Build critique please.

[Amric]

My GM wasn't keen on my bloodrager so I am back to the drawing board. I was thinking of making a fighter and will post below. We have 84 stat points to assign how we want. We will be playing the Curse of the Crimson throne. I chose hobgoblin for flair but willing to change the race.

Race: Hobgoblin. Class: Fighter. Favored class: Fighter.
Traits: Hungry for revenge and Indomitable faith. Racial traits: Mage hunter to replace sneaky.
1st level: Bonus feat: EWP - Wakizashi. Feat: Weapon finesse.
2nd level: Bonus feat: Two weapon fighting.
3rd level: Armor training. Feat: Weapon focus - Wakizashi.
4th level: Bonus feat: Double slice.
5th level: Feat: Piranha strike. Weapon training with light blades.
6th level: Bonus feat: Improved two weapon fighting.
7th level: AAT – None. Feat: AWT – Trained grace.
8th level: Bonus feat: AWT – Focused weapon.
9th level: Feat: Weapon specialization. AWT – Defensive weapon training.
10th level: Bonus feat: Hammer the gap.
11th level: AAT – Armor specialization. Feat: Greater two weapon fighting.
12th level: Bonus feat: Two weapon rend.
13th level: Feat: Improved initiative. AWT – Trained initiative.
14th level: Bonus feat: Staggering critical.
15th level: AAT – Armor sacrifice. Feat: Blinding critical.
16th level: Bonus feat: Critical mastery.
17th level: Feat: Step up. AWT – Cut from air.
18th level: Bonus feat: Step up and strike.
19th level: Armor mastery. Feat: Greater weapon specialization.
20th level: Bonus feat: Weapon mastery.

I apologize for the wall of text and any advice would surely be welcome.

[Meirril]

So, I've got 2 problems with this build.

First, actual rules violation: You can't take AWT until 9th level when you would receive a new Weapon Training Group. You're taking one at 7th level and 8th level when you don't get an opportunity to do so. You can't trade a feat for extra weapon training. If you could fighters would do nothing BUT get more weapon training!!! So ditch the 2 extra AWT and replace them with feats.

Second problem I have is: Why a Wakizashi? You want a light weapon with a 18-20 crit range. Fine. Sure. Use a Kukri. That saves you a very important early feat that you can put into something more productive. If you decide to go from Kukri to Wakizashi later you can use your fighter free retraining to change weapon focus: kukri to the new weapon.

My suggestion is that you pick up Kukri as your main weapon (moving from a d6 to a d4, oh no!) and use the extra feat to grab Weapon Focus: Kukri at 1st level, then Slashing Grace at 2nd level. This way you can start with a 20 dex and a 12 strength and not feel like you've wasted points. If you were human you could start with Slashing Grace at 1st level.

Once you have Slashing Grace you don't need to worry about Trained Grace, so one problem solved.

[avr]

There actually is an AWT feat but you can take it only once for every 5 fighter levels, i.e. you need to be 10th level before taking it the 2nd time.

The question I'd ask is what didn't the GM like about your bloodrager? If it was overspecialised in combat a fighter isn't likely to improve the situation. If it was something else, what?

[Trekkie90909]

Unless you play a weapon master, in which case you can bypass the restriction. I'm with Meirril on prioritizing early game single-hit damage. It matters a lot more than twf. I would probably not specialize so much into twf to be completely honest, it's bad and even the two weapon fighter archetype can't save it.

As general advice: will saves are important. Your bloodrager had rage to help with this; your fighter needs some feat investiture. There're several good options now which help you not kill your entire party the first time an evil baddie uses any low-level enchantment.

[BadBird]

There's nothing wrong with going Two-Weapon on a Fighter if done well, though unless it's being used for some specific purpose other than just plain face-smashing it's not 'optimal'. Trained Grace is a fantastic ability, and rewards characters for crossing decent strength and dexterity. For Archetypes, the Dervish Fighter is the best for dual wield, since at level 11 you get a pounce-like ability. "Quick" combat maneuver abilities like Quick Dirty Trick also work really well on a dual wield Fighter, since they sacrifice less to use them and have the feats to burn anyways.

