The Right Fist of Gond - F(8), DC(8), WM(7), C(7)

Fighter 10 / Divine Champion 5 / Weapon Master 7 / Cleric 8

Description
From a roleplay standpoint, the Right Fist of Gond is the fraternal twin brother of the Left Fist of Gond, when conceived they were Planetouched and destined to bring balance wherever they go. Their patron deity is Gond, he of the hammer, which they carry and use to dispense their particular brand of religious zealotry.

Both have trained and dedicated themselves to their weapon and their patron, following slightly different paths in combat and worship of their deity. The Right Hand is a tankbuster, and this build has chewn through most of the Battle of the Builds, defeating many (most) of the other power builds very rapidly, in some cases in under 10 seconds. The Left Hand is a magekiller, optimized to go after the Blood Scholar and others of his ilk, though some human piloting is required in order to do so. The concept is one of a single-minded religious warrior, one weapon, one faith, one mission: knock some heads in.

I built the twins out of an attempt to get something useful out of the Weapon Master class, and the high critical output of the WM features strongly in this build, and it is not out of the question to see over 300-400 melee damage generated in one round against a fully armored and buffed opponent (with a bit of luck). In fighting other WM builds this one seems to chew through them with no problems and without breaking a sweat.

Also, I think critical hits are cool and it makes me happy to see enemies go down in a flurry of *Critical Hit!*.

Advantages:


 * Fully buffed, +57 attack, 75AC -or- +60 attack 72AC by flipping the combat expertise mode. High attack, high defense, have your cake and eat it too.


 * High damage output, using Epic Divine Might. It's built to crit, if it hits, it hits hard for 4x on a 17-20 roll, with physical, divine and magical damage from buffs, a crit will land for 200+ points. See image of the Right Hand vs. the Inconvenient Ranger with two crits landing in the same sequence. This is with the elemental damage resisted.


 * Has additional toys of Knockdown and Disarm added to the repertoire. Knock your opponent down to give time for a self-buff or heal, or worse yet, knock them down, then knock their weapon away, to give you time to go pick it up while they're prone. Knockdown will also eventually clear Mirror Image as each attempt counts as a hit.


 * Has flexibility in the spell buildout on the cleric side if you want to role play.


 * Build starts off as a fighter and is useable throughout the build, should never be gimped but might have an XP multiclassing penalty (I'm not sure how that works lol).


 * High saves, with added buffs from Divine Champion, plus Divine Wrath for an ace in the hole or opening flurry to-hit bonus.


 * It is easy to make minor adjustments in stance from defensive to offensive by switching to two handed use of the warhammer and putting the shield away (more drastic) and by enabling or turning off combat expertise (tilts you +3/-3 on AC/Attack). A harder to hit enemy that is not much of a threat can be dealt with then without having to resort to spell buffs.

Disadvantages:


 * Might have problems with turtle builds meant entirely for defense.


 * Not very strong at detecting stealth, and the clerical spells don't seem to help much though they should according to descriptions.


 * AI doesn't seem to take a lot of advantage of the knockdown and disarm skills which are very powerful, but underselected by the computer.


 * AI will also make use of combat expertise in a defensive stance when it's not necessary, which can cripple what otherwise might be a 10% or 15% chance to hit... making the build perform a bit stupidly at times when controlled by AI.


 * Only very minor protection against mages using Bigby's Forceful Hand to get the stun. If anyone has any suggestions other than spell mantles or concealment, feel free to post on the talk page. Building for Weapon Master and Divine Might at the same time doesn't leave a huge amount of room for adjusting but I'd like to see how it could be improved.


 * Naked strength of 21 equates to equipped strength of 30, and will lose shoving matches against melee characters similarly equipped with knockdown and strength in the 30-40 range. Building for Divine Might doesn't allow for more power.


 * Relatively low constitution makes for kind of a lightweight build as a fighter, but this is more than balanced out by the extreme damage output.

