Good gestalt with Warlock?

[Robert Blackletter]

I'm playing a gestalt game sometime soon and would love to play a Hellfire warlock, with a binder dip on the other side, was wondering what to use for the other 19 levels, dose any one have any good suggestions?

[Roc Ness]

Swordsage. Definitely Swordsage. Especially if you're making a glaivelock.

[Soranar]

like most gestalt, just add Factotum

you get tons of skill points, better saves, AC, spells and more actions per turn!

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Ranger, preferably using the Mystic Ranger variant. That gets you good BAB, all good saves, and a lot more skill points/level.

Enlightened Spirit in Complete Mage can be taken along side Warlock and everything it grants will stack, since it's all expressed as bonuses and not an increase in effective level for a class feature.

I'd probably go Warlock 9/ Hellfire Warlock 3/ Warlock 8// (Mystic) Ranger 5/ Enlightened Spirit 4/ Binder 1/ Ranger 2/ Enlightened Spirit 6/ Ranger 2.

[Lysander]

Sorcerer isn't a bad match either. You can use your warlock abilities for direct blasty combat and basic utility abilities like continuous flight, and make up for the warlock's deficiencies with a powerful and diverse array of sor/wiz spells.

[Cahokia]

Why not turn that Binder dip into a straight-up Binder?

[Robert Blackletter]

Ranger, preferably using the Mystic Ranger variant. That gets you good BAB, all good saves, and a lot more skill points/level.

Enlightened Spirit in Complete Mage can be taken along side Warlock and everything it grants will stack, since it's all expressed as bonuses and not an increase in effective level for a class feature.

I'd probably go Warlock 9/ Hellfire Warlock 3/ Warlock 8// (Mystic) Ranger 5/ Enlightened Spirit 4/ Binder 1/ Ranger 2/ Enlightened Spirit 6/ Ranger 2.

This sounds quite good, and you say the enlighten spirit blast increase stack with the warlocks? that a fair bit of damage.
I think i found my build
thx

[Prime32]

Swordsage. Definitely Swordsage. Especially if you're making a glaivelock.

Especially especially if you take Eldritch Claws, and possibly Beast Strike.

Best race for such a build is Dragonwrought kobold, since it qualifies for Rapidstrike due to its Dragon type, while its size does not affect claw damage.

[Escheton]

Archivist, with a 1 lvl dip in incarnate for a +6 bonus to umd with some goggles.
seriously, check archivist out. You will UMD the wizards socks off.
Also: Iron Man ftw

[Wings of Peace]

Druid/Planar Shepard with the Dynamic Priest feat.

[true_shinken]

Glaivelocks need high base attack bonus. I'd go with Warblade focusing on boosts and counters on one side.

[Wings of Peace]

Glaivelocks need high base attack bonus. I'd go with Warblade focusing on boosts and counters on one side.

Not necessarily true, although the average AC of monsters scales upwards at higher levels, the average touch AC of monsters tends to stay about the same or even go downwards.

[Optimystik]

The lack of (Master) Spellthief in this thread disturbs me.

[Prime32]

Glaivelocks need high base attack bonus. I'd go with Warblade focusing on boosts and counters on one side.

Not necessarily true, although the average AC of monsters scales upwards at higher levels, the average touch AC of monsters tends to stay about the same or even go downwards.

Higher BAB will grant you more iteratives though.

[Tshern]

Higher BAB will grant you more iteratives though.

Seven levels of Cleric has that effect, too.

[true_shinken]

Not necessarily true, although the average AC of monsters scales upwards at higher levels, the average touch AC of monsters tends to stay about the same or even go downwards.

But the whole point of a glaivelock is to perform iteratives with hellfire blast damage. If you lack the bab, you lack the iteratives.

The lack of (Master) Spellthief in this thread disturbs me.

Master Spellthief is the kind of feat that works wonkily in gestalt. Also, since Practiced Spellcaster does not increase EB's damage, I'm inclined to say Master Spellthief also does not.

Seven levels of Cleric has that effect, too.

Yes, if you invest on Persist or spend an action every round. Since this is gestalt, it is a lot better to just tack Warblade on one side - getting a better skill list, more skill points, the best base attack bonus and the best hit dice. Warblade's counters and boosts are surprinsingly synergetic with a glaivelock, too.

[Tshern]

Better skill list than Cloistered Cleric? But I must agree, even with the Planning domain, a two feat investment can be harsh.

