CowardlyPaladin
2013-06-16, 08:44 AM
Let me be frank, I LOVE third party stuff. I love it because it is always trying out new things, I love it because it takes D20 in a new direction, and I love it because they have absolutely no conception of what balance is. Third Party stuff is full of innovative ideas and creativity, complete with awful spelling/grammar and absolutely no conception of how the system works. Since I am such a fan of third party books and have taken to collecting them (when they cost about 4$ locally this isn't as impressive as iit sounds) I am curious about balancing them. I have no eye for balance in the least, I can tell that the Monk and Fighter are useless but to my eye the Wizard and Rogue look about even, so I turn to you, people of the playground to help me.
Empedocles went through a Herculean effort to categorize every single third party class in existence, which is a monster of a task. You can find the complete list here, http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=13161141#post13161141. However in the almost 500 classes, it can be easy to get overwhelmed, and I am not entirely sure if every Tier is correct. So I decided to assist him by doing it book by book. I choose to start with the selection of more recognized classes, because they are more likely to be read and slightly less likely to be horribly balanced.....yeah.....I have faith. So this is divided into 3 sections, Dragon Magazine Classes, Pathfinder non Core Classes, and Arcana Evolved Class. I will include Empedocles estimate of there Tier, and a brief description of what they do. If it is legal to do so I will also link you to there description, however that might not be possible, apologies before hand.
What I am interested in is
1) What is its tier assuming it is held up against 3.5 typical classes?
2) Why is it at that tier?
3) Would you incorporate any of these classes in your game? Are they entirely worthless, good idea that has been done better, or a surprising gem of brilliance.
4) how do they work in there own setting. This one I care less about, but obviously the Iron heros classes are not going to stand up to Core, but how do they stand up to each other?
Thanks for all of your help.
What needs to be done
Iron Heroes
AN attempt to make a Conan style D20 system and fix melee classes.
Archer |Iron Heroes |4 |Melee |Ranged damage-dealer with tag-on effects, best at picking off immobile targets
Armiger |Iron Heroes |5 |Melee |Defensive melee, really swingy token mechanic, abilities stack poorly
Berserker |Iron Heroes |4 |Melee |Rager with a variety of rage powers fueled by enemies' attacks
Executioner |Iron Heroes |4 |Melee |Study enemies and gain debuffs against them; gain sneak attack and free tokens to start encounters. Good skills.
Harrier |Iron Heroes |5 |Skillmonkey |Mobile fighter with numeric attack and defense bonuses equal to squares of movement in a round. Gets Dervish dance ability really late.
Hunter |Iron Heroes |4 |Melee |Scouting and support character. Give allies numerical buffs and tokens (if their classes use them). Use combat maneuvers against multiple opponents. Good skills.
Man-at-Arms |Iron Heroes |4 |Melee |Fighter-type class with floating feats, good skills
Thief |Iron Heroes |4 |Skillmonkey |Elevated skill rank cap, sneak attack, various social skill tricks, ****loads of skill points.
Weapon Master |Iron Heroes |5 |Melee |Focus on one weapon's use. Easy to get weapon tokens, difficult to get enough of them to use class abilities. Generally a Warrior with really big numbers.
Arcanist |Iron Heroes |2 |Caster |Skill-based caster with severe limitations, nasty consequences for faiure or overzealousness, but still can access very powerful effects.
Legend of the Five Rings D20
What was not included in Oriental Adventures
Courtier Rokugan CS 5 Skillmonkey Built for Diplomancy w/ Built-in Leadership
Ninja Rokugan CS 5 Melee Sneak Attack fighter with numeric boosts (speed, init)
Inkyo Rokugan CS 6 Melee Monk, minus class abilities
Courtier is my favorite class by the way.
Dreamscarred Press
Devoted Psion DSP-SRD 2 Caster Psion ACF - Specialist
Enlightened Monk DSP-SRD 5 Melee Monk ACF; doesn't change much
Formbound Spiritist DSP-SRD 2 Caster Psionic Druid (Summoning Focus)
Formbound Surger DSP-SRD 2 Caster Psionic Druid (Animal Companion+Wild Surge)
Halo Knight DSP-SRD 5 Melee (Buffer) Kensai as a base class with minor numeric buffs
Marksman DSP-SRD 3 Gish (Archery) Psionic character with archery focus
Psychic Ranger DSP-SRD 3 Gish (Skills) Very low optimization floor
Society Mind DSP-SRD 2 Caster Primarily buff/debuffs
Thoughtsinger DSP-SRD 3 Buffer Psionic Bard
Worldthought Medic DSP-SRD 2 Caster Focused buffing
Augur DSP-SRD 3 Caster (NPC) Slow-progress manifesting
Demon Wars Campaign Setting
I can't believe again this exists, based on the slightly above decent still better than Drizzt Novels by RA Salvator, and there is a champaign setting absed on it
Abellican Brother: Tier 5: Monk reflavored to be more Europeon....still sucks
Gem Master: Tier 3, A person who casts from gem stones
Geme Sorcerer: Tier 3, Another person who casts from gem stones, relying upon the EVIL GEM STONES
King's Trooper: Tier 5....its a fighter....
