Help with picking a 3.5 prestige class for a fighter

[Tman1027]

I'm trying to pick a good prestige class (or any other class really) for my character to go into and I can't find one that fits. I might be able to replace two fighter levels with another class. Any suggestions? (3.5 only)
Here are my stats:
Level 22 Fighter
str 28
Dex 20
Con 26
INt 14
Wis 16
Cha 16
AC 38, Touch 18, Flat-footed 37

Weapons
Bastard Sword +5
Whip-dagger of minor lightning
Long sword of lesser flame +5

Armor
Platemail +5
Tower Shield +4
Amulet of magic defense +3
Ring of protection +3
Ring of Resistance +5
Gauntlets of Ogre Power
Boots of Toughness +5

Feats
Exotic weapon proficiency: Bastard Sword
Blindsight
endurance
steadfast determination
Armor Specialization: Heavy
quick draw
deft opportunist
defensive sweep
improved critical: Bastard Sword
Combat expertise
eyes in the back of my head
improved combat expertise
improved trip
mobility dodge
improved iniative
improved disarm
sidestep
exotic weapon proficiency whip
close quarters fighting
combat reflexes
karmic strike

[crazyhedgewizrd]

is there any background on the character, how is it played?

[Eldariel]

...epic, huh? Epic. Fighter. Right; well, good luck.

Well. The only PRC I can think off-hand that does something here, aside from Ur-Priest or some such, is Legendary Dreadnought (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/prestigeClasses/legendaryDreadnought.htm). Unfortunately, of course, it can only be entered level 24 (27 without shenanigans, I guess) and needs a while to get enough uses of Unstoppable for convenience.


Oh. You wield a Bastard Sword. You most definitely should take a look at Exotic Weapon Master from Complete Warrior. You get, among others, 2xStrength to damage when you two-hand it. Get your shield Animated and that's more than feasible.

Umm. Other than that. Good luck. I'd reconsider some of the feats if I were you, if it were possible. You have two different Exotic Weapon Proficiencies (you'd do just fine with only Whip Dagger), Mobility without Elusive Target, 5' Blindsight (you can almost certainly get some with a wider area as an item) & Improved Disarm (how often do you really expect to be disarming people?).

[Tman1027]

is there any background on the character, how is it played?

I prefer to trip an opponent to gain a free attack then use that free attack as a disarm.
I use Karmic Strike and sidestep as a defensive combo to end any free attack action. I can also use Karmic strike with the trip/disarm combo above.
I use improved combat expertise as a defensive last resort to massively up my AC.

[Urpriest]

Since you haven't explicitly said "No ToB"...

A few levels in Warblade (Tome of Battle) would be quite useful. With one level of Warblade you'd have Initiator Level 12 (as you get half Initiator Level from Fighter), which lets you have sixth level maneuvers, which are about as powerful as the weaker sixth level spells.

[Hirax]

Is this character already built? More than 2 fighter levels is generally iffy, and I don't think I'd ever recommend more than 6 fighter levels. As has been recommended already, I'd suggest you look into the warblade.

[Geigan]

This is perhaps the most vanilla fighter I've ever seen. How far are you willing to deviate from your build? Because I would suggest a lot more than just a couple levels being replaced...

As is, yeah I'll second the 2 levels of Warblade if you're only willing to replace 2.

[Hiro Protagonest]

...epic, huh? Epic. Fighter. Right; well, good luck.

Well. The only PRC I can think off-hand that does something here, aside from Ur-Priest or some such, is Legendary Dreadnought (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/prestigeClasses/legendaryDreadnought.htm). Unfortunately, of course, it can only be entered level 24 (27 without shenanigans, I guess) and needs a while to get enough uses of Unstoppable for convenience.


Oh. You wield a Bastard Sword. You most definitely should take a look at Exotic Weapon Master from Complete Warrior. You get, among others, 2xStrength to damage when you two-hand it. Get your shield Animated and that's more than feasible.

Umm. Other than that. Good luck. I'd reconsider some of the feats if I were you, if it were possible. You have two different Exotic Weapon Proficiencies (you'd do just fine with only Whip Dagger), Mobility without Elusive Target, 5' Blindsight (you can almost certainly get some with a wider area as an item) & Improved Disarm (how often do you really expect to be disarming people?).

