New Campaign Started...check out the PC's

Well we mett with the new group yesterday and had a great time. The only rules changes we adopted were a non-spell casting version of the Paladin and Ranger (though you could use the book version if you wanted).
We decided to go ahead and start at 3rd level, using only the PHB races. The party, composed of 5 PC's, is as follows:
1. Halfling Rogue
2. Elf Ranger - melee specialist (2 hand axes)
3. Elf Ranger - ranged specialist
4. 1/2 Elf Fighter 2/Ranger 1
5. 1/2 Elf Fighter 2/Ranger 1
All opted to use the non-spell casting verxion of the Ranger so we have a party with NO magic support! The big advantage is they can all Move Silently, Hide, and Spot. They really did well in the outdoor adventure that was planned, though it did get hairy a few times (two down, two with single digit HP's) but they made it through.
As many have said their IS no typical party...Ftr/Cleric/Wizard/Rogue. This party has some very useful skills and abilities, they just need to get herbs/potions for healing!

Did the players choose the race and classes?
It seems like a very odd mix.

Yep, they did. I had no influence at all about what they wanted to be or should be. In fact I pretty much told them to play what they wanted. They have all been playing RPG's for years and though a few mentioned, maybe we should have a Wizard or CLeric, went with what they wanted to play. I actual thought it was kinda nice to see character concept outweigh the we have to have a spell caster idea.
By the way, with the set-up of races/classes it was an easy intro to the campaign. All are members of the local Lord's scout team (that was a no brainer at least).

Broken Fang said:

Yep, they did. I had no influence at all about what they wanted to be or should be. In fact I pretty much told them to play what they wanted.

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This is generally a mistake.

This happened in my last campaign.

We had a Rogue, 3 Fighters, and a Psion. So, I added an NPC Druid to give them a little healing.

The Rogue ended up dying, so his player replaced him with a Wizard. The Psion ended up taking a level of Psi Warrior, just so that he could have a weapon and armor (that player later left the group due to 911). One of the Fighters took a few levels of Cleric due to them having so little healing.

The reason this is a problem is that generally, the PCs advantage over the NPCs is due to their spells. Mostly, they do not run into multiple enemy spell casters, so typically, the enemies do not outclass them spell-wise (in most campaigns).

So, with a party such as yours, you will find that they have to go buy healing potions all of the time if you challenge them at all in combat.

Without one or more party healers, you will have a greater frequency of someone getting knocked into negative points and nobody is able to stabilize them.

And without arcane area effect spells (or even divine ones for that matter), an encounter which is just generally challenging will suddenly become deadly due to hot rolls by the DM.

Of course, this is also dependent on whether you as a DM fudge your rolls. In our games, we make almost all rolls for PCs and NPCs out in the open, so there is no fudging of combat rolls to save the party by the DM.


I have seriously come to the conclusion that party make up balance is extremely important. PCs, especially low level ones, have four basic types of attacks: weapons, fire, spells, and turning. Your group is immediately limited to the first two, so a couple of Ghouls, for example, could be deadly.

Hey KD! Yes I figure after last night the realize they could be in trouble, but we still have two players who have yet to make characters. I'm pretty sure one will make a fighter type, he other might go druid (so say her friends). Plus at least one from last night is thinking of multi-classing over to cleric, for at least a few levels...maybe for good.
It will be interesting to see what happens. Like I said they have all played the game so they know what can happen. I rolled everything out in front when it came to combat. Let me tell you the first 3/4 of the game I was on my usual crappy rolling, I think I did 7 points of damage in 4 hours! Then the dice started rolling hot at the end and thats when the party started falling.
What was amazing was that all three PC's that ended up going negative, all stabalized on their own in either the first or second round of having to roll! Otherwise someone would have died, the only guy standing at the was the ranger who didn't take any heal!

My party is somewhat unusual, with only one spellcaster with level 2 spells or higher(Average level=3.5)
It consists of
Half Celestial Half human Clr1/Bard1
Half Halfling Half Kender Were-tiger Rog4/Drd2
Dwarven Were-wolf War2
Elf Wiz7
Elf Wiz1(Apprenticed to the Wiz7)
Cheetah(3 Hit dice, companion to both the Half celestial and the Half-kender)

Hey BF!

We just started a new campaign due to two of our players quitting.

So, I get to play as opposed to DM.

Our 3 players took:

Human Cleric
Elven Wizard (my character)
Halfling Rogue/Psion

The DM supplied us with an NPC Ranger.

No doubt about it though. We made sure that we had spells. Even the Rogue has "extraordinary abilities" due to his psionics.

And, we have a fourth player joining. Hopefully, she will take some form of fighter type, cleric, or druid for either extra fighting capability, or extra healing.

Another nice thing now is the Regeneration spell (?, don't have the book yet) that came out in MotW. That gives Druids and Rangers the healing ability they really need.

It does seem like your group will have plenty of trouble unless they can really maximize on their strengths.

My own group is much tougher to deal with.

Human Rog 3/Ftr 1 (all the archery feats)
Human Samurai 5
Human Samurai 4
Human Fighter 3/Rog 2
Aasimar Cler 2/Brd2
Vanara Saman 5
Elf Wizard 5

Mad healing and buffing, the Wizard mostly uses support spells like Web, and the fighters kill with extreme prejudice.

Past groups same way more ECL races and multiclassing so the raw power was less.

I run a Scarred Lands game and currently the party consists of:

Half-Orc Barbarian Level 6.
Human Bard Level 5/Rogue 1/Fighter1
Human Fighter 2/Cleric 2/Rogue 1
Human Paladin 5

The Paladin is lower than the rest due to the fact that he has died three or four times... *EG*

Deedlit said:

Half Halfling Half Kender Were-tiger Rog4/Drd2

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Half Halfling Half Kender Were-tiger !?!?!?