Looking to build a dwarven tank. Suggestions? - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 skarlett_spyder Nov 29, 2008 9:06:47	So, I've finally gotten sick and tired of spellcasters, and have decided that my next character would be a simple (although optimized), non-spellcasting fighter type to soak up and deal out damage the old fashion way. Problem is, I have no idea where to begin: I've become plenty adept at weaving through the intricacies of wizard builds, but I'm clueless in the melee department. I've settled on a dwarf (since I'm trying to shy away from playing humans too), and him being a melee type, and that's about it. Sources are the complete series, PHB2, PGtF, and the Races series (including Races of Faerun). Can anyone help me out, or point me in the direction of some excellent tanking literature?
#2 innabinder Nov 29, 2008 9:25:50	With your available sources, Barbarian 2/Ranger 3/Deepwarden 2/Fighter 1/Frenzied Berzerker 10/X 1 Is a pretty standard, solid build. Poke around the Surrealdex (stickied at the top) for the Deepwarden thread if you're not familiar; there are also a couple good threads in there about how to keep Frenzied Berzerker from TPKing the party. Take the Lion Totem variant Barbarian from Complete Champion.
#3 necroramo Nov 29, 2008 9:46:02	The ultimate objective of a tank is to make people want to attack you, and to survive. Traditionally, the classes of knight and crusader are the classes that are meant to be tanks, because their class features are designed to make the enemy's life miserable if you attack anyone other than them. They also have class features that make them absorb a lot of damage. With that in mind, we can outline the two roles of a successful tank: 1. Give enemies a very good reason to attack you rather than to rush at the squishier members of the party 2. Be able to soak up damage. Unfortunately for you, ToB isn't on the table, so crusader is out. The knight is also considered not that great. However, there are a multitude of ways to be a successful tank. First, we need to look into how to make enemies want to attack you. Obviously, there's the knight/crusader route, which is to spam up the enemy with penalties unless they attack you. Not too many classes have features with that design, so usually we have to resort to a more basic method: Dealing damage, and lots of it. The enemy can't ignore you if you're hacking lots of hit points out of them. Being a tank in this way is a fairly hard task. You have to deal damage that's appreciably close to the glass cannon, and be able to take a lot more damage. Otherwise, they'll still just rush for the glass cannon every time. There's also other ways of making the enemy's life hard. The enemy will really, REALLY want to take out a grappler or a trip-monster, etc. If you're going the route of battlefield control, be careful that you're not too hard to approach (Large and in Charge, Stand Still, tripping from way the heck away) or else the enemy will probably want to somehow evade you rather than attack you into submission. This problem can be offset by dealing lots and lots of damage in process. I suppose that Large and in Charge would be better for this one, because you're doing damage as well. Incarnate Construct Maugs are quite good at beating things into a bloody pulp, so a build focused around that could be golden. Soaking up damage works in two ways, I think. First, make yourself hard to hit. This is generally the best way to go. You could do this either by cranking up your AC or by having some sort of buff that makes you hard to hit - I'm thinking invisibility and the like. The other route is to have really high hit points or otherwise be able to soak up a lot of damage. However, this makes your survivability rate not so great. The two ways to do this are either to be expendable (ie. a summoned creature) or to have a way to get your hit points back. Mid-combat is great, but at least have a way to get yourself to full power between fights lest you really drag on your party resources. Note that the two are not mutually exclusive; even if you're cranking up your AC, you're going to get hit and hit hard, so you're going to want to have high hit points. So, what about builds? I really like the polymorph-esque builds for this. The forms tend to have high AC and damage that goes into the stratosphere, as well as a colossal CON score. Or have other ways to make their lives miserable, like improved grab and the daze attacks coming from the troll family. However, you run into a little bit of a problem when you think, let's just play a wizard, thanks to that stupid d4 hit die. A solution is to play a gish, which tends to give you a higher hit die. Draconic polymorphing into something scary will give you all the hit points you need after all that. You also get greater invisibility etc. An alternative is to simply play another