Defensive Fighter

[Raishoiken]

Does anyone have a good list of prestige classes or items for a defensive/tank fighter build? As comprehensive a list as is available would be awesome.


All help is appreciated



edit: things that focus on increasing armor/shield effectiveness or that grant DR are bonus points

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

The biggest problem with overly tanky characters is that this isn't WoW, opponents will just ignore you and go after your teammates.

Use Crusader instead of Fighter, in ToB. There's a few good race selections, but I prefer either Warforged or Water Orc.

Gain the Dragonborn of Bahamut template in RotD, pick the heart aspect to get a breath attack. Take the feat Entangling Exhalation in that same book and use it to keep as many opponents as possible debuffed. They can't ignore you and go after your teammates if they can't really move, and it makes you a clear threat.

Gain the Mineral Warrior template after dragonborn and buy off the level adjustment.

The ideal build would be Crusader 5/ Binder 1/ Hellreaver 5/ Crusader 9+, always bind Naberius and have an odd-numbered Con score. At Hellreaver 5 use heroic sacrifice as often as you need to, you'll take 2 Con damage but Naberius will heal one of it that same round, then the other point the next round, so having an odd-numbered Con score will help you avoid any math because of that.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

The biggest problem with overly tanky characters is that this isn't WoW, opponents will just ignore you and go after your teammates.

Use Crusader instead of Fighter, in ToB. There's a few good race selections, but I prefer either Warforged or Water Orc.

Gain the Dragonborn of Bahamut template in RotD, pick the heart aspect to get a breath attack. Take the feat Entangling Exhalation in that same book and use it to keep as many opponents as possible debuffed. They can't ignore you and go after your teammates if they can't really move, and it makes you a clear threat.

Gain the Mineral Warrior template after dragonborn and buy off the level adjustment.

The ideal build would be Crusader 5/ Binder 1/ Hellreaver 5/ Crusader 9+, always bind Naberius and have an odd-numbered Con score. At Hellreaver 5 use heroic sacrifice as often as you need to, you'll take 2 Con damage but Naberius will heal one of it that same round, then the other point the next round, so having an odd-numbered Con score will help you avoid any math because of that.

This, basically.

Get fighter if you want a dip for dungeon crasher or something, but avoid it if you want actual defenses, especially the original version in the PHB without any ACFs.

You may also want to consider finding a way to get fast healing and regeneration. Troll Blooded could work for the regen, although that requires being human (so you'd need Human Heritage or Human Blooded, [Improved] Toughness, and Troll Blooded, for a total of 3 feats), and either take Draconic Aura: Vigor or have a friend or minion with it to grant everyone in the party fast healing up to 1/2 hp. Also go after as many immunities as you can to various things.

[rediridesence]

knight class has a class feature that can force opponents in range to make a save or be forced to attack you. if they don't even after failing a save they take massive penalties.

its not the best solution but its something that fits the theme of what the op is asking?

[MaxiDuRaritry]

You might also consider going psychic warrior and taking the mantled warrior ACF for access to metamorphosis and the ability to craft a psychoactive skin of proteus. Access to variable types and subtypes (along with all the movement modes and other defenses variable forms could give you) is a surprisingly valid defense against all sorts of stuff, especially if you've got a decent idea of what you'll be up against so you can choose forms (and defenses) accordingly. If you're a warforged, that's even better, because constructs have some great racial immunities based on their type.

[Gruftzwerg]

As others have pointed out, tanking in 3.5 works different from what you would expect from online games like WoW.

1. The enemy needs a reason to attack you. If you are just hard to hit and take down, the enemy (unless low INT) will go for squishier teammates. Notable damage or good crowd control can help you out here. Or specific Intimidate builds (see below).

2. Keeping AC relevant requires constant investment. As a rule of thumb, aim for 60-80 AC around lvl 20 to keep it relevant. Better invest in %misschances first, before investing into AC.

3. Try to either get high Spell Resistance or Saves (or both - via items/class abilities).

There are a few common "tank" options in 3.5 ( can be combined to some degree)

A: Intimi(-date) Tank
Works around the "Zhentarim Soldier" fighter substitution levels (3,6,9). At lvl9 you can intimidate as a swift action. Downside is that to many enemies are immune (or to stupid) and can't be affected by this. Imho a bad choice unless you play in a campaign where you know that the enemies won't have those immunities.

B: Crusader
Crusader has some nice tank-abilities. The "Iron Guard Glare"(?) stance gives enemies -4 to attack your nearby allies (and thus gives em a reason to maybe attack you). Further there is a maneuver that can force enemies to attack you for a round. Can be a good base or dip for tank builds.

C: Wild Shape
Wilde Shape and its related stuff can give you access to really strong tanking forms that are still threatening (read: enough dmg or annoying abilities). Going for Master of Many Forms (prc) lvl 7 to get War-Troll as combat shape is a common choice here. Another option would be a Redcap build, have a look at my Papa Smurf build in my signature. Gets 60+AC and is a double Ubercharger build that can dish out high dmg.

D: Trip Tank
Works most of the time around Spiked Chains. Increase your reach and buff up your trip attempts. Get Combat Reflexes and a high DEX modifier to prevent enemies from closing the distance to you (and your mates). Can be improved with several trip feats like Knock-Down. Downside: Some enemies are hard to trip. Further make sure that your DM is fine with tripping flying enemies.

