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Shades TWF Tank
Topic Started: Jan 20 2012, 03:48 PM (391 Views)
Bowana
The Grandmaster

Ok, looking for a two weapon fighting tank, here you go

Bow

Quote:
 


THF Variant here (Good choice as well: Slightly more hitpoints, slightly less dex, better S&B DPS.)

Intro:
Been getting a lot of requests for a Fighter build, and I'm starting one soon, this is my plan. Also setting this up as a recommended guide for other players wanting to make pretty much the ultimate endgame tank for the hardest content in the game - especially designed with Lord of Blades/Master Artificer Epic in mind.

Build goals - what this build is NOT:

Absolutely not a focus on being a "AC Tank". AC is utterly ineffective in the hardest endgame content, so building for it simply does not make sense on a character with these goals, even if the PrE selected does offer some bonuses. There are a ton of other considerations for a tank so this is one that will be skipped.
Not recommended for casual players. Arrmor class is useful in casual/normal dungeons, and by players who don't have the skill or time to learn other forms of damage mitigation, and as such this build is not recommended to those players. That said, the build will have be able to have a reasonable AC regardless for the lower lvls while your still learning.
Top DPS. While there will be as little as possible sacrifices to DPS, obviously a half orc kensai/berserker will do much better.
An easy to play build - playing a tank well is very difficult and require a ton of gear. This guide is aimed more at veterans or new players looking to put a lot of time and effort into there character.

Build goals - what this build is aiming for:

Ultimate hitpoints - 1200+ expected
Massive threat generation
Great Saves
Great DR
Functional, if not maxxed intimidate
Good TWF DPS with either dwarven axes or khopesh, and Very solid S&B DPS


So yea, if you want a build that makes the easy content a joke cuz your AC is high enough to make things whiff - build is not for you. If you want to start building the ultimate tank for epic raids - make this character.

Race:
Dwarf:

+2 con, full racial toughness, dwarven spell resistance for up to +5 saves, higher balance skill (great for MA)
Top hitpoints, Top healing amp, exactly what a epic tank needs.

Ideal race for this.
Alternatives here are Human (Better healing amp, decent hp), Half-Orc (ultimate DPS with some defensive sacrifices). Guides gona cover dwarf, but you can adapt it to these races and they can certainly work. Halforc needs more gear to make up for the lower hp tho.

Alignment:
True Neutral. It's the only correct choice for a tank. You want to reduce your incoming damage as much as possible, and this is the only race with advantages in that - eg: Immune to anarchic, axiomatic, and can use superior stability items.

Stats
(36 point build - As thats what im planning for this, but 34/32 can work, see below for those)
(Stat - Amount - Build Point Cost during creation)
Str 17 - Cost: 13 points (All Level up points go here)
Dex 14 - Cost: 6 points
Con 19 - Cost: 13 points
Int 11 - Cost: 3 points
Wis 8 - None
Cha 7 - Cost: 1 point

TWF requires a +3 dex tome, so this is a very advanced build.
Only got +2 dex tome?: Con 18, Dex 15, Cha 8

34 point version (Has some sacrifices, but still works)
Str 17 - Cost: 13 points (All Level up points go here)
Dex 15 - Cost: 8 points
Con 18 - Cost: 10 points
Int 11 - Cost: 3 points
Wis 8 - None
Cha 6 - None

32 point version (Not really recommended, but I want this guide to be useful to as many as possible, so here for completeness.. I recommend you start off with one of my barbarian builds for first life, as the bbn PL is ultra useful to this build)
Str 17 - Cost: 13 points (All Level up points go here)
Dex 15 - Cost: 8 points
Con 16 - Cost: 6 points
Int 11 - Cost: 3 points
Wis 8 - None
Cha 8 - Cost: 2 points

Stat Analysis:
Str 17 = +5 level ups.. While I hate sacrifcing even a single point of strenght on a melee build, it's really neccesary here, as you otherwise have to lose too much hitpoints or skill points to max it.
lvl points: No brainer on all melee builds. If you want to tank, you need to build up threat and dps, you can't do that without great strength. Especially considering TWF penalties and -2 tower shield penalties for when you go sword and board.

