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Toliudar
2010-03-24, 09:39 PM
We have a great tier system now that helps to articulate what classes tend to have the most flexibility, and with a lot of preparation, can be overwelmingly powerful.

What I've come to wonder is this: for a gamer who doesn't want to spend half an hour picking spells before each new day, and who doesn't want to spend six hours optimizing, are there classes that offer some flexibility and flavour out of the box? What classes would you steer a lazy. busy or beginning player towards.

Let's assume, for the sake of parity, that I'm looking at a 5th and a 10th level campaign. Because, well, I am.

krossbow
2010-03-24, 09:45 PM
warblade or crusader, great out of the box, hard to screw up.

However, keep in mind their flavor is drastically different, and they are essentially melee wizards.

Eldariel
2010-03-24, 09:45 PM
Warblade. They work out great out of the box. As a corollary, every martial adept is a good choice. Crusader is notable for having few schools and lots of maneuvers known making the decisions pretty simple early on.

If not that, there's always Dragonfire Adept, Warlock (Invocation-users tends to be pretty simple in having versatile abilities but not too much decision-making, especially not daily) and Factotum (sure, you gotta know the skills and your class features and manage Inspiration, but that's no worse than managing your HP).

And Binder if they're into that sorta thing, as while there's a lot of options for Binding, things are really straight-forward after making the Pact each day. And making one-two Pacts > choosing 50 spells in simplicity..

holywhippet
2010-03-24, 10:20 PM
Bard. You only learn new spells as you level up and you can each spell level a different number of times based on level and charisma.

They aren't combat machines, but they can help out a lot both during combat and adventuring due to their knowledge skills and talking skills.

Mushroom Ninja
2010-03-24, 10:21 PM
Druid. As long as you take natural spell, you can do pretty much whatever you want.

Dr Bwaa
2010-03-24, 10:29 PM
Duskblade 20 is a pretty solid, user-friendly build. Much like Warblade & Crusader.

deuxhero
2010-03-24, 10:50 PM
Focuses casters (Well the tier 3 pair) know everything on their class list, so outside of the bonus spells known every few levels, there is no need to pick spells.

krossbow
2010-03-24, 10:51 PM
CW Samurai. You will be death incarnate.

deuxhero
2010-03-24, 11:00 PM
I thought that was Truenamer.

IthilanorStPete
2010-03-24, 11:01 PM
Druid. As long as you take natural spell, you can do pretty much whatever you want.

No. Really, no - Druids are one of the most annoying to deal with, work-intensive classes. Not only do you have to deal with the whole preapring spells rigamarole, you have to keep up with your AC, and keep up with your Wildshape forms...it's not what the OP's looking for.

DSCrankshaw
2010-03-24, 11:01 PM
Beguiler--use any spell on their list at any time, and they've got a lot of good ones.

taltamir
2010-03-24, 11:35 PM
an interesting question OP...
I believe the solution is extremely simple:
1. you want to spend the least time building the class (that means going over class abilities and learning to optimize as well)
2. you want to do the least bookkeping
3. you want the most "power (flexibility)" possible out of the box.

The problem is that learning any class is an investment of time.
For example, out of the core only, I would say barbarian is a solid choice. But even though most of its power is built in, it doesn't have too much power in the end (still a guy with a sharp stick) and optimizing it requires learning a lot of obscure rules...

So what is that extremely simple solution you ask? the best solution is to let someone ELSE do all the work for you... go on brilliantgameologists. Get a premade optimized character of your choice that has no build in bookkeeping (excludes most casters... although ones like warlock work fine). Your time invested is nil and your rewards are great.

Hand_of_Vecna
2010-03-25, 08:42 AM
No. Really, no - Druids are one of the most annoying to deal with, work-intensive classes. Not only do you have to deal with the whole preapring spells rigamarole, you have to keep up with your AC, and keep up with your Wildshape forms...it's not what the OP's looking for.

I disagree. You CAN put alot of effort into Druid to play them as the peer of the mighty wizard. But, they are very playable with a minimal time investment and will easily act as tier 2-3's if you do the following.

