If you've already decided that you want to play a fighter/warmage, say so then go ahead and do it. But if you post asking about whether to play a fighter/warmage or fighter/sorcerer, then you shouldn't be surprised if you actually get advice rather than affirmation of what you want to do anyway.
Now if you really want this:
Felon said:
I want to be a badass that other players will see and go "Whoa! What a badass! Hope I never piss him off!", not that they'll look at and say "What? You're a lizardman now? For how long? Sorry, Felon, that's just horseshit".
then I would assume that you want to make a character that other players will actually look at and say "whoah! What a badass!" not a character that other players will look at and say "well, at least he's a good roleplayer" or "he's doing the best he can with what he's got.
The position you seem to be advocating is that characters must be extremely specialized in order to be effective at all. I just don't share that outlook.
I wouldn't call my position "extremely specialized." I would call it "no more than one or two levels behind the iconics." A straight up iconic 10th level fighter will have Str 17 (15 start +2 lvl) plus a belt (which you may or may not have because there are different equipment priorities for a warmage), greater weapon focus, weapon specialization, and a +2 or +3 equivalent weapon. If we stat that out, his attacks look something like +17/+12 (+19/+14 with belt) for 1d10+7 damage (1d10+9 including the belt). If he's using a two handed weapon, that's dice +11 damage with a +4 belt.
Now, if you want, on 36 points and using multiclassing or non-core materials, you can do a lot better than that. Go 1/2 orc 20 starting strength Fighter/Barbarian/Exotic Weapon Master with a spiked chain and you're attacking at +21/+21/+16 for 2d4+19 when raging. Use a bastard sword two handed and you're only making two attacks but you're doing 1d10+24 (Uncanny Blows) per shot. If he manages to pull the feats together for Leap Attack and Shock Trooper, he can do even more impressive charges.
Now, if you're willing to be mediocre in combat rather than badass, you can give up a little bit of power (even vis a vis the iconics) for flexibility without becoming pathetic. Fighter 6/Rogue 4? It works OK. You won't impress anyone with your rogue skills, but sneak attack, uncanny dodge, and evasion will often make up for losing one point of base attack bonus, etc. But if you get to the point that your capabilities are pretty similar to an iconic character 3-4 levels lower than you, you're close to losing the ability to function in your chosen role. If you want to be badass, on the other hand, you need to be
better than Tordek, Lidda, Mialee, and the other iconics in whatever role you play in the party.
EB, it sounds like you're heaping criticism without even having read the discussion up to the point where you joined in. He won't be casting a 5d6 fireball at 10th level, he'll be casting a 10d6 fireball. And in melee, his foes will get chewed up by a ring of blades or fire shield while he makes the exact same number of attacks per round as the straight fighter and enjoying the same benefit of Weapon Focus and Weapon Specialization he is. That's synergy, my friend. The build has plenty going for it.
Sure I read the posts before mine. That's where I got the impression that you wanted to create a "badass" character rather than just one who doesn't suck. (Incidentally, every one that discussed the option of Warmage or Sorcerer said that Fighter/Sorcerer is a better choice than Fighter/Warmage). I don't deny that your character will have some things going for him as a fighter/warmage (most of the spells you list are on my previous list of synergies that you could get from the warmage--I left out ring of blades because I don't like the fact that your cleric friend will need to take the damage when he comes up to heal you). My point is that there's a lot
more that you could have going for you as a fighter/sorcerer and that, since you're giving up a LOT of power in your chosen roles to get the amount of flexibility you want, you need to have more going for your character than you'll have as a ftr/warmage... if you really want other players to say "wow, that character is badass." The warmage list doesn't have as many synergies as the sorceror list and the synergies it does have are not as impressive as the synergies on the sorcerer list.
There's no point served in you lecturing on how the game works. Fact is, I actually know how to play this game very well--as well as you do, I suspect. This character will be very viable. Will he be outright broken and abusive like the polymorph fighter that I've seen engender resentment from both players and DM as he constantly tries to rush everyone through the dungeon at a breakneck pace before his minute/level spell runs out? No. He'll actually be what a warrior-mage should be; potent at wielding both arms and spells, able to overcome many of the shortcomings of both classes.
You must have a different definition of potent that I haven't heard of. The character will be roughly as effective in melee combat as a rogue without sneak attack (same base attack and similar hit points but somewhat different abilities) and will be able to cast damaging spells roughly 2/3 as effectively as a single class mage (who can empower everything he casts, and match you spell for spell until you run out and he still has everything 2nd level or less remaining). All that, and really the only thing you can do that a straightforward fighter can't do is area effect damage. (Since warmages don't get spells like haste, blink, or fly).
If that's your cup of tea then I wish you well, but nobody is going to comment on your character being badass unless they're used to playing significantly lower level characters or the rest of the party is really weak. (Not that this character will be
really weak, but he won't stand out as effective unless the party is really weak).
