Favorite Fighter Build

[SpicyBoi_Nezu]

In an upcoming campaign, my DM has requested my help in leading a party of Newcomers through a Dungeon that he has planned. I though that the best way I could make their learning the easiest, wouldn't be to do everything for them, nor to let them struggle though the Dungeon on their own, but to play as a role model, showing them the mechanics of the game. I decided that I would play a standard fighter, starting at level 5, playing up to around level 8 or 9 (Maybe 10, depending on how well the campaign goes), so I wanted to ask what the playgrounds' favorite fighter builds are.

**Disclaimer**
I'm not asking for optimized builds, just a simple fighter build that would be fun for me to play. I'm also using the term "Fighter" loosely, because I really just want to play a typical versatile melee fighter, therefore, ranger, monk, barbarian, and various other classes, like Crusader, Knight, Samurai, and Paladin. Because we might play up until level 10, Prestige classes are welcome, I saw a knight/devoted defender build on a separate forum a little while back, and it looked pretty interesting.

[pabelfly]

How does a psychic warrior Giant Octopus sound?

Giant Octopus 2/Swordsage 1/Psychic Warrior 2

Giant Octopus gets the Amphibious template to breathe out of water.

Psychic Warrior drops the second feat in exchange for the Travel Mantle. Boosts land movement speed to 30ft and gives you a swift action teleport to get your full round of attacks off.

Swordsage lets you qualify for the Shadow Blade feat, and get dex to damage for your six weapon attacks (not your Bite though).

When you get to level 6, take any class you want for a one-level dip (perhaps Fighter for a bonus feat). You can still get extra PP thanks to the feat Practiced Manifester. If your DM is a stickler for multiclassing penalties, pick the "Additional Favored Class" feat so you can start levelling Psychic Warrior without worrying about said penalties.

Important Feats:
Multiweapon Fighting
Weapon Finesse
Shadow Blade
Practiced Manifester

Fill out the rest of your feats how you like.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

1. Be large size or count as large size. Half-Ogre in RoD is +2 LA and actually large, Goliath in RoS is +1 LA with powerful build. Pick whichever one can begin play with the level adjustment already bought off (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/races/reducingLevelAdjustments.htm), so you'll start out down a bit of xp instead of an entire character level. If buying off a level adjustment isn't allowed, Enlarge Person + Permanency is an option, but it's susceptible to dispelling unless you cast both of those yourself (such as from a Ring of Spell Storing).

2. ACFs and substitution levels: Dungeoncrasher in Dungeonscape, Zhentarim Soldier (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20060327a) (reflavored if necessary), Dead Levels (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/cwc/20061013a), and possibly gain Tumble and/or Gather Information as class skills (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20070228a) in exchange for others.

3. Level Build: Fighter 9/ Warblade 10/ Fighter 1. This gets all the Zhentarim Soldier benefits, the 9th level ability is definitely worthwhile. At 20th level the Fighter 10 bonus feat can be Weapon Supremacy in PH2 if you have all the other prerequisite feats for it.

4. What to pick: Definitely get Power Attack, Knock-Back (RoS), Combat Reflexes, Imperious Command (DotU), and possibly EWP: Spiked Chain (or Greathorn Minotaur Greathammer if you're already large size). Try to get Improved Trip and Knock-Down (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/divine/divineAbilitiesFeats.htm#knockDown), and consider Weapon Focus/Specialization and Melee Weapon Mastery (PH2). Warblade maneuvers should be mostly Iron Heart and Stone Dragon, with White Raven charge maneuvers and choice boosts/stances from Tiger Claw and Diamond Mind. Get the Never Outnumbered skill trick in CS as well.

5. Gear: Get the Sudden Stunning property in DMG2 on your primary weapon. Try to get Wrathful Healing from Enemies and Allies as well, but it's very expensive. Get the Fearsome property in Drow of the Underdark on your armor (it was published more recently than MIC so that's the most current version). Otherwise cover all the necessary magic items (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?187851-3-5-Lists-of-Necessary-Magic-Items).

