Want help with an unbreakable paladin for Rappan Athuk

[boring7]

So, I perused the paladin guides, the ones that weren't locked down and unreadable, and with their somewhat limited guidance I crafted a halfway decent paladin. "This guy will survive a session or two before being devoured by the horrors of the mega-dungeon," I thought to myself.

Then another player explained to me his Tiefling Magus character that will be throwing fistfulls of damage dice by level 3 and wreaking havoc at a disturbing level, so I think I need an upgrade.

Character creation rules are fairly simple: 20 point buy, max starting gold, the major splatbooks, ARG and ACG are available. It starts at level 1. My goal is to be the brickiest brick of a melee-martial that ever bricked. Someone has to weather the attacks and spells of enemies while the rest of the party does whatever dancing, slashing, casting BS they're going to do to kill the baddies. I have volunteered, but I'm not very good and power-gaming martials. Summoner and gunslinger not allowed for campaign setting reasons, The stranger the race the harder I will have to finagle and cajole permission from the GM, and "pass for human without difficulty" is pretty important.

Also, I really would like to be a paladin. Detect evil is pretty useful, and as a personal challenge I am trying to break out of my standard character rut of being the ride-along instead of a moral compass or a leader.

Any suggestions, or full on builds?

[Emperor Point]

Well I'm not sure about passing for human but Dwarves tend to be difficult to kill.
+2 to saves against spells, SLAs and poison will do you good. An extra +1 from a race trait called glory of old will make it better but its not from a major splatbook. Then add the feat Steel Soul and you have +4 (or 5 if you can get glory of old) to saving throws against Spells, SLAs and Poison. Rappan Athuk has a lot of those. Between that and your paladin having great saves from being a paladin you will at the very least survive everything that ISNT damage.
As for how to survive damage, you have swift action lay on hands to heal yourself with as a paladin so you shouldn't die too easy.

Though being a dwarf will lower your charisma so you may wish to consider the "Stonelord" archetype which will remove most of your charisma using abilities.

[Dragonflyer1243]

If you're going for a tanking paladin, I'd suggest going with heavy armor and a shield, with the one-handed weapon of your choice. It sounds like you're looking for pure survivability, so you'll want to boost Charisma for your saves, and take Greater Mercy at 3rd level to increase your healing from Lay on Hands.
I've played this build, and it does pretty good damage when you can get smite up, but his shining point is that once you get lay on hands, he's extremely tough to kill.

[boring7]

Clarification; "pass for human" = "pass for a core race, not stand out as some kind of scary-demon-monster that will upset local yokels."

[Caryth Derellis]

boring7 wrote:

So, I perused the paladin guides, the ones that weren't locked down and unreadable, and with their somewhat limited guidance I crafted a halfway decent paladin. "This guy will survive a session or two before being devoured by the horrors of the mega-dungeon," I thought to myself.

Then another player explained to me his Tiefling Magus character that will be throwing fistfulls of damage dice by level 3 and wreaking havoc at a disturbing level, so I think I need an upgrade.

Character creation rules are fairly simple: 20 point buy, max starting gold, the major splatbooks, ARG and ACG are available. It starts at level 1. My goal is to be the brickiest brick of a melee-martial that ever bricked. Someone has to weather the attacks and spells of enemies while the rest of the party does whatever dancing, slashing, casting BS they're going to do to kill the baddies. I have volunteered, but I'm not very good and power-gaming martials. Summoner and gunslinger not allowed for campaign setting reasons, The stranger the race the harder I will have to finagle and cajole permission from the GM, and "pass for human without difficulty" is pretty important.

Also, I really would like to be a paladin. Detect evil is pretty useful, and as a personal challenge I am trying to break out of my standard character rut of being the ride-along instead of a moral compass or a leader.

Any suggestions, or full on builds?

I would play a 1 hander and shield using, dwarven Inquisitor.

Dwarves:
Bonus to saves, plenty of con, dump cha which is offset by other Inquisitor abilities to boost Intimidate.

You can use dwarven weapons! (Dwarven waraxe comes to mind...)

They have no speed reductions from heavy armors.

Plenty of Con, which boosts hp and Fort saves and therefore survivability. You can pick up Heavy Armor Prof. and rock full-plate.

Bonus to Judgment level. At 10th you are effectively 15th which gives plenty of bonuses to your judgments.

Inquisitor:

Nice saves, Judgment ability can provide Fast Healing, Damage Reduction, AC, Save bonus, and attack/damage. When you have 2nd judgment you get TWO of these.

