[3.5] How is Knight as a tanking class?

[Thezecharon]

I'm sorry if this question has been asked before. I tried searching for information in regards to this but I couldn't really find much. Anyway, I was wondering how Knight (PHB2) is at tanking? Tanking for me means: The ability to take a hit and overall reduce the damage that weaker party members would take. It seems to me that this class has some nifty class features, but it doesn't really look like you could use them very much.

As a side topic, I'm interested in a class that is going to let me tank as I described. My limitations are no multi-classing (can I PrC but I'm not sure if that's considered multi-classing) and I'm limited to the basic books (PHB1, PHB2, DM) and the complete class books (complete divine, complete warrior, etc.). Any advice you all can give me would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

[Shadowknight12]

If you really want to tank properly, you have to play 4e or get something homebrewed. Proper tanking isn't supported in 3.5e due to a lack of an actual aggro system. The knight really is as close as it gets, unimpressive as it is.

Also, single-classed knight is terrible. It's usual just a dip for a ToB class (warblade or crusader).

[Greenish]

It's okay, a tad weak but workable. Of the sources available to you, the best (non-caster) tanks would probably be knight or trip-fighter, though the ban on multiclassing hurts especially the latter.

[Edit]: I mostly concur with Shadowknight above, though I'll claim single-classed crusader is the best (non-caster) tank the game offers "the closest it gets". It can pose a serious threat to the monsters' health and well-being, absorb or avoid (some) damage and protect it's allies and limit the monsters' options or movement.

[Amphetryon]

Knight's Test of Mettle ability is one of the few ways outside spellcasting to force enemies to pay attention to the meatshield, so it is reasonably good at its role. If the rest of the party is Cleric, Druid, Wizard, Artificer, the Knight will almost inevitably feel somewhat outclassed, but for a group that expects a non-caster to perform the role you've described, Knight is able to do admirably.

The other classes I can think of that perform this role without magic are from sources outside your list, incidentally.

[Thezecharon]

Honestly, I wouldn't mind at all playing a "tank" that uses magic so long as it's within the materials that I listed here. I had read up on Crusader before and mentioned it to my DM and he thought it looked overpowered and I was disappointed by that =/. Some additional information, we will probably be playing these characters from one and I'd be really surprised if I ever saw level 10. Thank you for such fast replies.

[Shadowknight12]

Honestly, I wouldn't mind at all playing a "tank" that uses magic so long as it's within the materials that I listed here. I had read up on Crusader before and mentioned it to my DM and he thought it looked overpowered and I was disappointed by that =/. Some additional information, we will probably be playing these characters from one and I'd be really surprised if I ever saw level 10. Thank you for such fast replies.

Laugh at your DM in the face for me. Unless he or she severely nerfs casters, in which case, don't.

Other than that, a good bet for tanking is to specialise in Enchantment and compel people to focus solely on you. Look up on ways to avoid that pesky immunity to mind-affecting effects and shore up on buffs that make you tougher (*cough*Polymorph*cough*Wildshape*cough*). Or, if you don't mind tanking indirectly, replace the buffs for summoned/called/animated/companion creatures.

[Hiro Protagonest]

Honestly, I wouldn't mind at all playing a "tank" that uses magic so long as it's within the materials that I listed here. I had read up on Crusader before and mentioned it to my DM and he thought it looked overpowered and I was disappointed by that =/. Some additional information, we will probably be playing these characters from one and I'd be really surprised if I ever saw level 10. Thank you for such fast replies.

Crusader's only overpowered if the cleric's a healbot and the arcane caster's a blaster who never uses metamagic. Or if they're playing a healer and warmage instead.

[Cog]

Between PHB 2 and Complete Champion, a Paladin can do some tanking as well, mostly in terms of battlefield control as a charger/anticharger. Charging Smite ACF, Cometary Collision, and Earth Devotion, with your other feats spent toward power attacking, can do most of what you need. On a low point buy, drop Wis and spellcasting for bonus feats, mainly Extra Turning to spam Earth Devotion. On a midrange point buy, keep the casting and maybe snag Battle Blessing; on a high range pointbuy, toss a few points toward Int so you can trip as well (there are ways to trip without getting Expertise, but I don't think any are on your source list).

[Metahuman1]

Personally, I'd look at Divine Metamagic Cleric, Natural spell Druid, and Batman Wizard.

Then when you've shown you DM what over powered REALLY looks like in 3.5 edition, ask him about letting you

a) Play a Crusader or Warblade.

b) Play a Multyclass Crusader/Warblade.

c) Play a Knight with a dip into either Crusader or Warblade.

d) Play a Knight with a dip into both Crusader and Warblade. (If he'll let you get away with a couple of flaws and using the affiliation rules in PHBII and an Armor style found in Planer Handbook I'll show you how to REALLY tank it up!)

[Hiro Protagonest]

Personally, I'd look at Divine Metamagic Cleric, Natural spell Druid, and Batman Wizard.