class. Dr00ds immediately come to mind, as do MoMF's for a lower power level. Be sure to wear wild dragonhide mountain plate for a free +11 to AC! The only drawback (yes, I said it) to dr00ds is that in the new errata, wild shape does not use your new constitution to determine the bonus to your hit points. Especially if you put an 18 into wisdom, you're going to have a hard time coming up with a high constitution score. A good handful of DMs will drag you into the street and shoot you for this, but a really really great way to go about this is to Frozen Wild Shape yourself into a hydra, with the wild mountain plate, with Enhanced Wild Shape on. That way you get all the offensive capability of a hydra, an AC that's much higher than the abhorrent AC you'd normally associate with hydras, and a really nice fast healing score (this could even make you viable sans the mountain plate). If you REALLY wanted to make your enemies notice, go Assume Supernatural Ability for a breath weapon that packs an incredible punch. Only in a very high-powered campaign, though. For more straight-forward melee, I really like the Primeval. You get to transform into your Dire Lion of doom, with improved grab and everything. It's a very nice (relatively) low-powered alternative to a dr00d. And oh, if you enter the class through wild shape ranger (like you should) you get to keep your mountain plate. Speaking of dwarves, if you can snag deepwarden somehow, that's even more AC for you. Another option that I'm thinking of is, as I hinted earlier, to get something else to fight for you. The classic route is the malconvoker. Check TreantMonk's guide, the summoned creatures can be very fierce and have plenty of AC and HP to spare. Master of Shrouds looks tempting because of the incorporeality on everything and a type of damage that you simply can't ignore, but if the victim can attack the monsters back, they have a 50/50 chance to squish. And if the victim has no means to attack incorporeal creatures, whatever he ends up doing will not involve the creatures tanking, because he won't even try to attack them. Dread Necromancers are a great option because you can make some truly vicious skeletons with lots of bonus hit points to offset their lack of Constitution score (they'll need all they can get to make up for their lousy AC), especially if you manage to get a dragon skeleton that has bonus HP to begin with. This only works because of your negative energy touch, because after your skeletons take a serious beating you can just poke them back to full health. If it looks like a skeleton's going to drop mid-fight, your negative energy pulse can help. The drawback here is that if a skeleton does drop, getting another one is not as easy as summoning another duo of fiendish colossal centipedes. That's all I could think up right now, and compared to what carnivore or treantmonk would say this is complete garbage, but do what you want with it
#4 skarlett_spyder Nov 29, 2008 14:02:37	Necroramo: While I do appreciate all the suggestions, and have this thread in my favorites to refer back to, the purpose was to get suggestions for a NON-spellcasting tank. I've pretty much done it all as far as druids are concerned - I've pimped out more than my share, and know full well that they make superior tanks. But as I've stated before, I'm going a different route and don't want to cast spells, divine, arcane or otherwise. As I stated in my initial post, I'm looking to play a simple (yet optimized) melee monster using the sources available for said campaign. Innabinder: Thanks for pointing me in the direction of the Deepwarden thread! I've got some cool ideas now that I'll share once I get them organized, however I'm still taking any and all (non spellcasting) suggestions.
#5 necroramo Nov 29, 2008 16:40:40	When I read "spellcasters" I thought you meant as in "I'm going to hang back and cast Evard's black tentacles," because usually one gets tired of the feel of the character and put the gishes up because once you figure out what you look like with your buffs they play like any other melee combatant. and by the time I got to the malconvokers I outright forgot :-[ Silly me... at least the MoMF, primeval, and theory can be dug out of that.
