EE Tanks. I need advice

[elraido]

His con is really high, maybe yugo, bard or some con in sentinel. Hope it's ok to link Verad's toon, I LOVE checking other setups :-)
http://ddocrafting.info/index.php?se...ookup!&p=myddo
Charisma almost same as yours but toaster so worse lohs ?
My fighter in every day gear dread to compare, 16 base, 4 tome, 2 ship, 1 toughness, no bard, yugo or epic toughness. Air GS and devotion on shintao for cocoon.
http://ddocrafting.info/index.php?se...ookup!&p=myddo
Many ways to build a tank.

My question for pallies, can you keep yourself up with max+quicken+lohs alone in elites ? In combat I mean, because fighter can umd scrolls or twist hjeals for out of combat too.

LOH's is the same for toasters and humans. It must be the healing amp then. And thanks for linking those! I haven't been able to look at my toon on mydoo in forever!

[verad]

My guy isn't lacking in gear either. He was literally the first toon I rolled on here and I almost play him exclusivly (I have one other 24, a 21, one TR who is now level 14, and a 19). WF and a +5 con tome would be only +4 more total con than my toon. Still scratching my head as how you have 500 more hp. My LoH are hitting for almost 900, so either I have a good amount more Charisma or healing amp than you.

wf healing amp vs human healing amp is thus why i kick out with 32 chr I think..

my base hp before i change destinys add pots scrolls and buffs is like 1268 hp
After i primal scream +5 str con then go into dos stance
I scroll tensors +4 alc bonus str/dex/con +6 ac
yugo pot +2 con +20hp
slot my large +20 hp augment slot
destiny +6 con +200 hp

my str is 47 before these buffs all 6 of my points went there because this is a dps build. I think i worked out with all buffs going i could break 1800.
Feats: power attack, cleave, great cleave, imp shield mastery, imp crit slash (ESOS),
toughness, barb pastlife, epic toughness, overwhelming critical

I have hate gear+hate bonus from pal and wf so i dont even need my intimidate
which is high too if need be.

I built this toon fist for when LOB came out i broke 1111 hp before destinies and I
can hold agro vs him and deal with his hp debuffs. Also I could tank old epic chrono
and survive through dragon and hold agro with a 30-60 second head start on the party.

Esos +cleaves+smites+divine sacrifice to me is the bomb.....Sure I could always
do more as a barb but I just dont have the same survivabilitiy that I have as I
do. Also when enhancement system comes I will change the build I will always
be a WF and I hope some day they make Bladesworn Transformation not suck
make it more like Tensors.

Vacuum/VD/Verad/Vesmadi/Veneral/Vrazell Ghallanda

[maddmatt70]

destiny +6 con +200 hp

This right here is a build mistake the 200 hp you gain vs. what you can do with these other 12 destiny points is huge i.e. that second build you had could have worked if you spent the points better. I would guess the gear is also a question. The second build also used a two hander instead of shield which means meat melee and not tank in the current game.

[Dolphious]

My question for pallies, can you keep yourself up with max+quicken+lohs alone in elites ? In combat I mean, because fighter can umd scrolls or twist hjeals for out of combat too.

Yes. And I don't even have maximize, and I only use my lay on hands in emergencies. A quickened cure serious hist my pally for 250-300 and takes almost no time particularly if you follow it with a cleave attack which breaks the usually "stop-time" after casting a spell and resuming combat animation.

Still working my way though the easier epics for completely solo, but I'm certain self sufficient in even the harder stuff.

3 lay on hands left:


Also 3, but it's hard to see because of the placement of the xp screen.

[Wipey]

~cause quoting pictures is idiotic ~

Very cool man, you got Torc on him ? Don't see it on hotbars :-) Do you think you get hit enough it would have any use ?
Absurd human hjeal amp with blue bar healing seems very appealing.

[verad]

This right here is a build mistake the 200 hp you gain vs. what you can do with these other 12 destiny points is huge i.e. that second build you had could have worked if you spent the points better. I would guess the gear is also a question. The second build also used a two hander instead of shield which means meat melee and not tank in the current game.

get 200 hp just from vigor of battle took brace for impact so fort is like 165%
+6 con endless smites and loh

I dont need half them destinies because i'm a wf without shield use i took shield
feat just to get dos and the random times i turtle up and do use a shield but often
rarely never. Don't need 10 more ac useless unless you pushing 100+.

