I checked the core rulebook, and you're correct. It seems bizarre though, that a monster can use its natural attacks and a weapon without TWF, but a PC cannot. I'm gonna click FAQ now.
I don't think that's true.
The combat chapter seems to disagrees with the universal monster rules.
PFPRD: http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/combat.htmlYou can make attacks with natural weapons in combination with attacks made with a melee weapon and unarmed strikes, so long as a different limb is used for each attack. For example, you cannot make a claw attack and also use that hand to make attacks with a longsword. When you make additional attacks in this way, all of your natural attacks are treated as secondary natural attacks, using your base attack bonus minus 5 and adding only 1/2 of your Strength modifier on damage rolls. In addition, all of your attacks made with melee weapons and unarmed strikes are made as if you were two-weapon fighting. Your natural attacks are treated as light, off-hand weapons for determining the penalty to your other attacks. Feats such as Two-Weapon Fighting and Multiattack can reduce these penalties.Emphasis mine.
So I've been scrounging for the other post I had seen, but this one will have to do Post from James Jacobs (near the bottom) Also if you read through the natural attack entry in the bestiary you also see it makes no notice of a two weapon fighting penalty for intermixing nautral and weapon attacks. I realize not everyone will be happy taking the lone post of Mr Jacobs's as gospel though, so I do suggest FAQing, but otherwise I see it as being adequate enough for me.
His post is good enough for me as well.
I don't think he actually answers the question, but yeah. I think the intention is clear.
So we are all in agreement that I need to take the multiattack feat
I do not agree here ;-P
First of all, I do not think you qualify for the multiattack feat. You do not have the necessary three natural attacks, you just gain some of them under special circumstances. For me that means you do not meet the prerequisites to take the feat. If your DM decides otherwise, that's fine of course :-)Also I think you are expecting way too much of those claws. They are rather pathetic and something to get you for the first few levels and be something nice for specific circumstances, e.g. to surprise someone who thought you're unarmed. If you look at it in detail, assuming you'll have an 18 in CHA, we are talking about 3+4=7 rounds of claws for the total day. That's something like one to two short encounters that you can use these claws in total. I would not like to rely on something like that :-/ So while the claws are cool thematically, mechanically they are not really great.
Then the form of the dragon thing: It looks good and certainly gives you some nice boosts. But you lose so much when you actually transform: weapons, access to certain feats due to your transformed form, magic items in effect when you transformed (seriously: do you always know when a fight will come, take them off, wait, transform, put them on again?)... It certainly is nice, but not the best thing there is IMO.
Which brings me to the last thing, the paladin and healing stuff. To me you seem to be trying to be too many things at once with this character: Healer via channel, channel to hurt undead, divine warrior to smack down evil, draconic warrior with claws and bites... This will not work out well IMO. There are some classes like the bard which allow you to do lots of things reasonably well. And there are classes that excel in a few things. The key to a playable and effective character in pathfinder in my experience is to pick a few things, e.g. two, that you want to be good at.
For instance, that channeling we are talking about with your build and your progression is pretty pathetic: 1d6. That's it. Ok, add a phylactery of positive energy, and we're at 2d6. On average that is 7 hp of healing. For that you would sacrifice the ability to smite evil a lot more times a day by not taking the oath of vengeance path and be much less effective in battle. In your situation, I would take the oath and rather invest into wands of cure light wounds, paladins and bards both can use them without any problem since these spells are on their spell list.
Channeling to hurt undead will be insignificant at later levels and only of minor effectiveness at this level. Since you cannot channel to heal and hurt at the same time, you will always be faced with the decision what to do. If you decide to hurt, then you will do 3-7 hp (with phylactery) of damage to those undead who fail their save, 1-3 hp damage to those that do. Is that really something you want to sacrifice the smiting for?
Then the question if you want to go sorcerer or bard. Sorcerer is, as a stated, absolutely a viable choice. But you mentioned several times that the priority for you is melee, not casting, and that you basically only want it to get into DD. I do not think you gain a lot over the bard in such a situation, but rather lose some options which are valuable through many levels, e.g. wearing armor. Still, this is a matter of taste. And maybe I am an exceptionally mean DM who plays his (higher level) NPCs to do reconnaisance and actually cast dispel magic on those pesky adventurers to bring down their defenses like mage armor ;-P
From what I have read so far I get the feeling that pure paladin might be much more rewarding for you. That or a fighter/sorc/DD or bard/DD route. Currently you are IMO going into too many directions which may well make you end up with a character who can do many little things which will just not be enough :-/
Well, just thought I give you some other ideas. See you :-)
Paizo is already aware of the contradiction re: Natural Weapons. I expect Errata when a new printing is released.
