Do tanks get kills?

Im starting to play more tanky characters with lots of Armor and wanted to know how do I measure good play with them?

Instead of kills I'm thinking it's something like Assists and damage taken/mitigated.

I feel like it is playing the tank wrong to sacrifice 2-4 armor items for enough damage items to get half power?

Right now I'm playing Ares. But are most warriors and in Ares' case, a guardian, very low damage out put over all?

Quick answer, yes for the most part. If you're playing a Guardian or Warrior, you're there to take damage and set up kills for the rest of your team.

Longer answer, it depends on the god. As far as Guardian, most are low power or low scaling, so they don't go for kills but instead want more assists and damage mitigated. However there are some guardians, Like Cerberus, Jormungandr, and Cthulhu who have high scaling and base damage and definitely want more kills and build more bruiser like with a mix of defense, damage and hybrid items so they can both take damage and dish it out. The only guardian that doesn't want kills is Ganesha cause of his passive.

For the Solo or Support it isn't so much kill that show how well you're doing but just the state of the game, if you're solo and you haven't got many kills and you have more deaths but you've set kills up for your jungle or defended a gold fury or your team is taking towers you are doing fine. With support just try and make sure your mid and ADC aren't dying, and use your kit to protect them or to set kills up for them.

Damage mitigated is a good stat to look at the end of the game, I usually like to compare to the other teams solo or support to see if I mitigated more. This means I've been in the fights and the aggressor more than they were (unless they've built more damage items).

comparing performance for a tank is a lot harder than your normal damage role. You can see some of your damage mitigated but most of it is in-game performance.

Things you should look for are teammate saves (preferably by not dying yourself) or how long did you "prolong" your teammates' life by disrupting and blocking your opponent.

In the end, as a tank you will become more reliant on your teammates to win the game in the end as your damage won't keep up with the opponents' damage dealer.

It will depend on your role and pick. It's possible to play a Warrior in Solo, snowball in your lane, and then carry your team after rotating with your lead.

But yes, it's not always about kills, especially for Support (and especially when it comes to more defensive supports).

If you're playing someone like Khepri or Sylvanas you're not looking for kills really. You're looking to set up kills for your teammates and protect them from getting peeled.

But if you're playing Cerb, Cthulhu or Sobek you're looking to do a bit of both. Personally I feel like when I play Cerb or Cthulhu I end up being a way better tank. Playing as Khepri going full tank mit/aura the enemies tend to ignore me in team fights. Also when I see someone trying to peel my squishy I show up and have CC them a dozen times to get them to safety. Cerb though? I hit them with one ability take half their health and they run for the hills. A hybrid damage/tank build with maybe Sovereignty, Heartward or Shogun for some aura just so my team is happy ends up being my best build.

Enemies have to respect your damage output and avoid diving when you're nearby. Plus if my team almost kills someone who runs behind their team for safety, I can dive in finish the kill and get out alive where a squishy tries that they might die. Damage tanks are great at confirming kills.

As for solo tanks like Chaac, Herc or Mulan they can go bruiser builds where they tank enough to survive while slapping everyone to death so yeah they're also good at confirming kills for teams.