Fighter / Dwarven Defender / XXX (Advice wanted)

[a shrouded figure]

I can't decide what to use for my tumble dip (Monk / Bard / Rogue)

Any advice would be appreciated, one advantage for Monk is the minor speed increase to help offset the speed penalty of defensive stance.

Monk(4), Fighter(8), Dwarven Defender(18), Dwarf

STR: 19 (24)
DEX: 9
CON: 20 (22)
WIS: 8
INT: 14
CHA: 6

Dwarf: (Darkvision, Defensive Training vs. Giants, Stonecunning, Hardiness vs. Poison, Hardiness vs. Spells, Offensive Training vs. Goblinoids, Offensive Training vs. Orcs, Skill Affinity: Lore)
01: Fighter(1): Expertise, Weapon Focus
02: Fighter(2): Improved Expertise
03: Fighter(3): Toughness
04: Fighter(4): STR+1, Weapon Specialization, (STR=18)
05: Fighter(5)
06: Fighter(6): Knockdown, Blind Fight
07: Fighter(7)
08: Dwarven Defender(1): STR+1, {Defensive Stance}, (STR=19)
09: Dwarven Defender(2): Improved Critical, {Defensive Awareness I}
10: Dwarven Defender(3)
11: Dwarven Defender(4)
12: Dwarven Defender(5): CON+1, Improved Knockdown, (CON=21)
13: Dwarven Defender(6)
14: Dwarven Defender(7)
15: Dwarven Defender(8): Disarm
16: Dwarven Defender(9): CON+1, (CON=22)
17: Dwarven Defender(10)
18: Monk(1): Improved Disarm, {Cleave, Evasion, Improved Unarmed Strike, Stunning Fist}
19: Monk(2): {Deflect Arrows}
20: Monk(3): STR+1, (STR=20)
21: Fighter(8): Epic Weapon Focus, Epic Weapon Specialization
22: Dwarven Defender(11)
23: Dwarven Defender(12)
24: Dwarven Defender(13): STR+1, Epic Damage Reduction I, (STR=21)
25: Dwarven Defender(14): Epic Damage Reduction II
26: Dwarven Defender(15)
27: Dwarven Defender(16): Armor Skin
28: Monk(4): STR+1, (STR=22)
29: Dwarven Defender(17)
30: Dwarven Defender(18): Epic Skill Focus: Discipline, Epic Damage Reduction III

[Mattamue]

Monk speed doesn't work with armor and shield.

Evasion from Rogue is hard to pass up.

Note that your dr is high, but crits will still hit hard. Barb with edr 3 and high phys immunity gear may actually have better overall damage reduction. Granted, completely different RP, but something to look into if you just like the damage reduction aspect.

[Archnon]

If you want to go Monk, you can go dex instead of strength, round at your wisdom at 10-12 if you can get it. The dex, monk wis bonus, defensive stance, etc makes you really hard to get. You won't get epic dodge, but you could get blinding speed if you are careful. Then you double up high dodge and high resistance. However, you will hit about as hard as a wet noodle.

**edit**
If you went this route, you could do a parry-build for increased attack and damage. You get cleave attacks in parry off the monk feats as well.

[a shrouded figure]

I didn’t realize monk speed was also attached to armor so that’s out. I suppose rogue it is. Plan is to wear elven chain with a rune wall, should be pretty solid %damage reduction along with the 21/- base dr

[a shrouded figure]

I was thinking also, it’s a little different build- but I was playing around with a 12 Monk / 18 DD, 2h naginata Str build. It has some interesting potential, still a little anemic on the damage front but honestly everything feels weak compared to WM damage, lol.

I’m mainly sad that mundane characters don’t have access to kensai anymore- that path is just amazing for almost any “pure” melee.

[Wuthering]

I didn’t realize monk speed was also attached to armor so that’s out. I suppose rogue it is. Plan is to wear elven chain with a rune wall, should be pretty solid %damage reduction along with the 21/- base dr

Yeah it's okay. But DR on Arelith doesn't save your life, enemies in both PVE and PVP just deal far too much damage. It's an okay "plus" for barbarians because they also have temporary HP (but I don't think most barbarians even go the DR route) and it's quite good on druids because they're also crit immune in elemental shapes. But I think most DDs are pretty underwhelmed by their defensive capability.

