Tank Building: 101

[mcgeedis]

Heya folks. We are starting a new adventure and I decided to build a tank. I haven't built a tank before, so I was wondering what tips everyone would be willing to share. Or you could share your experiences regarding other tank builds. How should ability points be distributed? What skills would you focus on? Feat chains? Best way for good AC? What am I missing?

And by the way. when I refer to tank, I am talking a big time damage dealing meat shield. Saves will be magic item and spell dependent.

Rules and books allowed - one non core (core defined as PHB and DMG) item, spell, feat, race, class, or prestige class per level. Our last campaign saw a warforged barbarian/fighter and he seemed to do really well. I have also been attracted to the whole spiked chain thing since it can really help to control the field in combat. The only thing that would prevent that is the need for 13 intelligence for improved trip and improved disarm.

 

[DogBackward]

First thing you want; the two Heavy Armor Specialization feats from Races of Stone. These'll give you +2 AC while in heavy armor, and -3 ACP while in heavy armor. Combine this with Knight 4 levels and Mithral Full Plate, and you've got an armor with +10 AC, -0 ACP and no penalty to speed.

The Knight levels will give you +1 AC when using a shield. Take Shield Specialization for another +1 from the shield, then take Shield Ward to add your shield bonus to your touch AC, which helps alleviate a huge problem in most tank builds. Knight levels will also allow you to treat your threatenes squares as difficult terrain, which helps you in your main goal. You can also use this to keep enemies from getting full attacks against you. Attack, take a 5ft step back, and wait. They can't 5ft step forward, since you can't take a 5ft step into difficult squares.

If you want, and if it fits the character and the setting, go with a couple of levels of Psychic Warrior for another Races of Stone feat. I forget the name, but it allows you to add your armor bonus against touch attacks, which makes you the hardest thing to hit, ever, anywhere.

After the Knight levels, and if you go for it the Psychic Warrior levels (I suggest no more than 2), go for Warblade. It has the d12 HD that will drive your taqnkiness for the rest of your career, and the maneuvers will help you dish out the damage as well. I suggest Mountian Hammer Strike (and future versions) combined with the Diamond Mind Concentration based maneuvers, combined with a high Concentration check.

If you're looking for more "You can't kill me... EVER.", then you might want to go for three levels of Paladin, and a level of Pious Templar, if you don't mind playing a holy tank. That gives you all teh nifty Paladin stuff, including Fear Immunity and some minor healing. With a decent Charisma, you get a nifty bonus to saves. The Pious Templar's Mettle ability is nice, as well. If you can manage it, and don't mind a couple of levels of low HD, go for 2 levels of Rogue for Evasion. Martial Rogue, if you can float it, for a couple more feats. That gives you phenominal saves, especially with Moment of Perfect Clarity, Action Before Thought and Mind Over Body. Combined with Mettle and Evasion, you'll never fail a save, and never take any effect from anything that allows a save.

Weapon wise, I'd suggest my old friend, Stormclaw. It was a +1 Keen Thundering Shocking Burst Adamantine Mercurial Longsword. It's not the most broken weapon around, which is cool, but it's got a 19-20/x4 crit, and deals MASSIVE damage if you do confirm that critical. 4d8 +4x Str base, +1d6 shocking, +3d10 shocking burst, +3d8 thundering, +4x any other static bonuses. Being the tank, you'll be making plenty of attacks, and those are bound to threaten eventually. Your shield should be just plain +x, the highest you can get it. Especially if you didn't go the psionic route, you'll need that boost to touch AC from Shield Ward. Your armor whould be +2, then add Light/Medium/Heavy Fortification, as soon as you can get them. Being the tank, you'll be taking plenty of attacks, and those are bound to threaten eventually. Get an item with Shield Other on it. DnD combat is hectic, and you can't be near everybody all the time. When battle starts, connect with the squishiest ally so they don't die when they wander off and get attacked by the hidden badguy. 'Cuz there's always a hidden badguy.

Stats are simple. If you're going the normal tank, go with Con/Str/Int/Dex/Wis/Cha. If you take the psionic route, switch Dex and Wis. if you go with Paladin, go Con/Str/Cha/Wis/Dex. This, of course, can be modified to fit your character's personality concept, but Con should ALWAYS be at the top of your list. It's the first thing you enhance, the first thing you read books about, and the only thing you use level-beased increases for.

In battle, with your Knight levels, always stay in the middle of things. Make sure that enemies can't move ANYWHERE without being in your threatened area at some point. First off, it'll give you an AoA as they move away, and if you get enough feats, take Standstill to keep them from moving away. Second, their movement will be slowed since your threatened squares are difficult terrain. This means that most enemies will either not be able to move far past you, or will stop and fight you instead of others. And that's what a tank is for.

So, that's generally my take on tanks. Make sure you're the guy who never dies, and you can have the dubious honor and glory of carrying your allies out of the dungeon just about every time.

