To Paladin players, what Feats do you select for your Paladins?

[Green Knight]

I think Blind Fight is almost required. Too many opponents that can go invisible, etheral, etc.

Nah. I figure by the time this becomes an issue, the Paladin will probably have gained access to magic which allows him to see such things. Or let the Wizard deal with it.

The usefullness of Great Cleave is really game dependent. I wouldn't take it as a Paladin, mostly because I see the paladin as more likely to have to go after big creatures rather than hordes of small ones.

Armies can handle goblins, you want a Paladin for a demon.

Yeah, the more I think about it the more I'm coming around to your thinking.

 

[Green Knight]

Originally posted by jollyninja well, like all of my characters, i take ambidexterity and two weapon fighting followed by expertise, dodge, off hand parry, improved two weapon fighting, whatever i feel like after that. i love two weapon fighting, what can i say, also they seldom wear better then a chain shirt (masterwork of course) and i get boots of striding and springing whenever possible.

While I had a Paladin in 2nd edition who fought 2-weapon style with his sword and shield, I don't think spending the Feats for the purpose of fighting with sword and shield is worth it. Besides, I'm a heavy armor kind of guy, myself. Not interested in playing an Erol Flynn type.

 

[ConcreteBuddha]

Just a thought:

A paladin only blows without your horse if you are never on your horse. With that in mind, do you like small paladins?

A Halfling or Gnome Paladin on a celestial riding dog or a dire bat is neato. I find that there is NEVER a time when I am without my mount when it is medium sized.

With a small paladin, the mounted combat feats are nifty.

Also, I dig Divine Might and Extra Smiting.

My humble opinions...

 

[Zerovoid]

Leadership definitely appeals to me. I'm gonna be playing in Forgotten Realms, and my character will probably be from Silverymoon. So the thought of building a keep to the north of the Silver Marches to watch out for orc tribes definitely looks good in my eyes.

Got a point about the mounted feats. I dunno. I've read "Le Morte D'Arthur" to many times, I guess. But I've been obsessed with the idea of making a master jouster for a long time. A character with amazing skills with a lance.

I agree that leadership is a good feat. Having a cohort is way more powerful than any other benefit provided by any other feat, especially if you have a high charisma score. The cohort ability can easily be abused, and it gets out of hand quickly if everyone has it. It seems like it would work really well for a paladin to have a squire or something though. I would also think about using leadership to get some sort of special intelligent mount, since cohorts can gain class levels. A pegasus with fighter levels would quickly become better than the standard paladin warhorse.

Besides leadership, I would probably take the mounted combat feats. Having to put a high score in cha means alot of paladins only have about 14 in Str. If you can do 3x damage with your lance on a charge though, your paladin will definately get his chance to shine.

 

[reapersaurus]

well, GreenKnight, I think I'll continue the non-standard way of replying to your request.
(very strange recommendations all around so far - no typical paladins in the lot)

Why do you want to play a paladin?

Because your question is one of the big problems with a paladin: they are destined to be one-dimensional fighters because they get so few feats.

Now, really - what's the difference between a LG fighter, and a LG Paladin?
The paladin really doesn't get that much.

Divine Grace is about the only worthwhile thing, and you can get that with one level.
Detect Evil is sometimes more trouble than it's worth, and too often overused and not liked by the DM anyway.
Lay on Hands blows. Take a level of cleric, and you'll be way better at healing + more spells + better turning + 2 domains!
Smite is the most overrated ability in the game. It's once per day, guys.
Aura of Courage never comes up.
Remove disease ? Again, be a cleric if you want to heal.
Immune to disease. Whoop-de-doo.

The spells are way too little to do much good, and are eclipsed by cleric spells anyway.
The only real special thing about a paladin is the mount.
And you can take Leadership for that.

So if you want flexible holy fighter, think of going fighter/cleric, and just role-playing him exactly the same.
This'll actually give you the feats to do something in combat.

If I had to take one set of feats, I'd go the Mounted Trilogy + Divine Might.
If you think the adventure will be indoors and still wanted it, go small with a halfling riding dog.

If you still choose human, go with Power Attack/(Cleave)/Divine Might.
Screw Great Cleave.

 

[bret]

Aura of Courage never comes up.

