PC Ultimate survival | Tank/Regen build

ppowersteef

Paladin
This thread is on topic for 1.3.5, this build is less effective in 1.4
Check out my 1.4 analysis
here


Have you ever wanted to feel undefeatable?
That every enemy is beating you constantly up but you just won't die?

With the latest introduced armor sets of DD2, I've been wondering if it was possible to have a tank build that could regenerate your harm in no time.

DISCLAIMER: Unlike things like maximizing defense stats, this thread is about keeping you alive for the longest time possible. which doesn't have to be maximum defense.
DISCLAIMER2: Ironically this is actually very similair to a maximising life-regen build. Although this also adds ideas to make the maximized life regen more helpful with other defensive accessoires.

I've been trying some stuff out, and this is the build as result, where most of it is even pre-lunar events.

---Armor---
Squire%27s_Great_Helm.png
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Valhalla_Knight%27s_Breastplate.png
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Valhalla_Knight%27s_Greaves.png

Squire's Great Helm, Valhalla's Knight armor and Valhalla's greaves.
In total they give 62 defence, along with a huge increase in life regen.
The Squire Great Helm only gives 12 defence, but it's increased life regen can make that up for a lot.
The Valhalla Knight Breastplate does, besides adding a bulky 30 defence, even adding a massive life regeneration on top of it.
The greaves are there because they add the most defence, as well as a good universal offense and great movement bonusses.

The best part of all is: The Helmet's regen along with the Valhalla Armor's regen stacks together.
This combination exceeds even the tankiness of Solar Flare or Beetle Armor.

Chlorophyte_Mask.png
There's also an alternate helmet available.
The Chlorophyte Mask grants 25 defence on it's own, which is the most defence of all helmets.
This can help to get less reliant on too much life regen, and when you want to add some melee bonusses to the build.
Though it bigger defence makes the Worm Scarf less useful. It's still a decent alternate for non-expert runs.

But in overall, both helmets are nearly identical for survivability. As both can keep around the same health under a spike ball shower for ~50 seconds.
But it's a preference if you prefer recover over defence. Either helmet will work really fine.

---Weapon---
Vampire_Knives.png
Vampire Knives, Their heal-on-hit rate is unaffected with the life regen, Using this will give an even bigger bonus. Useful along with the Chlorophyte Mask.

But you don't have to rely on the weapon for your regeneration, using a stronger weapon to kill bosses faster will work fine too.

---Prefixes---
For the Vampire knives, Either Ruthless or Godly will do well, as that may increase the healing amount as well.

For the accessoires, It'll be Warding, in total it may add up to 20 Defence (24 in expert).

---Accessoires---
There are several accessoires that are Defensive or healthy. I'll devide it in two groups.

-Major-
I find those accessoires a need to have the effect of tank/regen work greatly.
Celestial_Shell.png
Celestial Shell. Grants 4 Defence and extra life regen. It also allows you to become a werewolf at night to increase defence and life regen even more.
Celestial_Stone.png
Celestial Stone. Also gives 4 Defence and extra life regen.
Cross_Necklace.png
Star_Veil.png
Cross Necklace (or Star Veil), The small extra time to remain invincible really helps the regeneration a lot.
Worm_Scarf.png
Worm Scarf, absorbs 17% of damage taken. This is recommended for the Squire's Great Helmet, as it'll cover the low defence of the helmet.
It also helps surviving the high enemy damage.

-Minor-
The following Accessoires are possible to Tank. but are situational. so depending on what you're fighting, you may need different ones:
Frozen_Turtle_Shell.png
Frozen Turtle Shell, absorbs 25% of damage taken when at half health, but not functional above half health.
Moon_Stone.png
Moon Stone, This bit of 4 defense and recover will really work well along with the werewolf buff.
Paladin%27s_Shield.png
Paladin Shield, offers 6 Defence and full knockback resistance. And with the 25% absorbtion of team damage, it'll be surely recommended for Multiplayer.
Ankh_Shield.png
Ankh Shield, Because of the 4 defence and big debuff resistance. But the debuffs it blocks are more useful for underground biomes.
Angel_Wings.png
Wings, for a huge mobility and fall damage resistance, but if you're using mounts, it becomes redundant.
Master_Ninja_Gear.png
Master Ninja Gear/Black Belt, gives 10% change to fully ignore an incoming attack, as well as extra invincibility once dodged. (stacked with cross necklace)
1570897893207.png
Shiny Stone, this amplifies your current life regen with 10% and it adds a massive life regeneration on it's own, though that only works when you're not moving or attacking, if you're using this, then you'll probably have to rely on minions to deal damage.

