Multi-class options

Wolf72 · May 31, 2019

Anyone remember how excited they were when the UA came out? ... It was awesome. Made a drow ranger, before Drizz't (sp).

I do remember thinking, 'god, how do you figure out what you can and can't multiclass?'. As my memories blur together and I find myself perusing my 1e library, I'm still stumped.

At one time I was fairly certain there was a dragon magazine article that covered lots of MC options (optional options to be fair). I don't think it was a 2e article, nor do I think it was for FR ... but I could be totally wrong.

While I was rereading the class/level pages the only thing that stuck out was that dwarves cannot MC as an assassin, so they could not benefit from the +2 levels above what their maximum based on prime ability score was.

Anyone know where there is an official (optional) list, obviously besides the PHb. Was it in 2e, in which case, never mind.

***
Total tangent: was googling and trying to find some answers (none really). What I did find was that some people could not find out how to split the MC experience ... couldn't find it anywhere in the PHb, DMG, or UA. The responders weren't any better.

So I looked, they were right about it not being in the description of multiclassing. But, anyone old fart whose read the PHb knows that you split evenly by 2 or 3 depending on how many classes you chose. After about 2-3 minutes of perusing, it was right there in the racial descriptions. As plain as could be, and iirc in every racial description.

The Hierophant · May 31, 2019

As you have identified, the multi-class combinations are in the race descriptions. If you are using UA (and it sounds like you are) there is also the errata and corrections article from Dragon 103.

NEW RULES!

Multi-class possibilities

Multi-class possibilities With all the new racial strains available for player characters, it's high time we had some once-and-for-all definition of which multi-class combinations are permissible for the various demi-human races. Jeff came up with Character Race Table III (see page 49) to define who can become what. All combinations including the thief class also apply to the thief-acrobat split class, so that an elf (for instance) could begin as a cleric/fighter/thief and later become a cleric/ fighter/thief-acrobat. A note of caution regarding multi-classed assassin characters: Combinations with the assassin class are given as permissible for several racial types, even though we have reservations about some of them. (In partic-ular, Frank isn't crazy about non-dark elf magic-user/assassins.) We'd recommend limiting multi-classed assassins to only those races with a disposition toward evil — gray dwarves, dark elves, deep gnomes, half-orcs, and half-elves of dark descent. As Jeff points out, “An assassin in a good-aligned race tends to be a loner” — and who wants a loner for a player character? The list of allowable multi-class combina-tions is pretty liberal, but it doesn't permit every matchup that's theoretically possible. For instance, a PC hill dwarf can be a cleric or a thief, but not a cleric/thief; a surface gnome can be a cleric or an assassin, but not a cleric/assassin. Monster Manual II mentions that wild elves can be druid/ fighters, but that combination is not open to player characters of that race. Three-class combinations are only permitted for elves and half-elves, and only if all three classes are among the “basic four” (cleric, fighter, magic-user, thief). In no case can a player character be a member of a class and one of that class's sub-classes at the same time.

Now be careful with that table, the columns are out of line with the headings after “FM”!

Wolf72 · Jun 1, 2019

Thank you!

and it took me moment to realize what you wrote about the table. "hey, since when are there half-orc ranger/magic users" ... LoL

Still odd that wild elves get a whole lotta nothing.

Warpiglet · Jun 1, 2019

Actually there was some other options for 1e in dragon! We printed it and put it in our UA books. There were crazy allowable combos like cleric magic user thieves! I had an evil one--worshipped Loki. An evil gray elf named Glavis! Some 30 years ago...

The Hierophant · Jun 1, 2019

I really want to play a Gray Elf Druid/Magic User.

Warpiglet · Jun 1, 2019

The Hierophant said:
I really want to play a Gray Elf Druid/Magic User.

After reading this I looked for some of my ancient sheets! I actually also had a gray elf druid/magic-user as well. 'Gristos Achilleous'

We went crazy for a while in the 90s with multiclassing combos for 1st ed AD&D! That article in dragon opened up crazy vistas. We never converted to 2nd edition at all...

TwoSix · Jun 1, 2019

Hmm...not having access to older Dragons, I never realized how much more open 1e was to multiclassing than 2e was. Cleric/Thief was a thing!

Wolf72 · Jun 1, 2019

playing with numbers:

If you managed to get your Elf Druid/Thief (why do wild elves get the nature shaft? I would think they're more in tune with Nature, maybe I'm channeling to much 3x/PF) to max Druid level they could be a Druid 23/Thief 25 with sub-par (say a 14, which in 3x/PF isn't that bad) ability scores.

still ranting on wild elves, would think they'd be natural rangers too.