What makes the best tank, in your opinion?

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I don't think Baldurdash fixed it Drew.

 

Are you sure? I don't have a Baldurdash install for comparison it anymore, so I'll have to take your word for it.

 

Yes,I never play a game without it.

 

Best legit tank? Fighter/Mage multiclass with Grandmastery in Staves...

Stoneskin, Mirror Image, Improved Haste, Tensor's Transformation, Improved Invisibility, Blur, Spirit Armor, SI: Abjuration, SI: Divination...and then just rip into anything and everything.

If you are really high level, activate Critical strike with that Staff of the Ram +6 and see the chunks fly. I honestly cannot think of a better LEGIT tank in-game. If you wanted to make it mod-inclusive, remove the XP cap and play an FMC...

 

It just doesn't feel right having a Fighter/Mage not dual wield.

I never used that staff before, its obvious that it can deal out a nice amount of damage, but are the affects on striking (stun & knockback) stopped by MR or include a save vs. component that isn't stated?

Critical Strike is nice in theory but so many enemies have a helmet it just doesn't deal out the huge damage it could, although it is nice having guaranteed hits against the high ac ascension characters.

[ May 22, 2006, 17:39: Message edited by: Pseudospawn ]

 

As for the Staff. Put it this way. It's the weapon that is used to do the highest possible damage backstabs/backsmacks ever done.

The knockback affect only has a small percentage chance of working(like 5% or something like that). I'm not sure if there is anything that causes it not to work other than that. These other guys might know.

 

I was under the impression that Hindo + Equalizer inflicted an equal if not greater amount of damage with True Grandmastery.

I never backstab outside of a solo game as its often too damn powerful and i prefer my team to march in face the enemy like men, and heroicly slaughter them all. not sneak around stabbing/smacking.

 

The barbarian's problem is his inability to wear better then chainmail, which means he gets hit... a lot. Also the berserker's frenzy lasts quite a bit longer then the barbarian's rage.

The barbarian's immunity to backstab makes him useful in some places, but his resistances to damage during SoA are so small they've never made a difference for me.

 

I have to go with the Barbarian on this one. I took a solo Barbarian through most of a rather heavily-modded game -- enough to say they are great tanks. The best chain mail is only (if memory serves) 2 AC higher than the best plate, which doesn't make that big of a difference, whereas the 20% damage reduction and the d12 hitpoints are a huge help.

 

The Equalizer has some nice potential damage but it's unreliable. It relies on the randomness of the enemy alignments.

Ilmater some of the best armor's in ToB are only rated as Leather so they can get the same AC as any other character. In fact if your not playing a Bard or a mage/something combo then there are a few different chainmails that are actually quite good. Including the Chainmail from the black Dragon in the End of SoA.

The berserker rage only lasts like 30 seconds. According to the stuff that i have that's not any longer than the Barbarian Rage but I haven't tested it.

20% Damage reduction at level 19 is a pretty good reduction and can mean a lot. And that's more than duable just in unmodded SoA. But considering that we are in the ToB forum saying it doesn't mean much in SoA is not entirely a ringing endorsement for being weak. It would mean a lot more in the SoA forum.


Though this is all making me think that perhaps my Cleric should wait and I should play a Barbarian to see just how well they do. I've never bothered to play one seriously or for the full game.

 

Slight correction: Barbarians cannot wear anything heavier than splint, not chain. Basically all that means is that they cannot wear plate. Only two of the four dragonscale armors are considered plate mail.

The damage reduction is significant, and with the extra 18 HP, it makes the barbarian able to take almost twice as much damage as a fighter, especially when other damage-reducing items (like the Belt of Inertial Barrier) are added on top of that. I still stand by the Berserker->Mage for unadulterated a$$-kicking + absolute protection, though.

 

@Felinoid
Agreed. Fighter/Mage in any setup is gonna walk away with it.

Barbarian may be able to reduce the damage taken and have more hitpoints to burn through.

But a good fighter/mage won't take any damage whatsoever.

@starwalker
I don't know how unpreditcable the damage is though. Most everyone you fight in the game is evil and of an extreme (chaotic/lawful)

 

Only if you have installed a mod to make them that way. We had that discussion about the Carsomyr when we were talking about weapons that did the most damage. It was tested against a Drow and it was only evil. it wasn't Chaotic or Lawful.

Those that talk about other things that are creatures in the game say there are a number of things that got marked as neutral in their files as well. Alignments are all over the place with creatures. The oversight mod has a component that fixes that but I haven't installed it at this point.

 

Looking through the item files, I made a surprising discovery. The best plate in the game (barring the disintegrating Drow armor) is AC -2, and the best chain/splint mail in the game is...AC -2! The only thing is that there are four sets of plate with AC -2 (Armor of the Hart +3, Tracie's Plate +5 *cursed*, Enkidu's Full Plate +3, & Shuruppak's Plate), there is only one set of chain/splint mail with AC -2 (White Dragon Scale), only available in ToB. Before then, the best you can get is AC 0 or 1.

Also, the only (physical) damage reduction items I could find were the Belt of Inertial Barrier and the Defender of Easthaven. Still, taking only 60% damage is incredible. Especially when a single Hardiness can reduce that to 10%.

Ultimately, a Barbarian->Mage would be teh pwn, but that's not possible, even with SK.

EDIT:
Though I do remember hearing about a mod that allowed it...

 

You forgot Roranach's Horn (Gromnir's helmet) for an additional 50% crushing resistance

Also a Fighter/Thief or a Cleric/Thief can do even better.Both of them could use Jan's Armor which gives + 25% physical resistance.
And the Cleric/Thief instead of Hardiness can use Armor of Faith (+ 25% phys.res.).Lower resistance than Hardiness but with a much longer duration.

 

There's one other item with Damage reduction but I don't know that a PC of any usable kind for this discussion could wear it. Jan Jansen's armour.

edit: nevermind. TheTruth just answered that.

 

Also the Rat form from the Cloak of the Sewers grants 90% resistance to physical damage.But it's not cumulative with the resistance of other items,AoF or Hardiness.

Who knows if it is cumulative with the Barbarian's innate p.resistance.It would be the only way for a character to have +100% ph.res. in the unmodded game.

 

Hmm. I was very thorough with the armors (and helmets and shields), but I didn't think of looking in the components (Roranach's Horn is used to improve the Staff of the Ram). Nice catch. Jan's armor is usable only by CN gnome M/Ts with at least 4 STR and 17 DEX.

And yes, a Berserker->Cleric would get Armor of Faith, but they would be denied Stoneskin. A Berserker->Druid would have both AoF and Ironskins, though... That makes for a whole new consideration, with the divine damage reduction spells giving pause against arcane absolute protection spells.

 

UAI

 

Ah, of course. UAI. It fixes everything, doesn't it?

RE: Rat resistance
I don't think the barbarian bonus would stack, but items might. It'd be quite ironically hilarious if the best tank ended up being a puny little rat. Though I'm not sure I'd call that a tank; maybe just a meat-shield.