I been playing for around 1 week now, I started out using Barbarian with clubs and strength items, I passed my first mq to sammy
and I notice I have quite a few enhanced effect armors now, including a 163ee level 40 scale armor I found last night, my question is
for a 100% pure tank, using ee armors would I build it on a Barbarian or Guardian? and would I go 100% vitality? or add Int in there some where?
I'm sure dexterity would also help on me not getting hit as much I suppose, but would like to hear from some of you professionals on this
keep in mind I don't want to do much damage I want to be a 100% tank I'll still be using clubs to hit with but for charms instead of using the
strength charms I been using, would I go for max life, or vitality charms or what?

You will be much more sought out if you can do dmg too. My suggestion would be to put in say 70 into vit first on the barb. Then the rest depends on what weapon you are using for the appropriate str/dex ratio. Check here: http://ladderslasher.d2jsp.org/index.php?g=3

well as I said I'll still be using my clubs, and they all have at a minimum of 100ee up to 161ee so I'll be doing damage, just not no 2k crits,
I want to mainly focus on the tank build all ee armors, but I'm curious as to the charms, because I see alot of 500+ max life charms for very cheap, and vitality charms, if I can pump as much life into the character as possible I'm sure it would be a nice character to use in a full catacomb game, I'm just curious if I should go first 10 points into vit or 5 in vit 5 in int, then every 5 levels put 5 vit 5 int etc the more defense I have from melee attacks and magic attacks the better, I know the clubs are a ratio of 90/10 and a barb starts with 25 dex that will be plent, just curious if barb or guard for tank, since guard can use clubs

This post was edited by I_LOVE_BRITT on Oct 17 2010 08:01am

+VIT and +LIFE items work well during the lower half of the game, but during the later levels the +Life is negligible and +Stats (str/dex) would benefit you more I believe.

Although if you insist on going a pure tank build and being ok with dealing mediocre damage, +Life would be the way to go as +Vit from items will not add to your HP.

70 Vit is a lot and should net you huge HP pool. Find some EE armors (scale being the best in my opinion) and you will do fine, better if you can get in a group and tank for them while one of them heals you.

I woul prefer go all int. Remember mobs deal ~2 of 3 times physical and ~1 of 3 times magical damage, and the magical damage is decreased by your int-value.
Int also makes good heals possible, wich keeps you and the group alive. If the tank is a healer as well, the groups mages dont need to heal and are able to focus on mobs.

[x] Int-barb

No class can pull off the tanking and healing like Guardian

[x]Guardian
[ ] Int-barb

This post was edited by Svartermetalisk on Oct 19 2010 12:14pm

A guard cant wear ee-scale, wich is needed to absorb even the magical damage...

but you may be right, grabbing a chain and going all int on a guard is never a bad choice

I think these two classes would be very close to eachother.


If I had to pick one, it would be Barb, simply based on aesthetics, I don't like how the guard looks. Plus barb seems more like a natural tank to me, even though he is a dunce with his low INT.

I was going to make a thread about tanking as first three classes. Might as well post here since other people are posting.

I've got an 195EE chain and use EE swords, also have decent heal charms (133ee 55 heal). Would it be advisable to stat pure INT to contribute to Magic Damage Reduction and Heals, or pure damage (STR), to assist in killing speed? I have ok STR charms, but would need to find better Tanking charms.

[x] 100 vita barb.


I''ve tried 90 and 100 statted vita barbs and I can say that those were probably the coolest chars I've played. Huge life pool. I'd recommend trying it out. (100 worked better for me, somehow 90 didnt have the life to do the thing and the dmg increasement wasn't noticeable, same gear ofc)

Scale has nice magic def but barb int is so low that you would need to waste all your stats into int till 71 to actually get your def nicely. If you're worried about that, get a tank charm (high dex and int charm with +life if you can find). I know that with clubs you won't benefit that much from dex but dex still helps with crits and specially your def. Tank geting critted couple times in a row can suprise your healer.

Whatever you do, don't do 5 lvls vita, then 5 lvls int then again 5 lvls vita.. go purely for vita first if you really feel you must stat int. Every lvl will raise your hp by your base vita = more life (this is what you need and want). Higher int @lower lvls = higher mana... for what? 1 heal that will be very low and then you oom? maybe 2 heals before oom, @high lvls maybe 5 heals?

You will deal enough dmg. I did it in hc with clubs aswell with every weapon having less than 80ee, armors having less than 100ee and +0 in int. I did think of going with higher vita but the gear I had really restricted making it slower to solo hc. But loved it in catas! Even @50%hp you will still have more hp left than most of your group will have max hp.



Well, if you go fighter, you could make quite a nice hybrid. (tho in that case I'd probably pick a stat armor instead of a tank armor)

If you wana tank+heal, go guardian.