Is there a good Commander type class?

[SangoProduction]

I haven't realized how much I've missed the role until I watched Overlord season 3 - where she can just call out commands and save allies. So, I was going to play 4e...and there are literally 3 games on roll20. Sigh.

So, I ask here. Is there a good, active, commander class in 3.5 or pathfinder? Not only which is merely an aura bot who passes out piddly bonuses, but actually does substantial things, such as giving allies extra attacks, or forces them to move out of the way of attacks, or even just rerolling the rolls of allies and enemies?

I guess there are a few spells, like (Mass) Snake's Swiftness. Are there any more?

[PhantasyPen]

A crusader or Warblade (both from Tome of Battle) with the White Raven discipline might fit the bill.

[Nifft]

Yeah, look at Crusader.

Between the healing you can hand out with Devoted Spirit and the bonus actions you can give with White Raven (Tactics), plus the attack bonuses your allies can get when you use some Strikes from either.

Both tend towards a lead-from-the-front playstyle, where you hit things with your sword to inspire your allies -- so not a 4e Lazy-Warlord commander, but still a good Leader-type class.

[Fizban]

The War of the Burning Sky campaign has a pretty good version. They made a commander feat group with an inspire courage effect and the rest of the Marshal's stuff, including grant move action available as early as 3rd, and then a base class with the Marshal's minor auras, a bunch of bonus feats that can be fighter or commander feats, as well as group initiative bonus and increases to the radius for all of their stuff. It's free in the intro pack here.

I would assume you were already aware of the original Marshal in Mini's Handbook, whose main problem is being a bit too weak.

[Florian]

There're two PF 3PP classes that are based on that theme.

DSP has an akashic/initiator hybrid class that basically uses team mates to initiate maneuvers. Forgot the name and don't know whether it´s out of the playtest phase.

Legendary Games has the Ultimate Commander, a class that basically has a troop subtype companion to boss around, so pretty similar to Overlord.

[SangoProduction]

OK. So we've got some feats, and Tome of Battle.
I was somewhat disappointed by ToB, with them having like 2 spells per spell level for the different schools. I'll look in to White Raven.
And yeah. The Marshal is basically the penultimate example of what I don't want: a passive aura bot that doesn't really do anything actively.

EDIT: looked at the feats. Somewhat interesting. Not the most generally useful, and limited to [# of feats] per day. Also only 2 non-aura bot feats, with 1 of them being a slight penalty to enemy's spell saves. But it's cool that it's an option.
Just checked out the commander class from the same book. It's certainly more active with the bonuses it hands out, and I can appreciate that.

[Troacctid]

I don't think it would be too hard to convert the Warlord to 3.5e.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Here's something: warblade 6/ legendary tactician 10/ legendary leader 4 with a marshal cohort.

Take your (not so) dinky followers into battle and use your White Raven, IC, and rally and your cohort's auras and extra move actions to have them just mess stuff up. If legendary leader isn't available because of its interaction with certain HoB alternate rules, just grab some more warblade and if the followers are just too squishy, get the marshal's adrenaline rush ACF.

[Nifft]

The Marshal is basically the penultimate example

Huh, so it's one before the actual ultimate example.

What is the ultimate example?

[Florian]

Huh, so it's one before the actual ultimate example.

What is the ultimate example?

A Marshal NPC cohort?

[Fizban]

And yeah. The Marshal is basically the penultimate example of what I don't want: a passive aura bot that doesn't really do anything actively.

It has an active ability, just extremely late. Hence why the WotBS legally distinct Commander can pick it up way earlier. I suppose if literally all you want is short range active commands you could just go with feats, but if you want a commander character then the class is the best way to leverage them. They also get a free use per hour at 4th.

I expect the ultimate example would be either the Leadership feat, or someone who just says they're a leader.

Ah, and I've just remembered the other one I like, Legendary Tactician from Dragonlance Campaign Setting. It's mostly a full BAB inspire courage vector, no active ability to turn your actions into other people's actions.

[OgresAreCute]

Huh, so it's one before the actual ultimate example.

What is the ultimate example?

Dragon Shaman

[SangoProduction]

Dragon Shaman

Thank you! I am so glad I didn't have to say that. lol. Dragon Shaman is the class that you take as a feat and forget it was even a class.

[Serafina]

Spheres of Power (and Might) offers several options.

