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You could try the Antagonize feat.
Ultimately, I'm not entirely sure a refereed RPG needs an aggro mechanic like an algorithm-run game like a MMORPG does.
Antagonize and Demanding Challenge both come to mind. DC comes in SUPER late, though. You can also effectively mess with enemies by using the Step Up and Stand Still feats.
Best bet is the Antagonize feat and then use a reach weapon. Punish when they provoke an AoO off you. As mentioned, aggro mechanics don't really exist, nor does the concept of a "tank" etc, but an AoO based build is all about punishing in the fighting game use of the word.
If you get Antagonize, Call Out may also be useful.
If you play an inquisitor (with solo tactics) or other character with an ability to share teamwork feats, or if you can get your allies to take the required feats there are some things you can do like Intercept Charge, Undermine and Swap Places or Escape Route.
If you can play something larger than a halfling, tripping your enemies may help. Especially with a reach weapon rather than sword & board. This fades in usefulness by ~level 10, but it's great at low levels.
An intimidate-focused barbarian can take rage powers like boasting taunt and terrifying howl, though being small won't help.
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4E also included a sort of catch-22, in that enemies were penalized for attacking allies (with negatives to attack) as well as granting the character a sort of AoO if the enemy chose to attack an ally any way. On the other hand, they could instead attack the tanking character, whose AC was normally through the roof, and had plenty of HP to spare.
Pathfinder has a Paladin archetype that does most of this.
Sacred ShieldThis ability replaces smite evil.
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I think a lot of this has come from roleplaying in my games. As a GM, if I have a PC trying to force an enemy to fight him, I will respond to the character verbally challenging and insulting him if the enemy is intelligent, within reason. A big hit will also gain its attention. Obviously choke-pointing a corridor is good. As others have already mentioned, there are a few feats and spells.
But keep in mind, in an RPG an enemy can be intelligent. It won't always take the bait if a fighter is ineffectually trying to hit it while the wizard's magic really can hurt it. In video games, enemies can't be intelligent and aggro makes more sense.
Aggro is a metagame concept. As much as GMs don't like players to metagame, GMs themselves shouldn't metagame by blasting the casters first (sometimes without even knowing they're casters in game). Just like most things in a real RPG, there is a social contract there.
The Bodyguard feat does much of what you want.
Take the Helpful Halfling trait, Bodyguard, and Covering Fire.
As long as you carry shurikens and have a free hand, this lets you protect adjacent allies from both melee and ranged attacks that come from within 50 ft of you. Whenever an ally is attacked, you can spend a AoO to give them +4 AC.
At higher levels, you can get Benevolant armor and a True-Love Locket. For more bonuses.
Enemies will either have to deal with a way higher AC, or attack you. If that's not aggro I don't know what is. I recommend Paladin as your class so that you can swift-action heal since you will be taking lots of damage from the focused attacks. Since you want lots of Dex, it would be useful to focus on the bow as your weapon, but you will be pretty feat-starved with all the bodyguard tech, so sword-and-buckler will work too.
I think a lot of this has come from roleplaying in my games. As a GM, if I have a PC trying to force an enemy to fight him, I will respond to the character verbally challenging and insulting him if the enemy is intelligent, within reason. A big hit will also gain its attention. Obviously choke-pointing a corridor is good. As others have already mentioned, there are a few feats and spells.
But keep in mind, in an RPG an enemy can be intelligent. It won't always take the bait if a fighter is ineffectually trying to hit it while the wizard's magic really can hurt it. In video games, enemies can't be intelligent and aggro makes more sense.
Aggro is a metagame concept. As much as GMs don't like players to metagame, GMs themselves shouldn't metagame by blasting the casters first (sometimes without even knowing they're casters in game). Just like most things in a real RPG, there is a social contract there.
There's a reason that I've built lightly-armored combatants that wear an obvious spell component pouch and spellbook without actually being casters. That, of course, just brings me back to SAO 2, episode 2, where the guy that the ambush party thought was just a pack mule was really carrying a minigun.
