Gestalt Suggestions

[greyknight666]

Its been a while since i've played a gestalt game. I'm just looking for some brainstorming mostly 3.0/3.5 plus magazines. With maybe pathfinder with a discussion.
Campaign: Open ended starting at level 4 with the group taking over a fort or a keep then leading us into doing what ever we want good landlords or bad landlords fighting our neightbors or doing whatever or going on some other adventure still using the keep as a base. No alignment has been talked between party so far and no other party composition is known.

Sort of thinking Druid just having issues figuring out what to pair it up with. But I'm not sold on it. Too many ideas and possibilities. Can probably get some Level adjustments worked in but I haven't checked yet.

Thanks in advance for any and all ideas that might pop up.

[Extra Anchovies]

Druid//Unarmed Swordsage; take Beast Strike and hit everything lots of times for tons of damage.

Alternately, Druid//Incarnate (or Druid//Totemist, but I'm not sure how well that works); it's one of the few situations where Vow of Poverty actually works, and Share Soulmeld makes your animal companion a lot stronger too. For extra cheese take the Celestial Companion feat so your companion can have VoP too.

[ksbsnowowl]

Scout. Wildshape into any feline form with pounce, and you easily get full attacks that can apply skirmish to all the attacks.

Rogue. Druid already gives you a built-in flanking buddy, and druid has several touch attack spells to make for easy sneak attacks.

Monk. Probably best if it is only a dip of two levels or so. Wisdom to AC, and other possibilities, such as Invisible Fist (from Exemplars of Evil).

Wizard or Sorcerer. Thought MAD, I ran a gestalt game from 1st – 20th level, and the PC Druid//Sorcerer was amazingly effective. Lots of buff spells that buff AC in different ways, and spells that buff your wildshape attacks (wraithstrike, Arcane Strike feat, etc).

Spellthief would be interesting. Some sneak attack, some spells, decent skills, and the ability to steal spells and SLA's.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Druid 20 for sure.

Cloistered Cleric 1 with the Undeath and Planning domains and Knowledge Devotion, and take DMM: Persist.

Binder 1 and consider taking Improved Binding.

Unarmed Swordsage 2+

Master of Many Forms 7+

Warshaper 2-4

Maybe finish off with a few Paragnostic Apostle levels, advancing your Cleric casting.

[PsyBomb]

Druid is a mighty class that only improves in Gestalt. In order to recommend a good off-side, we need to know what you intend to focus on with the one you're decided on.

Are you going to be a primary caster with animal companion and shapeshifting support? In this case, you should probably take a class (or three) on the off-side that provide good passive abilities. Meldshaper levels, casters with long-term buffs, Binder, that kind of thing.

If you inted to use Druid as your buff-side, Wild Shape and wade into combat, you want the other side to give active actions and options in combat.

I have a ten-commandments thing to put up for Gestalting, will edit it in once I dig it up.

[greyknight666]

Think my biggest hangup is not knowing what to expect from rest of the group. One player I know will wait till the very last moment. One has expressed interest in being the tanky beatstick. And the 3rd will probably want to do some monstrous race combo(she has issues playing with standard humanoid races so given a chance she'll pick a monster race). So optimizing really doesn't need to be a strong point in the idea suggestions. I guess so far I only know we're getting a fort or a keep to clean out then its ours.

[Hellborn_Blight]

Crusader/Marshal is serious fun. Alternately Crusader/Bard can due something stupid if you take the feat Song of the White Raven, as it would give you double your level on inspire courage bonus and let you activate it as a swift action. These are my top, personal, suggestions.

Gishes are amazing in gestalt so if you have wanted to try a particular flavor of one it will be much better in this type of game.

Classes often deemed weaker, like Dread Necromancer or The eastern casting classes, make major strides toward awesome if you shore up their weaknesses. I have seen a Dread Necromancer/Rouge be a more deadly combatant than the heavy melees early game, and gracefully transition into phantasmal killing and slay living mid.

It is also a great time to try out multiple classes you just haven't had a chance to play if you aren't worrying about how optimal you have to be. Sane choices can be ignored...within reason; Cleric/Paladin would probably be pretty damn boring. But really who am I to judge, find the fun toy wanna bring to the game and live it.

