Stalwart Defender worth it or not?

[One]

So, I have Valerie in my team she is a tower shield fighter and I use her as a tank (you know mobs in this game usually attack the character which runs first, so having 1 tank in a team is not that bad idea..)

I got level 8 and can switch from fighter to Stalwart Defender for her. I just wonder what will be the best tank - a level 20 tower shiled fighter or a level 7 fighter\ Stalwart Defender up to max?

Any idea on this?

[One]

Originally posted by Yaldabaoth:

If you are absolutely certain you want to use Valerie, give her fighter 9 for that ac against touch attacks, 1 level of vivisectionst and rest in stalwart defender. She has too low dex to benefit from higher fighter levels.

Forgotten to say. I edited her initial stats with cheatengine so she has better dexterity but less charisma and so. Nothing really overpowered just redistributed 25 points properly as if I created her as a new character and had 25 points to put in with all stats at 10.

[Andante]

Originally posted by One:

Originally posted by Yaldabaoth:

If you are absolutely certain you want to use Valerie, give her fighter 9 for that ac against touch attacks, 1 level of vivisectionst and rest in stalwart defender. She has too low dex to benefit from higher fighter levels.

Forgotten to say. I edited her initial stats with cheatengine so she has better dexterity but less charisma and so. Nothing really overpowered just redistributed 25 points properly as if I created her as a new character and had 25 points to put in with all stats at 10.

imo she is perfectly workable on challenging/hard as a tank. 1 dip in traditional monk for crane style helps her ac, to hit and will saves, and 1 dip into visectionist for sneak damage and mutagen that can boost either dex/con/str and natural ac, later on 1 dip into stalward defender for 1 natural ac and defender's ability. With buff support I was able to get her 40+ ac level 4 onwards and at lvl 10 she has 50+ ac and decent offense.

Due to her high charisma, I made her my persuasion companion and went cornugon smash to keep her target perma demoralized.

Once they fix thug's bonus, she can also dip into thug but right now thug fear effect doesn't work on most abilities which is a shame.

[Graygan]

Valerie is totally worth it as a stalwart defender. Just put the one point into str to even it out and the rest into Con to make her even better as a stalwart defender.

Have her trigger the fights... the enemy focuses on her and she rarely gets hit. Meanwhile, the rest of the party rolls up both sides and slaughters the enemy.

Or just use a merc. I have a monk as my player character and he's an excellent tank, so I use a merc as my dps on one side and Ekuns dog on the other side to roll things up. Maximized fireball before I let them all move and other buffs/debuffs and I roll through pretty much every tough fight.

The normal fights are just cakewalks...

This is not story-mode level either... I keep my settings at as close to Pathfinder PnP difficulty as I can. I have had to reload twice because my character has died... I've not lost anyone else though.

[EvilDonut]

Originally posted by One:

Originally posted by Yaldabaoth:

If you are absolutely certain you want to use Valerie, give her fighter 9 for that ac against touch attacks, 1 level of vivisectionst and rest in stalwart defender. She has too low dex to benefit from higher fighter levels.

Forgotten to say. I edited her initial stats with cheatengine so she has better dexterity but less charisma and so. Nothing really overpowered just redistributed 25 points properly as if I created her as a new character and had 25 points to put in with all stats at 10.

You should have waited....and i won't say more to avoid spoilers

[Andante]

Originally posted by Graygan:

This is not story-mode level either... I keep my settings at as close to Pathfinder PnP difficulty as I can. I have had to reload twice because my character has died... I've not lost anyone else though.

Pathfinder PnP stats are a joke. I looked up the stats of a PnP 4 CR owlbear and I think my custom lvl 2 1 monk/1 visictionist with 30 ac can solo most 4-5 CR monsters.

Pathfinder PnP stats honestly look like it is balanced for players who play like "hur I'm gonna give my 2h fighter 12 strength to role play a weak but courageous fighter".

It's no wonder the devs boosted up the joke PnP stats because generally computer players are smarter and tend to optimize more since for traditional CRPG players making optimized OP characters is the norm.

[GAME GOD FLUENT]

Originally posted by Graygan:

Valerie is totally worth it as a stalwart defender. Just put the one point into str to even it out and the rest into Con to make her even better as a stalwart defender.