I agree that aggro is a metagame concept that is exclusive to procedural play (like MMOs or other e-games, where the math happens behind the curtain). Enemies should have a reason for their choices and it's tricky to build something that emulates aggro mechanics in a tabletop game, both from the practical and meta perspectives.
Duels. The info there isn't well organised, but the important part is that any action a participant in a duel takes has to directly affect at least one participant in the duel. With the Call Out feat you can force someone to start a duel even in a battle.
If 3rd party stuff is acceptable consider a Warder specialising in Golden Lion maneuvers. You don't need to buy the book to take a look.
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One option is to make him a melee bard. (not quite what you were looking for - but similar vibe) It doesn't force them to attack you (though bards can make good use of Antagonize) but it allows your build to focus upon defense and still contribute. Plus - the first time someone sees you cast a spell, they'll likely take a swing or three at you.
Bards can have very high defenses - with a mithril breastplate, heavy shield, and a high dex. With Fencing Grace their offense can be decent. And with Inspire Courage & buffing, your foes will regret ignoring you, and you'll always pull your weight. (halflings are arguably the best race for bards too)
You can pull some nice tricks with Antagonize too. Say your foe is in melee with your high offense buddy. If you force them to attack you and you're 50ft or so off, they either need to charge you (provoking an AOO) or likely drop their melee weapon in order to 5ft step & use a ranged attack against you. If they do charge you - they then need to either start fighting you their next turn (good - since you have jacked up AC) or give you an AOO by moving back to their intended target.
an Id bloodrager or spiritualist with the Jealousy option has something that maybe fits.
It is much easier to draw aggro with other classes.
A one-level dip in Cleric, Oracle, or Druid will let you cast one round summon spells, which will generally draw aggro from those who don't identify it as low-level.
Kineticists can gather energy for a round, which is good for drawing aggro. Since the "bait" is lots of unhealable nonlethal damage, it's limited uses per day.
Spiritualist will probably be your best option for something like what you're looking for. Jealousy phantoms can give attack penalties against other targets and stagger those hitting others. Lust phantoms can draw aggro, but only to protect the Spiritualist.
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"Aggro" is a game mechanic that only comes into existence when fighting opponents whos combat behavior is governd by easily to see combat routines.
Which would be mindless enemies in D&D/PF terms (INT "-"). But to our luck wh have the DM to "roleplay" monster levels above mindless.
Once you get into animal level intelligence you will have different tactics, depending on the monster itself. Wolfs single out one individual to bring it down teamwork style. Hyenas go for the next weakish-looking victim to drag away, etc...
And once you have real intelligent opponents you will have a hard time justifying why the opponent vainly klonks at the Fullplate/Board dude who hits like wet cottonballs, while the backstabby rogue tears bloody holes into your body.
Or why you should keep trading blows with the Barbarian, if all most all your hits are instantly healed back up by the cleric standing right behind him. Why not take care of the Cleric 1st? This is not a glorious stroke of genius to realize this.
Wanting an "aggro mechanic" for intelligent opponents means putting them back into mindless territoy.
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I feel like people that talk about aggro in Tabletop RPGs haven't really tanked in MMOs, because aggro isn't a thing by itself: A tank needs to build threat, which means any good tank needs to consider his own DPS and how it relates to threat. Survivability is crucial, yes, but you without steady threat generation your own survivability is moot, as you lose aggro all the time.
Basically? Build a guy that does solid damage, and has good defenses, preferably that can cover a large part of the battlefield easily (typically via reach weapons). Abilities like the barbarian Come And Get Me, as well as the Cavalier's Challenge, also encourage enemies to attack you while simultaneously making you more threatening.
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Halfling Fighters have some awesome ways of sharing AC with the people adjacent to them. In many ways this is like the basic ability of the mark mechanic, the -2 to hit.
Check out:
Combat Reflexes
Bodyguard
In Harm's Way
Crane Style
Cautious Fighter
Blundering Defense
Benevolent Armor
Cavalier Orders
Saving Shield
I was in a game last night and the halfling fighter was giving out 12 AC to people adjacent to him and never got to use Saving Shield.
