Help Required Optimizing a Gestalt Party (Something for everyone)

[patha787]

The campaign I'd been preparing for has been changed to gestalt rules, much to my relief (I have a build I can use). Thanks very much to those who helped me with build suggestions prior to this change, but I'm afraid your ideas won't see use. I apologize for starting a new thread on a similar topic so quickly, but figured it best to start afresh - moderators/admins may freely lock the other thread as it is no longer relevant.

That said, I've been in discussion with the other members of our group and I've been asked to act as the go-between/middle man mining shiny gold nuggets of CharOp knowledge from the great minds of the forums. In other words, please help me optimize our party. :smallsmile:

Feel free to post opinions/advice/suggestions/tips etc. for any or all of the characters mentioned.

First off, about the Campaign:
- It's gestalt.
- The DM is lenient, open-minded and agreeable (I was able to talk him into allowing a Psionic version of Swiftblade), as well as very good at what he does.
- The setting is homebrew.
- All WotC sources (including Dragon and online material etc.) is available, including setting specific stuff which will be house ruled/re-fluffed. Third party MAY be allowed, but we'd rather not and I'd definitely have to check with the DM. Homebrew stuff is a no-go.
- We're planning our builds to 20th level.
- We're trying not to step on each other's toes/steal each other's thunder. By this I mean, while it's fine (and even makes some tactical sense) to be able to fill a fellow party member's generic role in a pinch (e.g. the tank, the Batman, etc) we're trying to avoid straight-up duplicating each other's classes/abilities if at all possible - we should all be unique little snowflakes. :smallwink:

Okay, here is what we have so far . . .

NG Human male Spell to Power Erudite 20//Factotum 8/Chameleon 2/Swiftblade 10
As played by me, and as kindly built by KellKheraptis and the suggestions of various posters in the past (thanks again).
I'm considering negotiating a Deathless (BoED) variant of the Necropolitan template, both for the immunities etc. and for "experience is a river". If I can pull this off, will it be worth it?

CG Strongheart Halfling male Swashbuckler 3/Rogue 1/Swordsage 2/Warblade 2/Master Thrower 5/Bloodstorm Blade 4/Whisper Knife 3//Beguiler 20
From what I understand, this is the ToB Build Compendium's Stormwhisper build with Beguiler taped onto the other side as a Gestalt character. The player also mentioned the possibility of instead going Wilderness variant Feat Rogue. Which is more optimized? I guess he'll be filling the ranged striker/glass cannon/skill monkey role.

LG Goliath Dragonborn male Knight 4/Crusader 16//???
This player hasn't made up his mind on the second side. He'll be the primary tank and battlefield lockdown/controller (using a ranseur) and he's almost settled on Dragonfire Adept 18 for ranged options/additional battlefield control options, but if he goes that route he's not sure what to take with the remaining two levels. He mentioned buying off the Goliath LA and taking Vassal of Bahamut for some special armor or something, although that seems a little sub-par.

LN Warforged male personality Artificer 20//???
Likewise, this player hasn't settled on their second side either. He'll be taking the delicious Warforged Artificer racial substitution levels. He wants to make the most of Int synergy if possible, and suggested perhaps going Warblade and making the character a Meleeficer. Is that a good choice? Straight Warblade 20?

NG Human female Wizard 5/War Weaver 5/Incantatrix 10?//Archivist 20
The party's primary divine caster and buffer/booster. She's not 100% settled on Incantatrix and wants reassurance that this is the optimal choice. She's not going to be fulfilling the primary arcane caster/Batman/God role (which will be left to me), so she's considering specializing further and going Transmuter or even Focused Specialist: Transmuter.

As I said before, any and all input on any of these characters will be greatly appreciated by their players (including me). Thanks in advance to those who respond.

Finally, any general thoughts on party composition/synergy? I think we should have our bases covered and be quite formidable with a few tweaks here and there.

[DeAnno]

I know from experience in highly optimized (gestalt is similar in scope) games, that while full casting is really great, it pays to have someone who can operate easily under an antimagic field and destroy the source of said field with great prejudice. For this reason I think the Crusader should try to augment his melee BFC with melee DPR on his second side.

He probably wants at least one monk/unarmed Swordsage level to allow him to threat adjacent squares while holding his reach weapon. If he has feat space he should consider getting a decently optimized charge going, though without the Barbarian dip for Pounce this can be difficult to do convincingly. (He may be able to make the damage fairly respectable if he uses Crusader charges, Knockback, and Dungeon Crasher from Fighter all in concert).