Funny, I'm having that come up more than any other single Paladin power except possibly Detect Evil.

Being immune to fear is nice. Giving a bonus to anyone close has come in useful a couple of times already.

If you really want to use it, get a Wiz or Sor that likes the Fear spell. It is a cone, but the Paladin can stand in the way (protecting the Mage) when the spell is cast.

The undead turning is best used to power the various Divine feats from DotF. I think it is Divine Power that allows you to turn it into a damage bonus.

I agree that it would be a lot more useful if the Smite was useable more often. Still, it is a great way to get a good solid hit in on a creature. Charge with Power Attack and the Smite, you can do some pretty good damage.


In any case, anyone who takes a paladin based strictly on the class powers is probably going to have problems. It is one of the classes that I think needs to be roleplayed.

 

[Plane Sailing]

My Paladin has exotic weapon (spiked chain), expertise, improved trip, leadership.

Backstory - he was brought up a slave of an eeeevil nation, fought his way to freedom with a length of chain and decided to take up that chain and fight against oppressers everywhere.

I'd love to have combat reflexes, but with a dex of 11 it doesn't give me world-shaking bonuses with the spiked chain. This was a deliberate policy decision to avoid munchy-ness

Improved trip and the reach of the spiked chain makes a great defensive position, and he has already managed a couple of heroic last stands in corridors to allow wounded party members to escape and regroup. Probably ought to be heroic penultimate stands, since he made it out OK in each cases!

BTW, I disagree with reapersaurus about the lameness of "lay on hands". The power multiplies magnificently, and there is a finer degree of precision than any clerics get. A 7th Paladin in my game can cure 28 points of damage per day, and he can do that in 1pt increments if he wishes... very flexible, very useful.

Cheers

 

[reapersaurus]

BTW, I disagree with reapersaurus about the lameness of "lay on hands". The power multiplies magnificently, and there is a finer degree of precision than any clerics get. A 7th Paladin in my game can cure 28 points of damage per day, and he can do that in 1pt increments if he wishes... very flexible, very useful.

Don't take out of context, please.
In comparison to a cleric's healing ability (even at 1st level cleric), it blows.
A 1st level cleric has 3d8 +6 healing ability, and that's only dependant on having a 12 in Wis, not like the Pally's 18 in CHA.
So almost 20 points for a 1st level cleric with 12 WIS vs. 28 pts for the 7th level Pally w/ 18 CHA.

Call that inequity what you want, but don't ignore it.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

2Plane Sailing:
Where do you want to spend your next ability point? are you wearing Gloves?
Combat Reflexes is even useful without the Extra Attacks of Oppertunity, because you can even take AOOs when you are still flat-footed. In regular combat, the enemies will move very careful to avoid AOOs, but in the beginning, most of them will try to charge in - and a reach weapon will show them very fast that it was a stupid idea to do it...

One of the first thing to consider is the Exotic Weapon Profiency Bastard Sword (at least, if you don`t expect to find a Sunblade), for more damage.
The Divine Might Feats seem to be very useful (at least some of them), so you might look at them - I don`t have the books...

Mounted Combat can be a good idea for Halfing and Gnomes, because there mounts are small enough to go everywhere, as already stated...

With just the base feats, the following might be the best:
Exotic Weapon Profiency - Bastard Sword
Blind Fight
Leadership
Power Attack, Cleave, Bullrush
If you qualify for Expertise, Improved Trip/Disarm are very useful feats. Expertise itself is very useful, and might be underrated by some (my Ranger/Fighter uses it often to compensate for the lack of his armor) You might prefer these Feats over Power Attack, but it is difficult to qualify for it...

Mustrum Ridcully

 

[Wolfspirit]

A Halfling or Gnome Paladin on a celestial riding dog or a dire bat is neato. I find that there is NEVER a time when I am without my mount when it is medium sized.

Sigh, I just started playing in a new game last week, and was wanting to try out a halfling paladin with a riding dog. I'd spent about down to the last copper on it and a saddle (no armor, a shield and a light lance were all I could afford after spending 150 gp at first level) and was estatic to find out that we were exploring some caves that weren't known to have unstable floors.

Only problem was we had to climb down a rope 30 feet to get down to the caves. Sigh. No happy cavalier this time.