Return of Reckoning

Greetings,I have some question about IB S&B:
1 For a lvl 31 what a Build make sense.
2 How is better spend my RR 31*
2 Talis and pot*

*It's better stay full tank or is better have some DPS too and when yes how...right to use STR talis?

Anyone in t4 been trying out 2h builds since the new gear dropped? I just returned after a couple months of hiatus, and I'm liking how the new gear looks, both appearance and stat wise. I'm of the opinion that 2h IB is pretty decent, even if overshadowed by SM and KotbS, and the assist damage you bring isn't necessarily too far behind SM anyways while remaining pretty damn tanky. The new gear only helps with that, especially with the set bonus stacking you can achieve.

For solo/PUG play, I still pretty much go with the ol' Grumble'n'Mutter spec: RoR.builders - Ironbreaker

2h IB is still one of the best melee classes for solo roaming and PUG play IMO because of the sustain you get from GnM and the survivability you can get from your buffs. I put my renown full into parry and dodge/disrupt, with leftovers in Futile Strikes (IB has lowest base Ini for all tanks except Black Orc, so lowering chance to be crit is a must IMO). My gear is still pretty low (haven't gotten a BL group yet), so only Anni/Merc, but I do pretty well all things considered. Self-buffed, my Strength is around 670, Toughness is at 625, and armor is just about 5k.

For group play with my guild, I usually go something like this: RoR.builders - Ironbreaker

IB has less group utility than KotBs (who doesn't?) and less assist damage than Sword Master, but you can still provide some pretty good buffs/debuffs, depending on your group composition. Oathbound is one of the best group buffs an IB brings, esp against melee trains: 25% parry for you and your Oathfriend, plus around 60 or so Ini, which is a pretty substantial reduction in your chance to be crit. Ancestor's Fury is typically overshadowed a bit by the passive buffs a KotBS can bring (2h Knight will just passively give out the same amount of crit and strength for no effort, oh what fun), but if you're like me and somehow have like the one knight in your guild, it's worth picking up.

Earthshatter is, again, somewhat overshadowed by the aoe snare provided by knights, but it still has its uses. It is one of your highest tooltip damage abilities, and can easily crit for upward of 1.2-1.5k on squishies, and so provides a nice bit of burst in addition to the AoE snare when at 100 grudge (which is piss easy to maintain in any sort of group). Also, it can potentially affect more enemies than the Knight snare, so there is that. Biggest downside is the cd: 20 seconds means you gotta be judicious with its use, and also decide whether its more important to use it for its snare, or for its damage.

Runic Shield isn't essential, but it's nice to have in this RDPS meta, especially as 2h tank whom typically get eaten alive by the firing squads of Sorcs and Magi present everywhere nowadays. Also can be a good way to boost your Grudge intake, though that's usually unnecessary. The damage shield itself is fairly small, so it's better in small-scale than it is in RvR, where it gets popped almost immediately.

Anyways, what have any of you other 2h IB been speccing? I know I saw Osgrim mention he has 975 Strength on his IB, which I assume he achieves through set bonus stacking and using all +str jewelery, and I'm curious how that works out. Is the trade-off in survivability worth it for the assist damage? I feel like at that point you're playing a bit more like a mdps than a tank, but I'd definitely love to see it in action.

GodlessCrom wrote:Anyways, what have any of you other 2h IB been speccing? I know I saw Osgrim mention he has 975 Strength on his IB, which I assume he achieves through set bonus stacking and using all +str jewelery, and I'm curious how that works out. Is the trade-off in survivability worth it for the assist damage? I feel like at that point you're playing a bit more like a mdps than a tank, but I'd definitely love to see it in action.

Full merc + 2 dps-y genesis-Strife and Torment + any offensive 2h should work really well without losing too much utility and defense.

15 points in Vengeance tree means your Stonebreaker will reduce armor by 1200+ (at 100 grudges) pair it with a Taunt + Cave-in into a Grudge Born Fury and you have a devastating combo. You could also use a taunt proc (Carnage or Dominator set if you have it) to skip using Taunt.

That combo coupled with some assist from a Mdps can easily destroy any target without much difficulty.

Nefarian78 wrote:

GodlessCrom wrote:Anyways, what have any of you other 2h IB been speccing? I know I saw Osgrim mention he has 975 Strength on his IB, which I assume he achieves through set bonus stacking and using all +str jewelery, and I'm curious how that works out. Is the trade-off in survivability worth it for the assist damage? I feel like at that point you're playing a bit more like a mdps than a tank, but I'd definitely love to see it in action.

Full merc + 2 dps-y genesis-Strife and Torment + any offensive 2h should work really well without losing too much utility and defense.

15 points in Vengeance tree means your Stonebreaker will reduce armor by 1200+ (at 100 grudges) pair it with a Taunt + Cave-in into a Grudge Born Fury and you have a devastating combo. You could also use a taunt proc (Carnage or Dominator set if you have it) to skip using Taunt.

That combo coupled with some assist from a Mdps can easily destroy any target without much difficulty.

