Fighter/Rogue or Fighter/Paladin?

[skibuns]

What are the pros and cons of each build. I am leaning toward a Fighter/Rogue but what do you think is better for end game use? Both build are looking toward 18/2. Thanks for your help!

[Goldeneye]

18 Fighter / 2 Rogue works well. UMD/Evasion, but lower damage then pure fighter (capstone)


20 fighter, or 20 paladin is better then 18 Fighter / 2 Paladin.
Unless you have high CHA, and want high saves, 2 paladin isn't a great splash for fighters (IMO)

[skibuns]

18 Fighter / 2 Rogue works well. UMD/Evasion, but lower damage then pure fighter (capstone)


20 fighter, or 20 paladin is better then 18 Fighter / 2 Paladin.
Unless you have high CHA, and want high saves, 2 paladin isn't a great splash for fighters (IMO)

I figured after reading how certain class mixes go well with each other... of course I come across another post about the fighter/paladin and that is why I asked the question. With UMD I would be able to have some kind of heal even if it is small. If I set my stats i.e. Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma. Say 16, 14, 14, 12, 8, 12 would it be possible to get UMD up enough with a pure 20 Fighter build? Or would it be best to take 2 Rogue? I have build examples for both.

I have jumped for character to character trying to find one that I like. I started with a Rogue but man talk about squishy... Did a paladin... Ranger... Barbarian... and I finally have settled into a fighter with cleric a near second... mainly because I was able to take the begging instances to Hard on solo with the cleric but just do not want to heal bot at end game... So Fighter it is... I may make a second squishy spell caster of some sort... Thanks for the info

[Goldeneye]

Sounds like you want to be a paladin.

High DPS, Smites, Spells, Buffs, Heals, Lay on Hands, Aura to help party members.

Basically a fighter w/ self-sufficiency.

Also, enough CHA to get ~35-40 UMD w/ all your gear.
(Alternatively, 2 rogue in a paladin makes it easy to UMD anything)

[valas1750]

When it comes to intimitank, my personal favorite TR is my 18fighter/2pally. People sometimes ask why I didnt take rogue for evasion, I always feel that in epic content evasion is wasted due to a lower reflex save on the 18fght/2rogue.

Pump into Cha and leave Wis as a worthless dump stat. Since the build has so many feats (went human even!) take force of personality for cha as will save stat, then every point of cha adds to all stats.

Also the 2 levels of pally get you +1ac and +1 saves to the group if no other pally is around. max UMD at all levels with a decent enouch Cha, can at least heal yourself during downtime if you really have to!

So in summary:
You lose a decent ability to picklocks etc (at lower levels/ high level normal difficulty_
You lose evasion (which endgame gets pretty hard to be worthwhile without a lot of +Dex + Reflex gear/buffs
You lose 1d6 SA dmg when having CA

You Get +Cha to all saves (Im sitting at +8)
You give party +1 ac and +1 saves if no other pally
You keep your perfect BAB
You get higher HP for those 2 levels
You get to forget about Wis entirely and just pump up Cha (good for UMD and good for Force of personality!)
You get a smite you can use twice just to add cha to hit bonus (2 levels of pally wont add much dmg, but getting a +16 to your attack mod from double charisma mod)

.... when the holy avenger comes out, you can equip it .... (hopefully they wont allow UMD to)

[Madchicken]

Well...Well...Well

First off i have to say valas u just gave a bunch of false statments.

I personally am running an 18 fighter/ 2 rogue dwarf.

Epic with my builds evasion is for one not wasted just so you knw.
I jump into infernos in epic von 6 and save pretty much everytime except for a 1 or a 2 so....
As for traps pretty much even the rogue somtimes dies so not a suprise.
Epic atdq: whirling blade barriers-save
Vod wen traps are not disabled-save

As for max umd that is a complete utter lie. Only a bard or a sorcerer can get a max umd every level.

On to your cons/pros:

My build has no problems for locks actually i havnt found one i cant pick besides epic...but come on its epic im not a rogue. Lock picking is very usfull in shroud wen u need a puzzle solved and the wall is up and chasing u but the rogue or caster isnt no wer to b found.

evasion with my reflex isnt really a problem its not super high but it works.

Sneak attack damage helps somtimes wen u need to grab agro fast. Extra damage over ur party members. not a huge bonus wouldnt mind losing but it comes with rogue.

As for hps ur not really gettting that much..My dwarf is sitting at 600 with stance plus raid buffs and has 2 rogue.

Forget wisdom? You would actually use that on an intima tank? With all ur feats and force of personality if u dont have a high cha then u need to re roll. TR or not.