-Not recommended-
Charm_of_Myths.png
Charm of Myths, While a slower cooldown on potions sounds neat, it only adds 0,8 HP/sec with Greater Healing Potions, (if you use it instantiously). combined with the band of regeneration, that's just 1,3 HP/sec. This falls too short in comparison with the other possible accessoires to use. It sure helps to heal up in a pinch, but you'll need potions less frequently with this build.

---Buffs---
Using Buffs are pretty optional at this point, as you'll be doing really fine without.
But for the definition of overpower. here's a list of recommendations:
Well_Fed.png
Well fed for overall bonus (including defence) and restoring life regen on Expert Mode.
Endurance.png
Ironskin.png
Lifeforce.png
Regeneration.png
Endurance, ironskin, lifeforce and regeneration for even longer survival.
1591527412562.png
Obsidian Skin, this makes you immume to On Fire! Which can be useful during Betsy's fight.
Weapon_Imbue_Ichor.png
Ichor weapon imbue: To increase vampire knives effectiveness at long duration.
Honey_%28buff%29.png
Cozy_Fire.png
Heart_Lamp_%28buff%29.png
Enviromental buffs. Always useful to use.


---Downsides---
Although this setup can work great, it does have a few downsides of using it:
Debuffs:
Poisoned.png
Venom.png
On_Fire%21.png
Cursed_Inferno.png
Electrified.png
E
very DoT debuff will prevent all kinds of life regeneration. for a build that depends on life regen, this can make the most ignorant debuffs annoying. Keep note that Betsy inflicts On-Fire! Use an Obsidian Skin Potion to prevent this.
Broken_Armor.png
Withered_Armor.png
Broken armor is also worth to mention, a reducing of 50% of defence will be harder to recover.

The effect of these debuffs varies a bit depending on which helmet you've chosen to wear.
Chlorophyte Helmet won't be cancelled out against the DoT debuffs, while the Squire Helmet recovers faster from the Broken Armor.

Low Offense:
The armor will only give a buff to melee and summons. The Celestial stones may also make up a bit to become more viable for other classes. but you have to do it with that.

Insane high enemy damage:
Attacks that do 150+ damage are harder to recover. thankfully there aren't many sources that do this amount of damage in quick succession. But stay alert of the True Eyes of Cthulhu and Duke Fishron. The Worm Scarf can counter a portion of it.

Low Mobility:
Lack of mobility accessoires can make things harder. Even with the extra movement speed. But this can be countered by using mounts.

With a setup like this, You'll have a minimum defence of 90 and can regenerate around 17hp/sec. (No buffs included)
With this, you've created an similair health restore effect as a pernament Shiny Stone or Nebula Regen Buff. which is insane.
And thus you're able to tank a serious lot of enemies,
Buff potions aren't even necessary, but when using them, then you're able to resist the Expert Moon Lord by been hooked at one spot!
It's an interesting setup for me, especially that it also makes a new weakness for regeneration.

I hope you all have enjoyed reading, have fun tanking. :)
 
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Awesome build! One question, why isn't the master ninja gear mentioned? The extra invincibility time and chance to dodge should at least be mentioned as one of the minor choices.
 
Awesome build! One question, why isn't the master ninja gear mentioned? The extra invincibility time and chance to dodge should at least be mentioned as one of the minor choices.
It's possible. But I don't think I want to depend too much on the RNG chances. But it's indeed worth mentioning

I'll update once done with dinner.
 
