Hey! WL's p def might not equal a tank... but ****it, as pve goes, you can't go wrong with a class that wears heavy, has aoe hate, aoe skills, and polearm masteries. AND NO IT'S NOT THE SAME AS PLAYING A DORF. It also haves unique buffs, stuff like battle roar, final frenzy, thrill fight, and lionheart, and.. I dunno... HIGHER LEVELS OF VICIOUS STANCE. Not bad for an aoe tank... wannabe.
Warlords don't have aoe hate :X it's aoe aggro :P equivalent of running past a aggro mob, even if the mob is non-aggro.
With a Warlord you will be focusing on 1vs.many fights and hence will require at least a couple healers dedicated to you.
If you want to be a tank, as in someone who can soak damage, all the knight classes in this gamea re decent at it with their own strengths and weaknesses. Read the guide Spundnik provided for deatiled info on that. But basically:
Temple Knight:
Ad - Fast, great defense, healing cubic, self heal, strong against undead, 1 attack cube
Dis - HP not that great, weak attack power
Shillien Knight:
Ad - Strong attack power, some offensive magic spells, great defense, offensive cubics
Dis - Lowest HP for tanks (dies the easiest, but still not that easy o.o)
Paladin:
Ad - High HP, Healing ability for self and for others, strong against undead, shield stun
dis - Moderate attack power, low offensive capability
Dark Avenger:
Ad - High hp, offensive spells, panther summon that deals decent damage (at the cost of your xp), shield stun
Dis - Not amazing in defense against anything in particular compared to other tanks.
it kind of depends on what you want in your "tank". as a warlord, we can aggro many mobs at the same time (sometimes from alot further away than intended, especially in dungeon areas); the problem is that it is next to impossible to hold the aggro when in party. as soon as one of your dds starts to attack, the aggro will inevitably fall to that char, and theres not much you can do to get it back. so, if youre looking for a tank in the truest sense of the word, dont go wl (besides, i like being exclusive).
There are two different answers to those two questions.
I think all the tanks can perform tanking. If you are in small groups (random pickup groups) you want the tank to actually do some damage and really hold aggro--that requires 'hate'.
The actual tanks can all perform that with varying degrees of "lasting power". If you're in an academy you intend to stick with--they will want a true tank and you may as well start it.
Short answer to question #1: All tanks can tank. Pick one you like some features of and get grinding.
Which tank is best in PvE, ie NOT tanking for a group, but just hunting in solo or duo?
This is DA, Pally, and TK last imo. This is where Orc comes in too--he/she is better than all of these 3 "out in the countryside with mean, nasties around".
True tanks are patk whimps (compared to DD's) whereas the orc mentioned above is a patk machine!
Short answer to question #2: if you just want a tough toon that is great against all mobs pve--don't pick a tank class! DD's do this.
The answer then, depends a bit on what you were asking, and a bit upon how you intend to play.
FYI--all things being equal--you will get a DE fighter to 40 in 2/3 the time you will get the human fighter to 40. Sorry, but human fighters alone are PONDEROUS in PvE. Even the slow moving Orc will level faster through low levels than the humans (who are 4th out of 5 in base strength--a problem for a melee that has to hit stuff to kill it!).
FYI--all things being equal--you will get a DE fighter to 40 in 2/3 the time you will get the human fighter to 40. Sorry, but human fighters alone are PONDEROUS in PvE. Even the slow moving Orc will level faster through low levels than the humans (who are 4th out of 5 in base strength--a problem for a melee that has to hit stuff to kill it!).
Humans only have one point less str than a dark elf, the same as the orcs and one better than a dwarfs. Humans also have 6 more points on physical attributes than dark elves (1 less str, 4 less dex, 11 more con).
FYI--all things being equal--you will get a DE fighter to 40 in 2/3 the time you will get the human fighter to 40. Sorry, but human fighters alone are PONDEROUS in PvE. Even the slow moving Orc will level faster through low levels than the humans (who are 4th out of 5 in base strength--a problem for a melee that has to hit stuff to kill it!).
From my own experiences i would say thats incorrect, I managed to level my gladdie(human) up almost twice as fast as my SK(Dark elf), same gears, same kind of pot usages, same areas and actually it wasnt completely equal... the Human had a couple of disadvantages against him... i didnt make use of the Overhit abilities for extra exp on the human whilst i did so on the Dark Elf, imagine how much faster the Human would go up in lvls compared to the Dark Elf if i had used overhits on the Human also. And the Dark Elf has selfbuffs too which a human doesnt have except 9 mins battle roar and 60 seconds p.atk boost of which i only really made use of the battle roar lol. Toggle skills on Human, Vicious Stance and Accuracy, are worthless in PvE imo so i didnt make use of those either