6. What it does: You hit an opponent, whether with an attack or an AoO, and they get knocked away from you and possibly knocked prone. That means they're wasting a move action to get up and another move action to get back into position, i.e. an entire round before they're contributing to the fight again. If you knock them into a solid obstacle (including the ground if you're flying above them) they take absurd damage from dungeoncrasher. In addition to your formidable attacks and the crowd controls they impose, you can intimidate an opponent you threaten as a swift action each turn, if successful they cower for a round and are shaken on the following round (and get -2 to your next intimidate, which escalates them to frightened for the duration of everything that contributed to it). Never Outnumbered allows you to affect all opponents within ten feet with that once per encounter, causing them all to cower for a round and be shaken the following round. You can even spend a move action (Fearsome armor) to intimidate again, the same creature or a different one, and you'll still be able to make an attack or use a martial strike on the same turn.

[MisterKaws]

OP says "keep it simple" and "up to 10th level", and you guys pull an Anthropomorphic Giant Octopus PsiWar/Swordsage and a 20th-level Goliath Dungeoncrasher-Zhentarim Fighter/Warblade...

Read the OP carefully before wasting your time typing text walls.

That aside, let's actually talk about a "simple" build. The most effective Fighter build you can get straight out of the PHB is a Spiked Chain user with Combat Reflexes and Improved Trip, abusing Attacks of Opportunity for battlefield control. Just using those two, combined with decent items and some buffs from your friendly neighborhood wizard will make you a pretty effective tank/damage dealer early on. It isn't Ubercharger/Full-attack Dungeoncrasher/Hulking Hurler levels of effective, but it's good enough for a low-OP party.

[Falontani]

Kalashtar Swashbuckler 3/Hit and Run Sneak Attack Fighter 1/Monk 1/Warmind 5/Duelist 10
1 Swashbuckler : Exotic Weapon Proficiency: Broadblade Short Sword (if flaws are allowed, grab dodge here, and two weapon fighting), Cautious trait
2 Hit and Run Sneak Attack Fighter
3 Swashbuckler : Dodge (if flaws are allowed, nab Craven)
4 Swashbuckler
5 Denying Way Monk : Combat Expertise
6 Warmind : Improved Combat Expertise
7 Warmind
8 Warmind
9 Warmind : Mobility
10 Warmind
11 Duelist
12 Duelist : Path of Shadows
13 Duelist
14 Duelist
15 Duelist : Dancing with Shadows
16 Duelist
17 Duelist
18 Duelist : Allied Defense
19 Duelist
20 Duelist

Nab up to a +21 bonus to ac to yourself and adjacent allies at the cost of 1 round with a penalty, enjoy very high armor class that you can share with others. Drop the ac boost for one round to get a bonus to hit. Or tank your to hit for huge boosts to ac. Attack with aoes. Won't be stealing the spotlight with great damage, but can still do decently with 1d6 + str + int + dex + sneak attack if they are flatfooted.
Even if no flaws wield a second blade in the offhand. Enchant the offhand with Defending, it still grants the +1 ac to yourself and adjacent allies, and can grant you up to a +5 insight bonus to ac.

Your ac: 10 + dex mod + wis mod + 4 fighting defensively + 21 Improved Combat Expertise + 10 Duelist + 6 inertial armor + 4 thought shield, before counting items like natural armor, deflection, monk's belt, or a defending weapon. That's 41 touch ac before equipment or stats. Get a wizard to amf you and most dedicated martials will be missing you.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

How about one of the following:

Dragonborn (Heart) Warforged, Crusader 5/ Hellreaver X, take Adamantine Body, Stone Power, and Entangling Exhalation. A Warforged keeps their type and subtype when becoming Dragonborn, and they get to keep everything that comes with those. This build would typically dip Binder prior to taking Hellreaver to bind Naberius, so the Hellreaver 5 ability is sustainable. If you may not even reach 10 it's not necessary, but if the game keeps going you'll want the one Binder level and only five Hellreaver total, all the rest should be Crusader.