[true_shinken]

Better skill list than Cloistered Cleric? But I must agree, even with the Planning domain, a two feat investment can be harsh.

Cloistered Cleric lacks physical skills such as Balance, Jump and Tumble. Those are important for glaivelocks, who are in the thick of battle and need ways to move while making their full attacks. A DC 40 Tumble check to make a 10-foot step, tempo bloodspikes or Sudden Leap all spring to mind, and side from tempo bloodspikes all require skill checks. Cloistered Clerics could use Knight's Move, a second level swift action teleport spell, but it just teleports you to flanking positions.
Cloistered Clerics also have low hit points and you have to choose between using your spells or your eldritch glaive; it's backwards in the action economy trend. Why go 7 levels into Cleric just to get full-base attack bonus that you could get, among other things, from Warblade?

[Optimystik]

Master Spellthief is the kind of feat that works wonkily in gestalt. Also, since Practiced Spellcaster does not increase EB's damage, I'm inclined to say Master Spellthief also does not.

Who ever said it was meant for the Warlock side?

He 's got the standard Warlock/Binder/HFW schtick on one side... and Spellthief 1/Sorcerer X on the other. (Or perhaps better yet, Spellthief 1/Bard 9/Sublime Chord 2/PrC X on the other.) Now he has a ton more skill points, bardic music, 9th-level spells, CHA synergy, and his Eldritch Blasts steal spells - again, up to 9th-level.

[true_shinken]

Who ever said it was meant for the Warlock side?
Well, I thought you meant Warlock because the thread is about Warlock...
He 's got the standard Warlock/Binder/HFW schtick on one side... and Spellthief 1/Sorcerer X on the other. (Or perhaps better yet, Spellthief 1/Bard 9/Sublime Chord 2/PrC X on the other.) Now he has a ton more skill points, bardic music, 9th-level spells, CHA synergy, and his Eldritch Blasts steal spells - again, up to 9th-level.

He said he is going Warlock/Hellfire Warlock in one side and looking for stuff for the other side. Spellthief/Sublime Chord does not add a lot to his intended Warlock blasting role, it just adds a whole lot of other abilities he might not even care about. Gestalt is all about synergy, and while Sublime Chords are powerful and I love Spellthieves with a passion, they have no synergy with Warlocks; even a Bard has better synergy, since he can sing while he swings his eldritch glaive around.

[Knaight]

I would consider swapping Warblade for Crusader*. The devoted spirit stances that work with Eldritch Glaive are extremely good, particularly if you have a good defensive game (miss chances are key here, though the heavier armor can't actually hurt much) and while there are a few maneuvers you will want to pick up elsewhere, there is a feat for that, though you also want more invocations than you have by default.

*Of course, ToB multiclasses with itself beautifully. You can take both on that side.

[true_shinken]

I would consider swapping Warblade for Crusader*. The devoted spirit stances that work with Eldritch Glaive are extremely good, particularly if you have a good defensive game (miss chances are key here, though the heavier armor can't actually hurt much) and while there are a few maneuvers you will want to pick up elsewhere, there is a feat for that, though you also want more invocations than you have by default.

*Of course, ToB multiclasses with itself beautifully. You can take both on that side.

Though I disagree on heavy armor (you need Tumble as a glaivelock), Crusader really is a very good option. Furious Counterstrike even adds some bonus damage, though if I remember correctly Crusader is a bit weak on the counter/boost territory. Crusader/Warblade//Warlock looks just beautiful, though.

[Optimystik]

He said he is going Warlock/Hellfire Warlock in one side and looking for stuff for the other side. Spellthief/Sublime Chord does not add a lot to his intended Warlock blasting role, it just adds a whole lot of other abilities he might not even care about. Gestalt is all about synergy, and while Sublime Chords are powerful and I love Spellthieves with a passion, they have no synergy with Warlocks; even a Bard has better synergy, since he can sing while he swings his eldritch glaive around.

I disagree completely; Spell Steal has a great deal of synergy with Warlocks. You drain the slots of enemy casters with a touch attack, do damage at the same time, AND gain their spells to cast yourself.

Since you don't like Sublime Chord, let's go with the standard US/AT build.

