Race-Class-Matchup

[Gloombunny]

Dwarves for example, make better Guardian Fighters and Dragonborn but worse Great Weapon Fighters.

...why? I mean, clearly a dwarf will be more defensive and a dragonborn more offensive, but what difference does it make whether one chooses to focus on shields or two-handers? One-handed weapons benefit just as much from Strength as two-handed weapons, and an increase to Con provides the same hit points and surges regardless of what kind of shield you have, so... while someone who wants to maximize their defensive potential will play a shield-toting dwarf, and someone who wants to maximize their damage while still being a fighter will pick a dragonborn with a two-hander, it seems to me that a dwarf with a two-hander or a dragonborn with a shield wouldn't be in any way suboptimal, just a bit more balanced between the extremes.

 

[Seeker_of_Truth]

I only really looked closely at the wizard column. I think you drastically underrated the elf wizard. The three top tier races for a wizard are eladrin, elf, and human. If a wizard wants to focus on locking down a single opponent per combat using the orb power the elf is mathematically superior to any other PHB race.

 

[Thanee]

I think you drastically underrated the elf wizard.

That could very well be. As I said, I don't consider this finished... it's more like a draft. So Input (like yours) is greatly appreciated.

I think I'll update the table with some double values (i.e. '0/-' or '+/0'), where I am unsure, that will probably give a more fitting impression.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Thanee]

Question: Why Dragonborn Ranger gets 0 when every other choice which gets a bonus to a possible primary stat gets a +?

That's one of the cases, where I switched back and forth between two values ('+' and '0').

I think, while the Ranger does benefit from the Str increase for sure (melee path, obviously), there is not much else the Dragonborn offers, which supports the Ranger class.

OTOH, the Eladrin, who is in a similar position (just for the ranged path), offers a very useful racial ability for this kind of character, and the extra Skill is also very nice, since Rangers are quite skillful characters typically. It supports the Ranger better than the Dragonborn, I believe.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Thanee]

Yeah, dragonborn make as good TWF rangers as anyone in the PHB, since there's no Str/Wis or even Str/Dex race. And they'll get a lot more use out of Dragon's Breath than the human will out of the extra at-will.

Good point.

Dragonborn also make fine melee clerics... you get the essential Str bonus, and the Cha bonus is still useful, which is something dragonborn fighters can't say for themselves.

Yes, Dragonborn definitely make good melee clerics, though I still think they are better-suited for Fighters. Fighters are more single-attribute (Str by far the most important) than melee Clerics (who need high Str and Wis, at least; they do benefit from Cha as well, of course). Fighters also take damage, so the Dragonborn racial ability is very good for them, and furthermore the multimarking with the breath weapon is very potent.

I find it odd that you rate humans so consistently high. ++ for wizard, certainly... but I don't think humans have much to offer for clerics or paladins. The extra at-will is useless to a cleric unless you're doing a hybrid melee/ranged build, and then having only one +2 attribute becomes a significant drawback. Paladins have a similar problem. I'd rate humans 0 at best for those two classes. + for warlocks, maybe, as long as they're not fey-pact.

Yeah, not entirely sure about that myself... probably some human/class combinations should just get a '0' (i.e. the Ranger, as you mentioned does not get much benefit from the extra At-Will).


As I said, there's still some work to do before I can consider this finished.

So, keep the comments coming, please!

Bye
Thanee

 

[Arakim]

Just a few comments.

Humans make great Wizards. Extra at-will and +2 INT works well.

Dragonborn make good Infernal Warlocks. Pump that con up and DB the monsters that get close. Use feats to make the damage decent.

Dwarves make great Infernal Locks, and pretty good Melee Rangers.

The current chart makes a good evaluation tough due to the fact that every class has at least 2 paths it can take, and those paths use differnt stats for the most part.

 

[ac_noj]

so... while someone who wants to maximize their defensive potential will play a shield-toting dwarf, and someone who wants to maximize their damage while still being a fighter will pick a dragonborn with a two-hander

...which was exactly my point. I'm not saying Dragonborn makes a bad Guardian fighter, just that the Dwarf makes a better one. Isn't the point of the table to advise beginners on the best choice of class? If so, why ignore the obvious difference between builds?

 

[Thanee]

So, expanding the table to include all the "subclasses" instead of just the classes would make sense?

Bye
Thanee

 

[Gloombunny]

Yes, Dragonborn definitely make good melee clerics, though I still think they are better-suited for Fighters. Fighters are more single-attribute (Str by far the most important) than melee Clerics (who need high Str and Wis, at least; they do benefit from Cha as well, of course).

Why do melee clerics need high Wis? All it does for them is Turn Undead and Healing Lore. Healing Lore is great stuff at low levels, but even if you bump Wisdom at every opportunity it doesn't scale up nearly as fast as hit points do. Turn Undead is situationally very nice, but if your deity offers a good channel it's not too much of a loss. Anyway, I'm not saying you should make Wisdom a total dump stat, but it's really tertiary importance at best.

There are no good cleric paragon paths for a character like this, but multiclassing to fighter or warlord solves that problem.
[/QUOTE]

Dragonborn make good Infernal Warlocks. Pump that con up and DB the monsters that get close. Use feats to make the damage decent.

They don't get a Con bonus or an Int bonus. If having a once/encounter AoE attack is that important to you, multi into wizard. Or be a half-elf, or both. Your Int shouldn't be far behind your Con as a infernal 'lock anyway.

The current chart makes a good evaluation tough due to the fact that every class has at least 2 paths it can take, and those paths use differnt stats for the most part.

I think the chart should reflect how good a character of that class a member of that race can be, assuming they choose the most appropriate build. The fact that dragonborn make lousy archery rangers shouldn't give them a low ranger rating; that would be misleading since dragonborn do in fact make pretty decent rangers if you play to their strengths.

 

[Thanee]

Why do melee clerics need high Wis? All it does for them is Turn Undead and Healing Lore. Healing Lore is great stuff at low levels, but even if you bump Wisdom at every opportunity it doesn't scale up nearly as fast as hit points do.

Well, you might want the occasional Wis-based power, and I think that Wisdom also affects some powers, even if it is not the attack ability. Though that is a bit of a guess right now, will have to look through the powers to confirm. I know Charisma is used quite a bit there, which makes the Dragonborn's attribute bonuses very nice for a melee cleric.

I think the chart should reflect how good a character of that class a member of that race can be, assuming they choose the most appropriate build. The fact that dragonborn make lousy archery rangers shouldn't give them a low ranger rating; that would be misleading since dragonborn do in fact make pretty decent rangers if you play to their strengths.

That is pretty much how I intended it to work right now (how good is the race/class combination if you play to its strenghts).

Bye
Thanee