E: Knockback Tank
Requires you to be of large size (or count as large). Thus either a Goliath as base race or a Wild Shape build will be needed for this. Similar to the trip tank, you aim to keep your enemies out of melee range (of your allies). Can be combined with Trip/Knockdown builds. Similar problems as the Trip Tank.

F: Be immune to most/all forms of damage
This involves often the Regeneration ability combined with immunity to non-lethal damage and the energy type you regeneration would be normally vulnerable to. Can be very OP and gamebreaking if your teammates and DM don't play on the same optimization lvl. So be careful with these kind of options.

The question is: in which direction you want to go with your tank build?

[RNightstalker]

Barbarian and Dwarven Defender have DR as a class feature. Most items won't stack with it, but there's Roll With It from Savage Species that can be taken more than once and boosts your DR by 2 and stacks with the class feature.
PH2 has Armor Specialization, Shield Specialization, and Shield Ward.
Races of Stone has Goad, Greater Heavy Armor Optimization, Heavy Armor Optimization, and a Dwarfen Fighter Substitution level.
Dread Commando from Heroes of Battle has a class feature that lowers ACP from your armor.
Torc of Heroic Sacrifice will let you take one for the team...literally.
Also from MIC: Nimbleness armor enchantment increases max dex and lowers acp.

[Darg]

D: Trip Tank
Works most of the time around Spiked Chains. Increase your reach and buff up your trip attempts. Get Combat Reflexes and a high DEX modifier to prevent enemies from closing the distance to you (and your mates). Can be improved with several trip feats like Knock-Down. Downside: Some enemies are hard to trip. Further make sure that your DM is fine with tripping flying enemies.

E: Knockback Tank
Requires you to be of large size (or count as large). Thus either a Goliath as base race or a Wild Shape build will be needed for this. Similar to the trip tank, you aim to keep your enemies out of melee range (of your allies). Can be combined with Trip/Knockdown builds. Similar problems as the Trip Tank.

Whirlwind attack + improved trip + driving attack = win? + thunderous throw + shield sling = battlefield carnage? Sounds like a fun day to me.

[Thurbane]

The biggest problem with overly tanky characters is that this isn't WoW, opponents will just ignore you and go after your teammates.

Terrain plays a role in this as well. If your caster is in a 5 ft dungeon corridor, and the party tank is between the enemies and the caster, they often have little choice but to try and go through the tank.

[Gruftzwerg]

Whirlwind attack + improved trip + driving attack = win? + thunderous throw + shield sling = battlefield carnage? Sounds like a fun day to me.

I would either go with "Trip" or for "driving attack". The problem here is that driving attack does prefer high flat dmg boost, since those add on the free bull rush roll.

This bull rush uses your total bonus on damage rolls in place of your Strength modifier

And Driving Attack has very deep feat costs. As such I would go for either one.

Trip would be imho better with a Kockback / Knockdown build here.

For Driving Attack I would recommend an ubercharger build for the maximum possible "total bonus damage".
I like Driving Attack, it's just that it comes pretty late online. I even did make 4 builds (WW + DA) a while ago.

Note that the combination of Whirlwind Attack & Driving Attack relies on the interpretation that WW only makes a single roll for all enemies and not a single roll per enemy. This is a debatable part of WW where we already had debate about here in the forum. So take that with care and check with your DM / table. ;)

[Rebel7284]

Ruby Knight Vindicators can make some truly amazing tanks. Between crusader progression giving you tanking maneuvers and stacking cleric buffs on top of that, you can be real difficult to kill or disable. Extra actions at RKV 7 are pretty amazing too.

[Fizban]

Short version: don't let the forum intimidate you out of it, if you know your game respects AC and standing in front of people, play a tank if you want. Any indoor fight, any ability your allies have to funnel foes into you, and just the fact that they have to waste more movement and actions if they want to even try "going around," (and don't forget about the soft cover your body provides) are how the game is expected to be played.

As for damage reduction, unless your DM allows you to stack DR from certain sources, it's basically either you take a DR granting PrC, or you have adamantine armor with a flat 3/-. It's fairly common for people to allow the DR from adamantine, a prestige class, and the Armor Specialization (PHB2) feat to all stack, so that playing a DR character is actually possible, but the game normally doesn't want you to do it (tends to make things like dragons waaaay less scary if you ignore 10 points or something on each attack, which is why Stoneskin costs 100gp per cast). Monsters printed in later books hit hard enough that even with all that stacked they'll still deal plenty of damage. Alternatively you could use Tome of Battle's DR granting strikes, which go higher but aren't constant and reduce your attacks.

