Playing a Fighter that focuses on utilizing reach weapons is something that has caught my interest recently. I was curious as to what feats would supplement my idea and whether or not the Polearm Master archetype was worth the try for it.
I figure that Dex would be like, 13 or 14 as to get more attacks of opportunity considering Combat Reflexes is an important feat in the build.
The fighter would likely wield a Glaive or Glaive-Bardiche.
The feats I took into consideration were the typical fighter feats (Power Attack, Weapons Focus, Spec, etc.), Lunge, Cleave, and others.
One feat that I found was interesting was Combat Patrol, though it has Mobility as a prerequisite which would require Dodge as well.
Here are some other feat ideas:
Stand Still: When a foe provokes an attack of opportunity due to moving through your adjacent squares, you can make a combat maneuver check as your attack of opportunity. If successful, the enemy cannot move for the rest of his turn. An enemy can still take the rest of his action, but cannot move. This feat also applies to any creature that attempts to move from a square that is adjacent to you if such movement provokes an attack of opportunity.
Lunge: You can increase the reach of your melee attacks by 5 feet until the end of your turn by taking a –2 penalty to your AC until your next turn. You must decide to use this ability before any attacks are made.
In general though the polearm master is a bit underwhelming. There are other fighter archetypes that you can take with using a polearm in mind that probably give you more bang for your buck.
Improved Trip and Greater Trip.. Mobile fighter or two-handed fighter might work also, but frankly a regular fighter works just fine.
|
Another to consider is the whip fighter. At level two it can do lethal, and doesn't provoke. At level 5 it has threatening reach out to 10 feet and can still threaten adjacent. Since stand still is adjacent only, using the whip to trip is just as good, except against untrippable enemies. At higher levels this build weakens unless you're against chiefly humanoid enemies. Make it finesse and agile and combined with your other bonuses you can put out quite a bit of damage. If you want piranha strike you'd need to use the scorpion whip though.
Tripping feats were definitely something I was looking into, as well as the Mobile Fighter archetype.
I'm working through a Phalanx Soldier Archetype Fighter right now...can't wait till I get to use my polearm AND tower shield at level 3.
***Edit***
Using a Bec de Corbin. Having a blast with this build.
Tripping gets to be pretty tough against monsters with more than 2 feet.
|
When it comes to reach weapons i greatly encourage whip builds.
-Class / Race-
Human Fighter - Lore Warden
-Stats (25 point buy)-
STR 14 (+6 item) = 20
DEX 17 (+2 racial)(+5 leveling)(+6 item) = 30
CON 10
INT 13
WIS 09
CHA 14 (+6 item) = 20
-Hit-
Attack 36
Trip 44
-Feats-
01 Racial Heritage (Hobgoblin), Weapon Finesse, Weapon Focus Whip
02 Combat Expertise, Whip Mastery
03 Toughness
04 Dodge
05 Improved Whip Mastery
06 Weapon Specialization Whip
07 Mobility
08 Greater Weapon Focus Whip
09 Spring Attack
10 Whirlwind Attack
11 Lunge
12 Greater Weapon Specialization Whip
13 Dazzling Display
14 Demoralizing Lash
15 Skill Focus Intimidate
16 Intimidating Prowess
17 Shatter Defenses
18 Combat Reflexes
19 Improved Trip
20 Greater Trip
-Method-
Full round intimidate(39) to make all enemies shaken to all and flat-footed to u only. Next round 20ft aoe Whirlwind Attack that increases the duration of intimidate by another round against each target struck via Demoralizing Lash. On single / few targets same thing but instead of whirlwind attack use trip(d20 + 44) and make use of AoO granted when they fall prone and get back up.
|
|
These are all interesting ideas, here is one more. Give yourself a one level dip of cleric, of Erastil (LG) and take the Good domain (touch of good, domain spell-protection from evil) and the other domain as Plant/subdomain Growth (Enlarge 3+wis per day, domain spell-enlarge). The only sacrifice is giving yourself an 11 or 12 wisdom to cast your spells and the uptick is that you can, when enlarged, wield any weapon with reach. Imagine using a two handed sword for 2d.6 damage, and enlarged it becomes 3d.6. When you are all out of enlarge spells for the day, heal yourself, and go back to using your regular reach weapon, your glaive.
I am going to be doing something simlar but with spear.
http://paizo.com/threads/rzs2p1t4?Some-type-of-Spear-BuildPolearm master is a trap as stated in my thread, you get stuck useing your swift actions up by swaping the lenght of the pole arm so much. it also points out lots of other positve feats I would have missed out on or found useful. if I had not asked on here.