On the other claw, it might make sense for him to shoot higher than Goliath with his race (perhaps a lycanthrope of some stripe) and run his Hit Dice up the other side, as someone who is just freakishly strong can often be handy for this sort of party. I'm not sure how your game is handling nontrivial LA in gestalt though, so this might or might not be wise.

[patha787]

I know from experience in highly optimized (gestalt is similar in scope) games, that while full casting is really great, it pays to have someone who can operate easily under an antimagic field and destroy the source of said field with great prejudice. For this reason I think the Crusader should try to augment his melee BFC with melee DPR on his second side.

He probably wants at least one monk/unarmed Swordsage level to allow him to threat adjacent squares while holding his reach weapon. If he has feat space he should consider getting a decently optimized charge going, though without the Barbarian dip for Pounce this can be difficult to do convincingly. (He may be able to make the damage fairly respectable if he uses Crusader charges, Knockback, and Dungeon Crasher from Fighter all in concert).

On the other claw, it might make sense for him to shoot higher than Goliath with his race (perhaps a lycanthrope of some stripe) and run his Hit Dice up the other side, as someone who is just freakishly strong can often be handy for this sort of party. I'm not sure how your game is handling nontrivial LA in gestalt though, so this might or might not be wise.

It reeks of cheese, but what about the Half-Minotaur template (eliminate Dragonborn, use Water Orc as base race perhaps), and then moving into War Hulk? Or would the complete lack of ranks in any Int, Wis or Cha skills be crippling? Throw in a Barbarian dip for Pounce if possible for options (provided there's enough feats to go around for charging). Also, this character would have a gore attack to use against adjacent enemies.

EDIT: Half-Ogre would work too, but is less optimal (and admittedly far less cheesy).

[Godskook]

May I make a completely tangential character suggestion? Cool.

A high-powered level 20 gestalt team needs Mr. Awesome. As in, the Cha to everything powerhouse that only has team-mates cause his awesomeness is contagious.

Build:

Bard 9/Druid 1/Sublime Chord 1/Fochlucan Lyrist 8/Sacred Exorcist 1
Rogue 2/Marshal 4/Paladin 2/Swordsage 2/Marshal +5/Free 5

Feats:
-Ascetic Mage
-Song of Heart(ECS)
-Words of Creation(BoED)
-Dragonfire Inspiration(Dragon Magic)
-Dragontouched
-Draconic Heritage(Force>Sonic>Acid, depending on your DM's tolerance)
-Snowflake Wardance

Items:
-Vest of Legends(Gets us to Bard 20 for IC purposes)
-Badge of Valor x2(cheap!)
-Crystal Echoblade with the Harmonizing enchantment
-Slippers of Battledancing.
-Belt of Battle(x2 or x3 if you feel you need it)

Notes:
-Rogue 2 is only needed to get SA and Evasion for Lyrist. If you can get these elsewhere, feel free to drop it.
-Fochlucan Lyrist is actually only used to get bardic music progression while progressing Sublime Chord casting. The fact that you can squeeze level 5 druid spells out of the deal is a delicious bonus your DM might not like. If so, either talk to him about removing the divine casting, find a bard-only version, or take enough Crusader/Warblade levels and Song of the White Raven to make it not matter, and just progress Sublime Chord.
-Marshal 9 gives Cha on Cha/Wis/Int/Dex/Str checks and skills. Of these, you can afford to drop Cha, Int and/or Str, but they'll all serve usefulness at times, especially if your remember you have them(Str includes some of the combat options, such as Trip).
-The unarmed swordsage variant is required to qualify you for Ascetic Mage. That or taking feats or a monk dip, and neither of the latter options are desirable.
-Have entire party learn Drow Sign Language so you can project your skill auras silently.
-Sacred Exorcist is only in the build to grant you turning attempts. Dump it if you can't use them somehow, or if you want to dip cleric to get the devotion feat substitution going.

