Flesh Mountain, an alternative?

[RoelHeeswijk]

High saves, 198% healing, 2WF 90AC Tank

one year later... an intimidate change has happenend, new gear options have been released, i'm bored with my WF so i thought i'd google my

old post again.

18 Fighter / 2 Monk
Lawful Neutral Half Elf (Paladin Dilettante)

STR: 16 +1
DEX: 16 +4
CON: 14
INT: 10
WIS: 14
CHA: 10

Normal: Combat Expertise
Normal: Dodge
Normal: Two-Weapon Defense
Normal: Past Life Barbarian
Normal: Toughness
Normal: Toughness
Normal: Toughness

Monk: Toughness
Monk: Toughness

Fighter: Focus Slashing
Fighter: Greater Focus: Slashing
Fighter: Specialization Slashing
Fighter: Greater Spec. Slashing
Fighter: 2WF
Fighter: I2WF
Fighter: G2WF
Fighter: Improved Crit
Fighter: Khopesh
Fighter: Oversized

Fighter AC Boost III - 6 AP
Elven Dexterity II - 6 AP
Fighter Khopesh Specialization II - 3 AP
Human Improved Recovery II - 6 AP
Fighter Item Defense II - 3 AP
Stalwart Defender III  - 8 AP
Racial Toughness II - 3 AP
Improved Intimidate II - 2 AP
Fighter Strength III - 10 AP
Fighter Toughness IV - 10 AP
Monk Way of the Badger I - 1 AP
Monk Wisdom I - 2 AP
Paladin Dilettante Charisma - 2 AP
Paladin Improved Dilettante III - 6 AP
Fighter Haste Boost IV - 10 AP
Fighter Extra Action Boost I - 2 AP

38 STR: 16, +3 tome, + 3 enhancements, +3 abishai, +1 racial str, +6 item, 6 stance
+19 damage (+9 STR, +4 claw, +2 weapon spec, +2 greater weapon spec, +2 khopesh)
+11 to-hit (+9 STR, +1 focus, +1 greater focus, +4 raven's sight, +2 oversized, -5 combat expertise, -1 BAB)

210% threat (100% base + 15% stalwart set + 20% claw + 75% stance)

AC Breakdown:
10 base
8 epic Abishai Bracers
11 dex (32 DEX: 16, +5 level, +3 tome, +2 racial dex, +6 item)
8 wis (26 WIS: 14 + 3 tome, +1 monk wisdom, +6 item, +2 exceptional (raven's sight))
1 dodge alchemical ritual on Icy Raiment
2 dodge on cloak of night
3 dodge chattering ring
4 dodge Icy Raiment
4 insight shroud khopesh
5 protection (Greensteel)
1 feat called "dodge"
1 Two-Weapon Defense
3 Stalwart defender III
5 Combat expertise
4 Stalwart defender III stance
2 Stalwart defender set bonus
3 Abishai
1 haste
4 shield wand
1 dex +2 yugo
1 wis +2 yugo
4 barkskin from wisdom yugo pot
1 dex +2 airship
1 wis +2 airship
1 Airship - Sentinels Bulwark
1 Airship - Dwarven Stoutness
1 Airship - Blessing of the Three Dragons
*party: 1 ranger barkskin
*party: 2 recitation
*party: 4 Bard AC Song
*party: 6 paladin aura
TWF: 92 AC without party buffs

HP Breakdown
180 fighter
12 monk
140 from (24 con: 14 base +3 tome +6 item +1 exc (stalwart ring))
45 shroud
30 GFL
20 toughness item
115 toughness feat x5
60 toughness enhancements
20 barb past life chosen feat
10 barb past life passive
10 draconic vitality
20 heroic durability
60 Stalwart Stance
20 +2 CON airship 
+20% from stalwart
==== 914 without weird madstone tricks (madstone only works if you activate and trigger them before going into stance and combat 

expertise)