Prestige Classes

• Dwarven Defender is the top, pretty much bar none, it gets a flat AC bonus up to +4, and up to DR 6/-. Other defensive PrCs specifically take care not to be better than the DD. There's like one other class with DR 6 hiding in Oriental Adventures, Green Star Adept can get up to 5/adamantine (plus str and natural armor, minus BAB, and the last level ruins your hit points and fort save). If you want DR, Dwarven Defender.
• Great Rift Deep Defender (Shining South): a shorter version of Dwarven Defender, still for dwarves, no DR or stance but gets +3 AC in only 5 levels.
• Battlerager (Races of Faerun): even more dwarfism, gives +2 natural armor at 5th.
• Stoneblessed (Races of Stone): lets you count as a dwarf, but charges you -1 BAB for the privilege.
• Frostrager (Frostburn): gets +2-4 natural armor when frostraging.
• Topaz Guardian (Lords of Madness): gets +3 sacred to AC and all saves in 5 levels.
• Deepwarden (Races of Stone): fairly well known for getting Con to AC instead of Dex, at 2nd level- if you can afford to take Deepwarden but not pay for a bit of dex to fill up your mithral armor.
• Citadel Elite (Sharn, City of Towers): +5 insight to AC over 5 levels, also up to +5 attack against dodgy foes, and more.
• Duelist: there's a trick here where the Duelist actually gives +10 AC- it just takes 7 levels to get to the ability, and you only get it when fighting defensively. But that particular ability does not say anything about not wearing armor or shield.

Feats

• Constant Guardian and Dutiful Guardian (Drow of the Underdark): should be plenty enough "tank control" for a normal game, trade -2 AB for +2 AC for an ally, then get the ability to switch places with them between turns.
• Combat Expertise: If your AC is high enough that an enemy needs to roll an 11 to hit you on an attack, trading -5/+5 means they go from 50% to 25%, and this *stacks* with miss chances. Miss chances don't invalidate AC, AC makes miss chances even better. Or if your AC is already high enough that they need a 15, then CE will drop them to needing natural 20s.
• Allied Defense (Shining South): If you don't want the Guardian feats, you can just take this and share your CE bonus with adjacent allies.
• Improved Combat Expertise? Shouldn't be necessary if you're focusing on AC, but if you're using Allied Defense, granting +10 is hilarious.

There's also Shield Specialization (PHB2) for a flat +1, and Heavy Armor Optimization and Greater Heavy Armor Optimization (Races of Stone) for another +1 each. If you're willing to burn as many feats as possible on AC and pick the right PrCs, you can make quite a large gap between yourself and a person with just plain armor and shield, who has a further huge gap above the person who refuses to use a shield. I don't necessarily recommend going that far though, you do want some extra offense unless you've got the perfect DM-supplied weapon for the campaign or something, and there are other good defensive feats that can cut down on how many spells and magic items it takes to keep you going.

Don't bother spending a feat on an exotic armor- if the +8/+1 of full plate isn't enough, put on some Mechanus Gear (Planar Handbook) for +10/+0 and drop your move speed to 1/2.

Tome of Battle
Pearl of Black Doubt stance: Wall of Blades (block an attack with an opposed attack roll) gets all the press, but Pearl of Black Doubt is the real killer, giving you +2 AC for 1 round every time a foe misses you. More mooks= more AC. Block even one attack with Wall of Blades (or Shield Block, which includes no line preventing you from counting yourself as an ally, letting you add +4 or more depending on reading) or Combat Expertise, and your AC skyrockets as their next attacks, already at an iterative or natural weapon penalty, have even less chance of hitting.

Rage
The Whirling Frenzy variant (Unearthed Arcana/online SRDs) is all upside, including bonus AC instead of a penalty, and is frankly broken as far as I'm concerned (in the "no one would ever not take this" way). The Ferocity version (Cityscape Web Enhancement) gives a dex bonus and no AC penalty. If you're interested in a raging PrC, you'll want to get your DM to allow it to work with one of these.

Races
If you're not a dwarf, you're not going small for the size bonus, and you're not going goliath (for +1 natural armor and a 2d6 one-handed weapon instead of the usual 1d8), then you might get wacky and play a Neraphim (Planar Handbook): they're non-native outsiders whose big feature is ignoring the enemy's dex bonus on a charge or thrown weapon, once per enemy per encounter. That has nothing to do with tanking though- 'cause their other, less noticed feature, is a flat +2 natural armor, despite having +0 level adjustment.

Items: aside from just keeping your numbers high, consider the Chains of Shield Other (Ghostwalk), which will let you cast Shield Other on someone and take half their damage. Simple, cheap, effective.

Edit: and now I notice the thread was a month old before it was bumped. Still, they might still be around.

[Doctor Despair]

Does anyone have a good list of prestige classes or items for a defensive/tank fighter build? As comprehensive a list as is available would be awesome.


All help is appreciated



edit: things that focus on increasing armor/shield effectiveness or that grant DR are bonus points

Someone already mentioned that knights get a taunt class feature, but that scales with knight level, so isn't very multiclass friendly. The feat Master of Mockery is a much stronger option, but is poorly worded, so may require some DM adjusting.

[Darg]

Short version: don't let the forum intimidate you out of it, if you know your game respects AC and standing in front of people, play a tank if you want. Any indoor fight, any ability your allies have to funnel foes into you, and just the fact that they have to waste more movement and actions if they want to even try "going around," (and don't forget about the soft cover your body provides) are how the game is expected to be played.

I think this is the biggest problem a lot of tables have. The DM abuses meta knowledge and that makes building for defense a losing proposition.

