fighter/fighter gestalt [Archive] - Wizards Community

fighter/fighter gestalt [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Tyler Do'Urden
06-24-05, 11:34 PM With gestalt classes, everyone's taking two classes. It means everyone can fill at least two roles in your conventional party (which was the point). But it also means that the role of frontline fighter is no longer a role unto itself. In every other game setting, you have characters who's sole job is to hit bad guys with swords. The closest you can get to that in gestalt is fighter/barbarian (which is nothing to sneeze at).

Would it be balanced with other gestalt classes to make a class that takes up both gestalt "slots" and is just good BAB, good Fort, and a fighter feat every level (two at 1st)? It'd be the gestalt tank to the sorcerer/wizard's gestalt mage.
TwistedShadow
06-25-05, 12:03 AM Its an interesting idea, If I understand correctly you want to basically allow characters to double up the fighter class with Gestalt Class since you feel that there is really no dedicated combatant with the gestalt classes rule. Im not sure if you have any of the Complete series of book (complete Warrior, Adventurer, Divine, Arcane) One of the things that are introduced in these books is each comes with 3 new 1-20 base classes. Since Gestalt only gives you the best of the two classes in regards to base attack, saves, and hit die. Taking fighter twice really is not as effective as one might think it would be, Sure you could gain twice the normal amount of fighter feats, (but your still limited in ways, to just those fighter feats by 4th level you would end up with 8 or 9 feats which don't get me wrong thats wow, but fighter feats still have their limits of usefulness. Instead I would spend a little extra time trying to figure out what kind of front line fighter I want this character to be.
Samurai *Complete Warrior*(has two weapons and some other useful abilities if you use them correctly)
Ranger (again two weapons/combat style and good skill and saves, plus a little spells later on)
Barbarian (all i have to say is RAGE!)
Hexblade *Complete Warrior*( get good will saves with your fort saves, will save version of evasion! <SWEET!> Nasty spells to increase how mean you are in a fight)
Swashbuckler *Complete Warrior*( Finesse fighter lots of nice abilities expecially on difficult footing. very acrobatic)
Also look at the Scout class in Complete Adventurer and Think "Spring Attack"

In all of these cases these other classes set the tone for what style of fighting you want your warrior to excel at and then you can use the fighters bonus feats to round out that fighting style and more importantly stear your character for multiple prestiges very quickly (try Dervish and Order of the Bow initiate from the complete warriror together <lots of feats required but you could do it by 5th -8th level no problem> that combo is good at range or up close, just look at the long term, there are a ton of prestiges when combined using gestalt can turn the 5ft area around a purely combat character into a veritable zone of death to anything dumb enough to get caught there for a round or two.

I actually believe that you can play a gestalt character with a party of normal characters, Just give the gestalt character a +2 LA and it all works out pretty fair (get DM approval before trying that one !)
Gehenna
06-25-05, 03:29 PM If you're allowing psionics, use a fighter/Psychic warrior. It's not quite 1 feat/level, but it's close. Actually it's 19 feats in 20 levels + the psi powers. I thinks that's close enough.
Tyler Do'Urden
06-26-05, 04:12 AM I do actually have Complete Warrior. I feel the samurai was poorly done and should have been more like the ranger with two combat styles; the twin sword style would focus on using the katana and the wakizashi together while the bushido style would just climb the Greater Weap. Spec. feat chain with the Katana.

It's a flavor thing. Ranger, barbarian, and psychic warrior all have flavors. Fighter is like water: no flavor to speak of.

I guess you could just do fighter/psychic warrior and downplay the use of powers by specializing in discrete internal things like body adjustment. I just wanted something that mirrored the power and flaws of the sorcerer/wizard gestalt and had the same classical 4-Man Party feel.
Quirriff
06-26-05, 04:28 AM Hell a Fighter/P-Warrior, would Rule all fighters (every1 else would Drewl).
Basically a Psychic Warrior without the 3/4 BAB weakness and more feats.
Iron Cobra
06-26-05, 04:58 AM Fighter is like water: no flavor to speak of.

Feat selection my friend, to correspond to a background. Your class does not dictate how interesting you are, you dictate how interesting it is.
KobaldArchmage
06-26-05, 03:06 PM We tried this once( we love gesalt!!! ) it worked pretty good, at first we thought the Rogue/Rogue would be totaly broken, but I thought a pair of Fighter/Rogues would actually be worse(easyer flanking, better BAB, ect...)
ElfWord
06-26-05, 05:02 PM How about a Fighter/Monk gestalt for a frontline combo? Really it makes the fighter into the ultimate commando, prepared for every situation. They get all of the fighter's combat expertise, plus all of the monk's survivability. And if they get disarmed of their big bad magic weapon, they're just as good at unarmed combat as anyone else. Use the fighter feats to specialize in a monk weapon like quarterstaff, making flurry of blows even more broke.

