Crosswind's page

For a full example of a slayer/horizon walker build:

Half Orc Slayer
Sacred Tattoo, Shaman's Apprentice (endurance)
1.) Slayer 1: Power Attack
2.) Slayer 2: Slayer Talent: TWF
3.) Slayer 3: Two-weapon Rend, Sneak Attack: 1d6
4.) Slayer 4: Slayer Talent: Trapfinding
5.) Slayer 5: Double Slice
6.) Slayer 6: Slayer Talent: Improved TWF, Sneak attack: 2d6
7.) Horizon Walker 1, Favored Terrain: Urban, Feat: Outflank
8.) Horizon Walker 2, Favored Terrain: Astral, Terrain Mastery: Astral
9.) Horizon Walker 3, Terrain Dominance: Astral, Feat: Dimensional Agility
10.) Slayer 7
11.) Slayer 8: Combat Trick (Improved Critical), Feat: Dimensional Assault
12: Slayer 9: Sneak Attack 3d6
13.) Slayer 10:Slayer Talent: Greater TWF, Feat: Dimensional Dervish
14.) Slayer 11:
15.) Slayer 12: Sneak Attack 4d6, Feat: Dimensional Savant

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I think that's about as good as you can do. I spent a few talents on general utility (trapfinding, evasion, urban/astral hide in plain sight), but the rest of it's just straight damage, homie.

A few nice twists:
Half-orcs get a 1d8/1d8 double weapon, so no particular need to spend a feat on sawtooth sabre.
You can get endurance as a racial trait, so no need to blow a feat on it.
Strength-dependence means that Two-Weapon Rend is basically another attack.
Power attack works dandy.
Plenty of free feats and talents in the build. I choose trapfinding, evasion, slayer camouflage and two-weapon rend/double slice, but you can do whatever.

You _will_ be glass cannony, but your nova potential is absolutely ridiculous. This build might be even better with ranger as a base, just for all the favored enemies you could have

Heyo. I'm going to break rules slightly by using Synthesist (not PFS legal). Return of Limburger, Half-Elf Paladin of Vengeance/Synthesist.

Build: Pal(2)/Synth(8)

7/7/7/14/16/18+2(+2 levels)

Trait: Anything that gives diplomacy as a class skill along with +1.
Trait: Anything that gives Perception as a class skill along with +1.

Skills: Stealth, Perception, UMD, Knowledge: Planes

Feats: Improved Initiative, Skill Focus: Diplomacy, Extra Evolution(x2),Power Attack, Improved Arcane Heritage

Eidolon Evolution Pool (11+2+2=15): Head(x2)(4), Bite(x2)(2) + Improved Natural Armor(x2)(2), Pounce(1), Large(4), Improved Dex (2)

Relevant Combat Stats Before Equipment And Abilities(Eidolon ability score to str):
26/15/17/14/16/22
BAB: +8
Base Saves: 2/2/6 + 3/0/3 = 5/2/9

Gear: +1 Amulet of Mighty Fists (1k), +4 Cloak of Charisma (16k), +1 Belt of Giant's Strength (16k), +3 Cloak of Resistance (9k), +2 amulet of natural armor (4k), +2 Ring of Protection (4k), Boots of Speed (12k), rod of silence (lesser) (3k), golembane scaraab (2.5k) = 57.5k, 2 scrolls of level 8 acute senses (400 or 800 each). Spend the rest on wands of cure light wounds

------
Relevant Stats After Abilities And Gear:
30/15/17/14/16/26
Attack Bonus: 8+10(str)+1(Amulet)-1(Large)+1(10 rounds of haste, gonna use 'em) -3 (Power attack)= +16/+16/+16/+16 (Haste!)
Damage: d8 + 15 (str) + 9(Power attack) + 1 (Amulet)
Saves: 5/2/9 + 3/2/3 (Stats) + 3/3/3 (Cloak) + 8/8/8 (Paladin) + 2/2/2(Shielded Meld) = 5/2/9 + 16/15/16 = 21/17/25
AC (Mage Armor always cast): 10 + 4 (Armor) + 12 (Natural Armor) + 2 (Deflection) + 1 (Haste) + 2 (Dexterity) - 1(Large) +2 (Shielded Meld)= 30

Initiative: +10
-----

Spells:
1: Mage Armor
2: Resist Energy, Invisibility, Silence
3: Dimensional Anchor, Stoneskin, Greater Invisibility
---------

Okay, let's fight stuff.
-----
Encounter #1: Due to a complete lack of tact, Limburger ends up fighting 4 hell hounds, 4 cave trolls, a fire giant, and a succubus. Since he knows he's fighting a fire giant, he will have cast Resist Energy (Fire) On himself first.

Let's establish one thing: The succubus, cave trolls, and hell hounds cannot actually do damage. We only fail their saves on natural 1s, they only hit on natural 20s. This combat isn't going to last long enough for them to do much that's relevant. The only question is how much damage I take before exploding the hill giant and then mopping up everybody else.

On a full attack vs. AC 24, my expected damage (ignoring crits for laziness) is 4*(.65*29.5) = 76.25. Kills the hill giant in 2 rounds. I almost certainly go first (+10 initiative), so hill giant gets in 1 round of attacks. Ow!

Against AC 30, it does: 22.05ish points of damage (full attack is better against me than its 2 slams). I am suitably sad, kill it, and butcher everything else casually without haste.

If the succubus gets salty, I can dimensional anchor her before butchering things. So she can't teleport away.

Can heal back the damage with lay on hands or some good old fashioned cure light wounds wands.

-----

We don't really care about zombies, because we can kill pretty infinite numbers of them just as soon as we've dealt with the mohrg. We pretty much need to prevent him from summoning the Glabrezu, because that sucker is going to power word: stun us and that's going to be unpleasant.

There are probably a number of ways around this, but the easiest one is this: Somehow figure out where in the damn dungeon the thing is. Wait 'til it's in a not-huge-room (one I can affect with silence). I have 10k, and 11 castings of Summon Monster 4. I can probably do this.

So we cast invisibility and silence on ourselves. Use Maker's Jump (supernatural, not affected by silence) to dimension door to the morg. Beat it on initiative while blocking the door, and slug it out. I do 65 damage to it a round, killing it in 3 rounds. Odds are okay that it gets 2 rounds off of full attacking or futilely trying to cast spells. Let's have it full attack. Not failing that fort save except on a natural 1, so it does about 28 points of damage per round (...about 8 through stoneskin) for 2 rounds.

No worries. Kill him, run around cheerily murdering zombies, declare victory. Heal up with a wand or with lay on hands, we probably didn't take too much damage.

Note that we could also smite this dude, killing him in 2 rounds. Nothing later on requires our smite-age.

------

Encounter #3:

Erinyes + Devil can't hit, and cant make Limburger fail saves. The Hill giants, as a group, are going to about 5-9 points of damage a round through stoneskin. The cleric is dead in 2 rounds, taking 50 damage a round. He can't make Limburger fail saves, and he can't get away.

It takes Limburger some time to clean up everything, but there's no real threat here.

-------
Encounter #4:
I talk to everybody at the party. My diplomacy check is at +28. I determine everybody who is a guard by auto-succeeding at dem will saves. I will talk random people into Distracting the guards, lowering their perception by 5. at a +18, using a rod of silence to cast invis, I can sneak past more or less guaranteed (20+10+3+1). With an attitude of Helpful, I can probably convince them to let me out too.

Being a master of subtlety, I cast silence on myself after making sure I am not invisible. I batter the door down silently (30 strength) and succeed at my saving throw against the polymorph. The golem and I cheerily bludgeon eachother for 2 rounds (hint: I win casually).

Use the scroll of acute senses (drop silence). My perception check is now 10 (levels) + 2 (wisdom) + 20 = 32. I find it, leave the party. Maybe I smash my way through a wall or something.

-------
Encounter #5:
...we don't suuuper believe in diplomacy if we can avoid it through wanton violence. We fight it!

We don't power attack, so we do 32 points of damage a round (....stuuupid high AC.) Sadly, we can't smite this thing. Nonetheless, it's going to die in ...6 rounds? 7? Let's see how much damage it does to us.

We have about 105 hit points, plus 80 from Stoneskin that sure as hell are going to be used. Nonetheless, it currently does like 55 points of damage to us a round, so it's going to kill us in 4 rounds. What? we're losing? Nooo, we're going to have to use spells. Or worse, DIPLOMACY. Gross.

We're not suuuper far off from brawling this down, but I'm not sure what money or spells I'd spend to make it easy to do. The fact that it's not evil sorta hurts us.

To beat this, we're just going to rely on our stupid, stupid charisma. Our diplomacy is 10(ranks) + 1(trait) + 6(Skill Focus) + 8(charisma) + 3 (class skill) = +28.

Damnit. Stupid diplomacy. WHEN WAR FAILS...

Our average roll is a 38, which makes the DC of 23 and turns him from Unfriendly to Friendly. We agree that the locals will give him sheep and in return, he'll protect them from raiders, wolves, and Demonic Morghs.

It should be noted that if this jackass had the common decency to be evil, we could probably smite him and win.

-Cross (Caveat: OBVIOUSLY I HANDWAVE AWAY A BUNCH OF THINGS, among them crit chance because I'm lazy. But I think this is pretty reasonable.

This is the bullshittiest build, from 1-20, that I am aware of. It is the only straight ass-kicker (no save or die, gives no f+~$s about what dice are rolled) to thoroughly whoop on Beastmass. It is virtually unkillable, won't really fail saves, and pretty my teleport-gibs anything in about 1 turn.

Build: Half elf Synthesist (16), Oath of Vengeance Paladin (4)
Laaaaame Stats (20 point buy): 7/7/7/8/18/18+2
Half elf class bonus goes to summoner for +5 evolution points.

