Need some Paladin suggestions.


Advice


So...

Okay. I made a Pallie - Gwyn - And I love him. He's not optimized, he's not super effective, but he's mega fun. He is an Angel-Blooded Aasimar.

So far he's level 6 and if I were to use 1 word to describe him it would be durable.

Now we are fast approaching level 7 and I'm debating jumping to a Prestige Class or multiclassing.

So... Where to go...

I could reach the prerequs for Sentinel by lvl 9. I know, optimal build would be do Warrior of the Holy Light, Oath of Vengeance Paladin to 5 then jump... I'm not optimal.

I am a 2-Handed Pallie Iomedae follower that will be using the Power Attack-Hurtful-Cornugun Smash chain (On a successful power attack, free intimidate, swift action extra attack) for some extra pain and smitey fun.

I have considered going Hellknight.

I have considered dipping into Celestial Steelblooded Bloodrager.

But I'm kinda not sure what I wanna do. I want to be unique, non-standard, and fun. Expect level 15ish to 17ish by campaign end.

Gwyn's very brave, boisterous, he sees good in everything. He's not Lawful Stupid, he accepts that others serve Good in ways that are not his way and that it is okay. He doesn't preach or berate, he leads by example. He believes that (almost) anyone can seek redemption.

He can be quick to anger. When innocents are harmed or killed he can become a Holy terror and lo be it to be a villain who dares to get in his way.

So... Ideas?

Willing to entertain anything. Just pop it in and tell me why. Gwyn is also a heavy armor wearer.


Paladin/Magus/Wizard its very useful becuase you become able to slay/take down enimeys quickly. also what did you choose a mount or a powerful weapon?


I going straight half-orc paladin of Torag (a very unique and strange type of character.) and he once was able to convince a red dragon to help him take out an evil wizard and his fortress.


For the most part multiclassing weakens a character. Next level you gain another smite and access to your second level spells. Litany of Righteousness can do some massive damage when combined with an active smite evil. At 8th level you become immune to charm. At 11th level you can give others the ability to smite evil. Also every level up improves your smite evil, lay on hands and caster level.

Also most prestige classes are actually weaker than the standard classes.


TheWhiteWingFamily wrote:
Paladin/Magus/Wizard its very useful becuase you become able to slay/take down enimeys quickly. also what did you choose a mount or a powerful weapon?

This is not true. The spells of a 1st level caster are not going to be able to do much against a level appropriate monster. This also means he is either going to have to give up using heavy armor or he will have problems casting due to the armor. A magus can cast in armor but he is limited to light armor at 1st level. Both of these are also INT based casters and the Paladin probably does not have the INT to make this work.


Went weapon bond.

As for the caster idea, eep. That'd be twitch-tastic on the spell failure unless maybe the magus that casts off of charisma and even then I'd be looking at a pretty high failure rate.


Mysterious Stranger wrote:
TheWhiteWingFamily wrote:
Paladin/Magus/Wizard its very useful becuase you become able to slay/take down enimeys quickly. also what did you choose a mount or a powerful weapon?
This is not true. The spells of a 1st level caster are not going to be able to do much against a level appropriate monster. This also means he is either going to have to give up using heavy armor or he will have problems casting due to the armor. A magus can cast in armor but he is limited to light armor at 1st level. Both of these are also INT based casters and the Paladin probably does not have the INT to make this work.

for that character they'd have to focuse on magus mostly till the medium armor casting ability


you should have gone mount my dire boar is amazing he single handedly stoped a boss fight.

he was summoned behind the boss so the boss tried to slide under him and keep running but he sat down on top of him


Interested in this thread. My Nagaji Iomedaean Paladin is very similar in character - less boisterous and more childlike.
I'm trying to work out how to 'spin' the thug. Emphasising the intimidation and threat of violence to resolve an issue without a fight, and downplaying/ignoring the 'take by force'. It's a solid dip mechanically if I can grasp it conceptually.

flavourful option but may lack that spark of fun.


Here is the sheet:

Sheet

At the moment my main ideas are:

Inheritor's Crusader

The reasons I like:
My character follows Iomedae.

