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HMS Invincible
2011-01-27, 03:04 AM
See title for question. We also have a shugenja coming in. I dunno why they all chose the asian stuff, but w/e floats their boat. Yea our group is big, but we lack enough DMs.
Our DM just brought a couple of people into our game. They decided on some oriental classes that I vaguely remember. We our currently loaded up with a wizard, a druid, a sorcerer, a bard and a cleric. On our stabby side, we have a fighter and half-orc barbarian. Nobody bothers to optimize for real except for the wizard and druid. The half-orc will carry us through the roleplaying aspect.
Please don't be tier 6,
please don't be teir 6,
please don't be tier 6...

JellyPooga
2011-01-27, 03:41 AM
Samurai is an extremely limited Fighter with vaguely useless abilities from the get-go. That is, assuming a Complete Warrior Samurai. If he wants Samurai flavour, I would suggest he plays a different Class (seriously, any other Class will do...Monk, Paladin, Fighter...anything!) and calls himself a Samurai.

Wu Jen is a Wizard with a different but slightly more limited spell list. Powerful in her own way. Frankly, I'm a fan. Can compete with the Wizard and Druid for raw utility and power but has built-in flavour that you would otherwise have to write in yourself. Depending on how you view the game, this is either a redundancy or a good thing.

Yuki Akuma
2011-01-27, 04:39 AM
Oriental Adventures Samurai, meanwhile, is just a limited Fighter with Ancestral Weapon for free.

Seriously don't be a Samurai. Warblades with Diamond Mind work well.

MeeposFire
2011-01-27, 05:28 AM
Oriental Adventures Samurai, meanwhile, is just a limited Fighter with Ancestral Weapon for free.

Seriously don't be a Samurai. Warblades with Diamond Mind work well.

Don't forget iron heart and white raven! Also stone dragon for breaking/slashing objects.

Czin
2011-01-27, 06:36 AM
See title for question. We also have a shugenja coming in. I dunno why they all chose the asian stuff, but w/e floats their boat. Yea our group is big, but we lack enough DMs.
Our DM just brought a couple of people into our game. They decided on some oriental classes that I vaguely remember. We our currently loaded up with wizards, druids, sorcerer, bard and a cleric. On our stabby side, we have a fighter and half-orc barbarian. Nobody bothers to optimize for real except for 1 wizard and 1 druid. The half-orc will carry us through the roleplaying aspect.
Please don't be tier 6,
please don't be teir 6,
please don't be tier 6...

The Samurai brings levels of suck so great that he hurts your entire party by just being there. He is in the pit of shame tier because man, does he SUCK. Your party is much better off just using their Samurai as a disposable meatshield, looting his corpse then forgetting he ever existed. The class is so bad that it completely robs the entire Samurai concept of any coolness it had. Every time someone seriously picks the Samurai class, all the optimizers of the world weep as a torrent of suck and fail pours down across the world.

I'm not so sure about what the Wujen brings to the Table, but since it can cast spells, it's definitely better than the Samurai.

Antonok
2011-01-27, 06:46 AM
After playing a Goblin Wujen, I'm a big fan of the class. They do really well, especially in a lower magic game. They may not get as many spells as a sorcerer/wizard, but they have good utility and are extremely fun to roleplay.

Samurai... just suck.

JBento
2011-01-27, 06:47 AM
I'm not so sure about what the Wujen brings to the Table, but since it can cast spells, it's definitely better than the Samurai.

A 1st-lvl Commoner with chicken-infested is better than a 20th lvl Samurai, too. Even if you don't use the chickens as chargebreakers or as polymorph targets, at least the commoner brings dinner. :smallamused:

Wu jen is a spellcaster, and thus rocks anyway, unless you're playing in an high-optimization game.

Samurai is a black hole of quality - its only saving grace is that it's immune to spheres of annihilation, because it tastes so bad they just spit it out again.

