Alright l thought I would help this thread out and give a good starting point for some of the aspiring tankers. I personally think there are two classes best suited to tanking - logi and heavy , simply because of the required skills in defence and tbh being a tanker is just as much about staying alive as it is dishing out damage.
Most aspiring tankers wont have the skills to go above malitia tanks for a while but thats ok everyone starts somewere . So I thought id put up a list of mods that will seriously help the new tankers stay alive during battle

FOR THE SOMA
Heavy ig polerized armour repair
180mm steal plates
1 power diognostic system
1 power expansion unit
1 light clarity shield repair
And one periferal damage contoll system
This is with a 80gj blaster turret also applies when fitting the rail turret .

FOR THE SICA
2 power diognostic systems
1 heavy shield extender
1 supplamental shield extender
And 1 light clarity ward shield booster
This applyscto fitting rail turrets when fitting the blaster replace one of the power diognostic units for a power expansion unit and the heavy shield for the heavy suplamental shield booster and swap the light clarity ward shield booster for the heavy clarity ward shield booster

I hope these loadout guidlines help the aspiring tanker as I said staying alive is just as important as getting the kills especially in your early tanking days .

Response to Covert Clay


Remove the small shield booster since you have a heavy shield booster already installed. Remove the missle turrets completely, so far due to their complete lack of accuracy since the winter updates, they are completely useless. Skill up in small blasters and railguns as your secondary turrets.

Replace the small shield booster with a shield resistance amplifier, another shield extender OR a shield hardener.

Skill up in small blaster turrets to level 4, then youl be able to upgrade to large blaster turret level 1 and have a better blaster as a main cannon.

Also skill up in vehicle command level 5 then go for Caldari or Gallente HAV level 1, militia tanks may be cheap and easy to replace, but there is a reason they are not standard issue. Go for the Gunnlogi or Madrugar as a first official tank.

Unlock either or, the only difference is that Claldari focus on shielding while Gallente focus on armor. When I had a madrugar before the reset, I had 9000 armor. Now I have a Gunnlogi with 6000 shields. It just depends on what type you want, shield railgun, shield blaster, shield missle or armor railgun, armor blaster or armor missle.

Unlock either or, the only difference is that Claldari focus on shielding while Gallente focus on armor. When I had a madrugar before the reset, I had 9000 armor. Now I have a Gunnlogi with 6000 shields. It just depends on what type you want, shield railgun, shield blaster, shield missle or armor railgun, armor blaster or armor missle.

It's not. Atleast not by wide sweeping margins. I've taken down plenty a Gunloggi and Madragaur with Somas and Sicas.

The devil is in the details. It's a habit from EVE but small changes are what make big differances. Between the 2 tanks, the Gunloggi gets 2 more mid slots, more CPU, and a higher base shields. This helps in several ways as Shield Control only effects base shield health so you get more out of it. The more mid slots and CPU allow better shield tanks since shield tanking modules require a lot of CPU useage. So the end result is a tougher (or more flexable depending on fit) tank.

As for getting the Gunloggi to 6k shields? That's easy to do. I've seen higher then that. Really it comes down to Shield Control skills and Shield Extenders. I'm not going to give away all my fitting secrets but if you manage your PG/CPU well and have a set fitting goal in mind it's possible. For the record I have a Sica that is over 6k shields :P

Just be sure to match Defence with Offence. You don't want to go in being a super tough tank and realize you died simply because the other tank can just output a ton of damage. I'm not going to say how but much later on you'll see Railguns doing over 2000 per shot so defences won't last forever.

I believe armor is better for anti-infantry because it is PG heavy. It is also able to repair its armor much faster than a shield tank can rep its shield. Armor tanks also have better damage reduction mods and great low slots, which allow you to have more EHP than a shield tank.

PG is good for an AI tank because blaster is much better than a railgun for mowing down enemy infantry. Blaster uses more PG and less CPU. Railguns use more CPU and have less PG. If you want to AI on a shield tank, you'll have some serious PG problems if you want to keep your tank alive. Again, the slow shield recharge will not allow you to tank enemy AV. You'll have to use the shield booster twice times to recharge your shields from even 50% to full.

edit: I wouldn't start over if you put points into shield. Eventually (if you're going all tank) you'll probably want to have the option of going shield tank too. You can't have spent too many points on shield tanks alone because armor tanks use shields too. I'm 100% shield tank atm, but once I finish my shield tank I'm getting my armor tanking skills up.

I think I'm the loudest proponent of specialization on these forums lol. I see tanking as a specialization in itself. Turrets are one of the most important things to a tank, and fortunately blaster and railguns are both hybrid and require the same skills to level up. The amount of points you spend on shields or armor can easily be done in a few weeks at most. If you started with the arbiter class it's much easier to go from shield tank to armor than it is to go from armor to shield. Armor skills don't have the expensive prerequisites that the shields do. It's just one more reason why the arbiter class is pretty much the best class for almost every role.

There is no point choosing a new class or bloodline. It has no effect other then starting skills and since you're 2-3 weeks in, you'll just be farther behind. There is a saying in EVE that "no skill goes wasted" to mean as things change with patches what is best will change. One day it's shields, next day it's armour.

You are better off just skilling into the stuff you need now rather then restarting since you'll have skills now that can still be useful rather then have to get them again. You also have to remember there is no limit on the SP your character can have. So eventually you could get everything. (But new content usually prevents that as there is always something new to skill into :D)

Absolutely. That's the attitude to have :D

Send me a mail in game. We should have a few games together :)

But really it doesn't take much SP to get into armour tanking. Field mechanics to 5, repair systems and armour upgrades to 3, and adaptation to 1 for starters gets you everything you need to build a good, strong armour tank. Even just getting lvl 4 mechanics and 1 in each is a good start to expand from.

yeah, the thread was dead for a month but im going to revive it.

I have been doing some experimenting and made 2 very dangerous tanks.

Madrugar:

HP-
1034 Shields
10424 Armor

Turrets-
1 80GJ Scattered Neutron Blaster
2 Prototype 20GJ Scattered Ion Cannons

Modules-
1 180MM Reinforced Polycrystalline Plate
1 120MM Reinforced Nanofiber Plate
1 180MM Reinforced Nanofiber Plate
1 Light Polarized Armor Regenerator
1 Supplemental Shield Regenerator
1 Supplemental Shield Amplifier

Gunnlogi:

HP-
7418 Shields
1249 Armor

Turrets-
1 80GJ Compressed Particle Accelerator
1 Prototype 20GJ Compressed Particle Cannon
1 Prototype 20GJ Scattered Ion Cannon

Modules-
1 Heavy Azeotropic Ward Shield Extender
3 Azeotropic Ward Shield Extenders
1 Heavy Clarity Ward Shield Booster

I have circuitry level 5
cpu upgrades level 3
nanocircuitry level 3
combat engineering level 5
powergrid upgrades level 3
field mechanics level 5
armor upgrades level 3

and a lot more **** at level 3

each tank driver in dust514 has their own style of play, just like me. rolling with a squad is better for me because I get support against enemy AV and I get orbital strikes faster. it just depends on who your with