Hu7ch's Simple Guide to Earth Tanking and DPSing.

So a lot of people have been asking me recently on the US-PC server for a guide on how to play Earth DPS/Earth Tank, and a few asked me to write something on the forum. So here we go, forgive me if there's any spelling mistakes or if I get a few bits of info wrong, but hopefully by the end you'll have found what you were looking for. Also its nothing fancy because I suck at using this Thread creating thingy.

Earth Tanking: PvP
So for starters I thought i'd share with you one of the best loadout's for an Earth Tank to have in Arenas PvP, the Open World PvP Earth loadout will come a bit later. For Earth Tanking in arenas my loadout consisted of: 1) Gemstone, 2) Earthen Grip, 3) Unstoppable, 4) Jackhammer, 5) Totem, 6) Crystal Golem. Reasons for these powers are as follows: Gemstone is your basic shield but it also gives an aftershock bonus, meaning you can absorb damage depending on the amount of Gemstones you bring up. On the fourth Gemstone, damage is done to the opponent which is a good way to start a duel as you get damage in and a shield at the same time. Jackhammer is a basic AoE but it does drain power fast so unless you have a very good troller, use it to burst after a weapon combo, but beware that Jackhammer counts as a precision power which means used 3 times against someone blocking and you will be knocked down. Earthen Grip is a must for Earth Tanking, as it is the troller debuff. When in arena matches especially 5v5's, spam this power on trolls to stop them from, well, trolling :v. It also works as a good stun if your dominance is reasonably high. Now more to the support side of Earth Tanking, Totem and Crystal Golem are used to provide the team with immunity to control powers and debuffs used by the enemy. I'm not 100% sure but from what I heard the Crystal wipes the control powers every 10 seconds or so, I may be wrong. Unstoppable does the same thing and protects your teammates from debuffs from enemy trollers, which normally saves your healers a lot of damage and means they can constantly heal you.

Earth DPSing: PvP
Almost forgot the DPS part of Hu7ch's Simple Guide to Earth Tanking And "DPSing" So again my loadout for Earth DPS is very different to Earth Tanking. I have: 1) Gemstone, 2) Pebble Blast, 3) Stone, 4) Unstoppable, 5) Jackhammer, 6) Sandblast. I preferred to DPS with Earth, much to my league's disappointment, but my guide for Earth DPS will be a bit more technical than the Tank guide. This will be more focused on 1v1's and open world pvp than arenas. Ive already explained Jackhammer, Gemstone and Unstoppable so I won't go over those. Stone is a basic 1 hit power that does decent damage but more importantly has a very low cooldown and gives the Dazed power interaction. When this is active on your opponent they take extra damage from Pebble Blast and Jackhammer which is good for bursting. Now for the more technical side, I wanted to talk you through a sort of chain of combos for this loadout. When starting a duel I would normally activate Unstoppable as soon as the duel starts to stop those with stun powers (mainly HL users that stun/throw you up to begin their duels) from stunning you instantly, and performing their combo chain. The fact that your not stunned may throw them off as well giving you time to perform your own combo. After unstoppable, I would use stone to guarantee the power interaction Dazed is on my opponent. Stone at this point can be clipped by jumping directly after using Stone, and using Pebble Blast during or just after landing from the jump. I should mention at this point that I won't include many weapon combos as everyone uses dif weps and has their on preferences. Gemstone can be activated when knocked down, so I always used it right after being BB'd or having my BB lunged to protect me from the combo that usually follows. I would recommend Jackhammer to be used only when the person is knocked down or stunned and NOT after a weapon combo burst as your opponent can block and counter it. Sandblast is pretty self explanatory, just wait till they reach about 35% and below before spamming it until it kills them. A smart tactic here is to clip the BB just before using Sandblast, since it will stun them meaning they can't counter it in time. Hopefully this guide has been some help to you, if not try another guide this one isn't perfect. If you'd like more info mail me ingame at the ID: Hu7ch.

Hahah, nice to see you making guide, though... that font color is killer on my eyes!. Not sure if you can still edit it... But switching to something brighter would be nice ^^

Really nice to see someone include Pebble Blast in their loadout though...It is by far Earth's best clipping power for single target imo. Easily spammable and extremely fast animation. I never go into PvP without it.. Tank or DPS role!

Thanks for the feedback and yeah sorry about the colour, I thought i'd make it roughly the colour of Earth but forgot how it would look -.- (imagine if I did a guide for lightning xD) And yeah not sure if I included it in the DPS guide but Pebble Blast allows for very easy clipping whereas the majority of people take Localised Tremor, the animation is simply to long for me.

I've been wondering how viable Earth is for tanking PVP. We don't have that health pool of Fire Tanks and we don't get the Toughness buff like Ice does. We have to Jack 3 times to get our defense up which can be interrupted and Gemstone can be interrupted too so that we don't get the full effect.

Hu7ch...damn good guide bro! As a fellow earth dps/tank...i definally approve this guide!!!!