Any race (Warforged works here as well), Ardent 2/ Crusader 3/ Sanctified Mind 6. Say he visited the Otyugh Hole to get Iron Will without spending a feat on it. Be sure to take Practiced Manifester, an Ardent gets higher level powers based on manifester level instead of effective class level (Ardent 2 should be at his 5th level). Mantles should be Time, Freedom, and Energy, and always use Substitute Powers (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20070629a). If the game keeps going you can finish the build with Slayer (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/prestigeClasses/slayer.htm).

[Eldariel]

I'm partial to Warblade. Hmm:
Ranger 2/Fighter 1/Barbarian 1/Warblade 6/Eternal Blade 10.

Though on a level this low, I'd rather use:
Ranger 2/Warblade 3 or straight Warblade 5


Warblade 5 would have 3rd level maneuvers including Conanesque Iron Heart Surge and the awesome White Raven Tactics, but Ranger 2 gives you bow proficiencies, a lot of wilderness skills, Rapid Shot (so you're not completely useless when forced to resort to your bow), access to Ranger Wands (including Wand of Cure Light Wounds for the means of party sustenance) and some minor bonuses like Trapfinding or Track, Favored Enemy and Wild Empathy (which you can trade for Chat With Plants/Animals, which you definitely should do).

Taking Warblade on level 5 has the advantage of allowing you to pick 2nd level maneuvers. Of course, your low overall maneuvers known count is a bit of an annoyance, but still better than nothing.

[DEMON]

OP says "keep it simple" and "up to 10th level", and you guys pull an Anthropomorphic Giant Octopus PsiWar/Swordsage and a 20th-level Goliath Dungeoncrasher-Zhentarim Fighter/Warblade...

Read the OP carefully before wasting your time typing text walls.

Mind if I sig this quote?

To OP: Warforged Fighter 1-4 / Warblade rest.
Start with the Warforged Fighter sub level 1 and the Adamantine Body feat. Take additional Fighter levels if you need bonus feats and then switch to Warblade for the rest of the game.
Should be both simple enough and serviceable, while by no means trivializing the encounters for the rest of the group.

[Darrin]

Saph's Horizon Tripper (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?80415-The-Horizon-Tripper-(Core-Melee-Build)) is a good build to show off what melee can do in Core. (Even outside of Core, most of my meatbag builds tend to be a mix of Ranger/Fighter/Barb.)

Next build is Not called GREAT Club for nothing (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?49522-Not-called-GREAT-Club-for-nothing), which is sort of a demonstration of "What can a Fighter do with status effects?" This inspired my own Three Mountain Morningstars (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showsinglepost.php?p=18367975&postcount=68) build.

Beyond that, the meatbag stuff tends to get a little more fiddly than what you're probably looking for.

[MisterKaws]

Mind if I sig this quote?

To OP: Warforged Fighter 1-4 / Warblade rest.
Start with the Warforged Fighter sub level 1 and the Adamantine Body feat. Take additional Fighter levels if you need bonus feats and then switch to Warblade for the rest of the game.
Should be both simple enough and serviceable, while by no means trivializing the encounters for the rest of the group.

Hah, feel free to do it :)

[AnimeTheCat]

So, one of my favorite fighter builds when you're not starting at level 1 is a mix of Fighter and Rogue with the rogue's sneak attack switched out for fighter bonus feats. Fighter 2/Feat Rogue 2/Class X or whatever. Basically, you can fill 2 roles and have the feats to support it. You can skill monkey and you can "tank". Here's what I usually go with:

Race: Strongheart Halfling
1. Racial Bonus Feat: Combat Expertise
1. Level 1 Feat: Exotic Weapoon Proficiency: Broadblade Shortsword
1. Feat Rogue 1: Two Weapon Fighting
2. Fighter Bonus Feat 1: Improved Shield Bash
3. Level 3 Feat: Shield Focus (Heavy)
3. Fighter Bonus Feat 2: Shield Ward
4. Feat Rogue Bonus Feat 2: Weapon Focus (Short Sword)

For Future Feats I recommend Picking up Weapon Specialization (Short Sword) and then Melee Weapon Mastery (Piercing) and get Shield Spikes.