1. Take Natural Spell
2. Prepare stats for three wildshape forms a tank, a flier and perhaps a utiliity form like a tracker or burrower, you really shouldn't need anymore forms especially if you keep the notes from old utility forms around just in case.
3. Pick whatever spells look cool just open the phb to the spell descriptions and go wild.
4. Use the other feats on whatever you want mellee, summoning whatever.

Eldariel
2010-03-25, 08:55 AM
The issue is having to stat out:
1) Yourself
2) Your common wildshape forms
3) Your animal companion
4) Your common summons
5) Your spell list

Whatever that is, that's not little work.

a typical hero
2010-03-25, 09:12 AM
I disagree. You CAN put alot of effort into Druid to play them as the peer of the mighty wizard. But, they are very playable with a minimal time investment and will easily act as tier 2-3's if you do the following.
...

I disagree your disagree (if that makes any sense in english ;) )

If you don't put some effort into druid, you will end up with a ...hm... jack of all trades who can't do anything really well.

Even if he follows your advice on what to do, he will have to read through a big amount of spells for every grade (along with the choice which spells to prepare each morning) and he will have to read through several monster manuals for his wildshape forms / animal companions every few levels.

A Tier 1 caster isn't something I would recommend to someone who is asking for simplicity and a character who can pull his weight out of the box.

I'd say go for Tome of Battle, Magic of Incarnum, Invocation-user... everything works just fine.

Starbuck_II
2010-03-25, 09:19 AM
We have a great tier system now that helps to articulate what classes tend to have the most flexibility, and with a lot of preparation, can be overwelmingly powerful.

What I've come to wonder is this: for a gamer who doesn't want to spend half an hour picking spells before each new day, and who doesn't want to spend six hours optimizing, are there classes that offer some flexibility and flavour out of the box? What classes would you steer a lazy. busy or beginning player towards.

Let's assume, for the sake of parity, that I'm looking at a 5th and a 10th level campaign. Because, well, I am.

Factotum can be good out of the box. Just take Font of Inspiration as a feat each time you can.

Vizzerdrix
2010-03-25, 09:20 AM
Sorcerer. No daily spell picking (we hates daily spell prep! :smallfurious:), a small number of feat to keep track of, and almost no class abilities to worry about. However, you have access to Arcane casting, and what feats you do get can make that as powerful as you feel like getting.

Kylarra
2010-03-25, 09:30 AM
ToB and Warlock/DFA are probably your best bets for easy power with minimal effort required.


I'd say go for Tome of Battle, Magic of Incarnum, Invocation-user... everything works just fine.Incarnum only goes here if you already know the system though. Otherwise it's at least as much effort to understand and index what you want to do as copying forms for a druid.

Coidzor
2010-03-25, 09:34 AM
Well, we probably want to be looking at tiers 3 and 4 here, since that cuts out the really bookkeeping intensive of the casters out of the loop as well as the things which don't exactly have much of an ability to give a return.

[Tier 3] Examples: Beguiler, Dread Necromancer, Crusader, Bard, Swordsage, Binder (without access to the summon monster vestige), Wildshape Varient Ranger, Duskblade, Factotum, Warblade, Psionic Warrior

[Tier 4] Examples: Rogue, Barbarian, Warlock, Warmage, Scout, Ranger, Hexblade, Adept, Spellthief, Marshal, Fighter (Dungeoncrasher Variant)

Investment-wise, of these, Beguiler, Dread Necromancer, Psionic Warrior, Duskblade, Warmage, Hexblade, Adept, Ranger, and Spellthief are casters. Plus Warlock, but, well, yeah... And the martial adepts are, well, martial adepts. I'm not exactly very up to date on ToB, so I don't know how much effort it takes once the basal attempt at familiarization is done. So these are basically at or below the ceiling of investment, a few might be over the ceiling of investment worthwhile to this particular exercise.

By the other criterion, return on said investment, psionic warrior, factotum, the martial adepts, and the beguiler seem to be regarded as the best mix of powerful and versatile on the boards. Making them basically the upper levels of that.

Though, it skews a bit, depending on how important book keeping in terms of building the character in the first place or choosing an array of spells day in and day out is,since that'll refine the ability to determine all this.