Then when you've shown you DM what over powered REALLY looks like in 3.5 edition, ask him about letting you

a) Play a Crusader or Warblade.

b) Play a Multyclass Crusader/Warblade.

c) Play a Knight with a dip into either Crusader or Warblade.

d) Play a Knight with a dip into both Crusader and Warblade. (If he'll let you get away with a couple of flaws and using the affiliation rules in PHBII and an Armor style found in Planer Handbook I'll show you how to REALLY tank it up!)

Maybe if he decides to just do a little mini-dungeon crawl for DMM cleric, natural spell druid, batman wizard, and crusader (either separate ones or as a full party) as a demonstration, that would actually do the trick without breaking the DM's game in half and annoying everyone at the game table.

[stainboy]

I'm sorry if this question has been asked before. I tried searching for information in regards to this but I couldn't really find much. Anyway, I was wondering how Knight (PHB2) is at tanking? Tanking for me means: The ability to take a hit and overall reduce the damage that weaker party members would take. It seems to me that this class has some nifty class features, but it doesn't really look like you could use them very much.


Knight is a poorly written class. It's not good at much of anything.

More importantly, MMO-style tanking isn't great in 3.5 even if you have the mechanics to do it. Why make a monster hit you when you can make it not hit anyone? A grappler barbarian protects his allies better than a knight (and takes hits better too). Hell, a regular barbarian protects his allies better than a knight just by killing things really fast.

[Greenish]

I had read up on Crusader before and mentioned it to my DM and he thought it looked overpowered and I was disappointed by that =/.He may be right if you play really low optimization, since ToB classes are nigh impossible to totally mess up.

Of course, at that low optimization, knight does just fine, as does paladin like Cog pointed out (but paladin is still a paladin).

I suggest against pulling an optimized caster to make the DM "see the light". First, it's bad form, and second he might decide it's not the classes, it's just you (and if you've had no problems before, he'd be right).

[Thezecharon]

I don't think we do play anything resembling optimized. A lot of the time, we do typically have a tank type character in our groups which seems like it ends up being a dwarven defender. I was really wanting to avoid doing that again. I am interested in doing a DMM cleric though. I'm not sure how the DM is going to respond to it, but I figured it would actually stand a chance at getting to see some play. I'm also interested in hearing how a grappling barbarian would work as well as a natural spell druid.

I'm thinking the main problem the DM has is if he's not already familiar with a class, he tends to instantly think a new class is op until otherwise proven. Anyway, I'm not here to complain about how he does things because I've had a lot of fun. I'm just interested in the concept of tank as described. I don't mind if it involves magic at all, I just wanted to try and avoid using a bunch of crazy feats from the other books.

I really appreciate all the input you all have given me so far. I was wondering if you all can recommend a place where I can read up on combat strategies used in D&D so I can also become more self-reliant? It seems like a lot of the information I find is sprawled out and makes it difficult to learn from.

[Greenish]

Handbooks are a start. Here's Knight (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=109429), Barbarian (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=8753.0), Cleric (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=420.0) and Druid (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=1354.0).

Barbarian grappler, you want high Str and maybe size increase. Sounds like a job for bear warrior (CWar). Something like barbarian4/fist of the forest3/bear warrior5 to start with. Fist of the Forest is from CChamp and gets you better unarmed damage, more fast movement and Con to AC while unarmoured. Bear Warrior allows you to turn into a bear when raging, which offers you natural weapons, big stat boosts and later increased size. You could trade two levels of barbarian for fighter for feats.

[Drachasor]

In terms of minimizing damage to the group, it is hard to go wrong with the druid. Anything that hits a summon isn't hitting a group member.

Doesn't hurt that once you hit 7th level you can summon a Unicorn which has Cure Light Wounds 3/day and Cure Moderate Wounds 1/day, and isn't bad in a fight.

You can also wildshape and with just a spell or two be capable of taking a lot of punishment and dish out a ton of punishment. (Wildshaping into lions and other creatures with Pounce is a great way to start a fight, btw).

On top of that you also have an animal companion, which can easily be pretty tough (on the level of a Fighter), and if you heal yourself your animal companion is also healed.

With hardly any effort at all you can do most of the damage in a party and soak up a ton of damage. Of all the powerhouses to play, it is the easiest. You can use 100% Core material and easily make everyone else look weak. My first 3rd edition (3.5) character was a Druid and I stumbled upon how monstrously effective they are.

This doesn't even get into all the utility spells you bring to the table. How you can scout (flying creature or house cat), etc, etc, etc.

Edit: Honestly I find it hilarious whenever I hear someone thinks the ToB classes are overpowered.

[Thrice Dead Cat]

Honestly, a well built fighter or Crusader is all you need single classing. Prestige classes are multiclassing, but come with none of the associated penalties of multiclassing because RAW is derp.

