It's not as simple as it sounds to play a tank role. Despite having the highest sustainability on your squad, your tasks are essential for a successful play and your function depends heavily on your colleagues. Being a great tank requires timing, talent, knowledge of the map, and a keen understanding of your squad. Check out this article to learn how to tank like a pro and make sure your team is headed in the right direction towards victory!
Delay or take enemy buff / Protect team jungler
Master Delayer
A. If you are using tanks like Franco or Tigreal, you are playing the buff delay gods. These heroes can cause an early game ruckus at the enemy team's buff side making it harder for their carry to have an early game advantage. The first few seconds are the time to be aggressive! Get to the enemy team buff and hook it (Franco) or push it (Tigreal) outside of its radius range so the buff resets. This will delay the enemy team jungler giving your team a really good advantage. Tanks like Hylos, Grock, and Hilda can time their attacks to steal the enemy buff entirely.
B. When faced off against buff delayers/stealers, your job as a tank is to both protect your core hero and prevent enemy tanks from executing their delaying tactics. Your job will be to take enemy damage, check nearby bushes, and shove the enemy away. This may be accomplished by positioning yourself in front of Franco's hook, using CC on nearby foes, and dealing damage so they are forced to retreat.
The first few seconds are crucial for the game, so tanks need to act fast and set the playing field for the entire team.
- Quickly focus on buff area in the start of game
- Either defend your side or delay the other team buff
- Deal damage to their core hero
- Get to the Lithowanderer and make sure that your jungler gets it for an advantage
2. Check bushes
I see you~
You are the toughest hero in the team, and that comes with a set of duties. You can move about the map with no concern for ambush thanks to your excellent defense and high health build. Tanks are excellent for inspecting dangerous locations because of their high sustainability. As a tank hero, you should search the bushes for hidden enemy heroes because they make excellent ambush and ganking locations. By doing this, you reduce the likelihood that the opposing team will kill one of your teammates, and you also increase map visibility by moving around. Checking bushes with your skills will lower the likelihood that your core or marksman will be shut down, so don't worry about wasting skills on bushes.
- Rotate around strategic bushes and watch out for enemies
- Camp around the gold lane bush to prevent gankers
- Stay around turtle bush for vision
3. Initiate Team Fights
Lolita's deadly set
Tank heroes are the natural initiator of clashes. They take enemy damage and sustain it for the team while also making the play and doing the set up to make sure that the team fight will favor his side of the team.
The key is knowing when and when not to engage in a clash. Playing the tank role requires a player to be observant to his team's movements, if your team plays aggressively and wants to secure kills then you can initiate clashes whenever you have a strong backup that you know will engage and win a team fight. If your team focuses on securing objectives and is still building their kit, you should not engage in teamfights unless the enemy team is outnumbered or if you are sure that you will dominate them.
Tanks are gifted with awesome CC skills, this includes stuns, roots, pulls, and slows. These skills are used to make the perfect set up for your team. Make sure that your sets count, that will give your team the advantage in team fights.
- Initiate and handle the front lines
- Set the battlefield
- Sustain enemy damage
4. Maximize your rotation
Turtle is ours!
It is only natural for you to move around the map and support your teammates in team fights or lane clashes because your job is to absorb the majority of the damage your foes do. To maximize your trips on each lane, you must choose a good rotation path. Pay attention to the turtle and lord timers when choosing lanes, make sure that you will have enough time to reach the area and ensure that your team gets the jungle objectives. When using a tank hero with small damage, focus on checking the surrounding turtle area for enemies that will try to steal the objectives since you won't deal substantial damage to the turtle anyway. It is common for disadvantaged teams to camp around the objectives area and just spring out when the opposing team has diminished HP, it is the tank's role to make sure that the enemy team will not successfully steal your objective.
- Find lanes where ganking is possible
- When turtle/lord is about to spawn, rotate to the nearer lane to secure objectives
- Help your marksman to gain gold lead/ level advantage
- Protect squishy team mates from gankers
5. Find Strategic Positioning
Take the damage
Finding the right positions are crucial for tank users, they should place themselves between the enemy and the team’s damage dealers. While the tank soaks up all the damage, the back lines retaliate by casting their skills to take down enemies. Position yourself on bushes around the mid lane or the buff area, these are places where it is likely that an enemy hero will pass by to visit other lanes. These strategic bushes are great hiding spots for ganking lone enemy heroes.
During team fights, your position should be upfront. Boldness is a trait of tank users, you should have a good reading of the enemy movements and dictate when your team should engage. Make your way towards the enemy team, and surprise them with a crowd control skill and allow your team to do the rest.
- Front for the team
- Soak up damage (use taunt if available)
- Stun enemies to make easy target for backrow attackers
6. Target enemy damage dealers
Let em' have it!
One of the most important roles of a tank hero is to provide vision and location of the enemy damage dealers, usually the jungler and the marksman. By giving your team map visibility, they can build up a strategy that could bring your team to victory. As a tank, you are heavily reliant on your team's damage, focus on targeting enemy damage dealers and push them or take them to when your team can shut them down before they can retaliate. Stuns are effective whenever you take sight of an enemy damage dealer, the few seconds of stun will allow your team to take him down even when the enemy hero can out damage you. Their damage will not matter as long as they can’t cast their skills. That's why tank heroes immediately apply stuns, knock ups, and more whenever they take sight of enemy damage heroes.
