So what are the best stats for a tank/support champion now?

[quickpawmaud]

Presence no longer gives health and gives less leadership so seems a bit more of a waste. I like building a sort of tank/support Champ so I can use all the companions for the most part and if the champ dies you lose anyways. Used to go for Presence, Willpower, Toughness with Warrior and using paladin type gear and spells a lot. Would probably go White Mage instead now with the changes to the perks. I guess they did change some of the spells to be Charms now so maybe Presence is not useless for my build? Wiki still is not updated for the changes to Presence I don't think. Aria of Waves is yellow but still listed as a spell on the wiki not a charm so that would still be willpower I assume? Don't see any Charms I would want really. Probably would rather go for Strength now with either the +3 from starting into Willpower or Toughness which is easier to do since can start as White Mage or Warrior right away (old character was Human, Noble, Charmer for the +3 Presence before switching to Warrior later) Elf with Dove Wings could be neat

 

[Sextaker]

(Haven't tried this build yet, so take everything I say with a grain of salt.)

For class, go White Mage and choose Overflowing Health and Holy Champion at the perk branches.
For stats, go with Toughness, Willpower, and Cunning. Use the Presence boon when you can.
For equipment,

Primary	Free Slot, Flametongue Blade	Catalyst, +10 Crit and +5 Spellpower We want those two stats, so feel free to switch to any weapon that has those
Offhand	Thornshield	Gain Defending and Thorny (scales with Spellpower) when you are crit'd
Head	Helm Of Heroes	+10 Leadership
Neck	Heart Of Oak	+5 Crit and +30 Armor
Shoulders	Seaweave Shaman's Cape	Immunity to Sunder
Armor	Conqueror's Breastplate	+20 Leadership, generate 10% more Threat
Waist	Evergreen's Bountiful Bag	20% increase on self heals
Hands	Golden Carrot Bracelet	+3 Crit and +25 Crit Effectiveness when HP>75%
Feet	Free Slot, Weed-walkers	+5 Spellpower, feel free to switch this
Ring	White Blossom Ring	+5 Crit When you crit or crit heal, give enemies Willpower/3 stacks of Resonance and Staggered
Ring	Free Slot, Hornet Ring	Hornet Ring would be BiS, but if the curse is too much then check out other crit rings

For powers,

At-Will	Recharge	Recharge	Encounter	Ultimate
Lay on Hands	Blessing	Primal Scar?	Summon???	Inspiration
Heal that can transfer Threat from you companions to you or give Threat when use on self	Attack buff for party	AoE Debuff for Fire, Storm, and Frost damage Feel free to switch around spells	Anything really? Haven't thought about powers too much Summon can bring in the extra damage you lack	Full party heal and increases max HP

You Crit Heal to give enemies Resonance and Staggered, which in turns gives a small party heal, which will happen ~50% of the time.
You take DPS companions who no longer have to worry about threat since you'll just heal them and transfer it over to yourself.
With your Leadership through equipment, you give +30 to all attack stats to your companions and more while you have the Presence boon.
As a slight bonus you do passive thorn damage whenever you are hit by a crit.
You won't do too much damage, but you have your Recharge and Encounter slot to put some damage spells in.

Might be fun since you're a tank and healer support wrapped in one, might make fights a slog since you'll lack damage.

 

[Punccline]

Personally, I like to do Strength + Toughness Warrior and then either Willpower or Presence. Willpower for healing and spells, Presence for stacking Leadership. Remember that Leadership doesn't just come from Presence, plenty of gear has it too. Helm of Heroes, Conqueror's breastplate, Guldring, etc.

Toughness + Presence + (Strength or Willpower) Charmer is also good. Charmer gets Expert Inspiration, which is the best supportive perk in the game if you use a lot of buffs.

White Mage and Charmer are better for healing and buffing, but Warrior is the best class at personal raw survivability. Especially getting said survivability without sacrificing your damage.

 

[quickpawmaud]

(Haven't tried this build yet, so take everything I say with a grain of salt.)

For class, go White Mage and choose Overflowing Health and Holy Champion at the perk branches.
For stats, go with Toughness, Willpower, and Cunning. Use the Presence boon when you can.
For equipment,

Primary	Free Slot, Flametongue Blade	Catalyst, +10 Crit and +5 Spellpower We want those two stats, so feel free to switch to any weapon that has those
Offhand	Thornshield	Gain Defending and Thorny (scales with Spellpower) when you are crit'd
Head	Helm Of Heroes	+10 Leadership
Neck	Heart Of Oak	+5 Crit and +30 Armor
Shoulders	Seaweave Shaman's Cape	Immunity to Sunder
Armor	Conqueror's Breastplate	+20 Leadership, generate 10% more Threat
Waist	Evergreen's Bountiful Bag	20% increase on self heals
Hands	Golden Carrot Bracelet	+3 Crit and +25 Crit Effectiveness when HP>75%
Feet	Free Slot, Weed-walkers	+5 Spellpower, feel free to switch this
Ring	White Blossom Ring	+5 Crit When you crit or crit heal, give enemies Willpower/3 stacks of Resonance and Staggered
Ring	Free Slot, Hornet Ring	Hornet Ring would be BiS, but if the curse is too much then check out other crit rings

