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Alright my friend heard about me posting here and he asked if I could post something to help him get around this block he is hitting.

He wants to play a character that uses Spears or at least Polearms. So he is looking at Polearm Master for one of the sides of this Gestalt Build.

He is basing this character off the character Oberyn Martell at least an influence of that character (Who used a spear in combat.)

But he is not sure what else should be added on the other side. He also considered taking the Phalanx Soldier to make it a spear and shield style fighter, which allows him to one hand a spear or polearm.

He considered taking Swashbuckler so his spear would take benefit of Precise Strike since he would not be two handing the spear and thus losing the benefit of the 1.5x Str.

I jokingly suggested him taking Kasatha as the race and having two arms using long spears, and one shortspear for those who get close. But that would likely not work for his desired build.

Any advice for me to give him?
Silver Crusade

Does he plan to use reach tactics, or does he plan to mostly get in a static slugfest? E.g. Does he intend to maximize his AoO damage or his full attack damage? One can do either approach with reach weapons, and which approach he prefers will strongly influence character design.

Reach I think the Polearm Master can as a swift action change any reach weapon to be able to fight at normal range for a weapon.
Silver Crusade

The ability to threaten adjacent is only important to a reach fighter when they fail and get trapped in a tactical situation where they can't use their reach effectively. This does happen, but not very often. On those rare occasions the best solution is often to draw a more appropriate weapon. If you're frequently having to shift to a close grip it indicates something keeps going wrong, and you probably have bigger problems. After well over 20 levels of playing various reach fighters I've reached the conclusion that the ability to threaten adjacent is just not very important. It's a tertiary effect, at best. People always seem to think it's important, but it's really not. The biggest impact of not threatening adjacent is that your allies sometimes lose a +2 flank bonus. Perhaps no need to make this a center point of the build.
Grand Lodge

Lore Warden or Mutagen Fighter/Empiricist Investigator

Grab a Spear and some Light Armor. Studied strike doesn't come online as a swift action till 5, but boy when it does come online you will have lots of damage potential.

Your focusing on 3 stats...Str, Dex, and Int. But with the amount of buffs you have your able to cruise by with a lower Dex and mutagen in the Dex buff so no need to do more then a 13-14 in the opening point buy.

Also with investigator you get the increase to reflex and will saves...something every fighter wants.

Well remember he wants to stick to the theme of the fast and agile spearmen.
I think he wants yo be able to cover range and close with the spear because its more iconic and reduces the need for multiple weapons.

Though I might be able to talk him into the shield and spear fellow with a sword for when it gets close. Is that better?
Silver Crusade

It depends on what kind of tactics he wants to use. The below two fighting styles want different feats. If he doesn't want to think much about tactics then he wants the second option. Every warrior should carry multiple weapons. E.g. A sling and a club are both free, and make excellent backup weapons.

The fast and agile spearman will favor a mobile, tactical fighting style to deal out AoOs while avoiding full attacks from his foes. If he plays this sort of tactical game he'll eventually not care whether he threatens close, because it is not tactically important. If he cares, though, 50 gp armor spikes gets it done. This style is best at fighting multiple opponents.

The heavily armored shield-and-spear fighter will favor a less mobile style, which will tend to lead to static knock-down-drag-out fights. Less tactical attention is required. This style is best at facing a single foe.
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In the real world, spears have been the most important weapons in history, but for some reason fantasy roleplaying systems just don't seem to like them that much.

In game terms, spears and polearms seem to benefit most from diversity. For instance, a Short Spear is a 1 handed weapon, which means you can use a shield with it, and it's a throwing weapon. A spear is a melee weapon a throwing weapon, and a Brace weapon. It is a 2 handed weapon which means you get the +0.5 St bonus. A halberd is a Brace Weapon, a Trip Weapon, a Piercing Weapon, and a Slashing Weapon, and it does 1d10.

