Hey guys!
I hope you can help me a bit with this since it is the first time I play a paladin. A friend of mine wants to run a campaign only with small races (Gnomes, Halflings and Dwarves) and I decided that I want to play the stonelord archetype. Before I go on I want you to know that this is his first time as a GM and he said that this will not be a high power campaign, so the character doesnt need to be perfectly min-maxed. We will be four players: one dwarven guntank, a gnome sorcerer, my stonelord and the last one has not decided yet.
Here are the stats I thought of (20 Points), but I am open for other suggestions!
Str: 16
Dex: 12
Con: 16
Int: 13
Wis: 12
Cha: 8
(all with racial mods included)
I want to use a heavy steel shield and a dwarven waraxe. And perhaps a dwarven longhammer as well but not so sure on that. The GM already said I can use LoH with the heavy shield as well, so that wont be a problem.
Generally I want to keep my AC as high as possible since I will be in the first line of battle all the time.
What feats can you suggest for me? This is where I really cant decide. I hope you can help me!
Perhaps I should take two levels of master of many styles to get crane style and crane riposte for that awesome -1 to hit/ +4 AC? Then I could go down to Int 10 and use the 3 stat points for something else?
Thanks in advance for your help!
Doing a quick search on the forums in the advice area for stonelord. There have been numerous discussion on them in the past 6 months or so and it will save you the time waiting for responses.
I already did a search and there were some good ideas, but it did not completely satisfy me. Perhaps there are some new ideas some of you want to share.
What do you think of the two monk levels? Is this viable or a waste of levels?
Monk is a waste of levels and doesn't make much sense to me for this particular class.
A stonelord is a armored paladin who specializes in defense with his stance and his armor. He's not going to be dancing around trying to avoid attacks like a monk does, he's going to absorb those attacks and laugh in the faces of his enemies. He will stand in the line of fire and smash in faces.
As far as feats selections go, I will refer you back to our earlier discussions which I linked in the previous post. Most people are of the opinion that you use a weapon with reach and utilize AOOs when you can, then at level six you can stance dance and use your LOH to remove the fatigue (utilizing the remove fatigue level 3 mercy), healing you at the same time. I'd recommend you look at them again there is a lot of good stuff in the previous discussions and all of them focus on stonelord staying stonelord or perhaps a small dip in fighter, but never in monk.
If you have specific questions as to feats, I'll probably sound pretty repetitive from my previous posts in the last few times I've talked about stonelords.
Monk may actually have some appealing features for a Stonelord (such as what you get as a master of many styles and/or flowing monk and/or monk of the sacred mountain; amazingly, I think you can be all 3), but I think you give up too much for them.
13 Dex and 12 Int instead of 12 Dex and 13 Int is advisable so that you can grab Combat Reflexes, and be better at locking down areas.
A reach weapon to threaten a larger area.
Grabbing the Sunder feats down the line might be nice, with how Stonestrike lets you ignore hardness.
As a Stonelord you really want a reach weapon. Nothing is more annoying than dropping into defensive stance and having an opponent stand 10' away from you. Also, remember armor spikes... that way you can still threaten close while using your reach weapon.
Since you are a dwarf, consider the Dwarven Dorn Dergar. Sure it's an exotic weapon for everyone else, but as a dwarf it's only martial. Also you can take a couple of feats and be able to use it one handed (and keep your shield) and swap between using it as a reach or close weapon as a swift action.
There's very little stopping you from getting both spikes and a boulder helmet, except the decision about which to enchant if you want to go down that route.