65 replies to this topic

[-PenguinFetish-]

Video link here.

 

Abilities

 

Shield Wall - (Block attacks costing stamina, but generating Guard. Upgrade gives everyone in a 4m radius 30% armor.)

 

Unbowed - (10% guard per nearby enemy. 32s cooldown. Upgrade improves Guard generation by 100%) 

 

War Cry - (taunt all nearby enemies. 4s duration, 20% guard per enemy taunted. 24s cooldown, 35 stamina cost. Upgrade enhances armor by 200% for 10s). 

 

Walking Fortress - (Invulnerable for 8s. 32s cooldown. Upgrade gives -1s to all cooldowns and 10% guard per hit taken)

 

Passives

 

Everything in the Guardian tree except Balanced Combat. 

 

It'll Cost You, Deep Reserves and Bear Mauls the Wolves (can't be flanked. Less likely to be staggered from the front) in the Combined Arms tree. 

 

Unlock Order

 

Straight to Walking Fortress (level 4), then get War Cry and Unbowed. Upgrade all your abilities except Shield Wall (level 9). Get Bulwark and Untouchable Defense, then go for Bear Mauls the Wolves (level 14). Fill out the rest of the Guardian tree as you see fit (I go for the full defensive passives first). 

 

Strategy 

 

YOU ARE A TANK. And by god you are a good one. The very best actually. On threatening you are practically invulnerable with this build. If you use shield wall as a parrying tool rather than a solid defensive ability, you can be mobile and aggressive as well as generating guard instead of losing health. 

 

Charging into rooms on your own isn't exactly recommended, but just make sure you get there first, use War Cry, then unbowed when your guard drops. You should now be swarmed with enemies. When your guard drops from the onslaught, use Walking Fortress, or War Cry again if its off cooldown. Walking Fortress should be used for getting otherwise dangerous revives and for keeping alive against large groups of archers, or when tanking a powerful group of melee units (Templar Commander/Knight, dual wielding rogues, Behemoth/Pride Demon/Brutes). Make sure you have this ready to pop when you need it. Do not spam it, or you will most likely find yourself needing it and not having it. 

 

If you play correctly and practice your parrying, you will be unkillable, even on Perilous. One thing to remember though, do not turn your back. Ever. Even when you are staring death in the face, tank on. Use your abilities, health potions, everything you have to stay alive. Your DPS teammates will take care of the killing, you just need to be the little playtoy to distract them while they do it.

[Shinnyshin]

You don't like Counterstrike, I take it?

[Cirvante]

Counter Strike and the passive you get right before it are too good to pass up imo. Counter Strike's area taunt also seems to have a higher radius than War Cry.

[Nitestick7]

"If you use shield wall as a parrying tool rather than a solid defensive ability, you can be mobile and aggressive as well as generating guard instead of losing health."

 

This is a good point since it also lets you regenerate stamina between blocking attacks, leading to the ability to block more total hits.

[Shinnyshin]

Counter Strike and the passive you get right before it are too good to pass up imo. Counter Strike's area taunt also seems to have a higher radius than War Cry.

More than seems to. Counterstrike range is practically global, limited solely by LoS. It's how we've taken to pulling in Perilous. Just counterstrike taunt from across the map and have the Legionnaire run around a corner. And the passive you get right before it makes for actual invulnerability.

[xlm1994]

Most people don't like playing tank.  Everyone wants to do loads of damage, even when they play tanks.

And that's okay, that's natural.  Sadly, tanks are useless in this game and mages can help the team survive better.  That's a big design mistake.

[horangi88]

Counterstrike >>>> Unbowed. Other than that, nice build.

[Shinnyshin]

Sadly, tanks are useless in this game and mages can help the team survive better.

Strongly disagree with this given there're only two tanks (if you include AW) and both are considered ludicrously strong.

[horangi88]

Most people don't like playing tank.  Everyone wants to do loads of damage, even when they play tanks.

And that's okay, that's natural.  Sadly, tanks are useless in this game and mages can help the team survive better.  That's a big design mistake.

 

What are you talking about? A good tank makes thing a lot easier. 1 tank and 3 damage dealers is a win.

[xlm1994]

What are you talking about? A good tank makes thing a lot easier. 1 tank and 3 damage dealers is a win.

Maximum guard is 25% of your health (your health is usually bit more than 1000 for a tank), barrier is somewhere around 1200.  Besides, the area of taunt is quite small.  You can ask your team to stand together for barrier but you can't ask demons to stand close to be taunted.  So 1 tank 3 dps is not as good as 1 keeper 3 dps, or 4 AW.

[Cirvante]

Maximum guard is 25% of your health (which is usually bit more than 1000 for a tank), barrier is somewhere around 1200.  Besides, the area of taunt is quite small.  You can ask your team to stand together for barrier but you can't ask demons to stand close to be taunted.  So 1 tank 3 dps is not as good as 1 keeper 3 dps, or 4 AW.

 

You can increase your max guard with passives, the area taunt of counter strike is quite large and an elementalist can give you barriers.

[horangi88]

@xlm

 

Counterstrike taunts everything, everything!!!, on the screen. What are you talking about?

