Pathfinder: WotR (Beta) - Stalwart Defender Prestige Class Mechanics/Overview

[@justmonica9253]

Definitely a loss from the 3e dwarven defender. Rounds per day on an ability that fatigues you once you lose it is kind of sucky- definitely preferred the old 'until you choose to end it', which works for the defender since you'll want to move at some point. As it is, thank your stars the ai in these games is fairly simple, because any opponent thinking clearly could just pepper the defender with arrows until they relent, leave the stance, and become fatigued.

[@Abraham10777]

You can use the stance while fatigued with the right defensive power but tbh I prefer an invulnerable rager over this class.

[@Abraham10777]

@@notalefty999 The invulnerable rager can get guarded stance which eventually gives him +6 dodge bonus and reflex and he can get beast totem which gives +6 natural armor. Even with the -4 to AC from mighty rage he still gets +8 to AC compared to the defender with his +6 to AC from his stance and the dodge bonus.

[@Weerknuffelbeer]

Well, yes and no. If you load up your character with a bunch of feats that improve attacks of opportunity and then charge them into the biggest cluster of enemies in the fight and activate Defensive Stance your enemies will be faced with a tough decision: do I stay within threat range of the Defender or do I move to a better position while taking a massive AoO to the face? No matter the choice, it's going to hurt.

[@neiljopling4693]

Could help toughen up a reach rogue while adding BAB but with the bonus to thrown weapon damage I think a dual javelin build would get the most benefit.

[@bjorn7556]

Could you do a build video on your favourite play style! I'd like to see that

[@TheGrunaldi]

i like it on my main tank in non-unfair games 3paladin; 7 fighter (towerShield spec) ;10 Stalwart Defender however on unfair his touch AC is 2 low for end game enemies in Kingmaker not moving can be negated by legendary proportions at later levels

[@noukan42]

Personally, i really hate Tower Shield specialist. There are so many ways to pump AC that i find renouncing the bash attack and getting a penalty to hit rate is almost never worth the extra few AC of a tower shield

[@TheGrunaldi]

@@noukan42 TS spec have a few intersing things going for it :adding shield ac to reflect saves ,not getting flanked while having shield and adding shield ac to touch ac . All of those are nice and only TSspec get those in fighter and even outside of fighter those are hard to find . Also u can just use heavy shield for first few levels if TS is 2 heavy

[@noukan42]

@@TheGrunaldi point is, those are purely defensive abilities that require the worst fighting style by far. How are you supposed to do damage or control the battlefield? In general as a fighter type you want to either do a lot of damage or excel at a combat manuever, because there are no aggro mechanichs for a tank to use. Tower Shield specialist damage is curbed into the dust, and nothing on it is particoularly attractive to a CM build. If it had a taunting ability like 3.5 Knight i wouldn't think as lowly of it, but as it is it's only useful if the enemy AI decide to attack them instead of going for anybody else.

[@TheGrunaldi]

@@noukan42 yes i probably would not enjoy pure TSSpec in real Pathfinder session . But in crpg where i have 6 characters i don't need then all to be interesting (2 much micro xD)

[@vitaminc2161]

@@noukan42 in this case you deal damage by delegating damage dealing role to the more competent damage dealers a.k.a other party members. In addition TS and SD are still fighters so even if they don't deal so much damage, they still have high BAB to hit constantly while most likely outlasting the enemies.