Tankage (3.PF)

[Techsmart]

So, my friends and I are starting one of our first Pathfinder games, and I am currently the wizard. I've had plenty of experience playing a caster, and have fun with the impact my character made on combat/roleplay so far (lvl 3 almost soloed a wyvern with a small hand from our cleric). The problem is, my spells are great when they work on the enemy, but with no tank, I feel a little unprotected. Right now, we have a LN cleric that channels negative energy, a NG oracle (he focused almost entirely on healing), a ranger who plays more like a rogue, and a rogue who plays more like a fighter. Nobody is built to tank or protect other team members in any way. If something happens to my current character, I am planning on swapping over to a melee character.

Problem in short: I have only built rogue and caster builds. I know most of the good feats necessary to building a good tank, but what are some good PrCs and such for me to aim for. We are mostly pathfinder, but my DM allowed me to convert 3.5 PrCs over if it means that I can provide good melee support to the team (not much shorter, i know).

[The_Jackal]

Spell focus conjuration and augment summoning. Filling the field with critters is a FANTASTIC way to tank, and far more effective than just one lumpy warrior with a sword and board.

[Essence_of_War]

There are a couple of good ways to build a melee tanking character.

If your goal is to keep the squishy people from getting squished while they wreak havoc on your foes you need the following:
1) Some way to get the enemy interested in you.
2) Someway to prevent them from directly attacking squishy people.
3) Preferably a way to combine 1/2 so that they HAVE to continue interacting with you even once they see/understand what you're trying to do and no longer have any interest in dealing with you.

The knight handles 1/2/3 with its class features and you can read all about how to build a freaking sweet knight from Person Man's Handbook:
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=109429

An alternative approach is to build a fighter/psychic warrior/crusader. These either get sufficient feats, or maneuvers that are effectively feats that work towards the purposes of getting 1/2/3 online.

With these classes, to accomplish 1), you will need to interpose yourself between the enemy and the squishy folk, and sufficient reach to threaten most easy paths to the squishy folk. By being a formidable physical barrier, you can draw the interest of the enemy's frontliners.
Some ways to do this:
Get enlarged by a caster, manifest expansion, play a large race. Combine any two of those that don't overlap with a reach weapon. Preferably a spiked chain. Crusader's Iron Guard Glare stance.
Ex. A Human Psychic Warrior manifests expansion while using a spiked chain. Being large gives him 10 ft. reach, a spiked chain doubles this to 20 foot reach. He now occupies a 10/10 square and threatens everything within 20 feet of his occupied area. Anyone who wants to avoid him to get at the casters will need to move quite a bit out of their way.

To accomplish 2), we need to prevent a smart enemy from merely running past you and striking the squishy folk.
Some ways to do this:
We could use some combination of the trip line* and the push line** of feats along with AoOs generated from combat reflexes. Alternatively, a way to halt movement like the Stand Still feat. The Crusader's Thicket of Blades stance just sweetens the deal and prevents tricky movement (tumbling or iterated 5 ft steps).
Ex.
Again, consider our human psywar. He is 6th level and has 7 feats. If he takes the whole trip line, + combat expertise, +exotic weapon prof spiked chain he still has 2 feats left over! Whenever someone provokes an AoO from him, say by moving through his threatened area (to get at squishy folk) or by standing up (if they've already been tripped by him) he provokes an AoO and if he deals at least 10 damage, he makes a free trip attempt. This will lock enemies down within his threatened area and prevent them from getting past him to the squishy folk.

Have we accomplished 3)? Does the enemy have to deal with us?
If they are trying any sort of motion through our threatened area towards people we'd rather they not attack, then yes. They have to interact with our lockdown attempts, and they're only ways out are to bypass us physically (burrowing, flying, looping around), magical maneuvering (dim door/dim slide etc etc), or bypassing us in a more abstract sense (charm, dominate etc).

Hopefully this can give you some ideas to get your creative juices flowing. Other good resources are the Crusader's Handbook:
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=181655
and the PsyWar Handbook:
http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=162701

*Trip Line - Combat Exp. -> Imp Trip -> Knockdown
**Push Line - Power Attack ->imp. bullrush -> Knockback

[Andion Isurand]

Try to use the variant where you summon specific individual creatures (DMG 37).... and to see if your DM will let you tailor each individual's features.

This is best done with fairly intelligent outsiders, such as a Firre Eladrin (BoED 169) which is one of my favorite creatures that can be summoned using Summon Monster IX (BoED 190). They also cast spells as 12th-level clerics.

In addition, the following feats work very well for any Knight character (or cohort) as suggested above.

Combat Expertise
Improved Combat Expertise
Allied Defense (from Shining South)

[AslanCross]

If you are allowed to use Tome of Battle, the Crusader does a great job of tanking (that is, absorbing hits). If you want more of the "Attack me instead" style of tanking (like in MMORPGs), then the Knight will mix and match well with the crusader.

[Essence_of_War]

Aside/Addendum on the PrC issue:

They aren't really necessary at all. A straight psychic warrior gets enough feats, powers, and flexibility to have good tanking and charging ability w/o PrCs. The knight and crusader can be played straight through also.

If you want to be a fighter tank, you really need to find one or more good PrC's to slip into, especially if you're playing past 12th level.

For a psywar - Sanctified Mind is an excellent choice if you think mind-affecting aberrations are a large part of your campaign. Slayer is solid, with the same qualifications about particular enemies, but it also causes you to miss more bonus feats if you commit to finishing it; you certainly don't need to stay in for all 10 levels, the capstone is really the lvl 9 class feature anyway.

For a crusader - a 1 level cleric dip is sufficient to qualify for the Ruby Knight Vindicator PrC. I might toss on a 1 level fighter dip to nab a bonus feat and have the two dip levels contribute to your IL as well. This PrC is really good. Deepstone Sentinel is a good pick, but is off the table until level lvl 10.