Let's say you were forced to play a straight-leveled Ranger, Paladin, or Hexblade. Starting organically at level all the way through level 20.
in your honest opininon, is there a qualitative advantage in taking one of over the other two? Assuming use of all official 3.X game material. And assuming a goal of building the most powerful min/maxed combatant of these 3 similar tertiary spellcasters.
the reason I bring this up now, is that a few years has passed since the 3.5 version of Ranger and Paladin has come out. tons of feats, class-specific spells, and class-friendly magic weapons have come out making both more effective. And then the Hexblade comes onto the scene, and mechanically looks quite similar to the Ranger & Paladin.
Any thoughts you have would be appreciated. thanks!
Being a Hexblade is like stabbing yourself in the eye with a spork repeatedly. It gets class features based on being able to cast spells sometimes in armor - something that Rangers and Paladins get for free.
Paladins and Rangers are superficially pretty similar - they both get to do some pretty cool and unique stuff for like five levels before they stop getting any good abilities and fall increasingly behind the casters. Rangers get a pile of cool skills, and Paladins get some pretty sweet save bonuses.
Rangers get better spells, and Paladins can (ab)use the Divine Feats. The special mount is astoundingly superior to the ranger's half-leveled animal companion.
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All in all, the Paladin is the best of those three as a straight class. That's not saying a whole lot, but there it is.
The Paladin is the best route if you have to straight class through 20 levels. It is the only one with 2 acceptable dump stats (INT and DEX) and the only that allows you to make an extremely focused combat character that can actually matter at all 20 levels. That being the Paladin Mounted Charger or the Paladin Tank.
Still in the long run, I would never take 20 levels of any of these classes. And I'm still peeved that the Paladin gets the totally craptacular class ability of Cure Disease X/week.
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If your respective campaign and DM makes optimal use of skill creativity, the Ranger may bump the Paladin from the top spot. The Ranger skill list and rank allocations are both generous and useful all-around.
Paladins do have two dump stats, but they aren't Dex and Int - they are Dexterity and Wisdom. The Paladin skill list is pretty sweet, but you only get 2 skill points natively. Also, the inherent defensive benefits of the Paladin make (combat) expertise a good fit.
However, your spells are low level only, so you don't need a Wisdom of even 15, ever. This is true with the spellcasting stats of the other mentioned classes (Ranger and Hexblade) as well, but those classes pretend that they have attack spells - so the low save DCs from a fump stat are a big problem.
Not so the Paladin, all of their spells worth casting are buffs and cures - so having a garbage save DC is meaningless. Even Dex is a better stat for Paladins - it adds to Ride.
I really don't think anybody ever uses Rgr/Pal/Hex spells as attack spells. Just as supplementary spells. I like a highish WIS for a Paladin if for anything, the boost to WILL saves. But the bonus spell slots are always nifty as well.
Good point on Combat Expertise though. Ultimately, I like Paladins clad in big-ass armor. And that's when DEX doesn't mean much to me.
Interestingly, you can actually build a pretty decent high-DEX Paladin Archer archetype. Even going as far to take that crappo feat in the BoED that let's you Smite via ranged attacks. The Divine Might feat applies to ranged attacks as well.
Quickening a divine favor combined with prayer beads of karma and practiced spellcaster used to be an acceptable option, before the nerf (which, honestly, hurt high level paladins a lot more than high level clerics--the UMD check on a staff of nature's favor is embarrassingly easy and is in fact what you'd want to do).
Try to con your DM into letting you use the 3.0E version of divine shield and improved shield bash, too. You can become a startlingly effective defensive character.
But if you want a cool Hexblade character that is *almost* straight level, but with a neat twist, try the following:
Take 14 levels of Hexblade. Make sure you take the Divine feat that gives you access to a given domain's spell list (it's in the Complete Divine book) for your arcane spell list. The domain you want is the Summon Domain.
Next, take 4 levels of Nar Demonbinder, or 2 of NarD and 2 of good Wiz/Sorc PrC that gets you +1 BAB and +2 spell levels (and some additional class goodies).
Finally, take 1 level of Spellsword and 1 level of Dragonslayer (Draconomicon).
This way you net a BAB of +18, 7th level CHA-based arcane spells, and 14 levels of Hexblade goodies (which allows you to still be a fairly robust primary combatant). All your Hexblade goodies, spells, and NarD spells are CHA-based, making MAD a little less burdensome.
If you can squeeze in 2 Practiced Spellcaster feats, you can get your Hexblade caster level up to 11, and your NarD caster level up to 21. The latter of which makes your "toggle-able" Blasphemy/Holy Word's pretty darn efficient. Especially if you can grab a few orange ioun stones and what-not.
thanks!