3.5 Dwarven Defender build help

[Incan Road]

I am about to stat a new campaign with a group and we are starting at lvl 10. I strongly want to play a Dwarven Defender. I was hoping that someone could tell me a way to make a good Dwarven Defender in 10 levels, or at least a good starting build for a Dwarven Defender later on? Also we are only using the Core rulebooks for 3.5, nothing else not even the complete series.

[Hawk7915]

Dwarven Defender is pretty weak, even in core only it's a lot worse than just straight fighter in my opinion. Still, if you are married to a core only Dwarven Defender build then here is an okay one . . .

Dwarf Fighter 8/Dwarven Defender 2
Stat priority: STR > CON > INT (must have 13) > DEX (must have 13) > WIS > CHA
Feats:
1st: Toughness (bleh!)
F1: Exotic Weapon Proficiency: Spiked Chain
F2: Combat Expertise
3rd: Endurance (double bleh, but at least you can sleep in your armor. . .)
F4: Improved Trip
6th: Dodge
F6: Power Attack
F8: Combat Reflexes (if DEX is 14 or greater) or Improved Disarm (if not)
9th (first level of Dwarven Defender): ??? Probably not profit.

At this point, the rest of the feats don't matter a great deal. If you can use the SRD, Stand Still and/or Knock-down would be great. If not, you could work on the Weapon Focus line, you could take Diehard or Cleave since you've already taken the prerequisites, or you could just take save-boosting feats and. . .more. . .toughness (I feel dirty just typing that). You have 5 feats to play with, so you can also choose to take something like ranged combat feats so if your enemy refuses to come within reach of you for some mean reason, you can shoot it to death.

EDIT: If you want to be cheesy, then see if you can ask your DM to have a backstory where you were a feral and angry dwarven raider (chaotic) for a while, but have been captured and retrained as a dwarf of law by the Defenders. Your build would be Fighter 6/Barbarian 1/Dwarven Defender 3 in that case, and you would get to stack rage and defensive stance for MASSIVE DAMAGE 1/day.

[Godskook]

Best advice I can give is don't. The biggest class feature is one that's negated by normal combat(movement). Boosting AC only helps so much, as eventually, your DM will just respond with high AB monsters or things that don't rely on hitting AC.

And then there's a couple spells that'll negate your now-famous combat style(Telekinesis, Forceful Hand, and Cloudkill come to mind as being the most relevant in core).

*You're a L10 PC. By definition, you're famous enough that people would know about you and specifically plan to fight you.

[marjan]

EDIT: If you want to be cheesy, then see if you can ask your DM to have a backstory where you were a feral and angry dwarven raider (chaotic) for a while, but have been captured and retrained as a dwarf of law by the Defenders. Your build would be Fighter 6/Barbarian 1/Dwarven Defender 3 in that case, and you would get to stack rage and defensive stance for MASSIVE DAMAGE 1/day.

He'd lose rage once he becomes lawful. Aside from that the build looks solid. Just don't use stance unless you have a good chance of keeping your opponent next to you.

[Seatbelt]

Could you make a viable Dwarven Defender build that uses ranged attacks?

[QuantumSteve]

The best "Dwarven Defender" is actually a Dwarven Fighter or Barbarian.

DD's signature ability "Defensive Stance" is very limiting when you're not fighting in a bottleneck and enemies can just walk around you. The best way to overcome this is to grab a reach weapon and use a lockdown tripping build. The problem is lockdown builds are feat intensive, and DD already costs 3 feats.

The best way to play a Dwarven tank is Fighter, possibly with splashes of Barb, Pally, or even Cleric.

If you want to play a lockdown build, you're probably still better off with Fighter.

What exactly about Dwarven Defender appeals to you? What are your visions for your character? If we knew exactly what you wanted to do, we could easier tell you the best way to do it.

[marjan]

Boosting AC only helps so much, as eventually, your DM will just respond with high AB monsters or things that don't rely on hitting AC.

DM can negate any advantage you have by selecting appropriate monsters. That's not a reason not to play class.


If you want to play a lockdown build, you're probably still better off with Fighter.