I'd been toying with the idea of making some kind of Spartan build, that is to say Short Spear and Shield. I was thinking his main melee weapon would be the shield, perhaps with Shield Slam, Great Bull Rush, and Paired Opportunist. The Spear he would keep handy to throw. He would have Close Quarters Thrower and maybe False Opening with some other Feats to exploit that. The idea is that he would wade into the center of a battle line and be able to keep a readied action to throw his spear at anybody who looks like they are casting a spell. It just seems like having a ranged capability from the center of a melee has a lot of potential as a tactic.

For gestalt classes, you got to take into consideration more than just the theme you are going for. Doubling down on full BAB classes is often a bad idea because you don't get as many benefits as combinations where the BAB is not wasted.

Sohei is great for any kind of polearm build, as they get to (eventually) flurry with polearm weapons. In gestalt, you could twink this out by going your first 3 levels weapon master and Sohei; by 3rd level, you could flurry with polearms (well, your chosen polearm), which is really, really useful, and you get IUS to cover close opponents. And you also get a nice monk bonus feat list to pick from, so it's full win. They can also handle unarmored, since they still have WIS to AC.

After that advancing sohei is enough, but you'll probably want to find seomthing for the other half; something that can make good use ofthe all good saves and full BAB that an always flurry-capable sohei is giving out. Something with Wisdom synergy, like Cleric, Inquisitor, Hunter, Warpriest are all good choices. Could also play up The Red Viper's fondness of poisons (I mean, I don't recommend it, but it's an option) and go into Alchemist. Since you can flurry anyway, if you want a kung-fu dance-like fighting, you could even take the Dawnflower Dervish archetype for dervish dance. Bard spell list is really, really great and you can always use more skill points.
Silver Crusade

Were I trying to power-optimize a gestalt build of this sort, which is not what the OP asked for, I'd make a gestalt Sohei-Wizard. All the martial polearm-flurry goodness of a Sohei, and all the arcane world-warping of the Wizard. The OP seems to mostly be looking for flavor, not power.

I suggest finding out what the other players will be gestalting, and approximately what level of optimization they will use, then build from that. If the other players are not optimizing then do a non-magical Sohei-Fighter gestalt, or whatever seems flavorful. If the other players are optimizing then choose something strong enough to keep up, yet with similar flavor.

Why wizard? You should go with Sage bloodline for Wisdom synergy.

Apparently the vision he gets of this guy is using the Syringe spear and using the shaft and butt of the spear to fight opponents who get in close.

But he could get into the idea of Achilles from the movie Troy. Using Shield, Spear, and Sword.
Grand Lodge

Well The viper fought in light armor, uses the reach to get in many hits, does his own style of investigation, uses cleverness and intelligence.

Im still gonna stick with Fighter/investigator pitch.

The drinking potions even fits. If you remember he drinks before every fight.

Feats every level. Skills like crazy. Poisons. Extracts. Mutagen. Self buffs including Form spells and flight.

Ill be honest I think this will be my next gestalt.

Oh and if he wants a syringe spear its even possible.

I was looking at the fighter//Investigator build up and I actually think it would work well.

However, I am curious which one to suggest for the fighter side. Phalanx (One Handed + Shield) or Polearm Master (Two-Handed). Investigator.. would any archetype fit better?
Grand Lodge

For damage 2 handed fighter or mutagen.

For combat manuvers lore warden.

If your looking at flavor phalanx is basically spartan inspired and splits focus on 1 handed and shield which means less damage overall.

Pole arm master is ok for flavor and I get what you wanna do with the close range defense. I suggest either armor spikes or taking dragoon instead. Spinning lance and banner are far superior in the long run.

Dragoon is good for this as well, Dorne did have the best horses in the seven.
Grand Lodge

For emulating Oberyn, Polearm Master or Dragoon for the fighter archetype as has already been suggested.

For the Investigator half, just the base form will do for what you want. Normally the Empiricist archetype is an improvement because it gets a lot more important skills synergized with intelligence, but they give up all the goodies with poison, which diverges from Oberyn's style.

Very true, Polearm master seems more his style. I will give him the intel.
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