Really nice, I love this set up Steef. The tank builds always appeal to me as I don't dodge well and need a lot of defense. Looking at your regen build, it's an interesting alternative and one I'd love to try.
 
Try it with the basilisk mount. Ramming enemies got much easier now that you can simply disregard being hit. Previously you'd have to jump at the right time in order to avoid being hit. It's really fun by the way.

Speaking of that, a basilisk works well in the water with the celestial shell.

For single targets go with the scutlix mount. The lasers are better than the ram damage against single targets.

Hopefully that solves the damage issue. Plus the scutlix mount reduces fall damage to 1. You may not be able to dodge that well but with this armor set that's pretty much irrelevant.
 
Try it with the basilisk mount. Ramming enemies got much easier now that you can simply disregard being hit. Previously you'd have to jump at the right time in order to avoid being hit. It's really fun by the way.

Speaking of that, a basilisk works well in the water with the celestial shell.

For single targets go with the scutlix mount. The lasers are better than the ram damage against single targets.

Hopefully that solves the damage issue. Plus the scutlix mount reduces fall damage to 1. You may not be able to dodge that well but with this armor set that's pretty much irrelevant.
I could also go to the obvious and say the mechanical cart -should- be the best mount as it adds 7 defence. But I'm not a fan of travelling at high speed at a limited rail track.

Hence why I left the choice of mount open, various ones have their pros and cons.
 
Very helpful guide; a downsides section for addressing the weaknesses of the build is also a huge plus. I'm loving the feeling of a tank that can gobble up hits and actually walk it all off (or rather sleep it off, since regeneration is way faster when stationary than when moving). Especially in Expert Mode, where high-defense "tanky" builds still go down in just a handful of hits, this one manages to hang on so long as you're at least halfway decent at dodging.

I'd recommend Paladin's Shield receives a bit more attention, especially alongside the Star Veil. When you block damage for a friend, you also receive invincibility frames from it which the Star Veil extends. It makes a very nice synergy since you're merely taking a quarter of the damage a regular hit would do to trigger your invincibility, rather than a regular hit for... regular damage.

Additionally, I believe Solar Flare Leggings can be more or less ignored entirely in favour of Valhalla Knight Greaves. Both of them provide the same defence, but Valhalla Knight Greaves offers double the movement speed bonus of Solar Flare Leggings and a whopping twenty percent critical strike rate bonus on top of that. Melee speed only affects the range of yoyos by a marginal amount and the velocity of melee weapon-produced projectiles (and not the fire rate of those projectiles), while the Valhalla Knight Greaves offers substantially more DPS in its crit boost as well as mobility with the movement speed bonus, helping to patch those two (fairly minor) problems with the build.
 
Very helpful guide; a downsides section for addressing the weaknesses of the build is also a huge plus. I'm loving the feeling of a tank that can gobble up hits and actually walk it all off (or rather sleep it off, since regeneration is way faster when stationary than when moving). Especially in Expert Mode, where high-defense "tanky" builds still go down in just a handful of hits, this one manages to hang on so long as you're at least halfway decent at dodging.

I'd recommend Paladin's Shield receives a bit more attention, especially alongside the Star Veil. When you block damage for a friend, you also receive invincibility frames from it which the Star Veil extends. It makes a very nice synergy since you're merely taking a quarter of the damage a regular hit would do to trigger your invincibility, rather than a regular hit for... regular damage.

Additionally, I believe Solar Flare Leggings can be more or less ignored entirely in favour of Valhalla Knight Greaves. Both of them provide the same defence, but Valhalla Knight Greaves offers double the movement speed bonus of Solar Flare Leggings and a whopping twenty percent critical strike rate bonus on top of that. Melee speed only affects the range of yoyos by a marginal amount and the velocity of melee weapon-produced projectiles (and not the fire rate of those projectiles), while the Valhalla Knight Greaves offers substantially more DPS in its crit boost as well as mobility with the movement speed bonus, helping to patch those two (fairly minor) problems with the build.
Thanks a lot for the suggestion. I'm going to update the OP with the leggings when available.