As for damage reduction, unless your DM allows you to stack DR from certain sources, it's basically either you take a DR granting PrC, or you have adamantine armor with a flat 3/-. It's fairly common for people to allow the DR from adamantine, a prestige class, and the Armor Specialization (PHB2) feat to all stack, so that playing a DR character is actually possible, but the game normally doesn't want you to do it (tends to make things like dragons waaaay less scary if you ignore 10 points or something on each attack, which is why Stoneskin costs 100gp per cast). Monsters printed in later books hit hard enough that even with all that stacked they'll still deal plenty of damage. Alternatively you could use Tome of Battle's DR granting strikes, which go higher but aren't constant and reduce your attacks.

UA has a variant that reduces armor bonus by half to provide DR. It also specifically allows DR /- to stack. I personally like the variant. It also makes a reference to how the rules mention different DR types don't stack, but there is no such mention unless "forms" had the intended meaning of "type" as the rules only mention type in the form of weapons to overcome damage reduction.

Also, want to bring up a binder dip to bind Dahlver-Nar for an AC bonus = half Con bonus and the shield self ability. Maddening Moan for an area daze is simply icing on the cake.

[AnimeTheCat]

This isn't optimized by the Playground's standards, but something I like to do is stack my first four levels with Fighter and Psychic Warrior on a Strongheart Halfling.

The concept is a Dex based fighter that is simply difficult to hit at low levels, then pivots to something more like Rogue or similar with two weapon fighting at higher levels to become a damage dealer. Use your Bonus Feats to pick up B. Combat Expertise, 1. Exotic Weapon Proficiency: Broadblade Shortsword, F1. Shield Focus (Light), F2. Shield Ward, 3. Two Weapon Fighting, PW1. Improved Shield Bash, and PW2. Weapon Finesse. That gives you a very solid chassis and sets you up to pick up 2 more level of fighter (if you want) for weapon focus and weapon specialization.

Why Weapon Focus and Weapon Specialization, you ask? Well I'll tell you internet stranger. Melee Weapon Mastery. Take Weapon Specialization and Weapon Focus for the Shortsword (which applies to the broadblade shortsword) and then when you hit BAB +8, take Melee weapon mastery (piercing). Now, get yourself a fancy spiked shield and keep you BBSS and get the +1 to hit and +2 damage on all your attacks. It's not a lot, but it's not nothing.

You also get some Psychic warrior powers a handful of times per day, so that's a bonus too.

After that, the world's your oyster. Go Crusader and take on more of a support role (you'll start with a higher initiator level too, so you can start with level 3 maneuvers if you wait until level 9 to begin taking initiator classes). Go rogue to take on a more offensive role. Go wizard to... do wizardy things. Go cleric to be useful while still using your armor and shield. Truly just have fun with it. I chose to go Knight because I rolled a spectacular 18 for Charisma, but I started that at level 5 and stuck with it, plus the campaign I was in had lots of humanoid/monstrous humanoids with bad saves so my challenges were quite effective.

But yeah, I just thought I would drop Psychic Warrior in there too since Psionics are pretty dope and hadn't been mentioned yet.

[RNightstalker]

Short version: don't let the forum intimidate you out of it...

THIS!!!!! Love, love, love, love, love this!!!

Also, Complete Champion has Chaos, Law, and Protection Devotions.

[rrwoods]

I am currently playing this build from level 1, and at level 2 I'm already enjoying the heck out of it (but that might be mostly because I've never played a binder before, and somehow in all my years also never played a barbarian before) -- https://forums.giantitp.com/showthre...ahlver-Nah-Bro

Even if you don't go with the full build here, it incorporates a number of different things that are all superb for someone who wants to be on the front lines taking damage for their allies. Some of these things interact favorably with one another; others are just solid options on their own. Here they all are, by my reckoning, in order. If you're building from scratch, any one of these options is worth considering:

* Savnok is a level 2 vestige, attainable at level 1 with Improved Binding, which provides a number of benefits: Full plate at level 1 (which is completely unattainable using wealth), DR 1/piercing, and ally swap. That last one might seem pretty limited, since it's a standard action and you have to be right next to your ally, but you can ready it to trigger in response to an attack meant for an ally, which is pretty effective. Savnok will fall off at mid levels, but thankfully Dahlver-Nar (for whom the build is named) picks up the slack, and you can switch to it on the day it becomes relevant.

* Barbarian has a d12 hit die. This is great all by itself, to be honest. The whirling frenzy and pounce ACFs are nothing to scoff at, as per usual, but even without them barbarian is just a really good choice. Warblade is notable for the same reason, and gives access to the wall of blades maneuver depending on when you take your warblade level (or how deep you go).

* Fighter's bonus feats never go amiss on a martial build, and tanks are often martial builds. They also get tower shield proficiency, which is swappable for exotic shield proficiency (from Races of Stone). That's a +4 shield bonus in exchange for -2 on attack rolls; or, if you're going exotic, a +3 shield bonus with no attack roll penalty. And a d10 hit die.

* The Constant Guardian feat lets you grant an AC bonus to an ally. (It's also a prerequisite for the excellent Dutiful Guardian feat.)