Ernir
2010-03-25, 09:53 AM
The ToB classes usually end up competent even if you barely put any thought at all into the build.
Keeping track of the maneuvers readied, though, can get a bit messy (especially in the case of the Crusader). Solution for the scatterbrained or inexperienced: Maneuver cards. Print them out and keep them in seperate stacks, all the bookkeeping is now done.


Druid. As long as you take natural spell, you can do pretty much whatever you want.

Which... pretty much is the problem.

Building a Druid is easy as hell. You don't have to build for anything, because, indeed, as long as you take Natural Spell, you can do whatever you want.
Which brings the problem away from building the character to playing the character. You can cast spells (from a list of dozens to hundreds, which have to be picked every day), you have an animal companion (pick it once, but you have to look up its stats forever), you have wildshaping (you can take only three or so favourite forms you change into, but that's still four times as many stat blocks as the party Big Stupid Fighter has), and the king of all bookkeeping, summons.

Druids are not what I'd call simple to play. I'd say they are the most complicated core class.

taltamir
2010-03-25, 10:02 AM
While tier 1 classes are a huge investment if done yourself... if you just follow one guide to the letter then you can end up with less work then doing a martial character yourself.
every level you take exactly what the guide tells you, and you only bother reading about and learning the spells the guide tells you are awesome.
you CAN even be a wizard and still have an easy time...

Choco
2010-03-25, 10:12 AM
Don't forget the Warmage, it also just uses all spells on it's small spell list. All you gotta think about is what spell you want to use at any given time.

Gnaeus
2010-03-25, 10:19 AM
Don't forget the Warmage, it also just uses all spells on it's small spell list. All you gotta think about is what spell you want to use at any given time.

Yes, but OP wanted flexibility as well, and Warmage alone doesn't have that. All it does well is blast. It can get flexibility, with good choices of PRCs, but things like Rainbow Warsnake really crank up the complexity scale.

Toliudar
2010-03-25, 10:31 AM
Thanks all, and I'll keep checking in for more feedback. For the RL players I'm dealing with, the Beguiler/Warmage/DN trio are indeed going to seem attractive. Although the players have to learn a lot of spells (from their prospective) at each level. Warlock and the ToB classes are great ideas - especially if I help walk them through their invocation/maneuver selection.

Yes, power/optimization is NOT the priority, but ending up with 4-5 characters who each contribute, and can be played by somebody who can figure out what their attack bonus is THIS time.

I haven't played a factotum, but my sense was that there was a their own mechanic - the inspiration points? - to keep track of, plus picking spells when you want to access that option. Advice from those who have played one? Remember, I'm not looking for optimized, but a playable Jack of trades. As easy as a bard/rogue?

RagnaroksChosen
2010-03-25, 10:38 AM
Tob/Warlocks/barbarian

I believe ranged scouts too but that's my personally opinion.

What about duskblades pritty much power attack and then there channeling and you got a great tank dmg dealer.

Greenish
2010-03-25, 10:38 AM
For the RL players I'm dealing with, the Beguiler/Warmage/DN trio are indeed going to seem attractive.I love the "knows all spells on list, spontaneous casting" thing they have.

One option that hasn't been mentioned yet: Psion. Has a limited list of powers like sorcerer, but there are some nice flexible powers out there. You only have to pick new powers when you level up. In normal play, you only have to keep track of power points, which isn't any harder than keeping score of your hitpoints.

BenTheJester
2010-03-25, 10:39 AM
Duskblade is a good choice, even if it is a spellcasting class, you have a relatively small spell list, so the choices aren't that hard to make

Dragonfire Adepts are really good out of the box. They can't really be screwed up, as few of their invocations/breath effects are useless, and you can take pretty much any feat you like.

Eldariel
2010-03-25, 10:46 AM
I haven't played a factotum, but my sense was that there was a their own mechanic - the inspiration points? - to keep track of, plus picking spells when you want to access that option. Advice from those who have played one? Remember, I'm not looking for optimized, but a playable Jack of trades. As easy as a bard/rogue?

Well, Inspiration Points aren't tough to track; you just have certain number, basically all you do spends one-two points and you get new ones per encounter. It's no worse than tracking your HP or actions.