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Wanting an "aggro mechanic" for intelligent opponents means putting them back into mindless territoy.
Actually I would disagree, there are or more can be ways of getting aggro. The challenge ability, playing off an opponent's honor if they have it, or pissing them off and making them angry. If we were to have feats that focus on such we could have a good aggro mechanic without making intelligent opponent's be unintelligent.
Bodyguard and tricking out Aid Another is pretty good. It kind of sucks that the AC bonus is only against the next attack as opposed to all attacks for 1 round or something like that. I'd rather find a way to try and grant a longer term AC bonus or attack penalty, though I would keep the Bodyguard stuff in mind to maybe also fit it in as well.
This teamwork feat is what you are looking for.
Combat Reflexes can also help, since usually your Dex bonus will be higher than the number of attacks made if you work towards that kind of build.
Edit: Also, something I meant to mention is there are a couple really optimal ways of making yourself the only valid target for rolled targetting.
Helpful halfling Bodyguard optimization of aid another, mixed with some optimizing of fighting defensively plus draconic defender feat can lead to some really silly high ac values for your allies....but that's pretty much all you'll be able to do.
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I'm interested in remaking a party-favorite character from 4E: A Halfling Fighter. The problem is 4E had a way to draw aggro in the mark mechanic, but Pathfinder does not, as far as I know.
Aggro is a bad mechanic in tabletop play. "Tanking" in a tabletop game should not resemble MMO tanking; rather, if you must make a videogame analogy, it should resemble MOBA Tanking: positioning, control of enemy movement, bottlenecking, and high defenses are the key.
For a Fighter, this means using tactics like repositioning, the Stand Still feat, the Bodyguard feat, etc. As a Halfling, you'll have the benefit in AC, but a disadvantage in CMD, meaning that you'll be easier for large enemies to grapple, bull rush, etc.
Aggro is acceptable in MMOs because much of the group content is completed by pick-up groups (PUGs) without voice chat, so proper coordination is both difficult and unlikely. The battlefields are typically very large with a lot of open space, so positioning is generally irrelevant beyond "don't stand in fire". In that type of game, Aggro is needed because no other form of control is available to a front-line fighter.
In a tabletop game, we're generally fighting in closer quarters, difficult terrain is frequently present, and turn-based combat makes coordination easier. In fact, without requiring precise coordination, turn-based combat would be far too easy, which is why aggro is a bad mechanic that has no place in tabletop RPGs.
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I think we've pretty much established that there's no 1:1 translation of the Aggro concept into PF, although there are some abilities that nudge in that direction. I wanna talk about a different angle: how to make your somewhat free-willed opponents choose to focus on you (i.e. make a bad decision).
Let's start with the bad news. There is no universal rule. What the GM thinks is reasonable for an NPC to do is up to that GM, so different GM, different choices. Sometimes you'll face a difficult GM who just won't agree with your "suggestion" to focus on you. Others will be easy. One can be persuaded that "smart NPCs focus on casters first", and you're well on your way by using Sleeves of Many Garments to simulate fancy wizards robes. Others may give the impression (true or not) that NPCs have an uncanny ability to know your true class no matter what you do.
All that said, you can improve your odds considerably, especially with good positioning. If enemies have to get through you to get to your allies, and you have a large threatened area and deal significant damage or keep tripping/grappling them, they'll have a hard time not focusing on you.
Another approach is to invest in Knowledges, and pay close attention to adventure background, so that in a combat, you can basically ask the GM "what does this monster want?" And then you can make it so that to get what it wants, it must focus on you. Defending its young? Threaten the young. Wants to murder the NPC you're escorting? Put yourself in between there. Trying to escape? Cut off the escape route. Prove his honor? Issue a challenge or mock him. The thing is, once you've actually gotten the GM to ascribe motivation to the NPC, the GM will be more inclined to actually act according to those motivations, rather than "the optimal tactics".