* Crusader gets so many tanking tools. Shield block and iron guard's glare for more ally-protecting goodness; martial spirit for incidental healing; steely resolve; d10 hit die... there's just a lot.

* Dahlver-Nar is a level 2 vestige (again, attainable with one level of binder with Improved Binding), which provides a number of benefits: Half your Con as a bonus to AC, immunity to a bunch of negative stuff, and the ability to split some incoming damage with a willing ally. That last one seems weird since you're trying to take the damage yourself, but what you do with this is point it at a wizard's or druid's summoned creature, or a raven harrier (from Knight of the Raven) ... or a rat from a bag of tricks if that's not to cheesy. This effectively increases the amount of damage you can soak yourself.

* Here is where "pious templar" goes, but that's pretty specific to this particular build and there's a lot you need to do to enter it. So what I'll say instead is "a divine casting class", which does two things: Helps qualify you for Ruby Knight Vindicator, and (usually) lets you cast healing spells. Hit point healing isn't a great use of actions in combat, but sometimes it's necessary, and out of combat it's a great way to make sure your party is healthy for the next encounter. Your "job" as a tank is to make sure your party is healthy, and even though this is not a "typical" tank thing to be doing, it's worth considering nonetheless. Separately from hit point healing, things like lesser restoration, resurgence, and other status-removal spells help make sure the party fully operational.

* Deepwarden gives you Con to AC in place of Dex, which does two things: Consolidates the ability scores used to determine HP and AC, and makes your flat-footed AC as high as your normal AC. (This stacks with Dahlver-Nar's half-Con to AC.)

* Dutiful Guardian lets you swap places with your Constant Guardian target as an immediate action. It's like the ally swap from Savnok, except you don't need to commit a standard action to ready it.

* Ruby Knight Vindicator is just really good generally. For a tank specifically, it will advance your crusader maneuver progression alongside your spell progression. Maneuvers and stances of note are thicket of blades for lockdown potential, shield counter for action denial, and greater divine surge to take advantage of a massive Constitution score (and then heal it back up with a divine spell).

* Steadfast Determination lets you base your Will save on your (hopefully) great Constitution score.

Whew! That's a lot of stuff. The linked build in particular uses it all (and more), but like I said you could pick and choose any one or more of these and staple them onto whatever other defensive build you come up with!

EDIT: I too did not notice this thread was a month old... but I'm still gonna evangelize Piggy's build 'cause it's awesome and I love it.

[Zombulian]

Check this out

[Darg]

Why Weapon Focus and Weapon Specialization, you ask? Well I'll tell you internet stranger. Melee Weapon Mastery. Take Weapon Specialization and Weapon Focus for the Shortsword (which applies to the broadblade shortsword) and then when you hit BAB +8, take Melee weapon mastery (piercing). Now, get yourself a fancy spiked shield and keep you BBSS and get the +1 to hit and +2 damage on all your attacks. It's not a lot, but it's not nothing.

Instead of EWP (BBSS) I would probably just get ranged weapon mastery with a melee thrown weapon as they benefit from both melee and ranged weapon mastery (bonuses are from different sources). With this you get an extra +2 to damage and with combat expertise you have a variable 0-2 bonus to AC/AB.

I think agile shield fighter is better than TWF when using a shield and getting shield ward. You can even dump dex as a stat.

[PoeticallyPsyco]

For prestige classes, I'm a big fan of Devoted Defender. Switch places with allies, parry attacks made against them, and counter-attack enemies that attack them; all in the first three levels.

I also endorse Crusader as a base class.

For race, another option is Dvati (Dragon Compendium). This gives you two bodies with half-HP each; you'll be squishier, but you'll be able to cover twice as much ground and take twice as many actions, making you much better able to defend your allies.

[Falontani]

The spell Mindless Rage is a level 2 wizard/sorc/bard spell that
[quote=Spell Compendium]You fill the subject with so great a rage that it can do nothing but focus on engaging you in personal physical combat. The target must be able to see you when you cast this spell. If the subject later loses line of sight to you, the spell immediately ends. (A subject can't voluntarily break line of sight with you, such as by closing its eyes, to end this spell prematurely.)

If the subject threatens you, it must make a full attack against you using a melee weapon or a natural weapon. If the subject doesn't threaten you at the start of its turn, it must move toward you (taking nothing but move actions) and end its movement as close to you as possible. If it gets close enough with a single move action to threaten you, it stops and makes a melee attack against you as normal.

While under the effect of a mindless rage spell, the subject can make use of all its normal melee combat skills, abilities, and feats—either offensive or defensive. However, the subject can't make ranged attacks, cast spells, or activate magic items that require a command word, a spell trigger, or spell completion to function. The subject can't make any attack against a creature other than you.

The subject of this spell, though overcome with rage, is by no means rendered idiotic or suicidal. For example, an affected creature will not charge off a cliff in an attempt to reach you.
[/quoted]

So max out that DC, build for tanking (there are ways to be an armored wizard, ways to get it on the cleric spell list, or onto the paladin spell list) and have fun with the spell.

Alternatively the Class Jester gets a lovely taunt ability, but you are basically working with bard then.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

For prestige classes, I'm a big fan of Devoted Defender. Switch places with allies, parry attacks made against them, and counter-attack enemies that attack them; all in the first three levels.