Tricks:
-Since you're so incredibly Cha SAD, you'll have a check that's ridiculous(+5 levels, +5 insight(tome), +6 enhancement(cape), +2 Racial, probably 18 base, so +13 unles you're rolling stats)
-Your IC bonus is between +11 and +14, and that's in +xD6 force/sonic/acid damage.
-Should you be forced to defend yourself, your attack start at a +2xCha base, before calculating anything other than abilities, and you deal +Cha+(Bard/2)+11d6 minimum damage.
-If 1 attack isn't enough to keep you out of 'aggro', belts of battle give you your full attack with the slippers.
-With +Cha on basically all skill checks and stat checks, you'll want to make sure you always have the best one up at all times. Alternate Dex/Wis for exploring.
-With Cha to Saves and AC, light armor(well, medium mithral) and normal AC optimization, your defenses are *AMAZING*. Find a method to get temp HP quickly, and you're going to be extremely hard to kill, yet the single most important party member to kill.
-Switching to your Dex aura mid-combat should give your team an 'effective' bonus turn against anyone who beat your non-enhanced initiative checks(he goes, you go and switch aura, next round, your initiative is higher, so you go first), but DMs quite often houserule initiative so talk to him about it.

[patha787]

May I make a completely tangential character suggestion? Cool.

A high-powered level 20 gestalt team needs Mr. Awesome. As in, the Cha to everything powerhouse that only has team-mates cause his awesomeness is contagious.

Build:

Bard 9/Druid 1/Sublime Chord 1/Fochlucan Lyrist 8/Sacred Exorcist 1
Rogue 2/Marshal 4/Paladin 2/Swordsage 2/Marshal +5/Free 5

Feats:
-Ascetic Mage
-Song of Heart(ECS)
-Words of Creation(BoED)
-Dragonfire Inspiration(Dragon Magic)
-Dragontouched
-Draconic Heritage(Force>Sonic>Acid, depending on your DM's tolerance)
-Snowflake Wardance

Items:
-Vest of Legends(Gets us to Bard 20 for IC purposes)
-Badge of Valor x2(cheap!)
-Crystal Echoblade with the Harmonizing enchantment
-Slippers of Battledancing.
-Belt of Battle(x2 or x3 if you feel you need it)

Notes:
-Rogue 2 is only needed to get SA and Evasion for Lyrist. If you can get these elsewhere, feel free to drop it.
-Fochlucan Lyrist is actually only used to get bardic music progression while progressing Sublime Chord casting. The fact that you can squeeze level 5 druid spells out of the deal is a delicious bonus your DM might not like. If so, either talk to him about removing the divine casting, find a bard-only version, or take enough Crusader/Warblade levels and Song of the White Raven to make it not matter, and just progress Sublime Chord.
-Marshal 9 gives Cha on Cha/Wis/Int/Dex/Str checks and skills. Of these, you can afford to drop Cha, Int and/or Str, but they'll all serve usefulness at times, especially if your remember you have them(Str includes some of the combat options, such as Trip).
-The unarmed swordsage variant is required to qualify you for Ascetic Mage. That or taking feats or a monk dip, and neither of the latter options are desirable.
-Have entire party learn Drow Sign Language so you can project your skill auras silently.
-Sacred Exorcist is only in the build to grant you turning attempts. Dump it if you can't use them somehow, or if you want to dip cleric to get the devotion feat substitution going.

Tricks:
-Since you're so incredibly Cha SAD, you'll have a check that's ridiculous(+5 levels, +5 insight(tome), +6 enhancement(cape), +2 Racial, probably 18 base, so +13 unles you're rolling stats)
-Your IC bonus is between +11 and +14, and that's in +xD6 force/sonic/acid damage.
-Should you be forced to defend yourself, your attack start at a +2xCha base, before calculating anything other than abilities, and you deal +Cha+(Bard/2)+11d6 minimum damage.
-If 1 attack isn't enough to keep you out of 'aggro', belts of battle give you your full attack with the slippers.
-With +Cha on basically all skill checks and stat checks, you'll want to make sure you always have the best one up at all times. Alternate Dex/Wis for exploring.
-With Cha to Saves and AC, light armor(well, medium mithral) and normal AC optimization, your defenses are *AMAZING*. Find a method to get temp HP quickly, and you're going to be extremely hard to kill, yet the single most important party member to kill.
-Switching to your Dex aura mid-combat should give your team an 'effective' bonus turn against anyone who beat your non-enhanced initiative checks(he goes, you go and switch aura, next round, your initiative is higher, so you go first), but DMs quite often houserule initiative so talk to him about it.

Wow, interesting build. How do you deal with all the alignment restrictions from those classes though? Your alignment would have to flip-flop all over the place, surely.

