My first 4th edition campaign

[UngeheuerLich]

You should play what you like. The group will work without a leader. You may however look after your own emergency healing, as AC doesn,´t make you invincible.

 

[UltimaGabe]

Eh, you are assuming you have a leader.
If you can't win without healing, sooner or later you're going to take a TPK, 'cos at any time you need healing you're potentially losing the fight.

So you can pack healing, or you can pack bigger guns.

It sounds to me like you've never been in a party with a truly good leader.

 

[Danceofmasks]

It sounds to me like you've never been in a party with a truly good leader.

What as in infinite surgeless healing cheese?

I expect monsters to fight to win.
If they don't follow up knocking a character unconscious with a coup de grace, they're fighting to lose.
I also expect monsters to delay and arrange their initiative orders just so they can successfully kill a PC in 1 round.
Fighting to win.

It sounds to me like you've never been in a party with powergamers that prefer most of their encounters around L+6.

 

[Prestidigitalis]

If you can't win without healing, sooner or later you're going to take a TPK, 'cos at any time you need healing you're potentially losing the fight.

The problem with the "we don't need no stinking healing" strategy is that it ignores the key role of dice in the game. The encounter may be level-1, but if a few important powers recharge and the DM rolls a few crits at the wrong time... Healing predictably counteracts the unpredictable, and that has great value.

 

[Danceofmasks]

Thanks for your ignorance.
I'll repeat myself now, won't I?
I play leaders. Healing is plan C. I heal on the rare occasions when we get multiply critted.

Admin here. Please see my warning on the following page. ~ PCat

 

[Antronach]

It sounds to me like you've never been in a party with powergamers that prefer most of their encounters around L+6.

Surely you exaggerate

 

[Danceofmasks]

No, I do not.
Some of the things I did in 3.5e:

When Keith Baker visited australia, I defeated the final encounter of the scenario he ran for us with a single readied action.
Without dealing damage.

My group also famously annihilated 2 encounters in the final session of a battle interactive in a single round.
Then we asked the DM to run the scenario again, at the highest level it was written at.
We annihilated that, too ... then attacked each other for kill-stealing.

4e is a bit trickier, as it requires multiple characters with party-wide AP cheese to counteract the enemy's defenses .. meaning we haven't been able to reliably deal with L+6 encounters before level 11.

 

[UltimaGabe]

It sounds to me like you've never been in a party with powergamers that prefer most of their encounters around L+6.

No, I haven't. And I hope to God I never am. Luckily for the TC, this is his first 4e campaign, and he's not asking "OMG my group is fighting Orcus and they say leaders suxxors and now I need halp pl0x". Telling a new player that a class's main archetype is poor because your very, very, very specialized group has less need for it is in poor form, IMO.

 

[Danceofmasks]

Huh.

Did I not say that clerics are good?
Did I also not say that I play leaders?!
(I wouldn't play them if they suxx0rz)

 

[Amaroq]

Here's the suggestion I would make for you:

If you enjoy tactics and "gifting" your teammates actions and bonuses, then a Warlord would be a great addition to that party. If you personally aren't much of a tactician, your Warlord isn't going to help as much.

A cleric or shaman would go a long way towards healing the party - and may be the "best" compliment to the existing group; you'll get a lot of powers like "attack X, and gift a party-member a healing surge".

If you enjoy rolling lots of damage dice and hitting for tons of damage, then you might try a ranger, sorcerer, or warlock. The ranger can "skin" either as a two-sword whirlwind, or as an archer who can fire two shots per round; you'll deal out lots of weapon damage.

If you'd enjoy looking evil, intimidating, and badass, a Tiefling Warlock is pretty badass and deals out a lot of magical damage.

If you enjoy a "Even my character doesn't know what's going to happen", then a Sorcerer with Wild Magic fits; a lot of the powers have random benefits to you.

Finally, it never hurts to have a second Defender in a group; that party might really benefit from a Dwarf Warden; a Paladin would also be able to do some healing while filling the defender role.

There's plenty of good options out there - they have a solid party already so I'd say focus on something that you will enjoy playing rather than on "what they need".