#6 Wyvernhand Nov 29, 2008 17:50:23	Would you consider Paladin spellcasting to be spellcasting? Cause I have a heck of a dwarf build for you, but it has a decent number of Pious Templar levels. http://forums.gleemax.com/showpost.php?p=15422232&postcount=1 Take a looksie. Its dwarfy, its tanky, its beaty... And he uses a freakin Urgosh? MAD STYLE beyond compare. Show So, I was thinking of an idea...who ever uses the Dwarven Urgosh....I do! The trick is, not to use it as a double weapon, but to wield each side individually as if you were wielding 2 twohanded weapons. That way, you get all the benefits of 2handed fighting (1.5x str, 2:1 PA) but you are still using an awesome ass weapon and qualify for Flurry of Strikes and Slashing Fury. Dwarven Urgosh Flurry Fury! Dwarf 28 PB Str 16, Dex 10, Con 17, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 6 Final stats with items Str 26 (30 rage), Dex 10, Con 24, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 6 1 Ranger1 Track, Endurance Favored Enemy: Arcanists (get 4 ranks in prereq skills, 2 ranks Kn:Relig xclass) 2 Fighter1 Power Attack (5th rank in Climb + Jump) 3 Fighter2 Hold the Line, Weapon Focus: Urgosh (5th rank Kn: Dung xclass) 4 Barbarian1 Spirit Lion Totem (5th rank in Survival class + 3 Craft:Weapon) 5 Barbarian2 Uncanny Dodge (3rd + 4th rank Kn:Relig xclass) 6 Deepwarden1 Track again... True Believer (Kn:Arc 3 ranks) 7 Deepwarden2 Stonewarden (Kn:Arc 4th rank xclass Spellcraft 2 ranks xclass) 8 Pious Templar1 Mettle (Spellcraft 3rd rank xclass) 9 Pious Templar2 Improved Init (Spellcraft 4th rank xclass) 10 Pious Templar3 Weapon Spec:Urgosh 11 Exotic Weapon Master1 Flurry of Strikes Trick 12 Pious Templar4 Leap Attack Melee Weapon Mastery: Slashing 13 Occult Slayer1 14 Occult Slayer2 15 Occult Slayer3 Slashing Fury 16 Occult Slayer4 17 Occult Slayer5 18 Pious Templar5 Battle Blessing 19 Pious Templar6 20 Pious Templar7 So, what do you get? Con to AC (AC 37 with +5 mith fullplate and +5 animated shield, 41 vs giants) Mettle 7th level PT casting as swift actions (spells like Righteous Fury and Rhino's Rush) Mind Blank Spell Reflection 2x/day 40 movement in Mith Fullplate while Hasted. Pounce DR 2/- Very strong fort save, decent will save, weakish reflex save (meh) Full 20/20 BAB Smite Attack (good for final iterative) Always set for a charge (Hold the Line) + Double damage from Urgosh spike Best part is: with Haste, feats, str, and +5 weapon, attacks at +30, +30, +30, +30, +25, +20, +15 before misc buffs. A bit of a late bloomer, but all in all, very strong offensively and defensively. Gear at 20 is +6 str and con items, Boots of Speed, +1 Animated Energy Immunity Deathward Mithril Lg Shield(with MV), +1 Energy Immunity Deathward Mithril Fullplate(with MV) probably a +5 Vest of Resistance. Still lots of room for gear. Probably a +1 Wounding Transmuting Valorous//+1 Brilliant Energy Urgosh, made from Adamantine or Star Metal.
#7 tordak Nov 29, 2008 17:52:20	I think nothing says dwarven tank like a dwarven defender. I guess that taken with levels of knight, for the knight challenge, or goad or something, you'll be able to get others to attack you. With the nice damage reduction you don't even have to use your defensive stance all the time. It's in DMG. Just thought this would be something to look at for a start.
#8 emansdrawkcab Nov 29, 2008 18:53:48	What kind of tank are you looking for? Would you consider a Psychic Warrior to be too caster-esque for you? Also, are you opposed to playing a Tome of Battle style melee combatant? The maneuvers are spell-like, is that a problem? What kind of damage do you plan on doing? Power Attacking with a two-handed weapon? Sneak Attacking with more precision? Skirmishing with a pouncing Barbarian? Iaijutsu!?!? Do you plan on using skills in combat? If so, which? ... I could go on, but the gist of what I wanted to know is: Other than a Dwarf, what do you see this guy looking like/ doing?
#9 ninjarabbit Nov 29, 2008 20:29:54	Exotic weapon master might not be a bad idea since dwarves get Dwarven waraxe as a martial weapon rather than as an exotic weapon. The uncanny blow and trip stunts could be worthwhile.
#10 jameswilliamogle Nov 29, 2008 20:55:30	One of the most effective characters at general campaign work that I've seen in a game was a Ranger / Deepwarden / Bloodhound. Those marking abilities are SO effective, and the 5th level Bloodhound ability is awesome, particularly w/ TWF and full BAB. Skill points are awesome too. But that's not a huge change from what people are suggesting... I just really was envious of his abilties in that game.
#11 kaiza Nov 29, 2008 20:57:47	Why not Fighter 2 / Knight 3 / Ranger 2 / Deepwarden 2 / Dwarven Defender 10 / Somethingelse 1, for defending abilities to use with sword&board? k.
#12 innabinder Nov 29, 2008 21:13:17	Why not Fighter 2 / Knight 3 / Ranger 2 / Deepwarden 2 / Dwarven Defender 10 / Somethingelse 1, for defending abilities to use with sword&board? k. Sword & Board is not optimal in 3.X without TWF and Improved Shield Bash plus several other Feats, at which point it's still less optimal in most cases than, for instance, Guisarme + Spiked Armor. My biggest issue with Dwarven Defender is the way you're rooted in place for your best abilities, allowing enemies to either ignore you - probable - or pling away at you with spells and ranged attacks - eventually probable. If, somehow, you're a significant threat to them, the following quote applies: 'Lookout! The Dwarven Defender's after us! Everyone, walk quickly!'