Combine this with the dwarven racial and you can have fast healing AND damage reduction... or saves... or ac... :D

You have a great range of spells for both offense and defense.

You can get teamwork feats that allow you to boost saves, AC, CMD, etc. for FREE. I repeat, FREE. Your allies do not have to obtain the TW feats for you to benefit. You get free ones every few levels.

Bane offsets your damage loss. Your knowledge provide great insight into your foes, making it a lot easier to survive them if you know what to expect.

I slapped Great Fort and Iron Will on my own Inquisitor and he has GODLY saves.

I know this was rushed and poorly written, but I HIGHLY suggest a dwarf Inquisitor for your build. You will be very hard to kill.

[Noctani]

boring7 wrote:

So, I perused the paladin guides, the ones that weren't locked down and unreadable, and with their somewhat limited guidance I crafted a halfway decent paladin. "This guy will survive a session or two before being devoured by the horrors of the mega-dungeon," I thought to myself.

Then another player explained to me his Tiefling Magus character that will be throwing fistfulls of damage dice by level 3 and wreaking havoc at a disturbing level, so I think I need an upgrade.

Character creation rules are fairly simple: 20 point buy, max starting gold, the major splatbooks, ARG and ACG are available. It starts at level 1. My goal is to be the brickiest brick of a melee-martial that ever bricked. Someone has to weather the attacks and spells of enemies while the rest of the party does whatever dancing, slashing, casting BS they're going to do to kill the baddies. I have volunteered, but I'm not very good and power-gaming martials. Summoner and gunslinger not allowed for campaign setting reasons, The stranger the race the harder I will have to finagle and cajole permission from the GM, and "pass for human without difficulty" is pretty important.

Also, I really would like to be a paladin. Detect evil is pretty useful, and as a personal challenge I am trying to break out of my standard character rut of being the ride-along instead of a moral compass or a leader.

Any suggestions, or full on builds?

First you'll need to choose a race:

Dwarves: Have the stonelord lord archetype which gives you DR/adamantine and a natural armor bonus. You'll also get a nifty elemental that can help get to some places that may be unreachable or open locked doors from behind. With the right investment it can even become a companion on the battle field. However, your saves except against spells and poison will be significantly lower. Stone Lords often go with a two-handed weapon and use their power attack in order to force enemies to pay attention to them. This also means you'll be going with medium or heavy armor, you'll have a hefty negative to str/dex skills but can take a lot of damage and have a high constitution. Much later in the game your saves will be lower than a normal paladin. Take the dwarven longhammer with reach and go to town. If you have someone who can enlarge you things will get nasty quit quickly. If you want stats just ask.

LVL 1 Power attack
LVL 3 Improved Bull Rush or cleave or Steel Soul or combat reflexes
LVL 5 one of thee aboves
LVL 7 greater improved bull rush or vital strike

Tiefling(Demon-Spawned +2 STR +2 Cha -2 Int): Tieflings excel at healing themselves because of their bonus. They often make very good furydins. STR 16 DEX 15 CON 14 INT 8 WIS 10 CHA 15. Favored Bonus heal self. Warrior of light archetype.
LVL 1 Two-Weapon Fighting
LVL 3 Improved Shield Bash
LVL 4 attribute into CHA
LVL 5 Extra channel
This build can really dish out the damage especially when smiting. In addition by level 5 you'll be able to cast lay on hands up to 10 times on yourself and heal for an average of 12 as a swift action. This makes you an invaluable front line fighter that doesn't require healing by other party members and gives your allies another source of healing if required. Your saves should be quite high and your smite evil gets double the trouble with sword and shield. You also get to your hot sweet zone very quickly.

You could go archer, but then, you don't really care as much about being a brick.

The last is a mounted character. This is best done with a small character where you can go into dungeons. I suggest a boar as a companion. If you want stats and race just ask.

LVL 1 Mounted Combat
LVL 3 Ride by attack
LVL 5 spirited charge

Humans and assimars also make good paladins.

I think I've given you what you've asked for so now let me give you what you didn't. No matter what character you make you want to make sure it keys off of your allies and that they key off of you. What kind of healing is available or are you a crowd control kind of party. How many people have high damage out-put? How do you attack flying monsters? Who can easily deal with swarms of monsters or literal swarms. How many melee builds do you have? Make sure you consider your party make-up carefully. If you can post their intended plans on what they are and what the players want their characters to do. How the party is going to work together will be more important than anything.

[Xethik]

Fey Foundling works very well for a Paladin with high charisma. Same with some Oracle dipping. Sadly, Fey Foundling is in Inner Sea something, so probably not on the table.