Kyra is a Paragon Paladin, she does everything a Paladin does, she just does it better (asside from turn undead, but then she is a cleric of Wee Jas and so just as likely to protect undead from unlawful persecution). She can also take over for any missing party member (Or function alone if need be), not as good as them, but at least minimally capable. Or even better support and protect them at what they do best, help the cleric heal so he can focus on buffing or make his spells last longer, wade in with the fighter and kill/debuff things while healing him, or sneak with the rouge when scouting and provide the rouge with flanking, healing and some serious combat backup when things go sour. And of course white raven tactics means you can effectivly double the support a party member is able to lend. Or When burning turn attempts effetivly able to double the entire party
Ussualy characters that do everything are not that well liked by other players, I think this one might just be the exception, assuming you use your buffs wisely.She excells as a tank and beatstick, is an ok cleric and tracker, capable of using items as a wizard or cleric, can work stopgap as a skillmonkey, and has accsess to a vareity of abilities that let her go nova.
Best of all she hits her powercurve at 3'rd level and ramps it up seriously at 5'th level, however it's not until 9'th level that you get a lot of tricks to support the rest of the party. After 9'th you have all your core abilities and just get better at them, although you get some noteworthy good stuff at levels 15,16 and 20.
levels:
1 Cloistered Cleric of Wee Jas
2 Paladin
4 Swordsage
1 Pious Templar
1 Crusader
10 Ruby Knight Vindicator
+1 Swordsage
Feats
1: True Believer
1: Able Learner (For getting rouge skills, not nessessary if you don't wish to be the skill monkey.)
3: Serenity (One of the key feats in this build)
6: Adaptive Style
9: Tracking (Why not. I really didn't know what feat to take. and this lets you be the party tracker and therefore replace any party member. If there is a cleric spell that grants this (just like there is a leric spell that grants trapfinding) that would be better.)
12: Power Attack
15: Extra Turning
18: Improved Unarmed Strike (I'm sure there are better feats out there...)
Domains:
Pride (Reroll save on 1's!)
Magic
Knowledge
End Result:
17 bab, 13/7/15 saves,
Fun Notes:
Caster level 9 for cleric spells
Caster level 1 for Paladin spells
Crusader initaitor Level 10
SwordSage initiator Level 17
Reroll 1's on saves. Only 1 in 400 chance of failing a roll when you are not using Aura of Perfet Order.
Use magic tools as a 1'st or 4'th level mage depending on rules interpretation.
Bardic Lore on top of a bunch of other abilities.
Aura of perfect order profides a few fun things:
* Roll an 11 on casterlevel checks to see if you can cast a scroll, which means all cleric scrolls and wizard scrolls with a CL of 11 or 14 depending on DM ruling.
* Virtually immune to effects that allow a save.
Wisom as a bonus to:
1) AC
2) bonus spells to 2 divine spell list (1'st - 5'th and 1'st level spells.)
3) Damage on Strikes from Shadow Hand
4) DC for spells and many manuvers.
5) 2*wis in healing through lay on hands
6) 7+wis turning attempts. It also adds to turning damge but...
7) all saves.
8) 1/day as an attack bonus to smite evil. (which does +2 bonus damage... oh well at least the attack will hit.)
Turning attempts used for:
1) extra swift action
2) recover manuver
3) +4 to hit and 1d10 extra damage on one strike
4) (Not) turning undead (you turn as a 1'st level cleric.... not usefull)
Tactical Notes:
* Go incorperal and rearange readied manuvers regaining all of them... including the ability to go incorperal.
* When throwing stuff while incorperal it becomes normal again, so keep some non-magical throwing daggers around, just in case.
* Works best with others, complements almost any group well. However the group really should have a primary cleric that you can support.
Key Equipment:
* Ring of evasion (Not enough swordsage levels in the build :/)
* Ring of Freedom of Movement. (Immunity to grapple, often overlooked)
* Ghosttouch weapons and armor, as well as nonmagical dagers for throwing.
8 Swordsage manuvers readied and all crusader manuvers readied
Crusader:
stance:
* Martial Spirit (Maybe swap for Iron Guard Glare)
Manuvers:
* Revitalizing Strike
* Vanguard Strike
* Mountain Hammer
* Leading the Attack
* White Raven Tactics
Sword Sage Focus (Weapon Focus and Insightful Strike):
* Shadow Hand
RKV stances
* Assasin Stance
* Aura of Perfect Order
RKV manuvers:
* Hand of Death
* Law Bearer
* Stalker in the Night
* Shadow Blink
* One with Shadow
SwordSage stances:
* Flames's Blessing
* Hunters Sense
* Balance on the Sky
SwordSage Manuvers:
* Burning Blade
* Blustering Flourish
* Distracting Ember
* Counter Charge
* Sudden Leap
* Cloak of Deception
* Mountain Hammer
* Shadow Garrote
* Strength Draining Strike
* Five Shadow Creeping Ice Enervation Strike
Notes:
Ah, the swordsage, so good that I decided to take the 5'th level as my capstone
If playing for epic you might want to take a level of Ranger first and move all the classes one level later down corespondingly, that will boost your 'weak' saves and give you +1 bab and a few more HP.
Only True Believer and Serenity are requiered feats, although Adaptive Style is highly recomended.
Wisdom is by far the most important stat, after that it depends on how you want to play her. For a skillmonkey she'll need high inteligence to counterbalance her limited points per level. for melee combat strength would be most important. Charisma is a dump stat after the first two levels you'll not use it again.