Post/Author/DateTime

Post

skarlett_spyder

Nov 29, 2008 9:06:47

So, I've finally gotten sick and tired of spellcasters, and have decided that my next character would be a simple (although optimized), non-spellcasting fighter type to soak up and deal out damage the old fashion way.

Problem is, I have no idea where to begin: I've become plenty adept at weaving through the intricacies of wizard builds, but I'm clueless in the melee department.

I've settled on a dwarf (since I'm trying to shy away from playing humans too), and him being a melee type, and that's about it.

Sources are the complete series, PHB2, PGtF, and the Races series (including Races of Faerun).

Can anyone help me out, or point me in the direction of some excellent tanking literature?

innabinder

Nov 29, 2008 9:25:50

With your available sources, Barbarian 2/Ranger 3/Deepwarden 2/Fighter 1/Frenzied Berzerker 10/X 1 Is a pretty standard, solid build. Poke around the Surrealdex (stickied at the top) for the Deepwarden thread if you're not familiar; there are also a couple good threads in there about how to keep Frenzied Berzerker from TPKing the party. Take the Lion Totem variant Barbarian from Complete Champion.

necroramo

Nov 29, 2008 9:46:02

The ultimate objective of a tank is to make people want to attack you, and to survive. Traditionally, the classes of knight and crusader are the classes that are meant to be tanks, because their class features are designed to make the enemy's life miserable if you attack anyone other than them. They also have class features that make them absorb a lot of damage.

With that in mind, we can outline the two roles of a successful tank:
1. Give enemies a very good reason to attack you rather than to rush at the squishier members of the party
2. Be able to soak up damage.

Unfortunately for you, ToB isn't on the table, so crusader is out. The knight is also considered not that great. However, there are a multitude of ways to be a successful tank.