YOUR BUILD:
S1: Extra Evolution + SF(Perception), Fused Link
S1/P1: Smite
S1/P2: Improved Initiative, Divine Grace, Lay On Hands
S2/P2:
S3/P2: Extra Evolution
S4/P2:
S5/P2: Power attack
S6/P2: Maker's Jump
S7/P2: Dimensional Agility
S8/P2:
S8/P3: Extra Evolution
S8/P4: Channel Wrath
S9/P4: Dimensional Assault
S10/P4:
S11/P4: Extra Evolution
S12/P4: Greater Shielded Meld
S13/P4: Extend Spell
S14/P4:
S15/P4: Quicken Spell

YOUR EIDOLON'S BUILD: (Final Points: 21 base, 4 feats, 4 HE favored class bonus)
1 (4 Points): Quadruped (Bite, some limbs), Improved Natural Armor (1), Head (2), Pounce (1)
4 (5 Points): 1 Spare
5 (7 Points): Head (2), Improved Natural Armor (1), 1 Spare
6 (10 Points): Head (2), 2 spare.
7 (11 Points): 3 Spare.
8 (12 Points): 4 Spare
9 (13 Points): Improved Natural Armor (1), 4 Spare
10 (15 Points): 6 Spare
11 (16 Points): 7 Spare
13 (18 Points): 9 Spare Improved Natural Armor (1)
14 (19 Points): Huge (10)
15 (21 Points): Head (2)
16 (22 Points): 1 spare
17 (23 Points): Improved Ability Score (Dex) (2)
18 (25 Points): Head (2)
19 (27 Points): Improved Ability Score (Dex) (2)
20 (29 Points): Improved Ability Score (Dex) (2)

-----------------

Here's the basic thing. At level 1, you take Mage Armor and some healing. Your AC is 10 (base) + 2 (Dex) + 2(Improved Natural Armor) + 4(Mage Armor). You can pounce and you do reasonable damage with your two heads. Most importantly, if you're not in that form, you can cast Summon Monster 1 like...oh...6 times in a day.

This is your weakest level. Your attack, AC, and saves go crazy over the next few levels, as you gain the ability to heal yourself a ton (lay on hands), get +5 to all saves.

In the end, with equipment, you end up looking like this:
Initiative is at 17, we have 65/37/52 AC, 44/38/43 saves, and we have 6 attacks at +52, so we only miss anything on a natural 1. We have reach and teleport-pounce, so we’re full attacking every round. When we get to attack, we do 275 damage which ignores all DR.

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Obviously, you should never actually play this character, as it's complete bullshit. Not sure that you can't make a stronger level 1 character, but, I think, on average across all levels, this is altogether the most bullshit build in Pathfinder.

-Cross

Short answer:
Alchemists aren't overpowered.

Character optimizers are overpowered.

-Cross

I have to point out a critical flaw in this build idea. Namely that you can't use the banner of ancient kings and cast any spells.

"As long as the longspear or pole to which the banner is attached is firmly wielded in two hands...."

When using the banner you must hold it in Two Hands to get the effect. This means that you can't cast spells because you have no free hands.

The easiest way to fix it though is to make the guy an arcane duelist.

Pros, cast spells while wielding the flag, blade thirst and mass blade thirst (over some DR and ghost touch), and ability to wear armor.

Cons your skills are destroyed, you have to rely on your own abilities for skills. It also comes with a bunch of useless feats (if your not planning on attacking).

RAW, easy to get around. Might annoy the piss out of your DM:

Your turn starts.
Shift to hold it in one hand (free action)
...do whatever.
Shift to hold it in two hands (free action)
Allies get all the bonuses during their turn.

-Cross

Crosswind wrote:

By itself, it's not awesome.

With Foehammer (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/races/core-races/dwarf/foehammer-fighter-dwarf), it's sort of amazing. You can basically prevent enemies from ever getting a single attack off of on you, by knocking them 10 feet back and prone any time they get close. =)

-Cross

Add truestrike to that and knock the enemy back 30 feet. All you need is one level of Sorcerer.

As the Pathfinder Advice Board's Greatest Defender of Cleave and Great Cleave, I am a big fan of the Captain America SLAM-CLEAVE wherein our hero knocks all enemies near him back a bunch and on their asses.

-Cross

Hey - I am dumb, not super-sure what you mean by core. If Aasimar doesn't work for you, human or really any other race works fine. Aasimar's a touch better.

Hey OP. Bards experience a big power spike at level 7, so level 6 is a bit lackluster, but here's a (very, very, very) good support build. Your rogue will probably have most of the skills taken care of.

Aasimar (Angel-Blooded), Arcane Duelist

Stats:

Str 16 (+2)
Dex 13
Con 14
Int 12
Wis 10
Cha 14 (+2)

1.) Lingering Song, (Arcane Strike)
2.) (Combat Casting)
3.) Improved Initiative
5.) (Arcane Bond (Longspear)), Flagbearer

Spells:

Spells
0: Ghost Sound, Prestidigitation, Detect Magic, Summon Instrument, Message, Dancing Lights
1: Silent Image, Cure Light Wounds, Liberating Command, Saving Finale
2: Blistering Invective, Gallant Inspiration, Silence, Glitterdust

Take Aasimar favored class bonus for Inspire Courage. It doesn't pay off yet, but it will soon.

------------------

Basic idea:
Wield a long spear and attach a flag to it. Sing Inspire courage, all the time, whenever you can. This gives everybody a +2 competence bonus to attack and damage, and a +1 morale bonus to attack and damage, for a total of +3/+3. Which is incredible. At level 8, your aasimar class bonus will up inspire courage to +3/+3. When you get a Banner of the Ancient Kings, that will up the morale bonus to +2/+2. Everybody attacking at +5/+5 is just terrific.

Meanwhile, you are pretty good at melee - 18 strength and arcane strike means you won't be able to be ignored. You can take power attack at 7 if you like.

Regarding Song Management:
Always start off combat playing a song. First, the bonuses are incredible. Second, you need to have a song playing to use Saving Finale. If somebody fails a save that they had a reasonable shot at making (and it's bad), Saving Finale them. Lingering Song will mean that everybody gets your bonuses for the next 2 rounds anyways, even if you don't have time to get your song back up.

Regarding Spell Management:
For level 1 spells, you will use Saving Finale a LOT. Liberating Command will be used infrequently, but when it is used, everybody will love you. Cure Light Wounds and Silent Image almost always have uses - you'll get your mileage out of them.

For level 2 spells, well, they're all good. Blistering Invective is a great second-round action if you can tag a lot of enemies with it, silence is situationally incredible, and the merits of glitterdust have been discussed.

I generally use Gallant Inspiration if it will get somebody to confirm a crit with a x3 or greater multiplier (thaaat's a lot of damage), or for a particularly important out of combat skill roll (critical trap-disable, diplomacy, and the like).

Bards are incredibly good in pathfinder. Enjoy, and feel free to ask any questions about the build. I'm currently playing a half-orc version of this!

-Cross

OP - you're not wrong. Master Summoner is a complete disaster of an archetype, tacked on to summoner, which is pretty much a complete disaster of a class. Your experience is shared by many. I'd like to highlight some very good advice from above:

1.) Turn Time Limit. If you trust your player not to cheat, have him spend other people's turns rolling the attacks/damage for his minions. Then, on his turn, he can just ask "Does this hit? Does this hit?", etc, and tally the damage from the attacks that hit.

2.) If you want a fight to be even, there's a few things you can do:

2a.) Protection from <summoner alignment> pretty much shuts down all summoned critters, and is outrageously hard to dispel. Same with circle of protection from <summoner alignment>

2b.) Lots and lots of AOE damage.

2c.) Chokepoints - if there are only a few places a fight can happen, a mass of summons is less useful

2d.) Specific anti-summon weapons, like Runeforged: Liberal (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic-items/magic-weapons/magic-weapons-non-core/r uneforged-weapon?tmpl=%2Fsystem%2Fapp%2Ftemplates%2Fprint%2F).

Hope this helps.

-Cross

No, not really. If you're interested in what characters taken to the extreme can do though look up the DPR Olympics thread and the Beastmast thread on this board.

Standard exists now! Only took like 20 minutes of MATLAB/Python.

Wooooorth it? ...

Note that I didn't include point blank shot damage/ab, because who the @#$% wants to stand within 30 feet of enemies as an archer?

-Cross

If somebody wants to doublecheck my numbers:

AB CALCULATIONS:
ab = bab+dex+fighter+items+wepfoc + deadaimab + rapidshotab
bab = 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
dex = 5 5 5 6 6 6 6 7 7 7 8 8
fighter = 0 0 0 0 1 1 1 3 4 4 4 4
items = 0 0 1 1 2 3 3 3 4 5 6 7
wepfoc = 0 0 0 0 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 2
deadaimab = 0 0 -1 -2 -2 -2 -2 -3 -3 -3 -3 -4
rapidshotab 0 -2 -2 -2 -2 -2 -2 -2 -2 -2 -2 -2

DAMAGE CALCULATIONS:
damage = strdam + itemdam + wepspec + deadaimdam + fighter + 4.5
strdam = 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4
itemdam = 0 0 1 1 1 2 2 2 3 4 5 7
wepspec = 0 0 0 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 4
deadaimdam = 0 0 2 4 4 4 4 6 6 6 6 8
fighter = 0 0 0 0 1 1 1 3 4 4 4 4

crit chance = .05 .05 .05 .05 .01 .01 .01 .01 .01 .01 .01 .01
crit mult = 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

He attacks with 3 sets of attacks, basically. The ones at full-ish AB (rapidshot, then rapidshot + manyshot), second-ish AB, and third-ish AB.

We define a multiplier for this first dpr, depending on how many times we shoot:

dpr1mult = 1 2 2 2 2 3 3 3 3 3 3 3

dpr1base = (chancetohit).*damage + critchance.*critmult.*(chancetohit).*damage

then our dpr1 = dpr1base.*dpr1mult

dpr2 = dpr2 = (chancetohit-.25).*damage + critchance.*critmult.*(chancetohit-.25).*damage
dpr2(1:5) = 0 (<--No second attack from levels 1-5)

dpr3 = (chancetohit-.5).*damage + critchance.*critmult.*(chancetohit-.5).*damage
dpr2(1:10) = 0 (<--No third attack from levels 1-10)

dpr = dpr1 + dpr2 + dpr3

Wheeee!

Is there a standard for the average DPR of optimized or near-optimized martial characters at various levels? I would like to compare the damage of an optimized character to a character that has significantly more flavor.

