The Tyranny of Choice

[Drowbane]

I'm for the Tyranny of Choice versus Tyranny of One.

QFT

 

[mhacdebhandia]

Hundreds of 1-20 classes with hundreds of prestige classes

There are certainly hundreds of prestige classes, but there are less than seventy base classes in everything Wizards of the Coast has ever published. You'd only get over one hundred if you counted class variants and classes from official third-party sources like Dragon Magazine.

Now that the nitpicking portion of this evening's entertainment is done . . .

I know it seems like there are a lot of classes out there that you could be looking at, but in practical terms I think there's actually a very small number of meaningful options available to you.

For any given character idea you might have, the vast majority of options simply vanish. If I want to play a devious scoundrel like Jack Sparrow, I don't even have to consider half of the classic D&D archetypes - neither a mage nor a priest is Jack Sparrow! I reckon that even at your most generous translation (i.e. thinking of what he might be in a D&D setting, as opposed to recreating him as-is from the films' setting) of the character to D&D rules, there are only four base classes in the core rules that fit: bard, fighter, rogue, or ranger. Two of those - bard and ranger - are only in there because it's possible to see how in a D&D setting a character like Jack might turn his silver tongue to magic or really gain an intimate, even mystical relationship with the sea; the other two are much closer to the original film character, depending on what you want to emphasise about the character (i.e. Jack's cunning wit or his proficiency with a blade).

If we expand our options to the sixty-something classes Wizards of the Coast have published, so what? First, many of these are dedicated spellcasters, which rules them out immediately - he's no favoured soul or shugenja or duskblade or dread necromancer or warmage. Many of the others are tied to specific "capsystems" like psionics, incarnum, and the like - Jack's not a shadowcaster or psychic warrior or totemist either. He's not a knight, an archivist, a dragon shaman, a marshal, a spellthief or any one of a dozen other niche classes.

You do have to consider some of the other classes - the swashbuckler, for instance, or perhaps the scout. Truly, though, if you have a firm concept in mind it's hard to ignore the fact that it instantly contracts your viable options down to a handful of classes, which then itself contracts your choice of feats and prestige classes - make your version of Jack a warrior like a fighter or swashbuckler, and you don't have to worry about feats that enhance or alter sneak attack, for instance.

There are thousands of different characters you can make just with the rules, not even paying one iota of attention to distinguishing your PCs' personalities, it's true. But it's also just as true, if not more so, that the range of meaningful choices you have at character creation is always constricted down to a manageable number if you have any idea whatsoever of what kind of character you want to play.

Hell, a choice as shallow and undescriptive as "spellcaster" instantly cuts down your options dramatically - after a quick count, there are only twenty-three PC classes that cast spells in Wizards of the Coast products, counting minor casters like the paladin and odd classes like the artificer or shadowcaster which kinda-sorta cast spells, but excluding psionicists and classes with supernatural abilties that aren't spells like the warlock (as well as variants like the cloistered cleric):

• Bard
• Cleric
• Druid
• Ranger
• Paladin
• Sorcerer
• Wizard
• Healer
• Hexblade
• Favoured Soul
• Shugenja
• Spirit Shaman
• Warmage
• Wu Jen
• Spellthief
• Archivist
• Dread Necromancer
• Beguiler
• Duskblade
• Artificer
• Mystic
• Shadowcaster

So we're down from sixty-something to twenty-three after only one word of character concept. I call that good odds we can easily find something suitable with a little more work.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I found focusing on characters personality over power and campaign story over balance makes most of these problems go away.

'xactly.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The thing is, they're not real choices. They don't give you any options about who your character is that you wouldn't have without them. Most of the meaningful things you could decide about your character and what they can do can be handled with the core rules.

Make a swashbuckler or a warlock with the core rules. The most popular non-core choices -- the ones DMs will deal with the most -- are the most popular precisely because the core rules cover some tropes less well than others.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

What Crothian said.

The anxiety goes away when you stop trying to compete. Do not compete with the other players. Do not compete with other PCs. Do not compete with the DM. Do not compete with yourself.

Just play this game as if it were fun.