[Olo Demonsbane]

My advice for a gestalt party is to try and come up with a way for everyone to do a bit of action denial.

Spell to Power Erudite: Use the spell bladeweave that lets you force one opponent that you hit each round to save vs. daze.

Stormwhisper: Grab aptitude weapons, EWP: Boomerang, and Boomerang Daze. Forces a number of saves vs. daze that can quickly get irresistible.

Crusader: If you're starting at high level, White Raven Hammer is a nice way to do this. Otherwise, getting really good at tripping/stand-stilling is helpful.

Artificer: Being an artificer, he can persist bladeweave with a wand or just grab some scrolls of that fun 6th level necromancy spell that automatically stuns your target and then makes them save against damage and nausea.

Wizard: If you grab an item that gives you sneak attack, one level in Spellwarp Sniper, the feat Sanctum Spell, and a couple lesser rods of extend. Now, she can spellwarp sanctum rod extended frost breaths that automatically daze anyone they hit for two rounds.

In addition to this, any of them can get good at demoralizing and pick up Imperious Command for some cower-locking fun.

[dspeyer]

With so many meleeists, a bard would be very well placed. Perhaps across from the crusader for charisma synergy and Song of the White Raven. If this is stepping on the beguiler's social toes, take lots of knowledge skills.

Edit: Marshall may also be useful for similar reasons

[patha787]

With so many meleeists, a bard would be very well placed. Perhaps across from the crusader for charisma synergy and Song of the White Raven. If this is stepping on the beguiler's social toes, take lots of knowledge skills.

Edit: Marshall may also be useful for similar reasons

Funnily enough, our Artificer has decided he's going to fill out the second side of his build with something like Bard 4/Warblade 16, doing the whole White Raven/Song of the White Raven/Dragonfire Inspiration/Snowflake War Dance etc. thing. Since Artificer uses both Cha and Int it's not a bad choice and should get nice synergy. As a Warforged he's also immune to the subdual damage from Words of Creation and the fatigue from Snowflake War Dance, and should make a nice melee skirmisher type/secondary buffer/self-healing addition to the party, as well as being our primary item crafter.

Our Dragonborn Crusader has ditched the idea of Dragonfire Adept and is looking for ways to increase his battlefield control/lockdown/tanking/damage abilities. At the moment it looks like this might involve a Lion Spirit Totem Barbarian dip/Dungeon Crasher Fighter charge build opposite the Knight 4/Crusader 16 side, possibly with the addition of Psychic Warrior (or Ardent?) and War Mind for expansion and perhaps the Mantled Warrior ACF to get Dimension Hop, allowing him to teleport around the battlefield. I'm not sure how he'd get around the Barbarian/Knight alignment contradictions, though. Any thoughts?

He's also looking at potentially ditching Goliath and replacing it with Half-Minotaur and some other decent race, ending up with base race Half-Minotaur Template Dragonborn; LA to be bought off. Thoughts?

Olo Demonsbane:
Thanks for the tips, very interesting (and useful)!

[DeAnno]

If he can get into and out of barbarian quickly (possibly before the game starts) he can be lawful and still have the ability to pounce, he just loses rage.

Alternately the Ordered Chaos feat in FCI may do what he needs if the DM interprets it to work, though the RAW is murky.

[Godskook]

Wow, interesting build. How do you deal with all the alignment restrictions from those classes though? Your alignment would have to flip-flop all over the place, surely.

Oh wow, derp on my part.

Adjusted(Mostly for completeness' sake):

Bard 7/Virtuoso 3/Sublime Chord 2/Virtuoso 7/Sacred Exorcist 1
Marshal 4/Paladin 2/Swordsage 2/Marshal +5/Free 7

Unearthed Aracana allows for a CG Paladin, so that part was working fine anyway.

[patha787]

Oh wow, derp on my part.

Adjusted(Mostly for completeness' sake):

Bard 7/Virtuoso 3/Sublime Chord 2/Virtuoso 7/Sacred Exorcist 1
Marshal 4/Paladin 2/Swordsage 2/Marshal +5/Free 7

Unearthed Aracana allows for a CG Paladin, so that part was working fine anyway.

That's cool - if it makes you feel better, your idea did inspire the Artificer player to go the Bard 4/Warblade 16 route on the other side of his gestalt progression.