Dual-wakizashi is pretty dated though, and done to death. You could easily do something like a STR-based 17-DEX dual falcata build with really monstrous critical stacking, or a Trained Grace dual rapier build with Amateur Swashbuckler and Pommel Strike, or a dual 9-ring broadsword build that used Mantis Style and Cornugon Stun to deliver really powerful Stunning Fist attacks through a sword, or a million other cool things.

Fighter also works very well with multiclassing, which can be really simple or very complex. A simple multiclass that really makes Fighter interesting is a couple levels of Rogue or Ninja for some Sneak Attack and Rogue Talents or Ninja Tricks. It's easy for a Fighter to pick up things like Quick Dirty Trick or Shatter Defenses to open up a target to Sneak Attacks. For example, three Ninja levels plus some feats can grab a decent Ki pool, the Vanishing Trick and/or Shadow Clone abilities, and 3d6 Sneak Attack damage with Accomplished Sneak Attacker.

[Meirril]

Ok, lets talk about Trained Grace. All it does is give you +2 damage if you use weapon finesse to get dex to hit and str for damage. Fighters aren't short on feats, it is easy to take the extra 2 steps to get weapon focus and slashing grace to get dex to damage.

So when does Trained Grace become better than Slashing Grace? When your strength is within 2 points of your dex, and your dex is higher. Or if you're using a weapon that doesn't qualify for slashing grace.

Instead of assigning a bunch of points to both strength and dex, just assign lots of points to dex and then use the left over to go into con and wis. A few points in str will help carry gear, but that is really all you need it for if you plan on doing a slashing grace build.

So lets say OP goes Hobgoblin, with a dex based build it could look something like

Str 10 Dex 20 Con 18 Wis 18 Int 10 Cha 8 (I really don't like flat point systems)

While a build aiming for Trained Grace would need to be like:
str: 18 Dex 20 Con 16 Wis 12 Int 10 cha 8

If Strength is equal to Dex, there is no point in having Weapon Finesse. If Str is 4 points less than Dex, Slashing Grace is easier to get than Trained Grace since Slashing is just a feat you get every level and the other is a very limited resource.

Since the entire build looks like it wants to sacrifice heavy armor in favor of taking advanced armor training to improve light armor it looks like a half-hearted dex build. If you are going to do it, go for a full dex build instead of an uncomfortable half measure unless you have a reason to spend points in strength?

[Amric]

Thanks for all the replies, I will take it all into consideration and change the character.

[BadBird]

Meirril wrote:

Ok, lets talk about Trained Grace. All it does is give you +2 damage if you use weapon finesse to get dex to hit and str for damage. Fighters aren't short on feats, it is easy to take the extra 2 steps to get weapon focus and slashing grace to get dex to damage.

Trained Grace doubles Weapon Training. A level 11 Weapon Master with Gloves of Dueling will get +10 instead of +5 Weapon Training damage.

Slashing Grace and Fencing Grace won't work with TWF or with two-handed weapons, which for a DEX-based Fighter are the ideal ways to ramp-up damage.

I know some people get really uncomfortable with not plowing everything into one ability score, but ability score stacking has vastly diminishing returns anyhow. Taking 14STR, Power Attack and Trained Grace with two large weapons or a two-hander isn't much of a point-buy sacrifice, and works great.

Edit: to the OP, if you're looking for a strong, simple DEX Fighter in general, you can always just finesse a Greatsword and specialize in tripping with Fury's Fall (combo STR and DEX when using trip). Tripping is great with Felling Smash.

[Slim Jim]

Armic, given the ability to slam three 18s into a build with 84 stat-buy (as opposed to the escalating expense of point-buy preventing that, as intended), your GM is basically requesting Incredible Hulk builds, which leads me to ask...

....what was his problem with your Bloodrager build (whatever that was)?

If it was because it was too overpowered (in his opinion), then it doesn't make sense. He should just ask for regular point-buy from his players.

If he does really intend upon 84 stat-buy, what is the lowest he will permit anything to be (prior to racial adjustment)?