Sword and board TWF or two hander with power attack, what say you.
My rolled stats are 16, 15, 14, 13, 12, 11, playing a human.
2-hander.
TWF is a feat-sucking, hit-penalty-giving, stat-hungry, useless-unless-standing-still trap.
Well obviously the TWF would be better for when I am smiting evil vs the two hander which is better at most non smiting times. Really I was hoping to get some responses on peoples actual play experience with the two styles....
The issue with TWF is that when you aren't smiting, your damage isn't going to be too awesome.
The other issue is that TWF costs a ton of feats. The other issue is that it requires you have a decent dexterity score when the paladin doesn't have that much free roaming space. I guess the final issue I can think of is that enhancing two weapons is expensive even with your divine weapon option.
That said, two-weapon fighting will give you the most smiting damage. Sword and board might be a bit preferable, with all the shield feats and such.
If you're planning to be the party's tank, I'd go with two-handed or sword and board for sure. The multiple taxes two-weapon fighting puts on you will show in your AC and hit points.
But if you're going for more of a striker position, and have someone to take the front lines if you need to dart, two-weapon fighting can be excellent on attack returns.
Note: If you go two-weapon fighting, you want to have high crit ratio weapons. Dual wielding kukri and taking the improved critical feat is possibly the best way to do it: smite multiplies on a crit, and if you're not maximizing smite damage two weapon fighting is not worth it.
Way I see it, both styles are viable enough in the longrun.
Well obviously the TWF would be better for when I am smiting evil vs the two hander which is better at most non smiting times.
Even then, you have to be standing still to use TWF at all - it only works on full attacks. 2H lets you deliver more overall damage and frees up ability scores for strength.
TWF requires high DEX, which means something else is suffering such as STR, and then to make up for the -2 and lower hit chance from lower STR, you need yet another feat - weapon finesse. Even then, you're still -2 behind the curve again from TWF. Further, all you can do for damage is smite, since STR is lagging.
2HF requires less feats, lets you max out your strength for maximum damage, and if you find your foe easy to hit you're using PA for more damage while still being ahead of TWF's accuracy. Ironically, since you also don't need to stand still to get the most out of 2HF anyway, you're more mobile and more flexible than the high-Dex TWF character.
Lastly, there's the whole problem of the full-attack anyway, with iteratives having less and less of a chance to hit at all, which in turn means that the attacks proved useless. Unless you get some very tasty bonuses to hit, or happen to be killing low-AC foes, the full attack is heavily overrated.
In summary, if you're going to just exist for the sole purpose of standing still and smiting, TWF is the path toward that land of one-trick ponies. 2HF requires far less investment, allowing you to round out your character better, and maybe do more in his life than just plant his feet and swing kukris around.
NOTE: I may read jaded and sarcastic ... and I am, but not at you. I'm posting in hopes of selling you what I see as the truth.
2HF is great because you can quickdraw + throw a dart or javelin without having to drop your weapon. You can cast a spell while not having to drop your weapon. Your charges are awesome. Your attacks of opportunity are awesome. Your surprise round damage is awesome. Mounted combat becomes SPIRITEDSMITECHARGE of doom. You save money by not having to enchant x2 on weapons. It's a substantial list.