If you go Whirlwind route greater trip is only going to be a extra trip bonus as you can not take your AOO that granted because of wirlind. You would ingore the ranged weapon feats I picked because you are all pole arm instead of a spear you can speicalize more. Likely do more damage per round then me or combat manuvers. With more critial feats or who knows what else. you can even add disarm to ablitys. Trip them all the frist round, and when they stand up use your AOO to disarm or do damage. enjoy
Xexyz suggested Stand still but I think it actually not that effective unless you are non-reach fighter. It has limited use for as you it only going to work if you short haft the weapon some kind of way or use spike guantlet. ect. As the enemies have to be adjacent to you and that does no good since you can do anything to anyone adjacent to you with pole arm.
Good catch on the Stand Still adjacent restriction; I thought you could use the feat on anyone who moved through any square you threatened, not just adjacent ones. I agree, given that restriction it's not worth it for a reach weapon fighter.
I do slightly disagree with you regarding the polearm master archetype, however. While I agree that it's a mediocre archetype overall, I think it's mediocre for different reasons. I actually think the pole-fighting ability is pretty good; you're getting an ability that allows you to do something that counters the main weakness of reach weapons, and you're only giving up Bravery for it. It's the other abilities of the polearm master that I find lackluster. Giving up all your armor training for +4 to hit on AoOs is not a good tradeoff IMO. I also find the other abilities you get in place of weapon training levels lukewarm at best. Flexible Flanker is weak; how often have you not been able to flank someone because you couldn't move a single square? Sweeping Fend is worthless as far as I'm concerned; it actually makes you worse at trip maneuvers than if you didn't have the ability at all, while the ability to bull rush with a reach weapon isn't very impressive. Step Aside is actually really nice, although you don't get it until level 17. Polearm Parry is a poor replacement for Armor Mastery.
Personally I think mobile fighter, two-handed fighter, or dragoon would be superior choices - especially the mobile fighter. Then again mobile fighter is my favorite archetype so I pretty much always recommend it. =)
I would take armor spikes incase they get in close.
I didn't really think of it much until just now but I figure this concept would be an interesting idea for a back-up in case the Corsair Fighter I am playing in SaS dies.
I was looking through a thread once about what feat was the best in peoples' opinions, and someone mentioned Breadth of Experience. I realized for a campaign like SaS, having a +2 bonus to all Profession checks and Knowledge checks and can use them all untrained is insane. So I made this build and was wanting some suggestions on it.
20 pt buy
Bjornlod, Elf Mobile Fighter
Str 17, Dex 14 (+2 from Elf), Con 13 (-2 from Elf), Int 10 (+2 from Elf), Wis 12, Cha 10
I swapped out the Elf racial trait Elven Magic for Woodcraft. It may not be useful for Sas all the way through but it is more helpful than Elven Magic for a Fighter. My GM mentioned I could use Adopted to get alternate racial traits so I chose Heart of the Fields since getting a bonus to something like Craft (Ships) is huge and ignoring fatigue 1/day will help too. The other trait I would get is Ship's Surgeon to get a +1 to Craft (Ships) and Heal and get Heal as a class skill. It gives more to the idea of my guy's "Breadth of Experience."
I wanted the 12 Wis to reflect his wisdom from his broad range of experiences (Breadth of Experience). I didn't want to dump Int or Cha if I could help it so that I could be at least shabby in what skills a Fighter is somewhat capable of. He will definitely use a glaive or a bardiche, though which one I am not sure of. If somewhere down the line Improved Critical or Critical Focus will be in consideration then bardiche is obviously the better option.
Oh, and a bit of backstory for him, he was raised near the Land of the Linnorm Kings, thus the name Bjornlod (which combines some Ulfen influence with Elven culture). He became fascinated with old Ulfen culture, and one day he would want to go out on the sea and live the life of a pirate after he felt he was ready. It makes sense for an Elf to wait for a while before finally venturing out since he's going to live for a while and having more experience before making such a venture is important.
In SaS, being versatile seems to be a lot more valuable than I would think it would be in other adventure paths so far that I have played in Wormwood Mutiny. Even with 3 SP/level, the bonuses I get from Heart of the Fields, Breadth of Experience and being an Elf kind of balance it a bit for me. It'll give me breathing room for putting points in skills like Climb, Swim, or whatever else I notice I'll need.
This build actually really does excite me, I feel that it is a lot more interesting than the Corsair Fighter to the point I almost want to go ahead and swap out the characters. I've never used a reach weapon before or played an Elf, so it will be a fun experience for me.