For powers,

At-Will	Recharge	Recharge	Encounter	Ultimate
Lay on Hands	Blessing	Primal Scar?	Summon???	Inspiration
Heal that can transfer Threat from you companions to you or give Threat when use on self	Attack buff for party	AoE Debuff for Fire, Storm, and Frost damage Feel free to switch around spells	Anything really? Haven't thought about powers too much Summon can bring in the extra damage you lack	Full party heal and increases max HP

You Crit Heal to give enemies Resonance and Staggered, which in turns gives a small party heal, which will happen ~50% of the time.
You take DPS companions who no longer have to worry about threat since you'll just heal them and transfer it over to yourself.
With your Leadership through equipment, you give +30 to all attack stats to your companions and more while you have the Presence boon.
As a slight bonus you do passive thorn damage whenever you are hit by a crit.
You won't do too much damage, but you have your Recharge and Encounter slot to put some damage spells in.

Might be fun since you're a tank and healer support wrapped in one, might make fights a slog since you'll lack damage.

This is what I was using in like 2024 when somebody on the forum helped me but a lot of stuff has been added and changed since then. (I know you can't get both Dawnsword and Guldring I ended up just using the sword from Eryka it is the same amount of damage but less holy slightly and more physical) I would usually go with like Grease and Pyro Brienne or using Hexblade Cait and the Ghost Slayer Arona set (forget the name) and they would kill stuff pretty fast. The crit healing is interesting though will try it out for sure.

 

[quickpawmaud]

Personally, I like to do Strength + Toughness Warrior and then either Willpower or Presence. Willpower for healing and spells, Presence for stacking Leadership. Remember that Leadership doesn't just come from Presence, plenty of gear has it too. Helm of Heroes, Conqueror's breastplate, Guldring, etc.

Toughness + Presence + (Strength or Willpower) Charmer is also good. Charmer gets Expert Inspiration, which is the best supportive perk in the game if you use a lot of buffs.

White Mage and Charmer are better for healing and buffing, but Warrior is the best class at personal raw survivability. Especially getting said survivability without sacrificing your damage.

I am not sure how much leadership is good or if it gets diminishing returns. Like 1 presense is 1 leadership but you get items with like +20 leadership and the only other thing presense does now is give +2 sexiness which some spells were changed to charm and scale of that but I didn't see any in the list that I would want to use really on the wiki. Which is why I wondered if Agility, Cunning, ke Strength might be better now to tank more or deal more damage myself. Also the goal was less to become personally unkillable but more to consolidate roles into the champion so companions could do most of the damage. I always felt the companion tank and healing sets were limiting. So I would focus on maintaining threat, healing, and buffing/debuffing but could also add in like Celestial Smite and Charge Weapon.

 

[Bast]

I always felt the companion tank and healing sets were limiting.

Try tripple white mage tank build with Vestal Raiment Cait and Green Knight Brienne and just autoresolve every fight on dark difficulty.

 

[quickpawmaud]

Try tripple white mage tank build with Vestal Raiment Cait and Green Knight Brienne and just autoresolve every fight on dark difficulty.

Sure but what if I wanted to use Arona and Vivianne who don't have good tank sets? That is what I meant by limiting. Only a few companions have tank sets and only a few of those tank sets are really good. Pretty much every companion has a damage set though. Cait is the only companion with a good tank, healing, and damage set pretty sure and that limits party compositions. Only other good solo healer is Etheryn with her one healing set afaik but she can't revive and her ult is not that useful on a healer. I like mixing and matching with companions rather than sticking with the same 2 always. Kiyoko has like 5 sets and not a single healing or tank set XD. (Etheryn might also have a good set for all 3 roles now but not really tried her tank sets yet and her damage felt a bit underwhelming when I played before using her default set)

 

[Punccline]

Sure but what if I wanted to use Arona and Vivianne who don't have good tank sets? That is what I meant by limiting. Only a few companions have tank sets and only a few of those tank sets are really good. Pretty much every companion has a damage set though. Cait is the only companion with a good tank, healing, and damage set pretty sure and that limits party compositions. Only other good solo healer is Etheryn with her one healing set afaik. I like mixing and matching with companions rather than sticking with the same 2 always.

Not true, Brint's Green Knight and Azzyran's Honey Maiden sets are both good healers too. Agni is a lot better now that Cauterize is an At-Will rather than a Recharge.