I find I sit more often in legendary dreadnought, or even primal avatar when i'm
tank/dpsing. I just use Unyielding for soloing. Or LOB or some EE content.
hitting cleave imp cleave smite Divine sac I'm always doing some sort of special
attack and don't need the ones from unyielding oh yeah I always have Momentum
swing twisted. With it i'm doing 8-11 (2d6) +10 with a 54-60 str. x3-x5 crit rating
with an amazing crit range with smites.

[elraido]

I scroll tensors +4 alc bonus str/dex/con +6 ac

Tensors is now an alchemical bonus!?!? When did I miss that!!!! Time to buy scrolls like mad!!! What is the length of duration?

[verad]

Tensors is now an alchemical bonus!?!? When did I miss that!!!! Time to buy scrolls like mad!!! What is the length of duration?

I think like 1:20 or so its good to start a big fight. its like that final buff to throw before charging into combat. Primal scream is a good 3 min of +5+5 pretty easy
to sustain even in dos.

Right now I had a decent tank 11/9 barb/druid with a 72 con I was gonna hit something like 107 con end game with boosts. I tr'd him tho because I want a
few past lives. On problem with build was cant use bear attacks while raged =(
I hope this gets changed in future. My str on that build was around 70 too so
dps was pretty decent.

Mitigating damage with a shield is very nice.
Ac used to be the stand alone
then HP came along
then there was blur/displace/conceal
then dodge and PRR

A good EE tank is going to not specialize in one of these but as many of these as
he can.

[elraido]

Mitigating damage with a shield is very nice.
Ac used to be the stand alone
then HP came along
then there was blur/displace/conceal
then dodge and PRR

A good EE tank is going to not specialize in one of these but as many of these as
he can.

Bingo. Especially with the laws of diminishing returns with AC and PRR. Sure you might hit 170 AC, but that is only going to be like a 5% change from 140 AC. There is no point in going that extra mile for 5% when you could do things that increase your DPS or survivability. And don't forget healing amp thrown in there!

[Dolphious]

Very cool man, you got Torc on him ? Don't see it on hotbars :-) Do you think you get hit enough it would have any use ?
Absurd human hjeal amp with blue bar healing seems very appealing.

Torc would definitely be great. I don't have one on my pally though, I've done the torc grind twice now on my bard and caster and I just don't have it in me to really grind hard for it so I'm picking up completions slowly.

[maddmatt70]

Torc would definitely be great. I don't have one on my pally though, I've done the torc grind twice now on my bard and caster and I just don't have it in me to really grind hard for it so I'm picking up completions slowly.

Mana Pots Gotcha. Doing epic elite for no loot solo on a character not equiped to do them solo using mana pots. Yeahs.

[Carpone]

Primal scream is a good 3 min of +5+5 pretty easy to sustain even in dos.

Since when does Primal Scream work in Defender of Siberys stance?

[Meat-Head]

Since when does Primal Scream work in Defender of Siberys stance?

My understanding is it sticks if you receive it out of stance and then switch. Can some1 confirm?

[Dolphious]

My understanding is it sticks if you receive it out of stance and then switch. Can some1 confirm?

Definitely true as of right now, though I'd be wary of making a build around that. Madstone rage used to work like this also (you could click it/get it to proc then enter stance and keep it), but they "fixed" it.

Mana Pots Gotcha. Doing epic elite for no loot solo on a character not equiped to do them solo using mana pots. Yeahs.

Those "store" pots in the SS are the lesser mana pots from the 6th year birthday cake. The greyed out one was from when I pulled one of the bigger ones in a chest. So I've used 20 small pots over the past 9 months... and probably half of those in CitW because I like to have mana between lolth and the first shrine spot (we seem to have decided to always shrine after the first portal fight on Cannith).

Sure I'll drink a pot once and awhile (1 in snitch during cratoes, 2 in BoB at the boss because I was in a rush due to RL and didn't want to bother scroll healing). If drinking an occasional pot is a big deal then OK, maybe blue bar healing isn't for you. I've got no problem with it, I find way more of the things than I ever use.

