Paladin and party help?

[hyp3r1onsun]

I just finished the prologue with a two-handed Paladin and have Amiri, Linzi and Valerie as companions.
1) What feats/skills and weapon/armour should my Paladin focus on?
2) What classes, feats/skills and weapon/armour should my companions focus on?

[Eonwe]

Have a look at the available guides, here, on reddit and on gog forums.

It'd be way to long to give you an anwser these questions.

[Morgian]

Since you play with 2H, your AC won't be stellar, indicating heavy armor (full plate). Do not focus on a specific armor or weapon, go for general feats, unless you have a good reason to do so. A fighter/rogue build has also like 21 feats coming and can afford things like weapon focus and improved critical. As a paladin you get 11 feats at most and better avoid the extravaganza of a fighter. A lot depends where your stats are, but pallies are MAD, so you probably don't have DEX 17 - that would allow to dual wield and go for shieldbashing (the two top shields are also bladed), which worked well for me.
Sword & board means AC, but little damage. 2H means more damage, but less AC. Dualwielders do the most damage, since they get the most attacks.

Your companions are a very thick book that was discussed since release on this board. I can only give you my preference:
- Linzi as bard, going full archer (I did not repeat that after I learned what happens in the end and used a merc bard instead)
- Nok-Nok as dual wielding kukri DPS
- Valerie as monk
- Merc cleric - same as the stupid deva, but built the right way so he can use fire spells
- Octavia as is, an arcane trickster/wizard
I don't like Ekundao the Whiner, the sisters from the DLC or Reg. I played with the others, but well...Harrim's CHA sucks and his 8th level ability can mean TPK, Amiri is a glass cannon and always down, and the gnome has no STR, which killed him once (otherwise he is nice).

[Lord Yanaek]

What difficulty are you playing on?
The game is extremely different if you play on Normal or Hard.

On Normal you have some freedom to build interesting/weird characters but if you're playing on Hard you better min-max to death or you'll end up real dead real fast.

[InEffect]

Min/maxing "to death" is not mandatory for hard. For unfair - sure. It mostly stems from the AC stacking. You need 70/50 to talk unfair, for example.

[Tanlaus]

If you're playing on normal, which I highly recommend for a first playthrough, just build the character you most want to RP with. You'll be fine.

[Crimmy]

Originally posted by Tanlaus:

If you're playing on normal, which I highly recommend for a first playthrough, just build the character you most want to RP with. You'll be fine.

This, but you should think about group structure on the basic level, and familiarize yourself with F5 and F8, since RNG can and will turn what should be a cakewalk into a TPK. Or you'll stumble into a place intended for lv6+ dudes with your lv2 party, as the game gives no real clues on what awaits.

[zero]

dont worry too much about feats, theres some good ones (power attack, weapon focus, etc etc) but due to the nature of this being a video game, a lot of the excellent Pf feats are missing, so you have a lot more leeway then you think.

[InEffect]

Imo, challenging is better for the blind run. You get all the mechanics working properly on it and mobs are the same as on normal. Maybe not for your standard paladin, though.