Reflex Save Breakdown
6 fighter
3 monk
11 dex
5 resistance
4 GH
1 Haste
2 luck bonus
3 Stalwart stance
5 Paladin Dilettante (20 CHA, 10 base + 3 tome + 7 item (abishai helmet))
1 Airship - Blessing of the Three Dragons
1 Airship - 2DEX
==== 42 Reflex

Example Gear (not included: resistance>3 (abishai cloak?), protection6, CON7, DEx7, ST7, DEX1, DEX2, STR1, STR2, WIS1, CON2, SFL, 10%amp,

incity10%, Seeker>0, Sneak>0, intim15, incite25%, Destruction, 20D6 lightning damage, Litany)

Abishai Helmet + WIS6
Raven's Sight
Gem of Many Facets + GFL
Stalwart Necklace
Cloak of Night
Abishai Bracers + Good Luck
Abishai Boots + Toughness, DEX6
Claw Gloves
GS HP Belt + Heavy Fort / Protection +5
Icy Raiment
Stalwart Ring +20% healing amp
Chattering Ring

[Battlehawke]

Wow,

I didn't really break it down, but looks pretty good. Let me know how it works out.

Battlehawke

[Merlocke]

Since you're not even wearing light armor, you can take monk instead of rogue for evasion so you get a wisdom bonus to AC when two weapon fighting

so... what do you think?

I was playing around witht he idea of TRing a toon into a 18f/2mnk Half-Orc Icy Rainment wearer type.

Some similarities here, but I gave mine more WIS to take advantage of the Raniment+monk splash.

[RoelHeeswijk]

Yeah, another option I considered was going 13 wis 8 cha and take dilettante cleric for the ability to self-heal.
If you solo/shortman more than tank, this is certainly a nice way to go, as it increases your TWF AC at the same time.
And for this purpose, Half-Orc wouldn't be bad at all, it's just where you want to focus to be.

[RoelHeeswijk]

And a nonepic gear turtle version:

GS HP goggles w/ heavy fort
+15 intimidate helmet
Stalwart Defender necklace 6CON
Litany
Poison Immunity belt of greater false life
Stalwart Defender Ring (6STR) +1CON, +2DEX
+6 DEX Gloves
+6 CHA cloak
GS CHA-Skills Boots
Some AC8 Bracers
Icy Raiment
Chattering Ring
Shield of Light and Darkness
GS 10% AMP, 20% AMP, AC+4 Khopesh

If you want to go circle of hatred + minos legens, you can put dodge 3 and GFL on a dragontouched vestment. You'd open up your belt slot and the second dragontouched tier, but you'd lose out on 4 AC, so that's probably not the way to go

also remember to pack skill focus intimidate and bullheaded (so the epic gloves of the claw basically only give your 44 HP in toughness feats in that aspect)

[Merlocke]

My thinking was that and the DOD DR 20/- would proc on grazing hits and make it work but havent found a way to do it on a WF yet. right now the Fleshy 2Mnk version Is the best I can come up with.

Was thinking Khopeshes can be Radiance II (to make the enemy miss more) until you get Chaosblades epic'd. I like the idea of UMDing Epic Chaosblades to nullify grazing hit dmg.

[Anthios888]

Half-elf intimidation boosts are clickies and short-term.

Every other race can at least argue some kind of racial help on that front. Even as a main tank, you will still end up doing a great deal of fighting whether it is against raid bosses or trash mobs. Hate tanking is also really important and you need to keep your DPS as high as possible to compete there. I have found that purely defensive characters seem cool and might be fun for a while, but are ultimately shelved and only brought out for certain quests.

Icy rainments is a weak armor slot. On top of that, none of the stalwart defender enhancement bonuses apply.

I always could have also done the same thing with /2monk on a warforged instead of /2 rog but UMD was a huge playability factor for my fighter. I would probably not have enjoyed the build as long without being able to heal, rez, buff myself and others. My second choice would just be 20 fighter for the easy full plate usage, and my third choice would be /2monk.