Yeah, this guy looks totally underpowered. Unless you spend a lot of time in harsh conditions (like a desert or icy tundra), you don't want endurance. And even then, the party caster can just use endure elements and create water to help with that. Also, he wields a bastard sword. A bastard sword. And has Improved Disarm. And he should trade out Eyes in the Back of My Head for Elusive Target.

[Tman1027]

This is perhaps the most vanilla fighter I've ever seen. How far are you willing to deviate from your build? Because I would suggest a lot more than just a couple levels being replaced...

As is, yeah I'll second the 2 levels of Warblade if you're only willing to replace 2.

The character has already been made and we are leveling up, and I think my DM will only let me replace 2 of my fighter levels. On the day we made characters I had no idea that the ToB existed or that fighters were completely useless at epic levels. I'm new to D&D.

[Geigan]

The character has already been made and we are leveling up, and I think my DM will only let me replace 2 of my fighter levels. On the day we made characters I had no idea that the ToB existed or that fighters were completely useless at epic levels. I'm new to D&D.

Well ToB the rest of the way then. Warblade would probably be fun, as was mentioned. Are playing with multiclassing penalties? If you're not a human it will be difficult getting into any base classes, and with what you have PrCs will be a bit restricted. As was suggested legendary dreadnought and Exotic Weapon Master if you don't have a race with a favored class useful to you. What is your race?

[Tman1027]

Well ToB the rest of the way then. Warblade would probably be fun, as was mentioned. Are playing with multiclassing penalties? If you're not a human it will be difficult getting into any base classes, and with what you have PrCs will be a bit restricted. As was suggested legendary dreadnought and Exotic Weapon Master if you don't have a race with a favored class useful to you. What is your race?

My race is human.

[Geigan]

My race is human.
Then you could easily go for any class. I would suggest replacing as many levels as possible with warblade and advancing with that.

[Autopsibiofeeder]

If you think your DM would only allow you to retrain two levels, are you sure you want to do that? As far as I understood it, the only nifty things non-spellcasters get at epic levels is epic bonus feats and the fighter gets by far most bonus feats. I won't go as far as saying a fighter starts to shine at epic levels, but the lack of class features actually pays off at 20+.

Sure, a prestige class will get you some new tricks, which is nice but a lot of them will not be that impressive at your level (although ToB may offer some valuable extras).

If you think your DM won't let you retrain class levels, maybe you can ask him to allow you to retrain some of your feats so your build gets a bit more focused and specialized. I am sure people on the forum here can help you flesh it out at various optimization levels.

[ericgrau]

Well depending on the level of his playgroup things could be worse. It's passable in a casual setting. I still remember how "OP" my epic fighter / arcane archer was even though the players in my last group had a bajillion splatbooks (oops, I misjudged). I would try to cut it down to 1 or 2 weapons with a lot more special abilities and make sure you'll be able to make frequent use of some of the feats before including them. The comment on endurance was a good example of something that's good if it comes up frequently and utterly useless if it doesn't.

Also at epic levels make sure you have everything: all the important ability score boosters, +10 worth of enchantments on your weapon, etc. Browse the magic item section a bit and check out the expensive stuff too.

Your prestige class depends on what you want to do. If you don't have many books then a good DMG melee prc is dragon disciple, but then you'd want to retrain at least 5 levels, if not 8 or 11. And ya as pointed out epic feats are nice so pure fighter may work out.

[Hazzardevil]

I made a decent mounted charger a while back.
It in theory can do a lot of damage and I didn't even go outside of core unless it was a few feats.
I can't find it now though and forgotten some of it.

[Telonius]

you don't want endurance. And even then, the party caster can just use endure elements and create water to help with that.

Well, it does qualify him for Horizon Walker (as long as he has ranks in Know Geography) if he wants to take that route. Not saying that's a great idea at this point, but if he's stuck with it, might as well try to make it work for him.

[Gullintanni]

If you think your DM would only allow you to retrain two levels, are you sure you want to do that? As far as I understood it, the only nifty things non-spellcasters get at epic levels is epic bonus feats and the fighter gets by far most bonus feats. I won't go as far as saying a fighter starts to shine at epic levels, but the lack of class features actually pays off at 20+.


This is incorrect. You do continue to accumulate class features after level 20. Your caster level increases, you continue to gain class features etc. The issue is that past level 20, most classes don't have class features. Taking Fighter 20/Cleric 1 would net you 1 level of cleric spellcasting, but you wouldn't be gaining the fighter bonus feats. You would also gain Turn/Rebuke Undead, Domains etc.

