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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Aldarc" data-source="post: 7013184" data-attributes="member: 5142">I'm not entirely sure how the "comparability" between a single-classed and multi-classed character of equal level matters in any meaningful way since it often misses the point of why people often multiclass in the first place. Let's take a paladin/sorcerer as one example. It may not be purely combat performance they are seeking, but something else entirely. She may, for example, be hoping to be a dragonborn dragonknight who has draconic sorcery. An eldritch knight does not quite fill that niche, as written, and what she has in mind is closer to a paladin but also with some of the dragonblood sorcerer abilities. It may be "just a ribbon ability," but she may actually want the bonus to charisma checks when dealing with dragons as a core part of her character concept. (And having this ability on her dragon-devoted character may actually prove exceptionally handy in the course of the campaign dealing with dragons.) Let's state the obvious. A purebred paladin will be able to carry/pull the weight of paladin responsibilities better than a MC paladin/sorcerer can. Likewise, a purebred sorcerer will be able to carry/pull the weight of sorcerer responsibilities better than a MC paladin/sorcerer can. But the player of the paladin/sorcerer is not necessarily multiclassing for the sake of carrying the weight of either a pure paladin or pure sorcerer but of some other, albeit similar, niche. She cannot necessarily out-paladin a purebred paladin, but she can out-sorcerer the purebred paladin. She cannot necessarily out-sorcerer a purebred sorcerer, but she can out-paladin the purebred sorcerer. Whatever the case may be, she will be delaying her class abilities. So what? The delay in a class ability and the loss of higher level abilities will always be part of the trade-off for multiclass characters. Yes, 3rd level spells are great. But the value or effectiveness of a character exists beyond the race to 3rd level spells, extra attack, or what other absurd metric becomes the moved goalpost. For many players who multiclass, it's a bit of a moot point. It tends to be about character concept more than anything else and the impact in the ambiguous arena of "character effectiveness" is often negligible at most tables. Until a single-class character class exists that can fill the mechanical and conceptual niche occupied by particular multiclass combinations, people will multiclass as such regardless of what anyone will tell them about how multiclassing sucks. So if multiclassing truly does suck, as some insist, then perhaps it would be better not to discourage people from multiclassing, but, rather, to actually build equally-effective new classes that fill the gap in which these various multi-class combos live.</blockquote>

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