Seeking direction on skill tree/mag for Swordtanking

[Drifting Fable]

Hello, fellow Sword Tankers. Now that I'm getting the feel of just guarding and nearing 30, I believe now is as good as time as any to compare my skillsets with other to see if I'm in the right or wrong direction, because I'm still rather squishy when it comes to hard mode.

For starters this is my current build thus far: http://ryuhiroshi.ry.funpic.de/pso2/hunter.html?01HU!IOI2IbtN4OjGD4Of Sort of tried to follow the opinions that have been stated. unfortunately some of these opinions tend to conflict with each other like for example if Automate is worth going for or not on a tank? So I may have wasted some points. :-? Currently I'm trying to max S-DEF and then try to plow as many points as I can in War Cry and Guard Stance.

My mag is currently lv 65 with 49 striking and 16 ability/dexerity having fed it nothing but weapons. I kinda just now released striking and striking defense are not the same slot so that's probably why I'm so squishy at the moment. How much longer should i consider more striking before switching gears into striking defense or any other kind of defense for that matter?

While I believe I've lost the opportunity to be a Stone Wall, can my build still be salvaged into a Mighty Glacier? Or do I need to consider finding a way to purchase AC for the sake of resetting. Maybe get a new mag for the sake of going pure defense.

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts. ^^

[IndigoNovember]

Hmm, here are some of my thoughts:

Just Reversal would serve you well, since it would allow you to quickly get back on your feet and continue tanking.

As for Automate Halfline, I can see it being useful to a tank since it means they could stay on their job without having to pull back to heal/get healed as much. Plus you've already started working towards the requirement to unlock it.

Warcry needs to be at level 10 to be effective or so I've been told. So you should probably focus more on Warcry than Guard Stance. You can probably make the S-DEF lost back through your mag/affixes.

[Dinosaur]

unfortunately some of these opinions tend to conflict with each other like for example if Automate is worth going for or not on a tank? So I may have wasted some points. :-? Currently I'm trying to max S-DEF and then try to plow as many points as I can in War Cry and Guard Stance.

My mag is currently lv 65 with 49 striking and 16 ability/dexerity having fed it nothing but weapons. I kinda just now released striking and striking defense are not the same slot so that's probably why I'm so squishy at the moment. How much longer should i consider more striking before switching gears into striking defense or any other kind of defense for that matter?

While I believe I've lost the opportunity to be a Stone Wall, can my build still be salvaged into a Mighty Glacier? Or do I need to consider finding a way to purchase AC for the sake of resetting. Maybe get a new mag for the sake of going pure defense.

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts. ^^

- If you want Automate halfline, then go for it. Very useful for any class.
- If you max the S-Def skill, you may not need to invest any S-Def points in your MAG. This depends on your race/gender combo, primarily to be able to equip rare units.
- If you want to maximize your defenses, you should focus on building units. Armors are able to provide large amounts of S-def. Snow Soul + Body III on some units can easily provide 200+ S-def per unit, which is more than enough even without Guard Stance.

[Drifting Fable]

Ah, so the actual real defense power comes from the units, increasing the stat is just so that we can equip the necessary units. Well seeing that I picked a Male Cast, I guess this means I'll keep my mag chugging on pure S-atk and max the S-def skill.

How many points do I need to invest in automate? just one?

Seeing that I'll need to grab just reversal I'll probably save war cry for the 50 cap.

What kind of abilities do I need to look for in a sword?

Lastly whats the verdict on just counter? worth the points?

[Geistritter]

How is "sword tank" even considered to be a thing.

I'm sorry, I can't get over that.

[IndigoNovember]

Ah, so the actual real defense power comes from the units, increasing the stat is just so that we can equip the necessary units. Well seeing that I picked a Male Cast, I guess this means I'll keep my mag chugging on pure S-atk and max the S-def skill.

How many points do I need to invest in automate? just one?

Seeing that I'll need to grab just reversal I'll probably save war cry for the 50 cap.

What kind of abilities do I need to look for in a sword?

Lastly whats the verdict on just counter? worth the points?

For Automate Hafline, it's pretty much up to you. At 1 point there is a 20% chance of it activating, at 10 you have a 100% chance of it activating. Feel free to stop anywhere in between if you feel comfortable with the chance.

For abilities, since you're going for Tank I suppose you'd want to look into ones that boost any of the DEF stats. Note that as a Hunter you naturally have a high S-DEF, but your T-DEF and R-DEF are pretty weak so you might want to try buffing those through your equipment's abilities/affixes.

Just Counter isn't horrible, but it isn't that great either. Since all it does is give you the ability to do a Just Attack after a Just Guard (you could just step cancel the guard do a Step Attack and then the following attack will be your Just Attack), I'd say skip it until you have nothing else to put SP into.

[gigawuts]

Get step attack. Sword is only half complete without it. You attack things and cause them to stumble much faster, can lead a combo with a JA, and have extended invulnerability frames on top of dashing more frequently as part of your attack patterns. In all it's both offensive and defensive.

Automate halfline is handy, but best maxed out. It's no good if you fail rolls all the way to death, and even with a 99% success rate it would eventually happen. At rank 9 it's 80%, so 1 in 5 times you get taken below max health you won't be autohealed. On certain attacks that you aren't tanked for that can be very bad. I'd just spend the SP and max it out.

As for everything else, I mainly played sword offensively with primarily JG tanking.

[Drifting Fable]

Alrighty taking the opinions to account, I've came up with this build, http://ryuhiroshi.ry.funpic.de/pso2/hunter.html?01HU!IOI2ebGO4OjGDqobN couldn't max automate but oh well D:

Last question, when the lv 50 cap is out, which takes priority for maxing? War Cry or Automate? I'm more inclined to automate after looking at the Quartz tanking video which only used a rank 6 war cry.

[IndigoNovember]

Probably Automate. War Cry won't help if you're dead.