Whats the point of a pure fighter?

RUN! :yikes:

 

A range-spec'ed Fighter will smoke a Ranger, especially in the higher levels, and I say this as someone who doesn't like fighters very much. A 10th level Human fighter will have 11 feats, all of which can be combat-oriented. Rangers are granted class feats and spells that are much better suited to actual role-playing environments and wilderness-focused campaigns. Consider also that a fighter is automatically proficient with heavy armor, so you can build a machine-gunner who is also a tank without using an additional feat.

 

Yeah. I find that the fighter-archer is way better than the archery ranger. More feats plus weapon specialisation, improved critical and greater weapon focus make the fighter a better archer. They have so many feats, they can take rapid shot and many shot as well as all of the archer feats.

For the melee fighter, I like the glaive fighter with whirlwind attack. I find that along with great cleave, this fighter can kill almost any monster group that abuses me when I rest.

 

Welllllll. At low levels the Fighter is better, but Ranger's get some nice perks at higher levels. It also depends what items are available. So for ToEE Fighter is better, but it's not so clear in PnP.

Same goes for multiclassing. Really you need more levels and PrCs for it to show its true worth.

 

StrontinumDog,

NWN allowed items in the chest to break and become worthless if you bashed it. Also in NWN it was usually your character and one henchie. TOEE allows a party of eight. So you can usually have a rogue in your party to take care of opening chests and doors.
It is also easy in NWN to make the chests or doors unbashable requiring you find a way to open the lock by magical means, picking the lock or finding the key just like TOEE. It is at the designer's discretion.

 

The point of a pure fighter is specialization. As others have stated the pure fighter come into his or her own depending on the feats and specialization you pick. Just like any other pure character. I am sure a low level spell caster would benefit from a few levels of fighter but at what cost? The extra hp could keep the spellcaster alive. but at the cost of learner higher level spells sooner. It basically comes down to how you want to roleplay the character.

 

One other point. Depends on what level you are going to finish at, but 1 level of Barbarian is good on a Fighter - that Fast Movement can be very useful, and Rage can be helpful sometimes.

 

I like pure fighter... especially in TOEE where you have no prestige classes...
Sacrificing BAB is a sin, it limits your attacks per round. and you can convert BAB to damage at a ratio of 1 to 2 if you have a two handed weapon...
Fighter has the most feats, which allow for some killer combos... combat refelexes + great cleave + enlarge person (why take a level of wizard when you can have your party's wizard use his otherwise useless first level spells on you?).
Freedom of movement + grease + web...

you are now AoO anything within reach (and you have reach), and when they die you get free attacks as well... it becomes one big massacre.

So would other classes do it better? would, a rogue sneak attack is superior in damage... in theory... in reality the vast majority of enemies are immune to sneak. Only low level animal and humanoids can be sneak attacked.

Monk? it is a trap.

That leaves barbarian... I am not too familiar with that one, but overall it seems gimmicky and lacks feats. I'd stay with fighter.

Of course there are way more feats than those few i mentioned, there is the whole weapon spec, improved crit, the whirlwind attack line, improved sunder, improved trip, improved etc... and so on and so forth... Fighter is a really solid choice for a tank.

 

Apart from the Stat requirements, which as have been pointed out, are suboptimal for a Fighter, you need the following Feats for this: Dodge, Mobility, Combat Expertise, Spring Attack, Whirlwind Attack, Power Attack, Cleave, Great Cleave. With Dwarf that takes until level 8 and you still haven't taken other (more) useful Feats.

WA with Glaive won't hit creatures inside your reach, and it's only really useful against mobs of lowish monsters. Cleave is similar, and Great Cleave is only useful where you're one shotting. Plus WA/Cleave don't work together (in that you get a Cleave on every foe dropped from WA). Well they shouldn't - I've not tested it in ToEE.

In the really tough battles most of these Feats won't be doing much for you, and the easier battles are pretty easy anyway. You're better off with just simple Cleave and Combat Reflexes on several characters.