Toul'alfar Woodsmen: A gish style class with a single weapon focus that really sounded cooler in the books
[/SPOILER]
Heroes of the Jade Oath
The Oriental Adventures of Arcana Evolved. I think I might be the only person in the entire world who actually bought this, so there is no tier selection because I have no talent for that sort of thing. Sadly I don't think it is legal to post the classes, but if it is please let me know
Demon Hunter: A Paladin/TOB like class which serves the Celestial Bureaucracy. Sort of a scholar/Exorcist mix. They fight all formes of creatures, with different types of subclasses for those who fight Undead, Outsiders, Fey ect, seems limited to mee, but what do I know about balance.
Enlightened Scholar: A confusian style Chi master who wants to learn everything in the world. A monk/Wizard/Skill monky combo
Kensai: We've all seen it before.
Kusa: A ninja variant with ALOT more abilities and a more Chinese flavor
Jade Monk: A slightly less terrible monk who draw on Charka
Totem Warrior: A spirit Warrior who draws from various animals. Melee fighter
Xia: A Paladin of there Ancestors
Done so far
Arcana Evolved
This is a different version of 3.75. I don't think these can be legally presented, but if I am wrong please let me know.
Akashic: Tier 4, A rogue like class that basically gets a massive amount of skill points. Like a hilarious amount. Fluff wise, they basically are able to tap into the collective subconscious of the world to draw upon different abilities.
Champion: Tier 5: A Paladin Variant who dedicate themselves to a special ideal, which can be something like Nature or Freedom. Personally in my games I have them tied to the Magic the Gathering Color system
GreenBound: Tier 2: A caster class that can draw both Arcane and Divine. Like with all Arcana Evolved Casters, they have alot more flexibility in there spells with things like Spell Templates and increased/decreased spell level, but limited spells. Most healing focused. Fluff wise are bit like caster Jedi, drawing from the collective life force
Magister: Tier 1, a Wizard with far more flexibility
Mage Blade: Tier 3: A typical Gish, whose only distinguishing feature is that there physical weapon has alot of small special abilities, like them being able to summon it at will
Oathsworn: Tier 5: A monk stand in, who aren't much better, they can use special rituals to increase there abilities, or take Oaths to gain special powers, like giving up drink for increased strenght ect.
Ritual Warrior: Tier 4 A master of Ritual magic, sort of like TOB before TOB, can perform elaborate rituals before battle to increase there powers.
Runethane: Tier 2: A rune focused caster class who focus mostly upon runic traps.
Unfettered: Tier 5: A swashbuckler wanna be, though it reminds me more of a Drizzt/Xena/Entari sort of feel. Basically your light infantry fighter, there main thing is that they can block really well.
Warmain: Tier 6: A replacement fighter I hear, I don't really know the difference
Witch: Tier 3: A caster who can draw upon the forces of nature. Extremely customizable, and a little Gishy. They can specalized like wizards into Iron Withc, Mind Witch, Sea Witch, Wind Witch, Winter Witch and Wood Witch, and can use there magic either with Words, Songs, Spirit, Storm, Fire, or Blade.
Arcana Evolved Explanations
Akashic: Tier 4. The damage output isn't great (but no one's is in melee compared to 3.5 due to how Power Attack works), but they have All The Skills. They also have memory-based buffs and information gathering. Just a bit down from the Factotum, really.
Champion: Tier 4 or 5. On par approximately with the Paladin. Limited by the fact that many of their cool powers are once-daily effects.
Greenbond: Tier 2. Full caster with somewhat limited spell selection, but access to all plant/positive energy spells is nothing to sneeze at. Also keep in mind that they can get access to various collections of complex spells with feats.
Mage Blade: Tier 3. Sort of a proto-Duskblade. Being a spellsword isn't as clean as with the Duskblade, but they've got some exclusive spells that allow for interesting effects. Plus their casting goes up to 7th at 20th level, so their spells are relevant without being crazy at the same time.
Magister: Tier 1. Some of the really crazy spells got moved into exotic. That said, with automatic complex access, full casting, feats that can grant access to handfuls of exotics at once, and the ability to swap around your list at an hour's notice, a magister would not be out of place with the god-casters of standard 3.x.
Oathsworn: Tier 5. Pretty much a monk with more text, enough so that even the fan community claimed that its 15th-level ability was "Eschew Sucking". (It's actually Refuse Spells, a copy/paste of the monk's SR.) They also get some combat rites (like the Ritual Warrior), but it's always too little at the levels they get them to make up for the class's flaws.
Ritual Warrior: Tier 4. The first incarnation of the concept that became ToB (ToB itself was the third incarnation, after this and Iron Heroes), this class is dragged down by the fact that its primary class feature (combat rites) consists of a bunch of daily-limited powers.
Runethane: Tier 1 or 2. Like the Mageblade, they have bardic casting (up to 7th at 20th). If you're familiar with all of the shenanigans a Zceryll-bound Binder can pull off, the Runethane will be very familiar. Except they don't just summon, but they can also pull out weird sorts of traps. They've also got access to spells with the runic descriptor; one of these is Explosive Runes. Another is Empower Rune, which can make your runes nastier so long as they're active. Finally, they get free access to the utterly broken runic spell template. (It makes saves against your spells key off Intelligence instead of other ability scores.)