[paranoidbox]

This is just me, obvs, but if I ever play a Gestalt game (such a fun word to say btw, Gestalt :smallbiggrin:) I would go for something like a Sorcerer/Favored Soul. It'd be fun to play a character with lots of spontaneous casting possibilities (add into it all those interesting combo's to increase your spells known). I'd basically only focus on Int/Wis/Cha stats and make him a skill monkey with the Able Learner feat (quite possibly my favorite feat, and whenever I play human this is the feat I choose).

Alternatively, I second the Druid/Cloistered Cleric, because that just seems so much fun too.

[PsyBomb]

This is just me, obvs, but if I ever play a Gestalt game (such a fun word to say btw, Gestalt :smallbiggrin:) I would go for something like a Sorcerer/Favored Soul. It'd be fun to play a character with lots of spontaneous casting possibilities (add into it all those interesting combo's to increase your spells known). I'd basically only focus on Int/Wis/Cha stats and make him a skill monkey with the Able Learner feat (quite possibly my favorite feat, and whenever I play human this is the feat I choose).

Alternatively, I second the Druid/Cloistered Cleric, because that just seems so much fun too.

This bring up the Commandments I was talking about earlier. The descriptions were meant for Pathfinder, but the list was originally written for 3.5. The quote grossly violates Commandment One in most cases, unless you only really use one side as pre-buffing or recovery.




I think I can sum up the building of a Gestalt Character in 10-commandments style:

1) Action Economy Is Still King
-Full Triple-progression casting is cute, but ultimately futile in combat since nearly every spell, Power, Invocation, etc takes a Standard Action to use, and you still only get one of those per round. Try to mix your activation abilities up, between Standard, Move, and Swift actions, so that you can get more out of what you have.

2) Focus On One Theme
-Having schizophrenic capabilities just means you'll be more at a loss in combat, despite the increased options, especially if the two sides interfere with each other in normal use. Barbarian/Wizard, though it may sound awesome, generally either gives up most of the benefits from one side of the progression or else is just confused in battle. If it can't be effectively done on one class, it generally isn't worth doing on two.

3) Strengthen Each Other's Weaknesses
-Since you always take the higher HP, BAB, Save, skill points and both skill lists, try to ensure that your secondary class is good at some things that your main one isn't.

4) Remember Your Stats
-Twice as many "classes" means twice as many opportunities for MAD. Make sure your key abilities from both sides are still lined up onto one or two main stats

5) Remember Your Feats
-Feats are the one thing you don't get multiples or increased numbers of normally. This makes prerequisites and feat chains just as hard to squeeze in as normal, more so if you want to Prestige (and many do)

6) Dipping Is Easier
-In Gestalt, dipping 1-3 levels on one side for supporting capabilities does not delay or prevent high-level capabilities from your other side. Ftr 2 for feats and proficiencies, Paladin 2-3 for Cha to saves and immunities, Meldshaper levels, etc are all simple and powerful options.

7) Beware Wasting Identical Advantages
-This causes pure waste. A PrC attempting to increase your Wizard caster level on one side and a level of Wizard on the other just lost a caster level benefit. Similar things go for other benefits, such as Uncanny Dodge, high HP/skills, and Proficiencies (not as much a concern as the others).

8) Active/Passive Mix is Typically Best
-Let one side have the abilities which require actions. You can put together cool utility, long-term buffing, bonus feats, and static/reactive abilities on the other side

9) The Very Worst Classes Sometimes Aren't Bad Here
-Monk, with its dominant saves, decent skills, and host of static abilities, is a FAR better choice for support-side levels than it is for single-class. The Expert, despite being an NPC class, notably is able to pick ANY TEN SKILLS as class skills with 6+Int per level, which can be clutch if your prereqs are getting tight. Any class that usually has the phrase "if only it had ___" can easily acquire it. Basically, almost anything can be of benefit to SOMEONE under Gestalt system (other than Commoner)

10) DM Always Has Final Word
-Just like normal, if you are crafting an epic masterpiece of a character but it will outshine the others of the group, expect any sane DM to veto it, or else be ready to throttle back what you can do for the sake of having, you know, fun.

