So is it true, that aveline is much better at pure tanking, than hawke because of her specialization (if you compare both as sword and bord warriosr, with sword/shield and defender talents).
Especially avelines passive abilities Indomitable (Knockdown resistance: 100% and Stun resistance: 100%) and thick skin (15% damage resistence) seem pretty "must have" to me.
I am also unsure, what exaclty is the difference between Knockdown and knockback resistance? Some large bosses, like dragons or monstrous spider have attacks that knock characters down, does knockback resistance also help against that?
Does Knockdown/knockback resistance 100% mean that you are completely immune to such attacks? Zarathustra01 (talk) 10:21, March 21, 2011 (UTC)
I used Fenris as a tank myself. Then had Varric, Merrill, and I pick everything off with arrows and magic.Robbloodwarden (talk) 10:29, March 21, 2011 (UTC)
I'm playing 2h Warrior Hawke, so fenris is not necessary for me on this playthrough. I've just completed act 1 on hard. I met 2 Dragons and one monstrous spider up to now, where 50% of their attacks knock their target down. This cripples a 2h warrior, because he keeps up aggro through damage, but cannot deal any while on the floor. So i'm considering either wasting 3 talent points in "Defender" to get "Resilience" (100% knockback resistance) or include Aveline in my party, when such bosses are coming. Any recommendations? Zarathustra01 (talk) 10:48, March 21, 2011 (UTC)
There is a lot of confusion between knockback and knockdown. When you are hit by an attack that deals physical or magical force (all melee and arrow/ranged attacks deal physical force, some mage spells deal magic force, i.e. fireball), you make a fortitude check (based on your strength) to determine if you are knocked back/down. If the damage dealt is only a certain percentage of your overall health, you are knocked back, instead of knocked down, which is also why you see mages being knocked back/down a lot easier than warriors, they simply have less health and fortitude. Immunity to knockback only prevents you from being knocked back, not knocked down, just as immunity to knockdown doesn't prevent you from being knocked back. A warrior is more prone to knockback, since he has high health, it takes a lot more to fully knock him down, so immunity to knockback gives you a lot more bang for your buck. The good thing about Hawk vs Aveline is that there are 2 rings in Act 2 and 3 in the Nexus Golem's shop (in the middle of the cave if you take the northwest path in the Dalish village) that give immunity to Knockback on the Act 2 ring, and immunity to Stun and Knockdown I believe on the Act 3 ring... or was it stun and flanking... or stun and critical hits... Well, either way, with those 2 rings (that cost about 90g each), you can have pretty much all of the same passive immunities that Aveline gets from her specialization, except that extra 15% damage reduction. But, since Hawke gets so many more ability points to distribute, he can easily make up the difference with more health. In the long run, a tank Hawke is going to be able to deal out a lot more damage than Aveline (thanks to his specializations) and tank _almost_ as good. T0rin (talk) 13:33, March 21, 2011 (UTC)