[Godskook]

Funnily enough, our Artificer has decided he's going to fill out the second side of his build with something like Bard 4/Warblade 16, doing the whole White Raven/Song of the White Raven/Dragonfire Inspiration/Snowflake War Dance etc. thing. Since Artificer uses both Cha and Int it's not a bad choice and should get nice synergy. As a Warforged he's also immune to the subdual damage from Words of Creation and the fatigue from Snowflake War Dance, and should make a nice melee skirmisher type/secondary buffer/self-healing addition to the party, as well as being our primary item crafter.

1.Horribly insufficient bardic music uses per day on that build. With only 4 uses and 2 ways he *REALLY* wants to burn it per encounter, he winds up only being able to contribute in 2 encounters per day as a Bard, and since this sounds like a primary source of combat prowess, 2/day is highly limiting.

2.At level 20, Artificers don't 'use' Cha anymore, at least not in any serious sense. Depends a little on how lenient the custom magic item rules are at your table, but even without them, you can make do with a mild score here past the early levels.


Our Dragonborn Crusader has ditched the idea of Dragonfire Adept and is looking for ways to increase his battlefield control/lockdown/tanking/damage abilities. At the moment it looks like this might involve a Lion Spirit Totem Barbarian dip/Dungeon Crasher Fighter charge build opposite the Knight 4/Crusader 16 side, possibly with the addition of Psychic Warrior (or Ardent?) and War Mind for expansion and perhaps the Mantled Warrior ACF to get Dimension Hop, allowing him to teleport around the battlefield. I'm not sure how he'd get around the Barbarian/Knight alignment contradictions, though. Any thoughts?

Crusader has 90% of battefield lockdown in-class, but there's definitely room for improvement. Here's some pointers:

1.Start large sized(if possible), and get Expansion. You now own a 12x12 grid, before adding a reach weapon.

2.Use a spiked chain. This is about the best option for locking down space, and will make that 20x20 grid your plaything.

3.Thicket of Blades, Mage Slayer, Pierce Magical Concealment, Combat Reflexes, Combat Exp, Improved Trip, Knock-Down.


That's cool - if it makes you feel better, your idea did inspire the Artificer player to go the Bard 4/Warblade 16 route on the other side of his gestalt progression.

Eh, just trying to be helpful, I guess.

[deuxhero]

Ditch Archivist on the wizard for Factotum. You only have 1 set of actions, and both classes are mainly abilities that need actions to use.

Factotum however, gives bonus actions, teh sexorz for a wizard.

Warblade is a possible alt to make you non-squishy, but Factotum is better.

[Godskook]

Ditch Archivist on the wizard for Factotum. You only have 1 set of actions, and both classes are mainly abilities that need actions to use.

Factotum however, gives bonus actions, teh sexorz for a wizard.

Warblade is a possible alt to make you non-squishy, but Factotum is better.

Presumably, the War Weaver + Incantrix Wizard is a buffer, and thus, isn't using mid-combat actions on his Wizard side, thus making your argument kinda moot.

[patha787]

Godskook:
Thanks for the advice.

EDIT:
One of us with the Leadership feat is going to have a Warforged Artificer cohort, so the guy who was playing the Artificer has decided to change his character completely to something mirroring what you suggested, since the cohort can handle crafting duties.

He's changed his race to Dragonwrought Jungle Kobold and will be venerable, giving him ability adjustments of -4 Str, +2 Dex, +1 Int, +3 Wis and +3 Cha. With Dragontouched he'll also have access to Draconic Heritage, and Battle Dragon has been allowed (admittedly it fits the flavor of the build), so Dragonfire Inspiration will be adding sonic to damage. The build he told me is the following (what are your thoughts?), level by level:

Bard 1//Warblade 1
Bard 2//Warblade 2
Bard 3//Warblade 3
Bard 4//Warblade 4
War Chanter 1//Marshal 1
War Chanter 2//Marshal 2
War Chanter 3//Marshal 3
War Chanter 4//Marshal 4
War Chanter 5//Marshal 5
War Chanter 6//Marshal 6
War Chanter 7//Marshal 7
War Chanter 8//Marshal 8
War Chanter 9//Marshal 9
War Chanter 10//Swordsage 1
Warblade +1 (is this possible? it's on the opposite side from the original levels)//Swordsage 2

Then Virtuoso, Bard and/or Sublime Chord levels on the Bard side and 2 Paladin of Freedom levels and Warblade levels to finish off the other side.

