Build suggestions

[shadow_archmagi]

My campaign is drawing to a close. My time as DM is, thankfully, nearly over. Well, quite possibly the new guy will be even worse, but hey. The other player (In the new campaign, there will only be two players. We're gestalt to compensate.) has already called dibs on being caster-guy, taking a Wizard-Cleric.

I'm wondering just what I should go. I'm tempted to play a Rogue/Ranger who uses pistols and has a bear animal companion named Chewy, but I thought I'd see if you guys could come up with something better.

Level is 13. I'd rather not be a swordsage (been working a lot with them lately)

[Jack_Simth]

My campaign is drawing to a close. My time as DM is, thankfully, nearly over. Well, quite possibly the new guy will be even worse, but hey. The other player (In the new campaign, there will only be two players. We're gestalt to compensate.) has already called dibs on being caster-guy, taking a Wizard-Cleric.

I'm wondering just what I should go. I'm tempted to play a Rogue/Ranger who uses pistols and has a bear animal companion named Chewy, but I thought I'd see if you guys could come up with something better.

Level is 13. I'd rather not be a swordsage (been working a lot with them lately)

Suggestion:
Collaborate with the other player. If he plays a Druid//Wizard, and you play a Druid//Ninja, and you both take the Ape animal companion, you've got two "characters" in the party that are 3/4ths meatshields (the Apes), the pair of you have the Divine role covered (a Druid is about 8/9ths of a classic Divine character, and you've got two of them), he has the Arcanist role covered, and you have the traps covered. Make sure his Wisdom is just enough to be sufficent to cast his highest-level Druid spell (and that he can boost it with permanent items for eventually getting 9th level spells) as a method of reducing MAD, keep Reduce Animal prepared at all times (for when you find yourself in medium-restricted territory), and you're set. You, of course, use Wildshape heavily and boost Wisdom up as high as you can manage (as a Druid//Ninja, Wisdom feeds your Ki abilities, your spellcasting, and your AC).

If you can't collaberate, that's okay. Play a Ninja//druid anyway - you'll still have a meatshield, and neither of you are exactly squishy.

[Chosen_of_Vecna]

You should be another Caster guy. But you should be Wizard//Factotum. Then you can win Init over him, and proceed to take as many standard actions as you need to beat the encounter.

[CASTLEMIKE]

Tough to do better than a Druid -5 Planar Shepherd - 8/Cloistered Cleric - 13 (or 11 if LN taking 2 levels of Church Inquisitor at levels 4 and 5).

[Jack_Simth]

Oh, and if you want to do something crazy, while still actually covering the skill monkey role he expects:

Dwarf Wizard//Wizard

Feats:
1) Heighten Spell
3) Craft Wondrous Item
5) Fiery Burst (reserve); can replace with any of the direct-damage reserve feats available at this level; for demolishing mechanical traps, primarily, but also useful for when you're battling mooks.
6) Natural Spell (a bit of a "duh" for Druids)
9) Summon Elemental (reserve) (for tripping traps, and manipulating stuff you'd rather not touch)
10) Dimensional Jaunt (reserve) (for getting out of grapples or other tight spots at whim)
12) Minor Shapeshift (reserve) (you want it primarily for the temp HP every round)

Use your Druid spell slots to power the Reserve feats, and use your Wizard spell slots to actually do stuff in battle
Spells to keep prepared:
Baleful Polymorph (for Minor Shapeshift); don't Heighten this one
Tree Stride (for Dimensional Jaunt); Heighten this one if you like (increased range is nice), although the primary reason for it is to escape tight quarters, so that's not necessary.
Summon Nature's Ally VI (yes, you need to prepare it - for Summon Elemental)
Fire Storm (for Fiery Burst); replace with a different spell if you choose to go with a different reserve feat.

Spells to keep prepared on the Wizard side:
Knock (for opening doors when you don't want to destroy them)
Invisibility (Dimensional Jaunt is limited by sight, not line of effect - and Invisibility applies to objects). You can go through walls or closed doors this way, although you can't bring anyone else with you.

