Neutrino Blast, which already feels impossibly long.

But juggling between those three I was able to stay on my feet and mostly keep my health up while the archon threw its antimatter tantrums. There was no way I could actually cause enough damage to take the stupid thing down, but I was actually Not Dying, which was nice. I assume people more familiar with the Tank role would consider this a relatively trivial enounter since it doesn't have any truly weird mechanics associated with it, but hey, baby steps.

The next phase of this will be to pay more attention to its stances while I'm fighting it.

I know others have mentioned it, but being a tank in the last few episodes requires three things:
1. Gear up
2. Learn to kite
3. Have thick skin (cause you WILL be blamed for everything)

Honestly, Dimensional Ink needs to address the roles in this game. Tanks haven’t felt like tanks in a few years now. And its my favorite role.

Congratulations on staying alive! I think this was a good exercise for you to work on. Here are some thoughts about countering.

Bosses cheat. I have seen some do the Brawlimg stomp smash and go into block faster than a player could. So when you try to lunge the boss, you end up hitting them while blocking and you get knocked down instead.

Feints. This was a hard one for me when introduced. It's where the boss does, for example, a block move but flashes yellow. Your reaction should be to block. They are telling you how to counter their next attack which is a lunge. Of course there are times when they change their mind and don't do what they telegraphed. Probably a coding error due to scripted attacks. Sometime they will feint a block break which means you should BB them. I don't see too many telegraphed lunges.

Lunges are sometimes necessary for v-skull attacks. The most notable boss for this is Deathstroke in the Hive raid. Constant lunging makes the fight a breeze. As an Atomic tank, you probably would need help with this. This is why some might dps should always carry a rifle.

Some bosses can't be countered but can counter you. Pretty much anything regarded to as a "god" in the story: Darkseid, Zeus and Olympians, Barbatos.

Thanks for the advice. I'm curious about blocking, though. All of my tanking powers specifically say they only work when _not_ blocking, so I'd been interpreting that as "tank is actually squishier when they are actively blocking an attack." Is that the case? Or is blocking ultimately still more effective than active tank powers, it's just that the active tank powers are _almost_ as good as blocking plus they give you some extra avenues/options blocking doesn't?

The idea is like when you would have to block on certain v-skull attacks in the past, like Carol Ferriss, the whole raid needed to block as they would take less damage than if they weren't blocking. Everyone gained an extra amount of defense when they blocked, historically. Earth would always be at the defense cap when it blocked.

So when you block now, you don't receive your active tank buff, it is replaced by the normal block buff. Your tank buff doesn't stack on top of the block buff. The idea is that when you block counter the boss as a tank, you may still take damage, but it is much less than what you would receive if you were just maintaining your active buff. I am probably not explaining it very well.

I've learned in my tanking (which I do alternatively, as my main character is a healer) through other players, YouTube, and experimentation that you have to use stuff outside of your powerset to increase your survivabilty.

1. Hard-Light Shield, because your power's normal shield and supercharge shield aren't enough.
2. Personal Dampening Fields of the highest level you can use... because your normal, supercharge, and Hard-Light shields aren't enough.
3. Movement Mode Supercharge Escape/Shield (that isn't the one in Flight, because that one is yuck), because you can never have enough shields... and for spamming the Eye of Gemini circle that heals and replenishes Supercharge.
4. And don't forget to equip Chronometric Emitters to freeze the swarms of adds on you to buy precious time for your shields to come back off cooldwn.

The artifacts I use for Tanking are the Eye of Gemini, Manacles of Force, and Mystic Symbol of the Seven.

I member the first bounty I solo'd. Hank Henshaw (it was still CR relevant). It felt petty good! It still does honestly and damn anyone who wants to trivialize that! lol

On another note, I wouldn't stress too much on obtaining a deep knowledge of countering mechanics as an atomic tank. The powerset was built the way it was to spam combos, 80% of which can't be cancelled out of to lunge or block break. I'm pretty sure the fortified assault neck mod was made specifically for atomic and jackhammering earth tanks. Sure, learning little things here and there along the way will help a bit but it is nowhere near the be all end all for atomic tanking. If you can manage to lunge most of the counterable skull attacks, that's 90% of the consequential counter mechanics right there. Other than a couple scenarios I can think of (Tala's heal in SGe, Forgemaster's howl thingy in FIe), the rest is mostly just showing off.

All fantastic advice. Some people poo poo on PDFs for tanking but they've bought me a couple seconds I needed between HL Shield and Density more times than I can count. I would add that for atomic, one should consider mass density over a movement mode shield. It's the strongest shield in the game (other than purely deflecting shields) and has the added benefit of being an 8-man group shield. Notice how I said "added benefit" and not "primary use". Don't be afraid to use it selfishly as there is no such thing as a selfish tank.

If one does opt for Mass Density, EoG may not be with wisest choice as the 60s cooldown (54s w/ 120 Manacles) won't really be able to take full advantage of the supercharge generation. Also, even though Atomic is not primarily a health based powerset, I personally can't stomach the lack of health the EoG gives, but that's just me. YRMV.

You are generally correct. As atomic, the only times you need to block are actual one-shot mechanics. You may want to block counter some block-counterable attacks or block some stun/knockback attacks but with a few exceptions, neither are a necessity. Blocking in just about any other scenario is actually disadvantageous.

Wow didn’t realize the thread on how to improve tanking got removed, it had very solid and useful feedback

Tankings at a odd point in this game, everyone hates kite but for the most part every power has to, ice is really the only power that is a traditional tank tank, and even with ice people get bullied when a robin pounces on them.

Maybe I'm alone in this but I've found atomic to be the exception due to the fact you get both heals and shield strength from a single stat (Dom) and Thermochemical explosion can keep adds CC'd and unable to attack 100% of the time. Obviously having high SP, artifacts and maxed augments maximizes this but I've been able to face tank in a lot of elite raid situations that others with comparable SP/arts/augs have said they have to kite including the Poison Ivy spores in MOMe and Forgemaster Hawkman in DMe. I only kite Lady Blackhawk in PCe to give myself a little extra time to react to her dive bomb skull attack but would otherwise be able to absorb and combo-heal through her non-oneshot attacks.

Now I do sky-tank when Dark Robbins are present except for DME last boss where there are too many grounding mechanics. But even if I get caught by them, Mass Density will absorb an entire munch-fest and if I don't have Mass Density available, a combination of Density, supply drop and soder cola will usually get me through.

Atomic was totally awesome when you could block break and lunge using only your combo abilities.

The combat mechanics for tanks can be confusing because of 2 things-- fakes and immunities. Basically, when the boss counters you he gets immune to your counters for 2 seconds or so (he'll flash when he's immune). And sometimes he'll take block or fake block-break and even if you counter him super quick the counter won't register. The fake-blocks you can tell because there's no " blocking " symbol over his head. The fake block-break you just have to get a feel for.