FMArthur
2011-01-27, 08:06 AM
10th level Samurai get 30ft AOE demoralization at will. For a 10-level investment that gets you basically nothing else, that's pretty bad, but for a dedicated intimidator, it is the source of evil laughs during chargen. Fear stacks very brutally. A couple levels in Avenging Executioner let you do it as a move action. You also need to waste more levels by going Ronin if you want to get into Barbarian intimidation stuff! :smallsigh:

But that's just for mundane intimidators. You could take the Fell Frighten metamagic and start doing it be level 3 if you were a wizard. Which might be around the point of entry for Dread Witch, a class for which melee gets no equivalent - the ability to ignore fear immunity.

Killer Angel
2011-01-27, 08:14 AM
The Samurai brings levels of suck so great that he hurts your entire party by just being there.

While this is true, if this is also true:


Nobody bothers to optimize for real except for 1 wizard and 1 druid.

the situation isn't so bad for the rest of the group... :smalltongue:

But yeah, I don't wanna think how much fun there's in playing a "standard" samurai, alongside two tier 1 optimized PCs...

Yora
2011-01-27, 08:18 AM
When the wizards and druid optimize, they already dominate the entire game. What everyone else is playing won't make much of a difference.

FMArthur
2011-01-27, 08:20 AM
Wait, how many people are in this game? :smalleek:
If you've got two wizards and two druids, I'm counting eleven with these new introductions. Is your DM himself some kind of wizard?

Anyway, I think you actually do have room in the party for a fear-dude. I bet no one else has that covered. To contribute to this party you definitely need a niche to be awesome at.

Czin
2011-01-27, 08:23 AM
Wait, how many people are in this game? :smalleek:
If you've got two wizards and two druids, I'm counting eleven with these new introductions. Is your DM himself some kind of wizard?

Anyway, I think you actually do have room in the party for a fear-dude. I bet no one else has that covered. To contribute to this party you definitely need a niche to be awesome at.

Bah, I manage a player group of 20 people...but I have four Co-DMs to assist. :smallbiggrin:

Psyren
2011-01-27, 08:38 AM
Wu Jen are Tier 2, maybe high T3. They may have just 50 ways to break the game instead of 5000, but break the game they certainly can. They have the major players (e.g. Polymorph, Astral Projection, Planar Spirit Binding, Wish, Gate) and even the not-so major players (Alter Self, Glitterdust, Stinking Cloud, Haste, Teleport etc.) They also have some very quirky abilities that wizards do not share, like Giant Size, Reanimation, and Snake Darts.

JellyPooga
2011-01-27, 08:50 AM
They also have some very quirky abilities that wizards do not share, like Giant Size, Reanimation, and Snake Darts.

Not to mention a 1st level AoE Con damage spell...

Psyren
2011-01-27, 09:05 AM
Not to mention a 1st level AoE Con damage spell...

While a powerful effect for its level, the range leaves a bit to be desired :smalltongue:

Myth
2011-01-27, 09:08 AM
Wu Jen: Limited Wizard with forced fluff that can be annoying (never bathe? Or never eat meat? yeah...) Some moderately interesting spells. As in, interesting to look at if you know every standard spell and are bored.

Samurai: Imagine a Fighter who does not get free feats per level. That's sort of how good a Samurai is.

Psyren
2011-01-27, 09:26 AM
Wu Jen: Limited Wizard with forced fluff that can be annoying (never bathe? Or never eat meat? yeah...)

"Never bathe" isn't actually a problem for Wu Jen (they get Prestidigitation.) You don't have to pick that one anyway, but it's good to stick to the printed ones to avoid your DM coming up with one that can screw you even worse. Make sure you put on a show of being totally bummed out as you pick the ones you can easily negate.

Antonok
2011-01-27, 09:30 AM
Wu Jen: Limited Wizard with forced fluff that can be annoying (never bathe? Or never eat meat? yeah...)


"Never bathe" isn't actually a problem for Wu Jen (they get Prestidigitation.) You don't have to pick that one anyway, but it's good to stick to the printed ones to avoid your DM coming up with one that can screw you even worse. Make sure you put on a show of being totally bummed out as you pick the ones you can easily negate.

The taboos aren't so bad if you look at em right. Instead of the 'never bathe' I changed it to 'must throw a handful of mud on anyone that he knows to have recently bathed (includes self)'. That was fun to annoy my party/commoners with. Luckily tho, I never ran across a Slyph bathing herself or that mighta caused a bit of trouble.