Help with tank fighter stats distribution

[Kanzen]

Hello All,

 

Currently I wanted to make a different approach and prepare a tanky character in my next gameplay. I was thinking about fighter or paladin class. Eventually I decided to stick as fighter because of the defender and capability to engage more enemies. Taking into consideration the new lvl 7 talent when enemies trying to break the fight with fighter can get hit with additional effect.

 

Now my characters are lvl 5 and my stats and looks they way presented below

 

Race: Human

 

Str: 10

Con : 10

Dex:4

P:16

Int: 18

Resolve: 20

 

Talents:

 

Konockback

Sword and Shield

Defender

Hold the Line

Vigorous Defense

 

I like the fact that my fighter is really tanky, but I decided to maybe switch a little bit of stats to make him a little more damage threat. With current DEX and STR values he attacks really I mean really slow and does like 5 damage per hit.

 

Can someone suggest what stats to decrease and what to increase to make him also a more damage threat.  I was thinking dumping maybe Int and Preception to buff Dex and Str.

 

Thank you for all feedback

 

PS. I almost forgot I am playing on hard difficulty so probably that high amount of defense is not so required that I currently have

 

[DreamWayfarer]

In Pillars' current state, pure tanks are more often than not worth less than tanky damage dealers. If an enemy sees a high-damage frail character nearby, and is engaged to a low damage character, it will often be willing to take a disengagement attack.

 

That is not to say there is no purpose in making resistent characters, and the new Talent does make them more viable, but you could consider lowering PER to 10(as Fighters base accuracy is already high) and taking 4 points from INT, increasing DEX to 8 and MIG to 16. Higher Might will also help making you tankier by making your self-healing abilities more powerful.

 

I would also drop Defender and take Confident Aim. Take the unique warhammer Shatterstar, which you can get quite early, since it increases your engagement limit by one. If you are already going to give it to an interrupt Barbarian, consider taking Measured Restraint, a rapier you get in the first floors of the Endless Paths.

 

EDIT: You may drop RES instead of INT, or instead divide the fall between both. If your resistence comes from self healing, not high defenses, the AI is more likely to think you are not tanky. It will not be worth as much during longer battles, however, and high INT is more useful if you are a damage dealer first and tank second.

 

You may also wish to drop RES to increase CON. More endurance is harder to get through gear and buffs than more deflection. But then, with above average Might and INT you may just out-heal every graze that comes your way, so I think high RES is still a good choice.

Edited April 12, 2016 by DreamWayfarer

[Boeroer]

You really don't need RES 20. Fighters have the highest base deflection in the game. 15 is enough. If you raise MIG like DreamWayfarer said, your Constant Recovery can become very powerful and you can not only tank, but also spank by yourself. The Overbearing Guard can still be cool. I didn't try it but somebody said reach wepons are good for that because you will be able to engage enemies that are normally out of reach. If those want to leave you they will go prone. There's a quarterstaff named "Wendwalker" in the game that has "Guarding" (=+1 engagement limit). It's a reach weapon and together with Defender and Hold the Line you could have 5 engagement slots in an area of 1.8 meters (reach weapon). In theory that is. So theoretically even enemies that run past you but and are covered behind other enemies (but in reach) would eat disengagement attacks from you and fall on their faces. Sounds fun - don't know it that works. You could compensate for the missing shield with Cautious Attack and/or Superior Deflection. Together with Knockdown, Bonus Knockdown, Girlde of the Driving Wave and Clear Out there will be tons of Knockdowns.

[Braven]

I also agree that you want high might, regardless of the type of fighter because your core ability, constant recovery and the fighter specific talent/items also involve self healing. Perception is a good stat to drop. I did a play through with a 3 perception fighter with large shield and my accuracy was still reasonable by mid game so reducing it down to around 10 shouldn't have too much of an impact. Confident aim can help mitigate the lower accuracy and if you stick with a shield, reflex should still be good too.

 

Personally, I feel like the high deflection, big shield traditional tank is best left to chanter or paladin. Fighters can be super tanks while also being a great damage dealer because all of their abilities benefit from aggressive stats. The level 15 ability is actually worthless if doing high con/resolve and much of their self-healing is wasted if they are not taking a lot of damage. It really doesn't matter if the enemy hits you if you immediately heal the damage with constant/rapid recovery. Also, by having a low deflection score, enemies will foolishly want to attack you anyways so you don't have to worry as much about forcing them to engage you with abilities. Into the fray, charge, and knockdown can be used to further protect your party. Because of this, I recommend high Might and INT. Everything else can be left around 10 and put the remaining in your favorite stat. I personally like DEX as third favorite since it seems to make the largest impact, but that doesn't really help tankiness unless using an endurance draining weapon(s). Perception can help land the knockdowns with a longer duration, but it only helps that slightly.

