How to make a melee spell caster?

[Salgood]

Im doing a dnd campaign where i was origonally gonna be a more melee focused shaman but because of the game not havinng many players my dm is letting us use the gestalt unearthed arcana rules too fill more roles in the party. I was looking at the rules and was thinking about doing a wu jen fighter gestalt however I realized that the party would have no healer if i did so and i know that none of them would be interested in filling that role. My question is how i can be a melee focused spellcaster and still remain an effective hearler? For some additional information, im using a trident and am in a sea based setting. Magic items (atleast cheaper ones) wont be an issue as my dm is putting in an artificer for us to get magic items from without much haggling. Id also be down for changing around the wu gen and shaman combo as long as i can cast normal magic spells and divine healing spells while making it work im all good with it. Any advice would be appreciated thank you :)

[Inevitability]

Bard/Crusader gets all good saves, d10 hit die, full BAB, with full bardic music, martial initiating, and spellcasting advancement. CLW is on your spell list, so buy or crafts some wands of that and you should be good to go as a healer. Grab Battle Caster to cast spells in medium armor and primarily focus on strength/charisma. Being a crusader also gives you access to some in-combat healing maneuvers, and you can grab Song of the White Raven at later levels to use inspire courage as a swift action (the secondary effect should probably be errata'd out if you're playing gestalt).

edit: Just realized you can also be a divine bard (UA) to get around the armor issue, though that requires keeping wisdom up as a moderately important secondary stat.

[Darg]

If you want to stick to just wu Jen, you could pick up arcane disciple healing domain and spell mastery and uncanny forethought or alacratous cogitation and versatile spellcaster.

That is 3 feats though. If you like shaman as an alternative, you already get 3/4 BAB. Competition, Fury, and War domains grant you divine power. The nobility domain grants you divine favor. Those are the main fighting booster spells. Anyways, I do recommend at least getting the domain spontaneity feat so you can spontaneously cast from your 3 domain lists to open up your arsenal of spells.

[Gnaeus]

Honestly, in gestalt, there are dozens of ways to make melee spell casters. A Duskblade//Cleric might be good at healing and channel bad touch cleric spells. The classic Sorcerer//Paladin is lighter on healing but tanky. Warblade//wizard is another classic, but you will need another trick to get your healing spells on list. Dread Necro//Antipaladin is limited but powerful, and very good at heals in the right party. Dread Necro//Cleric can use their 2 turn/rebuke pools to power DMM. Druid//monk is another simple option that can heal, cast or melee. You really have a LOT of options.

If, as you say, item availability is good because of a pet artificer, you probably don't even need a lot of heal spells. Something like paladin or ranger would get them on your list and then you buy a wand. Or you get something that can UMD. Or you get something that can UMD and then you spend a couple of feats to get an improved familiar who can UMD things for you. I assume because you are here and talking about gestalt that you are looking for reasonably high opp plans, but if your party isn't heavily optimized your options only increase. Wu Jen//Dragon Shaman isn't as strong as some of the above, but throwing out a fast healing aura and then just playing like a Wu Jen with more HP and better AC is easy. Make sure you get a wand chamber for that trident.

One question you want to answer is what kind of melee/caster are you AKA what is your "active class". Are you a melee caster that plans on casting harmful spells in combat? That indicates bad touches on list, quickened spells, maybe duskblade. Or are you a melee caster that plans to cast half a dozen all day buffs and then giant size yourself on round 1 and act like a buffed fighter?

[Glimbur]

Melee focused spellcaster and healer is cleric. You could gestalt full BAB onto it, Crusader or Paladin fit the flavor nicely. Avoid barbarian since raging and casting do not get along, but most other full BAB classes would bring something to the table.

You can also heal + frontline with paladin, then find something that synergizes with it, bard or sorcerer in core do OK. Armor is a bit of a hassle but there are ways, from Luminous Armor spell to special materials and real Armor. Your fixing of effects, like curses or diseases etc, will be a bit weaker without cleric.

Or you can get weird with Bard/Totemist. 3/4 BAB, bard casting buffing Incarnum stuff to handle melee. Use wands to heal, other effects... uh... UMD scrolls? But you get the passive incarnum buffs plus natural attacks on top of bardic goodness.

[Clause]

NINJA from OA, eith the Wu-jen is very tematic and u have full bab.
from the cure spells, tou can simpli take some feats, like: arcane disciple, and silver hands or a reserve feat that UPs healing.

[Forrestfire]

My favored way to do a melee spellcaster is a "dragon kicks" build: by combining the Draconic Heritage, Draconic Claw, and Snap Kick feats, you get a unique playstyle that gets to cast spells alongside both moving and making multiple attacks per round.

