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Get a reach weapon and combat reflexes. If you're a fighter, put your first feat into power attack and murder everyone who tries to approach you. Keep 3-5 Javelins. You do know you can throw them at people with 1 hand as a standard action and as a free action and switch back to your reach weapon afterwards, right? And ya you will probably want to get a bow, though I think most of the time it'll just sit on your back and molder.
Start with 16 str, 14 dex..try to fit in 14 con. Try not to dump any stats, you'll still have some points left to spare.
Ask GM if you can use armor spikes to threaten at reach and at 5 ft. If he says no, carry a backup weapon(morningstar recommended) just in case you get stuck in some tight corner you can't use your reach weapon out of.
Desert - don't run out of water, hopefully some one in party has create water. Also please opt for light armor (Chain shirt is best) else all that marching around in medium armor is going to get you a nasty lot of fort saves.
Best reach weapon is the falchard, needs a fairly obscure book, has 18-20 crit range, and is an exotic weapon.
So your parameters are "something that can hit really with a sword". That is... pretty much every class that isn't a 1/2 BAB full caster. Needs more details.
Furious Focus is decent if you don't have any other Feats that strike your fancy.
The thing here is, really, doing melee well is easy-peasy.
Step 1: Grab a bigass weapon. I like Earthbreakers, but most prefer the Greatsword or Falchion.
Step 2: Have a high Strength score.
Step 3: Grab Power Attack.
Step 4: ...There is no step 4. You're good.
From there, it's what you want to be able to do BESIDES hit things with a bigass weapon really hard.
Do you want a lot of skills to contribute out of combat? Go Ranger or Slayer (one of my favorite classes).
Do you want to be a big, bad, intimidating motherf%*+er? Grab Intimidating Prowess, Conrugon Smash, and Hurtful. Conider the Barbarian and Bloodragers classes (in the latter case, the Abyssal Bloodline...you get bonuses to Intimidate against things smaller than you).
Do you want to sling a little magic at the same time? Go Alchemist or Inqusitor, maybe Warpriest.
The first will have solid skills, a Mutagen to boost your Strength higher, and cool versatile Discoveries, along with "spells" and your choose of Bombs or Sneak Attack.
The second will have solid skills, one of the best self buffing spell lists in the game, and Judgement and Bane to rocket your damage higher than many full BaB classes.
The last is probably the weakest option, with poor skills and a stunted spell list not tailored for it like the other two, but neat if you want a Dagger to hit like a Greatsword later on.
Do you want to be impossible to put down? Roll a Paladin. Swift action healing is rad. Snag the Fey Foundling Feat, along with stuff like Greater Mercy to maximize your self healing. Coupled with the paladin's disgustingly good saves, immunities, and Smite you'll be a powerhouse.
Melee damage is easy. it's the other stuff that takes a bit more work.
Thing is, there are a lot of classes that are good at hitting things with weapons. For a quick rundown of the Full BAB melee classes:
Barbarian: Rage will pump up your damage, and your rage powers can add a ton of new options; everything from more damage to new movement options or added durability.
Bloodrager: Similar to the Barbarian, but with 4-level spellcasting and a different set of powers.
Cavalier: Specialized in mounted combat, and comes with a few abilities for supporting his teammates.
Fighter: Gets a lot of feats, and bonuses to his weapons and armor. Rather lacking in out-of-combat abilities, unless you pick the right archetypes.
Paladin: Smites evil, heals himself, has incredibly high saves, and gets 4 levels of spellcasting. Just be wary of the potential issues with alignment/code of conduct.
Ranger: One of my personal favorites. Solid out-of-combat abilities, an animal companion to help in fights, favored enemy+terrain, and 4-level spellcasting. Just make sure you check with the GM to pick relevant terrains/enemies.
Samurai: Similar to the cavalier, but with less focus on teammate support and mounted combat, and more focus on personal badassery.
Slayer: Like a rogue, except with martial combat abilities in exchange for slightly less rogueishness. A solid choice for the sneaky assassin/killer type.
Swashbuckler: Focused on finesse light weapons and light armor, plus a nice list of abilites that draw on his panache pool. Though be wary of his action economy issues, since almost all his nice abilities use a swift/immediate action.
Trait-wise, Blessed Touch is your go-to. Flat +1 healing with Cure spells, Channel, or Lay on Hands.
Feats:
-Fey Foundling, +2 HP healed per die. So 1d6+2 at 2nd, 2d6+4 at 4th, and so on.
-Greater Mercy, +1d6 healing whenever you don't have a condition your Mercy would remove (and an extra 2 from Fey Foundling as a result).
-Ultimate Mercy. Doesn't really maximize healing, per se, but a free Raise Dead for the cost of 10 uses of Lay on hands is pretty sweet.
-Extra Lay on Hands. For obvious reasons.
That's really it for healing.
Spells:
Hero's Defiance. Lets you Lay on Hands (plus 1d6. Plus 2 from FF) as an Immediate if someone manages to bring you to 0 or below.
As a Paladin you also have access to Heavy Armor, and get a bonus to AC equal to your Cha mod against your Smite target. Maximizing Str and Cha is a good idea. Start with an 18 in both if possible.
Best way to do that is the Angel Blooded Aasimar race. Thematic, and powerful. The Incorruptible racial trait is great for a Paladin. Lasts an hour/level and protects you from stuff like Smite Good or Unholy Blight.
You take a whopping 1 point of extra damage, and hardly anything actually uses it.
For perspective, even if you take the extra damage every round, you still get a net of +1 healing from all sources. At 1st, and so much more after.
Drop the melee weapon and go ranged.
Reactionary is a great trait choice... Always good to go first.
Why? Is it a better choice?
Drop the melee weapon and go ranged.
In Pathfinder archery got a very big boost in the feat Clustered Shots, since it allows you to only apply DR from an opponent once to all of your attacks. It also allows you to have a lot more damage because you no longer rely on movement to hit your enemies. If going the paladin route, your smites auto-bypass DR anyway making it really strong since you can make full attacks and not have to move.
There is nothing wrong with going melee though, being a big, strong target is great when you are unkillable, your party will love you.
Your stats look pretty goof for 20 point buy. You could theoretically deal with only having 17 STR and give yourself more DEX or CHA, but it doesn't affect much and you will get more out of it the way you have it now.
Why? Is it a better choice?
Drop the melee weapon and go ranged.
Almost always, you have a better chance of getting off a full attack, can deal plenty of damage with more attacks, only deal with DR once and with the proper feat choices can even make attacks of opportunity.
It automatically includes ways to hit all the targets meleers usually have trouble with and has fewer weaknesses of its own.
However it is more feat intensive (even a fighter could spend all his feats on archery if he so chose), and isn't melee so some people don't like that.
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If your still intersted in a melee built paladin my Jugger-Not concept may be of interst. The Tank version is very hard to kill the DPS version is hard to kill and hits like a truck, does as much damage as 194 (w/ rage & power attack) in a round, Saves of 16/13/15, move of 50, immune to fear, disease and All at level 7.
If you have any questions post them in the following thread: Jugger-Not