Becoming A Tank

Just before we head into the dungeon, Emma pulls me aside to talk to me. “I know what I wanna do.” She says. “I want to protect the others. I know I’m not very powerful or anything, but I want to try. What magic do I need to learn to protect our girls?” Emma asks.

“Our girls?” I repeat, with a smile on my face.

“Shut your face, I care about them.” She replies, a smile forming on her lips.

“There are a few different roles you could play to protect the others. Ivy does that as a healer, but I get the feeling that’s not what you mean.” I start.

Emma shakes her head. “I want people to attack me, not Paige.” She says.

“Ahh so a tank.” I nod in understanding.

“Is that what you call it?” She asks.

“Yep. Tanks draw enemy aggression and attention. Their role is usually to distract enemies and ‘tank’ damage. Tanks stop enemies from attacking people who can’t take as much damage.”

“Tanks also need to be able to deal enough damage to enemies to be immediately threatening. The basic idea is to be able to take lots of hits, focus enemy aggression on you, and be enough of a threat that enemies can’t just ignore you.” I explain.

“I like it. Teach me.” Emma demands, and I laugh.

“I’m not the best one for that. Let’s go talk to Olivia. She’ll know what kind of magic you need to learn.” I tell her. Once we find her (pointedly avoiding Belle for some reason), and explain what Emma wants to learn and her thought process behind it, Olivia nods thoughtfully.

“That role would suit you dear.” The lady of monsters says.

“Why? I mean, I know it would, but I want to know why you think so.” Emma asks, a smile on her face.

“You have made a career out of helping and protecting those who cannot help and protect themselves. That is a very accurate description of what pursuing this would be like.” Olivia sums up.

“How do I learn?” She asks.

“I can teach you. I know the magic you’ll need to learn. We’ll have Gemma buy some books on the abyss auction that I can help you study.” Olivia says.

“What am I, just your cash cow or something?” I joke.

Our mentor grins at me. “Yes.” She jokes, and I giggle. She turns back to Emma.

“Before we go down this path, I need to ask you: are you absolutely sure? Your magic might not be flashy or very cool. You probably will not be throwing around water or lightning, or anything else like that. You will be wearing armour and mostly casting spells to empower yourself and make yourself a threat. Your main goal will be to make yourself the most obvious and necessary threat to target first, to give space for the others.” Olivia explains.

Emma nods. “I’m sure. I don’t need cool magic, as long as I look slay as heck in my armour, I’m happy.” She says, and I laugh.

“We can definitely find you some cute armour.” I tell her.

“Gemma, I need you to buy some books. One on basic magical impairment, one on self empowerment magic, and one on magically influencing emotions.” Olivia lists off.

“You mean debuff magic?” I ask. Olivia nods and I pull out my phone, searching for the items she asked for.

“Magically influencing emotions? Why?” Emma asks.

Olivia smiles at her. “One of the best ways to get enemies to attack you is to induce anger in them.” She says.

“Wait, you mean I get to make people angry and talk shit to them, and it’s a good strategy? Werk, Lena’s gonna be gagged.” Emma cackles.

It doesn’t take too long thankfully for all the books to arrive. Out of interest, I pick them up and observe them to see if I could get any skills from them. Might be worth buying more copies if I could, but no popups come up from any of them. Maybe it’s all magic outside my skillset at this point, so I can’t get skills from them?

Olivia gives Lena the time off from sparring today, telling her to relax instead for a bit. Together, Olivia and Emma read through the books, taking things at Emma’s pace.

Olivia takes the time to explain everything Emma asks about, which is a lot. There are a lot of basic principles of magic that Emma still doesn’t really understand.

Once Emma has a solid enough grasp of the theory of the book they started on, which is about how magic can affect emotions, they start practicing.

Magically making something or someone experience anger and the want to attack isn’t an easy spell, and it’s a lot more difficult to do on sentient beings than it is on animals or dungeon enemies.

They start by practicing on the bunnies that spawn around the castle, from the almost forgotten Queen class perk. They fact that they can’t actually attack is helpful for the exercise, though it does make it a bit hard to tell if Emma’s spell is actually working.

The process of watching somebody learn magic is quite interesting, because it’s not something we’ve done much of before. The way my magic works, I press a button and magically can do something new.

Most of the focus of learning for both me and my guild, has been about application of magic, not learning the magic itself.

Watching Emma practice, try, fail, and get better at holding the spell, using it more powerfully, and repeating is very interesting. The spell itself isn’t just about making something or someone angry, it’s about making them want to attack her.

It’s a real life version of a taunt skill, and it’s very strange watching a magical bunny be angry and want to attack Emma, but not be able to.

By the time I’ve gone through two dungeons, Emma feels like she’s practiced the spell enough to be able to use it in a combat scenario. I decide to take her into one of my low level dungeons to test the spell. And surprisingly to me, it actually works pretty well.

Emma casts her magic, and the dungeon enemies instantly switch their focus to her, which allows Olivia and I to stand back and blast them with our magic, no problem. Emma whoops with joy at being able to cast a proper spell, and her happiness is pretty contagious. We’re all in a good mood.

After the dungeon, Olivia explains how her spell’s effect will be directly proportional to the power and will of the target she’s using it on. She won’t be able to redirect the attacks of an opponent exponentially more powerful opponent than herself, but it’s still a useful spell to know.

The next thing they work on, as I head into another dungeon to grind a level out, is the basics of debuff magic. Part of being a tank is to make yourself enough of a threat that enemies can’t just ignore you.

The wet dream for that kind of strategy is a ramping type of magic, like debuffs, that get stronger the longer they’re ignored.

For now, Olivia focuses entirely on the debuff part of that idea, since Emma won’t be able to learn how to channel her magic into it and make it stronger over time unless she has a lot more mana to draw on, and more experience with magic.

Instead, Olivia teaches her about the principle of magically drawing strength and speed out of an opponent, making them weaker and slower.

Olivia even hints towards the idea that masters of this area of magic, who know how to both boost themselves and inhibit their opponents, can even steal strength and speed temporarily to boost themselves, which would be an incredible asset if Emma could learn how to do something like that, and would make her an amazing tank as well.

For now, they just focus on the basics. Through the rest of the afternoon, Emma practices the magic, and eventually, when she feels she knows the principle well enough, they bring in Lena to help her girlfriend practice.

After around half an hour of practicing on another human, Lena reports that when Emma is casting her magic, she feels a little weaker and slower.

A check to her observe sheet reveals that she has a 5% debuff for strength and agility, confirming that Emma’s spell is working.

The spell has a pretty noticeable marker as well: when Emma uses it, there’s a white glow around her hands, and a white glow around whatever she’s targeting. It works in Emma’s favour, since part of the point is to incentivise enemies to attack her.

Emma’s use of debuff magic reminds me that it might be a good idea to look into getting Ivy some kind of buff skill, as something else she can do to play her role as a support mage.

Luckily, in the afternoon, after we’ve finished our three dungeon runs for the day, the artificial spirit skill hits level 50, and I get to talk to Ivy about her power development.