Draconic Claw gives you a pair of claws, but more importantly, lets you make a claw attack as a swift action in any round where you cast a standard action spell. Snap Kick gives you a bonus unarmed strike every time you take an action that gives an attack. Thus, once it comes online at 6th level, your turns become one of the following:



Move up to your speed, cast a touch-range spell, and attack four times in two pairs; the first is a touch spell delivered through unarmed strike and a Snap Kick attack (both at –2 to hit), and the second is a claw attack as a swift action from Draconic Claw and a Snap Kick attack (both at –4 to hit due to using Snap Kick twice this turn).
Move up to your speed, cast a non-touch spell, and attack two times; you use Draconic Claw to make a swift action attack and then Snap Kick off of it (both at –2 to hit).


Note that Complete Arcane lets you functionally do a duskblade-style spell channel with unarmed strikes as long as you have Improved Unarmed Strike.


Needless to say, this is pretty good. Though the feat costs and build constraints mean it won’t match raw damage with most full attackers in single-track play, in gestalt it easily keeps up. It's a gish build that, rare for 3.5, actively uses spells at the same time as attacking, rather than alternating turns (or primarily using buff spells and then full attacking). I like ranger as a basis for it (I wrote a whole guide about how good ranger is (https://hexdrake.support/ranger_handbook/)), but if you want something simple, even just fighter would do a great job.

Multi-touch spells are particularly good for this, since they let you deliver a touch on each attack in your combo.

For a build that wants to play as both an offensive martial spellcaster and a healer, I would probably do something like the following: sorcerer 20//crusader 20. It's not as amazing as it could be but it's simple and straightforward for the approach.

Race: Silverbrow Human (Dragon Magic)



Level

Class 1

Class 2

Feats

Notes



1

Dragonblood Sorcerer 1

Crusader 1

Improved Unarmed Strike
Draconic Heritage (class bonus, Complete Arcane)
Draconic Claw (human bonus, Complete Arcane)

Dragonblood Sorcerer substitution level trades familiar for Draconic Heritage; main damage spells are parching touch (Sandstorm) and shocking grasp.



2

Sorcerer 2

Crusader 2





3

Sorcerer 3

Crusader 3

Maximize Spell




4

Sorcerer 4

Crusader 4


Make sure to learn wings of cover from Races of the Dragon to protect yourself in a pinch.



5

Sorcerer 5

Crusader 5


Domain Access ACF (healing domain, Complete Champion)



6

Sorcerer 6

Crusader 6

Snap Kick (Tome of Battle)




7

Sorcerer 7

Crusader 7


Learn combust from the Spell Compendium as a 2nd-level spell for more damage.



8

Sorcerer 8

Crusader 8


Feign Death ACF (Exemplars of Evil)



9

Sorcerer 9

Crusader 9

Arcane Disciple (healing domain, Complete Divine)

You now have each spell in the healing domain 2/day



10

Sorcerer 10

Crusader 10





11

Sorcerer 11

Crusader 11


Learn storm touch from Magic of Eberron as a 5th-level spell; this is now your main damage spell.



12

Sorcerer 12

Crusader 12

Mastery of Night and Day

All your cure and inflict spells are Maximized for free from now on



13

Sorcerer 13

Crusader 13





14

Sorcerer 14

Crusader 14





15

Sorcerer 15

Crusader 15

Superior Unarmed Strike

Learn scalding touch from Magic of Eberron as a 7th-level spell; this is an upgrade/alternate to storm touch.



16

Sorcerer 16

Crusader 16





17

Sorcerer 17

Crusader 17





18

Sorcerer 18

Crusader 18

Open slot




19

Sorcerer 18

Crusader 19


Learn imprisonment as a 9th-level spell; you can deliver this with an unarmed strike to save-or-lose low Will save enemies.



20

Sorcerer 20

Crusader 20






You're a Strength and Charisma-centric build, in this case. Important magic items include stuff to boost your unarmed strikes (necklace of natural weapons from Savage Species is good for that, and the gauntlets of heartfelt blows from Dragon are great for Cha-based melee characters too) and boosts to both Charisma and Wisdom (since you need Wis for your Arcane Disciple stuff). If your group uses flaws, then you can push Maximize Spell to 1st level and take Mastery of Night and Day earlier. For your maneuvers, don't forget that you can use strikes for damage and healing as well! When you don't want to spend a slot on a cure spell, crusader has strikes for healing that will hit hard and still proc Snap Kick for a second attack, while leaving your swift action open. This is especially good for turns after you've been forced to use an immediate action to protect yourself; sorcerer's access to wings of cover lets you stay safe from dangerous attacks even with your low AC, and your high base hp should keep you safe otherwise.

