Dragonknight

Spiked Armor
(Optional)
This is your main source of Major Resolve to increase your resistances until you are able to get the Mages Guild ability Balance. Balance would be a better option but does require Mages Guild 9 to unlock, this will be fine as a placeholder until then. Hardened Armor is the better Tank morph as it provides a damage shield, and Volatile Armor offers a little damage. When using Harmony Jewellery and if you don’t need the extra sustain from Balance then Hardened Armor is really useful.

Choking Talons → Morph of Dark Talons
(Vital)
When using this crowd control ability, you hold up to 6 enemies near you rooted to the ground. It works well in combination with Unrelenting Grip where you pull enemies to you then root with Talons making it easier for your allies to use area damage to kill grouped up enemies. This does not root elite or boss targets, but it will still cause the Minor Maim even if it doesn’t root which means this is a good ability to do area of effect Minor Maim if it is needed.

Coagulating Blood → Morph of Dragon Blood
(Vital)
This is the main burst heal for a Dragonknight Tank. This morph is better for people with higher stats and anyone who heals themselves often when above 30% remaining Health. It gives a base heal plus additional healing based on how much health you have missing. If you setup with high health and low max stats then Green Dragon Blood will heal for more from around 50% and under Max Health. But this morph outperforms the other morph quite considerably for beginner Tanks who use this often and anyone who has 25k+ Stamina. The fact you get a base heal regardless of your current Health makes this a strong option.

Green Dragon Blood → Morph of Dragon Blood
(Situational)
This is another burst heal that can be used by a Dragonknight Tank. It’s an emergency heal and not intended to be spammed or used at high health, and it scales based on the amount of Health you have missing. To get the most benefit from this you want to have as much Max Health as possible, generally you should have over 40k and then you need to use this skill when you are as low health as possible, ideally at 30% and lower. When you use it when you are higher health it will heal very little, so it performs most effectively at lower Health, try to always use it when under 30% Max Health or less. The additional Minor Vitality can be the reason why you might use this instead of the other morph but ideally you should have both morphs levelled then switch according to the content you’re doing.

Protective Plate → Morph of Protective Scale
(Situational)
A very important skill for very certain situations. When you are taking heavy projectile damage you can cast this to reduce the incoming damage by 50%. It also removes and makes you immune to snares and immobilisation which again is useful for certain situations. A few good places to use this include Blackrose Prison, vHoF after Spider Boss to get through the beams, vCR when Tanking Z’Maja heavy attack and vMoL when dealing with Dark Barrage from Rakkhat.

Deep Breath → Morph of Inhale
(Situational)
Not a commonly used ability as there are not many situations where it is necessary, but when you have multiple targets that channel an ability that needs to be interrupted then this is a great skill as you can use this to cause an area of effect interrupt. A few places where this is useful include vKA adds after the 2nd Boss, vHoF adds, vSS Hardmode Last Boss Off Tank and Blackrose Prison.

Draw Essence → Morph of Inhale
(Unnecessary)
This is an AoE damage, heal and Magicka return skill which is not essential but if can be really nice for healing in add pulls or for a Hybrid build.