I also endorse Crusader as a base class.

For race, another option is Dvati (Dragon Compendium). This gives you two bodies with half-HP each; you'll be squishier, but you'll be able to cover twice as much ground and take twice as many actions, making you much better able to defend your allies.

Go dvati, take Otherworldly, pay a little money to get the [Evil] subtype, and take levels in fiend of possession. Then possess some bodies with high HP totals and whatever size you want to have. Then use their HP to defend your party (along with everything else mentioned by P.P. above).

[Anthrowhale]

Divine Prankster 5 (ECL 10 by normal entry) has the amazing Enrage Enemies. Since it's Su and the save is basically "no" because it's based on a skill check (... which clerics are _very_ good at via Guidance of the Avatar), the only protection is immunity to mind-affecting spells. The path from there to party wins is pretty straightforward and incredibly funny when the enemy spellcaster tries to play fighter.

I also want to second Allied Defense + Improved Combat Expertise. A character giving AC+20 to all allies (and yourself) is a serious obstacle that shuts down physical attacks hard with moderate optimization by other party members. Obviously, offense requires some creativity but there several approaches (touch attacks, quickened spells, etc...) to do something else as well.

[Thurbane]

There's a curse mentioned in Secrets of Xendrik which is great for tanking. Will require a discussion with the DM, of course:

There's a couple of "dirty tricks" for drawing enemy attacks that I've discovered since being on these forums.

First is the Commoner flaw Delicious (Dragon 330) which makes "All monsters attack you if able, regardless of their attitude toward the rest of your party". Weresheep flaw achieves the same thing, but hampers you with an unwanted form. The downsides are 1.) you need at least one level in Commoner, and 2.) this is very obviously an April Fools article, and was never intended in serious game play.

Second, and more insidious IMHO, is the the curse effect presented in Secrets of Xen'Drik: "The character is surrounded by an unnerving aura of menace. Lower the starting attitude of NPCs and animals towards this PC by one step. If a creature is already hostile, it attacks this character in preference to any others."

...you'll need your DM to be on board to avoid having books thrown at you!

[Seerow]

There's a fighting defensively handbook that has a lot of tricks I like for a lower-op game where AC matters. https://forums.giantitp.com/showthre...nsive-fighting


I had an E6 Swashbuckler at one point who would fight defensively taking a -2 to hit, gain +11 to AC, and grant adjacent allies +8 to AC

[Zombulian]

[QUOTE=Falontani;24943758]The spell Mindless Rage is a level 2 wizard/sorc/bard spell that

You fill the subject with so great a rage that it can do nothing but focus on engaging you in personal physical combat. The target must be able to see you when you cast this spell. If the subject later loses line of sight to you, the spell immediately ends. (A subject can't voluntarily break line of sight with you, such as by closing its eyes, to end this spell prematurely.)

If the subject threatens you, it must make a full attack against you using a melee weapon or a natural weapon. If the subject doesn't threaten you at the start of its turn, it must move toward you (taking nothing but move actions) and end its movement as close to you as possible. If it gets close enough with a single move action to threaten you, it stops and makes a melee attack against you as normal.

While under the effect of a mindless rage spell, the subject can make use of all its normal melee combat skills, abilities, and feats—either offensive or defensive. However, the subject can't make ranged attacks, cast spells, or activate magic items that require a command word, a spell trigger, or spell completion to function. The subject can't make any attack against a creature other than you.

The subject of this spell, though overcome with rage, is by no means rendered idiotic or suicidal. For example, an affected creature will not charge off a cliff in an attempt to reach you.
[/quoted]

So max out that DC, build for tanking (there are ways to be an armored wizard, ways to get it on the cleric spell list, or onto the paladin spell list) and have fun with the spell.

Alternatively the Class Jester gets a lovely taunt ability, but you are basically working with bard then.

Grab that on an Elan Spell to Power Erudite with a Share Pain Psicrystal and the Elan Resilience feat and you are in business.

[Fizban]

UA has a variant that reduces armor bonus by half to provide DR. It also specifically allows DR /- to stack. I personally like the variant.

You know, I've always hated that variant. And yet as you bring it up, one of my feats I'm proud of writing, which lets you trade some AC for DR, is actually that variant. The difference being that mine is a feat, part of a cycle of PA-like feats that sort of counter each other, and as feats they have an inherent cost and tradeoff, rather than a fundamental change that doesn't mesh with the rest of the rules. Still, it's always funny when something you hate is so close to something you support

The concept is a Dex based fighter that is simply difficult to hit at low levels, then pivots to something more like Rogue or similar with two weapon fighting at higher levels to become a damage dealer. Use your Bonus Feats to pick up B. Combat Expertise, 1. Exotic Weapon Proficiency: Broadblade Shortsword, F1. Shield Focus (Light), F2. Shield Ward, 3. Two Weapon Fighting, PW1. Improved Shield Bash, and PW2. Weapon Finesse. That gives you a very solid chassis and sets you up to pick up 2 more level of fighter (if you want) for weapon focus and weapon specialization.

