Colour me stupid, but...

[StreamOfTheSky]

I don't mean this as an insult to the player, but I'd say it stems entirely from ignorance. Ignorance of what he could get, without even losing that precious BAB, as you mentioned. In any case, if he's happy with what he's got, just leave it alone and let him enjoy. But I'll certainly tell you now, as I think most here would, losing a point of BAB is not a big deal, this is in no way, shape, or form "established thought."

Now, if you go Fighter 5 / Rogue 1 / Marshal 1 / Bard 1 / Swordsage 1/ etc..., THEN there'd be a right having issues over all that needlessly wasted BAB.

 

[krupintupple]

i would tend to agree.

my only concern is that the other party are a druid, a warlock, a ranger/rogue and a psion. i just wanted to make sure that, by level 10, when everyone else has neat tricks, spells, abilities and cool effects to fall back upon, he's not cringing that he's stuck with "I swing my longsword. And Again." and gets jealous or anything, since i'm not allowing rebuilding. or that his combat ability wouldn't be harmed with a dip into a class like barbarian, psywar or duskblade, and in fact might becomes several times more awesome.

ah well, c'est la vie, i suppose. we're having fun and that's what counts - i think i was just planning ahead, since the one group is fairly new to 3e after a long hiatus from 2e, and i don't want to hear a chorus of "but look what he can do" should someone become jealous of the psions damage output, or the shapeshifting druid's melee ability, ect.

 

[Folly]

Without knowing the player, there are really three possibilities as to the refusal to deviate from fighter.

Ignorance as stream said.

Some personal attachment to the idea of being a "Fighter" (fluff wise) and thinking that to do that you have to be a fighter (crunch wise)

A desire to have a simple build with straight forward play.

I personally find the 3rd reason the only valid one.

Stream, thanks for the info about the weapon enchant. I will definitely look into using it once I reach the point of having warblade levels.

 

[Zelc]

Well, it's usually nice to have +16 BAB for the fourth iterative attack. Other than that, BAB isn't a huge deal.

 

[moritheil]

A party I'm in at level 8 has AC ranging from 25 to 32... And that's just with permanent and/or day long buffs. I have no idea what crazy high levels you could reach with proper optimization and temporary buffs, just at that level!

Really, don't go by character builds. As others have suggested, just go by monster stats. Character builds can get AC 56 before 8th level.

FWIW, my rule of thumb for decent AC is 5 * ECL (obviously only valid above level 5 or so.)