Engineer

Guardian

Mesmer

Necromancer

Ranger

Revenant

Thief

Warrior

Tank Firebrand
August 2022

Select difficulty

Instanced PvE

Tank

Traits

Armor

Minstrel's HelmSuperior Rune of the Water

Minstrel's ShouldersSuperior Rune of the Water

Minstrel's ChestSuperior Rune of the Water

Minstrel's GlovesSuperior Rune of the Water

Minstrel's LegsSuperior Rune of the Water

Minstrel's BootsSuperior Rune of the Water

Weapons & Sigils

Minstrel's MaceSuperior Sigil of Transference

Minstrel's ShieldSuperior Sigil of Concentration

Minstrel's StaffSuperior Sigil of Transference Superior Sigil of Concentration

Trinkets

Minstrel's Backpiece

Minstrel's Accessory

Minstrel's Amulet

Minstrel's Ring

Food

Mint Creme Brulee Bountiful Maintenance Oil

Infusions

18xHealing Infusion

Weapon Skills

Utility Skills

copied

Rotation

If you want to follow a general rotation, you can look at using Empower and Shield of Judgment twice in their respective weaponset.

These skills should be used immediately after swapping to the set and just before swapping out in order to spend the least amount of time in each weaponset.

However, as you are a healer/tank, you should be ready to break this general rotation if it means you will support your allies better or survive easier.

Burst healing

Tome of Resolve
Epilogue: Eternal Oasis first to increase your healing
Chapter 4: Shining River for big aoe heal
Chapter 2: Igniting Burst if affected by conditions
Chapter 1: Desert Bloom is spammable
Additionally:

Using your Dodge heals allies around you as well.

Condition cleansing

Mantra of Lore – swap one of your utility skills to this if there is heavy condition pressure
Holy Strike in the Light field from Line of Warding/Symbol of Faith
Chapter 2: Igniting Burst in Tome of Resolve is strong, party-wide cleanse with additional healing
Epilogue: Eternal Oasis will convert conditions to boons

Tank Firebrand can be seen as a variant of Heal Firebrand which focuses more on self-sustain and tanking capabilities by swapping the Virtues traitline with Valor. Other than tanking the build can provide permanent Quickness, Swiftness, high uptime on Fury, and <25 stacks of Might to the party. It has access to lots of Stability and Aegis.

Note: As this is more of a niche PvE build, it is reusing most of gear of WvW Firebrand build (with only sigil difference).

Build Fundamentals

Aside of tanking bosses or mechanics, your main role will be the same as with Heal Firebrand: healing and providing boons. For detailed description of Heal Firebrand please refer to this guide.

Staying alive

Staying alive and tanking encounters can be achieved through combining Aegis uptime with the self-sustain from the trait Altruistic Healing.

To ensure blocking relevant attacks with Aegis utilize your skills Shield of Judgment and "Advance!" first. Another option is to use Protector's Strike which can block an attack while providing Aegis and Protection to the party. Entering Tome of Courage gives access to Epilogue: Unbroken Lines, a powerful ability that can also provide Aegis and Stability to the party along with 300 Toughness for 5 seconds.

The trait Altruistic Healing will heal the player for a small amount every time a boon is given to an ally. While this may not seem like much, this trait is not subject to an internal cooldown and when the boon output is scaled to 5 players it quickly becomes a powerful way of self-sustaining. Always try to make sure you are in the range of your allies to be able to provide boons to them through symbols, mantras, and other skills such as Shield of Judgment and "Advance!".