 

My glass tsunami build soloed the game without an issue (effectively tanking every enemy) with 3/3 con and resolve and dual weapons by charging right into the middle of battle. This worked because I picked up all the items that help endurance regeneration, concentration, and have a beneficially effect when a crit is received. Having those stats at around 7-10 each is probably better though, and will work out just fine as long as you take rapid recovery talent and wear heavy armor.

Edited April 12, 2016 by Braven

[MaxQuest]

Race: Human

 

Str: 10

Con : 10

Dex: 4

P:16

Int: 18

Resolve: 20

Your talent distribution is okay for an early game tank.

Although later, you won't need that high resolve on a fighter. Even in dragon fights; where you will want to have higher fortitude than deflection. Also fighters have decent health-per-endurance coefficient, so you might want to make use of it by rising CON a bit. So something like 15/15/3/15/15/15 with Stunning weapon, Overbearing Guard and Binding Rope/Lavender Wreath should work fine.

Edited April 12, 2016 by MaxQuest

[bigwillystyle]

Lately I've really, really come to appreciate a CON score.  Resolve is nice for dialogue options and concentration, but for a single digit boost in deflection ... it's just underwhelming.  

 

I personally am of the opinion that the best tanks these days are Barbarians with maximum CON and tanked Resolve.  Holy Meditation & the Shod-in-Faith boots solve all problems.  A fighter could potentially be even better without shod-in-faith via Constant + Rapid Recovery.  

[Braven]

If you want to stick with the large shield and focus on maximum defense (while still at least contributing something in regards to damage), here are my suggestions.

 

Might:  19   - Helps constant recovery (and makes disengagement attacks more punishing).  Some of your best abilities like Charge also greatly benefits from might.  You also will want this for Fortitude, as getting stunned or knocked prone will break engagement and we don't need much CON.

 

Con:  5  - You don't need that large of an endurance pool because you will auto-heal whatever pitiful amounts of damage your enemies actually manage to do to you since, at best, they graze and you have constant recovery the whole battle.  It also hurts your "trump card" ability at level 15, Triggered Immunity.  As a result, this is a pretty useless stat.  If you find your self running out of health and want to rest less, the binding wounds talent is a very efficient way to raise health.  As an added bonus, lower con also means your human racial, "Fighting Spirit" will trigger more often.

 

Dex: 10 - Even though you are a tank, you still don't want to be slow as molasses.  Besides, you will need to pump out some per-rest abilities/items in tough battles.  Also, you have quite a few abilities you want to always get out pretty quickly (3 knockdowns, 2 charges, into the fray...).

 

Per: 8 - You don't really need accuracy that much as a tank and fighters already start with high accuracy.  The only reason you want a little is to make sure your knockdowns hit.  However, if you use the "disciplined barrage" ability right before the knockdowns, this is not much of a problem since it provides +20 accuracy.

 

Int: 18 - This is mainly for the following:  Constant Recovery, triggered immunity, Vigorous Defense, disciplined barrage, and knockdown duration.  These will help a great deal for tanking so I consider it a core stat for a fighter.  As an added bonus, it also helps your watcher abilities and can make you a great scroll user if you so wish.

 

Res: 20 - Since the goal of the ultra tank is maximum defense, might as well go all in on deflection.  Not really needed, but it is nice seeing enemies miss all the time and helps open up some conversation options.

 

Armor:  Because you have such high deflection, and your fortitude is only average, I recommend primarily wearing the hide armor, Blaidh Golan, because it provides a massive +50 defense to stun and prone.  It is found during the main quest line, so you can't miss it.  Sure, it is only medium armor and has lower DR, but that doesn't actually matter because your deflection is so high that enemies only graze if they hit at all so more DR often provides no benefit and the lighter armor will speed your character up a bit.  Another honorable mention is Angio's Gambeson (padded armor).  It will make your fighter really fast, once-per-rest.  After you use it, just switch to the other armor.

 

Weapon:  Because you are a super tank which enemies don't want to engage, you probably want a weapon with +1 guarding.  Here are options available early in the game:  

 

- "Measured Restraint", available early in the game and has guarding.  The damage will be terrible, but it has very good accuracy.

 

- "Shatterstar",  This war hammer is more damaging than measured restraint and available for purchase pretty early.  Also has an often overlooked bonus of an increased interrupt rating of 1 second, but that won't matter much with low perception and dexterity.  If you get this, you could consider the talent "interrupting blows" after the priority ones.

 

- "Hearth Harvest Hatchet" - This doesn't have guarding for +1 engagement, but it has +5 deflection if you want to be even more un-hittable.  Has DR-bypass for a little extra damage, but it will still be weak.  Maybe good for your second weapon set when engagement is less important.  Has "slash" damage type that the two guarding weapons lack. 