CAVEAT: I am going to be lazy about some stuff, like what I can retrain/alternate build paths. This is an approximation. I'm also not buying boots of haste. Haste makes all damage crazy. =)

I'd compare to a fighter-archer's full attack. There are some tricks you can probably use. Let's try this:

Dual-Talented Human Archer, 20 point buy

16+2/18+2/14/7/7/7

1: Point Blank Shot, Precise Shot
2: Rapid Shot
3: Deadly Aim
4: WS: Longbow
5: WF: Longbow
6: Manyshot
7: ???2
8: Greater Weapon Focus, Retrain
9: Improved Critical: Longbow
10: Clustered Shots
11: ??4
12: Greater Weapon Spec: Longbow

For stuff to buy:
1: Longbow
2: +4 Strength Composite Longbow ~500
3: Bow+1 ~2500
4: Bow+1, +2 Dex belt ~6500
5: Bow+1, +2 Dex Belt, Bracers of Falcon's Aim ~ 10500
6: Bow+2, +2 Dex Belt, Bracers of Falcon's Aim ~16500
7: Bow+2, +2 Dex Belt, Bracers of Falcon's Aim ~16500
8: Bow+2, +2 Dex Belt, Bracers of Falcon's Aim, Gloves of Dueling, ~31k
9: Bow+3, +2 Dex Belt, Bracers of Falcon's Aim, Gloves of Dueling, ~41k
10: Bow+4, +2 Dex Belt, Bracers of Falcon's Aim, Gloves of Dueling, ~54k
11: Bow+5, +4 Dex Belt, Bracers of Falcon's Aim, Gloves of Dueling, ~85k
12: Bow+5, +4 Dex Belt, Greater Bracers of Archery, Gloves of Dueling, ~106k

We're always going to rapid shot + full deadly aim, so our AB is going to be something like:

6 5 6 7 11 13 14 18 21 23 26 27

and our damage is going to be something like:

8.5000 8.5000 11.5000 15.5000 16.5000 17.5000 17.5000 21.5000 23.5000 24.5000 25.5000 31.5000

and monster AC is something like

15 15 16 16 18 20 19 21 22 23 26 26

So, our dpr comes out to:

1: 5.8650
2: 10.7525
3: 14.5475
4: 21.3900
5: 30.0300
6: 58.0125
7: 67.1125
8: 93.6325
9: 114.5625
10: 125.8075
11: 149.1750
12: 194.5125

SOME MORE CAVEATS:

1.) That was a pain in the @#$%!
2.) Obviously I violate some of the DPR olympics threads about not having crappy AC and such. This is a character exclusively for damage
3.) I probably violate some basic pathfinder rules about spending more than half my cash on a single item.

That said, these numbers are probably not hugely far off.

-Cross

Crosswind wrote:

Here's a monk that's annoying as @#$% to kill too:

Snot the Quinggong Goblin Monk, Tree Runner

<snip>

He will always fight defensively, because, with Crane Style and 3 ranks in acrobatics, he trades -1 AB for 4 AC.

With the Threatening Defender trait, he won;t even lose the first -1.

...I think you have a real winner here (although the meager allotment of a single Crane Wing per round makes the Crane chain better on paper than in real combat versus multiple multi-attack opponents; it's a lot of investment to get what is essentially the melee equivalent of Deflect Arrows).

Sadly, Threatening Defender doesn't work with fighting defensively, on Combat Expertise, which Snot is too stupid to take. =D

Here's the thing about Snot the Goblin: Crane Style and Crane Riposte are great feats for AC boosting - You go from -4/+3 to -1/+4 between them, which is a swing of 3 AB and 1 AC for 2 feats. Usually you can pick up about 1 AC or AB for a feat, so you're getting double-mileage on these.

(Random Aside: You could take Mobility instead of Combat Reflexes at 6 if you wanted to be MORE invincible)

The idea for Snot the Goblin is thus:
Spellcasters can't touch him. Too high saves across the board.
Melee types come in two forms: Lots of attacks with medium damage, or low number of attacks with high damage.

Because of Roll With It, Snot can opt out of melee whenever he wants: All he has to do is make a 5+damage acrobatics check (on average, he can dodger a 25-point hit, which is much higher than the average damage for a CR 7 monster's single swing).
So all he has to actually be afraid of is a single GIANT swing that he can't dodge. ...which, cheerily, is exactly what Crane Riposte is there to do.

So to damage Snot, you basically have to hit his gigantic AC.
You have to hit him for more than he can casually roll out of the way with (remember, if he rolls out of the way, you're not getting the rest of your attacks, because he's not in melee any more)
Then you have to do this TWICE, because Crane Wing is going to negate the first attack _and_ let Snot make a Stunning Fist attack which could prevent you from even getting to swing a second time.

=)

...this ends up being really hard to do.

-Cross

You can also do a lot of variants on the following, which basically uses Dwarf to get the requisite saves required to not give a @#$%:

Dwarven Crusader Cleric
Domain: Plants(Growth)

Stats: 15+1(level), 13, 14+2(race), 10, 14+2(race), Cha: 10-2

Feats:
(1) (Heavy Armor Proficiency), Steel Soul
(3) Power Attack
(5) Extra Channel (Tower Shield Proficiency)
(7) Extra Channel

Equipment:
+2 Tower Shield 4k
+2 Full Plate 5.5k
+1 Warhammer 2k
+1 RoP 2k
+3 CoR 9k

AC: 10 + 1 (dex) + 11 (Armor) + 6(Shield) + 3 (Barkskin from plant domain) + 1 (Ring of Protection) = 32 AC

Saves: 5/2/5 + 3/3/3 (CoR) + 4/4/4 (dwarf + steel soul) + 3/1/4 (stats) = 15/10/16

You can pretty much do this build with any class. Dwarf + steel soul, put a lot of cash into AC items.

-Cross

We're trying to avoid the industrial manufacturing Character plant for him just spitting out Hero 1, Hero 2, Hero 3, Hero 4, Hero 5, Hero 6, Hero 7, ad infinitum lol. I'm seeing lots of good ideas, keep them coming! I used a similar heal yourself paladin in an arena fight we did, and he was a beast, eventually died but it was a slog for the baddies, lol.

Okay, one more for you. This, along with monk and paladin, are basically the only characters that get saves that are EFF YOOOU enough to easily beat most mid-level monster DCs. Though you can throw a dwarf with Sturdy Soul on almost any character.

Human Barbarian, Invulnerable Rager
Racial Traits: Heart of the Fields

17+2(race)+1(lvl)/14/14/11/10/7

Level 1: Power Attack, (Improved Sunder)
Level 2: Lesser Beast Totem
Level 3: Extra Rage Power: Superstition
Level 4: Reckless Abandon
Level 5: Extra Rage Power: Witch Hunter
Level 6: Spell Sunder
Level 7: Extra Rage Power: Beast Totem

Equipment:
+1 furious Falchion 8k
Breastplate +1 1.5k
RoP+1 2k
ANA+1 2k
Belt of Strength +2 4k
Cloak of Resistance +2 4k

AC: 10 + 2(dex)+7(armor) + 1 (def) + 1 (Natural) -2 (raging) = 19
Damage Reduction: 3/-

Saves: 5/2/2 + 5/5/5 (Superstition) + 2/2/2 (CoR) + 4/2/2 (stats in rage) = 16/11/11

This character is mostly going to muder the @#$% out of everything, ever. While raging, Reckless Abandon/Beast Totem/Power Attack cancel themselves out, and he just attacks at:

+7(base) + 8 (strength) + 3(weapon) = +18/+13

He does 2d4 + 12(strength) + 6 (power attack) = 23 damage on average, critting on an 18.

So, basically, enemies aren't going to live long enough to whittle down his (substantial) hit points.

Meanwhile, he's tough to kill.

-Cross

Here's a monk that's annoying as @#$% to kill too:

Snot the Quinggong Goblin Monk, Tree Runner

Stats: 12-2/16+4+1(level)/12/10-2/16/7-2

Feats:
(1) Roll With It, (Weapon Finesse)
(2) (Dodge)
(3) Crane Style
(5) Crane Wing
(6) (Combat Reflexes)
(7) Crane Riposte

Equipment:
Amulet of Mighty Fists (Agile): 4k
Headband of Wisdom +2: 4k
Belt of Dex +2: 4k
Bracers of Armor +1: 1k
Ring of Protection +1: 2k
Amulet of Natural Armor +1: 2k
Cloak of Resistance +2: 4k

= 21k

He will always fight defensively, because, with Crane Style and 3 ranks in acrobatics, he trades -1 AB for 4 AC.

AC: 10 + 1(dodge)+6(dex)+4(wis)+1(RoP)+1(AnA)+1(Armor)+1(Monk AC)+1(Small)+4(Fighting Defensively) +3 (Barkskin from Quinggong monk) = 33.

Notably, only 5 of that AC is subtracted on touch. So he's @#$%ing impossible to hit with rays either (28 AC vs. touch attacks)

Saves: 5/5/5 + 1/6/4 + 2/2/2 = 8/13/11

His AB is pretty amazing because of the 22 dex, and with Agile amulet of mighty fists, he adds his dex to damage (+6 on each punch), so he can actually put out a lot of damage. But here's the glorious bit: He will never take damage in melee if he doesn't want to.

At level 7, his acrobatics check is 7(ranks)+3(class skill)+6(dex)+4(Tree Runner)= +20. With an average roll of 10, his acrobatics check is a 30, which means with Roll With It, he can negate a hit of 25 damage or less.

If a hit hits him for more than that, he can auto-negate 1 per round with Crane Wing, so crits don't threaten him.

He has a great saves and evasion and touch AC, so wizards can't do anything to him. And it's utterly hopeless for melee types to attempt to do anything to him - literally, if he doesn't want to, he will never get hit by any enemy.

-Cross

The Heal Yourself Paladin is the best, by far. It's not even close. Build is freaking impossible to kill. Here's an optimized version.

