[Complexity] Rate the Core Classes

[FireLance]

The thread on Foresight and the recent discussions on having a simpler version of D&D got me thinking: the various elements of D&D - classes, races, skills, feats, spells, combat tactics, etc. do have varying degress of complexity. For example, feats such as Weapon Focus and spells such as Fireball are easier for players to use and DMs to adjudicate than feats such as Leadership and spells such as Foresight.

So I was thinking, if we really wanted to have a simpler version of D&D, we could just rate the complexity of each element, and throw out those which are too complex. Anybody interested in such a project?

I'm going to start this thread for the classes. If anyone else wants to start other threads for the races, feats, skills, spells, etc., please go ahead. My only request is that you put [Complexity] in the thread title so those who are interested in this project overall can find them easily.

In rating the classes, I considered the following: how many choices the player has to make, whether special knowledge of tactics and tricks is necessary to play an effective character of the class, and whether the class is difficult to DM. The classes are rated on a scale of 1 (least complex) to 4 (most complex). Please feel free to comment on my analysis in subsequent posts.

Barbarian: 1
The player only needs to allocate a moderate number of skill points in character creation. During play, most class features come into effect automatically (though the player needs to remember to apply the effects); the player only needs to decide when to rage. The player can get by on simple tactics. DMing this class is also relatively simple.

Bard: 4
The player needs to allocate a large number of skill points and choose spells known during character creation. During play, the player needs to make decisions on when to use skills, bardic music and spells, and which skill, bardic music effect or spell to use. The player needs to use fairly advanced strategies to be effective. DMing the class is also more complicated due to the open-ended nature of Bardic Knowledge.

Cleric: 2
The player needs to allocate a small number of skill points and choose two domains during character creation. During play, the player needs to choose prepared spells and when to cast them. The player needs to use basic tactics to be effective. DMing the class is also relatively simple, but there could be issues related to alignment and portfolio.

Druid: 3
The player needs to allocate a moderate number of skill points and choose an animal companion during character creation. During play, the player needs to choose prepared spells and when to cast them. Wild Shape can be a complicated class ability due to the number of possible forms. The player needs to use basic tactics to be effective. DMing the class is also relatively simple, but there could be issues related to alignment and revering nature.

Fighter: 1
The player needs to allocate a small number of skill points and choose a bonus feat during character creation. During play, the player may not need to make complicated decisions if he has chosen simple feats. The player can get by on fairly simple tactics. DMing the class is also relatively simple.

Monk: 4
The player needs to allocate a moderate number of skill points and choose between two bonus feats during character creation. During play, the player has to decide when to use his special abilities. The player needs to use fairly advanced strategies to be effective. DMing the class is relatively simple, but there could be issues related to alignment.

Paladin: 4
The player only needs to allocate a small number of skill points during character creation. During play, the player has to decide when to use a small number of special abilities. The player needs to use basic tactics to be effective. DMing the class can be complicated because of the code of conduct and alignment issues.

Ranger: 3
The player needs to allocate a large number of skill points and choose a favored enemy during character creation. Subsequently, the player will also have to choose a combat style and an animal companion. During play, the player has to decide when to use a small number of special abilities. The player needs to use basic tactics to be effective. DMing the class can be complicated because the usefulness of the Favored Enemy is DM-dependent. Camouflage and Hide in Plain Sight can also be difficult to adjudicate.

Rogue: 2
The player needs to allocate a very large number of skill points during character creation. During play, the player needs to remember to use his skills and abilities. The player needs to use basic tactics to be effective. DMing the class is relatively simple.

Sorcerer: 2
The player needs to allocate a small number of skill points, select a familiar and choose spells known during character creation. During play, the player needs to decide which spell to use. The player needs to use basic tactics to be effective. DMing the class is relatively simple.

Wizard: 3
The player needs to allocate a small number of skill points, select a familiar and choose spells known during character creation. During play, the player needs to choose prepared spells and when to cast them. The player needs to use basic tactics to be effective. DMing the class is relatively simple.

 

[shilsen]

Nice breakup. I'd bump the cleric up to a 3, just because having access to every spell on the spell list means there are more options to keep track of whenever preparing spells (as opposed to the wizard, who has only the spells in the spellbook to choose between).

