fun gestalt combos

[vasilidor]

The idea here is to post fun (not necessarily optimized) gestalt combos that you have played or ones you think would be fun. For me I found the rogue/warlock to be particularly fun, especially when the DM allowed me to mix eldritch blast with sneak attack. This got to be particularly nasty when I figured out a way to fly and be invisible :smallsmile:, and i stayed relevant once the undead came a-calling. Otherwise he was a sneaky trap expert.

[AvatarVecna]

Ranger/Master Thrower//Wizard/Incantatrix: On the one hand, you're pretty MAD; on the other hand, you are now Batman.

Druid//Monk/Fist of the Forest: you are now Kung-Fu Panda...and a pretty capable one at that.

More to come later, probably...

[LoyalPaladin]

I've always wanted to play a Battle Dancer//Spellthief. I just think it'd be fun to tumble into someone's square, steal some spells, and then tumble out while pelting them with their own spells.

[martixy]

Oh man, do I have many of those. :smallbiggrin:
Theorycrafting builds like these is a bit of a guilty pleasure of mine.

Without further ado I present to you:
HULK SMASH

War Hulk + full BAB class.

I mean think of it this way:
Lolth-touched Half-Minotaur Goliath Barbarian // ?
Where ? can be 5 levels of anything you want initially (Wisdom is the only mental stat not penalized so Monk, Swordsage, Psychic Warrior, heck even Ardent or Cleric are valid choices). I'll go with Psychic Warrior here.

So if we start with 18 Str, that's +4(Goliath) +4(16 levels) +6(Lolth-touched) +12(Half-minotaur, effectively) +20(War Hulk) for a total base Strenght of 64. Add in Barbarian Rage(maybe even Frenzied Berserker once you run out of War Hulk) for +4(+6), items (+6), being Huge(+2) - via the Expansion Psionic power.
Total = 78 Str on a huge beastie with 20 ft. reach (Reach psionic power (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20040827e)) making a very nasty full-attack with power attack cranked to max against everything in range.

I'm sure we can squeeze out some more strength from somewhere too.

[AvatarVecna]

Along similar lines:

Half-White-Dragon Half-Minotaur Half-Ogre Goliath Scout/Ranger//LA/Master Thrower/Hulking Hurler/War Hulk. You can make a "One Big Attack" hurl for X006s...but most of the time you'll just be bowling, making multiple attacks per round with a smaller weapon that deals enough damage to get the job done usually.

Now that you're Large with Powerful Build and Str 46 at character creation, a weapon you can wield as a one-handed weapon (which you can full attack with) weighs about 40 lbs...so what you do is find a 640 lb boulder and wield that...after applying magic enhancements to it and getting Continuous "Shrink Object" cast on it to make it weight 40 objects when held, and 640 when thrown, letting you deal multiple attacks with a 6d6 base damage weapon...before feats, high Str, and Swift Hunter Skirmish.

[FocusWolf413]

I'm partial to warlock/hellfire warlock // binder/spellthief/chameleon/Urpriest. It's not the most powerful or the most elegant, but it's fun to play. The fluff is just amazing. You grab wherever you can get it. You wrest it from devils, steal it from casters, rip it from the essence of the void, and even siphon it straight from the gods themselves. It's fun.

[Erik the Green]

Two combos with capability, versatility, and survivability that I like:

1) beguiler//warblade. Basically, you are The Most Interesting Man in the World. From L1 to L20 you can probably fix any situation that can be solved by talking with the three soc. skills and a little magical influence; if that doesn't do the business, you are fully equipped to remove face. Three-ish good saves, the best hp, amazing skills (and every important one, too), and about 120 spells from L1 to L9 (including at least 50 that every sorcerer would love to be able to take). Probably play human to work in Weapon Finesse, concentrate on Diamond Mind with a some Iron Heart and White Raven for flavor and utility, get Celestial Armor ASAP and add Death Ward and then Soulfire as WBL allows, get a means of flight, maybe a Runestaff of Evocation for when something at a distance really needs to die (and have a friendly wizard <cohort> enhance it whenever you are in funds). With a little luck you could work your way up to stopping entire nations from going to war. Or leading them, if that's your bag.