The Warleader-sphere allows you to use both Shouts and Tactics. Tactics are activated with a move-action (so quite usable in combat), and maintained with a swift- or move-action (so you can just have them always-on), and mostly provide stat-boosts to all your allies (though there's also a free bull-rush on attack-actions in there). Shouts are standard-actions and have various effects, such as granting temporary hitpoints, making enemies shaken or frightened, or allowing a new saving throw against an ongoing condition.

The War-sphere. It allows you to put down totems that can buff allies, or hinder enemies, in possibly quite a large radius. Most of them are pretty meh, but there's some nicer options. You can also Rally allies with immediate actions, which can include free attacks or movement and other nice things. Mandates create a link between two allies, and grant benefit under certain conditions. And Momentum-talents can grant even more nice benefits, including even more attacks and other options.
Just avoid using totems as standard-actions during battle - there are multiple ways to do so as a move-action, and you can also do so as a swift-action, or you can just maintain it for a longer time outside of combat.

And then there's Squadron Feats. Aside from making your totems better for your allies, you can also take Battlefield Tactics to just give an ally a standard action at the cost of your own. Or a move-action at the cost of your own. Or even a swift action at the cost of your own.


As for actual classes - there's a bunch of options.
Any caster can become a sphere caster. Anyone can dabble in combat spheres. You could focus on the War sphere, the Warleader sphere, on both, and also try to do other things on the side too. Do you want to have your own animal companion, summoned companions, or undead soldiers? All are quite possible.

Obviously, there's the Commander class. Pretty good at their job, but they gain no spellcasting.
The Soul Weaver is a full caster, and can be pretty good with the War sphere by using the Ensouled Totem feat, which allows a totem to be mobile and stick around for a really long time. In addition, you can buff allies and undead pretty well.
The Hedgewitch is great at combining both War and Warleader, by taking the Martial Hedgewitch archetype. They can also take the Iron Mage archetype to directly boost the War sphere, which makes for a really potent combination. And if you also want to dabble in undeath, there's a good archetype for that too (Triple Goddess), though you'll have to choose - otherwise, pick the +2 caster level trait for the Death-sphere.
And a lot of other classes can work too, but these three are the main standouts IMO.

[Nifft]

Dragon Shaman

Nah, that class can actually do a few things -- breath weapon, healing touch & condition removal, sometimes a spell-like ability.

Not enough things, of course, but significantly more than a Marshal.

Thank you! I am so glad I didn't have to say that. lol. Dragon Shaman is the class that you take as a feat and forget it was even a class.

Not that I want to be in the position of ever defending the awfulness that is Dragon Shaman, but I think it'd stack above Marshal and Divine Mind as a class. Even though all three are very poor classes, they are not equally poor.

Marshal might be a better one-level dip for Motivate Charisma on a diplomancer, but Dragon Shaman is closer to playable as a class in itself.

[SangoProduction]

Oh! I didn't realize Rallies can be done as an immediate action. Suddenly I have been given a new level of respect towards the War sphere.
Do kind of wished the War sphere was the slightest bit more consolidated though. Each effect is very limited, and the entire sphere nickel and dimes the heck out of your spell points.

[Serafina]

Oh! I didn't realize Rallies can be done as an immediate action. Suddenly I have been given a new level of respect towards the War sphere.

The main limitation is that normally, the target needs to be within the area of effect of one of your totems, or you can't rally them. Well, and that they all cost a spell point.

But, well with the right setup having a totem up isn't too much of a drawback. You can maintain it as a move-action with Easy Focus, and some of the totems are good. Say, if you are in a group where everyone is good, Totem of Allegiance together with Squadron Commander is just an untyped +2 to attack and saves for everyone.

Or you use one of the methods to rally allies without them having to be in the area of your totems. There's feats that allow you to do so for the Eliciter and Symbiat, or to rally allies affected by one of your Consecrations, Enhancements or Protection Wards, or within 30 feet of one of your Glows.

Or you just take the Battle Manipulator Drawback, and don't bother with all that in exchange for only being able to rally allies within 30 feet.


Oh, and one additional trick with Rallies:
Take the Invigorating Rally dual sphere feat, and you can Invigorate allies whom you rally as part of the same action. This can be further augmented with Restorative Cure - now you also Restore them. And you can grab a Vitality-talent to grant them a nice temporary bonus.



Oh and since I forgot: the Ghost Sovereign can rally allies without needing them within to be within the area of a totem, and they don't even need to have the rally-talent! It costs a soul, and only comes online at 8th level, but that's pretty good.