Totem Speaker: Tier 3. Found in Transendence, this is some mishmash of bard-casting and 3.x's Totemist. Like the Akashic, it can get All The Skills, since its skill points key off Wisdom (its casting stat) instead of Intelligence.
Totem Warrior: Tier 3 or 4. Something of a nonmagical Ranger with benefits that key off your totem animal, plus an animal companion that scales nearly as well as a druid's. Each companion animal also eventually becomes size Large (or greater), so you can have fun using it as a mount.
Unfettered: Tier 4. A cross between a Fighter and a Rogue, with reduced sneak attack damage but full BAB and the capacity to dodge just about everything. Dual-wielding is also relatively decent here and easy for them to use well.
Warmain: Tier 4 or 5. Basically the Fighter but tankier. Their numbers can be bigger (except for Power Attack), but they generally come later than they should. They also get combat rites, but they have the slowest progression of any class that uses them - too little, too late.
Witch: Tier 3. They're the last of the bardic-casting classes, but also get full access to certain spells and special abilities based on some theme. They also have The Sight, which among other things has the bizarre capacity to give you someone else's classes and level as in-character knowledge.
Advanced Player's Manual
Eldritch Weaver: Tier 2, Some kind of alternate wizard I never got the hand of
Evangelist: Tier 3, A Cleric/Bard combo
Scout: Tier 4: The D&D scout class with alter self
Spell Master: Tier 1: A skill based caster
Thanemage: Tier 4: Your basic Gish
Warpriest: Tier 3: A weaker cleric
Psychic: Tier 4: Psion using an alternate system. Personally I think it is more Tier 3
Advanced Player's Manual Explanations
Now, I won't pretend that the tiers were perfect. With over 400 classes to go through, I often just skimmed over them to find a class they were similar to. That being said, the Advanced Player's Manual was one of the earlier classes I did (before realizing the obscene number of rulebooks I had to go through) so it has a lot more thorough work on it.
The Scout and Thanemage are very similar to the rogue/scout and paladin, respectively. Similar enough that I think you can safely put them in identical tiers.
The Spell Master has a huge repertoire of magic available to him - close in both magnitude and versatility to the wizard - making him an obvious tier 1. The Eldritch Weaver was a lot trickier. He has a pretty large array of options theoretically available to him, but he's forced to specialize his magic, which adds up to lots of power, little versatility: tier 2.
The warpriest was a class that didn't receive much attention from me, because frankly it seemed sort of half-assed, but it has a medium amount of magic with decent versatility, so I think it's a tier 3, like the beguiler or dread necromancer. It's possible that it has a few gamebreaking options via it's spell list, but I haven't looked through it too carefully.
Last but not least, the psychic was a class that impressed me a lot. It uses psychic abilities that are dependent on a single skill. This left a lot of room for customization. It's possible, really, that the psychic is a tier 3. Skills are easy to optimize, and that allows you to run all your abilities off of a single optimized skill. However, I think that the number of abilities that you can actually receive puts this at tier 4, comparable to the warlock. Not a "bad" tier 4, really.
Dragon Magazine Classes
I have not read any of these so I am going off other people's word here. I don't know where to find them, nor am I sure if it is legal, but if it is, please provide
{table=head] CLASS |NUMBER |TIER |ROLE |NOTES
Mystic Ranger|336|3|Gish|A ranger with spellcasting from level 1. Can be combined with Sword of the Arcane Order for Tier 1 goodness up to level 10.
Bodyguard|310|5|Melee|A fighter who can select some special abilities instead of feats that make him more of a defensive character.
Commander|310|5|Melee|A fighter who can swap bonus feats for minor support abilities.
Corsair|310|5|Melee|A fighter who exchanges bonus feats for aquatically oriented abilities.
Exoticist|310|5|Melee|A fighter who has some unique abilities and gains proficiency with 4 exotic weapons at 1st level.
Fencer|310|5|Melee|A fighter with swashbuckling abilities, but who is limited to light armor.
Horseman|310|5|Melee|The fighter as a cavalryman.
Kensai|310|5|Melee|A fighter who can use a nerfed flurry of blows with a specific weapon.
Knight|310|5|Melee|Charging as a class.
Pugilist|310|5|Melee|A variant fighter based on unarmed combat.
Shield Bearer|310|5|Melee|Uses a shield, and is a fighter. That's all.
Survivalist|310|5|Melee|A fighter who tries to use ranger feats.
Targetteer|310|5|Ranged|A fighter with bonus feats and special abilities geared towards ranged combat.
Anarch|310|5|Melee|A paladin who hits objects instead of people and turns constructs.
Avenger|310|4|Melee|A paladin with a much-improved spell list.
Sentinel|310|4|Melee|A paladin who dispels evil. Pretty much identical to the original.
Incarnate|310|4|Melee|A paladin with an elemental theme.
Enforcer|310|4|Melee|A paladin that gains enchantment abilities.