[marcielle]

It is pretty hard to be OP as a melee unless your full casters are literally IDIOTS. Any DM that says otherwise would have his mind blown by the likes of Planar Shepard, Batman God and ... DUNDUNDUUUUUN...PunPun.

Just go druid if he won't let you Crusader. It really is the perfect tanking mechanic.

Enemies: Oh look, there's a fragile full caster without protection, Let's go andAAAAIIIIIEEEEEE! Ohmygodwhere'dthatbearcomefrom? Wait, where's the caster? AAAAAA! Now there are 2 bears!

By the end of the next round, your enemies are being obliterated by your stream of summoned Dire bears, while you, as a Dire bear riding your animal companion Dire bear summon yet more bears to bear down upon your enemies. And they walked right into it.

[Thrice Dead Cat]

It is pretty hard to be OP as a melee unless your full casters are literally IDIOTS. Any DM that says otherwise would have his mind blown by the likes of Planar Shepard, Batman God and ... DUNDUNDUUUUUN...PunPun.

To be fair, your first and last example there are really just strong theoretical optimizations. Batman-style wizardry though often does not need tanks - well, at least conventional ones.


Just go druid if he won't let you Crusader. It really is the perfect tanking mechanic.

Enemies: Oh look, there's a fragile full caster without protection, Let's go andAAAAIIIIIEEEEEE! Ohmygodwhere'dthatbearcomefrom? Wait, where's the caster? AAAAAA! Now there are 2 bears!

By the end of the next round, your enemies are being obliterated by your stream of summoned Dire bears, while you, as a Dire bear riding your animal companion Dire bear summon yet more bears to bear down upon your enemies. And they walked right into it.

Druid is the easy answer. Even at level one you've got a full caster and a fighter on one character in effect. By 5th, it's two bears. By 6th it is permanently two bears, one full caster, and X temporary floating bears. It is kind of like bringing a gun to a knife fight.

[Drachasor]

By the end of the next round, your enemies are being obliterated by your stream of summoned Dire bears, while you, as a Dire bear riding your animal companion Dire bear summon yet more bears to bear down upon your enemies. And they walked right into it.

You don't even need a stream. In my experience one or two summonings were quick sufficient in almost all battles. Even if they never hit with an attack they absorb a huge amount of damage for the rest of the party, and presumably your comrades can do the killing (of course, your summons will be doing a lot of killing too).

The summons are really great against all kinds of nasty critters too. There are tons of things with energy drain, ability drain, etc. A summon getting drained is something you don't care about. (This is to say nothing of the fact Summon Nature's Ally is a flat-out superior spell to Summon Monster).

On top of that the druid has a ton of crowd control spells, buffs, and other things. The only thing a druid really has to be careful about are incorporeal creatures. They can be a little tricky. Same, I guess, with enemies with a lot of area attacks (like dragons). Helps to have a little planning done for that.

[Person_Man]

Knights are decent tanks with 4 unique-ish class features (Test of Mettle, Vigilant Defender, Bulwark of Defense, and Loyal Beyond Death). But they're still a high Tier 4-ish class (though you can go higher with certain PrC). If you want a Tier 3 tank, take a look at the Incarnate, Binder, Crusader, or Psychic Warrior. If you want Tier 2 or 1, play your standard Cleric/Druid/Favored Soul/etc.

Also, I wrote the Knight Handbook, so if you do go that direction let me know if you go that direction and want build advice.

[Drachasor]

Ultimately, "tanking" is a pretty horrible idea in D&D. The game is realistic in that respect. NO ONE wants to get hit. Front-line warriors have a lot of health (and good AC) because they need that to survive as an inherent part of being on the front. Not because they are tanks. One shouldn't try to think of D&D in MMO terms.

More effective strategies are making the enemies not hit anyone using magic and other debuffing (or buffing) effects, or making them hit guys that don't matter with summons (the druid is the best class at the latter).

[NecroRick]

I'm pretty sure I saw a 3.5 feat the other day that lets you 'mark' an enemy and then they take a penalty if they attack anyone except you. Though I think the Knight might have something similar. (If so, maybe they will stack, maybe they won't)

As a Knight, what you should do is load up on 10 foot teleports (e.g. Anklet of Translocation for starters), and then _always_ teleport one square straight and then one square diagonal...

[Serpentine]

I have no doubt - as amply demonstrated here - that there are much better thanks than the Knight, but I find it a fun class that does the job.

[Thezecharon]

By the end of the next round, your enemies are being obliterated by your stream of summoned Dire bears, while you, as a Dire bear riding your animal companion Dire bear summon yet more bears to bear down upon your enemies. And they walked right into it.

Thank you for this. This was hilarious and it proved the point well enough. I think I'm going to try and go druid. I'm going to run this all by the DM before we get started with it because I don't want to turn level five and get wildshape and run into an instant QQ trap. Thank you everyone for your input on the subject. You have all been very nice and helpful.