[Shadowy Reality]

Damage Reduction is very bad. This is coming from someone who had both a barbarian and a dwarven defender with all the DR feats.

It will make some PvE trivial, because you cannot be damaged. But that PvE would still be trivial even without all that DR. In PvP AB and damage will always be better than DR.

The day the DR feats and Dwarven Defender DR is changed to Damage Immunity they may be worth taking.

[Biolab00]

Damage Reduction is very bad. This is coming from someone who had both a barbarian and a dwarven defender with all the DR feats.

It will make some PvE trivial, because you cannot be damaged. But that PvE would still be trivial even without all that DR. In PvP AB and damage will always be better than DR.

The day the DR feats and Dwarven Defender DR is changed to Damage Immunity they may be worth taking.

Yep agreed. Some monsters actually deal really high base physical damage...

[a shrouded figure]

Damage Reduction is very bad. This is coming from someone who had both a barbarian and a dwarven defender with all the DR feats.

It will make some PvE trivial, because you cannot be damaged. But that PvE would still be trivial even without all that DR. In PvP AB and damage will always be better than DR.

The day the DR feats and Dwarven Defender DR is changed to Damage Immunity they may be worth taking.

This statement really confuses me. I would argue that there is nothing BAD about 21/- DR. Overall AB/AC of this build is right in line with any sword and board character, you’re not actually sacrificing much (4ab and 3 dmg, maybe depending on the build from being 24 str vs 30 str).

I understand that critical hits will still hurt, but assuming a ~100 damage crit were already talking about 21% DI that stacks with anything. I’m just a little confused as to “DR is a waste of time, do DI instead” when I can easily do both, and in general I would are that unless you’re being hit for 100+ damage AND accomplish 50%+ DI (not possible 100% of the time), DR is superior. Add in the to fact that they’re not mutually exclusive and I have to start wondering about the hostile opinions of DR.

I have no first hand experience so I’m not at all claiming to be an expert- I’m just looking at it and scratching my head. If the build falls on its face and I immediately sacrifice I’ll be the first to eat crow and admit if it’s hot garbage, lol.

[Opustus]

The outcome of fights, especially toe-to-toe duels, is dictated by highest AB and AC, so most builds will outdamage you and your damage reduction -- you'll just take a little longer to slap at and dish in some attacks of your own. It's not hot garbage, it simply falls a bit short in terms of AB making it lose more in straightforward PvP situations, but it certainly can tank a lot better in PvM as opposed to a build that goes damage/AB over DR. In PvP you'll be effectively deathless against many sneak builds if you play correctly i.e. around your sneak immunity, but you won't be hurting them either.

[Shadowy Reality]

Opustus got it entirely correctly.

In melee PvP AB and AC are the most important stats. Sacrificing any of these for DR is most definitely not worth it, and unfortunately you always have to sacrifice AB to get those DR feats.

Those 4ab difference mean that you will have -20% chance to hit your opponent with all your attacks, that is huge, this may make it so that you no longer can hit your 2nd or 3rd attack except on a natural 20 (this also means you can no longer crit on those attacks). By comparison, Improved Invisibility is considered a must in melee fights offers 25% concealment (your enemy probably has blind fight).

Opustus also mentions the sneak immunity to shut down sneak attack builds. This works, sort of. You need to first see your target and you must be actively engaged in combat (with an attack action queued), so bear that in mind.

[a shrouded figure]

I appreciate the clarification of concerns. Thanks guys!

[Algol]

Hey! Currently I'm building a smiliar build but as a gnome. A few things I made different are:

Rogue instead of monk, and I took rogue from 1-3 and at level 27.

Luck of heros, lightnin reflexes, irown will and great foritdute instead imp. disarm and imp KD.

Epic Prowess instead of ESF:Disc.