Arona's tank set is perfectly fine. Is it amazing? No, but it's got Guarded Stance, Shield Drive, and Crit Immunity. That's really all you need out of a tank, even on Dark Difficulty. Etheryn has two tank sets (Glacial Guard is better imo but Warrior Queen is also good). Her damage set (Outrider) has been good as long as I've been playing, which is like a year or two.

The only two companions who can be a little difficult to slot into parties are Viv and Kiyoko, really. They're both buff/debuff focused utility damage dealers.

 

[Lostname475]

Not true, Brint's Green Knight and Azzyran's Honey Maiden sets are both good healers too. Agni is a lot better now that Cauterize is an At-Will rather than a Recharge.

Arona's tank set is perfectly fine. Is it amazing? No, but it's got Guarded Stance, Shield Drive, and Crit Immunity. That's really all you need out of a tank, even on Dark Difficulty. Etheryn has two tank sets (Glacial Guard is better imo but Warrior Queen is also good). Her damage set (Outrider) has been good as long as I've been playing, which is like a year or two.

The only two companions who can be a little difficult to slot into parties are Viv and Kiyoko, really. They're both buff/debuff focused utility damage dealers.

I do think that warrior queen Ryn feels a bit weak, especially compared to glacial guard. (I was also kinda hoping when it got added that it'd be a more offensive paladin, sort of like spirit totem Arona, but I totally get why it isn't)

Mind if I ask what sort of party you were using to get good results with Outrider? It wasn't bad per se in my experience, but it really felt like it only had 2 good non ultimate powers (frost arrow is only marginally better than a basic attack and harrick is really not a very good summon in my experience frost arrow is only marginally better than a basic attack, and I do think its a bit telling that neither of Ryn's 2 best sets have the power to summon him) I do like that she has a bit of healing though I'm not sure its reliable enough to forgo bringing a more dedicated healer companion

 

[quickpawmaud]

I do think that warrior queen Ryn feels a bit weak, especially compared to glacial guard. (I was also kinda hoping when it got added that it'd be a more offensive paladin, sort of like spirit totem Arona, but I totally get why it isn't)

Mind if I ask what sort of party you were using to get good results with Outrider? It wasn't bad per se in my experience, but it really feltlike it only had 2 good non recharge powers (frost arrow is only marginally better than a basic attack and harrick is really not a very good summon in my experience frost arrow is only marginally better than a basic attack, and I do think its a bit telling that neither of Ryn's 2 best sets have the power to summon him) I do like that she has a bit of healing though I'm not sure its reliable enough to forgo bringing a more dedicated healer companion

Yeah the Harrick summon is what killed it for me as it ruined auto battle since she would summon the useless bird and I couldn't summon Kiyoko or whatever else and Brienne couldn't summon her bull which is way better than Harrick. I like that her new set instead of Harrick as a summon is just an ability.

 

[quickpawmaud]

Not true, Brint's Green Knight and Azzyran's Honey Maiden sets are both good healers too. Agni is a lot better now that Cauterize is an At-Will rather than a Recharge.

Arona's tank set is perfectly fine. Is it amazing? No, but it's got Guarded Stance, Shield Drive, and Crit Immunity. That's really all you need out of a tank, even on Dark Difficulty. Etheryn has two tank sets (Glacial Guard is better imo but Warrior Queen is also good). Her damage set (Outrider) has been good as long as I've been playing, which is like a year or two.

The only two companions who can be a little difficult to slot into parties are Viv and Kiyoko, really. They're both buff/debuff focused utility damage dealers.

Arona doesn't hold threat and constantly misses with Mastbreaker from my experience. Not used her yet after coming back though I mostly played back in like 2024. Arona was worse than Arena Brint/Brienne and Hopknight Quint for sure. Green Knight is not good enough to be a solo healer as it is mostly heal over time stuff. It is like Knight Atugia. He has 4 damage abilities and 1 single target heal over time ability on his at will.

 

[Lostname475]

Yeah the Harrick summon is what killed it for me as it ruined auto battle since she would summon the useless bird and I couldn't summon Kiyoko or whatever else and Brienne couldn't summon her bull which is way better than Harrick. I like that her new set instead of Harrick as a summon is just an ability.

You let companions choose their own actions? Courageous of you

 

[quickpawmaud]

You let companions choose their own actions? Courageous of you

Against weak enemies yes. Harrick just makes killing wolves and shit take longer. Even on Dark difficulty by like level 3 I can auto battle most random encounters.

 

[Punccline]

Mind if I ask what sort of party you were using to get good results with Outrider? It wasn't bad per se in my experience, but it really felt like it only had 2 good non ultimate powers (frost arrow is only marginally better than a basic attack and harrick is really not a very good summon in my experience frost arrow is only marginally better than a basic attack, and I do think its a bit telling that neither of Ryn's 2 best sets have the power to summon him) I do like that she has a bit of healing though I'm not sure its reliable enough to forgo bringing a more dedicated healer companion

The thing to remember about Outrider is that it relies a fair bit on Twist the Knife. You want to debuff enemies and then have Ryn shoot them. It's part of why Harrick is important to the set, his attacks always proc bleed (which is very handy against enemies that heal a lot, because bleed halves all healing recieved).