 

[Plane Sailing]

I think that although the sorcerer seems easy to set up, in practice it takes a lot more planning than a wizard - if you want to be an effective sorcerer you really need to plan out most of your spells through the characters expected lifespan (since you have so few spells at each level and you need to know which ones you can trade out where)

So sorcerers are perhaps 2 in play but at least 3 in character creation IMO.

Cheers

 

[Gort]

Paladins are no way as complex as clerics, let alone more complex.

 

[Li Shenron]

Let's see...

Barbarian: 1
Gameplay: only Rage requires some player's decision, the rest is static
Roleplay: easy to fall to cliche's, but otherwise no problem
Development: every class feature is fixed, and skills are straightforward; you usually choose simple combat feats

Fighter: 1
Gameplay: if you choose passive feats it's terribly easy, it could get quite complex if you follow different active feat paths which open up different combat tactics, however the tactic choices are not many more than the other classes
Roleplay: no restrictions of any sort
Development: you only choose feats, and the only care needed is about not starting a feat path and change your mind later

Paladin: 1
Gameplay: very few tricks to use, and very few and easy spells per day; only at very high level spellcasting may require some more complex tactic
Roleplay: in theory it could be the most difficult class to roleplay; in practice it always ends up being the class for newbies
Development: nothing to choose at all, and usually feats are chosen among the combat ones

Monk: 2
Gameplay: most of the features are passive, you have some limited choices about flurry, grapple/stun, disarm/trip, and a couple of very high-level abilities
Roleplay: if you follow a code of conduct it could become interesting, but IMXP players don't choose one for monks
Development: class features are almost fixed (you only have 50% choice 3 times with bonus feats), the skill list offers instead quite a good array of options; there is no no-brainer feat choice

Cleric: 2
Gameplay: spells are always very versatile and therefore require a lot of care; however most of the time the cleric is just healing the party, and even if the spell list is huge many spells do basically the same thing at different degrees; spontaneous healing makes spell preparation a lot easier; turn undead is very straightforward (you use it when there are undead, don't you?); only some domains offer an active ability
Roleplay: in theory this is the class with greatest RP possibilities; however it is often played as a maniac of a single idea
Development: once the choice of deity and domains is done, you only need to choose which aspect of your character you want to improve with feats, and there are quite some possibilities

Druid: 2
Gameplay: spells are more diverse than the cleric ones, and there's no spontaneous healing to help; wildshape is very useful and versatile, and requires some serious bookkeeping; animal companion (unless used as mere cannon fodder) adds more complexity
Roleplay: normally limited to some eco-issues very easy to handle
Development: no special feature to choose, straightforward skills; many possible thing to improve with feats

Ranger: 2
Gameplay: not very very special abilities to require attention, but spellcasting is somewhat diverse and preparation can involve some thinking; combat is slightly more difficult because of typically lower defenses; sneaking is not particularly challenging but increases the portfolio
Roleplay: very open, almost as much as a fighter
Development: favored enemies are not exactly a tough strategic choice, and this is the only class with always enough skill points to cover all that it usually needs

Rogue: 3
Gameplay: IMHO the combination of low defenses and high top damage (with sneak attack) makes the rogue the most challenging class to play in combat, and getting it to work well requires serious tactical attention; the large array of skills trained usually gives a lot of options out of combat as well
Roleplay: very open, with social skills that actually can support it
Development: skill choice is not straightforward because despite the number or sp you have the largest number of options and you won't cover everything; feats almost always point towards combat and good choices are not very many

Bard: 3
Gameplay: without sneak attack, combat is more simple than for a rogue, but still requires care; bardic spells are spontaneous (which makes them definitely easy) but with so few per day, timing becomes very important; bardic music is usually simple per se, but often requires to stop fighting; out of combat, the tricks of this class are very many
Roleplay: the nature of bardic music ability kinds of railroad the class, but still leaves some options
Development: several skills to choose from and not so few spells can lead to very diverse sets of features, making the choice interesting; there is also no easy choice for feats for bards (since the spells levels limit metamagic quite a lot)

Sorcerer: 3
Gameplay: playing a sorcerer is very easy at low levels, when you basically a one-trick-pony; after a few levels, metamagics open up great tactical possibilities and once spells are quite many it is pretty challenging to play it well; the familiar introduces more tricks to choose from
Roleplay: very many possibilities, it's easy to find inspiration in the spells known and viceversa
Development: very hard, because the limited number of spells known (and the fact that you have only spells in your pocket!) makes the choice very important, if you want to cover a wide area of both defense, offense and utility; metamagic feats are the best to go for, but require serious care about how often and with which spells you are going to use them

