08 Jun 2005 at 03:48 - 2
I struggled with this question when designing my warrior build as well, and did a lot of research into it. Here's my opinion, for a tank build...
1. W/Mo... this is the easiest solution for the self heal and protection buffs. If you want to absorb lots of damage, solo on your own a lot, or not have to rely on there being a healer watching your back, then this is the best choice.
2. W/E... a warrior that uses Armor of Earth regularly is a super tank. There's very little self-healing capabilites here, but Endure Pain from the Strength line can often get you through really bad situations where the healer isn't able to keep up. The trap with this build is that if one decides to try and use the Ele for damage too, there simply isn't enough energy or regen for a warrior to do this effectively and make the most of their warrior skills and stances.
3. W/N... this is the one I use, and enjoy it immensely. However, Blood Magic does not even remotely compare to Monk healing prayers when it comes to self heal. Death Magic is fun, but requires so much energy to maintain that one must be really frugal with it's usage, and then one really needs to be wearing the Gladiator armor. The best line here is Curses, as it adds hexes and conditions to opponents that make dealing damage very powerful, as well as a great aoe spell in Mark of Pain. However, there is very little to zero quality self-healing here... at least that don't severly lower your max health, or require high energy and activation times. Imho, the W/N is more about being an effective damage dealer rather than a tank.
Something to consider, is that there are only so many attribute points to go around, and they come slowly through the first 12 levels or so. Sprint is in the Strength line, so you'll want to have it high. And then your main weapon choice needs to be pumped up pretty high as well, if you want it to be effective in melee combat. So then there comes a choice... Tactics or a secondary attribute?
Tactics is where all of the really good defensive stances reside, as well as the healing signet, and most high level shields require a high Tactics to wield. However, there are high level shields that have a Strength requirement instead, though they are harder to come by, and Endure Pain is often a better choice than the Healing Signet, and it's in the Strength line as well.
If one chooses to invest in all three warrior attributes, say 10,10,10, then that leaves only 5 levels left over for their secondary attribute... not much to be effective, especially with the Necro and Ele secondaries. And those two classes require so much micro management of energy, since most of the better spells/skills cost 10, 15 or even 25 points for a single cast. A warrior's bread and butter are 5 cost spells/skills, with the ocassional 10 or 15 one on the bar.
In the 10/10/10/5 type of design, a Monk is the best choice since the healing prayers can be really helpful even at a low level. But let's say one foregoes Tactics altogether, and invests those points into their secondary instead (what I've decided to do)...
Now the Necro and Ele spells are effective, especially curses and earth magic. But again, one needs to have a good healer around for routine maintenance, and at least Endure Pain or a good healing secondary skill. With nothing invested in Tactics, the healing signet gives only 40 pts and reduces your armor by 50%... not very helpful. Even with Tactics at lvl 5, the healing signet doesn't really help much, and is better replaced with something else.
I enjoy my W/N a lot, and switch attributes between Curses and Death Magic depending on what mood I'm in... I have 12 Axe, 7 Str and 9 Necro with runes and bonus armor. But I do use the Gladiator armor, and couldn't imagine running this character with only 20 pts total... unless I focused solely on Adrenaline skills for my axe and didn't use many stances. And then my solo ability isn't so hot... I have to at least take Alesia with me, or I'm in trouble. I'll carry Soul Feast if I'm using Death Magic to steal life from corpses, but that's about it. Blood Magic might look good on paper, but in my experience it wasn't very effective. I recognized quickly that the build I had with Blood Magic would have been much better using a Monk secondary and healing or protection prayers.
Anyway, hope that gives a little insight. One thing that may help is to use the Skill Listing engine on this site, and choose the two classes you're considering, and order the last field by Energy Cost or Activation Time. You'll mostly be relying on 5 pt skills and those that have very short activation times, since a spell that costs 15 pts and takes 3 seconds is going to cause a multitude of problems in actual application, for a number of reasons. So anyway, look at the secondary's skill selection for 5/10 pts and that have a less than 2 sec activation time. That might help you narrow down what would work best.
And don't underestimate Wilderness Survival for a Ranger... there's a lot of really effective skills there as well. That was one the options I looked at. Good luck to you.