The reasons I dislike:
Paladin spells suck, as far as frequency goes, and this basically gives me lower smite, my channel is handicapped already, this just doesn't mechanically help me. I do like the flavor though.

The next one:

The Sentinel

The reasons I like:
I like this class. This is awesome. If you are OoV this is the class for thee. I get some spells and special abilities. My smite keeps getting better. I get some free feats. I get extra to hit and extra damage. Awesome. I get super-smite. Again... AWESOME...

The reasons I don't like:
This is an amazing class... But... I dunno I am doing this in another game and I'd rather not copy myself. (The other game I have optimized it so it is even better.)

The Hellknight

The reasons I like:
You look freaking awesome. You get a spiffy suit of armor. You get cool powers. You get some extra resistances and some extra immunities.

The reasons I don't like:
You look like a villain. You are part of a brutal organization. You are kinda getting a lot of serious heaped on you.

Holy Vindicator

I have to wince. If Channel Energy didn't cost 2 LoH's then this would be more viable. I just don't know. :P

One other option...

Maybe Bloodrager, Celestial? Steelblood for the heavy armor?

Bloodrager


My suggestion: Don't fall. It's very bad for paladins.

More seriously, you already said you are not optimal and obviously don't care about it, so how can anyone else on these message boards give you any advice? The only thing that matters to a non-optimal character is, really, how much fun the player has with it. And when it comes to YOUR version of fun, our advice doesn't matter.

So pick one of those options that sounds fun and run with it.

Side note: Hellknights don't "look like a villain". They are villains. Nasty, evil, devil-worshiping villains. If you go with this option, ignore my initial suggestion - in fact, if you want to be a hellknight, do the opposite of my initial suggestion; it's required. OK, maybe not exactly required - maybe there is a LG order of Hellknights somewhere but I don't know of them.


DM_Blake wrote:

My suggestion: Don't fall. It's very bad for paladins.

More seriously, you already said you are not optimal and obviously don't care about it, so how can anyone else on these message boards give you any advice? The only thing that matters to a non-optimal character is, really, how much fun the player has with it. And when it comes to YOUR version of fun, our advice doesn't matter.

So pick one of those options that sounds fun and run with it.

Side note: Hellknights don't "look like a villain". They are villains. Nasty, evil, devil-worshiping villains. If you go with this option, ignore my initial suggestion - in fact, if you want to be a hellknight, do the opposite of my initial suggestion; it's required. OK, maybe not exactly required - maybe there is a LG order of Hellknights somewhere but I don't know of them.

Uh, side note, a lot of the Hellknight NPCs are Paladins. You totally can be a Paladin and a Hellknight. They don't (all) Worship demons. Heck the Order of the Godclaw uses teachings from the Good gods, with Asmodeus added in there who parlays with the good gods though he is evil. You can be a non-evil Hellknight, many are Lawful Good.

As to advice...

In this case its more:
"Hey, looking at your sheet, here is something neat that you may be able to do that you didn't consider."

Maybe something along the lines of:

"Maybe you could grab Angel Blooded at 7, Angel Flesh at 9, and then grab Angel Wings at 11, have your character become a pseudo-Angel."

Or:

"Check out Bloodrager, go X, take Y bloodline, then you can do Z."

Maybe:

"Go balls insane. Take a level of Sorcerer at 7, you aren't doing it for the magic, take the Tattoo Archetype for a sweet familiar tattoo and some extra (insert) at Level 8 go Dragon Disciple, stay Dragon Disciple for 4 levels, go back to Paladin after that... You don't really lose any attack bonus (as you get +2 Strength at level 2 and 4 of Dragon Disciple, so that makes up for the BAB loss at the Sorce Levels) and you gain some spells in a pinch (here are the spells that don't have an S component so you don't face spell failure) and you get a total of +3 Natural AC and you have an "Oh crap" 5d6 breath weapon! Very crazy!

For some extra fun instead of going back to Paladin, grab Arcane Armor training at level 11, then take a second level of Sorcerer once you get to level 4 Dragon Disciple, level 12 drop into Eldritch Knight for 3 levels, invest in a suit of Celestial Plate Armor (you can afford it by this point) and whammo... 0% Spell Failure, 5th level spells, effective full BAB and some extra toys to boot."

