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Top 10 Most Powerful Tank Sets in the Elder Scrolls Online

By Andrew | 18 May 2022 | Share
Top 10 Most Powerful Tank Sets in the Elder Scrolls Online

The Elder Scrolls Online has several hundred different sets to choose from, so it can be a little bit tricky to find the best sets for your role and build. Over the next few weeks we will be publishing a top 10 sets article for each role in the game, to help you decide which sets to prioritize when you are looking to improve your toolkit for whichever role you are playing. Today we will start by looking at the ten most powerful tank sets in the Elder Scrolls Online. Note that this list does not include monster sets or Mythic items. 

10 - Aegis of Galenwe

The Aegis of Galenwe set also comes in a Perfected version which grants you an additional 1206 maximum health. Don't worry if you're not able to get the perfected version at first, as the non perfected one works just as well. 

This set makes the list because it is very easy to use and offers a nice buff to your allies. The Empower buff increases the damage of light and heavy attacks by 40%, which might not sound too huge but it can actually be a pretty substantial boost. All you have to do to give the buff to your allies is block attacks.

There's one caveat with this set though - you won't get much value out of it if you have a Necromancer in your group who is using the Empowering Grasp skill, as this also grants the same buff. So if that applies to you, you might want to use something else from this list. 

Galenwe drops from the Cloudrest trial, and you need access to the Summerset DLC to get there. 

Cloudrest trial in ESOCloudrest trial in ESO

9 - Way of Martial Knowledge

In contrast to Galenwe, Way of Martial Knowledge is much more difficult to use, as you have to carefully manage your stamina, keeping it below 50% and also remembering to do a light or heavy attack every 5 seconds to refresh the buff. The buff that it gives is pretty huge though, an extra 8% damage output for your entire group can help to push your group that little bit further, so it's definitely worth having this set in your group somewhere if you're trying to optimize group damage output. The Martial Knowledge effect is unique, which means it can be stacked with similar effects from other sources, such as Major Vulnerability.

It's more common for a healer to run this set, but putting it on a tank is definitely possible too. I do not recommend this for beginner tanks though. Only wear this if you are comfortable with what you are doing. 

Martial Knowledge is an overland set from the Craglorn zone. It is part of the base game, so no DLC are required. 

8 - Crimson Oath's Rive

The Crimson Oath's Rive set has in a sense replaced the Roar of Alkosh set, which used to hold a firm place in the meta before it was changed. 

Crimson Oath is especially good for trash packs - reducing the armor of enemies is one of the most powerful ways of increasing your group's DPS in ESO, and in large trash pulls it often simply isn't feasible to manually debuff the armor of targets and do it quickly, so a set like this works perfectly for those situations. 

You can get this set from The Dread Cellar dungeon, which is a part of the Waking Flame DLC.

The Dread Cellar Dungeon in ESOThe Dread Cellar Dungeon in ESO

7 - Saxhleel Champion

This set comes in a perfected and non perfected version. The perfected version drops from Veteran Rockgrove, but the only extra effect is some additional max stamina, so don't worry if you're not able to get it yet. 

Saxhleel Champion gives you much more value from your ultimate abilities, granting your group 1 second of Major Force for every 15 points of ultimate that you spent. 

The most obvious use of the set is to extend the duration of your Aggressive Horn so that it does more to buff the team, but there's actually more efficient ways to use it than that. 

The most efficient way is to use this set on a Necromancer tank, and use your Frozen Colossus just as the Major Force from someone's warhorn is about to expire. You then drop your colossus ultimate which will “top up” the Major Force buff until the stat buffs from the warhorn also expire. Doing this is a bit complicated to pull off at first, especially on console where you do not have the help of addons, but it can really ramp up your team's damage by quite a bit. 

You can also use the set with protective ultimates like Replenishing Barrier to help keep your team alive while also buffing their damage. 

This set is obtained from the Rockgrove trial, which is a part of the Blackwood expansion. 

Rockgrove trial in ESORockgrove trial in ESO

6 - The Worm's Raiment

The Worm's Raiment is a light armor set that was traditionally used by healers, but over time became more common on tanks as more powerful healer sets were added to the game. It's an extremely easy set to use, but because it can only be obtained in light armor you will want to run it on your jewelry and weapon slots. 

Wearing it simply buffs the magicka sustain of your group at all times. You don't have to do anything else to activate the set. If your group is struggling with magicka sustain, then using this will help to remedy that. 

This set is available from Vaults of Madness, which is a base game dungeon. 

5 - War Machine

War Machine is a medium armor set, so you might want to run it on jewelry and weapons, however experienced offtanks might be comfortable tanking in medium armor depending on which trial they are doing. 