[paranoidbox]

This bring up the Commandments I was talking about earlier. The descriptions were meant for Pathfinder, but the list was originally written for 3.5. The quote grossly violates Commandment One in most cases, unless you only really use one side as pre-buffing or recovery.

Awww... lol. Not sure if I agree with you there, but to each their own *shrug*

[greyknight666]

Got a little more info at this point.
One player is going half ogre(home-brewed progression) Fighter/barbarian.
Hound Archon/Cleric>Paladin? = aiming to be a buffing beat stick. Not sure where this one is going other then I'm waiting to see how Lawful this ends up being played
Cleric/?bard? = Support/healer/buffer/?Summoner? = Know cleric is wanted and wants to be the support/healer but haven't figured out the 2nd class yet leaning towards Bard but not really.

I ended up being a guinea pig for an experimental stat generating method ending up with 22, 10, 13, 25, 21, 3.

Starting at lvl 3 with the group leaning towards good alignments. Thinking of the Arcane side or still sticking with druid and throwing that 3 on str/dex and dealing with it till wild shape kicks in. But I'm welcome to ideas classes/races with ways to deal with that 3.

[Brova]

I kinda like Dread Necromancer 20 || Druid 4/Sorcerer 1/Arcane Heirophant 10/Mystic Theurge 5 for a caster. You might want to add an extra level of Druid for wild shape at the cost of 8th level Sorcerer spells. You could also go Druid 20 || Idiot Crusader.

[Metahuman1]

Might not be 100% optimal, but, fighter.

Get full BAB, get a HD upgrade, lot's more feats means you can more effectively specialize on all the good things druid gives you being used to full potential.

I think there's a variant that get's a good reflex save, so that would give you all good saves as well.

And of course, dungeoncrasher can synergies well indeed with Wildshape.

[PsyBomb]

Might not be 100% optimal, but, fighter.

Get full BAB, get a HD upgrade, lot's more feats means you can more effectively specialize on all the good things druid gives you being used to full potential.

I think there's a variant that get's a good reflex save, so that would give you all good saves as well.

And of course, dungeoncrasher can synergies well indeed with Wildshape.

I've seen Dungeoncrasher gestalt onto a Druid, who went into Bull Elephant form and pre-buffed against a blaster wizard. First time I've ever seen impact dice exceed the 20d6 for terminal velocity

[CrazyYanmega]

One of my personal favorite gestalts is the Monk/Psychic Warrior. The Psionic Lion's Charge power combined with Flurry of Blows and Fast Movement gets around Monk's contradictory powers, and if you add Jump Kick and Snap Kick, you will be dealing respectable damage.

[Metahuman1]

I've seen Dungeoncrasher gestalt onto a Druid, who went into Bull Elephant form and pre-buffed against a blaster wizard. First time I've ever seen impact dice exceed the 20d6 for terminal velocity

Cool.


Course, if you really wanted to go super High Op, Go Cloistered Cleric.

No Attribute dependency increase really (I guess CHA but you can make items for extra turning cheaply enough.) Pick up Planning Domain, maybe Travel or Undead or some similar Domain (The latter to get some extra turning action, the former to get travel devotion.), and knowledge Domain or devotion depending on taste.

More skill points and class skills are kinda nice. Spontaneous Domain casting AFC get's you some spiffy options. (And they can get scary with the below suggestion combined with building toward more Domain Access. Hello speaker of the soverine Host.)

Oh, and that planning domain? That's extend spell as a bonus feat. Pick up 2 Flaws. Persist Spell and Divine Metamagic Persist spell, wth access to those lovely domain spells, ton's of turn undead, Full cleric and druid casting and Wildshape to boot. (And I think there's a way to share your buffs with your animal companion so bonus there.). You'll be a terror.

[KingSmitty]

Monk 20 on one side

Unarmed Swordsage 2+Feat Rogue2+Fighter 2+Kensai 10+4 more levels of anything awesome on the other.


Not the strongest but tons of attacks and sweet maneuvers, great saves and you can enchant yourself, with a decent amount of feats to boot. Trade evasion out with an ACF if you can...Though you gotta get your DM to let you use SS's Wis to AC for unarmored, not just light armor.