2) nomad (psion)//warblade. I call this one "the cat who walks by himself." With offense, mobility, and a slate of utility powers (albeit at the expense of some gold and xp to pick up those off-list beauties that start with astral construct and end with psychic chirurgery). Two cool things you can do with this A) You have Psionic Meditation, you just do. Get Psychic Weapon <pants> and then Deep Impact. Now all your Diamond Mind strikes are touch attacks, not just Emerald Razor. B) If you are a Nomad and web enhancements are on the table, you can trade your L1 bonus feat for Personal Space. That doesn't mean you are very touchy, it means you have a psychic Bag of Holding-like storage area coterminous with your corpus vivendi. It starts small but worth it and eventually is actually as big as a "medium creature," with no weight limit stated at any point. The cool bit is that you can only put things in _or takes things out_ by expending your psychic focus. And, you can't become focused if you are under outside control, so you probably have about the safest stash in the entire universe. Including your back-up gear, which means that by mid-levels even imprisonment is fairly voluntary unless your captors have a very reliable power jammer. It would take an Archmage with Invoke Magic as an SLA to beat that, I think, and maybe not as well.

EtG

[Soranar]

Fighter 20//Ninja 20

Makes a crossbow sniper plausible gives you out of combat usefulness (take the Drow fighter ACF for an extra punch)

Warblade 20//Factotum 20 (not as completely broken as factotum//spell to power erudite but still fun and versatile)

[MisterKaws]

Duskblade//Warblade+Eternal Blade

Time stands still+Belt of Battle and Island in Time get really fun together, preferrably with TWF and Somatic weaponry for OVER 40 VAMPIRIC TOUCH-IMBUED ATTACKS IN A ROUND.

[Honjuden]

I was always partial to Scout/Ranger//Wizard/Swiftblade. It is a little MAD, but Swiftblade makes a killer melee Swift Hunter.

[Esprit15]

Mixing anything with monsters that would normally be painful or unplayable due to LA and RHD. Want to play a caster? Enjoy getting first level spells at level 5 if you're not playing gestalt.

[ben-zayb]

Duskblade 13 / Bloodstorm Blade 2 / Crinti Shadow Marauder 5 || Wu Jen 5 / Shadowcraft Mage 3 / Spellguard of Silverymoon 5 / Wu Jen +5

Massive buffer (like Shapechange or Mind Blank), debuffer (like AMF), or killer (like Transcend Mortality, dismissed shortly after). And by massive, I'm talking about ridiculous amount of Full Attacks via Shadow Pounce + Thundering Throw + Far Shot + Teleporting Distant Shurikens (or Javelins) to affect enemies up to 200ft (or 600ft, if javelin) away. And due to Arcane Channeling's wording, you only need one casting per round, which is on the first full attack.

[vasilidor]

one i did for a game where we were all guardsmen in ahnkmorpark (i probably just butchered that) was a psion / soulknife. it was for a pathfinder game.

[Ravens_cry]

I've always wanted to play Rogue//Cleric. It seems silly that trickery gods should have Clanky McFullplate the cleric as their divine servant and while cleric buffs aren't super geared to rogues, it still works out well from what I can tell.
And it just fills a niche that game itself does not fill. There's some, frankly bad, prestige classes for it, but, in the official game, there isn't a straight synergy PrC like even Arcane Trickster.

[RoyVG]

We've done a gestalt campaign waaaaay back in the day using mostly only Core, Monster Manual 3 and Draconomicon. I was a Cleric//Paladin. Looking back, I was not a smart man. We also had a Druid//Ranger and a Wizard//Rogue in the party. Still, my character made the most impact as he became a reference for 'awesome' in later campaigns with the same group, so I got that at least. He returned as a mortal-turned-deity in a later campaign, the only one to do so before the campaign ended (the others were planned, but never made it)

[INoKnowNames]

Warblade//Rogue, using Clarion Commander's Perpetual Flank.

You are now the most un-sneaky sneak attacker ever. But you can do that Hokuto No Ken thing, where you threaten to kill someone, walk up to them, hit all of their vitals, and kill them. Hell, you can literally do that if you fight unarmed.

