Which core class you never play?

[Ferret]

I might not play fighter, it just seems hack and slashy. But I'd rather never say never.

 

[milotha]

Wow. Frankly I'm amazed at this statement. I would go to the point that saying that anyone who thinks a core class is a Stereotype is suffering from a severe lack of imagination. Sure, there are stereotypes for each class, but that doesn't mean that the rules limit you to playing them.

For example, Batman, for all intensive purposes is a paladin. No, he's not the shining mail, god worshiping, smite-all, stereotype, but he is a paladin.

I contend that the way certain of the core classes are written narrows their focus to the point of being stereotypes of certain of the other core classes. I think that these core classes currently more closely resemble prestige classes. Does this mean that I "lack imagination"- No, It means that the designers lacked an ability to design some of the core classses with a good breadth of options.

First, in 20 years of playing, I have seen far more fighters, clerics, rogues, and wizards/sorcerers (call them GENERAL classes) than barbarians, paladins, bards, monks, and druids (call them SPECIFIC classes). Perhaps my experiences vary, but from what I've read on the boards, I don't think so.

Next, when I design up a good character, I start with a concept and then choose the class or classes that best implememts the concept. I geneally find that I end up chosing GENERAL classes to implement my concepts. Why? Less of the aspects of the class are determined by the write up in the books.

Lets look at the Barbarian class. What is the class really. Well, its a fighter that is illiterate, has fast movement, has uncanny dodge and trap sense, rage a d12 hp, and mod skill points. Let's look at the description of rage in the PHB. "A barbarian can fly into a screaming blood frenzy... a barbarian gains phenomenal strength and durability but becomes reckless and less able to defend himself...cannot use any Charisma, Dexterity, or Intelligence based skills... cannot cast spells or use magic items..."

What if I want to play a wild type fighter, but I don't want one of my primary class abilities to involve a blood frenzy rage. Am I going to choose to play a barbarian? Why don't I just play a fighter with a good con and medium int, take the fast movement feat that gives me +10 to my base speed, take a couple of levels of rogue if I really want uncanny dodge and trapsense and skill points? One can always choose to role play ones character as illiterate. Now it's an option not predetermined.

Example: Suppose that I want to design a Mongul - nomadic, barbaric, horseback riding, arrow proficient fighter. You'd think based on the name that Barbarian should be the optimal choice. But those extra fighter or ranger arrow feats are far too necessary if I want to be killer with the bow. Were the Monguls know for their rage or their bowmanship/horse skills?

Why, oh why, did the designers make the Barbarian so narrowed? It's not that it's a bad class mechanistically. It's not that its not useful. It's not that you can't choose to role play it in the non Conan style (though even Conan didn't have this bad a temper). Yes, you can role play anything against its type. This doesn't make you a superior player, it does however, make you less useful. Hell, I'm currently playing a Sorcerer as the front rank fighter, but I don't have to give up key class abilites just to do it.

When I say fighter in 3.X. Do you know what my character can do? Am I a strength fighter, a dex fighter, or a con fighter. Do I fight with a melee or a ranged weapon. Did I go the PowerAttack/Cleave route or did I go the Shield Bash/ Bull Rush/ Grapple route or any of the other multitudinous routes available. It's a fairly general class.

When I say Barbarian in 3.X. Do you know what my character can do. Yes, more than you would if I said I was a fighter. This is why the Barbarian is a SPECIFIC class, the choices are mostly made by the write up in the book.

 

[kigmatzomat]

Ranger. I'm still in toxic shock from all the 2E half-elven rangers and fighter/rogue "scouts" that seemed to clutter up my games. Blerg.

I *almost* multiclassed into ranger in the 3.5 game I'm in now but decided against it, since it would enable my neutral evil character too much opportunity to decide the other characters are wankers and go his own way. Give him access to a CLW wand and he wouldn't stay around long.