Tiefling (Pit-born) Paladin (Oath of Vengeance)

Stats: 15+2(race)+1(level)/12/14/8-2(race)/8/16+2(race) = 18/12/14/6/8/18

Feats:
(1) Fey Foundling
(3) Armor of the Pit
(5) Power Attack
(7) Extra Lay on Hands

He should have 23,500 gp by level 7. Spend it on:

Full Plate Mail +1 (~3k)
+1 Longsword (2k)
+1 Shield (1k)
+2 headband of charisma (4k)
+2 belt of strength (4k)
+1 ring of protection(2k)
+1 amulet of natural armor(2k)
+2 cloak of resistance (4k)
= ~22k

His AC will be:

10 + 10(plate)+1(dex)+3(shield)+1(RoP) + 1 (ANA) + 2 (Armor of the Pit) = 28. Which is damned annoying for CR 7-9 enemies to hit.

His saves are:
5/2/5 + 2/1/-1 + 5/5/5(cha) + 2/2/2(cloak) = 12/8/9.

And he can heal himself for 4d6+8(fey foundling)+7(tiefling favored class bonus, take it every level) every round for 10 rounds, for an average of 29 points of healing per round.

-Cross

Those are clearly among the best on the list. But being able to trip (eating up their action economy) someone at reach with your casting stat and deal damage. Plus they will provoke when then stand because you threaten their square with your fire whip. So Trip + 15 damage (not including power attack) resolved against touch armor. Every round for the entire combat. Just using one spell?

Vampiric touch at level 5 you either provoke to cast or you end your turn next to the person you did it to. This spell neither of those happen. Vampiric touch does 3d6 damage (or 10.5) and you heal the same, yay! This spell lets you trip your opponent, which shuts down his action economy next round and deal 3 damage to him. When he stands back up you get to deal 6 more damage to him for a total of 9. Also, he didn't full round attack your face like the guy who we used vampiric touch on. I would say even at level 5 the trade off between one hit and full round is more than the 10.5 hp you healed (especially if you went first and didn't need to be healed yet)

Then the next round comes. We use vampiric touch again (we prepared it twice right?) or we just keep on using the same spell in our hand as the last round which did slightly less damage, but shut down an enemy and prevented a crapton of damage.

Hey, that guy made the bafflingly incorrect list, not me! I just pointed out the clear errors in it! =)

First, let's clear up a rules misconception that you may not be aware of: Whips don't threaten. From Whips, "The whip is treated as a melee weapon with 15-foot reach, though you don't threaten the area into which you can make an attack"

So there's no AoOs with this thing.

Second, what level are we talking about here? At low to mid levels, your wizard can try a trip maneuver and have a mediocre chance of tripping + doing like 3 damage.

At mid to high levels, this trip maneuver has about 0 chance of success, even against things with crappy CMD and legs. The Math does not support people who rely exclusively on A Stat to get CMB. So the tripping part isn't good.

About vampiric touch, I'm not sure you're aware of how it works: It gives temporary HP, not healing. So if you go first round and zap somebody with it, it works _awesome_. You get a lot of hit points. Finally, Vampiric Touch gets bonus utility points because anything else that adds to the damage (critical hit, sneak attack), ALSO gives you extra temporary HP, which is wonderful. Given that that temporary HP lasts up to an hour, you're probably going to get your use out of it too.

To summarize, two misconceptions are occurring. One is a rules misconception (whips don't threaten), and the other is a statistics misconception (a half-BAB class with stat to attack will actually succeed at tripping things a reasonable amount of the time).

The first, you can look up.

The second, I encourage you to go check out this document (https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B_z8_62f8rYHODdmYzNjMTItYTA1MC00NDc5LWI3NW EtY2RlZDAyNTg4YmQ0/edit)

Your average CR 4 monster has a CMD of ~18. This is not counting anything that's untrippable, 4 legs, etc.

Your whip-tripper has a +7 check (5 base stat, 2 BAB). Your trip works half the time. Bad news: It gets worse.

At level 10, it's 32. You probably have like a 24 intelligence at this point, so +7 bonus, +5 from BAB. You only can trip on a natural 20.

------------

So, basically, tripping with this is a waste of an action. doing damage with it is a waste of an action. Casting it as a level 2 spell is probably both a waste of an action and a spell slot, and casting it as a level 3 spell is a deed done for flavor only.

-Cross

So, one of the least-informed, least-thought-out things on these forums is the following idea:

"AC is only worth it if it renders you unhittable."

There are actually only 2 things to factor in, here:

1.) Does an opponent miss you on anything except a natural 1?

2.) Does your opponent hit you on anything except a natural 20?

For ALL CHARACTERS for whom (1) and (2) are true, a +X to AC bonus means that 5X% of attacks that WOULD have hit you, now do not.

That's it.

-------------

"Don't put any points in AC, because you will never be attacked if you position correctly" is a viable argument against wizards putting points into AC.

"Don't put any points into AC because you will get attacked infrequently!" Also viable.

"Don't put any points into AC because you either have to have super high AC or none at all" is not a mathematically sound argument.

--------------

Want a fun fact? In terms of how often they negate hits, a Cloak of Minor Displacement is in every way identical to a +4 AC bonus.

So, to conclude:

If you can upgrade your AC for cheap, it is well worth it. You probably don't NEED AC that much because you're not _attacked_ as much, but don't fall victim to the "super high AC or nothing!" fallacy.

-Crosss

But are there more effects I could add? It's tricky to try to search for on the SRD that because the wording isn't so much a keyword as it is a combination of soft-words "When you use the attack action to make a single attack...". That needs to be a keyword of some sort. :D

So I'm asking if anyone knows/remembers more feats or effects I could add, or is this the peak of effectiveness? Vital Strike and Felling Smash appear to merge happily, there ought to be several other similar feats that do the same. Maybe the first attack of cleave?

I GOT YOU, OP. Let's DO THIS. COMBO BREAKER TIME.

If you do this unarmed (Monk base damage is among the best for vital strike in the game), you can:

1.) Vicious Stomp: Free AoO after you trip that dude.
2.) Ki Throw: Move him around
3.) Enhanced Ki Throw: Spend a Ki Point to auto-hit with ANOTHER attack
4.) Improved Ki Throw: Throw the dude who you just tripped, stomped, etc, into ANOTHER DUDE for a bull rush attempt
5.) Spiked Destroyer: SLAM YOUR ARMOR SPIKES AGAINST THE GUY WHO JUST GOT BULL RUSHED.
6.) Vicious Stomp: Guy who just got bull rushed also fell prone. Vicious Stomp him.

So, to conclude, for our full combo, we require:
2 enemies.
On the first enemy, we get: Vital Strike Attack, Greater Trip AoO, Vicious Stomp AoO, Ki Throw Auto-hit
On the second enemy, we get: Armor Spikes, Vicious Stomp AoO.

So, we just got ~6 attacks worth of damage out of an attack action...how's that?

-Cross

Here are two:

Dwarven Fighter, Bowling Ball
Foehammer, Relentless

Stats: 16/15/14+2/10/10+2/8-2

Level 1: Power Attack, Cleave
Level 2: Two Weapon Fighting
Level 3: Improved Shield Bash
Level 4: <Insert Feat Of Your Choice>
Level 5: Improved Bull Rush
Level 6: Shield Slam
Level 7: Improved TWF
Level 8: Greater Bull Rush
Level 9: Great Cleave
Level 10: Combat Reflexes
Level 11: Shield Master
Level 12: Greater TWF, Swap Combat Reflexes to Pin Down

The basic idea here is this: You're going to wield a hammer and a shield. You will two-weapon fight with them, and do a nice hunk of damage.

The key synergy is this: Your full attack is great. But you can Cleave your enemies with your shield, and every time your shield hits, you get a free bull rush. Which, by the way, you are GREAT at thanks to relentless (+2), foehammer(+2). You get a free trip attack at the end of it, which you are not great at, but hey, free.

At level 9, you have great cleave, which means you can knock all the enemies in the room anywhere you want. Pretty sick, huh?

You do need to keep high-ish dex (you'll need a belt of physical perfection earlier than you'd otherwise like), but just postpone Improved TWF until you get it.

--------
Build #2
--------

Human Fighter (Space Controller):
Polearm Master
Stats: 15+2/14/14/14/10/8

1: EWP(Fauchard), Power Attack, Combat Expertise
2: Improved Trip
3: Combat Reflexes
4: Stand Still
5: Steady Engagement
6: Greater Trip
7: Lunge
8: Improved Critical (Fauchard)
9: Cornugon Smash
10: Intimidating Prowess
11: Pin Down
12: Penetrating Strike
13: Staggering Critical
14: Critical Mastery
15: Blinding Critical
16: Greater Penetrating Strike
17: Weapon Focus: Fauchard
18: Swap Staggering for Stunning, Greater weapon Focus: Fauchard
19: Weapon Specialization: Fauchard
20: Greater Weapon Specialization: Fauchard

Really simple plan here. Fauchards are great. And you are going to be tripping people continually with them. Combat Reflexes will make sure you get your fill of AoOs (which you get significant bonuses on thanks to polearm master). Stand Still will prevent people from closing into melee with you. Lunge will let you hit even more people, and Cornugon Smash/Intimidating Prowess will let you apply Shaken to just about everybody you run into.

Not as unique as the first build, but very standard, and very good.

-Cross

Furious Focus isn't doing much for you at level 1. I would consider Improved Initiative. Get to act before your allies move into your charge lanes. Especially important for PFS when you don't know what sort of fools will be on the table with you.

Actually, as a superstition barbarian, you don't want to go first. You want your buffers to go first, so you can get a round of spells on you before you become basically spell-impervious.

-Cross

Ok. I would like to propose a similar build, which may do better.

Vanara QingGong/Flowing Monk: Bonus feats in parentheses

(1) Combat Expertise, (Weapon Finesse)
(3) Combat Reflexes
(5) Vicious Stomp
(6) (Improved Trip)
(7) Greater Trip
(9) Improved Critical (for use while flurrying)
(10) (Tripping Strike)
(11) Shaping Focus
(13) Natural Spell
(15) SOME METAMAGIC FEAT
(17) Quicken Spell
(19) Monastic Legacy

-------

Let's talk a bit about what we're doing here.

1.) We took Flowing Monk because it allows us to get free trip attempts as a combat maneuver. Also, its list of bonus feats is fantastic. Also, it gives us double-bonus AC for our wisdom, up to the number of surrounding enemies, which is great. Just all around fantastic.

2.) At level 7, this build goes crazy. First, you're generally excellent at tripping things. However, every time you trip something:

2a.) Greater trip gives you a free punch to their face
2b.) Vicious stomp gives you a free stomp.