In essence, he's the same concept as the build you provided - based around Dragonfire Inspiration and CHA to everything. He'd have Full BAB, 4d12+10d8+1d12+2d10+3d12+CON HD, 4 or 6 skill + Int skill points at all levels, a decent Initiator level and access to a decent selection of White Raven maneuvers plus all the CHA to everything goodies you mentioned and the CHA auras of the Marshal etc, plus plenty of Bardic Music uses (War Chanter advances Bardic Music uses) to grant everyone xd6 sonic damage. In addition, he gets (via War Chanter) the ability to use two Bardic songs simultaneously, which he'd be using on Inspire Courage/Dragonfire Inspiration and Inspire Legion (War Chanter capstone), which grants all allies within 60 feet who heard the song the highest BAB among them, which will always be Full BAB by virtue of him having full BAB. He loses out on a decent spellcasting progression but that's what our primary buffer party member is for. I think if it is legal as a build, it's pretty amazing for what it adds to the party (no wonder you called it Mr. Awesome). So what are everyone's thoughts, opinions (and corrections, if need be)?

----

EDIT:
The Crusader is now ditching Dragonborn and likely going Half-Minotaur on top of something good (Water Orc?). His new build tentatively looks like:
Knight 4/Crusader 16//Lion Spirit Totem Barbarian 1/Dungeon Crasher Fighter 6/Ardent 2/War Mind 10/Ardent 2
Basically, it's a large-sized BFC/AaO tank/ubercharger build. It uses expansion to become Huge sized, extend reach and thanks to dimensional hop, it teleports around getting charge damage when it's not battlefield controlling. It also uses sweeping strike from War Mind, and probably a few other things I forget.

EDIT:
With regard to the party buffer (Wizard/War Weaver/Incantatrix//Archivist), it is true that she only has so many actions to go around; I guess the primary reason she didn't go Factotum is because we're trying to avoid stepping on each other's toes/stealing each other's thunder by using the same classes or fulfilling the same roles; however, Factotum is one of those classes where it's probably much less of a big deal, since it's really up to you what you do with it and it's more to enhance the other side of your build in gestalt.

It's more MAD, but Factotum 11?/Chameleon 9? or something similar on the other side would grant extra actions, better passives (HD, BAB etc), Int to a bunch of stuff, the ability to overcome SR/DR with inspiration points, various abilities, and most importantly a whole bunch more arcane spells per day (up to 6th level) and still grant up to 6th level divine casting. Arcane spells are generally better buffs for putting into the War Weaver tapestry (and she'd have a heap more of them), and she could still probably Sanctum Spell heal into the tapestry. Of course, she'd have to ditch the PrC levels on the other side and go straight Wizard. Worth it? Seems like it to me, but what are everyone's thoughts?

[Godskook]

Bard 1//Warblade 1
Bard 2//Warblade 2
Bard 3//Warblade 3
Bard 4//Warblade 4
War Chanter 1//Marshal 1
War Chanter 2//Marshal 2
War Chanter 3//Marshal 3
War Chanter 4//Marshal 4
War Chanter 5//Marshal 5
War Chanter 6//Marshal 6
War Chanter 7//Marshal 7
War Chanter 8//Marshal 8
War Chanter 9//Marshal 9
War Chanter 10//Swordsage 1
Warblade +1 (is this possible? it's on the opposite side from the original levels)//Swordsage 2

Then Virtuoso, Bard and/or Sublime Chord levels on the Bard side and 2 Paladin of Freedom levels and Warblade levels to finish off the other side.

In essence, he's the same concept as the build you provided - based around Dragonfire Inspiration and CHA to everything. He'd have Full BAB, 4d12+10d8+1d12+2d10+3d12+CON HD, 4 or 6 skill + Int skill points at all levels, a decent Initiator level and access to a decent selection of White Raven maneuvers plus all the CHA to everything goodies you mentioned and the CHA auras of the Marshal etc, plus plenty of Bardic Music uses (War Chanter advances Bardic Music uses) to grant everyone xd6 sonic damage. In addition, he gets (via War Chanter) the ability to use two Bardic songs simultaneously, which he'd be using on Inspire Courage/Dragonfire Inspiration and Inspire Legion (War Chanter capstone), which grants all allies within 60 feet who heard the song the highest BAB among them, which will always be Full BAB by virtue of him having full BAB. He loses out on a decent spellcasting progression but that's what our primary buffer party member is for. I think if it is legal as a build, it's pretty amazing for what it adds to the party (no wonder you called it Mr. Awesome). So what are everyone's thoughts, opinions (and corrections, if need be)?

