D&D General Which standard classes have you never (or very rarely) seen played? (Edited)

[Arnwolf666]

Actually, it often does. No matter how good your aim is, if you can’t draw a bow, your arrow is going nowhere. Shoot 120 arrows a day and see how defined your arms became.

Yes. The 8 strength archer is absurd.

 

[Ashrym]

Essentials did not revise class lists, it provided additional sub-classes, geared, in theory, towards new & returning players. The Druid was already a Core class, as the PH1-3 were core books, the Warlord was still a core class post-E. The only non-core classes in 4e/E were the Assassin and Vampire.

It was presented as not even being a half-ed, like 3.5 - not a lot of us bought that spin, but that's what they went for. Just an alternate point of entry to the game, because having a PH with a number on it was just tooooo confusing. It was accompanied by a brutal update, but 4e had always been update-happy.

Based on what evidence?

If it were part of 4e it would have been branded 4e like all the other 4e products. The 4e branding was clearly removed from Essentials and rebranded with "Essentials".

Essentials is not a supplement. Supplements do not require a core rule book to provide the game mechanics and 2 player rule books to reprint 7 classes, leave 1 out, and add another 1 that was already printed later. These are the basic books for Essentials:

• Dungeons & Dragons Rules Compendium
• Monster Vault
• Heroes of the Fallen Lands
• Heroes of the Forgotten Kingdoms

The rules compendium does not use or direct players back to 4e source books. There were lines stating that the way to add additional features was through Insider, however. For example, the Essentials fighter explicitly stated that there was one epic destiny available. Additional epic destinies would be available through supplements or Insider. That clearly demonstrates disassociating from the 4e core books.

Essentials also gave each base class individual progression tables for powers. That was a large step away from the universal table 4e was using. That also included adding real subclasses in the heroic tier.

Essentials was clearly a self contained system that changed the class list and progression table mechanics. The system branding reinforces that. I included it because it's a different set of classes than 4e presented, which is the point.

 

[Sword of Spirit]

I just edited the poll so you can vote even if you've seen all of the classes in play. Sorry, I haven't been back to check on it until now.

(Also, it's funny the discussion that has arisen over Warlord. The reason I included it was to avoid an edition war.)

 

[Tony Vargas]

Based on what evidence?

Based on what WotC actually said about it at the time.

Don't like it, write MM a strongly-worded letter.

 

[Ashrym]

Based on what WotC actually said about it at the time.

Don't like it, write MM a strongly-worded letter.

Or I could just demonstrate it like I did. That's the second time you mentioned talking to MM. That's dodging the information I gave and the point I made that Essentials was clearly an independent system with it's own class list.

If it was spun as something else you are welcome to give evidence demonstrating how the information I presented from those sourcebooks is inaccurate.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

(Also, it's funny the discussion that has arisen over Warlord. The reason I included it was to avoid an edition war.)

It was only a core class for a short fraction of D&D's lifespan. Which means that people would have had fewer opportunities to play it, irrespective of if people like the class or not. So the results are skewed.

 

[Li Shenron]

I played 4e only a few times and with no Warlord, otherwise from BECMI to 5e I've seen all classes played.

I've been playing since '86 and I've never played with a Druid in the party. Weird, because while they aren't the most popular class they aren't bottom of the barrel either and they've been a class for ever. I also voted for Warlord, but I skipped 4th ed, so there's no mystery how that happened.

If I remember correctly, the Druid WAS the bottom of the barrel in 5e statistics, i.e. the class least frequently seen in D&D Beyond.

Personally I have ALWAYS seen Druids played in all editions since AD&D in a very large number of games. Between cool versatile spellcasting, decent fighting abilities, and wildshaping, it's always one of the most wanted classes IMXP.

 

[Zardnaar]

Current party
Cleric
Rogue
Fighter
Wizard
Monk
Druid

I see a lot of skill based and wilderness classes due to my wife. She's usually playing Rogue, Ranger, Druid, Bards, Nature clerics etc.

Other longer term player skews heavily towards Fighters, Paladin's, War Clerics, Knight types.

 

[akr71]

I find monks get left out based on "doesn't suit the campaign" ideology. I bards all the time, though.

True enough, but the word 'druid' probably carries just as much baggage as 'monk.' For example, MMA has little resemblance to a shaolin monk, but if I wanted to play an MMA style brawler, I'd choose a monk.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

True enough, but the word 'druid' probably carries just as much baggage as 'monk.' For example, MMA has little resemblance to a shaolin monk, but if I wanted to play an MMA style brawler, I'd choose a monk.

The "baggage" carried by the druid is consistent with a standard European D&D setting, whilst the monk's baggage is not. And I find most players lack the experience/confidence to refluff a class to represent something other than the standard PHB version.