D&D 3E/3.5 Why be a Fighter? (3.5)

[Fedifensor]

The ultimate mounted archer:

Point Blank Shot
Far Shot
Many Shot
Precise Shot
Improved Precise Shot
Rapid Shot
Shot on the Run
Dodge
Mobility
Mounted Combat
Mounted Archery
Skill Focus (Ride)
Animal Affinity
Weapon Focus (bow of choice)
Greater Weapon Focus (bow of choice)
Weapon Specialization (bow of choice)
Greater Weapon Specialization (bow of choice)
Improved Critical (bow of choice)

Skill Focus (Ride) and Animal Affinity? At 20th level, if you have max ranks in Ride, that's at least a +20 without feats...and I assume you have a good Dex if you're an archer. A waste of two feats, if you ask me.

Likewise, if you're an archer, you have a high Dex (probably 18+ at level 20)...which means you don't need to wear heavy armor. If you're going this route, take Ranger 2/Fighter 18, wear a mithral breastplate (treated as light armor), and you get Rapid Shot as a free feat, replacing the one you lose from the two fighter levels. Not to mention the addition of Track, Favored Enemy, and more class skills, making you much more useful to a group.

If you take more ranger levels, going Ranger 6/Fighter 14, you lose two more fighter feats. In return, you get Manyshot (one feat), Endurance (one feat), better Reflex saves (that's worth a feat), another Favored Enemy, and more skill points to spread among a much wider selection of class skills.

We can take this even further, to a Ranger 12/Fighter 8. You lose three more feats to gain Improved Precise Shot (one feat), Evasion (worth at least one feat), other special abilities, and MUCH, much better skills than your fighter 20. This is the first time you make a serious sacrifice, being unable to get Greater Weapon Specialization.


With a human, you get everything your ultimate mounted archer has, and a lot more...

Human Ranger 6/Fighter 14 feats:
Point Blank Shot
Far Shot
Many Shot*
Precise Shot
Improved Precise Shot
Rapid Shot*
Shot on the Run
Dodge
Mobility
Mounted Combat
Mounted Archery
Weapon Focus (bow of choice)
Greater Weapon Focus (bow of choice)
Weapon Specialization (bow of choice)
Greater Weapon Specialization (bow of choice)
Track
Endurance

Other abilities:
36 extra skill points (and more class skills to use them on)
Favored Enemy x2
Wild Empathy
Animal Companion (equal to level 3 Druid)

Your mounted archer has 1 extra feat, and you used 2 feats to get a +5 Ride and +2 animal affinity. My mounted archer is much better out of combat, has more than sufficient Ride skill, has Wild Empathy (which is much better than Handle Animal), and can have a Light or Heavy Horse (with +2 HD, +2 natural armor, +1 Str and Dex, and Evasion).

Sorry, I'm not buying the argument that a single-class fighter is "just as good". Not at all. Any build you can make with a fighter 20 can be beat with multiclasses and/or taking prestige classes. This isn't a slam...it's just pointing out that after level 12, you're just making secondary feat choices that are less useful than the ones chosen previous. There is no capstone ability for a fighter, and that's a serious problem.

 

[Pbartender]

So he's a Penultimate Mounted Archer... Whatever. He's still a valid 20th level character.

Besides... Your character doesn't qualify for Greater Weapon Specialization. It requires 12 levels of Fighter.

Also... I never said the Fighter was "just as good". I said the Cleric and Wizard classes are the only classes I've seen players plan out single classed all the way to 20th level.

It's more like I was implying that the Fighter was "just as bad", and that multiclassing or prestige classes almost always seem to present a better option than single-classed characters.

So the Fighter class is best multiclassed. So what? So is the Sorcerer, for that matter.

 

[Particle_Man]

Isn't there a 2nd level spell called Calm Emotions that stops a barbarian's rage? And then the barbarian can't activate rage for that encounter? And then isn't it the case that even the 20th barbarian is basically a fighter in lousy armour, about 20 extra hit points, some DR, but behind the fighter by about 20 feats?

2nd level spell. Could be heightened to make absolutely sure the barbarian fails his save, or could be cast repeatedly once/round until he does.

I would be interested if anyone can make the "half-orc sword/bow/save/scent" fighter concept listed wayy above without using 20 fighter levels. Heck, I might even use it, since I am only 6th level right now.

 

[Saeviomagy]

Likewise, if you're an archer, you have a high Dex (probably 18+ at level 20)...

For a grand total of +4 to hit. There's no guarantee that high level characters have an entire array of 18's in their stat blocks. If you start with a standard array, then it's quite unlikely that someone's going to have 18's in even their primary stats.