Wizard: 4
Gameplay: lots of known spells to put into few slots every day and nothing else to do make this class very challenging to play; the use of scrolls is a strong point and another big challenge at every level, which only gets worse once you get other item creation feats or metamagic instead
Roleplay: more or less the same options as the sorcerer
Development: choosing spells is only slightly easier compared to the sorcerer, plus you have to choose bonus feats; specialisation is chosen only once, but the consequence of the choice are not trivial

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Normally if I have new players which are not familiar with 3ed, I suggest them to just play what attracts them for RP reasons. But if they are worried about how difficult it is to play, at first level I definitely suggest:

Fighter or Barbarian, rather than Monk, Paladin or Ranger
Cleric, rather than Druid
Rogue, rather than Bard
Sorcerer, rather than Wizard

 

[two]

Effective vs. just there

You might consider bumping up the difficulties for classes that are marginally balanced, meaning, balanced, but only if you pay attention.

This includes the Monk and Bard classes, primarily.

Monks require a huge amount of optimization/work/planning and splat-book knowledge to make "decent" in combat, or even out-of-combat. A run-of-the-mill monk, with not much attention paid to feats or skills, is really asking to be irrelevant. This is very different than a fighter or barbarian -- almost any F/B build will "work" though some are better than others. For example, the "low strength, stunning fist" monk archetype is just going to be useless at low, middle, and high levels, but it's hard to see this during PC planning, unless you are experienced.

Same goes for Bard. It's possible, just barely, using Alter Self a LOT, to create a melee-capable bard (for example), but very difficult and requires much planning. An archer bard, or enchantment-specialized bard are a lot easier to create and will be reasonably effective "out of the box". But this is not obvious to a beginner, probably. Ditto skills. There are a lot of skills, and not enough points... what to do?

Character creation is actually quite easy for Sorcerers and Wizards; there are certain obvious "no brainer" 1st level spells that can be chosen without fear of screwing up. It's only later that sorcerers/wizards get tricky...what 4th level spells should a sorcerer choose? etc.

In general, it's very difficult for new players to create balanced Bards or Monks, while the other classes are much easier to deal with. In my opinion.

 

[Thanee]

I'll give two numbers each, one for playing a basic version (i.e. blaster sorcerer) and one for playing a more sophisticate version making better and more effective use of their abilities.

Barbarian: 1-2
Bard: 2-4
Cleric: 3-4
Druid: 3-4
Fighter: 1-3
Monk: 1-3
Paladin: 2-3
Ranger: 2-3
Rogue: 2-4
Sorcerer: 2-4
Wizard: 3-4

Bye
Thanee

 

[Michael Tree]

I would definitely rate the Druid a 4. Not only do they have lots of choices to make during character creation and while preparing spells, but they have to manage the differnt forms they can wildshape into, and know enough about all the creatures they can spontaneously summon. Probably the most complicated caster class, IMO.

Sorcerers are tricky. In play they're probably a 2; they have a limited number of spells available, so its easy to remeber what you can cast and memorize what all your spells do. But character creation is probably a 4, since spell choice is very difficult, and the system is very unforgiving of bad choices.

 

[Dr_Rictus]

I'll second a point: Sorcerers aren't hard to play, they're just hard to play optimally. They'll give you plenty of room to angst over your decisions, but only if you let them. Players in superhero games have the same fundamental chore (pick a few powers and then decide during play which ones to use when, and occasionally get more powers), but you don't hear them saying how much "easier" or "simpler" it would be to pick their powers before each adventure.

As to clerics, limited spontaneous casting does make them easier, but it's more than counterbalanced by the vast array of spells available, and in my experience people find how domains work more confusing at first than you might think.

Stepping back to the "simpler D&D" concept, call me crazy, but if it were mine to do my short list would at least start as Barbarian, Rogue, Favored Soul, and Sorcerer. In my experience, people picking up D&D can get really bogged down in the process of preparing spells, while it's more experienced players who tend to get bogged down over picking Spells Known.

 

[rkanodia]

I would definitely rate the Druid a 4. Not only do they have lots of choices to make during character creation and while preparing spells, but they have to manage the differnt forms they can wildshape into, and know enough about all the creatures they can spontaneously summon. Probably the most complicated caster class, IMO.

Not to mention they have an animal companion to keep track of. I think Druids have more stuff going on than any other class.