3.) You pick up improved critical, because it is a great damage feat.

4.) And, now, whenever you critical something, you get try to trip it and do the combo in (2) for free.

Relatedly, your Flowing Monk ability allows you to try to trip things at severe advantage.

So, pretty much, you are an unhittable lord of tripping who manages to get a looot of AoOs on people once they're on the ground.

-Cross

First, you've gotten some really high-quality advice thus far. Haste and Glibness are really important. I will try to continue the trend.

1.) Consider what spells you should swap out. For instance, Grease is not very useful as you get higher in levels. Swap it out later for Liberating Command, which spends an immediate action to grant a higher bonus for people trying to escape grapples (grease's main use later on).

2.) Consider Obscure Object instead of Solid Note. It's a double-early-access spell, as you get a 2nd level wizard and 3rd level cleric spell as a first level. Very useful in any campaign with a macguffin.

3.) Remember that Heroism, Good Hope, and Banner of the Ancient Kings are all the same type of bonuses. So while Heroism is great at level 4, it's not so great at level 8 when you're giving people morale bonuses all the time anyways. Ditch it for something else.

4.) Silence is a really, really, brutally good spell. It's a no-save, can't-cast-spells here spell. The best anti-spellcaster spell in the game. It should be on your list, unless you have a cleric in your party who is taking it and you don't want to overlap.

5.) Blistering Invective is a must-have bard spell - AOE debuff + damage. I would not waste a level 2 spell slot on a single-target, save or screwed (Cacophonous call).

6.) You're arming yourself with an awful lot of will-save spells. Charm Person, Cacophonous call, fear, Confusion, Charm Monster, Slow. These are going to end up being redundant. Have care.

7.) I recommend ditching some of these spell slots for Bardic Masterpieces, if possible. Of particular note are: Triple Time and Symphony of the Elysian Heart. Elysian Heart, in particular, is super-fantastic.

8.) Consider, as a late 3rd-level spell, Sculpt Sound. It has an incredibly long duration, and its uses are limited only by your imagination. As an example, consider these uses:

8a.) Our party's footsteps/armor/weapons/etc make no sounds.

8b.) Whenever I snap my fingers, a marching band plays! Whenever I hit an enemy, we get a big "GONG!" sound and a crowd cheers.

8c.) Whenever I whistle, instead, the sound of an onrushing army/horde appears.

Wildly useful.

9.) Consider Purging Finale as a level 3 spell. Being able to negate such a wide variety of negative effects at minimal cost (you can restart as a move action at that point) is pretty sweet.

10.) You won't need Freedom of Movement as a level 4 if you can do Symphony of the Elysian Heart.

11.) Heroic Finale sucks. Spending a standard action and a level 4 spell slot to give somebody else a standard is a waste of your limited spell resources.

12.) Virtuoso Performance is good. Get it earlier. It's the only thing in the game that lets you keep up two bardic performances, which can be pretty sweet.

13.) Consider picking up dimension door. It's useful.

14.) Stunning Finale, at 5, is excellent. 3 enemies are guaranteed to be staggered (no full attack), and may be stunned. Likewise, Resonating Word is the best single-target damage spell on the bard spell list. Unless you have some reason to believe that your save DCs are going to be scaling really well (hint: they won't), I'd ditch Mass Cacophonous Call. Cloak of Dreams does what you need there, and better.

15.) If you can afford the spell slot, and don't have a healer, Music of the Spheres is the best after-battle healing spell in the game. If you can afford to sit around for 2 minutes, grants fast healing 5 to everybody near you for 1 round/level (concentration), so it can potentially heal 100 points of damage to the whole party.

16.) Take Brilliant Inspiration, along with Irresistible Dance, at level 16. They are the only two good 6th level bard spells. Dirge is a mediocre, badly-shaped blast. Waves of Ecstasy is replicable by Stunning Finale, which is a 5th level spell.

That is my list of additional suggestions! Happy to discuss any of them!

-Cross

Human Oracle of Life: ((Haunted) (Burned)) (Dual-Cursed)

1.) Fey Foundling, (Extra Channel), Revelation: Channel
3.) Selective Channel, Revelation: Life Link
5.) Quick Channel, Revelation: Misfortune
7.) Extra Revelation: Energy Body/Spirit Boost (or Healer's Touch), Revelation: Combat Healer
9.) Whatever I didn't take at 7th or maybe Misfortune, Revelation: Enhanced Cures
11.) DIVINE INTERFERENCE, Revelation: Lifesense

Maybe take Misfortune in there somewhere.

Would be my recommendation.

-Cross

Don't like your focus, here - you're not getting the most out of Polearm Master, which is really freaking good at taking AoOs and controlling space.

Here would be my suggestion:

1: EWP(Fauchard), Power Attack, Combat Expertise
2: Improved Trip
3: Combat Reflexes
4: Stand Still
5: Steady Engagement
6: Greater Trip
7: Lunge
8: Improved Critical (Fauchard)
9: Cornugon Smash
10: Intimidating Prowess
11: Pin Down
12: Penetrating Strike
13: Staggering Critical
14: Critical Mastery
15: Blinding Critical
16: Greater Penetrating Strike
17: Weapon Focus: Fauchard
18: Swap Staggering for Stunning, Greater weapon Focus: Fauchard
19: Weapon Specialization: Fauchard
20: Greater Weapon Specialization: Fauchard

We have the following pretty awesome abilities: Anybody who provokes an AoO from our reach gets hit (Standard AoO), stopped (Stand Still), tripped (Steady Engagement), and attacked again (Greater Trip).

Every time you hit anything, they will become shaken, because of Cornugon Smash and Intimidating Prowess (and your good charisma).

Meanwhile, we have also taken the most important damage feats as fast as we can take them: Power attack, Improved Critical, Lunge (So you can almost always get a full attack), the critical mastery feats. And you will ignore 10/- points of DR, which is generally useful as hell.

---------------------
But it seems like you want to be able to hit a lot of things. If you want to do that, could I recommend the following instead of dodge/mobility/spring attack/whirlwind?:

Cleave, Great Cleave, Cleaving Finish, Improved Cleaving Finish.

I prefer this for the following reasons: First, it only takes a standard action to do, so you can move up to somebody and do it. Second, given that you're at your full AB, you won't miss - pretty much the same. Third, if you kill somebody (which you are bound to do, because you have improved critical and are presumably using this on hordes of mooks), you get even more attacks.

If you want to slot them into my build above, I recommend you take them, in order, for the feats I take at 9-12. Take those 9-12 feats from 17-20.

--------

Is that about what you're looking for?

-Cross

First, this is going to end hilariously. An ex-boyfriend DM who is weird around you. This is not going to work.

Second, the "Just pick a character whose physical stats get replaced and dump dex" plan is also pretty legit.

Synthesist with 2 dex works great here.

-Cross

Can you give us some idea of what role you'd like to play in the party, then? And we'll turn that into a build and some suggestions for ya.

So long as you have 1 decent stat, there is a measure of hope. =)

-Cross

I have a level 5 Paladin/1 cleric, chose grease for level obe spells, but wasn't sure what to do with the other three levels, plus generalized advice on Paladin spell choices.

For unsanctioned knowledge, you'd have a tough time arguing against heroism, haste, and freedom of movement at 2,3,4.

Other than that:

1.) Lesser Restoration, Liberating Command, Word of Resolve
2.) Paladin's Sacrifice, Remove Paralysis
3.) Deadly Juggernaut, Remove Curse, Remove Blindness/Deafness
4.) Holy Sword, Litany of Vengeance.

Basically, as a paladin, your normal attacks are great. So if you're going to cast a spell it had better either be:
1.) A swift/immediate action
2.) A pre-combat buff
3.) A oh-holy-god-this-saves-somebody spell

-Cross

Ok. Let me take a crack at this.

Thump the Goblin
Goblin Monk (1), Rogue X

Stats: 12-2/16+4/14/10/15/7-2 = 10/20/14/10/15/5

Feats:
Monk 1.) (Weapon Finesse), Roll With It
Rogue 1/Monk 1.)
Rogue 2/Monk 1.) (Ninja Trick: Style Master: Crane Style), Dodge
Rogue 3/Monk 1.) +1 Wisdom
Rogue 4/Monk 1.) (Offensive Defense), FEAT OF YOUR CHOICE
Rogue 5/Monk 1.)
Rogue 6/Monk 1.) (Ninja Trick: Style Master: Crane Wing), FEAT OF YOUR CHOICE
Rogue 7/Monk 1.) +1 dex

--------
Alright. Let's break down what we just did here.

At level 7, I should have about 33k. We're going to buy:
Ring of Protection +1 (2k)
Bracers of Armor +2 (4k)
+1 Amulet of Mighty Fists
Amulet of Natural Armor +1 (2k)
Belt of Dex+2 (4k)
Belt of Wis+2 (4k)
Monk's Belt

Which is 33k

Relevant Skills:
Acrobatics (8 ranks + 3 (class skill) + 6 dex) = +16

So our AC is:
10 (base) + 6 (dex) + 4 (wis) + 1(dodge) +1 (Monk belt) + 1 (deflection) + 2(armor) + 1 (natural armor) +4 (Fighting Defensively) +1 (small)= 31

So, 31 AC at level 8 is incredibly good. And we only take a -2 penalty for fighting defensively thanks to crane style. But let's look at how OUTRAGEOUSLY DIFFICULT it is to hit us.

1.) If we sneak attack somebody, our AC against them is 35.
2.) Every round we can pick one attack that would hit us, and instantly negate it via Crane Wing.
3.) If some jackass manages to hit us twice (HOW DARE THEY.), we can always Roll With It: On average, we can dodge a hit that's 21 damage or less. And they don't get to attack us again, because we're far away.

Plus, you have evasion and decent saves from having dex and wisdom maxed, with 1 level in monk. Also, you get to do d8 base damage from monk's belt, which is pretty great, and you get flurry for free.

You can do it out by level, but pretty much from level 1 (Where your AC is...10+1+2+5+1 = 17 and you can Roll With It to evade any hit of up to 15 damage, on average) you're incredibly hard to hit.

