Suggestions for tank char please

[Madscientist3]

At the moment I play a mage and my party consists of Barik (tank), Verse (archer), Eb and me (mages). So its one tank and 3 glass cannons and I play on normal. I am a lawful character who sided with the disfavoured.

Next time I want to be a completely brutal psycho. I want to use Verse and KiS (mad killers) and Siren (femme fatale) in my party. (Barik is too lawful, Eb and Lentry are too sane). This means I need to be tanky.
What do you prefer:

- heavy armor, 1h+shield (classic tank but low on damage)
- unarmed + heavy armor (attacks faster, uses only dodge)
- 2h + heavy armor (more damage, I hope I can take some hits)
- throwns weapons, 2h or 1h+shield ? (Do you atomatically switch from range to melee attack when enemies come in range? It would be nice if my tank does not need to walk to the enemy. He thows things at them and when they get close he continues without need for weapon change.

Do you think it is wise to play without a classical mage?
I want to play on hard, not PotD.

 

[JackalTornMoons]

One hand+Shield and light armor.

I started Sword and Shield/Dual Wield and grabbed Sunder and Slice. I wanted to get the Armor Penetration stance and Arrow Shield before I added points into the Defense tree.

Take the Arrow Shield talent in the Agility tree that lets you use Parry for ranged attacks (making Dodge worthless), get a Parry focused shield, take the 2 +shield effectiveness talents, and train Parry 5 times a level. Nobody will be able to touch you. I went for Finesse first (for the accuracy mostly, but the bonuses to parry and deflection are nice too).

I went with the Disfavored, so I didn't really feel like I had to boost Resolve because of the aura.

You can actually do decent damage with the one handed mastery talents, so I've prioritized Finesse > Might > Quickness.

 

[Madscientist3]

Thanks

In my current playthrough Barik tanks quite well most of the time, but against some enemies he takes lots of damage. (I am still quite early in the game)

Of course, the main char will be the best char in whatever field you chose, because he can use talents from any tree and he gets skills through reputation and quests.

For tanks, why is quickness important? It unly reduces the cooldown of spells. At least my lv7 mage has so many spells that there is always something he can cast.

What weapon would be best for tanks? Since Barik is slow anyway I gave him the 1h weapon with the highest damage (which is also the slowest 1h weapon).
1h weapons come as 1.) high accurancy 2.) high armor penetration 3.) the better of 2 damage types 4.) high damage or 5.) also usable as thrown weapon.
Since I assume that special attacks are based on weapon damage and I will use special attacks whenever I can, I would prefer weapons with high base damage.

I assume that a tanky char would be the best choice if you want to go solo (I want a full party). There are several CC spells, but I did not find a way to perma CC most enemies because lots of them use ranged weapons and they do not stand close to each other. So a char who can dodge/parry/absorb most hits seems nessesary. The problem will be enemies who attack not dodge or parry but other defenses, because you cannot raise those via use/training.

 

[JackalTornMoons]

I like Quickness so you can get more Sunders off, which lets you use the higher damage lower penetration weapons. You are still capable of doing decent damage even as the main tank.

The special attacks list the damage modifier (I think sunder is 1.5x and slice is 1.2x).

I'd probably opt for a tanky mage if I were to play solo.