 

[Lord Zardoz]

There are generally two kinds of tanks. Those that are hard to take down, and those that have massive damage output. It really depends on what kind of tank you want to go for.

For tanks that are hard to take down, your best bet is usually a Dwarven Fighter type. You can avoid the movement penalties for wearing heavy armour, and you get the benefit of a Con bonus. Add to that the ability to use a Dwarven waraxe, and then you get a good damage output for a 1 handed weapon and the benefit of a shield. If you have the PHB 2, you can also add Shield Specialization. From there, I would suggest going for the Weapon specialization to enhance your damage and to hit, and getting Expertise so you an further pump your AC.

For tanks that are heavy hitters, there are a few ways to go about it, but the classic would be a Barbarian using a 2 handed weapon, possibly a Half Orc for the Str kick. Power attack further enhances your hitting power given the 2 for 1 when using 2 handed weapons. After getting that far, there usually aren't many feat choices that will obviously further enhance your damage output. Sticking with Barbarian is never a bad choice, but many prefer to switch back to fighter for the extra feats. It really comes down to whether or not you want more feats to play with, and how your DM does fights. If you can get by on raging only once per day (due to the game letting you rest often), using Barbarian as a level dip can work out fine.

END COMMUNICATION

 

[1500run]

First thing you want; the two Heavy Armor Specialization feats from Races of Stone. These'll give you +2 AC while in heavy armor, and -3 ACP while in heavy armor. Combine this with Knight 4 levels and Mithral Full Plate, and you've got an armor with +10 AC, -0 ACP and no penalty to speed.

The Knight levels will give you +1 AC when using a shield. Take Shield Specialization for another +1 from the shield, then take Shield Ward to add your shield bonus to your touch AC, which helps alleviate a huge problem in most tank builds. Knight levels will also allow you to treat your threatenes squares as difficult terrain, which helps you in your main goal. You can also use this to keep enemies from getting full attacks against you. Attack, take a 5ft step back, and wait. They can't 5ft step forward, since you can't take a 5ft step into difficult squares.

If you want, and if it fits the character and the setting, go with a couple of levels of Psychic Warrior for another Races of Stone feat. I forget the name, but it allows you to add your armor bonus against touch attacks, which makes you the hardest thing to hit, ever, anywhere.

After the Knight levels, and if you go for it the Psychic Warrior levels (I suggest no more than 2), go for Warblade. It has the d12 HD that will drive your taqnkiness for the rest of your career, and the maneuvers will help you dish out the damage as well. I suggest Mountian Hammer Strike (and future versions) combined with the Diamond Mind Concentration based maneuvers, combined with a high Concentration check.

If you're looking for more "You can't kill me... EVER.", then you might want to go for three levels of Paladin, and a level of Pious Templar, if you don't mind playing a holy tank. That gives you all teh nifty Paladin stuff, including Fear Immunity and some minor healing. With a decent Charisma, you get a nifty bonus to saves. The Pious Templar's Mettle ability is nice, as well. If you can manage it, and don't mind a couple of levels of low HD, go for 2 levels of Rogue for Evasion. Martial Rogue, if you can float it, for a couple more feats. That gives you phenominal saves, especially with Moment of Perfect Clarity, Action Before Thought and Mind Over Body. Combined with Mettle and Evasion, you'll never fail a save, and never take any effect from anything that allows a save.

Weapon wise, I'd suggest my old friend, Stormclaw. It was a +1 Keen Thundering Shocking Burst Adamantine Mercurial Longsword. It's not the most broken weapon around, which is cool, but it's got a 19-20/x4 crit, and deals MASSIVE damage if you do confirm that critical. 4d8 +4x Str base, +1d6 shocking, +3d10 shocking burst, +3d8 thundering, +4x any other static bonuses. Being the tank, you'll be making plenty of attacks, and those are bound to threaten eventually. Your shield should be just plain +x, the highest you can get it. Especially if you didn't go the psionic route, you'll need that boost to touch AC from Shield Ward. Your armor whould be +2, then add Light/Medium/Heavy Fortification, as soon as you can get them. Being the tank, you'll be taking plenty of attacks, and those are bound to threaten eventually. Get an item with Shield Other on it. DnD combat is hectic, and you can't be near everybody all the time. When battle starts, connect with the squishiest ally so they don't die when they wander off and get attacked by the hidden badguy. 'Cuz there's always a hidden badguy.

Stats are simple. If you're going the normal tank, go with Con/Str/Int/Dex/Wis/Cha. If you take the psionic route, switch Dex and Wis. if you go with Paladin, go Con/Str/Cha/Wis/Dex. This, of course, can be modified to fit your character's personality concept, but Con should ALWAYS be at the top of your list. It's the first thing you enhance, the first thing you read books about, and the only thing you use level-beased increases for.

