I find the easiest class to play, that can compete, a paladin aka a chiv dexxer.
Possible basic template:
100 weapon skill
100 tactics
100 chivalry
100 anatomy
100 parrying
100 healing
100 focus
of course this can be tweaked a lot more. Also if even the few chivalry spells are too much hassle for you and you want to go more simple, you could leave out chivalry and focus and take up resisting spells and some other passive skill like lumberjacking or poisoning.
*can some mod please merge these two identical threads? It had me utterly confused and tricked me into posting the same thing twice

*