Anti-Paladin|312|4|Melee|Blackguard as a base class.
Despot|312|4|Melee|Evil paladin who "oppresses" people.
Corruptor|312|4|Melee|An evil paladin themed around infiltration and, well, corruption.
Deathwalker|312|1|Caster|An alternate necromancer who gains an undead companion and some undead themed powers.
Fleshcrafter|312|1|Caster|An alternate necromancer who seeks to create artificial life.
Soul Reaper|312|1|Caster|A wizard plus the grim reaper.
Harbinger|337|3|Caster|A bard with bardic music that debuffs instead of buffs.
Rage Cleric|333|1|Caster|A cleric who trades turning and domains for the ability to rage.
Defiler|315|1|Caster|Technically an alternate magic system but easily usable as a class. It allows a caster to draw power upon his surroundings.
Totem Druid|335|1|Caster|A druid that can wild shape from level 1 and gets more uses of it as he progresses but is limited to a single form (his totem. Also the type of animal he has as a companion).
Chaos Monk|335|5|Melee|A monk with a potentially stronger, but much more random, flurry of blows attack.
Sidhe Scholar|339|1|Caster|A druid based more on casting and less on melee.
Wild Defender|324|3|Gish|A ranger with spellcasting from level 1 and a smiting ability.
Wild Monk|324|4|Melee|A monk that gains the ability to wild shape
Filidh|324|1|Caster|A shaman flavored wizard variant with bardic knowledge and a bonus to divination magic.
Implacable|330|4|Melee|A barbarian who's rage grants damage reduction. Built more around the idea of an unstoppable berserker who just seems to ignore wounds.
Angakok|344|1|Caster|A druid themed wizard with an expanded spell list and some class features.[/table]
Pathfinder
You can find all of the classes on there SRD here
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes
{table=head] CLASS |Source |TIER |ROLE |NOTES
Druid|Core|1|Caster|A nature based spellcaster who shapeshifts.
Wizard|Core|1|Caster|The archetypical spellcaster, who prepares his magic via spellbooks.
Cleric|Core|1|Caster|A spellcaster who draws his power from the gods and can still engage in melee.
Sorcerer|Core|2|Caster|A spellcaster who draws his magic from his bloodline.
Summoner|Advanced Player's Guide|3|Caster|A spellcaster with limited casting but the ability to create an "eidolon" that does his bidding.
Oracle|Advanced Player's Guide|2|Caster|A divine spellcaster with spell "mysteries" and no specific god.
Inquisitor|Advanced Player's Guide|3|Gish|A divine gish class, conceptually similar to a gritty paladin.
Magus|Ultimate Magic|3|Gish|An archetypical, effective but bland gish class.
Witch|Advanced Player's Guide|3|Caster|A spellcaster who hexes enemies and has an animal companion. Like an evil wizard+a druid/3.
Alchemist|Advanced Player's Guide|3|Buffer|The best class ever made, in my humble opinion. It uses more powerful versions of potions (extracts), can do Jeckyll and Hide style stuff, and throws bombs.
Bard|Core|3|Caster|A jack-of-all-trades style spellcaster who has a banjo.
Fighter|Core|4|Melee|The archetypical warrior.
Barbarian|Core|4|Melee|A fighter who gets mad.
Paladin|Core|4|Melee|A divine warrior who smites the bad guys.
Ranger|Core|4|Melee|A nature oriented warrior.
Rogue|Core|4|Skillmonkey|A sneaky little thief.
Cavalier|Advanced Player's Guide|5|Melee|A paladin minus the divine stuff. Probably should've been called the knight.
Gunslinger|Ultimate Combat|5|Ranged|A fighter with guns.
Monk|Core|5|Melee|A fighter who punches people instead of chopping them up.
Ninja|Ultimate Combat|5|Melee|A sneaky warrior.
Samurai|Ultimate Combat|5|Melee|A fighter with an oriental theme.[/table]
Corrections
Witch is Tier 2, maybe Tier 1
Ninja is Tier 4
Alchemist might be tier 4 i'm not sure
Summoner is Tier 2
The Quintessential Series
A combination of the Quintessential Series by Moongoose Publishing, along with a few other details
Has its own wiki thank god
The Samurai
http://www.purpleduckgames.com/qsam
Basically a TOB Samurai, which is really what the Samurai should have always been
The Chaos Mage
http://grandwiki.wikidot.com/qcmg
OH GOD MY EYES
I think its a Tier 2 not sure though
The Witch
http://www.purpleduckgames.com/qwth
We seriously need to have people stop making Witch Classes
The Shaman
http://grandwiki.wikidot.com/edsh1
I bet we can figure it out
Dark Weaver
http://grandwiki.wikidot.com/eadm2
A drow divine politician
Explanations for the Quintessential
The samurai doesn't look to impressive. Fighter with a few extra abilities. Tier 5.
Chaos mage is a class I have some experience with. So, so high tier 1. However, it is actually quite playable, as the magic quite literally destroys the caster. This doesnt make him less powerful in theory, but it does limit the amount the player will be willing to exploit the potential power at his disposal.
