Facetanking

[jat.4532]

Hi is there a profession that can facetank most of the damage? (not talking about one mechanism nor stand in the fire damage)

 

[The Boz.2038]

Warrior, guardian, necromancer, revenant have the most "eat damage and smile through the pain" potential.

Why?

[Imperial.8471]

Any class can facetank, even a squishy elementalist. It's a matter of gear (toughness and vitality stats) and build more than class

[Jtoon.6907]

Warrior has been the best from my experience.  

[ZeftheWicked.3076]

Necro is the profession for that.

Most professions have windows of absolute immunity and mechanics for avoiding damage, but in turn also suffer from windows of vulnerability. Warriors are one such case. Their defensive skills are almost always complete damage negation, but when they're down you can get slapped hard if not careful.

Necros are the polar opposite. They're designed as class of attrition, meant to take constant pressure. They got big health pools (yes, two), tons of lifesteal, and tons of skills that reduce (but not completely shut down) damage taken. What they don't have are above mentioned god-mode defenses. They facetank just about anything outside of clear 1 shot mechanics that are meant to be avoided/moved out of the way.

Edited June 29, 2023 by ZeftheWicked.3076

[Raarsi.6798]

Yup, warrior, necro, and rev have been pretty good about it.  I've heard of guardian doing it, but it's still a magic trick I'm trying to pull off.  Ranger, ele, and mesmer have their psuedo-facetank style by making things do it for them (i.e. pets and clones).  Engi was fun to do it on with scrapper, except mechanist came in asking why facetank when you can just roast anything in 10 seconds or less.  Thief can probably do it on specter, but the last time I was working on thief, I just stuck to either kiting on deadeye or smashing my dodge key on daredevil like it owes me money.

Really, anything can facetank if you have a thick enough helmet.

Edited June 29, 2023 by Raarsi.6798

[Voyant.1327]

Have had little issues facetanking as a Virtuoso prior to the update, used to run the Deadhouse event solo with it. Required a lot of active skill usage, but they keep breaking build diversity options so not even bothering playing til the next patch is launched.

[Blood Red Arachnid.2493]

Willbender and Dragonhunter have a lot of psuedo-invulnerability skills that let them leap into a fight and deal tons of damage.  Aside from them, any thief build with an off-hand pistol can pop Black Powder on occasion and neutralize anything without a defiance bar.  

[SlayerXX.7138]

Herald with salvation trait line is flat out unfair to the npc who try to damage you. Protection, barrier, damage reduction and heal.

[Sindust.7059]

Eelementalist. Unironically. I actually don't know if it's THE best, but with this build you'll have insane levels of passive tankiness combined with enough DPS to do group content (though be careful with the latter to avoid messing with the aggro since you'll have 2k toughness).

Trailblazer set + Balthazar runes with a condi Tempest build. In the earth tree swap Serrated Stones for Elemental Shielding (you don't give up much DPS, because this build has very little bleed damage to begin with), and use Unstable Conduit in the Tempest tree. Then use signets of fire, earth and restoration with the Written in Stone trait. This will give you 100% protection uptime, without any concentration on your gear. And because of Hardy Conduit the protection you get is giving 39,5% damage reduction instead of the regular 33%. The Signet of Earth gives another 10% damage reduction by itself. And because of the change to Tempestuous Aria in the latest balance update, all those signets that you use for the auras to apply protection are also boosting your DPS. 

Speaking of DPS - with the latest buff this build does 28k while just button mashing and camping fire attunement. I tested it yesterday.

Alternatively you can go with celestial gear instead of trailblazer. You will trade some toughness for better healing and some condi damage for a slight bump in power damage, which might be desirable when solo out in the open world or doing the story, since some (rare) objects and mobs you have to destroy are immune to condis or burning specifically. But with cele gear it'll be a slightly more actiive build, since you're trading a bit of passive defenses for healing.

Like I said, I don't know if it's the best build, but the only build with which I felt safer in the open world was power mech in cele gear, because with it it's my mech doing most of the tanking, while I can shoot from a safe distance. But cele power mech's DPS is absolute trash in comparison to condi tempest.

[taara.3217]

On 6/29/2023 at 4:07 PM, jat.4532 said:

Hi is there a profession that can facetank most of the damage? (not talking about one mechanism nor stand in the fire damage)

no))

[Batalix.2873]

Right now post balance patch, sandScourge is the tankiest thing I have seen. I can literally just stand in the middle of mobs, cover myself in sand, and stand there waiting for them to die.

Heal Herald is also quite tanky like that, between shield and Ventari tablet.

Best part is neither of these builds require any toughness. They just barrier/heal through everything.

[Misterbrady.2167]

Check out Lord Hizzen on YouTube.  His builds are designed to solo world bosses.  Not sure what content you're doing, but his builds focus on defense, self healing, and sustain before damage.  He has builds for every class.  

[jat.4532]

Thanks to all. i finally came to like warrior gameplay and mostly bladesworn found it really tanky too. thanks again for tips and info

[Gaeb.2837]

2 hours ago, jat.4532 said:

Thanks to all. i finally came to like warrior gameplay and mostly bladesworn found it really tanky too. thanks again for tips and info

You reeeeeally need to go look up Lord Hizen's builds. I love his super tanky solo bladesworn build (well, haven't played it in like a year).

(old version but was what I built off of, I'm sure there's something new)

 

Edited July 10, 2023 by Gaeb.2837