The important thing to remember in the discussion of Epic Levels is that the majority of the section on what advances and what doesn't is written with regard to Class Levels and not Character Level. BAB is a specific exception, so that if your BAB is not 20 by the time you hit level 20, it never will be. Whereas a Fighter 20 is not precluded from picking up Warblade class features.

Alternately this:

SRD:

"Adding a Second Class

When a single-class epic character gains a level, he or she may choose to increase the level of his or her current class or pick up a new class at 1st level. The standard rules for multiclass characters still apply, but epic characters must keep in mind the rules for epic advancement. The epic character gains all the 1st-level class skills, weapon proficiency, armor proficiency, spells, and other class features of the new class, as well as a Hit Die of the appropriate type. In addition, the character gets the usual skill points from the new class. Just as with standard multiclassing, adding the second class does not confer some of the benefits for a 1st-level character, including maximum hit points from the first Hit Die, quadruple the per-level skill points, starting equipment, starting gold, or an animal companion. An epic character does not gain the base attack bonuses and base save bonuses normally gained when adding a second class. Instead, an epic character uses the epic attack bonus and epic save bonus progression shown on Table: Epic Save and Epic Attack Bonuses."

[PinkysBrain]

ToB classes are the obvious choice, your fighter levels will improve your initiator level ... at this point nothing will give you the same bang/buck as Tome of Battle base classes.

PS. print out the Manoeuvre cards available here (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20061225a). Makes playing martial adepts a lot easier.

[Urpriest]

snip

You missed the word nifty. Pretty sure the guy you were quoting meant that the only epicish things you can get as a melee character are epic feats, and epic fighter would give more of them. Not that you gain no class features whatsoever no matter what you take.

That said, you have to ask yourself how many epic feats you really need, and how many you even qualify for. There aren't that many useful ones, so being able to pick them up fast as a fighter wouldn't be worth the ostensibly lower level but in practice more useful class features you could get from Warblade levels.

[Autopsibiofeeder]

This is incorrect. You do continue to accumulate class features after level 20. [snip]

Yes, I know that...I think you misinterpreted my post. I said the only nifty things non-spellcasters get is bonus feats. At level 20, I don't call getting 1st level cleric casting or sneak attack very impressive nor do I think progressing remove disease or trap sense ad infinitum is very exciting.

What I meant to convey that while at 1-20 fighter is arguably the worst choice in terms of versatility and options, once you hit epic levels the fighter shortens this gap to other classes by virtue of his high amount of bonus feats (which are actually the only real features epic characters have that pre-epic characters don't).

[agahii]

See if you can convince your DM to use this version of the "fighter"

http://dungeons.wikia.com/wiki/Races_of_War_%283.5e_Sourcebook%29/Warriors_with_Class#Base_Classes

[Gullintanni]

You missed the word nifty.


Yes, I know that...I think you misinterpreted my post. I said the only nifty things non-spellcasters get is bonus feats. At level 20, I don't call getting 1st level cleric casting or sneak attack very impressive nor do I think progressing remove disease or trap sense ad infinitum is very exciting.


I didn't miss the word nifty at all. I consider maneuvers and stances to be nifty non-spellcaster options even post epic. Reading your post strictly, you were indicating the only way a non-spellcaster can hope to increase power in any way that's relevant to gameplay mechanics is to partake in epic level feats. Frankly, I disagree.

In my opinion, if you slap Warblade 2 onto a Fighter 20, then you're adding much needed versatility to your character. Pick up a level of Lion-Totem Barbarian. Dipping a level of Cloistered Cleric would net you Knowledge Devotion and possibly Travel Devotion, expanding, once again on the versatility of your build.

There's plenty of nifty to be had by choosing non-epic improvements to a Fighter; even in post epic levels. That was the point your post seemed to be discarding.

[Autopsibiofeeder]

I didn't miss the word nifty at all. I consider maneuvers and stances to be nifty non-spellcaster options even post epic. Reading your post strictly, you were indicating the only way a non-spellcaster can hope to increase power in any way that's relevant to gameplay mechanics is to partake in epic level feats. Frankly, I disagree.

In my opinion, if you slap Warblade 2 onto a Fighter 20, then you're adding much needed versatility to your character. Pick up a level of Lion-Totem Barbarian. Dipping a level of Cloistered Cleric would net you Knowledge Devotion and possibly Travel Devotion, expanding, once again on the versatility of your build.

