Man at arms builds

[Akulakha]

I don't suppose anyone knows of any man at arms builds they could list? A good tanky build that would be suitable for very high survivability (High ac, high saving throws) that would also hold its own in pvp? Or maybe even suggest any feats that I should get to make an unkillable man at arms character?

[KhyberKruel]

M@A's with a dip into paladin or blackguard will give you the saves, past that they have high ac already. Pvp is a bit odd with them as they can be powerful against anything with low will saves or ac

[Akulakha]

M@A's with a dip into paladin or blackguard will give you the saves, past that they have high ac already. Pvp is a bit odd with them as they can be powerful against anything with low will saves or ac

Ok so...maybe Man at arms 24/fighter 3/paladin 3? I've been thinking about putting 5 levels of monk in there just for the all-around saves they get.

[chad878262]

Fighter 3 is pointless. Either go 4 or drop it from the build.getting weapon specialization will give you a bit more damage at the expense of being dependant on that weapon type and losing whatever MaA goodies you'd get. If your taking paladin going to 4 with STR and CHA of 21 can give you divine might/EDM for a good damage boost a limited amount of times/day. I'd say go MaA 26 and then pick either paladin OR fighter for the other 4, focusing on either getting weapon focus/specialization and one extra feat or EDM and better saves.

[KhyberKruel]

M@A does get a few bonus feats as well as goodies that you'd likely pick up with your fighter levels anyway, I would also suggest not taking fighter levels.

[R0ninknight]

I personally prefer Divine Shield over Divine Might. I focus on defense in my preferred playstyle, too, no matter the specific build. I just like defense.

Paladin 4 adds A LOT of defense to any build with decent charisma.

[Akulakha]

Does man at arms still get epic resilience at lvl 19? It says in the wiki yet it doesnt say it does so in the in-game description.

[KhyberKruel]

No, at least it didn't for my epic m@a so I would assume not. You get stead fast though and bonus epic feats so you could take it if you wanted too

[Thorsson]

Epic Resilience does nothing if you already have Steadfast.

[gazoo]

I always thought that steadfast had no buggy effect on reflex saves...but actually reflex is also bugged (in addition to will saves)?

[Thorsson]

Reflex isn't buggy AFAIK. You're not supposed to fail on a 1.

[Akulakha]

Ok I have just one more question: Which feats does anyone highly recommend I get?

[Thorsson]

All the Shield Feats I would imagine.

[Aelcar]

If you multiclass Paladin and invest in CHA heavily, then Divine Shield.

Pal (or BG) would solve all your survivability problems. CHA is also good for MaA given the challenges.

-) Pal itself covers the saves improvements you're looking for.
-) DS covers the AC improvements you're looking for. Consider Thorsson's suggestion about the shield feats, they're very good for the class.
-) EDM covers your low DMG issues (classic MaA problem, basically solved)
-) With Steadfast Determination, Epic Resilience is utterly redundant.
-) The CHA investment has great synergy with the build overall.

Conclusion: MaA 25/Pal 5 types are what you're looking for (could be MaA 26/Bg 4 if you're evil).

[Karond]

I've tested the 26 MAA/4 BG, and the 5 paladin version, and they're more or less needed to make the MAA work. MAA is a dip or go big class, but pure MAA really struggles. EDM really helps the build do damage and use that charisma for some much needed saves from P or BG.

That said, I'm a little unimpressed by the builds overall. It's quite annoying to use the various challenges, and you do specialize in them here. Like, the interesting thing is daunting challenge. If you first spend 6 seconds doing nothing with demoralize, you can then use daunting to fear them. Sounds pretty cool right? Well, not so much.

First of all, you can only demoralize one target at a time. So while Daunting looks cool, it's only realistically going to target a single enemy at a time. Even so, if you target it against something weak-willed that isn't immune, the duration of the fear effect is only 2-3 rounds. They'll come straight back at you, and you have to waste 12 seconds to send them away for another 12-18 seconds. I mean, at that point you're not even doing damage to each other most of the time.

This means that mocking challenge is the only thing that you're really specializing in, sadly. The effect is nice, sure, but it's also an effect that the game engine often already has built into it. Like, be the first character to charge into the fray, and the monsters have a tendency to attack that character. It's supposed to be used to make enemies not attack the squishy party members, but they rarely get attacked if they play decently, hanging slightly back and so forth.

So that leaves you with the basic challenge. It's absolutely needed to make the build viable offensively, it's single target and short duration. It won't help you fight the big stuff in other words, just regular minions. If you hit knockdown or some other activated combat feat as you charge in on the queue at the same time, you won't actually waste 6 seconds with the challenge. That's neat, but if you face 2+ enemies, as soon as you kill one of them, you're going to stand there for 6 seconds challenging the next enemy.

So what I'm trying to say is that MAA is underwhelming when soloing, and so-so in party play. It's a cool concept, but it really needs some kind of upgrade. This is with BG or Paladin dips btw, without them the MAA is really struggling.