[PF] Worthwhile dip for a Nightblade?

[genderlich]

My level 4 Nightblade just hit level 5. I built her to be a skill-monkey, party face, and utility caster/illusionist, but the party composition has forced me into the role of primary melee combatant, so I'm considering branching out with a level or two in something to help my damage output and staying power since that's the one thing the Nightblade isn't very good at. (We have a casting-focused spiritualist, a casting-focused oracle, and a fighter/bard whose only scores above 11 are Wis and Cha.) Legendary Rogues and Legendary Swashbucklers are both available for use, but not much other 3PP classes besides Path of Shadows itself. I feel like just a couple levels in Fighter won't really help that much; it'd only be like one extra BAB point and I can't really think of any combat feats I'd need.

My ability scores are Str 15, Dex 16, Con 12, Int 8, Wis 7, Cha 16; the feats I have currently are Power Attack and Spell Focus (Illusion), and I've been fighting with a +1 Longsword + buckler, meaning I power attack for 1d8+5, which will go up to 1d8+7 at level 6 if I remain a single-classed Nightblade. I took the nightblade path of the Twilight Veil, the illusionist-focused one. Is there any one- or two-level dip I could take that would add significantly to my effectiveness, or failing that, build suggestions for staying single-classed?

[Gallowglass]

Nightblades are proficient in Scythe and Spiked Chain, so you might want to switch to one of those. Why? Reach, Trip, and 2 handed so your damage from power attack goes from (+5) to (+8) Your loss in AC is made up by using your attacks to change up your attack routine to trip, then taking the AoO when they stand up, then tripping again, rinse and repeat.

I would also look into the scimitar, dancing dervish shtick so you can key your attack and damage off of your marginally higher dex. Maybe see if you can retrain Power Attack, then you can start fishing for +dex items. You have Cat's grace on your spell list, so you can buff with that and get another +2 to hit (with finesse) and damage (with dancing dervish or one of the other dex to damage shticks)

Because you got good Cha and good Dex, I used to have a combat bard build in pathfinder that had both Cha and Dex to dmg, but I don't remember how it worked off the top of my head. There is a list on this board of ways to get stat to different features. That combat bard (dervish dancer archtype, dervish dance feat, magic scimitars, somethign to add cha to dmg) far outstripped the martials in the group for sheer damage output (for a 15 minute workday)

Normally I would say use your ample illusion magic to get enemy flatfooted and for battlefield control, but you don't have any team members with precision damage and neither do you. If you want to dip, I would dip to something with precision damage (sneak attack, skirmish) (probably ninja) because you have lots of ways to trigger the precision damage through nightblade.

If you have your heart set on getting some martial levels, see if your DM will let you use some path of war stuff. Some initiator stuff is keyed off of charisma, and does a good job of emulating precision damage so it will work well with your nightblade chassis. Think about different ways to use your Shadow Surge, path techniques and illusion spells (silent image makes for the best ambushes) to control how the first round of combat is going to go, then pick initiator stances that will work well with that.

[LTwerewolf]

If you can get path of war approved, a level or two in warlord (sadly the other two are out because of your very low mental stats) would work well, substituting out the scarlet throne discipline for another that can give you some defensive options. As the primary melee, you'll end up being targeted a lot, so having a few abilities to completely negate damage and do something to them (like flat iron riposte) will go a long way. If you want to drop the buckler, scarlet throne would do well for you too, giving you the option of going either 1h or 2h easily enough.

If not, you're not going to find too terribly much that's going to mesh well with what you've got going on already. It's not much better than trying to get a ranger to be the primary healer. In a pinch they might pull something through, but you're going to notice the lack of the Heal spell when it's needed.