Tanking A1S first time

I'm a full STR 192 DRK, Stats included and I'm looking to tank A1S for the first time. I can do a1-4 norm. I'm looking for some advice on a few things:

Can't afford pentamelded so how many slaying vs fending accessories should I run? Do I need to reinvest all my stats into vit?
What's a good amount of total HP to hit before I can invest into Str again?

Any tips on when the best times to drop tank stance for a bit to dps would be?
Does the oppressor use royal fount at all the same times as on a1 normal?

And just any random tidbits of advice you can give me that will make this easier on myself and my team. I'm confident in my damage output (in full STR atleast, never had to try anything else so far ) and I'm confident in my cool down rotations except timing Dark Mind since not many bosses have magical tank busters but I atleast know when to pop it in a1 normal

30 STR always.

3 Slaying / 2 Fending or 3 Fending / 2 Slaying, depending on what you're more comfortable with.

13500-14000+ is good for A1S, could probably even get away with less.

The only times you'd want to be in Grit is when you're getting hit by the tank buster, and that largely depends on what mitigation you're using.

http://imgur.com/Csnxu1p

Play safe at first, don't try to do anything fancy. As you get used to the fight, start taking risks and figure out what your (and your healer's) limit is.

I don't play DRK so can't give any DRK specific tips, but I'm sure there's people more qualified who can.

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Originally Posted by SpookyGhost

30 STR always.

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Um...why would you not just dump it all into STR? What theorycrafting justification is there for JUST having 30?

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13500-14000+ is good for A1S, could probably even get away with less.

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Pretty hard to have less than a 14.5k HP pool in 190 gear...

I was actually going to make the same thread, except to ask for WAR advice since I just switched to WAR from DRK for my current static.

But to echo Spooky a bit, yes all STR in attributes, 3 slaying, 2 fending is what I would suggest. One thing though is I probably would go with 15000 if your healers/static is brand new to A1s until everyone gets their bearings, then go more STR from there.

CD usage is pretty straightforward. I rotated shadow wall and shadowskin for tank buster + DA dark mind + delirium + reprisal from dark dance. Dance has to be cast early before the tank buster in order to trigger reprisal and of course its not 100% so you will have to play around with the timing. I usually have the SCH healing me and with all of that and SCH shields and debuffs, I've seen sub 5K tank busters which is always nice.

Stance dancing is another thing. Again if your healer or party is new to it all then you would just have to see what their trends are and how/when they're topping you off. I had a huge problem with this when I first started A1S since my healers were learning the party and would kind of let me sit at low HP either right before or after the tank buster. So while learning I mostly stayed in grit until they were more comfortable with everything then started dropping it here and there. Never got a good flow of it though since changing statics (and now tank jobs).

Now to hijack your thread haha...I need some WAR tips on stance dancing and CD usage. I'm full deliverance up until .5 comes out and I voke the main one and pop vengeance. Usually I have infuriate up around this time so I double FC then go into defiance. I use HG on the first and third busters but still try to have IB and SP up on them. Or should I just stay in deliverance the whole time since I'm using HG and switch after while using conv + equilibrium? Do most people just go back to deliverance after they're healed up or stay in defiance until jump? And what do you all use on the non HG buster?

Drk has it easy peasy in this fight. Tank busters are 2 minutes apart so you should have plenty of stuff for each of them. You can use Dark Rampart early in the fight and have it back in time for the first buster. If you feel like it you can Living Dead the 2nd one and use your cooldowns elsewhere, but it's not necessary. Remember to start fishing for parries and use reprisal/delirium ~20s before the tank buster. As a paladin with ninja/full str I can run sword oath from the beginning and I'm pretty much fine on hate, but it's probably better for dark knight to start out in grit just so they don't have to do as many power slashes over the course of the fight.

It's been a while since I've done it on drk, but you might as well toss out a non-DA dark mind on pull for the first royal fount. Probably some time around the first Resin Bomb is a good place to drop grit.

Personnally I use 1 slaying ring and all other accessories Fending, and i keep grit on all the time. Still able to do 650 dps which is more than enough as the main tank. If you can do around 600 dps and your team doesnt meet the dps check, you need to get another team with better dps.
Keeping grit on and having more HP allow your healers to do more dps.
In my team, if I take off grit after doing a power slash combo, there's a chance the war while pull the hate. Your job is to tank and keep the hate. Around 600 dps is enough, let the rest of your team do their job. And if you can't do 600 dps with fending accessories and grit on, your equipment isnt the problem.

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Originally Posted by Ralvenom

Um...why would you not just dump it all into STR? What theorycrafting justification is there for JUST having 30?