[Serafina]

Just a quick 7th-level Iron Mage Martial Hedgewitch build:

Max out your Casting Ability Modifier, whichever your prefer works.
4 combat talents from class, 2 from martial tradition. 7 magic talents, War sphere as a bonus.

Secrets:
Imbued Weapon: use your Casting Ability Modifier to attack with your weapon of choice, instead of strenght
Battle Hardened: Stalward is great, why not take it?
Ritual Caster: it's always good.

Feats:
Invigorating Rally
Squadron Commander (gained for free from drawbacks)
Battlefield Tactics: you'll use this a lot to give allies standard actions. Really, what more do you want?
Extra Magic Talent x2

Warleader talents:
Deadly Herdsmen: this is ideal if your allies use Spheres of Might - but you'll be handing out standard-actions anyway, so those can be used for attack-actions. And hey, free bull rushes are nice.
Harangue: getting another saving throw, even when one would not normally be allowed, is really good. Well worth a standard-action in a lot of cases.

Fencing:
Expert Feint: your feints help your allies
Fast Feint: feint as a move-action
Shadow Strike (Exploit): fortitude or become fatigued is pretty good. So is full-damage against incorporeal creatures. Only getting non-lethal against corporeal creatures is fine for that.

War Talents (Drawbacks: Battle Manipulator, Squadron Elite)
Blood Bond: save a ton of spell points on your mandates.
Guile (Mandate): you give your fighter-type a standard-action. They make an attack-action and get a bull-rush. It lands, you get full concealment. Win-win-Win.
Tactical Momentum (Momentum): +5 or so to a combat maneuver for just one point out of 12 or so. That's pretty worthwhile.
Marauding Momentum (Momentum): 5-foot steps, up to four times per turn per ally.
Revitalize (Rally): reroll saving throws. Always good
Strike (Rally): immediate-action combat maneuvers. More full concealment in combination with Guile.
Resounding Rally: always rally yourself as well, for free. Also gives you those combat maneuvers, and with your decent BAB and the possibly +5 from Tactical Momentum, why not?

Life Talents (Drawbacks: Limited Restoration (Cure)
Restorative Cure: for when you have to remove a nasty condition, such as staggered or nauseated.
Ranged Healing: not actually sure this is needed with Invigorating Rally, but just in case


So in summary, here's what you do in a fight:
- spend your Standard action on giving your allies standard actions
- spend your move action on either feinting to make an enemy flat-footed until your next turn, on maintaining a tactic if you rallied someone, or on moving if you need to
- Rally allies to keep them save from spells
- give allies combat maneuvers via three different methods
- give yourself and possibly allies full concealment, as long as combat maneuvers succeed
- if you have to attack yourself for whatever reason, you get some precision-damage and fatigue the enemy.


I'm sure this can be optimized more, and you can obviously do vastly different builds too. But I think this already shows

[liquidformat]

What about bard? Also I really like the orc warlord prc but that is more of an npc class unless your dm lets you abuse leadership.

[mabriss lethe]

Ok... hear me out. I'm about to make a really bad suggestion, and make it with a modicum of sincerity. Ready?

TRUENAMER:
It's still an ungodly abomination, but if you turn down the lights and squint your eyes really hard, Utterances kind of look like a magic based commander ability set. Sort of like when people see religious figures on toast.

[liquidformat]

Ok... hear me out. I'm about to make a really bad suggestion, and make it with a modicum of sincerity. Ready?

TRUENAMER:
It's still an ungodly abomination, but if you turn down the lights and squint your eyes really hard, Utterances kind of look like a magic based commander ability set. Sort of like when people see religious figures on toast.

No... Just no go sit in the corner and think about what you just said.

[CharonsHelper]

If you have a group that it combos well with, a Pathfinder Skald can do that. They can give Rage powers to their allies, and boost ally attacks with the Inspiration spells. (They don't work well with the base bard because they don't stack with Inspire Courage.)

Other spells like Saving Finale can help allies re-roll.

[Zaq]

No... Just no go sit in the corner and think about what you just said.

There’s a tiny bit of merit there, though. Temporal Twist and Temporal Spiral are straight up “user speaks, target attacks/moves” abilities. They eventually become swift actions, even.

[Goaty14]

Aw man, I was beaten to the punch that a Truenamer could do everything listed! (Friggin love truenamers, man)

such as giving allies extra attacks (Temporal Twist, Greater Speed of the Zephyr)
forces them to move out of the way of attacks (Eldritch Attraction, Temporal Spiral, Shield of the Landscape, Creative Uses of Conjunctive Gate)
even just rerolling the rolls of allies and enemies? (Breath of Cleansing, Preternatural Clarity, Breath of Recovery)

Bolded is my input

EDIT: If you roll up and play a truenamer commander, I will personally snail-mail you some ice cream!