In battle, with your Knight levels, always stay in the middle of things. Make sure that enemies can't move ANYWHERE without being in your threatened area at some point. First off, it'll give you an AoA as they move away, and if you get enough feats, take Standstill to keep them from moving away. Second, their movement will be slowed since your threatened squares are difficult terrain. This means that most enemies will either not be able to move far past you, or will stop and fight you instead of others. And that's what a tank is for.

So, that's generally my take on tanks. Make sure you're the guy who never dies, and you can have the dubious honor and glory of carrying your allies out of the dungeon just about every time.

whoa, dude, did you READ his post, or did you just post what you once played??

 

[GorTeX]

First thing you want; the two Heavy Armor Specialization feats from Races of Stone. These'll give you +2 AC while in heavy armor, and -3 ACP while in heavy armor. Combine this with Knight 4 levels and Mithral Full Plate, and you've got an armor with +10 AC, -0 ACP and no penalty to speed.

I agree with you here. Check with your DM tho, as WOTC continuously rules that Mithal makes armor one category lighter for all purposes--so Mithral Full plate is medium armor and Armor Optimization won't work

Knight levels will also allow you to treat your threatenes squares as difficult terrain, which helps you in your main goal. You can also use this to keep enemies from getting full attacks against you. Attack, take a 5ft step back, and wait. They can't 5ft step forward, since you can't take a 5ft step into difficult squares.

IIRC, they only count as difficult terrain if your oppoent starts his action in them (or something like that--can't find my PHII at the moment to check

 

[Diirk]

First thing you want; the two Heavy Armor Specialization feats from Races of Stone. These'll give you +2 AC while in heavy armor, and -3 ACP while in heavy armor. Combine this with Knight 4 levels and Mithral Full Plate, and you've got an armor with +10 AC, -0 ACP and no penalty to speed.

Mithral Full Plate is medium armour, so you still take a penalty to speed.

Edit: Oh nm Knight 4 removes that.

 

[DogBackward]

whoa, dude, did you READ his post, or did you just post what you once played??

First of all, and this is not meant to be malicious, but when you Quote a long post like that, it's generally a good idea to shorten it, and just add a "..." in there. Presumably, everybody reading your post has already read mine, and repeating that much text wastes space.

Second, yeah I did read his post. I never played that character, actually, though Stormclaw was a favorite weapon of one of my old characters. He asked for a big-time damage dealing meatshield, and I gave him several options to go that direction. He said he could use one non-core thing per level, so even if he decides to use all of my non-core suggestions, he should be fine if the game is a high enough level (a number he neglected to mention, so I didn't know what I was working with there). I'll admit, I did spend a little more space on the "meat shield" part than the "damage dealing" part, but that's the part I had the most ideas on. If you have that huge AC and HP total, you'll be around much longer to bash someone's face in. A Warblade has some good damage-dealing maneuvers, so those would help. And with Power Attack, if you take it, that Crit with Stormclaw would smack just about anything down.

So, really, what was your problem with my post?

As for mithral and WOTC's rulings, they're not exactly known for using anything resembling sense there, to be honest. Mithral armor is still bulky and still has a large enough area to benefit from such things, it's just lighter. Of course, any DM might rule against that, but that's his right, I guess.

 

[Quartz]

2 levels of Monk will allow you to tank when you're caught without armour. 4 levels of Fighter is a must for Weapon Specialisation, allowing Weapon Mastery down the line if you want to be really good with one type of weapon - others go for the Trip / Bull Rush / etc feats.

 

[mcgeedis]

He said he could use one non-core thing per level, so even if he decides to use all of my non-core suggestions, he should be fine if the game is a high enough level (a number he neglected to mention, so I didn't know what I was working with there).

Sorry about not mentioning what level we'd be going up to. But, that is because I really don't know how high we'd go. I'd say at least 15th.

In addition, would it help if I mentioned that the DM said he prefers epic Good vs Evil type of campaigns, so Paladin is getting thrust into the limelight more and more.

Thanks for the advice so far! One other question though: Does race have any bearing on the basic Tank builds?

 

[DogBackward]

15th level is great for a good, solid, never-dies tank build.

Well, as mentioned above, dwarf makes a solid choice, though you could be hurt by the low speed. Unfortunately, the slow, plodding warrior concept doesn't really work in DnD, you have to be able to move to engage your enemy. Human is always a good choice, for just about everything. If you don't mind taking an LA hit, Goliath would make a great choice, both allowing larger weapons, improving your chances against/with trip and such, and a nice Strength bonus.

I'd suggest either dwarf or human myself. A human's bonus feat is always handy, and the build would probably be feat-heavy. Dwarves have enough great tanky things that the speed penalty is worth it. Bonuses to saves against spells and poison, a Con bonus and Stability are pretty handy, too.