(The above doesn't actually look that bad to be honest... Not sure if I'd do it but... Heh...)

But yeah, looking for something crazy, but that works. It might not be optimized but I don't want to be gimped. I want to do something just... Different... Something non-standard that works surprisingly better than it should.


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DM_Blake wrote:


Side note: Hellknights don't "look like a villain". They are villains. Nasty, evil, devil-worshiping villains. If you go with this option, ignore my initial suggestion - in fact, if you want to be a hellknight, do the opposite of my initial suggestion; it's required. OK, maybe not exactly required - maybe there is a LG order of Hellknights somewhere but I don't know of them.

You should probably re-read up on the Hellknights. They do not worship Devils, for one thing (they've based their regimented combat tactics and hierarchy based on the sheer Lawful nature of Hell).

They are a Lawful Neutral (not Evil) organization, and at least one of their members (and a high ranking one) is a Paladin anyway.

@HWalsh: I'd suggest just staying with Paladin all the way. It's a very, VERY good class 1-20, and if you want to be durable, there's pretty much nothing better than a Paladin with a high Cha. Except MAYBE a highly twinked Stalwart using Invulnerable Rager. And that's debatable.

That said, Hellknight is pretty good as far as PrCs go, so if you're fine with only qualifying for it at 8th (you don't have the requisite ranks in Kn. Planes to get into it at 7th), it's a decent option.

Sentinel is solid too, but you don't qualify until it's too late to get the best goodies from it.

My advice is stick with Paladin, and maybe angle towards getting Ultimate Mercy. Gwyn becomes even more durable with Greater Mercy, and Ultimate Mercy lets him lay the beatdown on those who harm innocents...and then actually save the innocents even from death.

If not that, consider some Eldritch Heritage shenanigans. Orc is good for pure power, Celestial can get you flight (though if you're an Aasimar, same number of Feats for Angel Wing and unlimited...that's a good Feat chain too BTW, especially with Metallic Wings later), or perhaps best flavor-wise (and interesting mechanically), the Martyred Bloodline.

The 1st level, 3rd level, and 15th level Bloodline Powers are all pretty neat (the 9th level one is kinda useless to you since you can use LoH to heal people normally anyway).


Rynjin wrote:

Sentinel is solid too, but you don't qualify until it's too late to get the best goodies from it.

My advice is stick with Paladin, and maybe angle towards getting Ultimate Mercy. Gwyn becomes even more durable with Greater Mercy, and Ultimate Mercy lets him lay the beatdown on those who harm innocents...and then actually save the innocents even from death.

If not that, consider some Eldritch Heritage shenanigans. Orc is good for pure power, Celestial can get you flight (though if you're an Aasimar, same number of Feats for Angel Wing and unlimited...that's a good Feat chain too BTW, especially with Metallic Wings later), or perhaps best flavor-wise (and interesting mechanically), the Martyred Bloodline.

The 1st level, 3rd level, and 15th level Bloodline Powers are all pretty neat (the...

Yeah greater and ultimate mercy could come online as early as 11th and 13th.

I could get into Sentinel as early as 8th with a little down time and retraining, (Drop Hurtful, get weapon focus, take deific at 7.) But its so much better for an OoV smiter. (Alt path: grab 1 rank of Lore Warrior from Fighter at 7, use 7th for Deific at 7th as level and weapon focus as BF) but even then Gwyn's biggest strength is that he's hard to put down and if he goes Sent, yes, he's able to get some neat stuff some extra +1's to damage and to hit (realistically +3) an extra feat and some other minor benefits since the game's likely to end at 17ish I won't end cap it.

Those bonuses are off set by the fact that if I stick with Pallie proper I'll have spells coming online that will offset the gains.

Not to mention the Self Heals will keep getting stronger and more numerous.

(Realistically, game will end around 17 so, I could realistically, and easily, get to lvl 10 in Sent but losing all the extra healing, spells, and such when Gwyn's not a "smiter" may not be worth it vs 12+ 8-9d6 swift action self Heals and spells)

Hellknight's attractive because we may be facing demons and Smite Chaos + Smite Evil stacking can be very good...

Also you can really double dip that with a bracer of the avenging knight. (+4 levels to all smites? Don't mind if I do!)

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