Now, this isn't a High Damage Build, nor is it a cliche tripping build. However it is fluid enough in composition at this point that it can go in a few directions. I would recommend starting with an Int of 14 and your Dex as high as possible. Strength would be nice around 14, but it's more likely that you'll have 12 or so. Con is always nice to have high, and I wouldn't recommend a wisdom any less than 10. If you want to have social skills, it's really quite alright for you to have a charisma of 8. A skill point makes up for those attribute points at character creation and you'll have plenty of skill points. The skills help with the "my fighter can't do anything" syndrome out of combat, and even leading up to combat having that nice pad of move silently/hide/spot/search/listen that you wouldn't normally have from Fighter really makes up for the missing BAB and HP.

Also, you'll not that this build is only up to level 4 at this point, and that's what I mean about the fluid composition of the build. At 5 you can take the Spirit Lion Totem Barbarian for Pounce with the Whirling Frenzy Rage Variant if you would like, or you could go a different route and pick up something else that gives utility, like Psychic Warrior or one of the intiator classes. All three complement the build well in their own different ways. Swordsage really brings the "utility" of the maneuvers, but does limit you to light armor only. Because you're using a high dex build, you're probably going to be in light armor anyway, but since you're using a shield you won't be getting the wisdom to AC anyway. Only pick this if you have a 10 in your Wisdom or you don't care about the wisdom to AC feature. As far as I've been able to tell in what I've read, that's the only class feature you'll lose out on, and the tradeoff is a lot of maneuvers from a lot of disciplines, so lots of versatility. Alternatively, you can pick Crusader which gives you the cliche "tank" like abilities, along with some shield-specific maneuvers and basic healing (to further increase your surviability) locked behind the "Devoted Spirit" discipline. If you want to maximize your basic survivability using a martial intiator, Crusader is your go-to. Lastly, warblade enhances your ability to reliably and regularly use your maneuvers to increase your damage. They have the least offensive recovery mechanic, allowing you to simultaneously make a standard attack while recovering all lost maneuvers. Warblade Is probably the best initiator if you want to primarily enhance your damage with some utility as well. Further, Warblades synergyze well with Int, which you already want decently high for Combat Expertise and Skill points. For Psychic warrior, I recommend picking up something OTHER than expansion. Something like Biofeedback for DR 2/- or similar. Be careful with Psychic warrior though as they are Wisdom based, and you probably don't have the points for a 14 Int, High Dex, a respectable Con and Strength score, AND a good Wisdom Score.

Hope this helps.

[SirNibbles]

Mystic Ranger (Dragon Magazine #336, page 105) is a good option. It would allow you to showcase how spells work without stealing the spotlight, as well as having good martial power, and you can always have a tiny bit of healing as backup. It's also nice to have 6 skill points per level.

Human Mystic Ranger 5 is an easy enough start. I'd go for the Archery Style. Hopefully it will allow you to stay back a bit and let the new players handle things close up. Regarding Favored Enemies, Favored Enemy (Arcanists) and Favored Enemy (Undead) are my recommendations, though you might know better what your DM likes to toss at you or what enemies will be present in the module he's running. Feats and spells are really up to you.

[Climowitz]

Play a tripper. You get to show special attacks and also be effective.

[mabriss lethe]

Play a tripper. You get to show special attacks and also be effective.

Pretty much this: I'd say go straight fighter get power attack and load up on improved special maneuver feats, maybe even some bad ones if you have room. Be competent in as many as possible. If you plan on showing them the dynamics of the game, it's good to show them why some options are sub-par.

Using something like Human Zhentarim/Dungeoncrasher would carry you through to level 10 without much effort and would be about the maximum level of fiddly that I'd use in this exercise.

[noob]

Lion totem barbarian 1/fighter 1/martial feat wizard 1/more barb and fighter/abjurant champion you use to only cast shield, mage armor and resistance against elements for all your life(forget entirely the existence of all the other spells)

[Ken Murikumo]

High strength Dungeon Crasher fighter with shock trooper and improved / greater trip & bullrush.

As was mentioned, you get to show off special moves and bullrush enemies into each other to lock them down. If a player is in trouble, bullrush your enemy into his, trip them both then you and the player can go nuts on the prone enemies.

Get a brutal surge weapon for more fun.