What even happened to tank and DPS Sword and Board builds

[ccd1977]

Back 2008 when I first began DDO, I used to see Tanks as the beasts of the battle. Usually clerics, pally's , fighters with sword and board. What happened? I have been trying to find a good DPS Sword and Board build and I cannot find anything recent?

Does anyone know if a build that I can follow for this or is this even a viable option?

[AlcoArgo]

For the majority of DDO's existence, "tank" and "DPS" were mutually exclusive. The S&B DPS character was created with the Pally pass a few updates back.

For a DPS S&B build go to the paladin forum. You should be able to get 4 or 5 almost immediately.

[unbongwah]

See my Sacred Vanguard thread.

The bad news is Vanguards (and most everyone else) are about to get nerfed. The good news is pure S&B paladin will still be a lot stronger than it ever was before U23 buffed pallies; they'll just be weaker than they were for the last year.

You may also want to look into S&B Swashbucklers. The forthcoming nerfs will also reduce heavy armor's protection; that might make lt armor + Evasion more attractive again.

[ccd1977]

See my Sacred Vanguard thread.The bad news is Vanguards (and most everyone else) are about to get nerfed. The good news is pure S&B paladin will still be a lot stronger than it ever was before U23 buffed pallies; they'll just be weaker than they were for the last year.You may also want to look into S&B Swashbucklers. The forthcoming nerfs will also reduce heavy armor's protection; that might make lt armor + Evasion more attractive again.

I checked out your Sacred Vanguard and it looks good but is there a way I can make that a Bladeforged or is that not worth it? With the new updates, I am concerned about AC being gimped and holy sword being gimped.

[unbongwah]

You can, but there are two issues with going BF instead of human: two less feats (you lose human bonus feat and Adamantine Body is practically a must-have) and BF racial tree is more expensive than human if you want Recon SLA (and you do). Plus a BF THF KotC pally is so strong & survivable that Vanguard is almost superfluous.

[lyrecono]

Back 2008 when I first began DDO, I used to see Tanks as the beasts of the battle. Usually clerics, pally's , fighters with sword and board. What happened? I have been trying to find a good DPS Sword and Board build and I cannot find anything recent?

Does anyone know if a build that I can follow for this or is this even a viable option?

really? tanks were a thing? and they had dps?
sorry, not in endgame, not with strong dps in party, if we ever saw one in there because it was an alt of someone previously in group or a guildie, melee' use to have terrible dps in raids and S&B were the pinnacle of terrible dps, the exception were barbs (4 barbs with the old crit enh using picks in a epic party was a common sight) and pre nerf Wounding and puncturing wielding rangers .

The consensus use to be that tanks were a waste of a party spot, the (very) few that put extreme effort into their tanks we're ok-ish, it still meant that the others had to limit/slow down their dps.
Often i was told that the warforged S&B tank would take Suulomades (VoD), after 10 min i got bored, took over the agro and drank a curse pot (H-orc barb) once in a while, it took a really strong tank to take the agro of a mediocre barb.

The other problem was, armor class being useless unless you really, really went for it (usually being a fighter and tremendously gimping your dps), so besides tanks none had any good reason to use heavy armor, just some skill penalties and no benefit? many people went for evasion (even paladins, the quintessential tanks), since melee attacks couldn't be blocked, magical damage was next in line (and often far more dangerous).

After they came out with epic content (raising the cap to 25 and then 28) the devs screwed up balance, it reached it's peak around the double pack stormhorns&wheloon(that they tried to sell as a expansion).
Taking 1000 hp damage per hit was a bit to much for melee's, incl tanks, many switched to ranged and caster builds.

The armor up update made playing a melee possible and fun again, as did the enh pass for pally, barb, bard, etc.
Armor class is still dead, but they added prr and later mrr to armor types to help melee's cope with their terribly balanced content.
Tanks were played again
but they got mildly screwed over the balance pass, still doable just use impaired as always

In conclusion,
Pure tanks were never really that needed nor that good but if you're still determent to build one, there are plenty of options, just keep in mind that they require a tremendous amount of gear and past lives to be passable on the highest difficulty.

Start by looking into vanguard and check stalwart defender(fighter) or sacred defender (paladin) for some nice low hanging fruits

[lyrecono]

You can, but there are two issues with going BF instead of human: two less feats (you lose human bonus feat and Adamantine Body is practically a must-have) and BF racial tree is more expensive than human if you want Recon SLA (and you do). Plus a BF THF KotC pally is so strong & survivable that Vanguard is almost superfluous.

i agree, human much better options then bladeforged, they also come with a dps boost (racial boosts can be used during a class boost) and have healing amp in their tree, for 3 point you could have a 20% weapon damage boost(to grab agro?) and a 20% heal amp.

If you're dead set on using a iconic to try it out on, use a pdk 18 paly/2 fighter-->crusader (for healing) on a different server (basically a test build)

[Basura_Grande]

really? tanks were a thing? and they had dps?
sorry, not in endgame, not with strong dps in party, . . .

You sir are incorrect, but no point in going over details over dead game mechanics.

[Robbenklopper]

Armor class is still dead ...

I can´t confirm that, but i know what you mean. It is not that easy to get your AC in regions where it makes a difference but around AC170+ you can feel it when the being-hit-avoidance is about 80%. For sure the PRR are much more important, but i won´t say AC is dead. Fighters can make Advantages of it and can deal good DPS, but by far not what a pala, barb, wlock or fotm does.

[ccd1977]

So since intimidate is being changed to be more effective, how does this impact the future of a tank? It teases me to feel there are now uses for them. Are they being revived again as a possible build option now or should we just stay away still?