Character Creation
Fighter 10 / Divine Champion 5 / Weapon Master 7 / Cleric 8

Race: Aasimar: the charisma and wisdom bonuses help get this off the ground, since we need to hit required stats on Strength and Charisma of 21 each (Epic Divine Might). We also need Intelligence and Dexterity to hit 13 each to qualify as a Weapon Master. If building with a human it might be possible to go with a lower constitution and/or wisdom to make the whole thing work, or one can take more epic bonuses and sacrifice some of the feats at the end of the build. Elves would also be a good choice, anything with bonus strength or charisma, with negatives in constitution, the only stat we don't care about.

Alignment: Neutral. Gond of the Warhammer is a Neutral god, and these two builds are patterned to serve him. Also, people can't protect vs. neutral alignment which is like carrying a permanent buff with you and is a benefit to going with Divine Champion over Paladin or Blackguard. A similar build to this would be possible by dropping cleric and going with one of those two for a good/evil roleplay.

Stats: Not much flexibility, you need to end up with Str/Ch at 21, and Int/Dex at 13, and they have to hit these numbers at the right time in the build to unlock WM in particular.

Skills
We need +4 intimidate to open up Weapon Master. Beyond this, the best build I think will start with 4 in intimidate and then use the minimum required on each level to pad out Listen, Spot, Spellcraft and Tumble. When Cleric is opened up, the skill points deferred can be dumped into Spellcraft, and otherwise we want to end up with 14 in tumble (for skill debuffing), and then as high a Spellcraft, Spot and Listen as possible. This suggested build doesn't use Taunt, but that is certainly an option.

Weapons
It is possible to build this out two-handed with a Greataxe, which would be pretty scary damage wise. Since the buffed defense is very high at 75, without a shield it would still sit at a respectable 63, and make for monster damage and better accuracy. However, it would be less survivable probably. The reliance of this build on criticals means it always has a puncher's chance unless it comes against someone who is critical resistant. Even so, high accuracy and divine damage tends to overcome these builds. The choice of warhammer may seem odd in a world that loves swords, but the warhammer is a perfect weapon for this task. The higher multiplier and lower range works perfectly with enemies that are hard to hit, where a larger range will not necessarily help you in damage output. It is possible to choose the Dwarven Waraxe which has a similar damage profile to the Warhammer, but is 1-10 x3 (x4 WM) instead of 1-8 x3 (x4 WM). Since this is an exotic weapon, it would mean an extra feat. It's possible with the sacrifice of Weapon Specialization, which would then be apples and oranges since it's a buff of 2 points of damage. Unless someone cares to build this out as a dwarf, which is a definite possibility and would rival or possibly beat the Aasimar for damage output. Monkey Grip in place of specialization would also make a Scythe wielding Right Fist of Gorm, and that would be nuts for damage coming to the x4 multiplier (x5 WM) but brings about a 2 point accuracy expense. Overall I thought it better to stick with the Warhammer, being halfway between the performance of the swords and the larger two handed weapons for this purpose.

Spells
The last two levels could be built out to go to Cleric level 10 instead of 8, and that is basically the road towards the Left Hand of Gond. For the spell buildout, you are free to pick what you want depending on what you need. For Battle of the Builds, I have been using the following with great success:


 * L0: Resistance x6
 * L1: Entropic Shield, Prot. vs. Align, Bless, Divine Fervor x3
 * L2: Aid x2, Bear's Endurance, Bull's Strength, Silence
 * L3: Blindsight x2, Magic Circle vs. Alignment, Prayer, Visage of the Diety
 * L4: Lesser Spell Mantle x2, Divine Power x2, Death Ward

Equipment
For BotB, the specs on the equipment choices are:


 * Mithril Full Plate, 28SR, 35HP, Regen+8
 * Boots of Hardiness, Reflex+9, Con+9, Dex+8
 * Bracers of Armor +10
 * Keen Warhammer +8, +5d6 electricity, +7 Vamp (Keen is very important!)
 * Adamantine Tower Shield +8, Regen+8, 35HP
 * Cloak of Movement +8, Char+9, Cold buffs.
 * Ring of Elemental Resist
 * Ring of Major Sonic Resist, +L4 Cleric, Elec Save, Acid Save
 * Greater Swordsman's Belt, Str+9, Fort+8, Dex+8
 * Natural Armor Amulet +5, 40/Elec, Universal Save +7, Wis+9