 

Shield:  You want to go with a large shield since the whole point is max defenses.  This not only helps deflection the most, but also helps reflex the most.  Because knockdown is a "full attack", I recommend using a shield with Bash so you can get two hits off with each knockdown.  Larder Door is available really early and is probably what you will use for quite a while.  Later in The White March, there are a couple good bash shields you can switch to.

 

Talents:  You will want Sword/Shield style, Rapid Recovery, Bonus Knockdown (a prone enemy is even better than an engaged one), and the ones that increase deflection.  In the late game, consider weapon focus, bear's fortitude, or binding wounds (if health is an issue).  Another honorable mention is the druid multi-class talent.  High intelligence will make the AOE and duration better and help out the whole party. However, someone else with less pressing talents might be able to take it sooner.

 

Abilities:  I don't recommend ever taking defender, even for a pure tank, because it is actually hard to get 5 people to surround your character.  After 3 enemies run into you, the others will just run by off to the side (outside of your engagement zone) and never turn back.  Also, that ability was nerfed really badly in version 2 such that it isn't worth the penalties.  Knockdown should be your first ability and is really good with high intelligence and a bashing shield.  Disciplined barrage is good for burst accuracy in order to land your knockdowns for maximum prone duration and lasts a decent amount of time with high INT.  Even though it seems like an offensive ability, I think it is actually a tanking ability because you are using it to prolong enemy disables.  Charge is really good for quickly getting to ranged attackers, or runners who disengage, and it does a TON of damage (sometimes hundreds of damage total with high might).  Into the fray is great tanking tool and also does pretty good damage too.

Edited April 12, 2016 by Braven

[KDubya]

I'd stay away from dumping constitution. Your high deflection will not help against spells or CC. Getting proned or stunned due to a low Fortitude will get you killed. Also many attacks do raw damage which will quickly drop you with your low endurance.

 

Triggered immunity only works against one damage type. If you are being beat on with Great Swords (slash/pierce) it'd do nothing. Same if you were being hit by multiple sources. Better in my opinion to not tank your con, maybe even add a few points and use Unbending (the one that gives you a 50% heal over time) when you really need to tank something. 

 

I have not tried it but I thought of a build using quarterstaffs for the reach. Get the one with the extra engagement, add in hold the line or defender for 3-5 engagements. The extra reach would allow you to engage farther away. If they move your prone attack would get them.

 

I'd keep Resolve at base 10 as deflection is easy to raise, maybe move the points into Perception to really max out on accuracy and go heavy for interrupts.

[Esajin]

Sure you can drop con, but why would you. Funnily enough, Constitution can be seen as an offensive stat on a fighter, as it allows you to use 10% more offensive gear/talents/abilities per point of Con (instead of, say, deflection, defenses, healing or dr), which may or may not be better than points in other stats depending on your approach.

 

Honestly part of me is starting to think that a flat 13 base in every attribute may be very well be pretty damn close to optimal for a fighter.

[Blunderboss]

Id like to keep con at 10 on Fighter Tanks because later when u stack all the regenerating health effects , u will notice that your endurance dont drop below 90% but your health can become red and limit endurance that way . Also 10 is max con i ever had on character :D so im not really a fan of the stat but its good for fighter tanks .

 

I want to stress how i respectfully disagree with Crucis , one should get Defender as soon as possible first 3 talents you should be aiming for are : Defender , Weapon and Shield Style , Hold The Line these talents are vital for Fighter Tank , because fighter has no other way to hold agro except engagement because he simply doesnt do any damage , and you should get Measured Restraint asap thats an endgame weapon right there in endless path 2 .

At level 7 you can take Overbearing Guard and now all your engagement slots starts to pay off greatly , my tank had 6 engagement slots in the end and i always sent him alone to start fights and it worked like a charm . Add in some Retaliation Gear , Flame Shield Potion , Pain Link from Cipher and such fighter will be able to kill 5 enemies that he has engaged without even attacking them once meanwhile staying with 90% of hp because of the regeneration setup that you should be aiming to build for every fighter tank . Also when going for Health Regen , id rather have Max Might than Max INT , con and dex arround 10 , rest points spread between Per and Res , tho if you gonna be using Measured Restraint u can safely leave per at 10 accuracy wont be a problem 

Edited April 13, 2016 by Blunderboss

[Psychevore]

Also 10 is max con i ever had on character :D so im not really a fan of the stat but its good for fighter tanks .

 

Ha, I did the same until I recently made a chanter with 14 con, which I ultimately ended up regretting as I found it rather useless later on in the game... and you can just sleep whenever anyway when your health gets low.