 

[Lamoni]

Paladin has been my favorite class, but after reading a lot of discussions about them, I think that enjoying a Paladin depends a LOT on the player and the DM sharing the same idea of how they should be played. Some people are very loose and free with their lawful good alignment and treat them the same as if they were lawful good of any other class (just don't do an obvious evil or unlawful act, or you risk changing alignments and therefore need atonement). Others are very rigid and expect a Paladin to do X when presented with situation Y. You can have fun either way, but I would hate playing a Paladin if the DM had different ideas of what a Paladin should be.

Every other class can be fun without meeting that condition since no one else risks losing their class abilities due to having a different playing style than the DM.

That said, I chose druid and bard as classes that don't interest me much. I like to specialize and I like fighting, and while the bard can fight fairly well... it can only specialize (to the point of being better than other classes) in gathering information, bluff, disguise, etc. As for the druid, the entire concept just doesn't fit in with any fantasy books I enjoy (and base my playing off of). I guess the monk doesn't either, but the monk has a few abilities I would like to try out just once... but only when I play with a larger group so that all the traditional roles can be filled.

 

[milotha]

As for Bards (and here is where my real gripe comes in). Bards were specifically designed to give the most diversity in play. They are one of my favorite classes. Sure, there is a stereotype of the all around incompetent, who spends valuable skill points on singing. But you know what? Spending those skill points on Perform didn't keep my bard from having at level 10, having a bluff check of +49 (with glibness). I specialized my bard. She's really good at lying, and infiltration. A natural spy, as it were. And when she spends points on song, it's because it's just as much ROLE playing as ROLL playing. But bards are diverse enough that you could make a bard with no musical talent at all, no dancing ability, and no acrobatics. A storyteller is still a bard performance type. You could make a Noble have a bard class and have it still fit in with the character.

Bards are incredibly diverse. You can do almost anything with them.
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If you can explain what singing, poetry and music has to do with giving you the most diversity in play, then please do. It's not that I don't like the bard concept. I love playing generalists. The bards I've played were useful, though always in everyone else's shadow. It's just that it seems to me that they crammed the music side of the old bard into a generalist class. Why does the generalist need to do countersongs? Why did they have to sing/play/recite in order to inspire courage?

Why not split this into two classes.

1) A music/song/poetry prestige class of a wizard/sorcerer. Like the candle caster.

2) A generalist class that doesn't have to sing. Then we can change around all the special abilities and make them more actually *general*. Yes, you will always be a supporting character, but you will be useful in all situations. I think more people would play the bard if the designers dropped the "dandy playing the lute" stereotype that it currently holds for a lot of players and GMs.

Also note, that just because the player is playing against type doesn't mean that the rest of the party and the GM are. If the rest of the group has classified you as something, you are stuck with it no matter what you actually do. It's the nature of stereotypes. Yes, for D&D they exist.

 

[JoeGKushner]

As a GM, I've played all of the classes and have used even those I don't like to good campaign effect.

Having said that, as a player, I hate bards and druids. They are definately support characters in almost every role I've seen them and fit best when the other core components (fighter, mage, rogue and cleric), are well defined.

 

[Kormydigar]

Is there any PHB core class that just doesn't inspire you at all, or that you feel like its strategies don't appeal your much? I have always said that I wanted to try ALL of them early or late, but after 3 years of gaming I noticed that there are some that I have lost interested in without even trying: the Monk, the Barbarian and the Paladin.

Druid and Ranger I would gladly try once, but there is always someone else playing one and I don't want to overlap. However I think that there is not much space to customization here, and I probably play them only once (like I did with a Bard).

Here I am mostly talking about playing a class either in single-class characters or at least being the main class of a multiclassed characters. For example, I could easily take a couple of Barbarian levels to give a Fighter a savage feel, but the point is that I will just probably never play a full or mostly Barbarian PC.

Nowadays, when I get to make a new character, I rather play again the same classes I played before, usually trying a different idea with feats or multiclassing or I aim to some PrCl, but I am always wishing to play one among Figther, Rogue, Cleric, Wizard or Sorcerer.