[LordOfCain]

I once played a Chaos Monk/Drunken Master//Barbarian/Bear Warrior.
Hardly optimized or even that playable but it was extremely fun to play.

[Fouredged Sword]

I am partial to Duskblade // Bard.

You can fill just about any party roll without really trying. Play the gentleman adventurer or redmage archtype.

[Naez]

Personal favorite of mine is Wildshape Ranger 5/Master of Many Forms 10/Nature's Warrior 5||Deadly Hunter Druid 20

Swap Ranger Animal Companion for Urban Companion (familiar), and Ranger Track for Trap Expert.

[TheTeaMustFlow]

Swordsage // Warblade and/or Crusader.

fun fact: Initiator Levels from different sources stack.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Swordsage // Warblade and/or Crusader.

fun fact: Initiator Levels from different sources stack.Only PrCs. Otherwise, it's your class's initiator level + 1/2 your other levels. But I wouldn't think that overlapping gestalt levels stack, since you'd still be level 20 at level 20; you just have 20 gestalted levels, rather than 40 levels. Ask your DM.

[geekintheground]

in 3.P, warder//crusader is pretty awesome, and probably the closest to an MMO tank as you can get (both classes have native access to stuff that encourages attacking you over your allies)

[Pex]

Barbarian/Druid

Be an animal with rabies.

Psion/Soul Knife

Jedi/Sith

[Ravens_cry]

in 3.P, warder//crusader is pretty awesome, and probably the closest to an MMO tank as you can get (both classes have native access to stuff that encourages attacking you over your allies)
If we're going to add Pathfinder to the mix, Paladin/Ninja (Pathfinder's version of both classes).
You are the Dark, Sacred Knight.

[sengmeng]

Barbarian//favored soul

Best bab, best hp, all good saves, self healing, self buffing, 9th level spells.
What are you? You're the Herald of Ragnarok, Viking berzerker prophet of doom.

[Esprit15]

Barbarian//favored soul

Best bab, best hp, all good saves, self healing, self buffing, 9th level spells.
What are you? You're the Herald of Ragnarok, Viking berzerker prophet of doom.

Things I didn't know I wanted to play, but now really want to play.

[sengmeng]

Things I didn't know I wanted to play, but now really want to play.

Herald of Ragnarok (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=17671991&postcount=9)

I already had this idea once as a base class, but the gestalt version would blow it out of the water.

[Quertus]

For fun? I'd probably go (paragon) treant // druid. Or maybe imp / ? // samurai / iaijutsu master. Just not sure what to take after the imp levels.

Or... There's an idea I've been toying around with - her code name is "total domination". Most people walk into the dungeon, kill all the monsters, walk out with the treasure. She walks into the dungeon... and walks out with all the monsters. Diplomancer is the obvious answer, but there's so many creatures you can't talk to. Dominate monster is good, but still has gaps. So my thought is simple cleric // wizard, rebuking undead, taking domains to turn to control plants and oozes, taking items to turn elementals, taking items to lower monsters effective HD vs turning, and using dominate monster (or lower level spells at lower level) and diplomacy (boosted by spells and items) for the rest. Oh, and a rod of construct control (?) for constructs.

[Aleolus]

Things I didn't know I wanted to play, but now really want to play.

Agreed. I'm already developing a story for him in my head

[Ravens_cry]

Sorcerer/Cleric (Oracle if using 3.Pathfinder) and a way to cast spells in rage. It just has a wonderful WAAAAGH! feel. Take leadership for your own personal horde.

[Mr Adventurer]

Personal favorite of mine is Wildshape Ranger 5/Master of Many Forms 10/Nature's Warrior 5||Deadly Hunter Druid 20

Swap Ranger Animal Companion for Urban Companion (familiar), and Ranger Track for Trap Expert.

Not spell-less Ranger and Warshaper instead of Nature's Warrior?

[yellowrocket]

Starting at level 5 wolf lion totem barbarian 2, rogue 3//druid 5. Wolf animal companion tripping as you trip and deal sneak attack damage when an opponent is tripped, or while you and your animal companion flank it. And get sneak attack while raging for additional you're down I smash you damage fun. Also summons for flanking bonuses.