[Shinnyshin]

Maximum guard is 25% of your health (your health is usually bit more than 1000 for a tank), barrier is somewhere around 1200. Besides, the area of taunt is quite small. You can ask your team to stand together for barrier but you can't ask demons to stand close to be taunted. So 1 tank 3 dps is not as good as 1 keeper 3 dps, or 4 AW.

Legionnaire has three abilities that can refill guard to full (Fortress, Warcry, Counter), true invulnerability that can have 100% uptime if you're taking enough fire and reduces the cooldown of all your abilities, and iframes + global taunt from counter. I find invulnerability makes me significantly more tanky than a keeper barrier, especially on higher difficulties.

Edit: also, you know armor doesn't apply to barrier, right? So 1k hp in barriers is far, far worse than 940 or 1250 in guard (max with upgrades and one optimal rotation, second if you start a fight with full). Especially since invincibility and guard spam.

[xlm1994]

You can increase your max guard with passives, the area taunt of counter strike is quite large and an elementalist can give you barriers.

I admit I didn't know about counter strike, sorry about that.

 

But I hold my point about barrier and guard.  Assuming in the video posted the character is lv 20.  At 1:20 he was hit once (never hit before, that's impressive I admit), damage is 115 and he lost more than half of the guard.  In the same video list the AW video, he was hit at 0:22, damage is over 500, and he lost less than half of his barrier.  That tells something.

Yes you can play a tank with a keeper, but what's the point to use a tank when you have a keeper already?

[horangi88]

1. Counterstrike (taunts ALL enemies on the screen and generates full guard)

2. Warcry (re-taunts and refills your guard)

3. Walking Fortess (gives you invulnerability [no damage, no status effects, no knockdowns] and refills your guard)

4. Shield Wall (builds guard if everything is on cooldown [rare, if you time things right] or there are only 1 or 2 enemies at close range)

?????

5. Profit

[xlm1994]

1. Counterstrike (taunts ALL enemies on the screen and generates full guard)

2. Warcry (re-taunts and refills your guard)

3. Walking Fortess (gives you invulnerability [no damage, no status effects, no knockdowns] and refills your guard)

4. Shield Wall (builds guard if everything is on cooldown [rare, if you time things right] or there are only 1 or 2 enemies at close range)

?????

5. Profit

Your point?

[horangi88]

The Legionnaire controls all aggro, is indestructible, and face-tanks all the bosses on the higher difficulties. In other words, The Legion is full of win.

[xlm1994]

The Legionnaire controls all aggro, is indestructible, and face-tanks all the bosses on the higher difficulties. In other words, The Legion is full of win.

Problem is boss doesn't always face you, they sometimes just jump out, hit your ass, break all your guard, damage half your health, then leave you in fear.  Unless you are good enough to avoid that (I never avoided by just running and jumping). But if you are good enough to avoid all attacks, why do you play tank?

[Shinnyshin]

But if you are good enough to avoid all attacks, why do you play tank?

You play tank to ensure the boss is consistently going after the one person who can dodge it and live if they make a misstep or two. You have a global taunt and demon is a thousand times easier to dodge if you know he's coming for you. Besides, it's very possible to take literally 0 damage from demon boss as Legionnaire. Spammable invincibility with a side of iframes is as strong as it sounds,

[horangi88]

For the bosses, Walking fortress [no damage, no knockdown, no status effects] and the invulnerability passive keep you at full capability. Also, what does skill level have to do with tanking? If you're good, why not play the tank? I don't follow you logic. I have carried many a PUG with the Legionnaire.

[Cirvante]

I admit I didn't know about counter strike, sorry about that.

 

But I hold my point about barrier and guard.  Assuming in the video posted the character is lv 20.  At 1:20 he was hit once (never hit before, that's impressive I admit), damage is 115 and he lost more than half of the guard.  In the same video list the AW video, he was hit at 0:22, damage is over 500, and he lost less than half of his barrier.  That tells something.

Yes you can play a tank with a keeper, but what's the point to use a tank when you have a keeper already?

 

If I remember correctly, my Elementalist's barrier was somewhere around 3-4k. Keepers are incredibly useful with Static Cage and Disruption Field, but not necessarily required for Barrier casting if you want to bring more deeps.

[21T09]

I have never tried counter strike, but will surely spec into it next time around. It feels that warcry is not always enough for aggroing enemies.

[golyoscsapagy]

I think the build is pretty much optimal. Counterstrike is better pound of pound, I agree, but the problem is with the 60s CD. You can recycle some of it during walking fortress, but sometimes there's still downtime between two clears, that was the main reason I gave it up in favor of Unbowed..Maybe if the party DPS is subpar it can work, but with good DPS the mobs deal less damage and the clears are faster. It's pathetic when the team has to wait for the tank.

 

Also, please note that guard gets your armor bonus while barrier takes full damage. With the passives and the war cry buff your guard can have close to the same effective hp as a barrier.

[-PenguinFetish-]

For those asking about counterstrike, i dont like the minute long cooldown. I can cycle these skills to keep my guard topped up at all times, assuming im parrying hits with shield wall.

[horangi88]

Counterstrike cooldown hasn't been a problem. Flow of Battle gives you some reduction so it's not really 60 seconds. Cycling through Counterstrike, Warcry, Walking Fortress  and Shieldwall keeps the enemies taunted and you at full guard through the whole game.