Your mounted archer has 1 extra feat, and you used 2 feats to get a +5 Ride and +2 animal affinity. My mounted archer is much better out of combat, has more than sufficient Ride skill, has Wild Empathy (which is much better than Handle Animal), and can have a Light or Heavy Horse (with +2 HD, +2 natural armor, +1 Str and Dex, and Evasion).

Since ride skill has at least one situation where it's opposed by an attack, it never really tops out.

Wild empathy does not replace handle animal in any way. It covers making an animal stop attacking you, and possibly even convinces said animal to help you out a bit. It certainly doesn't let you raise an animal domesticated, nor does it let you teach tricks.
Sure you've got your fantastic +2hd horse. The fighter SHOULD be running about with some form of advanced magical beast for a mount by now.

Sorry, I'm not buying the argument that a single-class fighter is "just as good". Not at all. Any build you can make with a fighter 20 can be beat with multiclasses and/or taking prestige classes. This isn't a slam...it's just pointing out that after level 12, you're just making secondary feat choices that are less useful than the ones chosen previous. There is no capstone ability for a fighter, and that's a serious problem.

Any SPECIALIST build can be beaten. A generalist won't be.

 

[Valiantheart]

Any SPECIALIST build can be beaten. A generalist won't be.

Unless he comes up against a SPECIALIST in his area.

 

[mmu1]

I never really bought into the "Barbarians are so much better than Fighters" school of thought, mainly because I really have very mixed feelings about Rage...

This is because I've played Barbarians, and I've seen several played when I DMed, and a lot of them end a fight going "Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap, in two rounds I lose 20 hit points, putting me at -14, someone please heal me NOW!"

To make things worse, as soon as they're 5th level and get at least 10 extra HP from Rage, they can no longer be safely stabilized while at negative HP, because as soon as Rage ends, they'll drop dead - which can be a huge problem at the end of a long fight that uses up most of a party's spells, or if the party Cleric happens to get knocked out. I'm sorry, but ending a fight 50 or 100 HP "in the hole" doesn't appeal to me in the slightest, and you never have enough HP in high level play - you just need massive amounts of healing more or less often.

Whereas the Fighter's biggest problem is that class is just so damn bland, not that it's weak... And the fact that Fighters multi-class so well is actually an asset, not some huge disadvantage.

 

[Fedifensor]

I would be interested if anyone can make the "half-orc sword/bow/save/scent" fighter concept listed wayy above without using 20 fighter levels. Heck, I might even use it, since I am only 6th level right now.

Well, it's difficult with half-orc, since the only available multiclass option without penalty is barbarian. Everything else would require keeping fighter levels within one level of the second class.

I could probably do it with prestige classes, though it would take a bit of searching. Most prestige classes have enough in the first two levels to make it worth sacrificing one fighter feat...heck, many offer a bonus feat in their first two levels (Divine Champion from FR is one example). Other melee classes have a lot more to lose. At 20th level, barbarians taking two levels of another class lose Mighty Rage and a point of DR - the best features of the class. Paladins and rangers lose less, but it still cuts into their spell abilities (two less of their highest level spell).

Now, if fighters had feat choices that required 18 or 20 levels of fighter (Ultimate Weapon Focus, Ultimate Weapon Specialization), then I'd see the usefulness of a single-classed fighter at high levels. But every choice you make after 12th level is a secondary one. For your sword/bow/save/scent guy, you must have a preference among those four choices. Which means that your final fighter feats are the options you're least interested in of what's listed. Not a great feeling at the end of your career.

 

[Creamsteak]

I'm not sure why anyone would want to play a single-classed fighter to 20th level. Sure, they get a lot of feats...but after a while, you've picked the ones most appropriate to your character concept and are just grabbing at the leftovers.

It's the law of diminishing returns...by the time you've grabbed the feat with the highest requirements (Greater Weapon Specialization at 12th), anything else you choose is weaker than your previous choices. Compare this to most other classes, where their special abilities get more powerful at higher levels.

I can agree with this. A single classed fighter (I was working on one recently) gets really boring for design after 12th level. You can still get more feats, and gain tons of abilities you didn't have the free feats to select earlier... but it isn't going to scale up any more. At that point your probably looking for a PrC or something else instead, but I don't Want that. Especially with epic rules, I'm going to try to stay single classed if at all possible. The more I look at it a fighter with a few levels in barbarian or rogue is way more tempting all around... especially since you don't need any more feets for a theme after 12th-14th level...

 

[The Blue Elf]

Put it this way I like to hack and slash.

 

[JoeGKushner]

I think that in 3.0, fighters were overpowered.

I think that using core rules alone, fighters may be under powered but with the wide array of 3rd party feats that allow anything from being size large to usinga two handed weapon in one hand, that they do more than okay.

When it comes to fighting, they're still the best.