First, we need to look into how to make enemies want to attack you. Obviously, there's the knight/crusader route, which is to spam up the enemy with penalties unless they attack you. Not too many classes have features with that design, so usually we have to resort to a more basic method:
Dealing damage, and lots of it.
The enemy can't ignore you if you're hacking lots of hit points out of them. Being a tank in this way is a fairly hard task. You have to deal damage that's appreciably close to the glass cannon, and be able to take a lot more damage. Otherwise, they'll still just rush for the glass cannon every time.

There's also other ways of making the enemy's life hard. The enemy will really, REALLY want to take out a grappler or a trip-monster, etc. If you're going the route of battlefield control, be careful that you're not too hard to approach (Large and in Charge, Stand Still, tripping from way the heck away) or else the enemy will probably want to somehow evade you rather than attack you into submission. This problem can be offset by dealing lots and lots of damage in process. I suppose that Large and in Charge would be better for this one, because you're doing damage as well. Incarnate Construct Maugs are quite good at beating things into a bloody pulp, so a build focused around that could be golden.

Soaking up damage works in two ways, I think. First, make yourself hard to hit. This is generally the best way to go. You could do this either by cranking up your AC or by having some sort of buff that makes you hard to hit - I'm thinking invisibility and the like. The other route is to have really high hit points or otherwise be able to soak up a lot of damage. However, this makes your survivability rate not so great. The two ways to do this are either to be expendable (ie. a summoned creature) or to have a way to get your hit points back. Mid-combat is great, but at least have a way to get yourself to full power between fights lest you really drag on your party resources. Note that the two are not mutually exclusive; even if you're cranking up your AC, you're going to get hit and hit hard, so you're going to want to have high hit points.

So, what about builds?

I really like the polymorph-esque builds for this. The forms tend to have high AC and damage that goes into the stratosphere, as well as a colossal CON score. Or have other ways to make their lives miserable, like improved grab and the daze attacks coming from the troll family. However, you run into a little bit of a problem when you think, let's just play a wizard, thanks to that stupid d4 hit die. A solution is to play a gish, which tends to give you a higher hit die. Draconic polymorphing into something scary will give you all the hit points you need after all that. You also get greater invisibility etc.

An alternative is to simply play another class. Dr00ds immediately come to mind, as do MoMF's for a lower power level. Be sure to wear wild dragonhide mountain plate for a free +11 to AC! The only drawback (yes, I said it) to dr00ds is that in the new errata, wild shape does not use your new constitution to determine the bonus to your hit points. Especially if you put an 18 into wisdom, you're going to have a hard time coming up with a high constitution score. A good handful of DMs will drag you into the street and shoot you for this, but a really really great way to go about this is to Frozen Wild Shape yourself into a hydra, with the wild mountain plate, with Enhanced Wild Shape on. That way you get all the offensive capability of a hydra, an AC that's much higher than the abhorrent AC you'd normally associate with hydras, and a really nice fast healing score (this could even make you viable sans the mountain plate). If you REALLY wanted to make your enemies notice, go Assume Supernatural Ability for a breath weapon that packs an incredible punch. Only in a very high-powered campaign, though.

For more straight-forward melee, I really like the Primeval. You get to transform into your Dire Lion of doom, with improved grab and everything. It's a very nice (relatively) low-powered alternative to a dr00d. And oh, if you enter the class through wild shape ranger (like you should) you get to keep your mountain plate. Speaking of dwarves, if you can snag deepwarden somehow, that's even more AC for you.

Another option that I'm thinking of is, as I hinted earlier, to get something else to fight for you. The classic route is the malconvoker. Check TreantMonk's guide, the summoned creatures can be very fierce and have plenty of AC and HP to spare. Master of Shrouds looks tempting because of the incorporeality on everything and a type of damage that you simply can't ignore, but if the victim can attack the monsters back, they have a 50/50 chance to squish. And if the victim has no means to attack incorporeal creatures, whatever he ends up doing will not involve the creatures tanking, because he won't even try to attack them. Dread Necromancers are a great option because you can make some truly vicious skeletons with lots of bonus hit points to offset their lack of Constitution score (they'll need all they can get to make up for their lousy AC), especially if you manage to get a dragon skeleton that has bonus HP to begin with. This only works because of your negative energy touch, because after your skeletons take a serious beating you can just poke them back to full health. If it looks like a skeleton's going to drop mid-fight, your negative energy pulse can help. The drawback here is that if a skeleton does drop, getting another one is not as easy as summoning another duo of fiendish colossal centipedes.