Another possibility is to present a very large threat by something you're "obviously" going to do. An obvious rogue, dressed like a rogue, quacks like a rogue, circling around to set up sneak attack will draw some attention. A cleric casting a whole-round spell is sending a signal: "I'm about to do something so devastating that I'm willing to put in all this effort. You'd better stop me or you'll be sorry." It should be noted that tactics like these sometimes don't work well on a GM if he's kinda metagaming the enemies, unless you've convinced him that your threat is real. Which can be as simple as the PC barbarian starting a trek around to get behind enemy lines at the caster. Spend a double move and force enemy melee types to come after you or else you'll kill their caster next round.
Basically, it's more of an RP thing than a mechanical one, or at least making yourself a credible threat to them.
For protecting allies, halflings can access some feats that improve allies' AC by aiding when they're attacked, and can add a pretty big bonus later on. Though, I played with a gnome bard once that added +10 AC with bodyguard, to touch at least.
I think the simple answer here is: house rule and homebrew.
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If you are a gnome ranger, there is the truly awful Caustic Slur, that allows you to taunt enemies by making them stronger.
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Another possibility is to present a very large threat by something you're "obviously" going to do. An obvious rogue, dressed like a rogue, quacks like a rogue, circling around to set up sneak attack will draw some attention. A cleric casting a whole-round spell is sending a signal: "I'm about to do something so devastating that I'm willing to put in all this effort. You'd better stop me or you'll be sorry."
I have a dwarf dex monk (so crazy high defenses) who pretends to do that. He has crappy STR - so he's rather scrawny - and he wears a robe & pointy hat with stars & moons on them. Between that & opening most battles with Scorching Ray (drunken master - so ki isn't an issue) - many enemies assume that he's the wizard. A wizard who foolishly placed himself in front of his allies!
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Could we have just *one* of these threads without people:
*Belittling the thread starter by stating that real roleplaying games don't need that kind of mechanic,
*Suggesting that the problem be solved entirely with roleplay, or
*Pretending they've been in a coma since 2002 and don't know what "aggro" means;
...please?
Mouser Swashbuckler gives you enemies a -4 penalty to attack anyone other than you and lets all adjacent allies be considered flanking. That way, if your Antagonize or whatever fails, the bad guy is still at major penalties.
Combine that with a high-AC Helpful Halfling build with the tactician ability (from Cavalier and others), and you have a really annoying character.
Add in a few levels of Unchained Rogue for the "sneak attack debuffs", and you can be really, really annoying.
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*Or belittling people who aren't up on the latest jargon that all the (apparently) cool kids use.
...please?
Mouser swashbuckler. Either they swing at you, or they get a -4 to hit the other guy.
There are some aggro mechanics easily ported over to Pathfinder from MMOs.
For example, if I were to port the humble warrior from vanilla World of Warcraft and set him on my party I will guarantee that they'll pay attention to him after the first stack of 'sunder PC gear' or so.
Less helpful for the PCs themselves, I have to admit :P
I apparently hit a hot button by using the term "aggro".
For all of those "aggro should only be in MMORPG" people out there, how about this: I want to cause enemies to attack me instead of my allies. It's as simple as that.
Well, there are a lot of good suggestions here in this thread. Basically, you have to be actively doing stuff to force the enemy to attack you. Stand in front of your other party members, grapple the enemy, use feats that let you swap places with your allies or give them AC bonuses. Initiate fights on your own terms when possible, rather than staying behind while the Rogue charges in to get killed.
I'm not implying there should be some statistic going on where my "threat" is higher than my allies. I just want something that forces them to attack me, either with a hard limit (like they can't attack anyone else, or they MUST attack me)
You've just described an MMO-style aggro mechanic, so clearly you *are* asking for MMO-style aggro.
or a soft one (they can attack other players, but there's a downside, like a penalty or an AoO).
Be a cavalier, both Order of the Lion and Order of the Shield allow you to "punish" enemies for attacking people other than you, or redirect attacks to yourself. There's also the Bodyguard feat, and the Swap Places Teamwork feat.