Or if you're stuck on the idea of a fighter fighting with a sword, go Fighter/Soulknife.
Jaerom Darkwind
06-26-05, 05:08 PM If you're really set on Fighter/Fighter, it would probably be more balanced if you changed one of the two fighter classes to have a good Reflex save.
Tyler Do'Urden
06-29-05, 02:46 AM How about a Fighter/Monk gestalt for a frontline combo?

...

Or if you're stuck on the idea of a fighter fighting with a sword, go Fighter/Soulknife.

Remember that passage in the DMG about prestige classes and how a fighter 8/blackguard 2 probably thinks of himself as a blackguard? A fighter/soulknife will think of himself as a soulknife. A fighter/ranger will think of himself as a ranger. Fighter/psychic warrior is the closest you get to a character who is a fighter first.
XrP-Leon The Second
07-03-05, 05:13 PM Hell a Fighter/P-Warrior, would Rule all fighters (every1 else would Drewl).
Basically a Psychic Warrior without the 3/4 BAB weakness and more feats.
Excatly, which is why we don't let Gestalts in our campaign. A wizard with full BAB? A Barbarian doing sneak attack dmage while raging, geting 8 skill ponts, 12 HP, full BAB and other little goodies? This is just wrong. How would a fully optimised wizard10/sorceror10 go up against a gestalt wizard/sorc?
Temrek
07-03-05, 05:16 PM Excatly, which is why we don't let Gestalts in our campaign. A wizard with full BAB? A Barbarian doing sneak attack dmage while raging, geting 8 skill ponts, 12 HP, full BAB and other little goodies? This is just wrong. How would a fully optimised wizard10/sorceror10 go up against a gestalt wizard/sorc?

Gestalt characters only work if everyone is gestalt.
Jaerom Darkwind
07-03-05, 05:47 PM Yeah, gestault characters aren't meant to interact at all with non-gestault characters. They're not broken when everyone's playing by the same rules.
XrP-Leon The Second
07-03-05, 05:57 PM -Gets burned-
-Recovers-
-Torches-
(Not a flame war, a burning war!)

Ok, yeah. I guessed that much, it's kinda like improved ability scores, if yoiu have straight 18s for your scores at 1st elvel, then you'll go up against hobgoblins, not kobolds.
Udnamtam
07-04-05, 12:31 AM mmm, as far as i've noticed, fighter can be a pretty weak class all by itself. i'm the DM, and what i do in my gestalt campaign is just throw on a variety of prestige classes on my fighter role NPC's. i'm not sure fighter/fighter is the best way to go in a gestalt campaign

