Gang Up, a whip and a pair of war dogs.
This is my concept for a fighter I'm making, with the idea that he can use the war dogs as the allies needed for Gang Up. Anyone see a problem with that? Also, using Gang Up, the dogs can attack in melee while I use the whip's reach to attack from a safe distance and still get the flank bonus, correct?
Ultimately, I was thinking of having the druid in the party Awaken my dogs so that they then qualify for teamwork feats. Again, anyone see a problem with that idea? Also, at this point, having human level intelligence, could they not also begin taking fighter levels with me, opening up more feat options and making them more capable allies in combat?
For the first part there is no problem as long as you have the appropriate whip feats.
For the second the issue is once you awaken them is they pretty much become NPCs with their own hopes and dreams in reference to RP and DM PC in regards to mechanics. Therefore getting xp and should be receiving loot and everything else or could simply decide to leave you and go find someplace else to live out their lives.
RPG super star a little bit ago had a write up for "hound master cavalier" that would do this REALLY well.
@Lord Phrofet - The dogs should retain their memories from before, albeit in some sort of a fuzzy form (no pun intended), so I'm hoping that between the history of my good treatment and their natural pack mentality, they would choose to stay with me. After all, they may be smarter, but they're still dogs. :)
@blackbloodtroll - The beastmaster ranger variant would be a good choice, if I wasn't focused on having the guy be as awesome with the whip as humanly possible. For that, I need all those lovely fighter feats. The dogs are for RP flavour and some small combat bonuses. I just thought it would be cool to have them become true best friends with the advent of intelligence. :)
@Pendagast - I would be interested in taking a look at that. Could you provide a link? I'm surfing on my phone, which I find to be annoying for searching for things at times. :)
If you can get an Animal Companion, then the "Eye for Talent" Alternate Racial Trait can give a dog a 3 point Intelligence (and thereby access to Teamwork Feats) right off the bat.
@VRMH - I looked that up and like it, if it didn't replace the Bonus Feat. I would lose one of my very valuable feats to gain an intelligent dog, plus I would have to lose ANOTHER feat by switching from fighter to ranger or cavalier. (BTW, I found that Hound Master. Awesome!) That would hamper my feat progression tree hideously, due to the lack of fighter feats every other level. I'll have to play with the class abilities to see if I can offset this to the point where I'm still happy with the whip progression, but the ranger doesn't offer any fighting styles that favour a high Dex whip fighter. I am still looking at the cavalier class to see if the Hound Master variant would make me happy, we'll see.