Remathilis
Legend
I say
Screw it.
The mundane fighter gets bonuses to ability scores every X levels after a certain point and become as powerful as the monsters they once fought.
Then have a mythic warrior that does the near supernatural actions.
THEN have plenty of templates that can be paid in good and/XP to get divine blood, magic fighting, super speed, troop arms, and instructions on how to craft Swords of Omens.
BUT BUT BUT WE WANT THE FIGHTER TO BE MYTHIC! AND IN THE PHB TOO!
There appears to be the belief that a fighter who is good at fighting isn't enough. He needs to wrestle geography and win, jump impossible distances, Make Ithilids poo their robes with a stern glance, and level whole forests in one swordstroke. Because he has to keep up with the wizard in "stuff I can do" and if the wizard can fly, become invisible, shrug off swordblows or open locks with a touch, the fighter should do so too (or something equally as cool).
From my perspective, a person who can shake off a 100' fall or an enormous magical fireball right to the face is, de facto, something out of myth.
Come to think of it, the most sensible way to rationalize the D&D power curve is to treat all PCs as if they're proto-demigods, every one of them a little Achilles or Herakles in training.
Doing this neatly explains why they can attain class levels while virtually everyone else can't -- at least under AD&D/2e. I realize 3e introduces the possibility of Shoalin Soccer-style high-level NPC classes, and such amusing constructs as the uber-waitress who's tougher than your average grizzled veteran sergeant --a real Eberror NPC, BTW.
This line will take us straight back to hit point logic and level problems. HP allows for "mythic" action because its a function of game mechanic, and it creates all sort of wonky issues: (A 2nd level fighter using a potion of invisibility and a longsword cannot kill a 10th level mage sitting quietly at his desk reading due to damage output vs. HP. I guess a 10th level mage without spells is still a better fighter than a 2nd level fighter).
The upper branches of mythic are not the whole of mythic, any more than "everyone eventually catches the plague or gets knifed in a dark alley" are the sum of gritty.
We talk about the extremes so that we don't have a 500 post topic arguing about whether James Bond crossed the line when he parachuted off the cliff in the Spy Who Loved Me or ran ahead of space shuttle fumes in Moonraker or had completely crossed the line in the infamous crawling outside the plane stunt in Octopussy. (Bond is an easier example of where that problem lies, since it is a single character straddling the line, over a long, fairly consistent franchise.)
I'm legitimately curious at this point: What should the mythic fighter BE doing during-and-out-of-combat at, say, 11th level compared to his wizard buddy, who has legend lore or disintergrate. I don't want ancedotes, I want as close to game-functional mechanics as possible.
In short, I want to see exactly what lies between full attack and mountain tossing.