D&D 4E JamesonCourage's First 4e Session

[Manbearcat]

WTB update @JamesonCourage!

 

[Scrivener of Doom]

Here, here!

 

[Garthanos]

Where? where?

(thread is definitely great though)

 

[JamesonCourage]

*BUMP*

Just kidding.

Anyway... after a long pause on the gaming sessions (thanks to my new job, the Warpriest's new job, and the scheduling conflicts that followed), we are planning on picking up gaming again. Right now, it looks like it'll be every other Saturday, starting on the 15th of this month. I am looking forward to diving back in! So, I'll be reading up on these threads (I'm so glad I ended up writing out as much as I did), getting a short term sub to DDI again, and getting ready to go.

A very notable change: the player of the gnome Monk will not be playing with us (as she's three hours ahead of us, now, and with her job/school, Skype won't work at the time we'll be playing). To fill the void in the party, I plan on bringing over one of my good friends (friendship goes back twelve or so years, past roommate on two occasions, regular player in my other games for the past ten years). I do not anticipate him ruffling any feathers in the group as far as our social dynamic goes, which is good.

He was hesitant to play 4e, and is basically only doing so because I'm running it (and he loves the games I run). He has said he's not making any promises, but while we were at the gym tonight, he was pretty happy to shoot around character ideas, so things look promising. I didn't have to convince him to play or anything, he's just skeptical.

But, a couple of questions about what he wanted to play. He seems to like the idea of a very knowledgeable character. Based on my description of 4e roles, he likes the idea of a Defender (with Controller secondary). He liked the description of a couple classes, though, so I think he's pretty open to stuff. He initially kicked around Rogue or Bard, but liked the idea of a Ranger or Warlord, too. When we talked about roles, he liked the sounds of the Swordmage and the Warden.

He hasn't looked anything over yet, though. My subscription ran out a while back (and I just renewed it tonight, but WOTC seems to have abysmal service, so it takes a bit [and me calling in], from my initial experience). So, in the meantime, I wanted to ask you:
(1) Based on the limited information I've gathered, what class should my friend play?
(2) What race should he play? (Your answer will likely mostly be based on racial abilities, since he didn't really talk to me about what race sounds fun at all.)
(3) What role should he take? Will that mess up the party's balance too much? (As a refresher, the party will consist of a dwarven Fighter, a mul Warpriest, and a Genasi Mage (the elemental one).
(4) Anything you'd recommend I point out to him? Feats, multi-class or hybrid stuff, backgrounds, etc?

Thanks for the help, everyone. This has been a fantastic thread, and I'm happy I get to cast Resurrection on it.

 

[pemerton]

(1)[/B] Based on the limited information I've gathered, what class should my friend play?
(2) What race should he play? (Your answer will likely mostly be based on racial abilities, since he didn't really talk to me about what race sounds fun at all.)
(3) What role should he take? Will that mess up the party's balance too much? (As a refresher, the party will consist of a dwarven Fighter, a mul Warpriest, and a Genasi Mage (the elemental one).
(4) Anything you'd recommend I point out to him? Feats, multi-class or hybrid stuff, backgrounds, etc?

Some thoughts.

Knowledgeable = needs decent INT. There are INT options for wizards (obviously), warlocks (but they're pretty complex to play well), swordmages, invokers, avengers, bards, psions and warlords. (And maybe others I'm forgetting.) But I don't think avengers have any knowledge skills on their class list, so you'd need a background option to swap in a new class skills (there seem to be plenty of backgrounds that have History as a skill, which is the most generic way of being "knowledgeable").

If he's inclined to defender, then swordmage is viable. So is a bladesinger wizard (from the Neverwinter supplement) - I've seen it criticised, but [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION] is a big fan I think. Your party looks like it could use a striker or else combat might grind, and swordmages have a reputation for being pretty low damage, whereas the bladesinger has some damage buffs, so perhaps it could be worth looking at.

Avenger and warlock are both strikers, but both at the more complex end to play well. The warlock is a low damage striker with good control and mobility. The avenger is also generally quite mobile and some builds can have some control - the class is based around locking down a single target in combat - but I wouldn't consider it very defender-y.

A bladesinger is INT/DEX and so would work well as an eladrin (naturally!). An avenger would be INT/WIS and would work well as a deva. Deva's also have a racial buff to two knowledge skills (History and Religion) as well as a racial power Memory of 1000 Lifetimes which certainly emphasises knowledgeability. In my game - which has a deva invoker/wizard who is a Sage of Ages - I use Memory of 1000 Lifetimes to flavour a lot of the character's knowledge checks ie instead of recalling stuff that the character studied up on out of play, the PC recalls some relevant detail from one of those 1000 prior lifetimes.

