Quick and painless answer to: Tripping

[Akennedy]

I want to apologize for using an entire thread to post this in, but I'm not 100% sure where else I could (maybe Raw Q&A but wasn't sure and didn't want to get yelled at if i was wrong).
So..
What are the staple feats for a tripping build? (and what books are they from?)
Combat expertise
Combat Reflexes
Imp. Trip
EWP Spiked Chain
...(help!)

[Overlard]

Combat Reflexes

Jotunbrund's in there too I think.

[daggaz]

combat reflexes so you can use...

stand still
knockdown

the latter of which goes directly into an improved trip

And yeah, obviously you are going to want some serious reach for this, the spiked chain being the fav, and a large sized character by any means possible.

[Rolaran]

Adding Dodge and Improved Unarmed Strike lets you go for this feat...

Defensive Throw

[Stephen_E]

Elusive Target (Comp Warrior) prereq Dobge+Mobility is good.
Amonst other things (negate Power Attack and screw with flanking) this feat allows you to suck AOOs from moving out of a threatened square, and if they miss you get a free trip on the attacker.

With Mobility - +4 AC against AOOs from moving, and Combat Expertise, you should be able to attract AOOs, and then Trip them and hit them with Improved Trip. Impotant note. Keep reminding the DM that in terms of actual combat it shouldn't be obvious to the enemy that their attacks are what is causeing them to be tripped.

Rings of Spell Storing are Wonderful for casting Righteous Might or Giant Str (Wu Jen spell) on yourself if you have a friendly Cleric or WuJen in the party.

1 Lev of Barbarian is good for Rage, otherwise known as +4 Str/Con.

Exotic Weapon Master (comp Warr) as a trick that allows you to add +2 to your trip.

Flyers that use wings can be tripped. It puts them in a stall. i.e. they drop a large amount of distance very quickly. Effectively this means if they're anywhere near the ground they hit the ground before they can recover. Possibly quite hard.

Good Races from the straight Trip perspective are Orc, Ogre and Troll.

If you have Knockdown and Improved Trip then Great Cleave works quite nice. After Hitting them, tripping them, and hitting them again there is a reasonable chance you've dropped them to neg Hps. That allows you to do it again to someone else.

Always have at least 3 Spiked Chains. Even with all the mods you'll fail on some of those tripp attempts and get tripped back, forcing you to drop the chain. This is why Quick Draw is also nice.

Stephen