Lockdown fighter in core gets every feat he needs by level 3,, so I'll say DD's abilities are better. Barbarian/Fighter would be better, though.

[Hawk7915]

DM can negate any advantage you have by selecting appropriate monsters. That's not a reason not to play class.

That's true, but in my meager experience a DM seems more willing to start hurling high AB monsters at a party with a big tank than they are to say, hurl enchanters at a party with abysmmal will saves, or drop an AMF on a wizard's head every other encounter. And the bigger concern is hitting enemies that either:

1) Don't attack his fortitude saves or AC. Touch attacks, will or reflex saves; these will be bad news for him and they're pretty common at this level (spells and spell-like abilities, incorporeal enemies, dragon's breath weapons) .

2) Ignore him entirely, since if he attempts to pursue them he loses his Defensive Stance. Might not happen with a big bad Dire Bear, but a demon, or vampire, or humanoid enemy? Will probably leave the big hunk of metal that's rooted to the ground alone.

If the rest of your team is similarly "playing for fun" with, say, A Ranger/Wizard/Arcane Archer, and an Evoker, and a heal-bot cleric, then you'll probably be fine as long as you avoid the urge to use a Shield. I know it seems like you should, but man do you need the reach to compensate for being immobile in defensive stance, and you need the damage to actually make yourself a threat to monsters. And as others have noted, a Fighter 4/Barbarian 6 is a much, much better build, as is arguably a Fighter 4/Paladin 6.

[PinkysBrain]

Ranger (archery) 3/Fighter 4/Dwarven Defender 3

Feats : dodge, toughness, point blank shot, many shot, precise shot, quickdraw, Iron Will.

PS. at level 10 you should be using a shield ... an animated one that is.

[QuantumSteve]

Ranger (archery) 3/Fighter 4/Dwarven Defender 3

Feats : dodge, toughness, point blank shot, many shot, precise shot, quickdraw, Iron Will.

Does manyshot work with thrown weapons?

[Godskook]

DM can negate any advantage you have by selecting appropriate monsters. That's not a reason not to play class.

1.In this case, yes it is. Few other classes have as obvious and common weaknesses as the DD.

2.Most good classes don't rely on a single avenue of attack, and as long as the DM is throwing CR-appropriate monsters at you, there's only so much he can do to negate an entire class.

[QUOTE=Hawk7915;8260692]1) Don't attack his fortitude saves or AC. Touch attacks, will or reflex saves; these will be bad news for him and they're pretty common at this level (spells and spell-like abilities, incorporeal enemies, dragon's breath weapons)./QUOTE]

Touch attacks aren't the big issue as the class feature grants a beefy +4 dodge bonus, which is beefy bonus for touch AC.

If we're going to tear the class apart, let's at least do it accurately.

[ericgrau]

Out of core classes DD is more than decent. Full BAB, 2 good saves, d12 HD, free AC and all of the minor barbarian special abilities. The supposed drawback is not a drawback at all, since the consequence for moving is loss of the benefit and a trivial penalty. You are never stuck, not even for a moment.

I would build him like any melee build. If you're outdoors a lot then you may never use defensive stance. In a dungeon all you have to do is plop yourself in the middle of a 15' wide or smaller hallway and activate the stance. If monsters waste time running by you and eating a hit, then in a game where most of the fight happens in the first two rounds you're already at a huge advantage. If you suspect there will be larger rooms then grab a reach weapon. If monsters play stupid as mentioned, you can capitalize on their mistake even more with a tripper build and combat reflexes. If nothing is in reach on your turn, simply deactivate the stance and go after something.

All the other benefits are passive (though probably greater), so you don't need to worry about them. Simply enjoy your nice stats. The best way to capitalize on an excellent free defense is to ignore it and use your extra time alive and not mind-screwed to hit things more. Maximizing defense while dumping offense is what will make the myths about it true. Defense is cheap, easy to obtain, and should never need to come at the expense of offense.

[Incan Road]

I'm aware of the drawbacks that come with the Dwarven Defender, I just want to experiment with one. The build I was thinking of was Ranger/Fighter/DD. I thought about using a Barbarian but DDs must be lawful.