Dex - TWF Build so really just set to the bare minimum as every point just holds you further back on hitpoints. For max hitpoints and tanking ability, make the THF variant.
Con - Very important, fit everything we can in here. As every 2 con on a Defender is no longer just +20 hp, but now +24 hp with the +20% stance.
Int 11 - Skillpoints will be tight, but doable. Get that +2 int tome in at 7 to qualify for Improved trip (and combat expertise, but i dont recommend using that much)
Wis 8 - Will save can be important in a couple places, but unfortunately there's not many points to spread around.. And you can still attain a decent will save with good gear on a dwarf thanks to dwarven resistance.
Cha - 1-2 points here because ultimately a dead tank is not a good tank.. So getting silver flame potions and being able to help keep yourself alive is a huge asset.. This also helps with intimidate.

Ultimate Lvl20 Hit points (Includes crazy hard to get items as this is a TR build):
End Game Hit points since this is important:
200 - Pure Ftr lvl20
20 - Heroic Durability
10 - Draconic Vitality (Gianthold Favor)
10 - 1x Bbn PL free
20 - Toughness enchantment from epic/minos
40 - Superior False Life (Epic Deneith Chain likely)
45 - Greensteel Item
240 - ~34 Con (Max geared, +3 tome, see post 2)
= 585 Pre Feats
----- (Toughness Feats Selected 3x, bersker pl 1x)
86 - Toughness/PL Feats
80 - 8 Toughness Enhancements
= 751 Feated/Enhanced
----- (Maintainable situational Buffs)
40 - Yugoloth Potions* (20 from con and 20 from secret effect)
= 791 Over 800 Fairly easy to maintain HP.
Enter stance: +6 con +20% = 1022 HP unbuffed.
----- (Unmaintainable situational Buffs)
40 - Madstone Single Con +4 (46) (Madstones here because it won't proc in stance)
40 - Madstone Double Con +4 (50)
40 - Hezrou Cookie
= 911 Situational
---- (Now lets enter our stance with the unmaintable buffs) ---
60 - +6 con from stance = 971
+20% from Superior stance
1166 Hitpoints
---- (Artificer in the raid party!) ---
+10% from positive energy infusion
Grand total ultimate HP:
1282 Hitpoints

(1400+ is possible from silly items like scourge choker, house d pots)

* Yugoloth +HP potions should not be used in general questing as it lowers your DPS by 5%. However for end game tanking I still recommend you drink them anytime your tanking, as you will not have trouble holding agro with the defender stances active.

Optimal Healing Amplification - Aside from hit points and saves, this is your foremost defense:
Finger Necklace - This is a hard to acquire high level item.. But a very good one, it provides another 10-12% healing, as it works in a strange way.
Actual "Healing Amp" There are 3 ranks, 10%, 20% and 30%. All 3 stack with each other, but 2 of the same will not stack (example leviks bracers + DT Tempest rune will not stack)
Ideal endgame gear to boost this:
DT Armor - source of 10% (wear this in the most critical deadly scenarios, otherwise wear epic deneith chain)
ToD Ring - source of 20%
Epic Gloes of the Claw - Source of 30%
Finger neck - equip this before the other 3 items.

Recommended past lives to have:
Barbarian - +20 hp, +2 intimi, and the +10 free hp PL bonus are awesome things for a tank, Personally im going to have 2 PL bbn. But others work:
Ftr - +1 to hit and combat DCs are awesome
Pal - Extra healing amp makes you a better tank, plain and simple. Plus the active part is quite awesome: +3 hit/dmg for 6+ minutes

Feats (work in progress atm, some optimizations may happen):
1 - Stunning Blow
1 (Ftr) - Weapon Focus: Slashing
2 (Ftr) - Power attack
3 - Improved Sunder or Exotic: Khopesh
4 (Ftr) - Shield Mastery
6 - Past Life: Berserkers Fury (Else: Pal PL, Else: Toughness)
6 (Ftr) - Two Weapon Fighting
7 - +2 Int tome
8 (Ftr) - Combat Expertise (prereq for Improved Trip)
9 - Improved Trip
10 (Ftr) - Improved Shield Mastery
11 - +3 dex tome if you only started 14 dex
12 - Toughness (1)
12 (Ftr) - Improved Two Weapon
14 - IC: Slashing
15 - Toughness (2)
16 (Ftr) - Greater Two weapon
18 - Toughness (3)
18 (Ftr) - Weapon Specialization: Slashing
20 (Ftr) - Oversized Two Weapon Fighting

Alternate spec if your intimidate ends up just a few short of a threshold: Replace weapon spec with SF: Intimidate. Replace related enhancement with more +intimdate enhancements.

