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I really like the idea of being a highly knowledgeable warrior who can pick out flaws in his enemies to augment his prowess. It's also quite flavorful to be able to rely on mental quickness (INT) rather than muscle memory. I am having a bit of trouble fitting it into a build though. Being a combat oriented Prestige Class, you need to get the +5 BAB, but which base class would get the most out of a good intelligence score?
First thing that comes to mind is an Eldritch Knight, but I would rather be good at walking up to something and hitting it, than be a weak caster and a weak fighter. I am sure there are plenty of ways to bork gishes, but what else would make a good melee combatant with intelligence?
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It's a tough call, if you ask me. Looking at the four core full BAB classes:
Barbarian - Doesn't fit it if you ask me. It's not that I don't think there's room for an intelligent person who flies into a murderous frenzy, it's just that it just doesn't work with the prestige class for me. It does have the advantage of not really using any mental stats, but the disadvantage of not wanting to have low stats in any of the physical stats.
Fighter - Better than barbarian, but 2 skill ranks just plain blows. The absence of flavor of the fighter works for you, because you can go with the same description before and after being able to take levels. Plus, feats are nice.
Paladin - Tough, mainly due to MAD. Between needing a decent charisma and not getting more skill points than a fighter, I'd say fighter is a smarter choice.
Ranger - Fares better than paladin, in spite of having arguably worse MAD. Dual-wielding or treeantmonk's Switch Hitter build works best, but you won't have as good of stats all around on account of wanting extra skills. The big advantage here is skills, which really helps you have a lot of knowledge all around. I'd recommend something like:
str 15+2
dex 14
con 12
int 14
wis 14
cha 7
If it was my choice, I'd go with ranger. For flavor, it fits nicely with favored enemies (those who you've spent extra time learning how to defeat) and although it makes you crazy MAD, I think it's workable.
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Are 7's generally acceptable in Pathfinder society or are they considered too powergamey?
@Wonko: I loved your 4E excel sheet in the early days. As a spreadsheet designer, do you have a good recommendation of an excel sheet for Pathfinder character building? I have something called Pathfinder sCoreGen and it looks pretty good, but a little out of date.
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Maybe I missed something but are you using the Student of War prestige class from Seeker of Secerts page 62, and asking what the best class to take prior to Student of War? If so Ranger or Fighter both work and (if your GM allows) take the Fighter variant from page 45 of the current Pathfinder Chronicles Campaign Setting, a fighter trained at a war college sounds great for you character concept.
Although after checking the Guide the Pathfinder Organized play the fighter variant from the Campaign Setting is not allowed, so I guess ranger is your best bet of course you can get there with fighter if you are human and 14 int.