That's all I could think up right now, and compared to what carnivore or treantmonk would say this is complete garbage, but do what you want with it

skarlett_spyder

Nov 29, 2008 14:02:37

Necroramo: While I do appreciate all the suggestions, and have this thread in my favorites to refer back to, the purpose was to get suggestions for a NON-spellcasting tank.

I've pretty much done it all as far as druids are concerned - I've pimped out more than my share, and know full well that they make superior tanks. But as I've stated before, I'm going a different route and don't want to cast spells, divine, arcane or otherwise.

As I stated in my initial post, I'm looking to play a simple (yet optimized) melee monster using the sources available for said campaign.

Innabinder: Thanks for pointing me in the direction of the Deepwarden thread! I've got some cool ideas now that I'll share once I get them organized, however I'm still taking any and all (non spellcasting) suggestions.

necroramo

Nov 29, 2008 16:40:40

When I read "spellcasters" I thought you meant as in "I'm going to hang back and cast Evard's black tentacles," because usually one gets tired of the feel of the character
and put the gishes up because once you figure out what you look like with your buffs they play like any other melee combatant.

and by the time I got to the malconvokers I outright forgot :-[

Silly me... at least the MoMF, primeval, and theory can be dug out of that.

Wyvernhand

Nov 29, 2008 17:50:23

Would you consider Paladin spellcasting to be spellcasting? Cause I have a heck of a dwarf build for you, but it has a decent number of Pious Templar levels.

http://forums.gleemax.com/showpost.php?p=15422232&postcount=1

Take a looksie.

Its dwarfy, its tanky, its beaty...

And he uses a freakin Urgosh?

MAD STYLE beyond compare.

Show

So, I was thinking of an idea...who ever uses the Dwarven Urgosh....I do! The trick is, not to use it as a double weapon, but to wield each side individually as if you were wielding 2 twohanded weapons. That way, you get all the benefits of 2handed fighting (1.5x str, 2:1 PA) but you are still using an awesome ass weapon and qualify for Flurry of Strikes and Slashing Fury.

Dwarven Urgosh Flurry Fury!
Dwarf 28 PB Str 16, Dex 10, Con 17, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 6
Final stats with items Str 26 (30 rage), Dex 10, Con 24, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 6
1 Ranger1 Track, Endurance Favored Enemy: Arcanists (get 4 ranks in prereq skills, 2 ranks Kn:Relig xclass)
2 Fighter1 Power Attack (5th rank in Climb + Jump)
3 Fighter2 Hold the Line, Weapon Focus: Urgosh (5th rank Kn: Dung xclass)
4 Barbarian1 Spirit Lion Totem (5th rank in Survival class + 3 Craft:Weapon)
5 Barbarian2 Uncanny Dodge (3rd + 4th rank Kn:Relig xclass)
6 Deepwarden1 Track again... True Believer (Kn:Arc 3 ranks)
7 Deepwarden2 Stonewarden (Kn:Arc 4th rank xclass Spellcraft 2 ranks xclass)
8 Pious Templar1 Mettle (Spellcraft 3rd rank xclass)
9 Pious Templar2 Improved Init (Spellcraft 4th rank xclass)
10 Pious Templar3 Weapon Spec:Urgosh
11 Exotic Weapon Master1 Flurry of Strikes Trick
12 Pious Templar4 Leap Attack Melee Weapon Mastery: Slashing
13 Occult Slayer1
14 Occult Slayer2
15 Occult Slayer3 Slashing Fury
16 Occult Slayer4
17 Occult Slayer5
18 Pious Templar5 Battle Blessing
19 Pious Templar6
20 Pious Templar7

So, what do you get?