[Elricaltovilla]

Have you looked at Path of War?

Path of War: Expanded's Mystic class has access to a lot of powerful buffing abilities through its own Elemental Glyph class feature, the Golden Lion discipline (use a trait to swap for it) and its other maneuvers available. On top of that it makes an excellent item crafter.

There's also the Zealot class, which has strong leadership abilities, access to Golden Lion, and psionic stuff for more shenanigans.

The Warlord also serves as a leader class, with presences and gambits to spread around bonuses and penalties to allies and enemies (respectively) as well as the ability to share feats. There are also several archetypes and class templates that add more or alternative leadership abilities that can be very powerful.

The Rajah (class not on the pfsrd yet) is another leader/healer class from the same book series, it's a ruler that grants titles to allies that give powerful, variable abilities to allies and can use them as vectors for initiating its maneuvers.

The Medic (class not on the pfsrd, up to date documents available in my signature however) can serve as a leader, though primarily as healer thanks to several of its expertises allowing you to stack aid another bonuses to very high levels. Your party will never lack for healing with a medic in the squad.

If you like Psionics at all (you should, it's great) the Tactician is a psionic leader with access to 9th level powers, a great deal of useful buff abilities and the collective ability, allowing you and your party to share powers, communicate telepathically and do all sorts of fun stuff.

[Florian]

The Rajah

And that is the class that I meant earlier.

[SangoProduction]

Aw man, I was beaten to the punch that a Truenamer could do everything listed! (Friggin love truenamers, man)



Bolded is my input

EDIT: If you roll up and play a truenamer commander, I will personally snail-mail you some ice cream!

Oh....That seems fun.

[SangoProduction]

Have you looked at Path of War?

Nope.

Path of War: Expanded's Mystic class has access to a lot of powerful buffing abilities through its own Elemental Glyph class feature, the Golden Lion discipline (use a trait to swap for it) and its other maneuvers available. On top of that it makes an excellent item crafter.

There's also the Zealot class, which has strong leadership abilities, access to Golden Lion, and psionic stuff for more shenanigans.

The Warlord also serves as a leader class, with presences and gambits to spread around bonuses and penalties to allies and enemies (respectively) as well as the ability to share feats. There are also several archetypes and class templates that add more or alternative leadership abilities that can be very powerful.

The Rajah (class not on the pfsrd yet) is another leader/healer class from the same book series, it's a ruler that grants titles to allies that give powerful, variable abilities to allies and can use them as vectors for initiating its maneuvers.

The Medic (class not on the pfsrd, up to date documents available in my signature however) can serve as a leader, though primarily as healer thanks to several of its expertises allowing you to stack aid another bonuses to very high levels. Your party will never lack for healing with a medic in the squad.

If you like Psionics at all (you should, it's great) the Tactician is a psionic leader with access to 9th level powers, a great deal of useful buff abilities and the collective ability, allowing you and your party to share powers, communicate telepathically and do all sorts of fun stuff.

That's interesting. I'll have to take a look at this.

[mabriss lethe]

Playing off of my earlier bad idea, I'm still trying to work out the kinks on a Half/Lesser Drow "pokemon" trainer build that could be a fun commander type. (The gist of it is that you dip Marshal to meet the prerequisites for the Vermin Trainer feat. Possibly using the Draconic Aura ACF, since a marshall's aura wouldn't work on Vermin, but a Draconic aura should. Then go into truenamer to buff your pestilent pets since the Vermin type is often associated with an absurdly low CR to HD. )

[TheBrassDuke]

I haven't realized how much I've missed the role until I watched Overlord season 3 - where she can just call out commands and save allies. So, I was going to play 4e...and there are literally 3 games on roll20. Sigh.

So, I ask here. Is there a good, active, commander class in 3.5 or pathfinder? Not only which is merely an aura bot who passes out piddly bonuses, but actually does substantial things, such as giving allies extra attacks, or forces them to move out of the way of attacks, or even just rerolling the rolls of allies and enemies?

I guess there are a few spells, like (Mass) Snake's Swiftness. Are there any more?

Bard x/Cloistered Cleric x/Evangelist x

or

Cloistered Cleric x/Church Inquisitor x