Also at higher levels with multiple attacks you may be better to concentrate all your hurt on one opponent to cut down on the damage being done to you.

 

IMO (I'm not humble it all depends on what you want. Pureclass fighters can be great with a lot of feats, if that's the type of fighter you want. Unlike, say, Icewinddale, there are actually good feats to be had.

That said, switch in 2 levels of Ranger and you get favored enemy (mmmm...humans...that's +2 to hit and on skills against, what, half the monsters in the game practically . Paladins can be cool if you don't mind skipping a lot of interesting material. Barbarians get lots of hitpoints. I have a dwarf barbarian that gets 17 hp/level-nice little tank

I agree that monk multiclassing is pointless, but the other classes can benefit. My current party has everyone start as a fighter (except for the barb and a rogue->ranger2->rogue, then switch to spellcasting at 2nd level. Not as strong with spells, but having a high Con and 1st level as fighter and a toad makes my sorceror and wizard die less often.

Dwarven Fighter-Wizard level : 20 Con (+5*2= +10) + 10 hp fighter +4 hp wizard + 3 for toad = 27 hit points. Yeah he's a level behind...but until level 3, wizards are limited in battle...this build can fight early, cast later.

Also, regarding rogue/warrior crosses: ToEE changes the max skill level so that a rogue/fighter can put just as many points into open lock, etc. as a pure rogue...it just costs double (higher int needed). So 1 level of rogue, high int, and a lot of ranger or fighter can be just as good at locks and traps as a pure rogue.

RE: Paladin chicks: Not sure if any of you have read it, but let's just say a certain D20 D&D title includes female Paladins in an interesting way...can't say more since I'm not sure the rating on the forums

-EdCon

 

Here in Houston, a lot of the Angels are hispanic. So around a third of the chapter is catholic. When I first joined in 1982, I trained 3 times a week at the Holy Rosary Church in downtown. Just walk out the door for training patrols. This is common in other cities.

One of the things I like about the Catholic Church is the honest social activism.

 

Choose pure fighter if you need a killing machine, melee or missile. I like to pollute mine with levels of rogue, barbarian, etc. Levels of fighter are also good for de-wimping other classes.

 

I use a human fighter for this and am able to do the WWA Great Cleave combo by level 6. My initial stats are Str 16, Dex 14, Con 12, Int 13, Wis 8 and Cha 8.

The feats are as follows:

Level 1: Power Attack, Cleave, Dodge
Level 2: Mobility
Level 3: Combat Expertise
Level 4: Great Cleave
Level 6: Spring Attack, Whirlwind Attack
Level 8: Weapon Focus Glaive
Level 9: Weapon Specialisation Glaive
Level 10: Greater Weapon Focus Glaive

ToEE does allow you to hit adjacent creatures. The developers did not program reach weapons to hit only at reach. That is why this combo works quite well.

That always happens when you're ambushed while resting or while travelling. It's just so convenient to just WWA and kill most of them.

It does in ToEE. If it didn't then there's no point in doing this combo.

I don't have much difficulty one shotting creatures with a +3 holy aximatic flaming frost shock glaive. The great thing about this combo is that it gets better the more you are surrounded. If you happen to miss one or do not do enough damage to drop it, you can always get a second or third shot at it if you drop other enemies around you. The more enemies, the better chance you have of dropping everyone because with every hit, you have an additional chance of getting additional hits via Great Cleave.

There are some battles where I get swarmed. I find the WWA/GC pretty useful in those battles where it is impractical to use Fireball. I just find that it is impractical to have several characters with Cleave and Combat Reflexes. Other characters are either not melee types or they need to spend their feats elsewhere.

My party does have much trouble concentrating attacks on a single target. My archer is able to pick out almost any target he wants to take down.

 

"I don't have much difficulty one shotting creatures with a +3 holy aximatic flaming frost shock glaive"

There's a clue there somewhere...