Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dausuul" data-source="post: 4380539" data-attributes="member: 58197">In order by power and general effectiveness:1: Elf.  Okay, 4E elves are teh awesome.  The extra movement is nice enough, but Elven Accuracy rules.  Who here hasn't suffered the agony of missing with your most powerful daily?  Elven Accuracy gives you a second crack at it.  And since you're only going to be busting out that daily power when you need it to turn a battle... yeah.  Plus, elves get Wild Step, which everybody always forgets about and is severely underrated.  Shift unimpeded through difficult terrain?  Yes please.2: Human.  I've always liked humans, and they remain a very solid race in 4E.  They lack the flashy powers of some of the other races, but they make up for it with better all-around abilities.  Everyone talks about the extra at-will, but to me it's the other human traits that make the difference; the extra feat, extra trained skill, +1 to Fort, Ref, and Will, and "wherever you want it" stat bonus all add up to make humans a very powerful race.  Plus they have kick-ass feats *cough*ActionSurge*cough*, and if you plan on multi-classing for your paragon path, that extra at-will becomes a lot more useful. 3: Eladrin.  A startlingly flexible race.  Fey Step can be the bomb, depending on circumstances, although its limitations (line of sight, 25-foot range, only once per 5 minutes) keep it from being abused as easily as the martial adept teleport powers were in 3.X.  Even so, it is tactically incredibly valuable, whether you're a wizard trying to get out of trouble, a fighter getting into position to block, or a rogue setting up a sneak attack.  It also has many out-of-combat uses; and Fey Step isn't all that eladrin get.  Eladrin Education is also quite good - an extra skill is nothing to sneeze at - and, of course, everybody loves having a party member who can stand watch in her sleep.4: Dragonborn.  Dragonborn are a very specialized race, but within that specialty - namely, tankitude - they are the unchallenged masters.  Their healing surges are better, they hit harder (no other PHB race gets a Strength bonus except humans), and when swarmed by minions, they can belch fire and blow them away.  Dragonborn Fury is icing on the cake, since tanks by definition take a lot of punishment and will therefore spend a lot of time being bloodied.  Unfortunately, at anything besides tanking, dragonborn mostly suck, which is why they're not ranked higher for me.5: Dwarf.  Like dragonborn, dwarves are basically made to tank.  The ability to use second wind as a minor action is a very big deal, my second favorite of all racial abilities (my favorite being Elven Accuracy).  Sadly, they don't get a lot else.  Resistance to being knocked around is nice, but kind of specialized.  Encumbered Speed just means they aren't any slower than any other heavy-armor-wearing tank.6: Halfling.  Nothing real special here except Second Chance, which can sometimes be a lifesaver.  But only sometimes.  Because it's reactive - the opponent's actions dictate when it's useful, you can't plan for it - I rank it well below Elven Accuracy.  And the rest of the halfling ability set is... bleh.  Nimble Reaction is nice, but not great.7: Half-Elf.  They're no longer the weaksauce they were in 3.X, but half-elves are still the low end of the scale for me.  Which is not to say I don't like them.  I'm playing one, after all.  The Dilettante encounter power has to be chosen carefully, but can be pretty dang handy - my warlord gets a lot of mileage out of eyebite.  Still... not quite up to par.  Their access to the Action Surge feat puts them above tieflings, but only by a hair.8: Tiefling.  Not a lot going on here.  The +1 against bloodied foes is a good ability, but not the equal of Elven Accuracy, Dwarven Resilience, Fey Step, or even Second Chance.  Tieflings do have one nice trick up their sleeves - fire resistance.  A tiefling defender can wade into the middle of a bunch of minions and proceed to call down airstrikes from the party wizard without fear of getting fried in the process.  Unfortunately, they don't have much else going for them.</blockquote>

Verification