Help with two handed character


Advice


I am trying to figure out what to play in my friend's next campaign. I am interested in using a two handed weapon type melee character, that has some decent flexibility (can do more than just fight), but does some solid DPR. Looking for something fun and unique as far as a combination of race/class.

Anyone have suggestions, or have something like this they are running now they can share for ideas?

Liberty's Edge

Half-Elf Bard/Paladin going Dragon Disciple.

Emphasize strength, but give a moderate cha (like 14). Go Bard 2/Paladin 3 so that you get Versatile Performance for one of your performs, but still get divine grace, divine health and aura of courage (+cha to saves, immune to disease and immune to fear).

Then, at 6th, start going Dragon Disciple. This gives Strength and Natural Armor (both great for a melee character), but also boosts your bard casting (which is full of utility spells and buffs).

Power attack is an important feat here. I recommend doing a paladin level as the first level so you can take power attack right away.

There, now you have a melee beat-stick character that gets several utility spells and abilities, in addition to eventually getting things like Blindsense, a breath weapon, wings, etc. These abilities take a bit to start rolling in, but in the low levels you can get by just power-attacking everything for pretty crazy damage.

Liberty's Edge

Keep it simple: barbarian with some levels of weapon master fighter and Gloves of Dueling. You'll pound the bloody tar out of just about everything without even having to think about it. Recommend dwarf for raging saves a paladin would be proud to call his own.

(If you want to fly and shoot fire and thunder out your arse at higher level, buy potions and beads.)


Switch hitter ranger, grab archery with your combat style feats and use your regular feats for THF.

The Exchange

Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

Half-elf titan mauler barbarian or titan mauler barbarian/fighter that wields a large one-handed bastard sword as a 2 handed weapon. Use half-elf racial of ancestral weapons to get the one-handed exotic proficiency with bastard sword so that when it becomes large you can wield it in 2 hands. Then go high in strength. You'll be doing 2d8+ 1.5 str per hit. Add in power attack and watch things melt away. AFAIK it is the highest DPR you can get.


The best choices(in my opinion) for pure melee classes are:

*Barbarians,but they don't have as much OOC versatility.
*Paladins,which have some decent social skills.
*Bruiser rogues/ninjas,they can do some decent damage when sneak attacking and they get a wide range of skills.
*Fighters,of course,but they have almost no OOC use(from what I've seen anyways).

I would play a Paladin,perhaps a half-orc if you would like something unique(rejected form his people,now he's trying to regain honor through righteousness?),otherwise I would play a human.

Get an 18 Strength,14 Con,and 14 Cha(at least).

Feats should go as followed if using a falchion:
L1:Power Attack
L1(H):Toughness
L3:WF(Falchion)
L9:Crit Focus
L11:Improved Crit
L13:Crit Feat of your choice
L15:Crit feat of your choice
L17:Crit Mastery

If you go this far into the later levels,this build does some insane damage,as well as having decent saves and AC.Wear a buckler if you want,and take Shield Focus(Buckler) in order to get a small bonus to AC.

Dark Archive

Hmmm; fighters are generally the best DPR two-handers, and Pallies are the best survivable two-handers, but you want to "do more than just fight".

It's hard to be front line without good armor, making rangers a pretty bad choice; they are #1 in flexibility, but losing all of their feats if they put on heavy armor is terrible.

Buffer-types (cleric, inquisitor, bard) do it great early, but are almost always better off getting off the front-line later... this makes them a waste of combat feats.

I'm going to go with Cavalier. Animal companion and 2-hander, 4 skill points per level, game advantages for higher Cha... you get a lot here. You don't have quite the damage output of a fighter, but are a little more flexible and get some pretty nifty extra effects :). They're actually pretty powerful; slightly less strong than Pallies; but more skill points gives you more out of combat, and they do break some good effects.

Liberty's Edge

Quote:
Switch hitter ranger, grab archery with your combat style feats and use your regular feats for THF.

Unless your ranger archtype also takes Point Blank Shot and Precise Shot before 12th, having Improved Precise Shot ahead of time (at 6th) really won't make a bit of difference because 90% of the time the reason an opponent has soft cover is because he's in melee with one of your allies (meaning you'll still be -4 to hit without Precise Shot).

The archtypes are essentially interchangeable if you're making a switch-hitter.

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