New Gnomish Favoured Class?

[MarkB]

It's conspicuous not because I think you have a motive for doing it, but rather because Illusionist had been the favored, iconic class for gnomes for ... nearly 30 years. And in that time it has been seperate and distinct from the Wizard, albeit related.

Voting Wizard just isn't the same as voting Illusionist or Wizard (Illusionist), and it's a feeling or playstyle some might try to capture by voting instead for Beguiler or Bard though they wouldn't have been their first choice.

While you might just vote Beguiler anyway, since it's your poll, and assuming you put these things up to gauge exacly which class folks think should be the favorite class, I thought you might consider the fact that you did not provide a clear choice for what has been a 30-year lock for Gnomes, and that this will very likely skew the results.

PS No snippityness from your end, and hopefully none from mine, either.

Illusionist was dropped as favoured class in 3.5 for good reasons - as others have already pointed out, it's the equivalent of giving a race a favoured class of "Fighter, with Power Attack and Weapon Focus (greataxe)", or "Ranger, but only with the two-weapon fighting style".

Illusionist is not a class, and therefore doesn't belong in a poll offering choices between existing classes.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Go Bard!

 

[diaglo]

Voting Wizard just isn't the same as voting Illusionist or Wizard (Illusionist), and it's a feeling or playstyle some might try to capture by voting instead for Beguiler or Bard though they wouldn't have been their first choice.

ditto.

i voted artificer instead b/c illusionist wasn't available.

this poll really needed Illusionist.

 

[Felix]

Illusionist was dropped as favoured class in 3.5 for good reasons - as others have already pointed out, it's the equivalent of giving a race a favoured class of "Fighter, with Power Attack and Weapon Focus (greataxe)", or "Ranger, but only with the two-weapon fighting style".

Illusionist is not a class, and therefore doesn't belong in a poll offering choices between existing classes.

Perhaps the focus of the favored class manages to balance what is otherwise arguably the most powerful base race?

Or perhaps it is a choice of flavor over mechancis? Which is not necessairly a bad thing.

Seriously. 30 years of being Illusionists and now they're... bards. What a let-down.

 

[BobChuck]

It's not a matter of 'power' or even 'playability', it's a matter of flavor and preference. Illusionist was the favored class of gnomes for 30 years, and it wasn't a choice in the poll. Assuming that people would just choose wizard isn't right, because a specialist wizard and a general wizard are not the exact same class.
People who want gnomes to have wizard (any) as a favored class should be allowed to vote for that class, and people who want wizard (Illusionist) should be allowed to choose that class instead of wizard (any).

 

[smootrk]

I still think Gardener is most appropriate.

 

[Wolfwood2]

I voted for Bard.

Gnomes are supposed to be scholarly and good at illusion magic. Bards get all knowledge skills as class skills, six skills points per level to spend on it, get a special class feature that gives them bits of curious and forgotten lore for free, and are good at illusion magic.

Favored class is supposed to be the class that many members of the race will drop the odd level or two into. I can easily picture many gnomes picking up a single level in bard and becoming immediate experts in some knowledge skill and a few odd illusion or enchantment cantrips. I can't picture many/most gnomes picking up one or two levels of artificer or one or two levels of wizard (illusionist).

Of course, I think many gnome bards don't bother with the Perform skill at all. Just like NPCs who take Commoner levels, their choices are not necessarily optimized towards adventuring.

 

[Kaodi]

To The Next Level

From the polls, I have come to the conclusion that we should just make real paragon classes for each race that go all the way from 1st to 20th and beyond. Every race would have their paragon class as the favoured class, and would not be able to take levels in any other racial paragon class, with *maybe* the exception of half-orcs and half-elves, as per the current UA classes. Humans wouldn't have a paragon class, and would still be Favoured: Any. Half-Elves would be Favoured: Half-Elf and Elf though... Anyway, just a thought.

 

[dragonhead]

Ninja.

Who else would be a good ninja then one of the shortest characters in the game?

 

[Kesh]

Archivist

I've always seen gnomes as the bookworm type in D&D: collecting old lore, hoarding it even, and then using that knowledge to make life hell for those they don't like. Tricks in fun on their friends, deadly tricks on their foes, etc.

Archivist just fits them tremendously well, especially in Eberron. And I'm not just saying that because I want the Archivist to be a core class in 4e.