Again thanks for the feedback. And yes Jaq I agree with you in that its a lot harder to bring up Toughness/Defence as an Earth Tank compared to Ice or Fire, but I think thats what makes Earth a more skilled power to use , nothing against Fire/Ice Tanks of course. I always found waiting till I actually need to bring up my Toughness in pvp was better than randomly using Gemstone and Jackhammer because as you said they are interuptable. Also I found in duels using Upheaval instead of Jackhammer sometimes gave me much better advantage as im sure its not interuptable and it still gives the Damage Absorption bonus.

It was interesting as I was running some PVP last night with a new loadout (trying pets for the first time). I was doing the Arkham Arena and went toe to toe with another Earth tank. I had Crystal up and he was using Brick. It was a bit of a stalemate. I had a bit more control with my weapon but he must have been shifting damage to Brick so he was starting to edge me out. We both pulled out henchmen too!

I am going to try running some more stuff with Brick instead of Crystal to see if I get better results. I did a 1v1 and ended up against an Earth DPS. I won the first two rounds but the other won the next 3. He was using Stone and clipping, then putting Debris Field on me. I lost miserably because I couldn't clip and he knew enough to block when I did Gemstone and I blocked when he tried Jacks.

I will try Upheaval too and see what results I get.

I did experiment for a while with Debris Field. Have to say it was effective but sucked my power dry, and if your not Prec/Might spec I wouldn't recommend it at all. Although before I switched powers I found using it with Stone did a lot of damage since I was Might speced. Also I found Brick useless as a DPS, hitting 8s and 10s just doesn't get me anywhere, Crystal however was useful.

You can still edit the colors. So please do? ;D

I know this is a late reply.. So maybe you know this now but...Earth also gets Defense/Toughness buff from using a power like Ice, just at a lower scale. Also...Alpha did testing and found out that now you only need to Aftershock Jackhammer or Upheaval once to get the 50% damage absorption. I tried in-game and can verify that this is now true.

Just a little info encase you didn't know xd

To clarify my earlier posts, Fire can cast their basic ability Immolation, Ice can cast Cold Snap which both cost 200 Power. With those casts, they get their buff, they do the regular damage granted by the ability and then get their secondary effect (self heal or reflected attack) all while gaining 10% Control Resistance. We have nothing comparable. Crystal does little to help our damage out. And as I've experienced going toe to toe with another Earth Tank, Brick>Crystal. Brick seems to be a more power efficient way of mitigating our damage than Jacks or Upheaval for PVP, however we need to spend 5 PP in order to get him. Many times Shards will not even knock down my opponents. To me, Earth has the weakest PVP tanking abilities.

Yes, whenever they use a power, Ice gains 90% more Toughness/Defense, Fire gains 2.2 Health per point of Dominance(Plus increased healing in, to suffice for their large HP difference), and Earth gains 1 Toughness/Defense per point of Dominance. They all gain 10% Control Resistance I believe. (+20% if you use a melee weapon, and whatever Tank role initially gives you.)

The only thing Ice and Fire have over Earth in PvP is they both have two Immunity powers to give to the team.. Earth has one. Unless you count Crystal who does her own whenever she feels like it lol. BUT what Earth gets that actually makes it somewhat better than Fire and Ice in PvP is... Reinforce. As an Earth Tank you can use Reinforce, and it will shift 25% of the damage your Healer is taking(Or whoever is being focused) onto yourself... This is a great addition.

I also prefer Pet tanking in PvP myself.... Jackhammer can be blocked. So that can get annoying if you're facing anyone decent.

I'm a little confused at some of the information you are giving out.
1. Gemshiled giving Jackhammer a damage boost? Definately not true might want to change that one.
2. Saying Earthen Grip is a must in PvP. Mes Lasso is much better for a pull if you are using one because it dots and grounds the target. Especially good when wanting to keep healers down. Also any damage dealing power Earth has will remove troller pot and shields.
3. As far as needing totem thats false as well. Totem does not affect the usability of Crystals immunity power but does increase her survivabitliy. Crystal wiping debuffs every 10 secs I have to check on. I know she doesn't do any restands or anything like that only break outs from encasements. I need to check that she does indeed use it on teammates as well because I have yet to see it work on teammates.
4. Why no Reinforce? Reinforce is probably the only power on an Earth tank loadout other than unstoppable that should be required in PvP. Reinforce literally is a lifesaver for most healers.

Your dps stuff is really good though.

I don't currently use Reinforce. I would be interested in knowing if there is a range on it. For example, if you are in Arkham and you and the player with lowest health are in different nodes, does it still work?

Requires line of sight yes.

It works like a heal does from a Healer. LoS is affected.

I think Reinforce will be a pass for me. Been having a bit more luck with Sonic Cry and Amazonium deflection in PVP.

As a tank why do you need amazonian deflection in PvP. Tanks are rarely focused on at all in arenas and are there to cleanse debuffs and put stress on trollers. At least in competitive thats how it is. Reinforce is a godsend, its the only power in the game that actually makes you feel like a tank in PvP. Not to mention you still get the crit and prec boost in tank stance.

I get that us supposed to be our function in PVP however with the current statr of PVP battles I see very little benefit in using those abilities. Call me a fool but stuns seem to go farther in winning the match as Unstoppably never guarantees knockback when I use it. It should throw everyone flying but it doesnt.