Why are there no sneaky leaders?

[Flipguarder]

I was just wondering why no strikers come with heavy armor.

Is this a joke?

 

[mneme]

Is this a joke?

Probably. It's pretty obvious why strikers don't start with heavy armor prof (most strikers are dex or (less common) Int, and Barbarians traditionally don't use heavy armor despite their stat pairs being perfect for it), but heavy armor is a flavor thing -- not a capability thing. Whereas when you put together a sneaky party, you can do trivial multiclassing to add a sneaky controller and a sneaky defender...but while you can find striker sets with every stat and then some, dex leaders are all but impossible.

Good point re Eagle shaman -- the dex secondary's buried in the powers, so I didn't find it (despite reccomending Eagle for a ranged sneaky party in the 2 person party thread yesterday). Could still use more choices there (though I'd be surprised if a Shadow leader doesn't cover that niche at least a little).

Re "can you picture any leaders who do so from the shadows", well, D&D leaders aren't necessarily leaders, per se, are they? Bards use magic and sometimes bows, so Dex is appropriate even if stealth isn't. Artificers are more or less batman, building golems to help the party and buffing their gear; the only reason a Dex build is kinda inappropriate is that it would screw up their defenses (and it's not like Paladin/Cleric pay attention to that). Warlords...well, I can totally picture the guy who brings his friends in under cover of night, attacking the bad guys with surprise and stealth, yeah; the "strike force leader" to a T. (in fact, warlord types are the only ones I could see having Stealth as a class skill).

 

[Starfox]

I was just wondering why no strikers come with heavy armor.

I too see this as an issue, as the armored offensive knight is a classic striker concept. The current answer is that a greatweapon and tempest fighters are pretty strikerish, capable of more damage than some strikers. The fighter is like 4 classes in one with all its versatile builds. Still, i do think both the fighter and swordmage could exist as strikers as well as defenders.

The conclusion, I guess, is that I dislike classes.

 

[Garthanos]

I too see this as an issue, as the armored offensive knight is a classic striker concept. The current answer is that a greatweapon and tempest fighters are pretty strikerish, capable of more damage than some strikers. The fighter is like 4 classes in one with all its versatile builds. Still, i do think both the fighter and swordmage could exist as strikers as well as defenders.

The conclusion, I guess, is that I dislike classes.

The fighter if his build gets him strikerish damage only needs mobility... the classic knight exploited a mount to enable that.. so what you would need would be more mobility enhancements for a fighter which centered on boosting your fighting via a mount.

Properly versatile builds are the battle role != class element in spades.

 

[Rechan]

I don't think there are any "Sneaky" classes outside of strikers. Dex doesn't inherently mean "Sneaky". And there are no defenders or controllers that have hide in shadows powers, nor heavy on the invisibility. Look at the Dex secondary tempest fighter - he's not hiding nor leaping with surprise, just wielding two weapons and relatively "fast".

"Why are there no sneaky leaders" probably should be expanded to "why are strikers the only sneaky ones".

 

[Alukane]

Uhm...why don't we get a look to the older edition? Which classes had sneaky class skills? If I do remember well, there was:

-Rogue
-Ranger
-Monk
-Bard (?)
-Swordsage
-Scout

Only Bard had lost theese skills in the new edition. But look at all the other classes, aren't them strikerish?

 

[Shieldhaven]

Dex doesn't inherently mean sneaky, but low Dex does inherently mean low Stealth...

Haven

 

[UngeheuerLich]

yes the bard lost its sneakiness and the precient bar with secondary wisdom would have been a good concept...

but i can still see a bard wih dex secondary (a scimitar dancer)

actually, a sneaky, fast leader could be a balance problem. Beeing able to heal yourself is a great way to survive, sneaking around too. Both on the same person... i don´t know.

 

[icedrake]

I hear you not having a sneaky leader, but right now I'm building an artificer for a game that employs the crossbow / con build, but multiclassing rogue for thievery and using my eladrin racial to pick up stealth. Supplementing skills with magic items, and perhaps a stat boost or two, and you get an okay skill mod as you progress in level.

Granted, its not ideal or comparable to a class with next in Primary, but its enough for me to scout about and go about pillaging ruins in an Indy Jones fashion.

 

[Garris]

Actually...An Eagle Spirit Shaman with the Ghost Panther Paragon Path is almost an ideal "Sneaky Party Leader". I'm having a devil of a time thinking of an appropriate multiclass feat to get Stealth trained with, though.