What about you?

I am not very fond of Wizards or Sorcerers in 3.0/3.5. I believe that arcane magic has become too watered down in the newer editions for my taste so I play fighter/ rogue/ cleric types.

 

[Rodrigo Istalindir]

What if I want to play a wild type fighter, but I don't want one of my primary class abilities to involve a blood frenzy rage. Am I going to choose to play a barbarian? Why don't I just play a fighter with a good con and medium int, take the fast movement feat that gives me +10 to my base speed, take a couple of levels of rogue if I really want uncanny dodge and trapsense and skill points?

What if you want to play a scouting type that doesn't want to sneak-attack? Same deal. A barbarian is, among other things, a rage-fueled war-machine. If it's not raging, it might be a barbarian, but it's not a Barbarian (tm). What if you don't have 15 different splat books at your disposal that allow you to cherry-pick class abilities?

Example: Suppose that I want to design a Mongul - nomadic, barbaric, horseback riding, arrow proficient fighter. You'd think based on the name that Barbarian should be the optimal choice. But those extra fighter or ranger arrow feats are far too necessary if I want to be killer with the bow. Were the Monguls know for their rage or their bowmanship/horse skills?

Mongols are clearly barbarians with a little 'B'. The Mongol better fits a dedicated warrior stereotype. Stop thinking of 'barbarian' in a cultural sense as opposed to as a class. Although, they shouldn't have added the illiteracy thing -- that just confuses the class/culture issue.

Why, oh why, did the designers make the Barbarian so narrowed?

Because they made it so easy and attractive to multiclass. Want to be Conan? Play a straight-up Barbarian. Want to play a slave raised in the gladiator pits? Play a Barb1/FighterX, and get that little desperation surge of adrenalin when your back is to the wall. Or how about a tireless bounty hunter that always gets his man? Barb/Ranger, for the extra speed and tracking.

When I say fighter in 3.X. Do you know what my character can do?

Sure, pretty much. If you are wearing plate, you're not a Dex fighter. But more to the point, I know what you can't do. You can't shrug off wounds as easily (DR), you can't outrun me (fast movement), you can't ignore traps and sneak attacks (evasion), or sneak past the guards (Hide as a class skill). All of which the Barbarian can do.

When I say Barbarian in 3.X. Do you know what my character can do. Yes, more than you would if I said I was a fighter. This is why the Barbarian is a SPECIFIC class, the choices are mostly made by the write up in the book.

Not really, any more than I do with the fighter. I don't know whether or not you are a bow user, or two-handed, or sword and board. Don't know if I have to fear AoO's (combat reflexes), or if you fear mine (spring attack).

The core clasess are perfectly fine, enjoyable, playable and survivable with just the core books. And that's one big reason why the Barbarian is the way he is (and the Paladin, for that matter). With just the core books, you don't have the overabundance of feats, especially ones that mimic core class abilities.

 

[Thanee]

I voted Bard, Monk and Paladin.

Those are the three classes I havn't played yet. From those, only the Bard has any appeal to me, but I find it pretty hard to play a good Bard, since it's just no fun, unless you can come up with cool poems and such.

The Monk, well I just don't like the Monk at all (maybe in L5R or a similar setting, I once played a Warrior Monk in Rolemaster, that was kinda fun), and the Paladin is also not the kind of character I like to play. I'm more drawn to the NG/CG type of character, especially Rogue and Wizard/Sorcerer.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Thanee]

Here I am mostly talking about playing a class either in single-class characters or at least being the main class of a multiclassed characters. For example, I could easily take a couple of Barbarian levels to give a Fighter a savage feel, but the point is that I will just probably never play a full or mostly Barbarian PC.

Hmm... in that case, I should have also ruled out the Barbarian and Fighter. I never have played and I don't think I would ever play a character that is primarily of those classes.

Bye
Thanee