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I was working up a new fighter. A true sword and board, defense heavy fighter. I looked through all of the fighter architypes, but they all seem too expensive. The armor master for instance. To gain some deflection bonus at 2nd, 6th & 10th and a DR at 5th level I have to give up bravery and all of my weapon training. Is anyone playing a fighter archetype that they like?
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Is anyone playing a fighter archetype that they like?
Oh, yes, definitely.
My PCs:
Callarek: Pure fighter who is an archer, but not an Archer. But I multiclkassed him into Cleric & Ranger. He is also too old for any of the archetypes...
Kinevon: Polearm Master Fighter. Uses a fauchard, and does trips and disarms with them. He does what he can to stay out of adjacent melee, and usually doesn't have to worry about non-reach opponents. Oops, you're tripped. Oh, and that provokes, so, oops, you're disarmed, too. And your weapon is over ... there, now. And he can still reach ridiculous ACs in light armor...
Bruno: Lore Warden Fighter. Uses a whip, will be mainly using trip and disarm far enough away that he doesn't provoke despite not having the feats for it. And having access to the Knowledge skills has been very nice. It will be even nicer at 7th level, when he gains "Know Thy Enemy" and can usually get that +2 to hit and damage...
Kynevon: Archer Fighter. I am planning oon taking the Snap SHot chain with him, which will make him ugly, too.
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Is anyone playing a fighter archetype that they like?
Well not an archetype, just a straight fighter.
Dwarf
1: Weapon Focus (Dwarven War Axe)
1: Power Attack
2: Step Up
3: Improved Bull Rush
4: Weapon Specialization (Dwarven War Axe)
5: Blind Fighting
6: Combat Reflexes
7: Shield Focus
8: Greater Weapon Focus (Dwarven War Axe)
9: Following Step
10: Greater Shield Focus
11: Step Up and Strike
12: Greater Weapon Specialization (Dwarven War Axe)
A typical Axe & Board (A&B) dwarf fighter. Currently at 3rd level with +1 Full Plate and +1 Heavy Darkwood Shield. His AC is 25 without buffs. He's also a History buff so he can help out during non-combat stuff as well.
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I've got two fighters in PFS, an archer and (just retired) a two-handed archetype.
Sure you give up a lot, but don't sweat the min-max aspect, go for the flavor and those one or two things that others cannot do.
It's really just another way to avoid the plain vanilla 'classed' character. Relish in it and don't worry too much about optimization.
Enjoy.
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anyone playing a fighter archetype that they like?
I play a Shielded Fighter Archetype as an almost purely defensive fighter. I was dropped into a home-play group that was already close to 5th level and expected to be the Tank for the group. With Toughness and higher Con than Str, and a crazy AC for the level, he survived and caught up with the group. Most of the Shielded Fighter's bonuses are dodge, so he has a great touch AC, if he gets caught sleeping without his armor, still has most of his AC from shield and class bonuses.
Now at 8th level with retraining fighter feats, he has switched to become a little more offensive. Shield Slam (free bullrush with knockdown chance depending on terrain) gives him a lot of maneuvering options. Weapon Focus , Weapon Specialization: Heavy Shield, and an expensive magical bashing spiked heavy shield raised his damage from negligible to decent.
He is now saving up for Full-plate and resistance items, specifically fire since the only thing that regularly hits him is the group's alchemist's misses.
I've recently started playing a Lore Warden. It's a fighter archetype from the pathfinder society field guide. It was very tough to give up armor training, but I love the class. It's definitely not a powerful class, but it looks like it will be an incredibly fun class to play.
Venture-Captain, Michigan—Mt. Pleasant
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We've got a halfling armor master fighter in our group. First few scenarios he played in (started at fourth level from GM credits) I could only hit on a 20. He might have lost 10-20 hps the first few scenarios that he played in. Of course, now that Antagonize was changed to allow for ranged attacks/magic he doesn't feel as useful and thinks he makes combat last longer since they can't hit him and he doesn't do much damage. He might have a point, but he's got a good backstory and definite personality to him. It'd be a shame if he got early retirement.
But yeah, he's an archetype. :) Another guy in the same group has a weapon master fighter that he plays every once in a while. But the guy likes building characters (like I do, but he doesn't have as many as I do yet.) so tends to play different characters when he plays.
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I have a level 3 polearm fighter that I like but I worry now I made him to powerful. I never trip because it just seems cheesy to me. Rather I play him as tank, a combat reflexes & wand of enlarge person for area control chainsaw tank.
Feats
Cleave
Combat Reflexes
Power Attack
Weapon Focus (Bardiche)
with buffs (wand of enlarge person, potion of cat's grace & wand of shield) his output is
2d8+10 with a +8 to hit(or +4 depending on the adjacent), Power attack & Cleave = 2 attacks per round + 4 AO's per round (with a bonus +1 to hit) and an AC of 22 with wand of shield & potion of cat's grace active (16 without)
I control a 20ft radius when enlarged at level 3 there are not many creatures that can cross his range & not die. The plan was to work him down the sunder weapon/armor path but he might go away to gm credits until some higher tiers with stronger monsters as he can overwhelm combat and outshine other players.
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Yes, my high level guy is a 2H fighter. It's ok, at the cost of his mobility. I find many of the archetypes, you're better off staying vanilla in my experience. Not all, but many.
Playing a fighter in general, I often wonder why I don't play another class. You have limited skills, which sucks in PFS. You're always dependent on everyone's charity to succeed in faction missions and you're of limited help in anything besides damage. You're also completely dependent on your arcane/divine support. Being a melee fighter is even worse since flying opponents and opponents that are out of reach are extremely common (at higher level), and you lose a lot of DPS sometimes getting to regular opponents (meanwhile an archer is doing full attacks the entire time). Or when you switch targets.
While you can get trip and reach monsters (see above) that are highly effective, I think archer rangers are better in general. Ranged attackers are doing full attacks from round 1, and they deal only slightly less damage. Rangers have spells and skills your party can use, great saving throws, and an animal companion to tank.
Sorry, just had to rant. Play whatever is fun for you.
My wife runs a trip based dervish dancing Lorewarden you can see Here
She seems to do fairly well with it.
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Another good approach is to go brawler fighter(Ultimate Combat), dual-wielding a heavy spiked shield and spiked armor. Both start at a d6, and the spiked armor is light. By doing that, as well as taking Defender of the Society (+1 AC when in medium/heavy armor, from Faction Guide), you can build an effective AC tank while not having to sacrifice damage output.