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I clearly meant 35 or w/e the maximum is... but ok. :V It's been 30 STR capped for 2 years now.

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Pretty hard to have less than a 14.5k HP pool in 190 gear...

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Correct! However! That is the minimum required! Anything above that and you're golden! Alright! Cool!

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Originally Posted by Kali-ka

Now to hijack your thread haha...I need some WAR tips on stance dancing and CD usage. I'm full deliverance up until .5 comes out and I voke the main one and pop vengeance. Usually I have infuriate up around this time so I double FC then go into defiance. I use HG on the first and third busters but still try to have IB and SP up on them. Or should I just stay in deliverance the whole time since I'm using HG and switch after while using conv + equilibrium? Do most people just go back to deliverance after they're healed up or stay in defiance until jump? And what do you all use on the non HG buster?

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Only time you need to be in Defiance is on the 2nd Plasma.

For the first one you want to use RI + Foresight + Awareness once you've 'voked Oppressor, then roll Vengeance so that it clips into when you'll get hit with the 2nd cleave, then roll Thrill + Conv before you get hit with the 2nd cleave, and finally Holmgang + SW the Plasma. Rest of it is just tanking in Deliverance with no CDs but not much really happens past the tank buster except the final cleave.

2nd one you want to go into Defiance ~20s before the Plasma with 5 stacks, pop Unchained, build 5, then pop Veng + Thrill + Conv so that they catch the cleave and the Plasma, IB the cleave, Infuriate, IB the Plasma, Equilibrium, and go back to Deliverance. You can also just IB the Plasma and keep Infuriate for a Fell Cleave, but that's up to you.

3rd one is the same as the first, your Veng and Thrill + Conv timings might be off if you pop them later on the 2nd one, but that's really it.

Oh, also, small tip: go into Defiance once the jump has happened. Your SCH can get a boosted Adlo on you and Deployment Tactics it to everyone else, negating a lot of the jump damage.

About your cooldowns, on the first tank buster, I activate Shadow Skin while he's charging Hydrothermal Missile, to lower dmg before tank buster and make it easier for my healer to keep me fully healed. Then as soon as he does the blue lazer cleave attack, i activate Dark Arts + Dark Mind and Shadow Wall. Hypercompressed Plasma does around 6k dmg.
On the second tank buster, almost the same thing but I activate Foresight along with Shadow Skin, then Dark Arts + Dark Mind, Shadow Wall is still on CD.
Then on the third, do the same as the first.

(from perspective of WAR offtank)
I usually start in DPS stance, Defiance when Resin Bomb comes, then back to DPS stance way after the tank buster (Hypercompressed Plasma) and a Gunnery Pod. After that Gunnery Pod you have about 15s to DPS before jump.

Certainly you could push more DPS than this, but why? My group is going to destroy it long before enrage and this method puts most of the big hits during tank stance. Also I run 1 of the lesser cooldowns pretty much full time while in DPS stance. If your group is actually hitting the enrage, sure push harder for DPS.

For cooldowns I usually watch the animation of bombs descend and hit Vengeance/Thrill of Battle a few secs before Hypercompressed Plasma starts casting. This is because their refresh is exactly as long as the 2 mins between tank busters. Wouldn't want to be there the next time clicking 1 sec before refresh. Not sure what the DRK equivalents would be, but I'm sure there is some cooldown to use.

Just a minor point - generally everyone is correct in that you can get away with a lot less HP as a DRK, so probably only want to wear 1-2 fendings at max, or even go full 5x slaying if your left side gear is decent.

That said, if you're going into A1S with a static group for the first time, with everyone new to it, I'd actually suggest more fending at first. Pile on 4-5 parts on your first few pulls purely to get your healers a bit of leeway with seeing things. In my experience, the trickiest part of learning A1S as a group is the healers getting used to the Preys into Tankbuster with all the other damage flying around. Having 18k+health for this means you'll likely be able to learn this part of the fight quicker, as once healers are fine with the timing you can drop the training wheel vit and go much more glass cannon.

Tanking A1S is really very simple - it's the healers that have the difficult job as they have even more mechanics to avoid and lots of damage spike/aoe cooldowns to keep track of. You'll probably find yourself having a quicker learning if you make their lives easier at the start until at least 2-3 decent pulls where they've seen all the timings. If they're already experienced in the fight of course, then by all means go Slaying from the start.

It's certainly not optimal, and you WILL want to drop to more slaying once your team has seen most of the fight, but don't be afraid to go into a -new- encounter with more vitality than you need just to aid in seeing mechanics. You wont need to worry about the DPS requirements of the enrage until your group can comfortably get past a Jump phase without any deaths, so may as well make the initial learning smoother.