My gnome will be able to hit 46 ab with self buffs only, while not stellar it's not garbage either. Combined with AC better than most STR builds and DR, she should be able to trade blows favourably. As a dwarf your AB (should be 45) and AC will be a bit lower but I belive if you stock up enough and bring things to a battle of attrition you should be able to come out on top in a lot of 1v1 scenarios. In group ight you can just say "Fly you fools" to your allies and die in a heroic stand while your allies make it to safety

[Shadowy Reality]

Your AC will not be higher than usual Str builds, as you cannot use Defensive Stance with Expertise. It is a good replacement for Expertise, you lose 1AC but lose on AB. But it is not a replacement for Improved Expertise.

Additionally, you will likely not be favourable trading blows, as WM criticals will heavily outweight your DR.

[Algol]

Afaik it has been updated and you can use expertise with defensive stance. I'll confirm it after getting my DD levels and testing it

[Opustus]

Yurp. Any combat mode stacks with the def stance e.g. Power attack, Expertise, and Parry.

[Shadowy Reality]

Must have missed that one! That is a nice change indeed. I am still not convinced it will make it compete with the typical melee builds but it is a step in the right direction.

[a shrouded figure]

100% agree with 1-3 rogue is the “better” choice for the extra skills.

My toon is going rogue as well, just hit 12 last night so far so good. For the time being it plays exactly like a pure fighter (of course it’s 7F/5DD so... what I would expect). I decided to take my 3 pre epic tumble dip later so that I could start playing while I decided what I wanted to do for the dip.

I actually somewhat agree with skipping disarm, I may replace that with Reflex / Will.

And yes, defensive stance works fine with expertise / imp expertise. Honestly I haven’t even had a use for expertise at this point in my leveling, but I’m getting close. Right now defensive stance is putting me around 34 AC, it’s mostly 20’s that are hitting me at all, and with a huge health pool it’s been a non issue.

[Opustus]

It's pretty hard to make fit with several builds, but you could do something like
Rogue21/Fighter6/DwD3
Bard23/Fighter4/DwD3
Bard20/Fighter5/DwD5
Bard21/Fighter6/DwD3
Fighter24/Specialist3/DwD3

and so on

The +4 Dodge from Def stance is offset by the loss of +3 AC from Tumble, but for builds that already incorporate a tumble class, the addition of DwD results in the net gain of 4 Dodge AC, which is nothing to scoff at whatsoever. Something like Ranger10/DwD3/SD17 also attains respectable AC with the shadow shield, and the free Dodge feat from DwD helps with the SD prereqs. All in all, it's not a bad 3-level dump, but it's pretty fringe.

[Archnon]

In group ight you can just say "Fly you fools" to your allies and die in a heroic stand while your allies make it to safety

Except for when the attackers just run past you as you are slowed in defensive stance. "Wait guys, you have to attack me first!"

Also, on the idea of a high rogue defender, I would be a little concerned. You would get great dodge and dex ac but the question would be what is your attack. Rogues really rely on their sneak attacks and would you lose out on that in defensive stance?

[Opustus]

Also, on the idea of a high rogue defender, I would be a little concerned. You would get great dodge and dex ac but the question would be what is your attack. Rogues really rely on their sneak attacks and would you lose out on that in defensive stance?

Shouldn't affect it. While attacking out of stealth to dish in your 1-flurry burst of sneak attack damage, you wouldn't need to be in defensive stance anyway. You want to be mobile to re-stealth around corners and such, but when you're caught in toe-to-toe combat, you would definitely be using the stance. The stacking with Parry also opens up some options for these situations. In PvM you would be taking on the spawn by KDing the enemies as cornersneaking is rather clunky and slow for PvM, so you'd have the stance activated pretty much all the time.

[Algol]

In group ight you can just say "Fly you fools" to your allies and die in a heroic stand while your allies make it to safety

Except for when the attackers just run past you as you are slowed in defensive stance. "Wait guys, you have to attack me first!"

Hehe, you are right, ideally you'd pop imp expertise up, run with your allies to a door way and make your stand there ;D