Having a hard time with building a character

[AngrySheep]

Hello ppl !
I'm a long time lurker, but this time it looks like I have a rather specific problem.
I'm trying to build a character for a upcoming campaign, but I can`t seem to fit the character I want to build in any way that is remotely playable from a mechanic standpoint.

This is basically what I want, a punching character that can carry a heavy shield.
I am looking for no armor at all just the shield. Being able to become a fiend-like creature is a bonus.
The heavy shield component is not as much for the AC as for it is for role-playing purposes, I wanna carry a coffin lid as a shield, I might be able to get it ruled as a light wooden shield.

To get the unarmed damage progression I've seen
Fist of the Forest ( Complete Divine )
Monk ( PHB )
Sacred Fist ( Defenders of Faith )

But the monk base class is not allowed to carry shields, or it loses quite a bunch of it's benefits, Fist of the Forest are not allowed either, and Sacred Fist brings to the table divine spells, which is good, but I was really looking for something more combative.

For anyone who knows the shows, I'm looking for a spinoff of something like Sebastian Michaelis from black butler or Hagi from Blood plus

The character concept is much like that of the Thayan Knight ( Complete Warrior ) as a monk.

I've already come up with some things I believe DM would accept, such as mixing some of the Thayan shortcomings with the fist of the forest. But I was wondering if any of you know anything that fit those requirements, I'm not very concerned with optimizations, as long as it's not horrible.

We are playing 3.5 and are rather open to supplements and such. I've looked up through all the Complete X series and was not able to find anything.
Thank you all for your time :)

[Bobby Baratheon]

Have you considered taking Fighter levels?

This might prove useful; there's a section on unarmed fighting and two sections on shield use.
http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Fighters'_Handbook_By_Dictum_Mortuum_(3.5e_Optimiz ed_Character_Build)#Unarmed_Strike_Style

Are you planning on using the shield for offense, or defense, or both?

If your campaign's not too high-powered, you could probably get away with combining some Fighter levels (and all those extra feats) with some other class, then go into the prestige class of your choice. Cleric, as in pretty much anything, is useful for a couple of reasons; Divine Might could amp up your damage by a respectable amount (especially if you combine with Dynamic Priest; your Charisma will be through the roof) and the Cleric's spells (and decent chassis) would make you pretty powerful.

I'm not really that familiar with Tome of Battle, but I would imagine dipping Warblade/Crusader/Swordsage could be beneficial. Heck, consider going Barbarian; you could do worse than making a Hulk-style raging barbarian that punches people through walls.

As far as race goes, I would look for something that already has a natural weapon. If not, go nuts with the feral template; it'll give you some pretty nifty scaling abilities, claws, Fast healing, +6 natural armor, and some significant physical stat boosts for the price of +1 LA. I would check with your DM first, though. Feral's a pretty hefty template, and could really stand to be nerfed.

[IcarusWulfe]

The first thing that comes to mind is unarmed Swordsage. You might have to dip Fighter or another class to get shield proficiency, but unarmed Swordsage gives you unarmed strike progression, WIS to AC, and a lot of good maneuvers that will prove very useful to you.

[HalfQuart]

If you don't want to use the coffin lid as an actual shield to get a shield bonus to AC, I'd probably let you just take Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Coffin Lid). You could get around that by dipping into Drunken Master (CW) for the Improvised Weapon ability, but Drunken Master is pretty sub-optimal and requires two crappy feats.

[Aresneo]

The Superior Unarmed Strike feat from Tome of Battle will give you an unarmed damage progression, not as good as the monks but close to it. That frees you up to use the class of your choice.

If your DM is up to allowing pathfinder you may want to look at the Brawler class. It is proficient with shields and has an unarmed strike progression.

[LentilNinja]

You may like this guide to using shields (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?123630-3-X-Person-Man-s-Guide-to-Shields). The guide mentions playing as a Fighter or a Crusader, the former giving you bonus feats which can be spent on shield options and the latter giving good defensive abilities as well as some maneuvers that work with using a shield. I'd give it a good read and browse its options.