[ericgrau]

Oh, in that case I assume you want an archer? Try a normal archer build. As said, nothing really needs to change, simply enjoy the better stats letting you fight longer with dying or getting enchanted. Except now you don't need to end your defensive stance as often. Pick a composite bow designed for your lowest possible strength; 1-2 points of damage isn't the end of the world but -2 AB could be much worse. If you must do a ranger archer, I'd go for a dwarven cave ranger style, with knowledge(dungeoneering), a good search modifier to exploit your stonecunning, etc. Otherwise fighters could get all the same feats and more.

[Godskook]

Note: There is no restriction on staying Lawful once you finish the class, so dipping Barbarian afterwards is still viable. Since you're staying within the core rulebooks, there are no rules whatsoever that would stop you.

And yeah, a tripper build that focuses on overcoming the DD's core weakness with reach is probably the best you can do. Buy a permanent enlarge person if you can handle it to help with the reach.

[Incan Road]

I didn't think about a trip build. In that case I will probably reconsider my progression.

[PinkysBrain]

Oh, in that case I assume you want an archer? Try a normal archer build.
Ranger 3 gets him 2 feats he would want any way (rapid shot and endurance, the second is prereq for DD), boosts his saves, lets him use healing wands, more skill points ... how is pure fighter better?

[herrhauptmann]

You might want Deepwarden 2. It grants Con to AC. So the defensive stance gets nicer.
Interlocking plate: Every time you take a 5 foot step or less, your AC rises by 2.
Make sure your DM will allow Improved toughness in place of toughness. And a dodge variant in place regular dodge. (There's at least two which are explicitly stated to work in place of dodge.)
If you're going to do ranger, check out their alternate combat styles. Includes, sword an board, 2handed weapon, grappling, and others. In a dragon magazine.

Deepstone Sentinal and bloodstorm blade together make a very fine PC who works like a DD and throws his weapon at the enemy. But they're Tome of Battle PrC's.

Here's a level 16 character I used: DM didn't allow ACF's, and had a few minor houserules:

In no particular order: Barbarian 2, Fighter 2, Cleric 1 (war domain, served Gorm Gulthyn), Dwarf Paragon3, Pious Templar 4, Deepwarden 2, Dwarven Defender 2

Feats:
Dodge (couldn't find the variants I mentioned above)
Endurance
Improved Toughness
Leap Attack (was useless due to campaign style, monsters always got the drop on us)
Power Attack
True Believer
Weapon Focus: D.waraxe (bonus from Cleric)
Weapon Spec: Dwarven waraxe (bonus)
Track (bonus)
Melee weapon mastery
Cleave
Slashign fury (useless, the extra attack negated by the -5 to attack)

Paragon: Racial bonuses were improved. Added HD to all craft checks on metal/stone. +30ft darkvision. +2 con (aka: +1 AC)
Cleric gave me access to wands and scrolls for the class (we needed a healer)
Pioustemplar: Mettle, smite, DR, a bonus feat, and weapon spec.
Deepwarden: Track, stonewarden, trapsense,
DD: Improved Uncanny dodge, defensivestance
Barbarian: fast movement

Items:
Custom boots of haste. As per spell, infinite use per day.
Mask of synthesete: negate blindness, or deafness.
Armor: Interlocking, soulfire, agility +3, blueshine (durable is cheaper), anti-impact,
D.Waraxe: Blessed (BoED version), Everbright

Flatfooted AC was 34, 40 in my stance. (Not counting the +2 for interlocking). My AC should've been higher, but my dancing tower shield had gotten sundered in the 3rd fight, and I never found a magical replacement. So I was stuck with a dinky nonmagical shield.
Base fort was 21. FInal was 35 in stance. Will final was 19. Final reflex was 12 (very difficult getting that raised. And looking back, i think I might've done soemthing illegal to do it)
My attack routines were varied.
Hasted: base of 15,15,10,5
Hasted slashing fury, gave a base attack of 15,15,15,10,5, but all had a -5
If in stance, I gained an extra +1 to each attack.