Why Weapon Focus and Weapon Specialization, you ask? Well I'll tell you internet stranger. Melee Weapon Mastery. Take Weapon Specialization and Weapon Focus for the Shortsword (which applies to the broadblade shortsword) and then when you hit BAB +8, take Melee weapon mastery (piercing). Now, get yourself a fancy spiked shield and keep you BBSS and get the +1 to hit and +2 damage on all your attacks. It's not a lot, but it's not nothing.

Instead of EWP (BBSS) I would probably just get ranged weapon mastery with a melee thrown weapon as they benefit from both melee and ranged weapon mastery (bonuses are from different sources). With this you get an extra +2 to damage and with combat expertise you have a variable 0-2 bonus to AC/AB.

I think agile shield fighter is better than TWF when using a shield and getting shield ward. You can even dump dex as a stat.

Broadblade Short Sword is basically a +2 AC feat, more than the usually allowed +1, but at the cost that it's only active when you CE. If you're also using the Guardian feats, that's a -4 attack just to keep them both active, and too many penalties start to stack up. They may be offset by the Weapon Mastery line, but I'd rather stick to -2 Guardian and a flat +1 AC feat. Having an option to trade attack is good so Combat Expertise=Yes, but investing too much on it means it's not an option anymore. Just like Weapon Specialization/Mastery, a flat bonus all the time can easily be worth more than the option to trade for a higher bonus.

That said, if you're not using the Guardian feats and you're going to -2 CE at all times, and use a light weapon, I would love to suggest Deadly Defense from Complete Scoundrel. But they put it under so many restrictions it's complete garbage- -2 CE sure, light weapon okay, light armor and no shield- ah, I see we're pretending one-handed sport fencing is a thing and swashbucklers don't use bucklers again (hilariously, by requiring so many feats to make an "einhander" style "work," they actually guarantee that the unrealistic option is realistically worse at actual combat, even beyond the obvious 1st level no-feat stats and into invested characters, by their very own attempts to support it).

My preferred Weapon Mastery trick is to use the Shortspear, with Ranged weapon mastery. That way you get the +2/+2 on bow attacks, a huge range bonus which makes throwing weapons much more useable, and yet because the Shortspear is still a ranged weapon and the feat says nothing about ranged attacks, your get it on your melee use as well. Though right after that, blunt is pretty awesome too- because Light Hammers are a thing, and I long for the day I get to hammer bros. a Lich to re-death. No bow synergy though.

I don't see TWF with shields as worth the effort- but then, I've added a feat to give shield users a reason to focus on not getting hit and retailiating, rather than flailing. Tome of Battle carries the standard in 1st party material there of course, though a Hellreaver (Fiendish Codex 2) can imitate them a bit, if you really don't want to touch any ToB.

For prestige classes, I'm a big fan of Devoted Defender. Switch places with allies, parry attacks made against them, and counter-attack enemies that attack them; all in the first three levels.

From 3.0 Sword and Fist and not updated- yeah, I usually forget that one. But it does have no real equal, no limit on the number of position switches, nothing else to compare to the unlimited counterattack AoOs, nor does anything have similar (eventually nigh-guaranteed) unlimited 1/round attack negation. The only problems are that the counterattack requires the foe to be adjacent to you, which means that standard large+ monsters with 10' reach can be completely immune (and where the Guardian feats let you be 10' away for convenience, this PrC want's you 5' away), and the class table and description make it sound like you get a massive +5 AC all the time, but the note under the table seems to say it only applies when you use the position swap to take an attack.

Though that does bring up another quirk of Constant/Dutiful Guardian: nowhere does it say that if you switch places, you actually get hit by the attack. An attack directed at a specific target, does not magically become an attack against a specific square just because the target vanished mid-way. And even if it did, that would make it a blind swing with a 50% miss chance. A harsh reading of Dutiful Guardian says that the ally swap actually negates an attack if used in response. The Devoted Defender's ability explicitly does not, but it's also unlimited use.

You could take both, but as material from different books years apart which is obviously supposed to be the same thing, any combining should involve properly merging them together, not just having the same thing multiple times.

[AnimeTheCat]

Broadblade Short Sword is basically a +2 AC feat, more than the usually allowed +1, but at the cost that it's only active when you CE. If you're also using the Guardian feats, that's a -4 attack just to keep them both active, and too many penalties start to stack up. They may be offset by the Weapon Mastery line, but I'd rather stick to -2 Guardian and a flat +1 AC feat. Having an option to trade attack is good so Combat Expertise=Yes, but investing too much on it means it's not an option anymore. Just like Weapon Specialization/Mastery, a flat bonus all the time can easily be worth more than the option to trade for a higher bonus.

That said, if you're not using the Guardian feats and you're going to -2 CE at all times, and use a light weapon, I would love to suggest Deadly Defense from Complete Scoundrel. But they put it under so many restrictions it's complete garbage- -2 CE sure, light weapon okay, light armor and no shield- ah, I see we're pretending one-handed sport fencing is a thing and swashbucklers don't use bucklers again (hilariously, by requiring so many feats to make an "einhander" style "work," they actually guarantee that the unrealistic option is realistically worse at actual combat, even beyond the obvious 1st level no-feat stats and into invested characters, by their very own attempts to support it).