Witch is tier 1...wildshaping and level 9 spells. Same with the shaman. 9th level spells is a recipe for POWER.
The Dark Weaver has 9th level spells, but levels 7-9 are all extremely restricted. This probably puts him at a tier 2: up to 6th level spells means easy tier 3, the extra power but lack of versatility puts him at tier 2
Empedocles went through a Herculean effort to categorize every single third party class in existence, which is a monster of a task. You can find the complete list here, http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=13161141#post13161141. However in the almost 500 classes, it can be easy to get overwhelmed, and I am not entirely sure if every Tier is correct. So I decided to assist him by doing it book by book. I choose to start with the selection of more recognized classes, because they are more likely to be read and slightly less likely to be horribly balanced.....yeah.....I have faith. So this is divided into 3 sections, Dragon Magazine Classes, Pathfinder non Core Classes, and Arcana Evolved Class. I will include Empedocles estimate of there Tier, and a brief description of what they do. If it is legal to do so I will also link you to there description, however that might not be possible, apologies before hand.
What I am interested in is
1) What is its tier assuming it is held up against 3.5 typical classes?
2) Why is it at that tier?
3) Would you incorporate any of these classes in your game? Are they entirely worthless, good idea that has been done better, or a surprising gem of brilliance.
4) how do they work in there own setting. This one I care less about, but obviously the Iron heros classes are not going to stand up to Core, but how do they stand up to each other?
Thanks for all of your help.
What needs to be done
Iron Heroes
AN attempt to make a Conan style D20 system and fix melee classes.
Archer |Iron Heroes |4 |Melee |Ranged damage-dealer with tag-on effects, best at picking off immobile targets
Armiger |Iron Heroes |5 |Melee |Defensive melee, really swingy token mechanic, abilities stack poorly
Berserker |Iron Heroes |4 |Melee |Rager with a variety of rage powers fueled by enemies' attacks
Executioner |Iron Heroes |4 |Melee |Study enemies and gain debuffs against them; gain sneak attack and free tokens to start encounters. Good skills.
Harrier |Iron Heroes |5 |Skillmonkey |Mobile fighter with numeric attack and defense bonuses equal to squares of movement in a round. Gets Dervish dance ability really late.
Hunter |Iron Heroes |4 |Melee |Scouting and support character. Give allies numerical buffs and tokens (if their classes use them). Use combat maneuvers against multiple opponents. Good skills.
Man-at-Arms |Iron Heroes |4 |Melee |Fighter-type class with floating feats, good skills
Thief |Iron Heroes |4 |Skillmonkey |Elevated skill rank cap, sneak attack, various social skill tricks, ****loads of skill points.
Weapon Master |Iron Heroes |5 |Melee |Focus on one weapon's use. Easy to get weapon tokens, difficult to get enough of them to use class abilities. Generally a Warrior with really big numbers.
Arcanist |Iron Heroes |2 |Caster |Skill-based caster with severe limitations, nasty consequences for faiure or overzealousness, but still can access very powerful effects.
Legend of the Five Rings D20
What was not included in Oriental Adventures
Courtier Rokugan CS 5 Skillmonkey Built for Diplomancy w/ Built-in Leadership
Ninja Rokugan CS 5 Melee Sneak Attack fighter with numeric boosts (speed, init)
Inkyo Rokugan CS 6 Melee Monk, minus class abilities
Courtier is my favorite class by the way.
Dreamscarred Press
Devoted Psion DSP-SRD 2 Caster Psion ACF - Specialist
Enlightened Monk DSP-SRD 5 Melee Monk ACF; doesn't change much
Formbound Spiritist DSP-SRD 2 Caster Psionic Druid (Summoning Focus)
Formbound Surger DSP-SRD 2 Caster Psionic Druid (Animal Companion+Wild Surge)
Halo Knight DSP-SRD 5 Melee (Buffer) Kensai as a base class with minor numeric buffs
Marksman DSP-SRD 3 Gish (Archery) Psionic character with archery focus
Psychic Ranger DSP-SRD 3 Gish (Skills) Very low optimization floor
Society Mind DSP-SRD 2 Caster Primarily buff/debuffs
Thoughtsinger DSP-SRD 3 Buffer Psionic Bard
Worldthought Medic DSP-SRD 2 Caster Focused buffing
Augur DSP-SRD 3 Caster (NPC) Slow-progress manifesting
Demon Wars Campaign Setting
I can't believe again this exists, based on the slightly above decent still better than Drizzt Novels by RA Salvator, and there is a champaign setting absed on it
Abellican Brother: Tier 5: Monk reflavored to be more Europeon....still sucks
Gem Master: Tier 3, A person who casts from gem stones
Geme Sorcerer: Tier 3, Another person who casts from gem stones, relying upon the EVIL GEM STONES
King's Trooper: Tier 5....its a fighter....