[Rebel7284]

My favorite sort of gestalt character is something like:



Level

Class 1

Class 2



1

(Martial) Wizard 1

Factotum 1



2

Wizard 2

Factotum 2



3

Wizard 3

Factotum 3



4

Wizard 4

Factotum 4



5

Wizard 5

Factotum 5



6

Swiftblade 1

Wizard 6



7

Spelldancer 1

Factotum 6



8

Swiftblade 2

Factotum 7



9

Swiftblade 3

Factotum 8



10

Swiftlbade 4

Wizard 7



11

Swiftlbade 5

*



12

Swiftlbade 6

*



13

Swiftblade 7

Wizard 8



14

Swiftblade 8

*



15

Swiftblade 9

*




etc.

You end up with
- Nearly full BAB.
- INT added to virtually everything.
- Two sources of extra actions.
- Metamagic cost mitigation so that your buffs can be persisted.
- A bunch of free levels that you can use to give yourself a secondary theme, such as healing
- Miss chance

[Gruftzwerg]

I was looking at the rules and was thinking about doing a wu jen fighter gestalt however I realized that the party would have no healer if i did so and i know that none of them would be interested in filling that role. My question is how i can be a melee focused spellcaster and still remain an effective hearler?

Since you intend to pick a non healer base class, we can narrow down the available options:

a) Dragonblooded + Draconic Aura: Vigor (feat)
Sorc ACF or just pick Silverbrow Human as race to get dragonblooded. The feat gives a fast healing aura that increases in strength as you level. Sole downside is that it only heals up to half of maxHP. But can be combined with the other options here.

b) UMD Wand for healing
Either pick a class with UMD or get it via a dip into Human Paragon. There is even a monk ACF with UMD as class skill.

c) Shadow Sun Ninja 1
A single lvl dip gives you the ability to alter between negative energy charged Unarmed Strikes and positive energy charged Unarmed Strikes. You can make once charged attack per turn and have to start with negative energy first. For that, either get an undead familiar or be a necropolitain. Finally if used for healing (even if you heal undead with negative energy) it becomes a free action (still limited to 1/turn).
Effectively you can heal your buddies every second turn with your base Unarmed Strike damage + WIS.
Get a Necklace of Natural Attacks + Sizing to size your US to colossal size for bigger heals.
Finally you could enter Enlightened Fist which progresses monk US damage and arcane casting (sadly only 8/10 IIRC).

[Inevitability]

c) Shadow Sun Ninja 1
A single lvl dip gives you the ability to alter between negative energy charged Unarmed Strikes and positive energy charged Unarmed Strikes. You can make once charged attack per turn and have to start with negative energy first. For that, either get an undead familiar or be a necropolitain. Finally if used for healing (even if you heal undead with negative energy) it becomes a free action (still limited to 1/turn).
Effectively you can heal your buddies every second turn with your base Unarmed Strike damage + WIS.
Get a Necklace of Natural Attacks + Sizing to size your US to colossal size for bigger heals.
Finally you could enter Enlightened Fist which progresses monk US damage and arcane casting (sadly only 8/10 IIRC).

Another good way to get healing is by using the fire elemental granted by Distracting Ember to drain positive energy from, though that's more of an out-of-combat healing thing. Assuming you're qualifying for SSN with a swordsage dip, Distracting Ember isn't a bad pick to begin with.

[lylsyly]

If your DM will allow Mystic Ranger and you play Cleric on the other side you will get full cleric casting (including spontaneous heal spells). d8 HD, full BAB, all good saves and there are a l0t of good spells on the ranger list the best of which would be swift haste as a 2nd level spell, free archery feats to add to your tool box, favored enemy which is a good melle boost. better skill points with a better list. adding the other ranger abilities just adds some extra tool in you box since you are in an undersized party.

[SirNibbles]

Since you're gestalt, a lot of partial-casting PRCs become viable: you can still get full casting progression by taking the levels at the right time.

For example, you could go with Bonded Summoner (Miniatures Handbook, page 16) to get yourself a Medium Elemental familiar at 1st level all the way up to an Elder Elemental at 9th level. I think something along these lines is especially useful since your party is low on players, so you get extra action economy (and flanking).

Havoc Mage (Miniatures Handbook, page 20) and its ability to cast 2nd/4th/8th level spells in melee combat, even with your hands full, without provoking AoOs, and while making a melee attack suddenly becomes a lot better when you don't have to worry about losing two levels of casting.

Swiftblade (Web) would also fit in well with its full BAB and 6/10 casting.