Con to AC (AC 37 with +5 mith fullplate and +5 animated shield, 41 vs giants)
Mettle
7th level PT casting as swift actions (spells like Righteous Fury and Rhino's Rush)
Mind Blank
Spell Reflection 2x/day
40 movement in Mith Fullplate while Hasted.
Pounce
DR 2/-
Very strong fort save, decent will save, weakish reflex save (meh)
Full 20/20 BAB
Smite Attack (good for final iterative)
Always set for a charge (Hold the Line) + Double damage from Urgosh spike
Best part is: with Haste, feats, str, and +5 weapon, attacks at +30, +30, +30, +30, +25, +20, +15 before misc buffs.

A bit of a late bloomer, but all in all, very strong offensively and defensively.

Gear at 20 is +6 str and con items, Boots of Speed, +1 Animated Energy Immunity Deathward Mithril Lg Shield(with MV), +1 Energy Immunity Deathward Mithril Fullplate(with MV) probably a +5 Vest of Resistance. Still lots of room for gear. Probably a +1 Wounding Transmuting Valorous//+1 Brilliant Energy Urgosh, made from Adamantine or Star Metal.

tordak

Nov 29, 2008 17:52:20

I think nothing says dwarven tank like a dwarven defender. I guess that taken with levels of knight, for the knight challenge, or goad or something, you'll be able to get others to attack you. With the nice damage reduction you don't even have to use your defensive stance all the time. It's in DMG. Just thought this would be something to look at for a start.

emansdrawkcab

Nov 29, 2008 18:53:48

What kind of tank are you looking for? Would you consider a Psychic Warrior to be too caster-esque for you? Also, are you opposed to playing a Tome of Battle style melee combatant? The maneuvers are spell-like, is that a problem?

What kind of damage do you plan on doing? Power Attacking with a two-handed weapon? Sneak Attacking with more precision? Skirmishing with a pouncing Barbarian? Iaijutsu!?!?

Do you plan on using skills in combat? If so, which?

...

I could go on, but the gist of what I wanted to know is: Other than a Dwarf, what do you see this guy looking like/ doing?

ninjarabbit

Nov 29, 2008 20:29:54

Exotic weapon master might not be a bad idea since dwarves get Dwarven waraxe as a martial weapon rather than as an exotic weapon. The uncanny blow and trip stunts could be worthwhile.

#10

jameswilliamogle

Nov 29, 2008 20:55:30

One of the most effective characters at general campaign work that I've seen in a game was a Ranger / Deepwarden / Bloodhound. Those marking abilities are SO effective, and the 5th level Bloodhound ability is awesome, particularly w/ TWF and full BAB. Skill points are awesome too.

But that's not a huge change from what people are suggesting... I just really was envious of his abilties in that game.

#11

kaiza

Nov 29, 2008 20:57:47

Why not Fighter 2 / Knight 3 / Ranger 2 / Deepwarden 2 / Dwarven Defender 10 / Somethingelse 1, for defending abilities to use with sword&board?

k.

#12

innabinder

Nov 29, 2008 21:13:17

Why not Fighter 2 / Knight 3 / Ranger 2 / Deepwarden 2 / Dwarven Defender 10 / Somethingelse 1, for defending abilities to use with sword&board?

k.

Sword & Board is not optimal in 3.X without TWF and Improved Shield Bash plus several other Feats, at which point it's still less optimal in most cases than, for instance, Guisarme + Spiked Armor. My biggest issue with Dwarven Defender is the way you're rooted in place for your best abilities, allowing enemies to either ignore you - probable - or pling away at you with spells and ranged attacks - eventually probable. If, somehow, you're a significant threat to them, the following quote applies:

'Lookout! The Dwarven Defender's after us! Everyone, walk quickly!'