Longsword vs. Greatsword

[Scion]

Drop the point into charisma.

Go for divine vigor eventually, it is a great one

 

[mikebr99]

Yeah... Lord P, CW is a good book all around,and has all the good feats for your Paladin (as jester & Scion mentioned):
divine might: CHA bonus to weapon damage

divine shield: CHA bonus (sacred) to shield's defense.

divine vigor: base speed +10ft., gain +2hps/lvl (temp).

sacred vengeance: +2d6 damage vs undead.


Mike

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

Yup. I've had some good success with the buckler and longsword combination for my elven fighter/paladin. But yet to collect Power Attack and Divine Might. However, the flexibility to add half str bonus to damage from 2-handed attack has proved useful when I needed maximum output (like against a demon).

Yeah. And that bonus will get more significant the higher level you get. (If you've a 14 or 16 strength, it's not a big deal; if your strength is 26, that's an extra 4 points of damage not 1).

Don't forget that attacking 2-handed while wearing a buckler incurs a -1 penalty.

Yeah. On the other hand, by mid levels (which is where power attack begins to shine), that penalty will often be negligible in the calculation of efficiency. If you take -6 to hit for +12 to damage (power attack two handed for 5 and picking up an extra 2 points for 18 strength), that's still noticably better than taking -5 to hit for +5 damage (power attack one-handed). At that point, wielding the weapon two-handed will usually be in conjunction with power attack.

 

[Scion]

greatsword + animated shield

 

[Liquidsabre]

Improved Buckler Defense allows the buckler shield bonus to AC while wielding a weapon in your off-hand. A great addition to a fighter-type wielding a 2-handed weapon and bows, just get that buckler enchanted and you're only missing out on +1 shield bonus to AC.

My only question would be does Imp. Buckler Def. applies to 2-handed wpns then? Or just a wpn used in the off-hand as the feat states? From the text it reads only while using an off-hand and NOT while wielding 2-handed.

 

[Lord Pendragon]

Yeah... Lord P, CW is a good book all around,and has all the good feats for your Paladin (as jester & Scion mentioned):

It certainly sounds like it! Although IMO they've gutted Divine Might. I'm going to have to beg my DM to let me use the 3.0 version.

I'd never even thought of longsword + buckler, but that's definitely looking better and better now. I had briefly considered the longsword's availability to be wielded two-handed, but dismissed it because I thought I'd have to loose my shield to do so. Never occurred to me to downsize my shield one level to eliminate that problem. (I guess I just subconsciously typed bucklers as "only for bards and rogues.)

Great advice, guys. Once again the sages of this board have come to my rescue.

 

[Darklone]

My only question would be does Imp. Buckler Def. applies to 2-handed wpns then? Or just a wpn used in the off-hand as the feat states? From the text it reads only while using an off-hand and NOT while wielding 2-handed.

It's not explicitely clear, but it's written for TWF dudes.

Do you really want to make Twohanded weapon twinks stronger?

 

[Endur]

I highly recommend staying with the Longsword.

Several reasons

1) Roleplaying reasons: Fits historical flavor for knights and makes more sense on horseback. Its very difficult to wield a two handed weapon on a horse because the horse's head gets in the way of your swing.

2) In a party of several characters, you don't have to kill the bad guy all by yourself. However, you do have to survive the combat. That +2 to AC will probably save your life.

3) If you want to swing your sword two-handed to maximize power attack damage, you can drop your shield and swing your long sword two handed. 1d8 is less than 2d6, but if you are using maximum power attack, the die rolls aren't going to matter much anyways.

4) Holy Avengers (and similar holy swords) tend to be long swords.

5) You can wear your longsword out to dinner with your formal wear, and its not as blatantly obvious as a Great Sword

6) In tight dungeons or in close order formation on a battlefield, you can't wield large weapons.

 

[Hypersmurf]

2) In a party of several characters, you don't have to kill the bad guy all by yourself.

You do when the bad guy has DR, and you're the only one reliably getting through it with two-handed swings of the greatsword

6) In tight dungeons or in close order formation on a battlefield, you can't wield large weapons.

Enh. Game-mechanically, a longsword and a greatsword need the same amount of space - 'not grappled'.

With the paladin we had in our party, we found the longsword-and-shield combination to be symptomatic of the character's personality - namely 'wussy coward'. Hiding behind his shield because he was afraid of getting hurt. Feh. Some paladin

The player didn't make one session; the remaining players unanimously decided that the character had 'seen the light'. He discarded his shield, swapped his longsword for the +1 greatsword we took off a slain foe, and started making his 20 Str actually work for a change.

And suddenly, the paladin was a fearsome smiter-of-evil, not a pansy cowerer-in-the-corner. The same character who, two weeks before, had decided not to dive sword-first off the glacier at the fleeing white dragon (heading for cover to breathe on us from safety), electing instead to climb cautiously down a rope, now took on a bearded devil pretty much single-handedly, being knocked unconscious and cured back into the low positives twice before dealing the death blow, from prone, while on zero hit points, with his single standard-action-while-staggered-before-falling-unconscious.

That's a paladin!

So drop the pussy shield and use a real sword!

-Hyp.

 

[two]

Somebody had an after-dinner (post-prandial) coffee, I think.