From there, you gain about 2 AC per level, and at level 3, when you start fighting defensively all the time (because it's -2/+4), nothing close to your level can hit you.

------------
That's how I'd do a tank rogue. It's pretty badass.

-Cross

I'm with Cyrad. Pick it up every single level. Spells known is vastly more valuable.

For what it's worth, here's the spell list for my bard, and the levels I took them at, in parentheses. An arrow (->) means that I swap it out later.

0: Ghost Sound (1), Prestidigitation(1), Detect Magic(1), Summon Instrument(1), Message (2), Dancing Lights (3)
1: Silent Image(1), Cure Light Wounds(1), Grease(1)->Liberating Command(5), Vanish (2), Saving Finale(2), Solid Note (3), Triple Time (3) Feather Fall(7)
2: Silence (4), Gallant Inspiration(4), Heroism(5)->Acute Senses(8), Blistering Invective(5), Glitterdust (6), Mirror Image (6)
3: HASTE(7), GOOD HOPE, Sculpt Sound (8), Glibness (8), Elysian Heart (9), Arcane Concordance or Purging Finale (9),
4: VIRTUOSO PERFORMANCE (10), Dimension Door (10), Dance of 100 Cuts (11), Infernal Bargain (11), Freedom of Movement/Modify Memory/Treasure Stitching(12, 12)

The following is my logic:

1st level: Silent Image and Grease are the two best pound-for-pound utility and AOE debuff spells. Having Cure Light Wounds at level 1 is frequently a life-saver - it's the only time a cure spell may cure half somebody's HP.
2: Now looking for situationally great spells. Vanish and Saving Finale fit.
3: Solid Note is just fun. Pick up bardic masterpiece Triple Time with a bonus spell, because it's an excellent buff and costs very little.
4.) Silence is situationally amazing. But I need a spammable spell, so that's Gallant Inspiration. It falls off in use later on, but from 4-7 you will use it all the time, and it's still fun to have later on for skill checks.
5.) Liberating Command is now more useful than Grease, so we swap it out. Heroism and Blistering Invective are spectacular buff/debuff spells, respectively. Both are best-in-breed for level 2 spells - I didn't take them at level 1 because neither is spammable, and I have very limited action resources.
6.) Glitterdust and Mirror Image. If I was the only caster, I would have picked up Glitterdust earlier. Both are great spells.
7.) Haste and Good Hope are no-brainers here.
8.) Glibness is one of the most overpowered spells in the game. Sculpt Sound is spectacular if creatively used. So I take them. Also, because I have good hope, which does not stack with Heroism (and I'm picking up flagbearer and banner of the ancient kings as feat/item), I'm swapping out Heroism for Acute Senses, a great utility spell.
9.) Symphony of the Elysian Heart masterpiece. It's freedom of movement without a spell slot. Amazing. Also, pick up Purging Finale or Arcane Concordance. The latter if you have a lot of casters who buff, the prior otherwise.
10.) Virtuoso Performance is the first thing in the game which allows you to stack bardic performances. Dimension door is just really good. I have never regretted having it.
11.) Dance of 100 cuts makes you an adequate meleer. Legato of the Infernal Bargain masterpiece is a nice planar ally spell.
12.) Pick 2 of 3. I thought all were useful: FoM, Modify Memory, Treasure Stitching.

---------------------

Those are my decisions and explanation. In general, I look to have the following, at each level:

1.) 1 spell that I know I can use basically infinite times if need be. This ensures that I can end the day having actually gotten the most out of resources
2.) A spell or two that's going to be SUPER useful in limited circumstances.
3.) A good mix of buffing, utility, debuffing, and CC.

-Cross

** spoiler omitted **

** spoiler omitted **...

Love the Rod of absorbption idea. Though it's a 50k consumable, it's a great way to get around having middling saves (without it, the Balor, Pit Fiend and Solar all have reasonable shots to insta-gib you with implosion/destruction).

Nice work! =)

-Cross

Found small problem in Crosswind's build.

The heads don't automatically have natural attacks.

Head (Ex): An eidolon grows an additional head. The eidolon does not gain any additional natural attacks for the additional head, but the additional head does allow the eidolon to take other evolutions that add an additional attack to a head (such as a bite, gore, or breath weapon). This evolution can be selected more than once.

So you have a 4 headed eidoloin with one bite.

Also you only have +4 evolution points from Half Elf as you only have 16 levels in favoured class.

Lawful - Half elf, multitalented:

You're right about heads, though. So I need to scare up 5 evolution points? And, if I recall correctly, I'm already down 1 evolution point from not being able to take Extra Evolution at 20. Because having anything less than six heads would be UNACCEPTABLE, and my reflex saves/touch AC are already way bigger than need be, I think I'll drop the dex evolutions. Do not forget that quadrupeds start off with 1 head with bite already, so I only need to add 5 to get up to 6. =)

End Result:

-----------------
Limburger Wolf-Bound, the Summoner
Build: Half elf Synthesist (16), Oath of Vengeance Paladin (4)
Laaaaame Stats (20 point buy): 7/7/7/8/18/18+2
Half elf class bonus goes to summoner for +5 evolution points.
Traits:
Reactionary
Feats:
Improved Initiative
Extra Evolution x4
Improved Natural Attack (Bite)
Power Attack
Dimensional Agility
Dimensional Assault
Defensive Combat Training
Advanced Defensive Combat Training

Eidolon is as follows:
Quadruped
Improved Natural Armor x4 (4)
Huge Size (10)
Head/Bite x5 (15)
Pounce (1)
Total Evo Points Required: 30
Total Evo Points We Have: 21(16 lvls), +5 (half-elf bonus) +4 (feats)= 30
Ability Bonuses into Dex (+3)
+6 str/dex from being lvl 16

CMD is 10 + 16 (BAB) + 19 (STR) + 11 (DEX) + 2(Huge) + 1(Haste) + 5(Deflection) + 8 (Feats) + 8(Smite, if evil). So, 72 or 80.
--------------------------------

To summarize:
Our initiative is at +16, we have 62/34/52 AC, 44/35/43 saves, and we have 6 attacks at +52, so we only miss anything on a natural 1. We have reach and teleport-pounce, so we’re full attacking every round. When we get to attack, we do 369 damage which ignores all DR.

Specific Tactics:
If somebody is going to be a jerk and cast antimagic field, we can summon our eidolon and use a scroll of Spell Immunity: Antimagic Field on him.
If we are worried about our touch AC being too low, we can pick up 4 dex with an Evolution Surge before combat.
If we are grumpy and would like to up our DPR by 18, we can also Evolution surge up some more strength.

Summary of Beastmass Trials:
The Shoggoth loses initiative and dies immediately.

The Balor loses initiative, gets a surprise round. He can greater dispel magic (ring of counterspells) or antimagic field. He either dies immediately or...dies immediately, because antimagic is 10 feet around him, and Limburger can attack from outside of it.

The same thing happens to the pit fiend.

The Linnorm can't hit Limburger's AC except on a 20, can't grapple even on a 20 (...checks don't auto-succeed or fail, right?), and his sprays o' doom are evaded on a 2. He dies in 1 round.

The Gold Dragon, being Good, can't be smote. As such, he takes 2 rounds to kill. He suffers from similar problems as every other creature.

Same with the solar. Can't really...do anything. And cannot heal through Limburger's massive damage.

The Tarrasque takes 3 rounds to kill. During which it futilely bites, stabs, attempts to consume Limburger, who is too stinky and crunchy to be eaten. He dies, and Limburger uses his 36 Charisma to found a Sunday Polo Club wherein a bunch of level 5 half-orcs come in every sunday to power attack the tarrasque's body down to arbitrarily negative hitpoints, so it won't recover before next sunday.

-Cross

I had assumed the 'regardless' part was referring to the target being undead, an evil outsider, etc., since later in the description it states:

Quote:

If the paladin targets a creature that is not evil, the smite is wasted with no effect.

It seems pretty awkward that a paladin's smite evil would bypass a neutral good creature's DR 15/Epic and Evil, I've certainly never used smite that way in my games, and I can't imagine it's the intended interpretation.

@ Crosswind, suffocation may actually keep the tarrasque down permanently. It's a slightly iffy rules area, but the universal rules for regeneration (which the tarrasque still uses, despite nothing being able to suppress the effect) clearly say:

Quote:

Regeneration also does not restore hit points lost from starvation, thirst, or suffocation.

This is the same part of the rules One used in his 'starve it on the astral plane' technique.

I prefer my "AND ON EVERY TUESDAY, I SHALL SPEND THE DAY PUMMELING THE UNCONSCIOUS TARRASQUE" approach. =D

-Cross

Crosswind, this may destroy your build but I must ask: If the monsters have foreknowledge of the character's build...would that mean they come in buffed and ready to rock?

Also Crosswind, you do realize that if you succeed in killing the Solar, you would fall so hard you'd be the reason in killing the dinosaurs, right?

Ganny - In all fairness, none of the monsters in the original beastmas buffed themselves, but I'm willing to allow the monsters to buff themselves! =) ...all of a sudden are they able to hit my AC occasionally? Because I don't think they can get me to fail a save.

...what if I'm, like, totally a MOON Paladin. For moons. So I, err, hate the sun? So it's okay if I kill solars? <_< >_>

-Cross (I WILL KILL HER LAST.)

Sooo, my previous post was meta-whining, which is actually worse than regular whining. Here's my attempt at this.

Key ideas here seem to be:
Untouchable AC.
Infallible Saves.
Gigantic, unmitigatable damage.
--------------------------------------------------------------
Build: Half elf Synthesist (16), Oath of Vengeance Paladin (4)
Laaaaame Stats (20 point buy): 7/7/7/8/18/18+2
Half elf class bonus goes to summoner for +5 evolution points.
Feats:
Improved Initiative
Extra Evolution x5
Improved Natural Attack (Bite)
Power Attack
Dimensional Agility
Dimensional Assault

Eidolon is as follows:
Quadruped
Improved Natural Armor x4 (4)
Improved Dex x3 (6)
Huge Size (10)
Head x5 (10)
Pounce (1)
Total Evo Points Required: 31
Total Evo Points We Have: 21 (16 lvls), +5 (half-elf bonus) +5 (feats)= 31
Ability Bonuses into Dex (+3)
+6 str/dex from being lvl 16
-----------------------------------------------------------
So, for untouchable AC, let's start off by committing to 16 levels of Synthesist. This gives us +12 Natural Armor from our eidolon, +8 from Improved Natural Armor Evolution x4. We'll go quadruped of some form, pick up +5 deflection and +5 natural armor, while wearing Braceres of Armor +8. And +4 shield bonus, from being a synthesist.