They have stated that 2WF penalties are not intended when using weapons + natural weapons as secondaries.
If you can buff the Fly skill by being able to ´routinely´ Fly (every day) even if you don´t continually have a Fly speed, I don´t see why having 3 natural attacks for a certain number of rounds/day wouldn´t also qualify. I mean, what happen if you DO normally have 3 natural attacks, but the party mage decides to Polymorph you into a worm every day for an hour, losing your 3 natural attacks, i.e. you no longer ´continually´ have 3 natural attacks?
I agree with Sangalor in general, in that Natural Weapons aren´t going to be SOOO uber, but getting extra attacks on Full Attack at Full BAB -2 (or even -5 without MWF) IS a nice thing to have, especially if you can be delivering Touch Spells with them. At high levels I find the Dragon Forms to not be all that great, Weapons are just much better in terms of Crit stats and using Reach if you want to, and DD doesn´t even gain the highest level Dragon Form. Alot of people seem to find that skipping the last 2 levels of Dragon Disciple, and going back into another class is a very strong approach, you just don´t gain all that much in level 9 and 10.
THe Bard CAN be a decent Melee base in and of itself, especially if you take the Arcane Duelist variant, or possibly Dawnflower Dervish, you are good at self-buffing, enough to make up for the BAB. But if you want alot of Paladin, I don´t think it makes sense to only take 1 level of Bard, you would want 5 levels at least.
Summoner could work ONLY if you use the Archetype that gains a ¨Battle Suit¨.
I´m not an expert on it, but it seems do-able. Since you´re not progressing it as much (gaining immunities for your Eidolon), you will be much more vulnerable to effects like Protection vs. (Alignment), Banishment, Dispel Magic, etc.
So you´re using Heavy Armor? How does that work? I found that Mithril Medium Armor is do-able, ending up with a 5% Arcane Spell Failure, which is acceptable to me.
2 1st level spells when you START Dragon Disciple I presume, but DD also progresses your spellcasting, so you should have alot more than that by the end of the time-span you´re considering. There are non-Somatic spells that you can use without problem, and you can use Still Spell, via Rod as well. You will probably have... 20-25% ASF, at least with the lower level Arcane Armor Training Feat, and that is workable for out-of-combat buffing, just not for in-combat usage where you don´t want to waste actions, not to mention spell slots. It does seem like if you ignore casting completely you will miss out on alot... Dragon Disciple CAN work, but you need to leverage everything to be comparable to Core Classes, IMHO. Of course, maybe that doesn´t matter to you, and with 12 players there´s plenty of wiggle room.
I would recommend checking out my Dragon Disciple character profile I mentioned earlier... It´s Barbarian based, not Paladin, but you can see how melee-heavy Dragon Disciple works in general, as well as seeing the relative importance of buffing. In general, I would suggest finding something good to do with your tons of STR (and Paladin Smite attack bonuses), probably Combat Maneuvers. Without Rage Powers, that will have to be via Feats, though Reach Weapons let you deliver many of them while avoiding AoO´s for not having the Improved Feat, and the ones based off of Feats you will already take (Power Attack) are easy enough to grab. In a very large party, I can definitely see that being viable and fun.
I hate Over-Run since you have to beat it by 5 to get the knockdown effect.
Trip is more direct, though it reqiures Combat Expertise of course.
Bull-rush is my preference, or Grapple. Check with your GM how Bullrushign somebody into a solid wall works, lots of people rule that it knocks you down, i.e. like Over-Run.
@Wrathsbane: I actually enjoyed that read especially since you have kinda the same experience that Im going to be getting. Hopefully we get an actual healer so something close to it so I can save my stuff for the situations that actually need it and as it is I have Fullplate on plus an armored kilt and ring of prot PLUS the armor is enchanted so my AC comes to around 23/24 without the shield equipped. the only time I should waste a turn is whenever I decide to activate bardic performance
Thanks :)
So my reccomendation would be to keep on with the armor, ecspecially if you are planning on leaning towards combat. If you are wanting to be a dangerous spellcaster as well, you may want to consider either lighter armor or Arcane Armor Mastery feat chain.
Also, let your group know to expect to spend some group loot on "cure x wounds" wands, because although you can keep them alive through burst channels (and even then, not so much if it a dungeoun crawl), a paladin is a only a good healer when they are full paladin, or near to full paladin. By the level 13/14 mark, you will be no where close to full paladin.
Other than that, keep in mind that claws are a limited duration, so dont base your character around them. They are great to use to add a bit of damage here and there, but I beleive my DD had only 10-12 ROUNDS a day with them. That can last one long encounter, or 2 or 3 shorter ones.