Return of Reckoning

I just started this guy when the stabbity rework was announced so I am far from experienced when it comes to gearing him. Trying to figure out what my BiS gear would be and where renown points should go. I want to be as tanky as possible, not sure how viable a glass cannon build would be even after the rework and I think I prefer being able to survive in the backlines for constant AoE and debuffs (indigestion, pierce defenses, aoe snare, etc.) and I really enjoy the tanky playstyle atm.

So ATM my goals gearwise are full SC gear with the defensive weapons, seems like a very tanky oriented set (how good is the 5pc shield proc? Anyone know the ICD?) Maybe with 2 piece imperator instead of full dom if that's better, not sure. Jewelry wise I have 3x Impervious Winds which seems real good, those resists are better than anything else I'm seeing and we get double the use out of the armor from 3 piece bonus. For my 4th piece I'm thinking skaven ring for the tali slot for more doubled armor although I don't know which of the rings would be ideal, I usually love extra parry on a real tank but I don't find myself in a good position to parry lots of people with this guy, I'm always running around so don't think I'll spend enough time facing forward to melee DPS for it to be worth it. I just got the purple bag subjugator cloak today (TY gobbo warband!!!) and it seems pretty good but wouldn't be surpised if there was something better I don't know about. I am seeing a lot of good looking BoE lair jewlery for sale lately, stuff with +hp regen and reduced armor pen I think, are those a lot better than what I have going atm (assuming there's a version of that for SH)?

For renown I have deft defender and reflexes maxed. After that what should I be focusing on? I'm thinking my choices are between toughness, initiative, or reduced chance to be crit. I am not interested at all in taking any activatable renown ability so those options are out for me even if they are ideal. I might at some point try out maxing regeneration and stacking it with Da Smell Don't Botha Me and tons of +HP per second gear for giggles, totally expecting it to be a waste of time thou, regen seems very underpowered.

So what am I doin wrong? Any obvious big mistakes I'm making here? Any advice or discussion is appreciated, thx!!!

The best part of stabbin for me is having multiple gear sets. I have almost every gear set, except for most of the new rvr stuff.

armor talismans are king, if you are using gas squig like you should be. I can rock easily 130 percent armor. I know its ridiculous, but its really helpful for stayin in front lines.
not much can be done about bright wizards, regeneration through renown is not worth it, cause you lose way to many defensive priorities.

try the merc sc weapons with defensive stats, and if you can afford it, get the dominator version.

I currently run 3 BL and 4 dominator I think. stats can go anywhere from 500 strength 600 toughness, 5k ish armor. to cappedB strength 19 crit and around the same armor.

relies so heavy on groups, some people say i'm tougher than a tank to kill, but when your not getting heals you still die pretty quick.

I run around a lot solo, and die a lot, I try to save people even if i'm going down. I like to knock back defensively, disarm and silence range. the utility is insane if you use your abilities right.

Once the changes are out, theirs probably going to be very few ways to screw up playing stabby. Immense buffs, like its going to be nuts I think.

many ways to play currently, just keep getting gear, multiple sets are great, so you can have defensive for one when you don't have gaurd, and offensive for when you do.

I wish it all just stayed the same, I like being the only stabbin squig around, and now uz steppin on ma turf and i'll bash yer ead, jk. I see you around and you play pretty well.
I'm Matrik btw, played stabbin from start all the way up to 61 where I am now.

Yeah we seem to have similar playstyles and ideas on our roles, I agree, the utility is mindblowing which is why I don't mind suffering in damage. AoE knockback, piercing defense, aoe CD reduction, AoE snare, KD, ranged silence, ranged disarm, then the pet stuff, and all the speed buffs you could want to get where ya need to be, just crazy. Sad to hear you say there's no answer to BW, they are definitely one of my major problems, I can jump into an enemy group and get tickled but BW still critting me for +2k constantly. I ended up picking the crit reduction skaven ring, probably a bad choice but my 2 big fears are WH and BW and that was the only ring that will help with both.

I certainly hope we don't become flavor of the month after the rework, I think a lot of people might be expecting WL type burst because we getting pounce and have the pet but I don't think we have the same tools for single target damage and doubt it will play the same. Really the only new single target damage we are getting is the damage off pounce and the channeled lifesteal which I imagine you'll wanna use defensively more often than open with it. Also if we lose our AP cost reduction talent because of Sneaky Git talent I could see AP being an issue in single target. Could be totally wrong though, I admit I have yet to try a strength build.

Also I'm really gonna miss our M4, it's the only M4 on all my characters that I'm in love with. Outta My Way does sound fun thou

Killing brightwizards is always the answer, and good team coordination. They just melt through me usually, like in the intro video lol. Best I do against them is with High crit reduction and resists.

That Ap tactic will be core, I remember reading somewhere, and it might have a home with the new ap heavy tree.

Depending on the damage of the new heal ability versus big bouncing, I might use it offensively as well, and probably cause i'm always going to be missing health in combat.

I will really miss the morale 4, m4 bombs are so much fun, they take quite a bit of practice to get everyone using it at the same time on the same place.
quite a bit is trying it like 4 times before getting some kills.

The new ability will wreak havoc on almost everyone haha, I'ts meant to be a line breaker but it will do much more than that I think.

The crit reduction Skaven ring isn't bad actually. I can think of 2 pvp pieces that give crit reduction, merc shoulders and dom boots. I don't even use them together usually, I picked up the parry though, and its okay. As long as you have an armor talisman in it, whatever works.

Witch hunters, you want to disarm/KD asap distance your self and hope they used their armor pen already, facing them is good, keep big claw up, bad gas everything alway, healers always have bad gas priority though.

Final thoughts, Building your defensive set first is excellent actually. I went through months of being glass, and just having a bad time when playing solo.
building kind of like a tank, is a lot of fun, and you usually end up doing more damage cause you are not dead.