[TroubleBrewing]

You might want Deepwarden 2. It grants Con to AC. So the defensive stance gets nicer.
Interlocking plate: Every time you take a 5 foot step or less, your AC rises by 2.
Make sure your DM will allow Improved toughness in place of toughness. And a dodge variant in place regular dodge. (There's at least two which are explicitly stated to work in place of dodge.)
If you're going to do ranger, check out their alternate combat styles. Includes, sword an board, 2handed weapon, grappling, and others. In a dragon magazine.

Deepstone Sentinal and bloodstorm blade together make a very fine PC who works like a DD and throws his weapon at the enemy. But they're Tome of Battle PrC's. [/spoiler]

Last sentence of the first post, man. I mean... Great build, makes DM's who throw lots of NPC enemies at their parties cry tears of anger and sickness, but he can't use any of it.

[herrhauptmann]

Last sentence of the first post, man. I mean... Great build, makes DM's who throw lots of NPC enemies at their parties cry tears of anger and sickness, but he can't use any of it.

Deepwarden's not in the complete series. HA! :)

[Amphetryon]

Deepwarden's not in the complete series. HA! :)

Nor is it in Core... :smallconfused:

[marjan]

1.In this case, yes it is. Few other classes have as obvious and common weaknesses as the DD.

Even without defensive stance, it's better than taking fighter after level 8.

[ErrantX]

I like Pal 2 / Fighter 4 / Dwarven Defender 4, myself.

-X

[Sinfire Titan]

I like Pal 2 / Fighter 4 / Dwarven Defender 4, myself.

-X

Doesn't meet the BAB requirements of DD.

[Starbuck_II]

I am about to stat a new campaign with a group and we are starting at lvl 10. I strongly want to play a Dwarven Defender. I was hoping that someone could tell me a way to make a good Dwarven Defender in 10 levels, or at least a good starting build for a Dwarven Defender later on? Also we are only using the Core rulebooks for 3.5, nothing else not even the complete series.

Cleric 8/Fighter 1/DD 1?
Why Cleric? Because Defensive stance doesn't block spell casting making a decent buff with casting spells.
Buff up with favorite buff (Bless, Divine Power, etc) then wail on enemies.

[Brock Samson]

Ranger 2/Fighter 2/Paladin or Barb 2/DD??? No multiclassing penalties, full BAB, some random abilities and some feats.

[karnalsyn]

I am currently playing a DD, and thought I’d run a quick google search on DD builds out there to see what I might find. So I stumbled on this post, few months old but I figured I’d drop my current build in the mix incase someone else wanted to test it out or comment.

At the moment I’m Fighter8/DD5.
The original intention behind this character, was to try and bolster my Survivability as best as I could possibly achieve in the campaign that I play in. The reason I did this, was because I wanted to see just how viable it could be. It was more or less a test of personal interest above anything. My campaign doesn’t current allow full access to all 3/3.5 materials, so some suggestions I saw above wouldn’t apply to me. We also roll 3d6 per stat at character creation and get to distribute the result of a 2d4 roll across them.

So heres what I’m working with and how I’ve tried to make the most out of the requirements. Granted I’m working off of memory, I don’t have my sheets with me. So I may be slightly off base in a couple areas.
Str 20 (18 with a +2 str gauntlet)
Dex 13
Con 22 (18 + dwarf + lvls 4 and 8)
Int 11
Wis 10
Cha 6

I’m wearing Mithril Full Plate +1 (soon to be +2) and carrying a Tower Sheild +2
The Endurance requirement works in conjunction with the Mithril Full Plate, allowing me to sleep in my full plate as if it were medium armor.
I used the Dodge feat requirement to gain the mobility feat.
I also took on the Parry Shield feat to grant my shield bonus to my touch AC, which is currently a +6

Next level I gain the damage reduction from DD. Allowing me to then take the Greater Resiliency feats to slowly increase it. Though that’ll probably wait, as I haven’t taken Iron Will yet and will likely be taking that first.

This wasn’t a fully optimized build or anything. As I didn’t decide on taking DD until I had already reached level 7-8. So I’ve got feat slots that might be better planned out it a later rendition. However you can see the addition of a few feats to the build that go further in trying to maximize it as a defensive character. Once available in my campaign, I’d like to take Titan Fighting (RoS) and Steadfast Determination (PHB2).

