There was a post not long ago about this, but I'm willing make my suggestions again although others certainly do have different opionions on the matter which I will get into in a moment,
Head
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If you are a using a sword go with the dualists helm for +1 in swords and add your swordsmanship rune here. In the future, should you ever branch out into other wepon types you can simply carry a couple of extra helemts with you to swap between with the appropriate rune. Helmets are relatively cheap and it works well since they also have the inherant wep bonus. In my opionion this should be either major or supieror for the +2 or +3.
Chest
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I prefer Gladiators but Plate (drednaughts now?) armour is also something I use on occasion. Glads is 80AL+20 vs phys and an energy bonus. Plate is 90 +10. With Plate you get less energy but your base armour is better. To clarify the difference: suppose you are attacked with a firey wepon, with glads you have 80 armour vs the attack since the elemental damage ignores your +20 vs physical. Wearing plate will give you 90 since it only ignores your +10.
Put your absorption rune here.
Legs
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Go with either glads or plate here again depending on what you chose for the chest.
Put your tactics or strength rune here
Gloves
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Same as above. You may in the future want to invest in stoneskin gauntlets.
Boots
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Ascalon/Knights boots
The purpose is the -2 damage reduction which applies universally from having 1 piece. You don't want to waste otherwise useful pieces of armour on this.
Put Your Vigor Rune here
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Ok first, where the last 3 runes go is of little importance. In the future if you ever want to boost tactics or strength instead of your weapon you might craft helmets for that as well.
I haven't mentioned the armour which gives you 100 armour but requires 13 str to use. Some people like it, personally I won't bother buying a set since you don't need that much universal armour for anything in pve (and it would never be used in pvp) and it simply restricts you to keeping your str at 13 for it to be of any use to you. This of course limits your ability to put points into any other attributes and in the end you gereral flexability in choice of playing style. Whereas with plate and glads I find you are given much more flexibility. You can tank if you want, you can go aggrsive if you want, and with glads the extra energy allows you dip more easily into your 2ndary class skills if you want to tinker with them. Furthermore, if you ever want to use this character in pvp (for fun though its not needed since you can make a pvp char) you'll want the glads setup.
That said, others have said they enjoy the other 13 str armour, and its your choice in the end. But you are more restricted in your choices by playing it. Glads on the other hand does give you more energy but the lower universal armour is sometimes not optimal, but this doesn't mean not comfortably functional. Plate is a nice middle ground, but i'd rather have the energy than the middle ground in almost every case. Thats my piece, others may have different advice.
Last edited by Winstar; Jul 07, 2006 at 12:53 AM // 00:53..
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