There's plenty of nifty to be had by choosing non-epic improvements to a Fighter; even in post epic levels. That was the point your post seemed to be discarding.

I still think we are not understanding one another completely :smallsmile:. Allow me to clarify my posts. The whole nifty story was aimed at epic classes. Will you agree with me that the only nifty things epic classes have are feats? If so, will you then agree with me that when you compare fighter vs anyclass with epic fighter vs epic anyclass the epic fighter looks less bleak in the epic comparison than the normal fighter? That was my first point: since you took the long road to fighter 20, you may want to consider sticking with it. I never meant that epic characters don't get class features whatsoever. The second part of my first posts actually reads clearly that I did not think this. I don't know why you jumped at that, really.

Second, the OP was asking for a (prestige) class to enter at this point. Especially since he took fighter all the way to 22, I did not interpret that as he was looking to cherry pick goodies, but to find a class. So my reasonings were aimed at that: picking a class and sticking with it. I still think that becoming a cloistered cleric or a lion totem barbarian (and sticking with it) is not that awesome for a level 20 fighter. I also noted in my first post that ToB may form an exception to this.

Sure, a fighter 20 / lion totem barbarian 1 / cloistered cleric 1 / warblade 2 / psychic warrior 2 / etc... will have its merits, but I did not have the slightest impression this was what the OP was looking for and therefore did not adress it in my reply.

[Eldariel]

I still think we are not understanding one another completely :smallsmile:. Allow me to clarify my posts. The whole nifty story was aimed at epic classes. Will you agree with me that the only nifty things epic classes have are feats? If so, will you then agree with me that when you compare fighter vs anyclass with epic fighter vs epic anyclass the epic fighter looks less bleak in the epic comparison than the normal fighter? That was my first point: since you took the long road to fighter 20, you may want to consider sticking with it. I never meant that epic characters don't get class features whatsoever. The second part of my first posts actually reads clearly that I did not think this. I don't know why you jumped at that, really.

Well. The thing is, Epic Fighter does not get many of the good feats. List of good Epic Fighter feats:
- Distant Shot (can only take once; gimmicky)
- Epic Leadership (can only take once; obviously OP)
- Exceptional Deflection (can only take once)
- Infinite Deflection (can only take once)
- Legendary Commander (can only take once; obviously OP)

Rest is basic stuff (Combat Archery = 1st level spell; Dire Charge = Barbarian 1, except worse; Spellcaster Harrier = Mage Slayer, except worse; Improved Combat Reflexes is largely superfluous; Instant Reload makes a crossbow equivalent to a Longbow; Perfect Two-Weapon Fighting, Improved Manyshot and company are unnecessary feat tax; Superior Initiative is...meh; Uncanny Accuracy = Bad version of a +1 weapon enhancement) and majorly not worth bothering about.

All the perma-scaling Fighter-feats are of the level of "+1 Natural Armor" or "+3/- DR" that just scale painfully slowly and are kinda mediocre against epic stuff with their Penetrate DRs, spellcasting and infinite To Hits anyways. Basically, the stuff Fighter gets just isn't up to par. I wrote a bunch of stuff that would be slightly closer to what Fighters need on these levels (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=92986) but unfortunately, being homebrew stuff, I don't see it flying.


Really, compared to Epic Fighter, Warblade is going to dance all over its face. The Epic Fighter feats just aren't from the best end and the few that could be worthwhile you can either pick up trivially with level-ups or they are wont to be banned anyways. Epic Fighter just...doesn't get very much.

[KoboldCleric]

Hmm... I see no problem with throwing good levels after bad with more fighter at this point as has been pointed out above. Frankly if I ever met a level 22/23 fighter I'd probably be too scared/smart to get anywhere near him as he's obviously some kind of major protagonist to have made it that far ... In fact, fighters should get an exponentially scaling bonus to intimidate starting at 15th for that reason alone, though that's neither here nor there.

I'll also throw out the Lasher (sword and fist) as a fun Prc that can add some fun options with the whipdagger even in only 2 levels.

[Tman1027]

Thanks for the help you guys. I talked to my DM and he let me rebuild my character to be a fighter 2/Warblade 20. I still have a level to go up So I might take bloodstorm blade. I'm gonna post my build on a different thread if you want to take a look.