Currently I’ve got an unbuffed AC in the low 30s. I can’t be flatfooted. And my Touch AC is 21-22 I think. My will save is around +8 I think with only a cloak of resistance +1. I can move near a giant and raise my AC to 38-39 due to racial+mobility. And my HP is roughly 190-200.

[Gnaeus]

This wasn’t a fully optimized build or anything. As I didn’t decide on taking DD until I had already reached level 7-8. So I’ve got feat slots that might be better planned out it a later rendition. However you can see the addition of a few feats to the build that go further in trying to maximize it as a defensive character. Once available in my campaign, I’d like to take Titan Fighting (RoS) and Steadfast Determination (PHB2).

Currently I’ve got an unbuffed AC in the low 30s. I can’t be flatfooted. And my Touch AC is 21-22 I think. My will save is around +8 I think with only a cloak of resistance +1. I can move near a giant and raise my AC to 38-39 due to racial+mobility. And my HP is roughly 190-200.

Unfortunately, a CR equivalent giant can hit that AC with pretty good frequency. He can sunder your tower shield in 1 round, or blast you with chain lightning.

Most telling, unless he is fighting you in an enclosed space, with his high int and wis, he won't do any of those things. He will ignore your feeble 1d10+9 1 handed dwarven axe or bastard sword, and stomp your party's squishies. After they are all dead, he and his friends will grapple you to death.

And every level from here out, the number of monsters you can toe to toe fight goes down, and the number of fliers, teleporters, etc who will ignore you and kill your wizard or cleric goes up.

[Nick_mi]

Stonewarden

[karnalsyn]

Unfortunately, a CR equivalent giant can hit that AC with pretty good frequency. He can sunder your tower shield in 1 round, or blast you with chain lightning.

Most telling, unless he is fighting you in an enclosed space, with his high int and wis, he won't do any of those things. He will ignore your feeble 1d10+9 1 handed dwarven axe or bastard sword, and stomp your party's squishies. After they are all dead, he and his friends will grapple you to death.

And every level from here out, the number of monsters you can toe to toe fight goes down, and the number of fliers, teleporters, etc who will ignore you and kill your wizard or cleric goes up.

Everything you’ve said could be applied to any fighter build one way or another.
‘He could sunder the tower shield’… he could also sunder the weapon out of the hands of a two handed/power attacking great sword user.
‘Enemies could fly, teleport, etc.’ … once again, all fighters face this potential scenario except for an archer build
‘Can be grappled to death’ … yet still, you’ve mentioned nothing that can’t be applied to other characters
‘AC still be hit’ … yes, but far less frequently than a dex fighter or archer or trip fighter or power attacker. And my AC is hardly the best for my level.

As I stated in my original post, my build was posted as an idea for anyone else considering the DD PrC and wanting to play it as a Tank type. I always giggle at your type of response, because it’s almost as if people forgot that playing D&D isn’t always about using the most uber-optimized character build the game has to offer. Sometimes you want to roleplay a character that has certain niches/faults, strengths or weaknesses. Sometimes you want to play a character for a different reason than just outputting the biggest numbers you can achieve. And as I stated, my basis behind doing what I was doing was to try and push some limits in areas I had yet to explore.

Also, not everyone’s DM runs campaigns the same. If your DM likes giving out thousands of gold in loot to assist in fighting against a handful of teleporting giants with laser beams, then all the power to ya. Doesn’t mean the campaign I’m in, or the original poster is in, will be played the same way. In fact, its far more likely in my campaign that we’d be fighting say 1 teleporting giant with laser beams, and then a few of his giant minions with lesser to no powers. Meaning I’d be the one holding off the minions till the calvalry finished off the uber giant.

Go ahead and build the best trip fighter money can buy. He’ll be standing right there beside my AC fighter watching as this giant is teleporting 50 yrds away from us and squishing the mage. Point being, many of the weaknesses of 1 fighter, apply to most/all fighters.

[Greenish]

Everything you’ve said could be applied to any fighter build one way or another.Yeah. That's why you PrC/multiclass into something that helps with said problems, not to Dwarven Defender.

[The Glyphstone]

Great Modthulhu: Please refrain from thread necromancy.