Help me build a tank

[Mort]

Crusader or Warblade do sound nice. Does anyone have any experience with these classes? Crusader in particular seems like a lot of book keeping to figure out which maneuver you can use. Are they good classes to multiclass? I was thinking maybe taking a few levels of crusader and then going for another class or PrC. Something like 3clr/3crus/-> pious templar. Do you think there's more tanky goodness by staying crusader all the way up?

IME crusaders can really dish out damage as well as take it. When I DM'd a crusader and a warblade in the same party, they were about equal in damage (at 7th level) but the warblade was a bit of a paper tiger (nocked out 2 encounters in a row) while the Crusader just wouldn't fall down.

Multiclassing is tempting but the crusader has some pretty good incentives to keep going (Furious counterstrike an the increasing delayed damage pool being the primary ones).

 

[welby]

Well you guys rock. Looks like a human crusader 5 with Stone Power, Extra Granted Maneuver, and Vital Recovery feats.

At 6, it seems like Sudden Recovery would be a nifty addition if it procs Vital Recovery. It does do that, right?

2nd question: If I get hit for 4 and it goes to my delayed damage pool, then on my turn I use stone power to get 4 temp hit points, at the end of my turn those 4 points of damage get soaked up by the temporary hit points, correct?
If that's true, combined with all the other abilities, I can see how awesome crusaders are for tanking.

 

[Mort]

Well you guys rock. Looks like a human crusader 5 with Stone Power, Extra Granted Maneuver, and Vital Recovery feats.

At 6, it seems like Sudden Recovery would be a nifty addition if it procs Vital Recovery. It does do that, right?

2nd question: If I get hit for 4 and it goes to my delayed damage pool, then on my turn I use stone power to get 4 temp hit points, at the end of my turn those 4 points of damage get soaked up by the temporary hit points, correct?
If that's true, combined with all the other abilities, I can see how awesome crusaders are for tanking.

1) you're recovering a manuever so yes this would work. That said, Crusaders recover HP's left and right anyway, vital recovery doesn't seem like that great a feat for them (sudden recovery is a great investment though).

2) this also seems to work, since you take the damage from the damage pool at the end of your turn and the temp. HP's from stone power last until the beginning of your next turn.

 

[Nightfall]

*thinks you don't need to use any other Class to get into Pious Templar if you just go Crusader* Unless you WANT more levels in cleric...

 

[BASHMAN]

Crusader or Warblade do sound nice. Does anyone have any experience with these classes? Crusader in particular seems like a lot of book keeping to figure out which maneuver you can use. Are they good classes to multiclass? I was thinking maybe taking a few levels of crusader and then going for another class or PrC. Something like 3clr/3crus/-> pious templar. Do you think there's more tanky goodness by staying crusader all the way up?

I recomend if you multiclass with Crusader or any Bo9S class, you take all your levels in whatever else you take FIRST. This is because your initiator level (which determines the highest level maneuvers you can learn) is = All your other classes/2 +Crusader.

So if you go 6 Crus, 6Cler, your initiator level at the last time you got to chose a maneuver was 6... meaning your best maneuver is level 3 when you are a 12th level character.

If, howver, you go Cleric6 then Crusader 6, your initiator level would be 9, giving you acces to level 5 maneuvers! (albeit likely only 1)

This worked out well for me. I was playing a level 15 Monk when I got BO9S and decided to take my next level in sword sage. So as a Monk15/Ssage1 I was an 8th level iniator! With my #maneuvers known, I was able to have I think 1 4th level maneuver, a couple 3rds, and the rest 1 or 2 (sword sages know a lot of maneuvers).

Now, as for the Random aspect of Crusader, there is a feat that you MUST take--
Sudden Recovery- Once per day, as a swift action, you can instantly recover an expended maneuver. This maneuver is immediately granted if you are a crusader. This means 1/day you can choose any maneuver you want without having to "get lucky" to get it back.

A very good feat is:
Extra Granted Maneuver- You have 1 more maneuver granted in your pool. This is good because it gives you better "odds" of having one of your preferred maneuvers being granted to you.

As a meat shield, an EXCELLENT feat would be:
Stone Power- Take penalty on attack rolls to gain temporary HP each round equal to twice that. i.e. -5 to hit gives you 10 Temp HP/round (they only last 1 round, and most you can get is 10hp).

EDIT: I see I was scooped on this a bit!

 

[satori01]

Ultimately Stone Power I think pales as time goes on, 10 HP is just not that big of a deal, especially with the healing potential of a Crusader.

Feats like Goad might be very useful. With a 3 person party you want to be sure to pull the monsters to you. A multi class with Knight might not be a bad way to go, with Knights Challenge being a good way to bring the bad guys to you.

Paladin/Crusader ->Divine Oracle would be an interesting way to go. Your BAB would take a hit but the Evasion like ability from the Divine Oracle that works w/ Heavy Armor and Mettle would make you the saving throw master.

 

[Engilbrand]

My tank is an Incarnate. At level 6, his AC is about 26 and he does 1d8+5d6+6 damage or so. Incarnates can easily get ridiculous ACs earlier than anyone else and they have enough cool abilities that they can damage or do just about anything else. I'm a big fan.

 

[Kafkonia]

Don't overlook the Knight. While he doesn't have quite as many cool doodads as the Bo9S folks do, he does have (at 4th level) an ability to make people attack him, which is always useful in a tank.

The d12 HD doesn't hurt either.

 

[Felon]

Funny how often threads about builting an "ultimate ___" warrior seem to inevitably boil down to Bo9S.

Just sayin'....

 

[Mort]

Funny how often threads about builting an "ultimate ___" warrior seem to inevitably boil down to Bo9S.

Just sayin'....

I find this a good thing. It means the book is doing it's job about being a fresh new take on warriors.