The thing is, when a Wizard PrCs, he still gains all his Wizard spellcasting, which is the primary Wizard thing. When a Fighter multiclasses, he's not gaining the main Fighter stuff anymore.
Usually the point of making a thread all about optimizing a class is to show what you can do with the class itself, and that way when people are making builds they can borrow what you've got and maybe multiclass around to get whatever else they want.
So yeah, almost every Fighter build could benefit greatly from a 1 level dip into Whirling Frenzy Lion Totem Barbarian, or a Crusader dip, or a Warblade dip. But an "optimized Fighter" thread should try to stick entirely to Fighters, just to show an example of the best they can do.
For that, I'd say go with something like this:
Human Fighter (Zhentarium, Dungeoncrasher, Thug variants)
Stats: Min Str 13, Min Int 14, Min Dex 13, focus on boosting Str, Con, and Dex. Keep all knowledge skills related to creatures maxed, as well as Intimidate
Level 1: Two Flaws (take your pick), Power Attack, Educated, Improved Bull Rush
Level 2: Dungeoncrasher 1 (knock enemies into walls for extra damage)
Level 3: Skill Focus: Intimidation, Imperious Command
Level 4: Knowledge Devotion
Level 5: Extended Intimidation (intimidation to raise disposition lasts longer)
Level 6: Shock Trooper, Dungeoncrasher 2 (more damage from slamming people into walls)
Level 8: Leap Attack
Level 9: Swift Demoralization (Intimidate as a Swift action)
Level 10: Knockback (must have gotten Permanent Enlarge Person by this point)
Level 12: Combat Expertise, Improved Trip
Level 14: Point Blank Shot
Level 15: Rapid Shot
Level 16: Woodland Archery
Level 18: Precise Shot, Far Shot
Level 20: Standstill
Basic gear: Bracers of Archery, an Eager Greatbow with Splitting as soon as you can afford it, a Valorous Glaive with other useful mods when you can afford them (possibly a Valorous Skillfull Meteor Hammer at high levels), a few items that give you manuevers once per encounter for Shadow Jaunt and Sudden Leap, items that boost intimidation, something to let you fly (maybe a flying mount), items that boost knowledge checks, Permanent Enlarge Person by level 10, Spiked armor of some kind.
Tactics: You can charge for enormous damage, killing almost anything you can hit this way (by level 8 it's +32 damage from power attack alone, and Knowledge Devotion is giving nice bonuses too). By level 10 Knockback provides huge bonuses to damage as you slam people back into walls, and knocking back people you've charged will help you charge again if you need. Take the Never Outnumbered skill trick and you can AoE intimidate everyone nearby to cowering as a swift action once per encounter (and intimidate a single target as a swift action once per round), which lets you target Will saves in addition to AC... and you can still coup de gras your cowering target, since you've still got a full round action left. Your archery damage should be pretty darn good too, especially with Knowledge Devotion, so you can be a solid threat from range as well. Furthermore, if you use Knockback to knock one enemy into another, they both get tripped and you get free Improved Trip attacks against both of them... and then knock both back again for more damage.
Additionally, you're useful out of combat, since you can intimidate in more useful ways than most Fighters and you can identify monsters effectively. The magic items let you jump to better charge positions or teleport around a bit, which is handy.
If you want to be really nasty, go Necropolitan while in a desecrated area and dump Con so you can raise your other stats, then make your weapon a Lifedrinker. Now every hit does two negative levels. Nasty. You'll need another party member to disguise you so you don't look undead, which means Clerics won't turn you right away.
JaronK