[valas1750]

Max UMD every level as a non-trained class is to what im referring to (put 2 points in a level) and you can get it high enough to heal oyurself decently with consumables.

1d6 sneak attack damage to get agro? .. hrm... I'll keep my BAB at 20 myself by not taking rogue.

And without it will saves of yours are what again?
I find that taking 1/2 damage versus full is less useful than getting some sort of status effect (my cleric friends can heal through some BB, not when im helpless for 7 seconds and dancing or something.

And I've never missed 2 rogue levels, why change out all my gear and focus points into those skills rather than things such as balance etc... when, well there's a rogue for that. Less you reallly are into soloing, but I'm not so to each their own.

Your 1d6 dmg you get to use every now and then versus my +16 to attack i get to use every now and then.

[Goldeneye]

Valas. yes, those are benefits, thought I completely disagree that 18 fighter / 2 paladin is a good idea.

the main benefit of 2 paladin, is to add CHA mod to your saves. Now a day, there are so many ways to increase your saves, even a low base save sorc can get there saves high enough to be effective.

In addition, in order to increase CHA enough to matter, you make even more sacrifices on the DPS of your build.

[Madchicken]

Valas honestly you obviously must die alot...and i mean alot

With my saves and gh i can get a 35 reflex but with force of personality my will is a 20 base plus buffs.

But i wont b seeing u using heal scrolls or greater tele scrolls or tanking any mob that requires a reflex and evasion to do well. But obviously im just to dumb to know how to build my character right and do efficently...o well i guess my 47 dr just doesnt cut it. Im just to to gimp

[valas1750]

Heh you fighter/rogue fanbois sure are touchy. Take it as you want, I feel evasion is extraneous in epic content, that 1d6 SA isn't enough to cheer for, and some mediocre thievery skills aren't my preference.

+8 to all saves.
Sitting at 45 resistances, when I save a a reflex throw (which happens at least 35% more often than you as you do not have divine grace but will gain some ref on level-up as a rogue) it has to do 90 damage to me before I feel it (as i reduce it to 45).

So getting nuked for over 90 and I START to take damage, but all reduced by half consistently. I will be attacking faster then you (have 1 more BAB), will hit more often (1 more bab), will save on ALL effects far better than you ever can, and will have more health than you.

Oh and BTW... I can bump my UMD up high enough to use heal scrolls without taking any levels in rogue. No I won't be greater teleporting. But my focus (and I feel what the OP could be interested in) was optimal performance during raids.

Apparently as a raid tank you've been asked to use greater teleport midfight, or use a heal scroll on that wizard who got nuked. Never heard of it before, and there's a reason for that. An intimitank's role is laid out for him, and if ever asked to be a back-up healer in a raid I would quickly decline.

But buddy if we ever cross paths you can greater teleport around me all day long and Ill throw a few copper your way. In the meantime I'll be focusing on two things, optimal defense, and increased DPS.

I would love to continue to debate with you madchicken, in a civilized manner, but you have yet to show that you can do this. If you want to troll, carry on I guess, I cant stop you. And you're right, 2 rogue splash isn't bad at all... they have very different uses. I am optimized for epic and raids. You are optimized for PuGs, leveling up, and easier raids (which makes up 99.5% of the gameplay practicaly). It frightens me however to think that the fact that I have +9 to all saves and +1 ac (including aura) makes me somehow die more often...

Also I wonder why a lack of evasion is somehow a serious weakness for an intimitank... you obviously haven't been around many other than your cookie-cutter ones posted on the forums that every nooblet and troll such as yourself will follow to the T


And to Goldeneye: You certainly are not alone in your thoughts... and normally I'd agree more. But I already have Cha as an important stat to get my intimidate high enough to gurantee success in every situation. I found the symbiosis between UMD (which as a non-class skill needs all the help it can get if I want to selfheal for whatever reason), intimidate, and my saves very satisfying. It turns CHA into a very important intimitank stat, governing my agro, my utility, and my non-AC defenses.

[Ystradmynach]

In the interest of accuracy here, sneak attack damage for two levels of rogue is actually 1d6 + 3 if you plan on spending any enhancement points. Additional benefits include another +2 reflex save versus traps, an additional +1 to hit when sneak attacking and a point in dexterity that can be used to raise your reflex save another point. And of course another 11 or so points that can be put in UMD.

Two levels of Paladins also gets you a weak smite evil as well as what was mentioned.

Honestly all but one of my characters have evasion but one, and that last one dies a lot more because of it, although I don't run epic so I couldn't tell if that is relevant to epic content.