[AngrySheep]

After writting a big answer and having my browser to crash and the text wall lost, I'm gonna write the brief version of it >.<

The unarmed swordsage does seem like the way to go here, I've taken a look at the tome of battle and alot of the character flavour I was looking for does seem to be covered over there.
Again, I do have to talk my way to get the sagesword wisdom to AC even with a shield. I don't think it should be much of a problem since I won't be wearing any armor, thus at least AC-wise it's not broken ( or am I missing something ? ). I was thinking of going Diamond Mind and Shadow Hand for the maneuvers, now mechanically speaking I would be trying to achieve

-> Mobile Combat
-> Skill Points
-> Hard-to-Hit

Being able to get the "aggro" with intimidation would be a really nice addition, but I'm worried that most posts in see in that matter stress the importance of having a high Charisma score.
How would you say I should prioritize stats ? We are probably playing a point buy system so I do have some freedom over what to pick stat-wise. I feel like this character needs to have high Dex and Wis, as for the rest since I keep other mods at least +0 I should be good. Is that ok ?
Dex > Wis > Int > Con > Str > Cha ?

I would take either barb or fighter dips, for either fast movement and uncanny dodge or just plain 2 bonus feats with some extra BAB.
I feel like rogue levels would have their sneak attacks wasted here, since I'm not planning to be the team surprise factor, other than that, more often than not there's already a rogue in the party.

EDIT :


Have you considered taking Fighter levels?

Are you planning on using the shield for offense, or defense, or both?

[...]

As far as race goes, I would look for something that already has a natural weapon. If not, go nuts with the feral template; it'll give you some pretty nifty scaling abilities, claws, Fast healing, +6 natural armor, and some significant physical stat boosts for the price of +1 LA. I would check with your DM first, though. Feral's a pretty hefty template, and could really stand to be nerfed.

Shield is just for defense, If I happen to have feats to spare I might get shield bashing feats, but not something I would be focusing on. Mostly the shield is there just to carry a coffin lid.

As for the races I'm afraid I'm stuck with the standard ones, our party has had bad experiences with allowing different races, ppl go big time crazy.

[PraxisVetli]

If you can get your DM to allow Pathfinder material, than Path of War may do exactly what you're looking for. You can grab Iron Tortise for your shield, Broken Blade for unarmed, and since you technically only have one weapon, you should qualify for Scarlet Throne discipline.

[Ruethgar]

For the race, I would go with Lesser Feyri or Teifling if you are Sebastian. Unarmed Swordsage would also do fairly well for him with Setting Sun and Shadow Hand maneuvers, though he has obvious throwing ability that typically wouldn't mesh well with a Swordsage build so I would just ignore it. The hyper defensive build I made would work well with the both of them.
Let's see, Human Devil Bloodline 3/Fighter 2(Bodyguard)/Barbarian 1(City Brawler, Spirit Lion Totem, Dashing Step)/Chaos Monk 2(Passive Way of the Wing Chun Kuen which is obviously not intentionally legal but RAWfully is)

Flaw: Parry
Flaw: Improved Parry
Trait: Cautious
First: Exotic Weapon Proficiency(Ward Cestus)
Human: Deadly Defense
Fighter: Clear the Way, Power Attack
Blood: Dodge
Monk: Combat Expertise, Combat Reflexes, Improve Unarmed Strike, Improved Trip, Cleave
Third: Reckless Offense
Barbarian: Two-Weapon Fighting(Unarmed), Improved Unarmed Strike, Pounce, +2 AC on Charge
Retrain Extras: Weapon Focus(Ward Cestus), Expert Parry, Protective Parry, Allied Defense, Defensive Throw

So, the result is: ECL 5: -1 AC to self, +1d6 unarmed damage, Great Cleave, +2 untyped AC to adjacent allies, able to roll attack vs attack with a +5 bonus to 100% prevent melee attacks Dex times per round(let's say 4) including to protect allies. Against your dodge target, a successful parry lets you attempt a trip and hit them with improved trip. Furthermore, you can flurry of misses 1d3+2 times per round on a consequence free charge at -6 to hit +2 on charge +1 Weapon Focus and Improved Trip them into the ground for +4 hit.

However cheesy the methods, this does not make a very effective character, but it sounds like it could be kind of cool.


Damn, that's the wrong one, still fits though. Add in Cover from the Bodyguard Fighter Dragon #310 and you can add your Combat Expertise bonus twice and your Shield bonus once to all adjacent allies.

[Janthkin]

If you don't want to use the shield for AC purposes, does it need to count as a shield at all? Can you simply have an unarmed swordsage who walks around carrying a coffin lid in one hand all the time? You can always punch with the other hand (or kick/headbutt/knee-strike/etc. - Unarmed Strike is versatile).

Basically, since it's not actually a shield, nor is it conveying the benefits of a shield, then don't CALL it a shield.