I think you pointed out that you have 5 fewer STR. For me, that's a really big down point. Once I got to 90ish AC, I was always wishing I had more DPS. Every bit of STR gives the build a better "feel". You could change your focus a bit and even it out, but STR equal and AC equal... Other races have always been able to get more AC for cheaper than warforged. I made and published the warforged because it could be healed by the casters and leave the clerics and bards free to worry about other people (or vice versa). It was always very nice never to worry about diseases, poison, holds, etc. Additional HP and Power Attack. My healing amp was not really much of an issue. Half-elves' saves are neat and this is a strength of your build, but warforged is already immune to a lot of the stuff you're trying to save against, and get CON, brute fighting, & power attack.

Your build is missing the power attack feat, which will leave its DPS below battleclerics and battlebards. Even if you do nothing else, I'd add that just to have some flexibility.

Just a final note on enhancements - You cannot take Racial Toughness III without having some kind of CON enhancement.

Good presentation of this build, I think it will do exactly what you want if you are looking for a defensively-oriented evasion intimitank.

[RoelHeeswijk]

DPS comparison with the warforged original:

EDIT: Update for rogue dilettante improvement

to-hit:
-3 from missing 6 Strength
+1 greater weapon focus: slashing
+2 from not having power attack II enhancement
=equal

damage:
-3 from missing 6 Strength
-2 from not having power attack II enhancement
+1 khopesh mastery
+4 sneak (3d6 instead of 1d6+3)
+30% haste boost
= -4 regular damage, but +4 sneak. And 30% more damage when under haste boost.

more important is whether you want to be a robot. the WF immunities versus the half-elf 120% base healing is something that can never be expressed in numbers, so it's up to your preferences.

[jc_madden]

I'm playing around with a similar concept. I'm very new to the game so I'm lacking in the resources to twink him up. Is this a viable character for a new player?

[RoelHeeswijk]

I'm playing around with a similar concept. I'm very new to the game so I'm lacking in the resources to twink him up. Is this a viable character for a new player?

I cannot recommend it as your first toon. Because you're spread out over all 6 stats, you do benefit greatly from 34/36 point builds, and things like getting both hit points and +2 intimidate from the barbarian past life.

The epic gear you can do without, but without a good load of raid/named/greensteel stuff, you're probably not using the uncapped dexterity bonus to it's full advantage, and are better off with a dragontouched light armor/docent build with less dexterity and more strength.

[voodoogroves]

One thing, I think, you should do is aim for a useful but achievable goal.

What I mean by that is it that I see plenty of VoD/etc. raids that need an intimitank, but the vast bulk of those go on Hard. For Epic, it's a different investment in gear and build spec (feats, APs) and maybe you could find you're happy making a DPSer with good AC who can AC tank on Hard/Normal and maybe some elites, but leave Epic to someone else.

That might be doable on an earlier life and give you some practice / purpose as you level and collect gear for a later life where you want to be the main elite/epic raid tank.

Some things in this game are simply much more attainable after you've capped once or hovered at cap for a while farming. You can't start that way, but can work towards it.

[RoelHeeswijk]

well, it didn't get it's 7 dex epic item. But with the cloak of night, you do suddenly get the +2 dodge bonus.
(I couldn't work that bonus in earlier because you need AC bracers, so no chaosgarde)
And at least it offers you 5 TWF DR and a bunch of conveniences, where chaosgarde didn't offer much.

I did some early testing and the invisibility seems to have no negative effect on holding aggro, neither hate or intimidate (nor did it have any positive effect for that matters, it seems to be only useful when moving around)

[RoelHeeswijk]

Updated the original post with a more realistic FvS dilettante option. It serves the same purpose as the cleric in the way that you can cast heal/rez scrolls, but with 13 starting CHA, it's a lot easier on the intimidate portion.

[RoelHeeswijk]

... and another update with the dilettante improvements. Gave up on scroll usage, but at least the damage is almost equal now.