Also if at 20 you end up purely raiding on this build and not questing at all: Respec stunning blow with another toughness.. Can't stun bosses and it rarely comes into play in raid tanking I find.. Maybe stun the odd orthon that pops on you while tanking horoth, but thats it.

Feat Analysis:
Overall:
Solid TWF DPS for when a shields not appropriate.
Top hitpoints (+86 hp from feats)
Top dmg mitigation (Improved Shield Mastery = 25% reduction to all incoming physical damage, even when not blocking. Huge blocking DR as well. And great saves from dwarven spell resistance.)

lvl notes:
1 - Stun - Start with something useful
3 - Personally I have a lot of nice dwarven axes and im kinda stubborn so id prolly get sunder.. But yea Khopesh are better, so get that feat and use em if you got some. Why sunder: Crit skeletons in Deleras! I do a lot of undead content lvling, so yea that would be nice.
4 - Shield Mastery: pre req.. and useful too.
8 - Improved trip is far too useful to pass up and imo a big draw of the fighter class as none other can really fit it. Combat exp is a prereq. AC is not a focus of the build, so I'd say stay in power attack mode, but hey it couldnt hurt in certain scenarios.
12 + the main utility is done now, so rest is mostly hitpoints and dps
20 - Could go greater weapon focus instead if your mostly using a shield at endgame. +1 to shield mode, -1 to twf mode.

Enhancement Order note: This is an endgame setup. It would be more ideal to spec less into hitpoints and more into tactics at lower levels.
Did it the lazy way for now - picture of planner:


Posted Image
BTW Recommend this enhancement planner:
http://ddo.motd.ru/planner


Skills:

On character creation:
Max Balance
1 Rank of Tumble (cross class it costs 2 points, but 1 rank is all you need forever)
Leftovers in Intimidate, Spot and Jump
On level ups:
Intimidate (Max this always, tho its less important at the lower lvls, long as it's maxxed at 20 your good)
Balance (Max this always, if you can)
Jump (Get this to about ~10 ranks and stop. Basically your aiming for 40+ with a jump item on whilebuffed - without a jump buff as you can't always rely on buffs, as any more doesn't improve your jump height)
Spot (Cross class, but worth it - fit as many points as you can in here)

If you have more left, pop em in haggle to make some extra coin. (You likely wont unless you snaged a +3 int tome or something)

Skill overview: (Stolen from my bbn guide)

Balance: It's a very important skill, if situation skill, you generally want to aim for a score around 20, you can do this easily with an item but ideally you get it to near this without wasting a slot on an item. You may wish to still carry a good set of balance boots however.
U11 Notes: Balance is critical in master artificer. Recommend the Fabricators bracers as your balance item (effectively +15)

Intimidate? :
In the early game: Your a fast highly tactic spec dwarf killer, it won't be that neccesary.
In the late game:
Your the ultimate tank, you want to invest everything you can in here.. Epic raids need scores of 70ish.. Achievable even on this builds crappy charisma, but not easily. Either way tho, ultimately you should be holding agro via your +threat gear/stances, and only using intimdate for when you die/get incapped.. So if it takes a few rolls to get it to land, its not a big deal.. This is no longer a skill that needs to be "no fail".

Some notes on current issues:
Stalwart Defender stances prevent rage,, lowers hp a few unforunately. Madstone is semi prevented: It wont proc while in stance, but you can exit stance, use the clicky or get a proc, then re-enter stance and not lose it. Recommended for the hardest encounters.

Gear:
Will fill in some ideal gear loadouts here eventually.

Ultimate HP Disclaimer:
Obviously you can gimp your character a bit more and fit even more toughness feats, but this is the maximum I think you can fit without really making your character otherwise gimped.
Attached to this post:
Attachments: defenderenhancements.gif (148.11 KB)
Edited by Bowana, Jan 20 2012, 03:51 PM.
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