Spells to Permanency:
Arcane Sight
Tongues (it permits you to speak any language, with no requirement that the base form be able to speak - which means you can do so while Wildshaped, technically).

Tactics:
Traps: use the Summon Elemental reserve feat to have a Medium Earth Elemental go everywhere you're planning to go (before you do), and look ahead with Arcane Sight. The Earth Elemental will trip all mechanical traps that you would (he weighs in at 800 pounds), while Arcane Sight auto-locates all magical traps. Between the two, you're actually better at it than a dedicated rogue. Once a trap is found, zap it to death with Fiery Burst, and move on.
Doors: Fiery Burst them to death. Or just have the Earth Elemental batter them down. Whichever.
Chests: Cast Knock, and have a Medium Earth Elemental from your Summon Elemental reserve feat open it.
Stealth: Turn into something Tiny or smaller with Wild Shape; this will give you a crazy-good Hide check, out of the box. Convince the Cleric/Wizard to keep a few Silence spells prepared for when you need to do this, and you'll have no need of Move Silently. Make sure to max out Listen and Spot.
Combat: You're a Wizard. Use basic Wizard combat tactics - stand in the back, and zap away. Alternately, Wild Shape into a battle-ready form and go all out with it, using Minor Shapeshift every round to extend your HP.
Social Interaction: Make sure to take ranks in Diplomacy, and you're covered.

Skills:
You want: Handle Animal, Spot, Listen, Diplomacy, Terran, Ignan, Aquan, and Auran (for when you're talking to your elementals from Summon Elemental). Some cross-class ranks in Move Silently are recommended, but not required.

Items:
Get some Leather Barding for your animal companion. Seriously. Stock up on Wilding Clasps for your stuff. Make sure to get a strand of Prayer Beads that includes a Bead of Karma - it's worth an extra +1 on your castings of Greater Magic Fang - and it's well worth it for that alone.

Long-term buffs:
You want several castings of Barkskin, as well as Greater Magic Fang. Trade Barkskin for Magic Vestments with your party companion - you want yourself and your animal companion covered with both. Make sure to keep enough Barkskins handy that you can get you, animal companion, and party companion covered all day (shouldn't be too hard). Make sure to GMF each of your Animal Companion's natural weapons seperately.

[FlyMolo]

Ooh! Ooh! Thri-kreen War Mind/Psy War//Barbarian, fighter, or Psion. Possible Dervish?

EWP 1h bastard sword
Multiweapon fighting tree, Cleave, Great cleave, PA, etc.
Up The Walls and leap attack.
Expansion power.

Huge insect people dropping off the ceiling and simple scathing the ground down to the bedrock. Seriously, 4 bastard sword attacks, cleave attempts, and sweeping strike? Win.

Cheese potential:
Take one level of crusader, use the extra intiator levels to pick up that stance that lets you take a 5FS every time you drop an enemy, then dip into Lion Totem Barbarian. Shock Trooper a must. You find a war, right? Then you charge the enemy, pounce, and using the Crusader stance and Great Cleave and Shock Trooper, mow your way up and down the ranks like a small child eating corn on the cob. Your chances of missing any given enemy are about 1/20, so you'd eventually lose your attacks, right? Wrong. With sweeping strike, PA, and shock trooper, you can ensure a hit on one of a pair of adjacent enemies on 399/400 times, which means a kill, which means you can move on. As a rough average, at level 20, you'd have 4+6= 10 attacks, assuming multiweapon fighting. Only the first 5-6 attacks would be 1/400 chance of expiring, the other 4 would be low AB, and more likely to miss almost right away. However, you don't need to worry about them until much later, when you're almost out of attacks. So you could easily go through 5*400= 2000 enemies on average, every six seconds. However, your AC would probably be zero or negative. Not sure how that works, but every archer from here to tibet would be able to shoot you.

Still, impressive, no?

[shadow_archmagi]

Fly's build. Explain that to me very, very slowly. Otherwise i may break under the awesome. Also because I really havn't gotten too far into optimization yet. I very much like the idea of being a wind of death, sweeping through enemy ranks.