Shield Gimp Cohort

[theIrkin]

So I'm looking at making a shield gimp to be my cohort (free, but static level 7). I literally never want him to attack, and to have a nigh-unassailable AC, and be as close to untouchable otherwise as possible. Also, while I don't mind multiclassing/prestige classes, the idea of dips is gross to me. Not that it's wrong, just not my scene. Here's what I've got so far:

Warforged Warblade

25 point stat array:
S10
D12
C17
I13
W10
C10

Flaws:
Shaky (-2 on ranged attacks)

Feats:
Shield Specialization
Combat Expertise
Adamantine Body
Sacred Vow
Vow of Peace

Equipment:
Magic Body (+whatever he can afford)
Magic Shield (+same)

Skills:
Max Concentration, what else matters?

Manuevers:
The two diamond maneuvers that let you replace saves Fort and Will Saves. Haven't bothered choosing the others yet

AC is 35, 34 FF, 20 Touch

The build has 2 shortcomings right now that I can see, namely healing and reflex saves. But other than that I'm pretty happy with how the build came out. He could also take the flaw that gives -2 to melee attacks for another feat if I could figure out what I needed.

Joe

[StreamOfTheSky]

I did well with a gish type. Just need to have draconic blood for Wings of Cover to protect other people.

Go Sorc for at least 4 levels, some martial class, then whatever gish prestige class(es) you prefer, like Abjurant Champion, Spellsword, Jade Phoenix Mage, or Eldritch Knight.

The key spell is wings of cover, which will let the shielding ally protect adjacent allies from basically any attack.

With two shields, he can use one to boost the AC of an adjacent ally with the Wall of Steel teamwork benefit and keep the other for his own protection.

You may want at least some Crusader, rather than Warblade. Crusader has the delayed damage pool, can heal (if you're willing to let the guy attack feebly instead of not at all), gets heavy armor proficiency, has stances to help control enemies on the battlefield (iron guard's glare and thicket of blades), and the Shield Block maneuver (which stacks with Wall of Steel, far as I can tell).

Also be sure to get a feat to add his shield AC bonus to touch AC. There's Shield Ward from PHB 2 (also adds to maneuver defenses, but has a pre-req) and Parrying Shield from Lords of Madness...iirc (no pre-req, but only adds to touch AC). The shield augment crystal of Arrow Deflection from MIC is also a very nice buy. For very little gp, you get a sweet +5 to shield AC vs. ranged attacks. Note the synergy with Parrying Shield / Shield Ward against ranged touch spells... (you might even want levels in a class with Evasion just so you can swap it for Spell Reflection alternate class feature).

[theIrkin]

Cool, thanks for the input. I definitely like the parrying shield feat and the armor crystal. Question: does adamantine body require proficiency with heavy armor to not have a penalty? Nothing says it needs to, simply that you count as wearing heavy armor.

I looked at crusader, but he doesn't have access to Diamond Mind, and my DM just loves his Will saves.

As far as the sorcerer levels, isn't the character at like 60% ASF at that point, so why cast spells?

[StreamOfTheSky]

Can't answer about Adamantine Body.

Diamond Mind: The novice rings are cheap, you can wear two of them if you want, and MIC lets you still stack protection +1 to +5 on it w/o extra cost. All the save replacers are levels 1-3 and thus ring eligible, though at 7th level, the cohort would be limited to only the will and reflex ones if he's only applying half his level to initiator level. Wings of Cover blocks line of effect, ruining basically all offensive spells, also.

ASF: If you did this build, you'd want to stick to lighter armor. Mithral everything, Twilight enhancement (+1 armor/shield property; reduces ASF by 10%) applied where needed, and a 1 level dip in Spellsword can all help bring the ASF to 0%.

It would have lower AC than yours, probably. But it'd be much better at protecting other people. And you could supplement the AC with miss chance from spells or grab a cloak of minor displacement later on. Otherwise, plenty of the suggestions like Wall of Steel and Parrying Shield would still be useful to your build.

[Phaederkiel]

the most important part about any kind of shield gimp is that your gimp shields YOU.

thus

shieldmate
Improved shieldmate

and

combat expertise
allied defense


are the strongest part of a shield gimp.


crusader adds the stance Iron guards glare. This gives the party another +4 AC.

Those feats are much better than the VoP, i think.