 

[MadMaxim]

Sure, all the choices that you can make regarding PC and NPC creation can seem overwhelming, it isn't really that hard once you got a firm image in your mind of the character you want, and then you go crunch some numbers to come up with the best possible (or most powerful) solution. That's what I usually do.

 

[Nightfall]

QFT

Thanks DB.

 

[sniffles]

I love choices, and would be turned off by a core-only game. But I don't make my choices based necessarily on optimization and damage potential. Sometimes I just pick something because it sounds fun or I've never tried it before.

I do see your point though, Fishbone, about selection of feats and prestige classes. I find it very frustrating to have to take a particular feat not because I want to take it, but because I need it to get another feat that I do want to take, or to get into a prestige class. That's taking away some of my choice, and I don't like that.

 

[Nightfall]

Sniffles, that why I think DMs need to talk to players IF they are "worried" about feat selections and such.

 

[Olaf the Stout]

There are certainly hundreds of prestige classes, but there are less than seventy base classes in everything Wizards of the Coast has ever published. You'd only get over one hundred if you counted class variants and classes from official third-party sources like Dragon Magazine.

Now that the nitpicking portion of this evening's entertainment is done . . .

I know it seems like there are a lot of classes out there that you could be looking at, but in practical terms I think there's actually a very small number of meaningful options available to you.

For any given character idea you might have, the vast majority of options simply vanish. If I want to play a devious scoundrel like Jack Sparrow, I don't even have to consider half of the classic D&D archetypes - neither a mage nor a priest is Jack Sparrow! I reckon that even at your most generous translation (i.e. thinking of what he might be in a D&D setting, as opposed to recreating him as-is from the films' setting) of the character to D&D rules, there are only four base classes in the core rules that fit: bard, fighter, rogue, or ranger. Two of those - bard and ranger - are only in there because it's possible to see how in a D&D setting a character like Jack might turn his silver tongue to magic or really gain an intimate, even mystical relationship with the sea; the other two are much closer to the original film character, depending on what you want to emphasise about the character (i.e. Jack's cunning wit or his proficiency with a blade).

If we expand our options to the sixty-something classes Wizards of the Coast have published, so what? First, many of these are dedicated spellcasters, which rules them out immediately - he's no favoured soul or shugenja or duskblade or dread necromancer or warmage. Many of the others are tied to specific "capsystems" like psionics, incarnum, and the like - Jack's not a shadowcaster or psychic warrior or totemist either. He's not a knight, an archivist, a dragon shaman, a marshal, a spellthief or any one of a dozen other niche classes.

You do have to consider some of the other classes - the swashbuckler, for instance, or perhaps the scout. Truly, though, if you have a firm concept in mind it's hard to ignore the fact that it instantly contracts your viable options down to a handful of classes, which then itself contracts your choice of feats and prestige classes - make your version of Jack a warrior like a fighter or swashbuckler, and you don't have to worry about feats that enhance or alter sneak attack, for instance.

There are thousands of different characters you can make just with the rules, not even paying one iota of attention to distinguishing your PCs' personalities, it's true. But it's also just as true, if not more so, that the range of meaningful choices you have at character creation is always constricted down to a manageable number if you have any idea whatsoever of what kind of character you want to play.

Hell, a choice as shallow and undescriptive as "spellcaster" instantly cuts down your options dramatically - after a quick count, there are only twenty-three PC classes that cast spells in Wizards of the Coast products, counting minor casters like the paladin and odd classes like the artificer or shadowcaster which kinda-sorta cast spells, but excluding psionicists and classes with supernatural abilties that aren't spells like the warlock (as well as variants like the cloistered cleric):

• Bard
• Cleric
• Druid
• Ranger
• Paladin
• Sorcerer
• Wizard
• Healer
• Hexblade
• Favoured Soul
• Shugenja
• Spirit Shaman
• Warmage
• Wu Jen
• Spellthief
• Archivist
• Dread Necromancer
• Beguiler
• Duskblade
• Artificer
• Mystic
• Shadowcaster

So we're down from sixty-something to twenty-three after only one word of character concept. I call that good odds we can easily find something suitable with a little more work.

Very well put mhacdebhandia. Sure there are a lot of options but when you actually look at it in a logical manner the number isn't as high as many people think. In fact, I think that in some cases there is still very much a lack of options.

Olaf the Stout