Toul'alfar Woodsmen: A gish style class with a single weapon focus that really sounded cooler in the books
[/SPOILER]
Heroes of the Jade Oath
The Oriental Adventures of Arcana Evolved. I think I might be the only person in the entire world who actually bought this, so there is no tier selection because I have no talent for that sort of thing. Sadly I don't think it is legal to post the classes, but if it is please let me know
Demon Hunter: A Paladin/TOB like class which serves the Celestial Bureaucracy. Sort of a scholar/Exorcist mix. They fight all formes of creatures, with different types of subclasses for those who fight Undead, Outsiders, Fey ect, seems limited to mee, but what do I know about balance.
Enlightened Scholar: A confusian style Chi master who wants to learn everything in the world. A monk/Wizard/Skill monky combo
Kensai: We've all seen it before.
Kusa: A ninja variant with ALOT more abilities and a more Chinese flavor
Jade Monk: A slightly less terrible monk who draw on Charka
Totem Warrior: A spirit Warrior who draws from various animals. Melee fighter
Xia: A Paladin of there Ancestors
Done so far
Arcana Evolved
This is a different version of 3.75. I don't think these can be legally presented, but if I am wrong please let me know.
Akashic: Tier 4, A rogue like class that basically gets a massive amount of skill points. Like a hilarious amount. Fluff wise, they basically are able to tap into the collective subconscious of the world to draw upon different abilities.
Champion: Tier 5: A Paladin Variant who dedicate themselves to a special ideal, which can be something like Nature or Freedom. Personally in my games I have them tied to the Magic the Gathering Color system
GreenBound: Tier 2: A caster class that can draw both Arcane and Divine. Like with all Arcana Evolved Casters, they have alot more flexibility in there spells with things like Spell Templates and increased/decreased spell level, but limited spells. Most healing focused. Fluff wise are bit like caster Jedi, drawing from the collective life force
Magister: Tier 1, a Wizard with far more flexibility
Mage Blade: Tier 3: A typical Gish, whose only distinguishing feature is that there physical weapon has alot of small special abilities, like them being able to summon it at will
Oathsworn: Tier 5: A monk stand in, who aren't much better, they can use special rituals to increase there abilities, or take Oaths to gain special powers, like giving up drink for increased strenght ect.
Ritual Warrior: Tier 4 A master of Ritual magic, sort of like TOB before TOB, can perform elaborate rituals before battle to increase there powers.
Runethane: Tier 2: A rune focused caster class who focus mostly upon runic traps.
Unfettered: Tier 5: A swashbuckler wanna be, though it reminds me more of a Drizzt/Xena/Entari sort of feel. Basically your light infantry fighter, there main thing is that they can block really well.
Warmain: Tier 6: A replacement fighter I hear, I don't really know the difference
Witch: Tier 3: A caster who can draw upon the forces of nature. Extremely customizable, and a little Gishy. They can specalized like wizards into Iron Withc, Mind Witch, Sea Witch, Wind Witch, Winter Witch and Wood Witch, and can use there magic either with Words, Songs, Spirit, Storm, Fire, or Blade.
Arcana Evolved Explanations
Akashic: Tier 4. The damage output isn't great (but no one's is in melee compared to 3.5 due to how Power Attack works), but they have All The Skills. They also have memory-based buffs and information gathering. Just a bit down from the Factotum, really.
Champion: Tier 4 or 5. On par approximately with the Paladin. Limited by the fact that many of their cool powers are once-daily effects.
Greenbond: Tier 2. Full caster with somewhat limited spell selection, but access to all plant/positive energy spells is nothing to sneeze at. Also keep in mind that they can get access to various collections of complex spells with feats.
Mage Blade: Tier 3. Sort of a proto-Duskblade. Being a spellsword isn't as clean as with the Duskblade, but they've got some exclusive spells that allow for interesting effects. Plus their casting goes up to 7th at 20th level, so their spells are relevant without being crazy at the same time.
Magister: Tier 1. Some of the really crazy spells got moved into exotic. That said, with automatic complex access, full casting, feats that can grant access to handfuls of exotics at once, and the ability to swap around your list at an hour's notice, a magister would not be out of place with the god-casters of standard 3.x.
Oathsworn: Tier 5. Pretty much a monk with more text, enough so that even the fan community claimed that its 15th-level ability was "Eschew Sucking". (It's actually Refuse Spells, a copy/paste of the monk's SR.) They also get some combat rites (like the Ritual Warrior), but it's always too little at the levels they get them to make up for the class's flaws.
Ritual Warrior: Tier 4. The first incarnation of the concept that became ToB (ToB itself was the third incarnation, after this and Iron Heroes), this class is dragged down by the fact that its primary class feature (combat rites) consists of a bunch of daily-limited powers.
Runethane: Tier 1 or 2. Like the Mageblade, they have bardic casting (up to 7th at 20th). If you're familiar with all of the shenanigans a Zceryll-bound Binder can pull off, the Runethane will be very familiar. Except they don't just summon, but they can also pull out weird sorts of traps. They've also got access to spells with the runic descriptor; one of these is Explosive Runes. Another is Empower Rune, which can make your runes nastier so long as they're active. Finally, they get free access to the utterly broken runic spell template. (It makes saves against your spells key off Intelligence instead of other ability scores.)