I'm not sure what the guardian feats are TBH, and I know that the concept isn't optimal. I just think it's neat to do with a small character. I also personally houserule that you can use deadly defense with a shield, because that just makes sense to me, but I didn't suggest it or recommend it because it doesn't work that way within the rules as written grrrrr

My thoughts are that if your DM respects AC as a means of defending oneself and you aren't expected to deal damage in order for enemies to feel provoked to attack you, even if you do take the guardian feats and plunge your to hit bonus in to the darkest depths of Tartarus, it won't matter because you're doing what you're expected to, "not get hit". Perhaps if you're playing Pathfinder, it might be worth taking levels in Cleric or something to get Murderous Command to force enemies to attack you with magic. You don't loose that much, and you could take the Crusader Archetype to get some bonus combat feats too.

My preferred Weapon Mastery trick is to use the Shortspear, with Ranged weapon mastery. That way you get the +2/+2 on bow attacks, a huge range bonus which makes throwing weapons much more useable, and yet because the Shortspear is still a ranged weapon and the feat says nothing about ranged attacks, your get it on your melee use as well. Though right after that, blunt is pretty awesome too- because Light Hammers are a thing, and I long for the day I get to hammer bros. a Lich to re-death. No bow synergy though.

Dubious, imo, that a shortspear fits the requirement of being a ranged weapon. Rules compendium pg 150 (and PHB pg 112) says,

Melee weapons are used for making melee attacks, though some of them can be thrown as well. Ranged weapons are thrown weapons or projectile weapons that are not effective in melee.

I bolded the parts that I feel are relevant, because I think the distinction is pretty clear. Ranged weapons can't be used effectively in melee, but not all melee weapons are ineffective as thrown weapons. If a thrown weapon is ineffective in melee (darts, nets, Javelins) it's a ranged weapon. If a thrown weapon is effective in melee, it's a melee weapon. I think that would make the Shortspear invalid as a recipient of the benefits of ranged weapon mastery. However, you play your game how you want to. That's just my interpretation of the rules as they are written. There's certainly more than one way to interpret them though, and there is no place that says "All thrown weapons are ranged weapons" or that "No thrown weapon are ranged weapons". There wouldn't be though, because the concept of "thrown weapons" bridges the two categories since some are ranged and some aren't.

[PoeticallyPsyco]

Dubious, imo, that a shortspear fits the requirement of being a ranged weapon. Rules compendium pg 150 (and PHB pg 112) says,

"Melee weapons are used for making melee attacks, though some of them can be thrown as well. Ranged weapons are thrown weapons or projectile weapons that are not effective in melee."

I bolded the parts that I feel are relevant, because I think the distinction is pretty clear. Ranged weapons can't be used effectively in melee, but not all melee weapons are ineffective as thrown weapons. If a thrown weapon is ineffective in melee (darts, nets, Javelins) it's a ranged weapon. If a thrown weapon is effective in melee, it's a melee weapon. I think that would make the Shortspear invalid as a recipient of the benefits of ranged weapon mastery. However, you play your game how you want to. That's just my interpretation of the rules as they are written. There's certainly more than one way to interpret them though, and there is no place that says "All thrown weapons are ranged weapons" or that "No thrown weapon are ranged weapons". There wouldn't be though, because the concept of "thrown weapons" bridges the two categories since some are ranged and some aren't.

Ah, that dang sentence again. The problem is, that sentence can be read two different ways with very different meanings:

Ranged weapons = (thrown weapons or projectile weapons) + not effective in melee
OR
Ranged weapons = thrown weapons + (projectile weapons that aren't effective in melee)

Both are equally valid in the English language, and there's no way to know which was meant. Like you say, it's going to come down to interpretation for each game. (Well, each game where this extremely pedantic distinction is relevant).

[Darg]

I'm not sure what the guardian feats are TBH, and I know that the concept isn't optimal. I just think it's neat to do with a small character. I also personally houserule that you can use deadly defense with a shield, because that just makes sense to me, but I didn't suggest it or recommend it because it doesn't work that way within the rules as written grrrrr

I rule that using a shield as a weapon means you aren't using it as shield. You don't get the AC bonus because of it, so why can't it work both ways.

Dubious, imo, that a shortspear fits the requirement of being a ranged weapon. Rules compendium pg 150 (and PHB pg 112) says,

I bolded the parts that I feel are relevant, because I think the distinction is pretty clear. Ranged weapons can't be used effectively in melee, but not all melee weapons are ineffective as thrown weapons. If a thrown weapon is ineffective in melee (darts, nets, Javelins) it's a ranged weapon. If a thrown weapon is effective in melee, it's a melee weapon. I think that would make the Shortspear invalid as a recipient of the benefits of ranged weapon mastery. However, you play your game how you want to. That's just my interpretation of the rules as they are written. There's certainly more than one way to interpret them though, and there is no place that says "All thrown weapons are ranged weapons" or that "No thrown weapon are ranged weapons". There wouldn't be though, because the concept of "thrown weapons" bridges the two categories since some are ranged and some aren't.

The glossary and the dex entry in the PHB disagree:

ranged weapon
A thrown or projectile weapon designed for ranged attacks.

Ranged attack rolls, including those for attacks made with bows, crossbows, throwing axes, and other ranged weapons.