Useful tanks?

[Das Big Hippo]

We all know frames like Inaros exist, but aside from massive HP, he doesn't bring a whole lot to the team. And I have never been a huge fan of nuke frames. I prefer tankier frames with some supportive aspects.

[Evill Bob]

I can vouch for Rhino, Nehza, and Chroma offering good synergy for most teams. I personally usually use a Rhino spec'd out to give double damage to teammates for nearly a minute.

[Lay Z]

Wukong + warcry/roar/larva helmith into his 4th is fun or Gara are pretty tanky, They both offer abilities that makes them immune to damage for a few seconds and can be modded to make it last longer

[[Meyo]Frakura]

Lavos got alot of defense and is quite useful for applying elemental.

[peppermint hollows]

Gara can tank, can provide defense for stationary objectives with her 4, give 90% DR to any teammates with her 2 (including pets/companions, and any kind of defense objective, including the "living" ones like in sorties or arbitrations), and build up insane amounts of damage. She is imo one of the most versatile and one of the strongest frames in the game.

EDIT: And with her augment for her 3, she can provide huge amounts of energy orbs for her team and herself.

[the poopshitter]

I'd vouch for Hildryn, Lavos, Harrow (believe it or not), and Wisp (hear me out)

Hildryn should be pretty obvious, immortal shield mom with longer shieldgate, immunity to most stuff that makes shields undesirable like toxin procs, an instant shield restore that scales with enemy level, meaning she only gets TANKIER as enemy level goes higher, and her 3 is entirely support.

Lavos naturally because he has one of the most insane base armor + health stats in the game, which in turn also means they scale out the ass if you put armor mods on. He doesn't really have any tank abilities, but the armor number alone makes him super tanky even in level 100. The rest of his kit could be used for support, mostly with guaranteed AoE status applying and DPS.

Harrow is straight up a crit god. His base stats don't shine much when it comes to tanking, but his 4 is literally an invincibility button (lasts longer with duration obviously), his 3 means practically infinite energy for both himself and teammates so there's your support and ability to spam his 4 for invincibility and then crit, and his 1 is a solid CC. Putting natural talent on him will also make 3 much easier to charge and let you move around much sooner with his 4.

Wisp, well, who doesn't like a wisp on their team for the free mote buffs? Again, not much tanking capability, but her Vitality mote alone can make both you and teammates crazy tanky, along with free health regen which is pretty fast considering other health regen methods that apply to your entire ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ team.

There's probably better options, but those are the ones i find fun.

[Carnasid]

Nekros is often overlooked, but with despoil, health conversion, and shield of shadows, he's extremely durable.

[Cosmic Afro]

Rhino: Your "I will be able to handle any mission" Tank. He's insanely durable, and not many players make use of the fact his Iron Skin scales with how much damage he takes in the first few seconds of the cast. Infinite scaling tank, great support damage and decent CC. Scales best with Armor and Str.

Nezha: Often joked as Rhino-Lite, he's actually an insanely useful tank/support combo. His augments can turn him into a support machine, either through Energy/Orb drops, a DR helper with rings on everything, and his fire walker ability in a practiced hand is insanely strong control. Very difficult to destroy and a little more versatile than Rhino, at the cost of not being completely invulnerable like Iron Skin. Also, complete knockdown and status immunity for your whole team is insanely useful.

Nekros: Admittedly, he's a lattice work of required mods. But essentially: Health Conversion to pick up orbs, Despoil Augment to take your health, Equilibrium to make Health energy too, and finally Shield of Shadows to piece it all together, he's unstoppable *once he gets a few kills*.

Titania: So, hear me out, her whole thing is her 4th ability (kind of). She's the archwing, but because she's so small, it actually makes it viable to play in regular missions unlike our poor friend Yareli. Mods that give you DR while airborne work with her Archwing state, meaning you can stack:
24%DR from Aerodynamic Aura + 40%DR from Aviator + 50% dodge from Dust +50% DR from Thorns + 50% Evasion from her 4th. When stacked with Adaptation, she's tough to kill when she's even HIT half the time.

She's not for everyone, but Titania is okay CC, helpful but negligible health regen, but she's WONDERFUL at status debuffing and fantastic DPS/Tanking.


In all frankness, if you can get your hands on Adaptation and Rolling Guard from Arbitrations, or buying one from a player if you can trade out the plat, almost ANY frame can be a tanky one. As a few others have said above, a few frames here have a lot of tank in their own rights. Heck, if you die as Trinity, you're just not a good Trinity. I'd read through the suggestions from others above, all of them are good.

[🔥Astral Rage🔥]

Rhino: his iron skin can take a million dmg and does no harm to him

Wukong: best reliable in terms of speed, survival and especially the clone ability that lets the clone carry weapon of same stat his passive is very useful

Nekros: Very good for survial missions the 4 ability lets u create spectres of dead enemies can stack maximum to 7

Wisp: the 1 increases speed,vitality and is very efficient
2 can distract enemies and lets u teleport
4 for full energy blast

Chroma: although 1 ability is lame the vex armour and 4 are good abilities

Nidus: 1 is litreally free if multiple enemies are hit gives energy back
2 can crowd control and makes stacking more easier using 1
3 can attach to enemies ,allies for health/armour
4 is best for crowd control making enemies slower as they approach
his passive is amazing one 15 is stacked he litreally is unkillable

[Ginebra]

Mesa is pretty good.

[VerrucktMedic]

All I'm saying as a Trinity main is that we technically have the ability to consistently tank more damage than any frame in the game because of blessing. And she's literally the quintessential support frame.

But this is only a technicality and obviously has the draw back of having to beat the the ground constantly and watch energy vampire, but you can do this forever.

[Shortpower]

Not the tankiest but Oberon + Phoenix Renewal allows for your team to be relatively durable (Immune to death once every 90/seconds, +400~ armor, +100HP/S to all in party)
While offering decent utility (4 applies radiation so makes decent CC and permanently strips armor when used in conjunction with 2)
Course frankly speaking, tanking/support is nearly useless in Warframe for getting content done the entire game is balanced around grinding loot so if you're not increasing loot drops or killing entire rooms instantly you're a bad warframe (barring some niche uses here and there)

[Pakaku]

Hildryn 2 restores her shields, steals shields and armour from enemies, and cleanses status debuffs from everyone it touches

Oberon's 2 can cleanse and prevent status debuffs on anyone standing in his field. His 3 is a channeled heal, so cast it once and let it work, and it will also buff armour on players standing in his 2. His 4 can strip armour from enemies standing in his 2, and is a good crowd-control radiation ability either way

And if anything, Helminth makes it possible for any tank to become more supportive. Best example I can think of is Protea's dispenser, so grinding Granum Void for her a second time is worth it (you probably already have a set if you've been doing Tenet weapon runs anyways)