The set is pretty easy to use, you just have to use your ultimate and doing so will grant Major Slayer to the 5 closest allies to you, which increases their damage done by 10%, a very powerful buff indeed.

Sometimes DDs will run this set instead of tanks, and it is very important to make sure you are close to your DDs when you use your ultimate, otherwise the buff may instead go on tanks or healers which is a complete waste of the effect. 

You can get this set from Halls of Fabrication, which is a trial in the Morrowind DLC. 

Halls of Fabrication trial in ESOHalls of Fabrication trial in ESO

4 - Elemental Catalyst

Elemental Catalyst is another light armor set, so get it on jewelry and weapons too. Also I have to say that the set is not for beginner tanks. If the tank is a beginner then a DD should use the set instead. 

The set's description is a little bit confusing at first. But basically, dealing fire frost or shock damage will make the enemy take 5% more damage from critical strikes, and you can stack this effect once per type of elemental damage. So dealing fire, frost and shock damage every 3 seconds will mean that the enemy takes 15% more critical damage. 

You can make use of skills like Crushing Shock to apply the effect of the set, as well as other elemental skills. But while the buff to your group's damage is very powerful, if you're quite new to tanking then I recommend either not using this set at all or just being very careful not to push too hard for high uptimes while you're still learning. 

This set drops from the Stone Garden dungeon, which is part of the Stonethorn DLC. 

3 - Turning Tide

Turning Tide is the newest set on this list, only making its appearance in ESO in the Ascending Tide update a couple of months ago.

The set shook up the meta a little bit for tanks, as previously you needed to have necromancers in your group using the Frozen Colossus ultimate in order to get a reliable uptime of Major Vulnerability, one of the most powerful debuffs in the game. 

Now however, a tank can just run this set and do an occasional bash to apply a good uptime of Major Vulnerability. The debuff increases the damage taken by enemies by 10%, which is very strong. 

To get this set, you will need to farm the Shipwright's Regret dungeon in the Ascending Tide DLC. 

Shipwright's Regret dungeon in ESOShipwright's Regret dungeon in ESO

2 - Claw of Yolnahkriin

Claw of Yolnahkriin is a heavy armor set which is extremely easy to use - you literally just need to taunt an enemy to apply the effects to your whole group, granting them the Minor Courage buff, which increases their spell damage. 

This set isn't as good in 4 man groups as you can get the same buff from Magma Incarnate instead, using only two item slots instead of five, but in trials this set is the only way to get a high uptime of the buff for your whole team, which makes the set highly desirable. 

The ease of use makes it perfect for tanks at any skill level, which is why it places so high on the list. 

There is a perfected version of the set which gives you some extra maximum health, but as with all of the perfected sets this only makes a very minor difference for tanks. 

The set drops from the Sunspire trial, which is part of the Elsweyr DLC. To get the perfected version, you need to do the trial on Veteran difficulty. 

Sunspire trial in ESOSunspire trial in ESO

1 - Powerful Assault

We finally come to Powerful Assault, which takes the top spot on this list. So what is so good about this set?

Well, it is relatively easy to use for starters, you just need to be stood in fairly close proximity to your damage dealers and cast a skill from the Assault skill line, such as Echoing Vigor, to give the buff to yourself and five allies. 

What makes this effect even better is that the set behaves in a smart manner when deciding who to apply the buff to - it will always apply it to group members who don't have the buff, or if everyone has it then it will reapply it to the people who are closest to having the buff expire. 

The 307 extra weapon and spell damage from the set is a unique buff too, which means it can stack with any other effect. This set just allows you to give your team tons of extra damage, and once you have mastered the basics of tanking I highly recommend practicing using the set. 

There is a bit of a caveat with the set that makes it a bit tricky for newer players though - it is a medium armor set which means you will probably want to run it on jewelry and weapons, and because the set is so highly sought after the weapons are extremely expensive - an Ice Staff can easily set you back three million gold.

It's possible to get the set from boxes sold by the Tel Var merchant in the Imperial City, but the boxes drop random items so you will need a lot of tel var stones to get the item you want unless you get lucky. 

But if you aren't able to get a staff yet, don't worry! You can make effective use out of this set by front-barring it, which means that you just run a sword and shield on the front bar with any random ice staff on the back bar, and you can still apply the buffs to your team as long as you are on your front bar. In contrast to the staff, it's normally possible to buy a sword and shield from the Powerful Assault set for around 100,000 gold (for both items). 

ESO Imperial CityESO Imperial CityThat concludes our top 10 most powerful tank sets for ESO (Elder Scrolls Online). We hope you found it useful and interesting!
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