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Discounting complete build rerolls, Karlach may be the most versatile companion in Baldur's Gate 3 since her Rage can do so many different things.
During the first playthrough, she will likely be the best ally you can have in battle and it is primarily because one of the two builds that can be used to carry a game with her.
One of the builds is focused on tanking and the other on enabling others in your party.
Karlach tank build
The Tiefling Barbarian comes with stats mostly focused on Strength, Dexterity and Constitution and depending whether you want to wear armour on her, you may want more in one stat than the others. Still, make sure to keep a decently high Strength at all times.
If you go the unarmoured route, prioritise Constitution because even as close as Creche Y'llek in the first Act, you can purchase gloves that raise your Dexterity to 18. Therefore, you can respec Karlach to have minimal Dexterity while tossing all the possible points into Strength and Constitution because the gloves will bring your AC bonus from Dex to +4. Get your Constitution to 20 by level eight and you will have 19 AC without wearing any armour or even accessories that increase the bonus.
The reason you shouldn't go for maximising stats at level four when the first feat becomes available is that you want Polearm Master with this build because you will be using The Skinburster halberd through the rest of the game.
Choose Wildheart subclass at level three with the choice of the Bear Heart, which will reduce all damage taken by 50 per cent while raging. With Skinburster's passive, you will reduce pretty much all damage to menial numbers, if not negate it completely. Toss Karlach into a pile of enemies and she will easily tank them all while the rest of your team picks hostiles off from a safe-ish range. This makes her a great fit with a glass cannon team.
Karlach melee enabler build
If you choose to have a brawler squad with more than one melee character in the party, going Wildheart with Wolf Heart on Karlach is the way to go. Once again, you can choose between armoured and non-armoured approaches as it doesn't matter too much. She will still be sturdy enough to withstand damage and she will not be your primary damage dealer.
Still, if you want to improve her survivability some more, give her the Heavy Armour Master feat and make sure someone in the party has the Longstrider ritual. You can use the spell on all party members outside of combat and it will last until the next long rest which is always a good thing to have but especially to compensate for Karlach's loss of mobility through using heavy armour.
Instead, she will give advantage on attacks from all other melee allies, as long as she is standing close to an enemy. If you have a Paladin that is hunting for crits, this is the perfect ally to have. Similarly, having Lae'Zel with the Githyanki greatsword obtained from Baretha, west of Waukeen's Rest, will result in massive, and almost guaranteed damage as long as she attacks targets in Karlach's vicinity.