[gorfnab]

Warforged Warblade // Artificer - self repairing and upgrading tank
Warblade // Factotum - Int to almost everything
Factotum // Wizard - 2 standard action spells per turn after level 8
Bard // Crusader - battle buffer tank

[Erik the Green]

If we're going to add Pathfinder to the mix, Paladin/Ninja (Pathfinder's version of both classes).
You are the Dark, Sacred Knight.

Nice. An alternative if PF 3rd party is on the table would be PF Paladin//Nightblade (obviously not one of the evilish archetypes). "Some things can be seen clearest in the dark, including your evil and your doom. That would be me, by the way."

Or: Sage Sorcerer//Warblade. Play human for the bonus spells, boost concentration, boost spellcraft and make your own gear (maybe go with bracers of armor rather than armor so all you need is craft WI) => immense profit.

Or, offbeat but tasty and high T2: Empyreal Sorcerer//Spirit Shaman. Some of the secrets of the universe are yours to keep, the rest you just borrow when you need them.

[Naez]

Not spell-less Ranger and Warshaper instead of Nature's Warrior?

Warshaper doesn't add hit die for wild shape progression so you'd wouldn't be able to turn into anything with more than 15 HD. As for spells, level 1 ranger spells include rhino's rush which I personally love especially if you wild shape into something with pounce.

[T.G. Oskar]

Warshaper doesn't add hit die for wild shape progression so you'd wouldn't be able to turn into anything with more than 15 HD.

You could still nix the two last levels of Nature's Warrior and simply go Warshaper 2. That gives the immunities, the plethora of natural weapons and the boosts to Str and Con while wildshaping, while still providing two Nature's Armament options and 3 levels worth of Wild Shape. If you could nudge two more levels, you gain better fast healing than the one Nature's Warrior gives you, and 5 ft. reach.

One gestalt combo that I'd consider fun because it's simply adding stuff to an already strong single-class build would be A-Game Paladin||Marshal. You tack minor auras, major auras and draconic auras to your already formidable buffing set-up, and make Charisma even MORE important (not to mention that you get a free boost to Diplomacy, making you even MORE of a face). Not sure if Dragon Lord has feat pre-reqs, 'cause otherwise it could be a nice PrC to tack on.

Archivist/Sacred Exorcist 1||Wizard/Incantatrix/Archmage would be also interesting. Full Int, access to pretty much ALL spells in existence, ways to maximize Metamagic, DMM: Quicken to work with action economy (for your divine spells at least, but then Incantatrix kicks in with Quicken maybe?), a class feature that provides a boost to your allies with your evidently massive collection of Knowledge skills for little effort, and eventually SLAs. Essentially what the Cleric||Wizard gestalt tried to do, but couldn't. It might also get some books chucked at you.

[Grod_The_Giant]

As a variant on the original post, I like Warlock//Scout. It's sneaky as all get-out, and Skirmish synergies very nicely with Eldritch Blast. Or, if you go for a Glaive, the Warlock has some great invocations for boosting key bits like Jump or Tumble.


One gestalt combo that I'd consider fun because it's simply adding stuff to an already strong single-class build would be A-Game Paladin||Marshal. You tack minor auras, major auras and draconic auras to your already formidable buffing set-up, and make Charisma even MORE important (not to mention that you get a free boost to Diplomacy, making you even MORE of a face). Not sure if Dragon Lord has feat pre-reqs, 'cause otherwise it could be a nice PrC to tack on.
I feel like it might be easier and more effective to do Paladin/Marshal (mix to taste)//Bard (or even Crusader/Marshal//Bard) and not worry about the A-game paladin stuff-- it's good, but it's a pretty effort-intensive way to get a (generally inferior) Paladin//Bard.

[dascarletm]

One I've always wanted to do, (Assuming we are allowing Pathfinder) is Gunslinger//Alchemist. It would really be awesome if Explosive Missile could be used with Fast Bombs, I just imagine a tricked out steampunk revolver firing explosive rounds until everything in a 10ft area is toast.

Also
Soulknife//Magus. You are mixing your magic and psionic, but it's still awesome.