Totem Speaker: Tier 3. Found in Transendence, this is some mishmash of bard-casting and 3.x's Totemist. Like the Akashic, it can get All The Skills, since its skill points key off Wisdom (its casting stat) instead of Intelligence.
Totem Warrior: Tier 3 or 4. Something of a nonmagical Ranger with benefits that key off your totem animal, plus an animal companion that scales nearly as well as a druid's. Each companion animal also eventually becomes size Large (or greater), so you can have fun using it as a mount.
Unfettered: Tier 4. A cross between a Fighter and a Rogue, with reduced sneak attack damage but full BAB and the capacity to dodge just about everything. Dual-wielding is also relatively decent here and easy for them to use well.
Warmain: Tier 4 or 5. Basically the Fighter but tankier. Their numbers can be bigger (except for Power Attack), but they generally come later than they should. They also get combat rites, but they have the slowest progression of any class that uses them - too little, too late.
Witch: Tier 3. They're the last of the bardic-casting classes, but also get full access to certain spells and special abilities based on some theme. They also have The Sight, which among other things has the bizarre capacity to give you someone else's classes and level as in-character knowledge.
Advanced Player's Manual
Eldritch Weaver: Tier 2, Some kind of alternate wizard I never got the hand of
Evangelist: Tier 3, A Cleric/Bard combo
Scout: Tier 4: The D&D scout class with alter self
Spell Master: Tier 1: A skill based caster
Thanemage: Tier 4: Your basic Gish
Warpriest: Tier 3: A weaker cleric
Psychic: Tier 4: Psion using an alternate system. Personally I think it is more Tier 3
Advanced Player's Manual Explanations
Now, I won't pretend that the tiers were perfect. With over 400 classes to go through, I often just skimmed over them to find a class they were similar to. That being said, the Advanced Player's Manual was one of the earlier classes I did (before realizing the obscene number of rulebooks I had to go through) so it has a lot more thorough work on it.
The Scout and Thanemage are very similar to the rogue/scout and paladin, respectively. Similar enough that I think you can safely put them in identical tiers.
The Spell Master has a huge repertoire of magic available to him - close in both magnitude and versatility to the wizard - making him an obvious tier 1. The Eldritch Weaver was a lot trickier. He has a pretty large array of options theoretically available to him, but he's forced to specialize his magic, which adds up to lots of power, little versatility: tier 2.
The warpriest was a class that didn't receive much attention from me, because frankly it seemed sort of half-assed, but it has a medium amount of magic with decent versatility, so I think it's a tier 3, like the beguiler or dread necromancer. It's possible that it has a few gamebreaking options via it's spell list, but I haven't looked through it too carefully.
Last but not least, the psychic was a class that impressed me a lot. It uses psychic abilities that are dependent on a single skill. This left a lot of room for customization. It's possible, really, that the psychic is a tier 3. Skills are easy to optimize, and that allows you to run all your abilities off of a single optimized skill. However, I think that the number of abilities that you can actually receive puts this at tier 4, comparable to the warlock. Not a "bad" tier 4, really.
Dragon Magazine Classes
I have not read any of these so I am going off other people's word here. I don't know where to find them, nor am I sure if it is legal, but if it is, please provide
{table=head] CLASS |NUMBER |TIER |ROLE |NOTES
Mystic Ranger|336|3|Gish|A ranger with spellcasting from level 1. Can be combined with Sword of the Arcane Order for Tier 1 goodness up to level 10.
Bodyguard|310|5|Melee|A fighter who can select some special abilities instead of feats that make him more of a defensive character.
Commander|310|5|Melee|A fighter who can swap bonus feats for minor support abilities.
Corsair|310|5|Melee|A fighter who exchanges bonus feats for aquatically oriented abilities.
Exoticist|310|5|Melee|A fighter who has some unique abilities and gains proficiency with 4 exotic weapons at 1st level.
Fencer|310|5|Melee|A fighter with swashbuckling abilities, but who is limited to light armor.
Horseman|310|5|Melee|The fighter as a cavalryman.
Kensai|310|5|Melee|A fighter who can use a nerfed flurry of blows with a specific weapon.
Knight|310|5|Melee|Charging as a class.
Pugilist|310|5|Melee|A variant fighter based on unarmed combat.
Shield Bearer|310|5|Melee|Uses a shield, and is a fighter. That's all.
Survivalist|310|5|Melee|A fighter who tries to use ranger feats.
Targetteer|310|5|Ranged|A fighter with bonus feats and special abilities geared towards ranged combat.
Anarch|310|5|Melee|A paladin who hits objects instead of people and turns constructs.
Avenger|310|4|Melee|A paladin with a much-improved spell list.
Sentinel|310|4|Melee|A paladin who dispels evil. Pretty much identical to the original.
Incarnate|310|4|Melee|A paladin with an elemental theme.
Enforcer|310|4|Melee|A paladin that gains enchantment abilities.
Anti-Paladin|312|4|Melee|Blackguard as a base class.
Despot|312|4|Melee|Evil paladin who "oppresses" people.
Corruptor|312|4|Melee|An evil paladin themed around infiltration and, well, corruption.
Deathwalker|312|1|Caster|An alternate necromancer who gains an undead companion and some undead themed powers.