And while they do get arcane spells, they get a very limited number of them so it's not that much trouble to prepare them, especially since they aren't that critical to the class's power.

Ormagoden
2010-03-25, 12:07 PM
Fighter is really easy too!

Feat 1 Improved toughness

all other feats

Toughness

BenTheJester
2010-03-25, 01:04 PM
Fighter is really easy too!

Feat 1 Improved toughness

all other feats

Toughness

Wow, I didn't expect so much cheese when I came here.

Choco
2010-03-25, 01:08 PM
Fighter is really easy too!

Feat 1 Improved toughness

all other feats

Toughness

Yeah, and don't forget to max out your Constitution.

Then make Charisma your second highest stat, and put max ranks in Diplomacy. Then if you happen to have any other skill points use them to learn all languages. Your only job is to stand there and get hit, and should something get smart and just go around you then you taunt them back :smallbiggrin:

Greenish
2010-03-25, 01:23 PM
Yeah, and don't forget to max out your Constitution.

Then make Charisma your second highest stat, and put max ranks in Diplomacy. Then if you happen to have any other skill points use them to learn all languages. Your only job is to stand there and get hit, and should something get smart and just go around you then you taunt them back :smallbiggrin:Better yet, just stand there diplomancing them until they're your fanatical followers.

KnightOfV
2010-03-25, 01:33 PM
Personally, I have had a lot of fun in games playing straight Rouge into Level 10, or even a basic Power Attacking Fighter. Fighter/Barbarian/Rogue/Ranger/Pally are all easy to pick up, and long as your group is not uber optimized, each can still contribute meaningfully. Don't base your choice on the characters 'tier', just pick something that sounds fun for you. Really, Beatsticks stay competitive until 6-7 level range anyway, and can still do decent stuff after. Don't let anyone talk you into a class, or a build, that doesn't sound fun. Just because it's more flexible, or can end the world at level 10, does not mean it will be more enjoyable for you to play. Hope that helps. (Comments based on actual play experience with a fairly casual--light optimization group. I am fully aware of the unbridled power of TOB classes)

Akal Saris
2010-03-25, 01:36 PM
Others have said it already, but I think beguiler, warlock, and dread necromancer are pretty much the best "out of the box" characters you can ask for that stay decent from 1-20. ToB and Psionics come a close second but require learning their systems, which is a turn-off.

Beguiler seems to be basically what the OP wants, since it's a very high skills character with UMD, trap-finding, and full casting, so it can pretty much do anything he wants it to do.

I have a player who swears by warlock and dread necro - she hates intensive book-keeping and always looks for the quick return on time invested classes, and those two are her picks of choice.

Factotum is a good class, but you have to decide on a focus because the class is so open-ended, which makes it a little less intuitive than a rogue or scout.

LichPrinceAlim
2010-03-25, 01:42 PM
For Ease:

Psion/Wilder- really? basically mana from any Video Game

Fighter- Feats, and lots of 'em

Factotum- spread your INT to everything.

For "Bang for Buck":

Bard/Jester: Suave, Leader, and able to deal some serious damage

Death Master/Dread Necromancer: Army of Darkness anyone?

Wizard: LOTS of spells

Druid: Wildshape cheese in a myriad of flavors

Monk: If made right, can deal a lot of damage

Warblade: INT to damage?!


For Pure Fun:

Swashbuckler: Ignio Montoya, Zoro, Robin Hood, Jack Sparrow. Take your pick...

Warlock: I point. You Die.

JaronK
2010-03-25, 01:45 PM
Even though I love Beguilers and Dread Necromancers, they still require a lot of bookkeeping to know all your spells. Sure, you could make a list of all your spells and be good to go, but that's still a lot of work.

I'd go with Crusader. They're almost impossible to mess up since your manuevers cover plenty. Your choices in manuevers are very easy since you get most of your options at level 1 anyway and then it's a relatively short list to pick from found in one book. And the random generation means you just draw cards and pick from 3-5 options a round (that are all pretty straight forward). It's fun and straight forward and you can't mess up. It's not hugely flexible... you mostly have combat options and diplomacy... but it's really nice in general.

JaronK

Mushroom Ninja
2010-03-25, 01:50 PM
Which... pretty much is the problem.