If you go to Spellthief 2, you can also steal buffs. You are now damaging and dispelling with the same action, plus whatever additional effect your essences are doing. Drop Bard/Sublime Chord and go Unseen Seer/Arcane Trickster instead, and now you are doing a ton of sneak attack damage, on top of your EB and HfB damage, with every shot. You can then subtract some of those d6s to steal more buffs. And on top of all that, you get 9th-level spells, all of which you can cast in light armor without ASF.

[[Warlock Side]]//(Master) Spellthief 2/Sorcerer 3/Unseen Seer 10/AT 5

This build also gets Sniper's Eye, adding (CL/3) more SA dice for even more EB damage - with every shot.

So no, I think you're underestimating Spellthief a great deal.

[true_shinken]

I disagree completely; Spell Steal has a great deal of synergy with Warlocks. You drain the slots of enemy casters with a touch attack, do damage at the same time, AND gain their spells to cast yourself.

That's not what I said, I said it has little to no synergy with glaivelocks, who would want to full-attack as often as possible.

[QUOTE=Optimystik;8884132]This build also gets Sniper's Eye, adding (CL/3) more SA dice for even more EB damage - with every shot.
Hunter's Eye, actually. And it spends a swift action each round, something a glaivelock could need to move around by means of Travel Devotion or Sudden Leap.

So no, I think you're underestimating Spellthief a great deal.

Not at all, I'm really fond of Spellthieves, I even have the only remaining guide on them at Wizard's CharOp board. In a non-gestalt build I could even think of diping spellthief as a glaivelock for movement skills and that +1d6 sneak attack. The thing is in gestalt is the active-passive rule is really, really important - each round spent using eldritch blast would be a waste of those tasty high level spells. A Sublime Chord build would be a lot better off with Crusader on the other side than Warlock and vice-versa. A Spellthief/Warlock/Hellfire Warlock//Warblade/Crusader could be pretty interesting if you get Master Spellthief to stack for EB damage. But otherwise? This is gestalt! A melee character with d4s and d6s across his levels is weak. A melee character lower than 16 at BAB is just doing it wrong.
That said, I think your advice is great for non-gestalt game and perhaps even gestalt standard warlocks, but bad advice for a glaivelock.

[Optimystik]

The OP didn't say anything about deciding on a glaivelock; you and Roc leaped to that particular conclusion. Even Biffo's build doesn't mention it.

[The Shadowmind]

This sounds quite good, and you say the enlighten spirit blast increase stack with the warlocks? that a fair bit of damage.
I think i found my build
thx

Umm, the enlightened spirit is a 0/10 spellcaster PrC, making your caster level suffer bad, being unable to pick your invocations other that the specific ones the class gives you, and it's abilities aren't that great to begin with, and going to the full PrC your eldritch blast in only 1d6 higher than normal.

[Optimystik]

Umm, the enlightened spirit is a 0/10 spellcaster PrC, making your caster level suffer bad, being unable to pick your invocations other that the specific ones the class gives you, and it's abilities aren't that great to begin with, and going to the full PrC your eldritch blast in only 1d6 higher than normal.

It's gestalt - the point of the build is that it doubles his blast damage (because he has Warlock on one side while ES is on the other), his Warlock side handles boosting the caster level, and he gets extra invocations as well.

(The immunity to energy drain and death effects isn't bad either)

Biffo knows what he's doing, don't worry.

[dspeyer]

I'd nominate rogue. Skills and invocations make a nice never-runs-out combination, and sneak attack stacks nicely with EB.

[thompur]

I don't know a lot about CharOp, but Warlock and Binder are my two favorite classes, and Binder synergizes well with any class. I think Warlock/Hellfire Warlock//Binder would be oodles of fun to play.

[Prime32]

Arcane Duelist is nice in gestalt if you dip sorcerer (Coba Strike monk variant can get you the prereqs), assuming that you can designate "touch spell" as your Chosen Weapon and use it with your glaive (the capstone doesn't work though). If you're binding Naberius I assume you have decent Cha to take advantage of your boosts to social skills. IIRC you can use eldritch glaive with Power Attack, so combine it with Dextrous Attack FOR MASSIVE DAMAGE.

I don't know a lot about CharOp, but Warlock and Binder are my two favorite classes, and Binder synergizes well with any class. I think Warlock/Hellfire Warlock//Binder would be oodles of fun to play.

The problem is that you can't use your hellfire blast effectively unless you have Naberius bound, negating the flexibility of binder.