Have her trigger the fights... the enemy focuses on her and she rarely gets hit. Meanwhile, the rest of the party rolls up both sides and slaughters the enemy.

Exactly this. She's a killer as a Stalwart Defender. They get great bonuses to AC and enemies can't hit her. If you flank and get teamwork feats like Precise Strike, you're damage dealers are mowing down enemies left and right while they're all focused on Valerie. She makes a perfect tank IMO.

[One]

Originally posted by w0lv3n:

Originally posted by One:

Forgotten to say. I edited her initial stats with cheatengine so she has better dexterity but less charisma and so. Nothing really overpowered just redistributed 25 points properly as if I created her as a new character and had 25 points to put in with all stats at 10.

You should have waited....and i won't say more to avoid spoilers

I think I know what you are speaking about. Well anyway I can always downgrade here to level 1 to her initial stats with tools like this https://pathfinder.deev.io/

[One]

Originally posted by Fluent:

Originally posted by Graygan:

Valerie is totally worth it as a stalwart defender. Just put the one point into str to even it out and the rest into Con to make her even better as a stalwart defender.

Have her trigger the fights... the enemy focuses on her and she rarely gets hit. Meanwhile, the rest of the party rolls up both sides and slaughters the enemy.

Exactly this. She's a killer as a Stalwart Defender. They get great bonuses to AC and enemies can't hit her. If you flank and get teamwork feats like Precise Strike, you're damage dealers are mowing down enemies left and right while they're all focused on Valerie. She makes a perfect tank IMO.

So does it make sence to switch to Stalwart Defender after lvl-7 fighter already or would it better to get fighter lvl-9 first for that AC bonus against touch attacks?

[GAME GOD FLUENT]

Originally posted by One:

Originally posted by Fluent:

Exactly this. She's a killer as a Stalwart Defender. They get great bonuses to AC and enemies can't hit her. If you flank and get teamwork feats like Precise Strike, you're damage dealers are mowing down enemies left and right while they're all focused on Valerie. She makes a perfect tank IMO.

So does it make sence to swithch to Stalwart Defender after lvl-7 fighter already or would it better to get fighter lvl-9 first for that ac bonus against touch attacks?

I would personally go as soon as possible. That way you have more levels to gain as Stalwart Defender, because each bonus you get there is a great one. It's your choice, though. You might want the extra Fighter feats, but I would go for Stalwart Defender sooner rather than later. You could make it work either way, it's really your choice. And you can always take more levels of Fighter later if you want to, it's unlimited multiclassing.

[N0S4A2]

The Touch AC bonus is absolutely worth waiting for, many fights AC is worthless and you will rely entirely on Touch to stay alive

[pascal.difolco]

Originally posted by Andante:

Originally posted by Graygan:

This is not story-mode level either... I keep my settings at as close to Pathfinder PnP difficulty as I can. I have had to reload twice because my character has died... I've not lost anyone else though.

Pathfinder PnP stats are a joke. I looked up the stats of a PnP 4 CR owlbear and I think my custom lvl 2 1 monk/1 visictionist with 30 ac can solo most 4-5 CR monsters.

Pathfinder PnP stats honestly look like it is balanced for players who play like "hur I'm gonna give my 2h fighter 12 strength to role play a weak but courageous fighter".

It's no wonder the devs boosted up the joke PnP stats because generally computer players are smarter and tend to optimize more since for traditional CRPG players making optimized OP characters is the norm.

No reload in PnP, chars aren't supposed to die once per day :)

[N0S4A2]

Originally posted by pascal.difolco:

Originally posted by Andante:

Pathfinder PnP stats are a joke. I looked up the stats of a PnP 4 CR owlbear and I think my custom lvl 2 1 monk/1 visictionist with 30 ac can solo most 4-5 CR monsters.

Pathfinder PnP stats honestly look like it is balanced for players who play like "hur I'm gonna give my 2h fighter 12 strength to role play a weak but courageous fighter".

It's no wonder the devs boosted up the joke PnP stats because generally computer players are smarter and tend to optimize more since for traditional CRPG players making optimized OP characters is the norm.

No reload in PnP, chars aren't supposed to die once per day :)

Exactly. You also have to remember that DMs, *ahem* good DMs adapt and change things for the party they are building encounters for, so most monster stats are the baseline for all the people who use 10-15 pt buys and take feats like Cosmopolitan