Building a Druid is easy as hell. You don't have to build for anything, because, indeed, as long as you take Natural Spell, you can do whatever you want.
Which brings the problem away from building the character to playing the character. You can cast spells (from a list of dozens to hundreds, which have to be picked every day), you have an animal companion (pick it once, but you have to look up its stats forever), you have wildshaping (you can take only three or so favourite forms you change into, but that's still four times as many stat blocks as the party Big Stupid Fighter has), and the king of all bookkeeping, summons.

Druids are not what I'd call simple to play. I'd say they are the most complicated core class.

Hmm... Good point.

DragoonWraith
2010-03-25, 01:52 PM
Fighter- Feats, and lots of 'em
Uh... that's precisely what makes them difficult - they get "lots" of feats but they need every single one to compete with actual class features (and even then are going to fall well short), which makes things very difficult because you have to be extremely careful about which feats you do pick.

LichPrinceAlim
2010-03-25, 01:54 PM
Uh... that's precisely what makes them difficult - they get "lots" of feats but they need every single one to compete with actual class features (and even then are going to fall well short), which makes things very difficult because you have to be extremely careful about which feats you do pick.

Well, consider how many ways a fighter can be built...

anything from a ranged bringer 'o death to a charging monster to a caster who can actually fight back

DragoonWraith
2010-03-25, 01:55 PM
And that has what to do with making them easy to build? If anything, it makes them harder.

And more importantly, they fail at it. No one, particularly not a new player, wants to just fail.

Greenish
2010-03-25, 01:57 PM
Well, consider how many ways a fighter can be built...

anything from a ranged bringer 'o death to a charging monster to a caster who can actually fight backWell, consider how many ways a fighter can be built poorly…

Anything from Sucky McSuck to Useless Von Deadweight to 15'x15' square of blood and guts…

krossbow
2010-03-25, 01:57 PM
What about using the variant Druid so that wildshaping is merely a statistical change rather than morphing completely into an animal?

LichPrinceAlim
2010-03-25, 01:58 PM
And that has what to do with making them easy to build? If anything, it makes them harder.

And more importantly, they fail at it. No one, particularly not a new player, wants to just fail.

Human Fighter is dirt easy to build. Just pick what you want to do (be it melee, ranged, tank, or magic) and pick feats to match what you want.

For tank, as my example, pick things to boost both your AC, HP, and shield feats. Seriously, then you have the Highest HP, AC, and are a wizard's Wall of Iron

Greenish
2010-03-25, 01:59 PM
What about using the variant Druid so that wildshaping is merely a statistical change rather than morphing completely into an animal?Makes it slightly less broken and slightly easier to manage. You still have to pick your spells from a large list on daily basis and manage your animal companion and possibly summons.

[Edit]:
Human Fighter is dirt easy to build. Just pick what you want to do (be it melee, ranged, tank, or magic) and pick feats to match what you want.

For tank, as my example, pick things to boost both your AC, HP, and shield feats. Seriously, then you have the Highest HP, AC, and are a wizard's Wall of Iron are the last to be killed after your buddies are dead, and there's nothing you can do to it.Fix'd.

LichPrinceAlim
2010-03-25, 02:00 PM
Makes it slightly less broken and slightly easier to manage. You still have to pick your spells from a large list on daily basis and manage your animal companion and possibly summons.

I like Wildshape as is, especially with feats like Dragon and Abberant wildshape

Mushroom Ninja
2010-03-25, 02:00 PM
Halfling Outrider/Charger types are relatively simple. Though you need to stat the mount, your build is relatively simple (the only necessities being spirited charge, power attack, and shock trooper), and it's really, really easy to play.

EDIT: Not exactly "overwhelmingly" powerful, but good enough in most games.

LichPrinceAlim
2010-03-25, 02:02 PM
Halfling Outrider/Charger types are relatively simple. Though you need to stat the mount, your build is relatively simple (the only necessities being spirited charge, power attack, and shock trooper), and it's really, really easy to play.

yeah. then, you grab a lance and unleash come piercing damage fun!