The thing with the Paladin Shield remains situational though, as it's use is less needed when you're playing singleplayer. But I'll update the information with it. :)
 
@Terry N. Muse
I've updated the thread with help of your suggestions. Also done my research to check if it's right.

A bit disappointing though, When one has spend so much time to research through all armors to check out and compare which one is truly the strongest, and then the results also looks so easy in comparison.

But I don't mind, I've fun doing such researches though, and I'm also enjoying it when the game introduced new armors that gave possibilities to improve the stats. :)
 
Wondering why Shiny Stone isn't mentioned at all? It may be limited to standing in-place, but with the massive total regen, I'd think that'd be fine regardless?
 
Wondering why Shiny Stone isn't mentioned at all? It may be limited to standing in-place, but with the massive total regen, I'd think that'd be fine regardless?
As far as I can remember, it works good only if you're not moving, don't take damage and not use any items, Meaning that it's barely any use during combat.

This thread had the focus mainly meant for the combat.

I'm aware that the Nebula Armor and their life regen exist too, but it has their drawbacks: One of them been an endgame material. Second that it doesn't support melee or summoners. And relies a little too much on the life regen to survive, which can be weakened by the debuffs mentioned above.
 
Ankh Shield should be in Major.
It provides immunity to two of the most common debuffs(those being Bleeding and Poison) in Hardmode.
And you can extinguish the On Fire! debuff with water.
Cursed Inferno is only applied by 2 enemies in the Corruption and only one boss(Spasmatizm), so that isn't much of a problem either.
Venom is also only applied by 2 enemies, so, much like Inferno, it's pretty rare.
 
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Ankh Shield should be in Major.
It provides immunity to two of the most common debuffs(those being Bleeding and Poison) in Hardmode.
And you can extinguish the On Fire! debuff with water.
Cursed Inferno is only applied by 2 enemies in the Corruption and only one boss(Spasmatizm), so that isn't much of a problem either.
Venom is also only applied by 2 enemies, so, much like Inferno, it's pretty rare.
The Ankh shield is not directly part of regeneration, therefore it is minor. Honestly, this is a post game set up, for grinding events and bosses, so a lot of the downsides you mention don't translate. Using this to explore would be hellish with the lack of movement speed alone.
 
The Ankh shield is not directly part of regeneration, therefore it is minor. Honestly, this is a post game set up, for grinding events and bosses, so a lot of the downsides you mention don't translate. Using this to explore would be hellish with the lack of movement speed alone.
Lack of movement speed? Mounts.
Also, the Star Veil is not directly part of the regeneration either.
 
Ankh Shield should be in Major.
It provides immunity to two of the most common debuffs(those being Bleeding and Poison) in Hardmode.
And you can extinguish the On Fire! debuff with water.
Cursed Inferno is only applied by 2 enemies in the Corruption and only one boss(Spasmatizm), so that isn't much of a problem either.
Venom is also only applied by 2 enemies, so, much like Inferno, it's pretty rare.
Lack of movement speed? Mounts.
Also, the Star Veil is not directly part of the regeneration either.
While the Ankh Shield has a lot of debuff resistance. I find it's use rather situational. and the situation where you need it's debuff resistance is even less during bossfights and invasions.
That's the reason why the Ankh Shield is not a major accessoire.

It's certainely an useful accessoire, and during some events is also useful to have one equipped too, but It's not necessary for this build to become successful.
Ankh Charm is in a big competition against the other defensive accessoires in the minor section, so it's up to you to choose which one will fits you the best. :)

As for the Star Veil. It's mostly because of the Cross Necklace. (But I've said Star Veil since it's a direct upgrade).
The Cross Necklace will allow you to take less hits per second, effectively reducing the DPS you take under a continious attack. This makes it also much easier for the regeneration to keep up it's heal per second, and thus it's a major accessoire needed to be successful with this build.

But thanks for your feedback, I'll update the main thread with my additional information.
 
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