Our dex will end up being 14(biped), plus 8 from ability score increase, -4 from being huge, +9 from leveling, +6 from an item, +5 from wishes or tomes So, total of: 38.
So our AC is: 10 + 14(dex)+4(shield)+25(Natural Armor)+8(Armor) + 5 (Deflection) + 1 (Dodge from boots of haste or haste) = 57.
Touch is 29 (Problem.)
Flat-footed is 43 (Not a problem.)
Let's check our saves.

Dex is 38, Con is 13+8(huge)+6(item) = 27, Wisdom is 18+6(item) = 24.

5/5/10 + 5(Cloak of Resistance) + 4 (synthesist) + 14/8/7 (stats) = 27/23/26.

Our saves are insufficient, so, we take 4 levels of paladin. This makes our base saves 9/6/14, and also adds our charisma (20 + 5 (stat increases) + 5 (tomes) + 6 (item) = 36 (+13) to our saves
So now our saves are a much more respectable 44/38/43. And we have improved evasion and evasion, from being a synthesist.

Now, from our super charisma, we have 15 uses of Channel Energy, which means we can smite 7+2 times. So we can assume that we’re smiting every BBEG, every combat. This helps us. While smiting, our AC goes 8 higher (Deflection bonus of +13).
So we’re at:
65 AC (yay!), 37 touch (Nice!), 52 Flat-footed (yay!).
Our saves are: 44/38/43, with improved evasion.
Now, how much damage do we do? We have a BAB of +16 (4 from paladin, 12 from summoner), so we can power attack for +5. Let’s give ourselves a +5 amulet of mighty fists, too.
Our strength is 14 (eidolon) + 6 (improvements) + 4 (tome) + 6 (item) + 16 (huge) = 46. With our 6 bite attacks, we do: 6*(3d6+27 + 4 (smite)+5 (magic weapon)+15 (power attack)), for an average of 369 points of damage.
Our attack bonus is 16+18 (strength)+13(smite charisma) + 5 (weapon), so, +52 on all of our attacks. I don’t think we ever miss. And we ignore all DR thanks to smite.
-------------------------------------------

To summarize:
Our initiative is at 17, we have 65/37/52 AC, 44/38/43 saves, and we have 6 attacks at +52, so we only miss anything on a natural 1. We have reach and teleport-pounce, so we’re full attacking every round. When we get to attack, we do 275 damage which ignores all DR.

-----------------------------------------------
I am not a great optimizer, so there may be some holes in this build. I would love it if other people could fill these holes using our remaining feat, and the 16 levels of summoner spells that I possess. =)

-Cross (I realize that I am probably way overbudget for a 20th level character, but I don’t have a good feel for how much stuff costs.)

(Edit: For fun and flexibility, could pick up dimensional agility and dimensional assault, so that our charge/full attack could be from...400+40*16 = 1040 feet away?)

(Double Edit: Reading through the fights. The shoggoth is @#$%ed. This character isn't particularly vulnerable to greater dispels, because his numbers (AC and saves) are so much freaking higher than they need to be. I have never played at high level, so I'm sure Wish would do something, but I'm not sure it's going to be that effective. ...Unlike One, this character can just flat out tank + spank the Solar, and I think every other fight goes equivalently, with Dimension-door charge taking the place of One's Perfect Shot. Nobody can really survive more than 2, and I can cast 8 dimension doors per day with my 3rd level spells. Use 6 more in 4th level spells and I can dimension-door charge every round of every one of these combats - because none of these critters can survive 2 full attacks. Any complaints?)

Let me state reasoning first, and then conclusions second.

1.) Consumables use a lot of standard and move actions. In combat, they're generally, therefore, not THAT useful (certain exceptions, like dimensional anchor, dispel magic, etc, apply).

What they do offer is incredible breadth and versatility.

2.) Consumables use some of your wealth. Classes that get by on the cheap can make a lot of use out of them.

3.) By and large, you get the most variety out of consumables from having a high UMD score.

As suggested above, Rogues and Ninjas get get a lot of mileage out of consumables. However, Rogues and Ninjas, being martial classes, can also use that money.

Allow me to suggest, therefore: The Arcane Bloodline Sorceror, for the following reasons:

a.) UMD as a class skill, charisma as a main stat. Giant UMD score.

b.) Caster class - generally has money to spare.

c.) Naturally limited spell selection, so versatility from consumables is extremely useful

d.) Gets a familiar at level 1. Upgrade it at level 7 with Improved Familiar, so you can have your familiar using wands and scrolls for double the consumable-action.

e.) Solve in-combat problems with your spell list. Solve out of combat problems with consumables.

-Cross

I think I have a few points to bring up that nobody else has.

Point 1.) When dealing with the Witch class, you need to basically consider that it nothing for a round or three, then wins. I usually ask myself "If a fighter had been full-attacking this thing for all those rounds, would it be alive?". Just because the end comes sharply, it often surprises DMs.

Point 2.) Ice Tomb has 20 hit points. Have a minion break it. You're level 11, this shouldn't be hard. You can't CDG the creature (Ice is in the way), and as soon as you break the ice the creature is no longer unconscious/paralyzed, so you've basically spent 2 rounds and a failed fort save to stagger somebody for 1d4 rounds.

In summary: Witches are really good at single-target encounters, particularly when that target can be tagged with mind-affecting spells.

Also, Scarred Witch Doctor is right up there with Synthesist in Super Questionable Archetypes. =)

-Cross

Basically, you're not going to be great at melee, no matter what you do. You don't have the BAB for it, nor do you have any spectacular strength or damage-boosting abilities.

What you can focus on is having a decent AC (so you don't get wrecked), or having some sort of extra helpfulness.

Given this, consider:

1.) Step up, Following Strike, Step up and Strike - you can make yourself super-annoying to casters and archers.

2.) Dodge, Mobility and Spring Attack - you can make yourself really mobile

3.) Cornugon Smash - if you're going to power attack, may as well use your super-good intimidate to demoralize everybody. For added fun, wield a Cruel weapon. If you can reliably hit your intimidate, they get shaken, and the next hit, Cruel makes them sickened.

This combo gives -4 to attacks/saves, -2 to damage, and some other fun.

Also give a look at the master performer/grand master performer feats if your GM is into them.

-Cross

Hey, couple of things:

1.) In general, if you have a group of players who enjoyed what you just did, you must be a pretty f*#!ing kick-ass DM, _and_ have a pretty good group. Pat yourself on the back. A lot of player/GM combos have combusted over less, and that's why you see a lot of "DM f#@~ed up!" comments here.

2.) I'm generally pretty opposed to stripping characters of their powers, as it makes characters less fun to play. I would consider, instead...

3.) Have an agent of the Paladin's god appear - the souls of the villagers rest in limbo, or ghosts, until certain deeds have been done. Think Hercules' labors, etc.

4.) Explicitly stripping a player of her powers ("You can no longer feel your god!") may be overkill. Instead, you could take away domain spells for a cleric, or even just make Domain Spells have a spell failure chance, for the cleric.

-Cross

Start telling ridiculous stories about him - "I saw him bring a woman back from the dead to hear one last song...", "I hear he once cured a famine by singing the locusts out of town...", etc

Have people fight over his talents. Example:
Devil tries to get him to sell out to be his own personal troubador
Dragon threatens to burn down a town if he doesn't write a song about her

-Cross

You're ignoring a couple really good powers out there. =) Here's my build:

Level 1: Power Attack, Improved Sunder
Level 2: Lesser Beast Totem
Level 3: Extra Rage Power: Superstition
Level 4: Reckless Abandon
Level 5: Extra Rage Power: Witch Hunter
Level 6: Spell Sunder
Level 7: Extra Rage Power: Beast Totem
Level 8: Strength Surge
Level 9: Combat Reflexes
Level 10: Greater Beast Totem
Level 11: Dazing Assault
Level 12: Come and Get Me

Strength surge, early-on, isn't really worth getting. It's not that big a bonus. The difference between this build and yours is that I fit in the beast totem line, which is really good. =) I don't get Greater Sunder - feel free to take swap it in for whatever you like.

-Cross

Zoolander.

-Cross

Can anybody point me in the direction of a good wild shape druid template/build?

I would look into that. Archers aren't my style, and the saurian shaman -- while COOL AS HECK, could be a little thematically jarring as I don't know how common Dinosaurs are in Andoran (likely where we'll start our adventures) ... something tells me nobody wants to cross the delaware on a diplodocus.

Thanks everybody for being so forthcoming... I have a LOT TO LEARN but one of my favorite things about pathfinder is that it forces you to make choices... even when you are spoiled for resources.

as a sidenote, I'm going to talk to my DM about his logic for the 50 point buy. I suspect that it is one part us being very new to pathfinder and two parts him wanting to throw the kitchen sink at us.

Okay. So, beware - Druid is a Rules-intensive class, particularly with wild shape. If you know the rules and are good with numbers, you will kickass. If not, some peril may arise.

Here's a pretty good build:

Human Druid

1.) Spell Focus: Conjuration, Augment Summoning
3.) Superior Summons
5.) Natural Spell
7.) Powerful Shape
9.) Planar Wild Shape

Saurian Shaman is okay. It's not amazing - it's fine. You sacrifice flexibility and gain power. Feel free to take it if you want. Other than that, Menhir Savant is a great "Don't give up anything useful, gain some SUPER useful things" Archetype.

Basically, you're going to be an excellent summoner with this. As soon as you get Wild Shape, you will be able to melee with the best of them. This gentleman's guide is quite good:

https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=1Y_uvQ0fgmLR9aW-OoAD_rbI-3iMJVQmxif LpA1s5EXg

-Cross

Man. With stats like those, I'd have a hard time not going Monk or Wild Shape Druid.

Wild Shape druid has full casting and you'll be a very viable backup melee option, too. You can punt charisma and intelligence, get 16s on all your physical scores and still have a great wisdom.

