Kinda been dreading this since I've never invested a lot of time
How do classes like monk and ninja actually tank solo since they can't really tank.
I mean aside from buying high ee padded robes but eHHH

High ee padded + high vita

Dex gear + even more vita

75 vita 50 int salvation double strike good heal charm


Extra: gear swap to int gear + healing

General agreement, for melee. I prefer the higher dex gear + vita, personally. I like to go ~110 vita or so and save shrinables.

Reasoning: EE robes give so-so protection against the cast, because you aren't high int. They give almost no protection against physical. Gotta be a punching bag not to die vs the 3-wave EPs at 76.

That's assuming full explore. If you're whistling? I think somewhere around 75 vita gives enough padding. Just... Save shrinables, especially the 71-77 portion of the climb turns your health bar very bouncy.

Tbh
What I was thinking of doing. Guess I wanted the OK.
Split 3:2 vit:int.
Dex armor until level 30ish then swap to padded ee
Whistle 1s and heal when I don't have shrines

I'm already dreading 71-77

no where near the best way or even a great way... but my way is dex arm + dex charm and hit harder than they hit me with EE dags. usually vit at start until 100 then rest into dex. gets slow and may have to town once per lvl from 60-77 (71+ mostly since can't guarantee 1-2 spawns at a time anymore) pending spawns and warm lights but still doable and whistling lvl 1's to heal on doesn't hurt

At lvl 65 ish i sometimes switch the dex robe to my int robe which lets me heal for 400-500 ish and lets me do pretty much all lvl besides eps

I like to do stat gear + all points into vita
And use salvation

Before i got decent pad robes, id pump vit but never really over 100 vit.

Never really used dex robes on solo monk/ninja climbs. Lifer dex charm helps.

Just a note: If you play mage, you can play monk pretty much identically to however you play mage. Just be prepared to regen/shrine a fair bit more due to the large difference in starting Int. It's what I'm doing in my current monk solo run. Assuming solid heal charm, somewhere around level 60 or so, probably take your base vita up from 40 to 50, possibly 60, depending on the quality of your caster robe. If you can clear out sneaky fast enough, 50 should be fine, if not, 60 probably better, 71-77 really does hit hard.

I don't personally prefer the caster route, but it is fun to shake it up sometimes.

Ninja similar if your mage gear includes int daggers. If not, I *think* int swords are pretty cheap as well.

i always just go 110-130 vita with dex robes for monk/ninja. i really dislike salvation, find it incredibly weak and now after the nerf where mobs can remove abilities it's even worse.

i also don't like ee padded robes, they seemed "meh" at best. so i stick with the high vita. i like it.

guess you need to decide what you like, many suggestions here and i'm not going to say mine is better than anyone elses.