D&D 5E Re-Noobed Class Advice?

[vogless]

I've been gone a looong time. I've been playing from the early 80's, but I've been gone from RPG's since 4th hit the shelves.

Kicking around giving 5th a whirl. I just need a quick hand getting back into the game.

What's the current thought on classes? Are the ones in the PHB fine, or should I go with the revised ones from UA? I see a revised Ranger class, and was/is there a problem with the Druid?

Also, ANY rumors of Greyhawk getting the 5E treatment?

I realize I can do lot's of Google foo to get some answers, but I'd prefer spending the time diving into the rest of the books to get going.

Thanks in advance!

 

[KahlessNestor]

I find the PHB classes to be just fine. Some claim sorcerers are weak, and moon druids OP at low levels. Biggest issue seemed to be the Beastmaster ranger. But I think they're all viable. Lore bards are really strong.

Remember that UA stuff is in beta playtest mode, and WOTC often puts them out as deliberately broken, so be wary.

No word on any setting other than FR getting any love, so no luck with Greyhawk.

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[rgoodbb]

As stated above, all PHB classes are fine to play. I've seen people play Sorcerers, Beastmaster Rangers and Druids and enjoy them just as much as any other class. As long as you are enjoying playing your character, you can't really go wrong.

Hope you enjoy the game.

 

[Ath-kethin]

If you're wary of taking the plunge and buying a bunch of books, a stripped-down version of the game is available for free from Wizards here. Just download the pdfs for the Player's Rules and DM's rules (which includes monsters).

It's a full 20-level game, and all the published adventures are written assuming people have access only to these files. The "basic" game just doesn't include optional rules like feats and multiclassing and has only one subclass option for each class.

You can also download the 5e SRD from Wizards here. Again, it isn't EVERYTHING, but it has the more advanced classes like the Warlock and Druid.

 

[vogless]

Sounds good!

Thanks for the help.

Another Question. Is there an official character generator, or will there be? Guessing it's not that important as it was with 3E. Character generation seems much simplified.

 

[KahlessNestor]

Nope. Nothing official, though some 3rd party ones using the SRD are floating around.

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[Ath-kethin]

Sounds good!

Thanks for the help.

Another Question. Is there an official character generator, or will there be? Guessing it's not that important as it was with 3E. Character generation seems much simplified.

As mentioned, there's nothing official. Some people seem to want one, some don't seem to care. From where I sit, making a character in 5e is so fast and easy (think pre-WotC days fast) a character builder would actually increase the amount of time it takes to whip something up.

 

[Al2O3]

For character building I prefer Roll20 with the 5e SRD (for spells etc) along with some point buy calculator. The form fillable PDF is also good.

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[vogless]

Again, Thanks very much!

That ought to do it. Time to dig in to the books.

 

[ad_hoc]

The classes/subclasses are mostly all fine but a few of them don't perform quite how they read.

These are Barbarian Berserker, Ranger Beastmaster, Rogue Assassin.

Sorcerer Wildmage is underestimated because people often miss how good Tides of Chaos is. They also fear the 1 in 50 chance of fireballing yourself/party which is fair.

Monk 4 Elements is both bad and doesn't perform how it reads.

I think I that's all of them.