Even still, you do have to remember that she's not a "Nuke everything" damage dealer like Wayfarer Brint or Spirit Totem Arona. She trades a bit of raw damage for utility in the form of Group Heal and debuff application (Frigid and Bleed).

Also worth noting that she gets unique permanent buffs for doing the quest with her ancestors in the crypt, and optionally if you reject the Crown of Winter on Dracia and tell her to keep it.

Arona doesn't hold threat and constantly misses with Mastbreaker from my experience. Not used her yet after coming back though I mostly played back in like 2024. Arona was worse than Arena Brint/Brienne and Hopknight Quint for sure. Green Knight is not good enough to be a solo healer as it is mostly heal over time stuff. It is like Knight Atugia. He has 4 damage abilities and 1 single target heal over time ability on his at will.

Arona (and other tank companions) benefited a fair bit from the recent change that causes Toughness to naturally increase your threat generated, in my experience. Makes holding aggro less of a chore.

As for GK Brint, he's not a great healer when set to Auto, but if you play Manual you can stack Regrowth (which has an immediate heal in addition to the regen) with Briar Armor (which buffs your defense and autoheals you if you fall below half health).

Is it as braindead easy as a companion with the straight up Heal At-Will? No. But I've beaten plenty of hard fights using him as my healer. He's also more survivable than, say, Passion Priestess Cait, and has bleed (which is, again, REALLY helpful against certain enemies that refuse to stop healing).

 

[Lostname475]

It's part of why Harrick is important to the set, his attacks always proc bleed (which is very handy against enemies that heal a lot, because bleed halves all healing recieved).

Honestly the way he can only hit one enemy at a time to a debuff and does very unimpressive base damage kinda makes me think outrider would be better if it had the glacial guard version of harrick as its second recharge instead of group heal, and some big hit thief power as an encounter. idk, I just find summoned harrick to be not very good and having group heal doesn't really let outrider ryn replace a healer, so it might be better if she was more focused on damage/debuffs rather than also trying to be a healer. Especially when she does also have what is probably the best healer set in the game, so if you want Ryn to do healing, you probably just go queenly raiment (which can occasionally get some surprisingly beefy spear hits in on enemies)

 

[quickpawmaud]

The thing to remember about Outrider is that it relies a fair bit on Twist the Knife. You want to debuff enemies and then have Ryn shoot them. It's part of why Harrick is important to the set, his attacks always proc bleed (which is very handy against enemies that heal a lot, because bleed halves all healing recieved).

Even still, you do have to remember that she's not a "Nuke everything" damage dealer like Wayfarer Brint or Spirit Totem Arona. She trades a bit of raw damage for utility in the form of Group Heal and debuff application (Frigid and Bleed).

Also worth noting that she gets unique permanent buffs for doing the quest with her ancestors in the crypt, and optionally if you reject the Crown of Winter on Dracia and tell her to keep it.


Arona (and other tank companions) benefited a fair bit from the recent change that causes Toughness to naturally increase your threat generated, in my experience. Makes holding aggro less of a chore.

As for GK Brint, he's not a great healer when set to Auto, but if you play Manual you can stack Regrowth (which has an immediate heal in addition to the regen) with Briar Armor (which buffs your defense and autoheals you if you fall below half health).

Is it as braindead easy as a companion with the straight up Heal At-Will? No. But I've beaten plenty of hard fights using him as my healer. He's also more survivable than, say, Passion Priestess Cait, and has bleed (which is, again, REALLY helpful against certain enemies that refuse to stop healing).

True on the buffs but it is just +10 holy damage to her bow (think it used to add crit as well but the wiki says not) not sure if it also applies to her new Glacial Guard set but I would think it should since they seem to both use the same weapon. Crown of Winter applies to all her sets though. Also even if Harrick theoretically makes sense for Outrider why does Warrior Queen get it too?

 

[quickpawmaud]

Honestly the way he can only hit one enemy at a time to a debuff and does very unimpressive base damage kinda makes me think outrider would be better if it had the glacial guard version of harrick as its second recharge instead of group heal, and some big hit thief power as an encounter. idk, I just find summoned harrick to be not very good and having group heal doesn't really let outrider ryn replace a healer, so it might be better if she was more focused on damage/debuffs rather than also trying to be a healer. Especially when she does also have what is probably the best healer set in the game, so if you want Ryn to do healing, you probably just go queenly raiment (which can occasionally get some surprisingly beefy spear hits in on enemies)

I agree I barely ever click group heal on her.