I also like doing the same thing, only with a Goliath Paladin 5/Cavalier 10 with a Pegasus Mount and a Large Lance ;3

DragoonWraith
2010-03-25, 02:08 PM
Human Fighter is dirt easy to build. Just pick what you want to do (be it melee, ranged, tank, or magic) and pick feats to match what you want.
Which means knowing which feats are traps (90% of them), and trawling through a dozen books to find 18 feats that are actually good enough to overcome your lack of being a real class. No, building an effective Fighter is very, very hard.

Mushroom Ninja
2010-03-25, 02:09 PM
I also like doing the same thing, only with a Goliath Paladin 5/Cavalier 10 with a Pegasus Mount and a Large Lance ;3

Personally I prefer halflings because a) Riding a medium-sized mount, they're more manuverable in dungeons, and b) you're a 3 ft, 30 pound hobbit, running dragons through with a tiny spear.

LichPrinceAlim
2010-03-25, 02:09 PM
Which means knowing which feats are traps (90% of them), and trawling through a dozen books to find 18 feats that are actually good enough to overcome your lack of being a real class. No, building an effective Fighter is very, very hard.

Fighter was my first character ever. I seriously ran a Human Fighter into 25th level and had a blast

Saph
2010-03-25, 02:10 PM
For casters, Sorcerer, hands down. At level 1, you only need to know the details of two spells. By level 4 it's four spells, by level 6 it's seven spells. By contrast, Beguiler and Dread Necromancer have pretty big spell lists.

For fighters, probably Barbarian or Crusader.

For those of you who seriously think a Druid is low on bookkeeping, I have to wonder what you're smoking. One character sheet for yourself. Another character sheet for your animal companion. Another sheet with stats for all your Wild Shape forms - don't forget to recalculate your skills, saves, and attack bonus for each form, because each will be different. Another sheet for your spell list. Another sheet for your spells prepared - which changes every day. And a final sheet for your summons, unless you want to just carry a few of the Monster Manuals around, except if you're using Augment Summoning, in which case you can't even do that.

I played a Druid from levels 3 through 19 in our World's Largest Dungeon game, and I think by the end his character data ran to about 7 pages of A4.

DragoonWraith
2010-03-25, 02:12 PM
For casters, Sorcerer, hands down. At level 1, you only need to know the details of two spells. By level 4 it's four spells, by level 6 it's seven spells. By contrast, Beguiler and Dread Necromancer have pretty big spell lists.
But having to pick a spell in the beginning, knowing it will be useful for the entire game? Is rough. I would make that recommendation only with the caveat that the DM be forgiving about letting the player change their spell list on level ups (as in, much more than 1 per 4 levels).

jiriku
2010-03-25, 02:15 PM
All prepared casters would be out, which eliminates Tier 1 classes and all psionic classes, along with factoti. Honestly, most PHB base classes and classes from Complete Warrior and Complete Adventurer are out because they don't do anything.

If your players are really at the "how do I add my attack bonus?" level, then you should also eliminate classes that require hard choices in character creation. I've known casual D&D players who suffer serious angst simply trying to pick their spells known. That kills psionic classes, bard, spirit shaman, sorcerer, duskblade, all martial initiators, warlocks, and DFAs.

So you're left with, hmmm, beguiler, dread necromancer, and warmage. Possibly also rogue, if you as the DM are willing to throw lots of sneak attack opportunities their way.

P.S. Variant druid lacks the animal companion. That makes it easier, but still not easier enough if the OP is aiming for the lowest common denominator.

DragoonWraith
2010-03-25, 02:17 PM
Fighter was my first character ever. I seriously ran a Human Fighter into 25th level and had a blast
And was it a blast because you were playing a Fighter? Would playing a different class have made it less fun? Would playing any other class have made it less fun?

ShneekeyTheLost
2010-03-25, 02:30 PM
Thanks all, and I'll keep checking in for more feedback. For the RL players I'm dealing with, the Beguiler/Warmage/DN trio are indeed going to seem attractive. Although the players have to learn a lot of spells (from their prospective) at each level. Warlock and the ToB classes are great ideas - especially if I help walk them through their invocation/maneuver selection.