1.Its gestalt. If you're not hitting 16 BAB or higher, you don't need BAB. Thus, for buffing party members, Inspire Legion is subpar. It is better used for buffing minions, buffing in non-gestalt, or similar cases. Thus, if you're not basing your fighting tactically, around large sums of minions, I find War Chanter 10 to be underwhelming at best. The level 5 ability is more impressive, and is the last impressive ability the class gets in the context I'm assuming(small party, all gestalt, 16+ BAB on everyone who matters)

2.Check with your DM about progressing things on opposite sides of the Gestalt. Its one of the things that was never covered in the original ruleset(which is garbage and *SHOULD* be homebrewed). I'll assume he's ok with it for now though.

3.I suspect a better build would be:

Bard 7/Warchanter +2/Virtuoso 1/SubChord 2/Virtuoso +7/SacEx 1
Warblade 4/Warchanter 3/Paladin 2/Marshal 9/Swordsage 2

Has BAB 16

(Other than the above, its a fairly decent modification of my suggestion, and I hope I made it clear that sometimes, Warchanter 10 can be a pretty beastly addition to the build, and getting sonic damage is probably the best anyone should hope for in this kind of build).



With regard to the party buffer (Wizard/War Weaver/Incantatrix//Archivist), it is true that she only has so many actions to go around; I guess the primary reason she didn't go Factotum is because we're trying to avoid stepping on each other's toes/stealing each other's thunder by using the same classes or fulfilling the same roles; however, Factotum is one of those classes where it's probably much less of a big deal, since it's really up to you what you do with it and it's more to enhance the other side of your build in gestalt.

It's more MAD, but Factotum 11?/Chameleon 9? or something similar on the other side would grant extra actions, better passives (HD, BAB etc), Int to a bunch of stuff, the ability to overcome SR/DR with inspiration points, various abilities, and most importantly a whole bunch more arcane spells per day (up to 6th level) and still grant up to 6th level divine casting. Arcane spells are generally better buffs for putting into the War Weaver tapestry (and she'd have a heap more of them), and she could still probably Sanctum Spell heal into the tapestry. Of course, she'd have to ditch the PrC levels on the other side and go straight Wizard. Worth it? Seems like it to me, but what are everyone's thoughts?

1.This is gestalt, as long as you're building a different combo, sharing a class won't 'step' on anyone's toes unless the classes do things that compete for the spotlight very explicitly, like having two Mr. Awesome marshals in the party wouldn't be too useful(but even that can be done). Multiple wizards just means cheaper spell learning(Start the game with 2 spell books to share rather than 1 for the single wizard). I think the only issue would be a skill-monkey who expects to be the skill-monkey, but that's about it.

2.While Chameleon is good, Incantrix and War Weaver are better(Although, depending on how much shenanigans you want to use, Chameleon 2 has abusability), and a double-caster focused on buffing with one side can focus a lot of 'active' power with the other. Also, don't count Archivist out of the buffing game. If you cherry-pick all the divine caster classes, there's a lot of buff spells that an Archivist can learn, including a lot of normally arcane spells, thanks to Domains.

Actually, screw it. Read this:

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=188138

And realize that the Incantrix is doing all the heavy lifting in the buff routine.

[Zagaroth]

Something that's been wandering through my mind, and would require a lenient GM: A gestalt Glaivelock//Warblade. Focus on Boosts and Counters. Trade up strikes as available. UNLESS, your GM allows you to replace your full-round attack with the glaive with a single strike maneuver, still using your glaive.

This will generally do less damage than simply hitting 2+ times with your EB damage glaive, but special effects can still make it awesome if allowed. And will make level 9 maneuvers actually useful to you.

Note: there is a Tiger school boost that gives +1 attack. At level 16, that means potentially 5 EB hits in one round, with what ever essence you have at it. And you can shatter doors by screaming at them (seriously, at high level, shatter is 10lbs/level. At 10th level.. well, very few doors are 100lbs. Careful of abuse though, or all the doors you come across will be magic!)

P.S., if used, avoid any stone dragon maneuvers. Have to have feet on the ground, and Warlocks want to fly...