 

I once did a game where everyone had only 3 con and 3 perception This was obviously before perception gave accuracy, but it worked.

 

Anyway, fighter stat spread:

 

 

Was tricky in the beginning and I thought I maybe should've gone for more con...but ultimately I think I could've done with less.

Edited April 14, 2016 by Psychevore

[Lampros]

You really don't need RES 20. Fighters have the highest base deflection in the game. 15 is enough. If you raise MIG like DreamWayfarer said, your Constant Recovery can become very powerful and you can not only tank, but also spank by yourself. The Overbearing Guard can still be cool. I didn't try it but somebody said reach wepons are good for that because you will be able to engage enemies that are normally out of reach. If those want to leave you they will go prone. There's a quarterstaff named "Wendwalker" in the game that has "Guarding" (=+1 engagement limit). It's a reach weapon and together with Defender and Hold the Line you could have 5 engagement slots in an area of 1.8 meters (reach weapon). In theory that is. So theoretically even enemies that run past you but and are covered behind other enemies (but in reach) would eat disengagement attacks from you and fall on their faces. Sounds fun - don't know it that works. You could compensate for the missing shield with Cautious Attack and/or Superior Deflection. Together with Knockdown, Bonus Knockdown, Girlde of the Driving Wave and Clear Out there will be tons of Knockdowns.

 

If I ever make an Overbearing Guard tank, what stat/attributes controls the effectiveness of Knockdowns? Accuracy (ability to hit, I guess) and Intelligence (is knockdown duration considered a "spell" duration?)?

 

Edit: Never mind. Braven's comprehensive answer after your post addressed those points!

Edited September 9, 2017 by Lampros

[Lampros]

 

Armor:  Because you have such high deflection, and your fortitude is only average, I recommend primarily wearing the hide armor, Blaidh Golan, because it provides a massive +50 defense to stun and prone.  It is found during the main quest line, so you can't miss it.  Sure, it is only medium armor and has lower DR, but that doesn't actually matter because your deflection is so high that enemies only graze if they hit at all so more DR often provides no benefit and the lighter armor will speed your character up a bit.  Another honorable mention is Angio's Gambeson (padded armor).  It will make your fighter really fast, once-per-rest.  After you use it, just switch to the other armor...

 

Abilities:  I don't recommend ever taking defender, even for a pure tank, because it is actually hard to get 5 people to surround your character.  After 3 enemies run into you, the others will just run by off to the side (outside of your engagement zone) and never turn back.  Also, that ability was nerfed really badly in version 2 such that it isn't worth the penalties.  Knockdown should be your first ability and is really good with high intelligence and a bashing shield.  Disciplined barrage is good for burst accuracy in order to land your knockdowns for maximum prone duration and lasts a decent amount of time with high INT.  Even though it seems like an offensive ability, I think it is actually a tanking ability because you are using it to prolong enemy disables.  Charge is really good for quickly getting to ranged attackers, or runners who disengage, and it does a TON of damage (sometimes hundreds of damage total with high might).  Into the fray is great tanking tool and also does pretty good damage too.

 

This thread is full of useful information. Thanks! In particular, what is contained in these two paragraphs is wholly new for me. That is, I never even considered hide armor for melees due to the low DR; and I didn't realize that Defender is now not so useful.

[Boeroer]

Also note that reach weapons have no advantage when it comes to engagement. The longer reach doesn't lead to engagement over longer distances like I thought. Reach weapons have the same engagement distance like every other melee weapon.

[firkraag888]

Lately I've really, really come to appreciate a CON score.  Resolve is nice for dialogue options and concentration, but for a single digit boost in deflection ... it's just underwhelming.  

 

I personally am of the opinion that the best tanks these days are Barbarians with maximum CON and tanked Resolve.  Holy Meditation & the Shod-in-Faith boots solve all problems.  A fighter could potentially be even better without shod-in-faith via Constant + Rapid Recovery.

 

Whoa. I'm sorry but this is no where near anywhere accurate.

 

Comparison a barb to a fighter as a tank is waaaaaaay off.

 

Um unbending, unbroken.............here's looking at you

[JerekKruger]

Whoa. I'm sorry but this is no where near anywhere accurate.

Comparison a barb to a fighter as a tank is waaaaaaay off.

 

Um unbending, unbroken.............here's looking at you

 

That post is over a year old so I doubt its author will notice your reply. 

[Blades of Vanatar]

A while back I was messing with the fighter tank abilities. So I created a Rautaii Captain with 5 reach weapon fighters. It was .... awesome in most fights. Except for when facing confusion/dominate/charm using enemies. Then it turns back on you big time. I was trying to keep a formation of 2x3. Also isn't wonderful against those little 'Creature of the Black Lagoon' Lagufeth bastards.