Feeling useless and demotivated playing a tank

[Tisaya]

Recently I have rolled a tank to help my side. It's not what I usually enjoy in RoR, I've always been a DPS through and through. But order severely lacks tanks, especially def tanks in oRvR, so here we are.

The problem is, I feel powerless and demotivated. It's like no matter what I do, nothing depends on my actions. If DPS are potatoes, if healers don't pull the weight then there's nothing I can do to turn the things around. As DPS, I can at least try to snatch a kill here and there, burst a key target. As tank I can switch guard, ok, enemy still kills the guarded target, just slower. Or punt the enemy healer towards our DPS. Doesn't matter much if DPS can't hit a barn door.

There are no metrics of my success. As DPS I see concrete numbers and can count dead enemies, killing blows. As tank I have... Well, there's protection score. Which doesn't say much. Am I doing good? Do I suck? Who knows.

In any big fights order will either run away and I die, or the enemy just ignores and bypass me and there's nothing I can do to stop them. Then I die anyway.

I also noticed that I get much less rewards than than when playing DPS. As SW, I hit 5 renown levels in a day. As kotbs, it takes days to reach the same rank. And I still haven't got a single gold bag despite being very active in orvr. As BW I was getting them in nearly every zone.

Anyone faced the similar problem and has a solution? Can I somehow change my mindset? Should I say screw it and play classes that I enjoy, even if they aren't as useful for Order?

[Aethilmar]

Well as someone who has 4 tanks (RR86 SM, RR80 Chosen, RR70 Knight and RR64 BG) I can tell you two things: One your feelings are completely valid and two it does get better.

The game is very much DPS biased. Since all renown flows from kills, tanks are indeed more dependent on others for getting their renown. There are some "tricks" you can use to make it more efficient (for example turning on your damage auras and zerg surfing) but still it is worse than dps classes ... especially rdps.

And as a support class you have limited options for quite a while to "force" the action. As a knight this is particularly acute because your most "visceral" ability that has impact punting but honestly your guard and auras do most the heavy lifting but you don't actually really do much interaction with those.

However, once you get to about RR70 things change pretty dramatically. You can go into a two hand spec and now start forcing more action. And your ability to soak damage (especially on a shield knight) is quite insane. You can stand there in the middle of death, destruction and chaos while others melt around you.

Anyway, playing tank takes a shift in mindset. Just like playing healer takes a shift in mindset. I'd say stick with it until RR70. If you still don't like it, then put it on the shelf at that point. But as a RR50 you are really in the worst part of being a tank atm so just got to tough it out.

[bw10]

for rr, bags: turn your damage and damage reflect auras, use damage reflect skills. challenge and bellow on cd. do everything you can to boost your protection score on fort lord. consider suns blessing + sunfury tactic for near constant uptime on shield of the sun, although it might not be worth it with forced 2 sec icd now lol. good luck.

[Avanos]

Step away from warband play, form a 6 man or start running solo.

Might be very difficult starting out, but your skillset will improve with time and you may find it very rewarding.

I've seen quite a few solo tanks (SNB) that do quite well in the lakes and are a massive pain to fight.

[cabal852]

Tanks are endgame content rn. All the fights need more dps and pocket heal.

Maybe you just run and spam debuff skills. Don't focus the fight cuz this thing is annoying. U can't kill someone.

[Culexus]

SnB tanking in RvR is only really fun in an organised warband with challenge/bellow rotations, coordinated m4 drops, and other players knowing their positioning so you and the other thanks can keep a proper tank wall up. You don't get the satisfaction of numbers flying on the screen like dps and healers, but instead get it from working as a unit to protect your warband so the dps and healers can do their thing.

If you're pugging in RvR you're unlikely to get any of that and will just be a glorified guard bot to some suicidal dps that will split off chasing kills every chance they get. Then playing SnB is boring and unrewarding.

The most fun you can have tanking imo is in a 6man. At a smaller scale you can really utilize your full toolkit and get the full experience of playing a tank beyond 'hold the line and challenge' that RvR can sometimes feel like. In smallscale, guard swapping and timing of your cc can make or break a game. You have to be as alert to your surroundings and focused on attacking enemies like a dps, while making sure your group are fully protected at all times like a healer. It can get very intense, but it's fun as hell.

I'd say stick with it. Once you have sov you can work on your off-set, giving yourself the option of running 2h which is a totally different playstyle and allows you to scratch that dps itch. If you find knight boring you could always try out IB or SM, both of which are great tanks in both snb and 2h spec. It's a long grind to full BiS so you wouldn't be too far behind if you rolled another class.

[Karl]

I feel your pain and it’s valid at your level. I agree with what been said by others in the thread but will add one thing: play what is fun for you! If you rather dps just do it! Enjoy!

[Noslock]

I find enjoyable to troll an entire enemy wb with a 6 man punting people and feeding my dps .I recently leveled my little ib from rr6xish in invader to rr78 in wl/sov and I was surprised by how fast it was when you know how to stat pad forts and farm gold bags.I must admit that probably leveling on order is a bit faster than on destro but yes it took like 2 weeks or a little more to go from invader to 6wl 2 sov with fort weapon .Get in a decent 6 man / guild or if you like pain go the solo tank route with some regen build.Tank can be fun too.

[Tisaya]

Many great points, thank you! I guess I'll try to get this char at least to vanquisher and see if it clicks.

[ASmellyMan]

I can think of a dozen different times where I joined a SC and turned it around with my auras.

Guard is pretty much exactly as you described though, only guard people who you see actually making a difference or else you are committing sewer slide for no reason. Don't guard if you don't have a healer.

Always stay behind tanks. Positioning will help you maximize your mediocre DPS since they can't block you when you're hitting them in the back. Spam Blazing Blade, snare and Vicious Slash until they reroll to Marauder.

Sitting and punching a healer with repeated AP drains can be both fun and profitable. Let them think you're trying to kill them. Taunt them when they try to rez people. The Rez animation is long and very obvious, learn all three of them and keep Taunt ready on alt+1. Watch them cope and seethe when they spend all of their AP on a failed rez. Spam Blazing Blade, snare and Vicious Slash until they reroll to Marauder.


If all else fails then just stand in your backline and actively guard your own healers. This is actually where a 2H knight should be anyway, you're not in the melee train. Witch Elves are the only thing lightly armored enough to kill easily so guess what? Go stand behind your healer! Watch the Whores of Khaine cope and seethe when you spot them through stealth and knock them down. Spam Blazing Blade, snare and Vicious Slash until they reroll to Marauder.