[valas1750]

You aren't wrong in that Ystrad, during the levelin up process and before Epics, evasion can be a live saver in many situations. At higher end content however, the benefits of having much higher saves outweigh evasion because of the things already mentioned (in my mind at least)

Having 750+ HP
Difficulty of making epic saving throws (without having to focus extremely hard on reflex boosting saves, leaving slots open)
Being able to easily maintain very high resists in every damage type (so taking 1/2 damage means you are utilizing those resistances to their maximum potential)
Lets not forget about our will and fort saves to now ok?
Taking evasion (monk or rogue), you remember that you are now 40% (more if you want an even more CHA based build or if intimidate ranks get more insane with new content) more likely to get hit by every spell. Let's not forget that you also have these stats called a fort save and a will save.

As an intimitank you are an HP sponge. Taking some damage (half of whatever is past 90) is a lot better than getting stunned/dazed/danced/ etc. And yes I will be more vulnerable to non epic traps. If you are getting hit by traps still... well then we are talking about different stages in a player's career. By this point in time (remember my build is a 36 pt intimitank build with barb and monk PL feats) I don't get hit by traps. I played mario enough as a kid and have memorized trap locations.... no need for **** against traps in almost 99% of content, even if there isnt a rogue around.

Now enhancements, yeah the only one that is really useful is taking extra smite if you so wish, or taking pally charisma 1 if you're build ends up with an odd number of charisma (after guild buff and exceptional charisma item).

To sum it up, I agree that evasion helps a TON before epic content. But I personally dont give two cents as to how difficult it is to get to 20, but rather how good I am once I get there. I enjoy a good struggle anyway, almost all of my builds are late bloomers (this one the least so in fact!). Also, it's not like adding my charisma mod (+5 un buffed before level 13) is not helping until 20... it really is quite noticable. Anyway, my build has exactly 0enchancement points to spare on anything other than the pally charisma 1 (2 AP). My Ap's are in intimidate, human deneith intimade, trip, and then all the armor and bastard sword specialization (with ever-changing amounts of strength and toughness enhancements until I find what works best for me).

More to the OP, if tanking is what you have in mind, you can't go wrong with both. A 18fighter/2rogue in the best gear and a 18fighter/2paladin in the best gear can both be MT in every fight in this game currently. They approach things differently, and focus on different things, and I dare say the 2 pally lets you do it more reliably (less spikes, more steady damage), but you won't go wrong with either. The rogue splash lets you ignore some damage when you roll high on your reflex. So the cleric has to manage a 0, 200, 180, 0, 260, 120. Where with the pally splash, the damage per round comes out more like 40, 65, 50, 105, 80, 15. Ill give you the benefit of the doubt you evasion likers, and say it comes out to roughly the same amounts of damage. However, mine is more constant and more predictable, heals can come in more relaxed. You however have to deal with 2 saved throws in a row sometimes, making it extremely difficult for clerics who just arent chain casting heal on you to know exactly when to cast. My build allows for maximum healer SP-efficiency!

BOTH are better than 20 fighter in my mind (only for tanking) If DPS specced, I would choose 20 fighter in a heartbeat over 18/2rogue or 18/2pally (unless you are F2P and dont want to do epic content). People scoff at the capstone, but I kinda like it, as well as keeping the perfect BAB (meaning better to-hit and faster attack speed) and 10% doublestrike, as well as an extra feat.

Oh and one last little note.... I wasn't kidding when I brought up the Holy Avenger. Screw the epic SoS (and thank God if it comes in a bastard sword variant!) Call me an rp-***, but I want that. Badly. And no you cant UMD it if they do it properly (it's bonuses only appearing for Paladins).

[Khellendros13]

Evasion not useful in epic?

Have you done Epic DQ2 and Epic VoN6?

Chain Lightning for 200 before resists...- your 45resist, half damage on a save, and you still take 77~ dmg per chain lightning in von6. That is every 6 seconds or so. My Barb with 800hp raged has a harder time than my 466hp fighter/rogue.

Elite/Epic traps and reflex save spells are vastly different. I'd rather face epic fire elementals and djinns all day than Elite Monastery traps.

That said, 2 pally or 2 rogue splash is a choice, and I see both as valid. However, a lot of people, and most of my guild, like to make self sufficient toons so we can zerg Amrath quests with 4 ppl and no dedicated healer. Rogue splash is king here.

EDIT: If I roll a 1 on my save for chain lightning or a blade in DQ2, I scroll heal myself for 171.