Fleshcrafter|312|1|Caster|An alternate necromancer who seeks to create artificial life.
Soul Reaper|312|1|Caster|A wizard plus the grim reaper.
Harbinger|337|3|Caster|A bard with bardic music that debuffs instead of buffs.
Rage Cleric|333|1|Caster|A cleric who trades turning and domains for the ability to rage.
Defiler|315|1|Caster|Technically an alternate magic system but easily usable as a class. It allows a caster to draw power upon his surroundings.
Totem Druid|335|1|Caster|A druid that can wild shape from level 1 and gets more uses of it as he progresses but is limited to a single form (his totem. Also the type of animal he has as a companion).
Chaos Monk|335|5|Melee|A monk with a potentially stronger, but much more random, flurry of blows attack.
Sidhe Scholar|339|1|Caster|A druid based more on casting and less on melee.
Wild Defender|324|3|Gish|A ranger with spellcasting from level 1 and a smiting ability.
Wild Monk|324|4|Melee|A monk that gains the ability to wild shape
Filidh|324|1|Caster|A shaman flavored wizard variant with bardic knowledge and a bonus to divination magic.
Implacable|330|4|Melee|A barbarian who's rage grants damage reduction. Built more around the idea of an unstoppable berserker who just seems to ignore wounds.
Angakok|344|1|Caster|A druid themed wizard with an expanded spell list and some class features.[/table]
Pathfinder
You can find all of the classes on there SRD here
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes
{table=head] CLASS |Source |TIER |ROLE |NOTES
Druid|Core|1|Caster|A nature based spellcaster who shapeshifts.
Wizard|Core|1|Caster|The archetypical spellcaster, who prepares his magic via spellbooks.
Cleric|Core|1|Caster|A spellcaster who draws his power from the gods and can still engage in melee.
Sorcerer|Core|2|Caster|A spellcaster who draws his magic from his bloodline.
Summoner|Advanced Player's Guide|3|Caster|A spellcaster with limited casting but the ability to create an "eidolon" that does his bidding.
Oracle|Advanced Player's Guide|2|Caster|A divine spellcaster with spell "mysteries" and no specific god.
Inquisitor|Advanced Player's Guide|3|Gish|A divine gish class, conceptually similar to a gritty paladin.
Magus|Ultimate Magic|3|Gish|An archetypical, effective but bland gish class.
Witch|Advanced Player's Guide|3|Caster|A spellcaster who hexes enemies and has an animal companion. Like an evil wizard+a druid/3.
Alchemist|Advanced Player's Guide|3|Buffer|The best class ever made, in my humble opinion. It uses more powerful versions of potions (extracts), can do Jeckyll and Hide style stuff, and throws bombs.
Bard|Core|3|Caster|A jack-of-all-trades style spellcaster who has a banjo.
Fighter|Core|4|Melee|The archetypical warrior.
Barbarian|Core|4|Melee|A fighter who gets mad.
Paladin|Core|4|Melee|A divine warrior who smites the bad guys.
Ranger|Core|4|Melee|A nature oriented warrior.
Rogue|Core|4|Skillmonkey|A sneaky little thief.
Cavalier|Advanced Player's Guide|5|Melee|A paladin minus the divine stuff. Probably should've been called the knight.
Gunslinger|Ultimate Combat|5|Ranged|A fighter with guns.
Monk|Core|5|Melee|A fighter who punches people instead of chopping them up.
Ninja|Ultimate Combat|5|Melee|A sneaky warrior.
Samurai|Ultimate Combat|5|Melee|A fighter with an oriental theme.[/table]
Corrections
Witch is Tier 2, maybe Tier 1
Ninja is Tier 4
Alchemist might be tier 4 i'm not sure
Summoner is Tier 2
The Quintessential Series
A combination of the Quintessential Series by Moongoose Publishing, along with a few other details
Has its own wiki thank god
The Samurai
http://www.purpleduckgames.com/qsam
Basically a TOB Samurai, which is really what the Samurai should have always been
The Chaos Mage
http://grandwiki.wikidot.com/qcmg
OH GOD MY EYES
I think its a Tier 2 not sure though
The Witch
http://www.purpleduckgames.com/qwth
We seriously need to have people stop making Witch Classes
The Shaman
http://grandwiki.wikidot.com/edsh1
I bet we can figure it out
Dark Weaver
http://grandwiki.wikidot.com/eadm2
A drow divine politician
Explanations for the Quintessential
The samurai doesn't look to impressive. Fighter with a few extra abilities. Tier 5.
Chaos mage is a class I have some experience with. So, so high tier 1. However, it is actually quite playable, as the magic quite literally destroys the caster. This doesnt make him less powerful in theory, but it does limit the amount the player will be willing to exploit the potential power at his disposal.
Witch is tier 1...wildshaping and level 9 spells. Same with the shaman. 9th level spells is a recipe for POWER.
The Dark Weaver has 9th level spells, but levels 7-9 are all extremely restricted. This probably puts him at a tier 2: up to 6th level spells means easy tier 3, the extra power but lack of versatility puts him at tier 2