Yes, power/optimization is NOT the priority, but ending up with 4-5 characters who each contribute, and can be played by somebody who can figure out what their attack bonus is THIS time.

I haven't played a factotum, but my sense was that there was a their own mechanic - the inspiration points? - to keep track of, plus picking spells when you want to access that option. Advice from those who have played one? Remember, I'm not looking for optimized, but a playable Jack of trades. As easy as a bard/rogue?

Warlocks/DFA's are awesome to run in tandem with ToB classes. They can contribute, all day long, without telling the part "Yo, I ran out of juice. Can we camp here for the night?"

A couple levels of Rogue can make a fun addition to Warlock levels. Extra damage output per die, Evasion, more skills... too bad there's not a rogue/lock PrC that works without requiring tons of hoops to jump through. Maybe if you change the prerequsites of Arcane Trickster to allow Warlocks to enter when they get Lesser Invocations, that would work nicely.

Problem is... you still need a healer of some kind for your party. That's gonna be tough to find with the constraints you listed.

I'm in the process of homebrewing a 'healer' class which focuses on healing and support, on the lines with Beguiler/Warmage/Dread Necro, but it's not done yet and is a homebrew class.

Favored Soul would be a decent healbot. Using the spontaneous divine caster (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/spontaneousDivineCasters.htm) variant might also be helpful, although again, rules intensive.

Point is: you need someone to patch up the hurt. Somehow.

Person_Man
2010-03-25, 02:39 PM
If bookkeeping is a problem, try printing out index cards. Every Tome of Battle class has them online for free (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20061225a) at the WotC website. If you want to be a spellcaster, be a Beguiler or a Sorcerer with a simple spell list. Print out your spells beforehand from the SRD, and you're set.

Ernir
2010-03-25, 02:53 PM
Human Fighter is dirt easy to build. Just pick what you want to do (be it melee, ranged, tank, or magic) and pick feats to match what you want.

You missed a step between "pick what you want to do" and "pick feats to match what you want", which is "familiarize yourself with the few hundred feat options out there and find out which actually help me fulfilling my role". Because it isn't obvious what feats you need to do this and that.

In fact, I'd say they are pretty much the opposite of the Druid.
Fighters are low on bookkeeping, and easy to play (I full attack the nearest bad guy!). But they are not easy to build. Whereas the Druid has to make very few critical build decisions, the Fighter has to make a critical build decision every other level.


Fighter was my first character ever. I seriously ran a Human Fighter into 25th level and had a blast

That's cool! But having fun playing the class even though was your first character is not the same as the class being easy to work with.


For casters, Sorcerer, hands down. At level 1, you only need to know the details of two spells. By level 4 it's four spells, by level 6 it's seven spells. By contrast, Beguiler and Dread Necromancer have pretty big spell lists.
Good point, the number of spells of the "I know my whole list" classes know even at first level can be a bit much for the not-devoted to keep in their heads...

Sorcerer players do have to deal with the problem of their spells becoming obsolete, but that's manageable. I've never seen the levelling happen so fast that a new player can't figure things out before it's too late.

I played a Druid from levels 3 through 19 in our World's Largest Dungeon game, and I think by the end his character data ran to about 7 pages of A4.
Only 7 pages? :smalltongue:

Greenish
2010-03-25, 02:58 PM
All prepared casters would be out, which eliminates … all psionic classesI'm not following your logic. Psions, wilders and psywars are all essentially spontaneous.

Ernir
2010-03-25, 03:00 PM
I'm not following your logic. Psions, wilders and psywars are all essentially spontaneous.

Quite a bit more spontaneous than the spontaneous casters, even. :smallbiggrin:

jiriku
2010-03-25, 03:09 PM
Corrected. Psionics should get eliminated in my second paragraph, not my first.

ShneekeyTheLost
2010-03-25, 03:27 PM
If your players are really at the "how do I add my attack bonus?" level, then you should also eliminate classes that require hard choices in character creation. I've known casual D&D players who suffer serious angst simply trying to pick their spells known. That kills psionic classes, bard, spirit shaman, sorcerer, duskblade, all martial initiators,

I disagree with this, RE invocation guys. No matter how poorly you choose your Invocations, you still have blasting you can always do, no matter what. Granted, you can get *MORE* power with proper invocation choice, but even with poor invocation choice, you can still blast stuff, which is fun.