[sephiroth1084]

Improved Shield Mastery. But seriously, I'd rather forget the Cleave/Greater Cleave/OC for some self-healing capabilities (Maximize, Quicken...). Then you'd be able to get also CE.

You don't need Maximize anymore. I dropped it on my paladin, because non-Maximized CSW was hitting in the 200-300 range with the spell power changes, and only for about 50 more I think with Max on.

Quicken is very good, but after picking up regenerating LOH in Unyielding Sentinel, I found that I was having to rarely use mana for healing anymore, even when soloing a bit. On EE, yeah, you're gonna want Quicken if you're with a weak healer, or short-manning, but the LOH were really going long.

Derailing my own thread here.. But making these hard choices really makes one reconsider a Stalwart instead.. Helf 20 stalwart cleric dilly? Not as awesome at self-healing, but it's something...


Someone tell me why Pallys are awesomer and stop my insanity plox

LOH is a pretty big deal, and Light the Dark had been pretty excellent for me when I was still playing (before September). Ran some of the easier EE quests as the party healer and tank, grabbing aggro and using LtD to keep everyone up. The saves are a big deal. Destinies muddy the waters a bit, but I still feel like paladins have better burst DPS, and much higher threat generation, than fighters, which makes quickly grabbing aggro in between intimidates, or on things immune to intim, a lot easier.

Spell-based buffs are nice, too. It really just comes down to preference. I've played a Fighter 20 (before epic destinies), a Paladin 18/Fighter 2, and a Paladin 20, and I definitely enjoyed the latter two more than the Fighter.

Fighters get Fighter Haste Boost. While you can twist it in on a paladin, it takes a lot of work to do so. And any extended fight, Divine Might will need to be recast. That animation takes a LONG time. That is a TON of attacks that a fighter is making that paladin can't. Same thing with Divine Favor.

There are very few fights in the game where you are attacking constantly for more than 1 min. My strategy with DM III is to try and activate while running to whatever I'm going to attack, that way, I'm not losing swings, and it's rare that I end up having to keep swinging while DM is off. With regenerating turns (even 1 rank), I have enough to keep DM up for about 98% of the time I'm attacking, and still more left over to keep Divine Righteousness up when needed.


Regarding the OP's debate, I'd drop Overwhelming Critical. It's cool, it makes bigass numbers on 19-20 smites, but it is offering less than every other option you have there. GTHF and ISM both do more DPS; GTHF gets you damage on multiple enemies; ISM gets you more procs for important things, and some more PRR. CE is definitely not an always-on ability, but in those moments when you want it, the feat definitely makes a difference, and while it's true you can't use Momentum Swing and Lay Waste while CE is up, the times that you want CE up are probably times where the DPS boost from those abilities isn't as important as simply staying alive--usually because you won't be killing the thing(s) faster enough to make the lower defense worthwhile.

Also, it means that when you want to be full-tank, you can be, and when you want to be full-DPS you can be most of the way there. Depends on your preference and outlook, but if I've got a choice, I'd rather go all-in on being a tank when it's necessary, since if I had wanted to be a DPSer, I'd have gone a completely different route in the first place. And, heck, could go full DPS and get a respectable amount of defense.

[Belsogno]

this.

I run a 18/2 pally. Go with both and drop gthf until you get them/one . Lots of build options. Right now im running with sentinal dragon marks so i get free BS prof with echimera's (which is really your weapon of choices with the sentinel marks) and only take thf. With the added incite from the full mark benefit plus getting a +10 weapon its pretty much impossible to take agro from me, not even dragon breath from a sorc or maxxed out fury barbs can do it, especial with intolerant blows and divine righteousness. I twist in momentum swing, laywaste and legendary shield mastery. This toon is a first lifer aswell.

this is JD btw

this one. Drop GTWF and enjoy tanking options.

As a capped sentinel pally with right gear you shouldn't really concern about loosing aggro.

I run a 18/2 pally/monk triple chimera fang and i need two swings to secure the threat at a point that even the best sorc on the server can't pull aggro off me anymore