Holy Hamburger 18 Barb / 21 Paladin / 1 Monk

[bort]

With the benefit of hindsight, this build is far from being one of the better melee builds on the forum.
Decided to leave it rather than delete it, in case anyone's curious.
However, I'd recommend anyone who's considering building it should either go for nearly all Barbarian levels or all Paladin levels for the benefits (shapestrong secret for barb, increased spell duration and potency for paladin), rather than have a mediocre mix of the two.

Just got hold of the Minotaur subrace, and having tried combinations of Barb/Wiz/Pm, Barb/Cleric and Barb/Barb/Rdd, for a Smash and Bash Barbarian with a little extra bite, this one was my favourite. A little more interesting than a 'straight' melee build, but doesn't rely on buffs to stay standing - I'm looking at you, staffmaster

Here's the naked stats at 40 with a +0 scimitar.

STR 25
DEX 7
CON 22 * 21 for Epic Damage Reduction, and 22 to boost your HPs
INT 8
WIS 16
CHA 4

AC 21
HP 714
AB 40/35/30/25 - comes to around 60 using only paladin buffs (combat log) - add roughly 14 to that with a +14 gmw from a friendly mage or cleric and +12 STR from items.
Crit range: 15-20/x2 (should be better with keen)
FORT 33
REFLEX 21
WILL 22
BA 30

Plus, your buffs give you Divine, Magical and Sonic damage added to your weapon. ;D

Guardian Angel:
Characters with at least 20 levels of paladin and 30 total levels can call upon a guardian angel to bring them back from death, once per day. You must find an item to use this power.

Here's how it works:

Progression: 18 Barb/21 Paladin/1 Monk
Alignment: Neutral Good for Barb, Lawful Good for Paladin/Monk

Stats (mino changes in brackets): STR 17(21), CON 16(16), WIS 14(16). Leave Charisma and Intelligence as is (will be 4 and 8 respectively after mino changes). One point to splash where you like.

Skill Points: Stick em in Taunt and Discipline from 1-39, then put 40 in tumble on monk level for the + 8 AC boost.

Levels (Stat increases in brackets):
1: Luck of Heroes, Weapon Focus Scimitar
3: Toughness
4: (Constitution)
6: Blind fight
8: (Constitution)
9: Improved Crit Scimitar
12: (Constitution), Lightning Reflexes
15: Iron Will
16: (Constitution)
18: Great Fortitude
(Shift alignment to Lawful)
19: Heavy Armor (free feat)
20: (Constitution)
21: Armor Skin
23: (Strength)
24: Epic Damage Reduction I
27: Epic Damage Reduction II
28: (Strength)
30: Epic Damage Reduction III
32: (Strength)
33: Craft Wand/Extend Spell (As you don't get many spell slots, I thought Craft Wand would be an interesting alternative here.. Paladin spells only go up to level 4 anyway, and wands could be made and quickslotted easily (for a little xp and gold))
36: (Strength), Epic Reflexes
39: Epic Weapon Focus Scimitar
40: (Constitution) Cleave and Evasion for free


LLs:: Epic Prowess, Epic Fort, Epic Will, Great Strength I-IV


Note: You get Greater Smite with 20 levels of Paladin, but because your Charisma sucks, so does the Greater Smite (21 divine, 21 positive dmg).
And you can't get Divine Might or Divine Shield with 4 charisma, even if you could squeeze the feats in.


Any thoughts on how this build would fair in LL would be much appreciated.. Thanks in advance

[hiryuu]

If your Paladin buffs are enough to reach 60, then your Paladin buffs maxed out your attack bonus, and GMW will not stack on that. (The Str bonus will, though.)

I predict you will spend most of your LL swinging at air with that AB. You have no epic class feats, so Damage Reduction, and the Con to get there, will cost you dearly. Craft Wand is a cute idea, but it's cast at the level you get the spell, so it's not very effective.

I would suggest putting all of your normal ability bonuses into your main ability (Str here) in any build you make. With 14 Epic/LL feats, Armor Skin, Epic Prowess, and EWF: Scimitar are all good picks. Pack 7-9 Great Str feats in there, too. If you do decide you want more Con, take Great Con before LL to get the best HP.

This build will also eat an XP penalty throughout LL.

[bort]

I think if the naked AB is 40, the best i can hope for (at that level) is 60 (+6 from maxed str, +14 with gmw...) and paladin buffs should boost a little beyond this.. (aid, bless etc).

What's a good ab for lvl 40?
50, with a mundane weapon?

Craft Wand is a no go? Damn, I knew that feat was too good to be true.
I imagined a party with all the melee builds in it using my wands for divine favour, holy avenger and deafening clang for the added damage. Shame. I'll have a read up on the spells and spell changes to see how they scale, but it looks like extend is back in then.

Yeah - I was trying to avoid making a strength build with super pumped AB but poor chance of survival in LLs. Hoped the High constitution and Epic DR would go some way to solving that problem. Maybe that's over-compensating for the main weakness of the Strength build. Hmm.

Would a build like this, but with more moderate Con, 16 or 18 for example, no epic damage reduction and more Str be likely to do well when kitted out right? Or would I get pasted all over the place? I've got some ok gear, so that's not a big probem. Lack of feats does make this build harder to get right than some.

Thanks very much Hiryuu.

[hiryuu]

Str builds tend toward the Mutually Assured Destruction mindset. They do get some nice damage immunity items, but it's really all about hurting the enemy faster than they hurt you. (Dex based, OTOH, is more about avoiding damage.)

With moderate Con and more focus on AB, this is a solid build. You should have no trouble reaching 45 natural AB at 40, plus some excellent buffing from the Paladin side.

[bort]

Thanks! I'll have a play in the Halls again and see where I get to.

p.s. I'm not sure I'm reading the combat log right, so just to check: Without buffs I got the following message in the combat log on my first hit of the Test Monkey: *critical hit* (16+44 = 60 : ....
Does that mean my AB is 44/etc/etc/etc?
Where does the 16 come into it?

[FunkySwerve]

AB stands for attack bonus, the amount added to the attack roll in an attempt to overcome the opponents armor class. The 16 is the roll.
Funky

[bort]

Great, got it. Thanks Funky.

[bort]

Now I'm thinking it would make alot more sense to go with
21 Paladin / 1 Bard / 17 Rdd / 1 Bard
or something similar, for the boost to Strength and Con in Rdd levels, and the bonus epic feats with Rdd, which might make Epic Damage Reduction and High AB possible. I'll test later this week when I've got a chance, but I think that should work out well. I'd forgotten that Paladins had full BAB pre-epic.

Alternatively, Pump Strength, Leave Constitution around 16 and go with
22 Paladin / 7 Bard (pm prereq) / Pale Master 10 / 1 Bard
or something similar, for Crit Immunity and higher AC.

Could even get epic warding, which could be handy..

I think you can take Wisdom down to 12 at Character generation for an extra point in Strength, as Mino gets +2 Wis (14) Which is enough for the lvl 4 paladin buffs (although spells slots may be very limited). I'll test this too, asap.

[lofwyr]

How are hard are the nuetral to lawaful alignment changes on Higher Grounds?

[hiryuu]

Trivial. It's in the crypt next to town.

[bort]

Build Scrapped (already lvl 15, doh!)
See replacement build, Holy Hamburger v.2