A different option again is an INT-based warlord who emphasises conferring buffed attacks on allies (probably the fighter) as a free action. This could be a way of getting a knowledgeable PC who also can function well on the front line and will help keep party damage up. A warlord is a leader, but if your friend went down this path I'd say be cautious of a party with two leaders - too much healing relative to output will mean that in combat things take forever as the PCs never go down but whittle away their foes at a depressingly slow pace. So other than the base Inspiring Word healing I'd suggest ways to try and buff attacks at every opportunity to try and emulate the effect of a striker: say Commander's Strike and Opening Shove (a little bit of control there), Warlord's Favour (for landing dailies), perhaps Flash of Insight at 2nd level to combine with Opening Shove (prone gives +2 to hit), perhaps Battering Command or Inspire Resilience at 3rd level, etc. (I don't know of any STR/INT race, but you could go human and start with Lend Might and Improved Tactics at 1st level to stack those to-hit bonuses.)

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

This is a tough one because you really could use a striker and there just aren't really any good INT based striker options. The PHB1 warlock is pretty so-so (though they can be very deadly at higher levels with careful building). You already have the other major alternative a Genasi blaster wizard. He could go with an Invoker build, you can do some INT based stuff there and although technically a controller you can put out some pretty decent hurt. That might be a fairly nice party, with the mage and the invoker trading "I create the zone, you pin them down in it" with the Invoker doing the toasting for anything with radiant vuln, and the genasi toasting all the stuff that doesn't resist fire damage. They could bicker about which gives the most bang for the buck, the gods or the primordials! lol.

 

[Neonchameleon]

He was hesitant to play 4e, and is basically only doing so because I'm running it (and he loves the games I run). He has said he's not making any promises, but while we were at the gym tonight, he was pretty happy to shoot around character ideas, so things look promising. I didn't have to convince him to play or anything, he's just skeptical.

But, a couple of questions about what he wanted to play. He seems to like the idea of a very knowledgeable character. Based on my description of 4e roles, he likes the idea of a Defender (with Controller secondary). He liked the description of a couple classes, though, so I think he's pretty open to stuff. He initially kicked around Rogue or Bard, but liked the idea of a Ranger or Warlord, too. When we talked about roles, he liked the sounds of the Swordmage and the Warden.

He hasn't looked anything over yet, though. My subscription ran out a while back (and I just renewed it tonight, but WOTC seems to have abysmal service, so it takes a bit [and me calling in], from my initial experience). So, in the meantime, I wanted to ask you:
(1) Based on the limited information I've gathered, what class should my friend play?
(2) What race should he play? (Your answer will likely mostly be based on racial abilities, since he didn't really talk to me about what race sounds fun at all.)
(3) What role should he take? Will that mess up the party's balance too much? (As a refresher, the party will consist of a dwarven Fighter, a mul Warpriest, and a Genasi Mage (the elemental one).
(4) Anything you'd recommend I point out to him? Feats, multi-class or hybrid stuff, backgrounds, etc?

Thanks for the help, everyone. This has been a fantastic thread, and I'm happy I get to cast Resurrection on it.

OK. Starting at the top.

There are five knowledge skills in 4e (you could make a case for Streetwise as a 6th)

• Arcana (int)
• History (int)
• Religion (int)
• Nature (wis)
• Dungeoneering (int)

That's ... a lot, but given that you should be able to get two from multiclass feats, it isn't impractical. Also I'd really recommend any knowledge expert gets the Ritual Caster feat (especially if you have a mage rather than a wizard).

Race: Human. An extra skill and Heroic Effort.

Role: Not a leader. One leader out of four is quite enough.

Question: How boardgame/tactical is he? If not very I'm going to suggest a Scout (in other words a wilderness master and roving ball of two weapon death who works outside). Int and Cha need to be 13 (or higher). Three feats to establish him as a loremaster: Bardic Ritualist (Training in Arcana, Ritual Caster, some free rituals), Bardic Dilettante (a 1/day heal to pick up the warpriest if he falls), and Bardic Lore (+2 feat bonus to knowledge skills). Combat's simple (stabbity - and if the first weapon hits you get a follow up). Knowledge is above and beyond from the ranger wilderness knacks and the skill training. The role? Strikers will really help your party.

If he's a tactician, probably another class.

 

[Quickleaf]

I think the more successful knowledge-based build I saw was kind of independent of class. For the record it was a "princess" warlord build with high Intelligence. What stood out was the utility power choices and theme. From what I can recall...

Legend Lore - History Utility 6 - make a History check in place of any knowledge check 1/encounter

Scholar - Theme - gives a bonus language @1 and ALL languages @10 plus the ability to make Arcana checks to decipher messages in code or protected by magical disguise. @5 gives a monster knowledge check to gain +4 damage or defense against a monster 1/encounter.

Bardic Ritualist - awesome feat with 1/day free ritual casting

[MENTION=6668292]JamesonCourage[/MENTION] what level are you playing at again? I'm sure some of us could put together a build that would be new player friendly.

EDIT: Do what [MENTION=87792]Neonchameleon[/MENTION] says, human ranger (scout) with those feats, and add in the Scholar theme and he will be good to go. A regular monster hunter

 

[JamesonCourage]

Thanks guys, I'll be running these past him, and see what he thinks / comes up with. Hopefully his character will be created this weekend (when I'll likely post an update on it).

 

[The Human Target]

Swordmage for sure.

Eladrin, human, or Tiefling.

Make sure he takes some weapon boosting feats to help the party damage.

Much fun will be had.