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Tyler Do'Urden 06-24-05, 11:34 PM	With gestalt classes, everyone's taking two classes. It means everyone can fill at least two roles in your conventional party (which was the point). But it also means that the role of frontline fighter is no longer a role unto itself. In every other game setting, you have characters who's sole job is to hit bad guys with swords. The closest you can get to that in gestalt is fighter/barbarian (which is nothing to sneeze at). Would it be balanced with other gestalt classes to make a class that takes up both gestalt "slots" and is just good BAB, good Fort, and a fighter feat every level (two at 1st)? It'd be the gestalt tank to the sorcerer/wizard's gestalt mage.
TwistedShadow 06-25-05, 12:03 AM	Its an interesting idea, If I understand correctly you want to basically allow characters to double up the fighter class with Gestalt Class since you feel that there is really no dedicated combatant with the gestalt classes rule. Im not sure if you have any of the Complete series of book (complete Warrior, Adventurer, Divine, Arcane) One of the things that are introduced in these books is each comes with 3 new 1-20 base classes. Since Gestalt only gives you the best of the two classes in regards to base attack, saves, and hit die. Taking fighter twice really is not as effective as one might think it would be, Sure you could gain twice the normal amount of fighter feats, (but your still limited in ways, to just those fighter feats by 4th level you would end up with 8 or 9 feats which don't get me wrong thats wow, but fighter feats still have their limits of usefulness. Instead I would spend a little extra time trying to figure out what kind of front line fighter I want this character to be. Samurai Complete Warrior(has two weapons and some other useful abilities if you use them correctly) Ranger (again two weapons/combat style and good skill and saves, plus a little spells later on) Barbarian (all i have to say is RAGE!) Hexblade Complete Warrior( get good will saves with your fort saves, will save version of evasion! <SWEET!> Nasty spells to increase how mean you are in a fight) Swashbuckler Complete Warrior( Finesse fighter lots of nice abilities expecially on difficult footing. very acrobatic) Also look at the Scout class in Complete Adventurer and Think "Spring Attack" In all of these cases these other classes set the tone for what style of fighting you want your warrior to excel at and then you can use the fighters bonus feats to round out that fighting style and more importantly stear your character for multiple prestiges very quickly (try Dervish and Order of the Bow initiate from the complete warriror together <lots of feats required but you could do it by 5th -8th level no problem> that combo is good at range or up close, just look at the long term, there are a ton of prestiges when combined using gestalt can turn the 5ft area around a purely combat character into a veritable zone of death to anything dumb enough to get caught there for a round or two. I actually believe that you can play a gestalt character with a party of normal characters, Just give the gestalt character a +2 LA and it all works out pretty fair (get DM approval before trying that one !)
Gehenna 06-25-05, 03:29 PM	If you're allowing psionics, use a fighter/Psychic warrior. It's not quite 1 feat/level, but it's close. Actually it's 19 feats in 20 levels + the psi powers. I thinks that's close enough.
Tyler Do'Urden 06-26-05, 04:12 AM	I do actually have Complete Warrior. I feel the samurai was poorly done and should have been more like the ranger with two combat styles; the twin sword style would focus on using the katana and the wakizashi together while the bushido style would just climb the Greater Weap. Spec. feat chain with the Katana. It's a flavor thing. Ranger, barbarian, and psychic warrior all have flavors. Fighter is like water: no flavor to speak of. I guess you could just do fighter/psychic warrior and downplay the use of powers by specializing in discrete internal things like body adjustment. I just wanted something that mirrored the power and flaws of the sorcerer/wizard gestalt and had the same classical 4-Man Party feel.
Quirriff 06-26-05, 04:28 AM	Hell a Fighter/P-Warrior, would Rule all fighters (every1 else would Drewl). Basically a Psychic Warrior without the 3/4 BAB weakness and more feats.
Iron Cobra 06-26-05, 04:58 AM	Fighter is like water: no flavor to speak of. Feat selection my friend, to correspond to a background. Your class does not dictate how interesting you are, you dictate how interesting it is.
KobaldArchmage 06-26-05, 03:06 PM	We tried this once( we love gesalt!!! ) it worked pretty good, at first we thought the Rogue/Rogue would be totaly broken, but I thought a pair of Fighter/Rogues would actually be worse(easyer flanking, better BAB, ect...)
ElfWord 06-26-05, 05:02 PM	How about a Fighter/Monk gestalt for a frontline combo? Really it makes the fighter into the ultimate commando, prepared for every situation. They get all of the fighter's combat expertise, plus all of the monk's survivability. And if they get disarmed of their big bad magic weapon, they're just as good at unarmed combat as anyone else. Use the fighter feats to specialize in a monk weapon like quarterstaff, making flurry of blows even more broke. Or if you're stuck on the idea of a fighter fighting with a sword, go Fighter/Soulknife.
Jaerom Darkwind 06-26-05, 05:08 PM	If you're really set on Fighter/Fighter, it would probably be more balanced if you changed one of the two fighter classes to have a good Reflex save.
Tyler Do'Urden 06-29-05, 02:46 AM	How about a Fighter/Monk gestalt for a frontline combo? ... Or if you're stuck on the idea of a fighter fighting with a sword, go Fighter/Soulknife. Remember that passage in the DMG about prestige classes and how a fighter 8/blackguard 2 probably thinks of himself as a blackguard? A fighter/soulknife will think of himself as a soulknife. A fighter/ranger will think of himself as a ranger. Fighter/psychic warrior is the closest you get to a character who is a fighter first.
XrP-Leon The Second 07-03-05, 05:13 PM	Hell a Fighter/P-Warrior, would Rule all fighters (every1 else would Drewl). Basically a Psychic Warrior without the 3/4 BAB weakness and more feats. Excatly, which is why we don't let Gestalts in our campaign. A wizard with full BAB? A Barbarian doing sneak attack dmage while raging, geting 8 skill ponts, 12 HP, full BAB and other little goodies? This is just wrong. How would a fully optimised wizard10/sorceror10 go up against a gestalt wizard/sorc?
Temrek 07-03-05, 05:16 PM	Excatly, which is why we don't let Gestalts in our campaign. A wizard with full BAB? A Barbarian doing sneak attack dmage while raging, geting 8 skill ponts, 12 HP, full BAB and other little goodies? This is just wrong. How would a fully optimised wizard10/sorceror10 go up against a gestalt wizard/sorc? Gestalt characters only work if everyone is gestalt.
Jaerom Darkwind 07-03-05, 05:47 PM	Yeah, gestault characters aren't meant to interact at all with non-gestault characters. They're not broken when everyone's playing by the same rules.
XrP-Leon The Second 07-03-05, 05:57 PM	-Gets burned- -Recovers- -Torches- (Not a flame war, a burning war!) Ok, yeah. I guessed that much, it's kinda like improved ability scores, if yoiu have straight 18s for your scores at 1st elvel, then you'll go up against hobgoblins, not kobolds.
Udnamtam 07-04-05, 12:31 AM	mmm, as far as i've noticed, fighter can be a pretty weak class all by itself. i'm the DM, and what i do in my gestalt campaign is just throw on a variety of prestige classes on my fighter role NPC's. i'm not sure fighter/fighter is the best way to go in a gestalt campaign