Build help: Warrior of Earth

[Mr.Kraken]

Hello, giants. Can you help me with this character I'm building? The idea is to create a (if possible/viable) non-spellcaster tank with an earth element fluff. As gestalt is allowed, I went with the following build:

Monk 1/Fighter 6//Stonechild 6/Mineral Warrior 1

Level break-down:
1 - Decisive Strike (ACF, Monk), Combat Expertise, Improved Disarm, Improved Grapple, Improved Trip, Power Attack
2 - Shield Specialization [Heavy]
3 - Earth Sense, Shield Ward
4 - Blind-Fight (bonus, Stonechild)
5 - Exotic Armor Proficiency [Interlocked Plate]
6 - Earth's Embrace
7 - Warrior of Earth (ACF, Fighter, Dragon 355), Heavy Armor Optimization

He's looking moderately good so far. I don't want him too heavily optimized, but I want him to be an interesting character to play. The idea is having him using a tower shield, his interlocked plate armor and fighting with unarmed strikes, he will be having moderate damage so I'm planning on focusing on disarming, tripping and grappling (mostly grappling), while being the best tank possible.

I was planning keep leveling as fighter, but I suspect that's not the best class for the job. On the other side, I have no idea what to do and where to go. Come to think of it, maybe Stone Dragon warblade will do a better job, but I don't know if ToB will be available. Any help?

[Seerow]

Warrior of Earth and you are looking at Interlocking Plate instead of Stone Plate?

Also any particular reason on the no casting progression at all? While there's not a ton of variety among earth/stone/rock themed spells, there's at least 2-3 at most spell levels, and being able to do things like Move Earth, Earthquake, Wall of Stone, Earth Glide, Tremorsense, Stoneskin, Hail of Stone, Heart of Earth, Heart of Stone, Rockblast... I can keep going but I'll stop there. There's a lot of potential in earth themed magic, and it seems a shame to pass that up, especially in a gestalt environment where you can easily have that and still be a badass warrior without shenanigans.

[Mr.Kraken]

Well, interlocking plate is better than stone plate, is it not? Although, fluffwise it's probably more suiting (and saves me a feat).

About the no-magic thing, there's no specific reason for that. I was just curious if there was a non-spellcaster way to pull this off. With that in mind, what do you think about Warblade//Wizard?

[Karl Aegis]

Is there any particular reason you want to be a storage device?

[Mr.Kraken]

Warblade//Wizard wouldn't work because of the spell failure... maybe, Crusader//Cleric then?

[daremetoidareyo]

I would look at elemental warrior from the planar handbook. 3 levels in and you get an earth energy infused weapon and a burrow speed (30')

[DarkSonic1337]

Warblade//Wizard wouldn't work because of the spell failure... maybe, Crusader//Cleric then?

Since when has armor caused spell failure? (http://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/18468/how-do-i-handle-arcane-spell-failure) :smalltongue:

[Mr.Kraken]

Elemental warrior looks good. It's a heck of an effort to get no ASF in plate armor, though, so I guess I'll stay with divine magic.

I'd like your opinion on the choice of race. Do you think the stonechild is a good race? 2 RHD and +4 LA can hurt the build, but the +8 to Str and Con is nice and it's thematically fitting. I've thought about goliath, dwarf, dream dwarf and earth genasi, but I've decided to try the stonechild. Do you guys have another race that fits in here?

[Necromancy]

I'd look into maybe Druid coupled with monk into shifter or something. Druid elemental form is solid for this idea. It's just a matter of optimizing

[sakuuya]

If you can squeeze it into your build when you get to higher levels, I recommend Earth Dreamer from Races of Stone. It's a 5-level full-casting PrC that only requires first-level spells (10 ranks of Spellcraft, though) and nets you earth glide and the ability to see through earth.

[Uncle Pine]

Intelocking plate: +8 AC.
Thaalud stone armor: +12 AC (Anauroch - The Empire of Shades, p108).
A single Crusader level would get you Martial Spirit, a handy 1st level stance that provides infinite healing between each fight. Also, since you're playing gestalt, it probably isn't an overpowered option.
Half-minotaur dwarf could be a decent race and fit the theme of the "big square stony guy".

[Brova]

A single Crusader level would get you Martial Spirit, a handy 1st level stance that provides infinite healing between each fight. Also, since you're playing gestalt, it probably isn't an overpowered option.

More generally, is there a reason you aren't taking Warblade levels or something to get Stone Dragon maneuvers? Those seem like a lock for an Earth Warrior concept.

[Mr.Kraken]

More generally, is there a reason you aren't taking Warblade levels or something to get Stone Dragon maneuvers? Those seem like a lock for an Earth Warrior concept.

Crusader also has access to Stone Dragon maneuvers and gains proficiency with tower shields, which I plan on using.

[Sam K]

Your original build faces the classic tank problem in D&D; you're great at taking damage, but there's no reason for enemies to target you. Crusader is the natural fix for that.

Since you're gestalting, warblade/psion could be cool too, no ASF from psionics.

Finally, I cant help thinking a warforged mineral warrior would be cool, assuming it's a legal template for warforged. Cause like, "Yo rock, we heard you like rocks, so we built a robot out of rocks and then made it into a rock!" If that doesn't rock your world, I don't know what will...