I have found Grudge-Born Fury just doesn't hit hard enough. I have about 710ish STR with self-buff up, and going up that far into Vengeance means you either don't get Oathbound (one of the best buffs you get, esp for tanking), or you don't get Earthshatter, which is also one of your best skills IMO. I'm still trying to keep my defensive stats pretty high too, and it seems like it's hard to strike a balance between being tanky and doing damage. Too much emphasis on defensive stats, and you might as well just wear an axe and shield. Too much emphasis on offense, and you're just a worse mdps. I just want to be Volgo 2.0, like the interwebs promised me, is that too much to ask?

GodlessCrom wrote: I just want to be Volgo 2.0, like the interwebs promised me, is that too much to ask?

#yes.

On a more serious note, speccing full strength is a no-no in my mind on IB, as 2 of your highest damage ability (Eathshatter and Punishing Blow) dont scale at all and AA doesn't scale well. We tried with Fluffy and got to around 1050 using purple +32 strength jewels + 2 genesis + Beastlord + dominator + merc. Wasnt providing enough extra damage to justify losing mega huge amount of defense (armor, wounds and toughness gets significantly lower, resists drop to abysmal level without Wind Impervious set and you cant spend RR points in defense).

So, all in all, 600-700 with buff works great for me. Which, in turn, lets you get about 600 toughness and 450-500 WS too. If I had to spec for full offense, I would stack crit and WS before strength.

That being said, I believe at least 40RR points need to be spec in parry + dodge/disrupt always, as Crom suggested. Then when you have more points, you can fool around trying different things (crit/strength/WS/FS/resolute d/cleansing wind/etc).

I have been running 5 beast/ 4 dominator since gear patch, full armor and spirit resist talis (lets me swap out armor tactic and slot Seen It All Before instead). When I have time to play again, I plan on getting the new shoulders/helm set that give 10% chance for 7% parry and go with that instead. All with scenario weapon. That 4% crit + AP is good good good.

And as always, for Open RvR battle, cap resists are a must. Yes, yes... keep laughing at me with my spirit resist talis and ele resist potion...

Thanks for the info, Volgo! One day I will have a highlight reel video to match your own :p I have found crit reduction from Futile Strikes to be pretty helpful as well in surviving the current Return of Rdpsening meta. All them big-**** crits from Sorcs and so on. I know you usually run with Mkatew as a duo: do you find you need more resists beyond the cap? I'm thinking with the KotBS resist aura+Winds Impervious and the resists you get from armor, you'd be resist capped without needing to slot resist talis. Elemental resist pots all the way though, **** the surf-bros and their rainbow fire of tzeentch's balls or whatever. I usually group with an AM, and the resist buff from them+winds impervious sets me at cap.

One good part of being an IB, your self buffs help keep the potting costs low haha.

Nah man, huge resist is king. If I run 800-850 ish on my own with no buff, then i have 1200+ with knights buff, which negates the resists debuff that sorc/magus/shaman have (it's round 350-400ish I believe). Except corp. I run low corp.

Whereas if you rely on buff to get soft capped (you run 400-600 base), then 1 debuff and you are back down to a place where it hurts. I think the same about armor. I always make sure i run capped armor (4400) after I factor mara 1500 debuff. So basically I run 4,9k + my 900 buff.

Get those 2 right, and your toughness can be much lower while still standing strong.

Ah, damn good point, had forgotten about the resists debuffs haha. Good stuff dude, always happy to see great players giving out advice

EDIT: Forgot to ask, do you find yourself still running Rugged in a tactic slot, or you get enough passive toughness from gear and aura/self buff to justify chucking it away in favor of something more interesting? With Rugged on, I get about 570-600 toughness, depending on what gear I go with and my mastery spec. Never really tried running with it gone, cuz then I'd have at 400-440 toughness, which seems awful low.

I only dish Rugged when we run a stupid group where I take a dps spot and Halhammer is guarding me. Otherwise I always use it. Without, I have less toughness than my RP, and I feel sad. 550-600 toughness is a sweet spot for me with overcapped resist and 5.5k+ armor.

When I do remove it, it is to use both Punishing knock and Sweet revenge with Seen it all before and Rising anger, both of which i never remove. In ''normal'' spec (i.e. Rugged, Seen it all before and rising anger), my 4th tactic are PK in tactic bar 1, Sweet Revenge in tactic bar 2 and Ancestral inheritance in tactic bar 3. I swap on the fly depending on the fight/scenario matchups :
PK against healer heavy comp;
Sweet revenge when we are low on dps;
Ancestral inheritance when i am the only tank in a scen or agasint players I know will target me.

Good stuff Volgo, thanks for sharing man! What you normally rocking for mastery spec? I assume solo/PUG is grumble'n'mutter for dem healz, but I could be wrong. I sometimes feel like if I spec for Ancestor's Fury, Runic Shield, and Oathbound, I spend too much casting buffs and not enough time hitting destro, which kinda defeats the purpose of going 2h, but I am admittedly le scrub.