What are the desirable tank stats?

[Count Smashula]

With my first character soon reaching CP 160 as a tank DK argonian, I want to know what health and resistance stats I should be aiming for.

I'm currently running with ~35K health and 20-22K resistances unbuffed and ~43K health and 28K resistances while buffed (food, abilities etc.)

I'm aiming to farm up the ebon armory, ursus and embershield sets as they seem to give nice tanky bonuses once I hit CP160 together with some desirable monster sets for some damage and tankiness if I deem that necessary.

So, how much health and resistances are desirable for a tank? Most of the time I can tank enemies and bosses in veteran dungeons just fine even without blocking but other times I get destroyed by certain enemies or attacks.

My current bars are: main bar is heroic sweeb, noxious breath, absorb magic, hardened armor, pierce armor and magma shell.
Second bar is unrelenting grip, rearming trap, igneous shield, igneous weapons, green dragonblood and standard of might.
Sorry for the wall of text.

[Drake]

Resistance cap is about 33K. So if you're 28K unbuffed and then add both major resistance buffs (like with hardened armor) you're good.
About HP it varies greatly depending on skills you're using. If you have a build that relies on %max health, you'll HP over 40K. Notable DK skills that work on max health are igneous shield (the shield strength relies on max HP, it's not stated but it works like that) and green dragon blood. If you d'ont plan on using a build relying heavily on health skill, having 35k HP is enough most of the time. Getting 20-25k stamina at least would be better instead (30K if you can afford it). About magic, unless you're a magicka tank, 10-12k (I go with 9K personally) with a good regen (over 2k regen) is way better than having a lot of magicka but no sustain. You usually donc need to spam magicka skills, you just need to have it ready fast in case you need it. There is a very good unique drink recipe in orsinium that gives 5000 HP and 400 magicka regen that is great for a lot of tank builds.

Also understand that some boss skills are sure kill attacks in veteran, so you need to dodge that, tank or not, and you need to learn what you should block, dodge or soak, it's very important to stay alive.

As for sets, ebony armor is great, especially in trials. aegis of galanwe from cloud rest is really useful too. You don't need embershield because you should already be capped armor wise. Ursus is good (assuming your group knows how to make proper use of synergies), even if I do prefer brands of imperium (but that's personal taste).

About the skill bar, you'll want to get the fire taunt from undaunted line (it's ranged, magicka so that you have a magicka option if your stam is low and the synergy is very good). You don't need bear trap, pick the talons in ardent flame, it's aoe and the utility morph has a very good debuff.

Instead of the standard of might you might want to do pvp and get the warhorn ultimate in assault, it's a very strong group buff, way better than the standard.

You don't really need noxious breath, since you have pierce armor already debuffing armor and it"s cheaper to put on relevant targets.
You do need absorb magic however (the absorb projectile morph in sword and shield), since it's a very strong defence against any magic projectile (you can even block some big spells from bosses that would otherwise kill you even if you're a tank) and has a slotted bonus to block so it's double nice.

About igneous weapons, it's good, but dps usually have those buffs on potions or on their skills already, so it can be a bit wasted when you start playing with higher level chars.

If you have summerset, I like meditation a lot with the block shield and the 30% mitigation passive while casting (all from the pjisic line). The 30% mitigation turn you into a wall while meditating and the block shield gives you a 5000 damage shield when blocking (always nice).
The Undo ultimate is also a good alternative to magma armor in dungeons where you don't need group shields.

PS : all skills are what you should aim when you're in instances doing full tanking, in solo do not hesitate to get damage skills, poison bow stam DK is a thing and works well as complement for a tank build. Werewolf is nice too (unless you're doing a vampire tank, then no werewolf).

[Count Smashula]

Thanks, you have given me a lot to think about! Knowing how close I already am to the resistance cap means I can focus on other things. My magica is around 13K and stamina around 15K and I haven't had much trouble with my ability casting, though more damage would always be welcome.

I abandoned choking talons because it didn't really do anything to bosses, but I'm not using the bear traps all that much either and I've thought about getting rid of it for a while. I should probably have realised that noxious breath and puncture armor don't stack a while ago but I'm dumb. I do like it for the AOE damage and debuff though.

Sidenote: Damn I didn't know how good the psijic order skill line was. Guess I'm doing summerset early!

[Wendersnaven]

I like how this is a decent discussion so far. I've just come back after an almost two year break and was thinking about how I would improve my tanks.

I was thinking of crafting Orgnum's Scales for my DK-Nord-stam-tank. I can use the unique quest weapons to add to the set and integrate my Chudan helm and shoulders. Ruins of Mazzatun was a major pain but it was worth it for tanking: https://elderscrollsonline.wiki.fextralife.com/Mighty+Chudan+Set

One of my mules is an Argonian tank that I've leveled up to 30 despite him just being storage. I like the RP aspect of Corrosive armor on him. I haven't tanked more than normal with him though.

[Drake]

About talons, it's for trash mobs and adds mostly, they make some fight way easier. Plus the attack debuff works on bosses, just not the cc.

[Commancho]

Originally posted by Sajah:

Also understand that some boss skills are sure kill attacks in veteran, so you need to dodge that, tank or not, and you need to learn what you should block, dodge or soak, it's very important to stay alive.

Werewolf is nice too (unless you're doing a vampire tank, then no werewolf).

WW is not recommended for pure tank build because it bases on stamina. Actually you need to be vampire which comes with overpowered passive
Undeath:
While you have Vampirism stage 3 or higher:
- Reduces damage dealt to you when you fall below 50% Health.
- Reduces your damage taken by up to 33% based on your missing Health

With this passive combined with such as hardened armor, green dragonblood and unstoppable (heavy armor skillline) and over 60k health no boss will ever kill you with one hit. There are also armor sets which are reducing damage based on your missing health - you want them ;-)

Tl'dr - More health = better. Then all possible buffs based on missing health. Once you hit 60k health you can cast draconic power which is restoring 33% missing health for cost of only 4300 magicka. Which means that you can restore almost 20k health instantly once your health drops to 25% (15k) :D

[Wendersnaven]

I think that's assuming that you are magic based Commancho. There's also the fire-weakness to consider- but a Dunmer-Vampire-Magic-DK would be amazing! The racial traits are too perfect for that build.

I can't tell if OP's Argonian is stam or magic based. I like the stamina, personally, because of the benefits outside of combat ... I like to sprint.

The Hardened Armor would be the magic equilvalent of the 1H+Shield Walls. For my stamina user, what magic I have is reserved for Igneous Shield+Green Dragon Blood.

Now I've got to go play around with my toon more- I have the Plague Doctor set in Jewelry and 1H+Shield. Chudan monster helm and shoulder. I think I can get him over 80k once my 8th level traits are researched.

I know little about the Summerset Jewelry crafting. Is it able to improve the purple rings and necklaces? That would boost OP's tanking.

[Drake]

The fire weakness on a vampire health tank is a non issue. You have so much defence and damage mitigation that you don't really take any damage anyway, especially when you hit the lowlife stage (which is like 20k so plenty of hp to do you job).

About jewelry crafting, you can do exactly the same things you could with blacksmith, tailor and woodworker. So legendary improvement, set crafting etc.