Curmudgeon
2010-03-25, 03:27 PM
Personally, I have had a lot of fun in games playing straight Rouge into Level 10, or even a basic Power Attacking Fighter. Fighter/Barbarian/Rogue/Ranger/Pally are all easy to pick up
As someone with quite a lot of experience with Rogues, I'll state categorically that Rogue is not "easy to pick up" if you're going to do the class justice. It's got about the deepest dependency chains of any class in the game, and if you don't plan the character's development at least 7 levels ahead you won't be doing a very good job. Just deciding if you should pick up Mobility as a feat, then buy Mobility as an armor enhancement later and retrain the feat can be a major effort in calculating resource (gp, magic item crafters, time) availability. And that is just a side issue of deciding to go for a dip into Shadowdancer, which determines pretty much all of your character development for 9 levels.

RagnaroksChosen
2010-03-25, 03:33 PM
Actualy I think i would add Fighter onto my list.

I forgot about the generic fighter(we usualy give to fighter types not familiar with dnd to run)

human fighter x
1st. weapon focus
h.cleave
F.Power attack
2.
3.
4. Weapon spec

though saph brings up a good point about sorcerer.


Are we talking about out of the box easyness for the pc to learn the fuduments of the game or out of the box easyness in general.

Math_Mage
2010-03-25, 03:50 PM
If your players are really at the "how do I add my attack bonus?" level, then you should also eliminate classes that require hard choices in character creation. I've known casual D&D players who suffer serious angst simply trying to pick their spells known. That kills psionic classes, bard, spirit shaman, sorcerer, duskblade, all martial initiators, warlocks, and DFAs.


I don't know about the others, but DFA has so few invocations that picking spells known shouldn't be a huge source of angst.

jpreem
2010-03-25, 03:53 PM
Personally, I have had a lot of fun in games playing straight Rouge into Level 10, or even a basic Power Attacking Fighter. Fighter/Barbarian/Rogue/Ranger/Pally are all easy to pick up, and long as your group is not uber optimized, each can still contribute meaningfully. Don't base your choice on the characters 'tier', just pick something that sounds fun for you. Really, Beatsticks stay competitive until 6-7 level range anyway, and can still do decent stuff after. Don't let anyone talk you into a class, or a build, that doesn't sound fun. Just because it's more flexible, or can end the world at level 10, does not mean it will be more enjoyable for you to play. Hope that helps. (Comments based on actual play experience with a fairly casual--light optimization group. I am fully aware of the unbridled power of TOB classes)

This. If you are not playing with some forum lurking splat book hoarding optimizers ( sorry fellows :D) then the first levels of playing a power attacking beatstick are both fun and simple :) later on you can start to add some class to your class hmmm.
:P just had to do a bad pun.

Human Paragon 3
2010-03-25, 04:02 PM
Battle Sorcerer is even less labor intensive. It's weaker than the sorcerer in basically every way, but it is a little beefier and tougher to bring down, and you can pull out a sword and start chopping people up when you need to.

You'll have fewer spells than an actual sorcerer to deal with.

Paladin and Ranger are both solid choices as well. Not too many spells to worry about, and they come pre-built. They're not as strong as the TOB guys, but the learning curve is a lot kinder.

krossbow
2010-03-25, 04:08 PM
Makes it slightly less broken and slightly easier to manage. You still have to pick your spells from a large list on daily basis and manage your animal companion and possibly summons.

[Edit]:Fix'd.


to my knowledge, shapeshift druids give up their animal companion; meaning he'd only have to worry about spells.

Starbuck_II
2010-03-25, 04:13 PM
to my knowledge, shapeshift druids give up their animal companion; meaning he'd only have to worry about spells.

Maybe the Druid took that Wild Cohort feat that gives an animal companion?

Coidzor
2010-03-25, 05:05 PM
Maybe the Druid took that Wild Cohort feat that gives an animal companion?

Possibly. Juggling which spells to prepare still denies them the sweet spot... Not sure whether I'd peg that druid variant above or below sorcerer in terms of RoI(Roy!? lol).