You'll basically be a full caster and still be an absolute melee powerhouse.

-Cross (Edit: Plus, you'll have an animal companion and great summons ability if you need to effectively up your party size. And certain wild shapes can help you be almost a rogue.)

I mean, the easy way is to give players the Elite Array, before race stats.

Ensures very little min-maxing. Everybody will have 1 or two sub-par stats, 2 above-average ones, and 1 very good one.

-Cross

Crosswind wrote:

I'd go with improved initiative. It's not amazing at level 3, but it gets better as you level up.

How does it get better? It's a flat +4 no matter when you take it.

It gets better because the value of acting first (and the value of an action) at higher level is bigger, particularly for a caster.

Think about it - at first level, combats slog a bit. Cleric spells don't really do that much. At 9th level, you have access to some serious party-wide buffs, plane-shift, etc. Using those before an enemy acts can dramatically change the encounter.

-Cross

Hey. A little late to the thread, but I've dealt with this stuff before, so I have OPINIONS.

The "TAKE A HARD LINE WITH YOUR FRIEND" replies are stupid. Hey, look, guys who play pen and paper DND and post on the internet exhibit all of the charisma and social awareness of a damp cabbage. Shocker. All of you, stop supporting stereotypes!

----------

Fundamentally, you need to talk to this guy, out of character, and have a "let's work this out" conversation. It doesn't seem like the guy's a bad roleplayer, or a bad person, so it should be remedy-able. The topic of the conversation should be: Can we find a way for both of us to enjoy this game, so we can keep gaming?

In my experience, I have found that the conversation should touch on the following topics:

1.) What do the characters in the party _agree_ on, such that they should travel together? Frequently, I find it useful to discuss this before character creation.
2.) When is an appropriate time for him to go with the team, and when's an appropriate time for him to have his moment? Explain how it's important that everybody get to do their thing sometimes.
2a.) You should note that this advice applies to you, as well. In your example, I think you behaved sort of unwisely. Let's agree that, OOC, you were pretty sure that reviving the ratling would have wasted resources and sort of @#$%'d the party over. By _far_ your best course of action is to say "Okay! You know best!" and let the disaster occur. Then, the next couple times something similar happens, you can do stuff your way ("I don't want them to get away!"). What happened here was that you BOTH really wanted to do what your character would do, and argued about it.
3.) Try not to get into the "BUT THAT'S WHAT MY CHARACTER WOULD DO" argument. It's a pretty f#&+in' stupid argument, despite about 9 replies above implying that staying in character is the most important thing one can do at the table.
4.) Discuss a way for him to get to play his character such that it doesn't ruin other people's fun. Can he eat only, say, evil babies? This sort of goes back to Point A. If you don't have some unifying purpose as a party that all members are willing to sacrifice a bit to stick to, you're not going to get very far.

Summary: There's definitely a way to play an evil witch who loves to diplomacize enemies in a predominantly good party in the setting you have discussed. Frankly, played well it would be hilarious ("Damn it. I _know_ we have to save the world, but...babies. They're so @#$%ing delicious. I can't eat just one."). But it sounds like this dude isn't that socially aware of a player, so it might help to have a conversation to make him directly aware of the implications of what he's doing.

-Cross

Passing for human is sort of a trash feat - it's not very good. I'm with Lemmy - let him take a trait for it.

-Cross

Okay. So the whole point here is:
------
The guarded life chain lets you make 2x your barbarian level nonlethal
Invulnerable Rager DR applies 2x.
------
REQUIRED feats/Powers here are:
Primary Powers: Guarded Life, Greater Guarded Life, Flesh Wound,
Secondary Powers: Superstition, Witch Hunter, Spell Sunder, Come And Get Me
Feats: Endurance, Diehard, Ferocious Tenacity, Power Attack

Crane Style, Stalwart and Improved Stalwart allow you to get +6 DR at the cost of 3 feats and a -2 penalty to AB, and (by RAW) this DR is not doubled against nonlethal damage.

Alternatively, taking Increased Damage Reduction 3 times gives you 3 DR which _is_ doubled (6 DR!) against nonlethal damage. So, that's better.
-----
So, I'd go with:

1-Rager1:Power Attack, Endurance
2-Rager2: Guarded Life
3-Rager3: Diehard
4-Rager4: Superstition
5-Rager5: Destroyer's Blessing
6-Rager6:Gtr Guarded Life
7-Rager7: Ferocious Tenacity
8-Rager8: Increased DR
9-Rager9: ERP: Increased DR
10-Rager10:Flesh Wound
11-Rager11: Dazing Assault
12-Rager12: Come and Get Me
13-Rager13 ERP: Increased DR
14-Rager14:Witch Hunter
15-Rager15:Improved Sunder
16-Rager16:Spell Sunder
17-Rager17:ERP: Raging Vitality
18-Rager18:Strength Surge
19-Rager19: ERP: Ghost Rager
20-Rager20: Raging Brutality

Advantages:
I get dazing assault along with Come and Get Me. It's really not worth doing CaGM without some way of negating those attacks entirely.
I get Destroyer's Blessing WAY earlier, which lets me stock up on rage rounds for Flesh Wound.
I don't do dips in other classes so half the time my DR/- is 1 higher.
I pick up 3 Increased DRs. By level 14, I'm rocking 10 DR/-, which is 20 DR/- against nonlethal.
You'll notice that, in general, I cluster my feats better. Witch Hunter, Improved Sunder, Spell Sunder all come together. By themselves, they're sort of useless, so there's no reason to spread them out.

Spell Sunder is still _late_. But the deathless idea sort of requires a lot of early investment, because you really don't want to risk biting it.

--------

Basically, by RAW, at level 5 this build is immortal. You have infinite rounds of rage per day (Destroyer's Blessing), and you have the ability to bring damage you take down to 1 (Ferocious Tenacity) so long as you have rage rounds, and you can mitigate a ton of that damage with double-DR.

While playing this, you will want to invest in the Belt of Rage Cycling mentioned above, and probably some fortification armor. The only way you're biting it is by massive damage that you haven't prepared for by repeatedly sundering a tree.

-Cross

I would agree with Crosswind. Extra Rage Power is not a sexy feat to describe but it is the be all end all feat that allows you to build extremely versatile barbarians = Blue. I think in my 12th lvl human barbarian I only have 4 real feats (Power Attack, Raging Vitality, Combat Reflexes, and Dazing Assault). The rest (3 feat slots) are Extra Rage Power. Probably in any 20th lvl build, half of your feats will be extra rage powers. They Are That Good.

Also, a superior barbarian build to the one linked in your guide. That guy is right on like 90% of things, but delaying Spell Sunder 'til 13 is super harsh. It's too good to pass up. And Strength Surge isn't good enough to take at 4.

An alternative build (for humans):

Level 1: Power Attack, Improved Sunder
Level 2: Lesser Beast Totem
Level 3: Extra Rage Power: Superstition
Level 4: Reckless Abandon
Level 5: Extra Rage Power: Witch Hunter
Level 6: Spell Sunder
Level 7: Extra Rage Power: Beast Totem
Level 8: Strength Surge
Level 9: Combat Reflexes
Level 10: Greater Beast Totem
Level 11: Dazing Assault
Level 12: Come and Get Me
Level 13: Extra Rage Power: Eater of Magic
Level 14: Improved Damage Reduction
Level 15: Greater Sunder
Level 16: Improved Damage Reduction
Level 17: Extra Rage Power: Improved Damage Reduction
Level 18: Knockback
Level 19: Extra Rage Power: Ghost Rager
Level 20: Unexpected Strike

I think the feats and powers line up a bit better, though me and STR Ranger agree on a lot of stuff.

-Cross (Edited to go to 20 and be non-redundant past 13)

Damn it. I wrote a glorious post and then I had to shut my internet off. Boo.

First, I'd recommend straight fighter. Straight fighter, tank with dual-wield and shields is pretty great.

General Tips:
1.) I, personally, think that you want to be shield-bashing as much as is humanly possible. You have the feats for it, it's fun, and you already have a shield in your hand. Plus, dwarves bullying people is great.

2.) Two-weapon fighting + shield bashing is great.

3.) Given that you'll be swinging with a weapon and a shield, try to avoid feats which only give one of them a benefit (weapon focus, weapon spec, etc), if it's a small benefit.

Specific Build (What I'd Do):
Level 1: Improved Shield Bash, Two-Weapon Fighting
Level 2: Stand Still
Level 3: Step Up
Level 4: Weapon Focus (...waaaait for it)
Level 5: Improved Bull Rush
Level 6: Improved TWF
Level 7: Shield Slam
Level 8: Lunge, Retrain Weapon Focus to Greater Bull Rush

So let's review what this gives you.
1.) Your damage will be lower than if you'd bought weapon focus, weapon spec, and improved critical. It will not be _much_ lower, though - those feats would affect 2-3 out of your 4-5 attacks per round (depending on haste)

2.) Your AC is going to be spectacular.

3.) Your ability to protect your party is going to be A+.
3a.) If somebody tries to move past you, you can AoO them and stop them from doing it
3b.) If somebody tries to 5 foot step away from you, you can immediate-action 5-foot step up to them. With 3a, this means that there is literally no way somebody can move away from you without eating an AOO short of a full withdraw action.

4.) Your ability to move enemies around the battlefield is going to be incredible.
4a.) 2 free bull rush checks a round from your off-hand attacks
4b.) +4 on those bull-rush checks
4c.) Every time you bull rush people, your allies near them get AOOS
4d.) Thanks to 3, when you move an enemy somewhere, he has very little reasonable way to get away.

----------

Some people in the above thread have implied that there is no way to make an enemy attack you if you don't do damage. It's a common belief held by the un-clever. Don't believe it - if you take away an enemy's ability to attack other people, he's left with pretty much no choice.

-Cross (If you don't want to follow this approach, I'd still stay fighter. A looot of good feats there.)

Edit: Lunge might be sort of superfluous. You could take Following Step at 8, Step Up and Strike at 9, FEATIMGOINGTOREPLACE at 10, Imp TWF at 11, and Pin Down and replace your level 10 feat with Shield Master. You will basically get to move enemies wherever the hell you want, whenever.)