Classes for Kids/Newbies

[TheDarkSaint]

I spend a bit of time on the boards and I enjoy what people can come up with. Now, I'm going to ask you guys for something different.


I teach at a middle/high school with kids ranging between 12 and 18. I have an afterschool science fiction/fantasy club that has a role playing component.

When I am teaching new kids to play, especially younger kids, I have to look at D&D in a different light than I do when I play with adults. I have to run a game where everyone feels important because many will be too shy to try to step forward to have their character do something. It's actually quite refreshing as a DM to have to plan an encounter where my 12 year old monk player will feel useful.

I'm currently making a list of very simple to play classes for my kids. By simple, I don't mean powerful. I mean classes that have all their powers/skills outlined for them and there is little choice in what they can do. Wizards, Rouges and Fighters are actually bad classes for these kids because of the sheer amount of options for these characters, from skill choices, spell ranges and feats.


I've come up with the following and I'm hoping you guys can add to it, as I can' think of good divine and rouge classes.


Barbarian
Sorcerer (with a bit of help from me)
War-mage
Monk
Paladin
Duskblade
Ranger

Again, power and tier levels aren't a problem since I'm doing the heavy lifting to make sure everyone feels valuable.

Thanks!

[Subaru Kujo]

I'd think helping out putting together clerics could be useful if some of them don't really like being in the spotlight. A supportive role, as it were. Throwing some buff spells out, and then heading to melee could be fairly simple. If simplicity is a problem, Favored Souls could accomplish the same idea.

Just don't underestimate them. If they want to play a class, they will find a way to do so (I know that's how I was, anyways).

[Hamste]

Please tell me you don't teach them "rouge" instead of rogue. :smalltongue:

Favored Soul is similar to Sorcerer for difficulty so you can use that for your divine caster if you wish.

Rogue is about the simplest rogue class you can get. Scout might be simpler for explaining when you get extra damage and all round better choice for simpleness but it is also quite weaker. They do get extra feats which you pointed out as bad but it is from a limited list and very rarely come up. Their skill choices are actually quite limited, every rogue tends to put points in the same thing and they to use most if not all points just doing that.

[TheDarkSaint]

I teach Drama as well. Guess which I type more, Rogue or Rouge :)

The sheer number of skills available to rogues often throws my younger ones off and they often ask what a skill can do. Rogue players are always asking. I'd like to find a sneaky type with a smaller list? Not even sure if that is possible.

Cleric is a great class, if you know what to memorize. When I explain to kids that they can memorize a new list in the morning, they spend half the game looking at each spell to figure out what they need, even with my coaching. for other kids, sending them home with a spell list just feels overwhelming for them.

Favored soul sounds perfect though :)

[TheDarkSaint]

Some of my kids also want to dive in feet first and build. They take to it like ducks to water and I don't worry about them. (usually high school kids). It's the younger kids that I like to have "easy play" classes for.

[ChaoticDitz]

Ur-Priest... It incubates valuable moral mindsets such as apathy which will take them far in life, introduces the concept of casting immediately so they can feel grown-up, gets them interested in Prestige Classes so they can see every single option all at once so they can get through the "overwhelmed" phase quickly, and reminds them that the best way to acquire power is to steal it from others more powerful than themselves.

More seriously, I actually think Diplomacy-focused Paladins make great classes for beginners. You can start getting used to social interactions, thus giving you a foundation for building roleplaying experience, and the Paladin's abilities are all neat, well-organized, and get straight to the point (the point being fighting Evil things such as monsters and diseases). It's sort of like a Fighter, except that your feats are chosen for you, and you can feel cool while doing it. Plus, it lets you get used to the mechanics of the game for the first few levels before introducing any bookkeeping in the form of spells, and if even the low-maintenance introduction is too much (though with only two or three spells per day for the first while of it, it shouldn't be too hard) most Paladins can still get by without casting *any* spells as long as the party has full casters and the DM kindly gets him a Holy Avenger at some point.

[Subaru Kujo]

I teach Drama as well. Guess which I type more, Rogue or Rouge :)

The sheer number of skills available to rogues often throws my younger ones off and they often ask what a skill can do. Rogue players are always asking. I'd like to find a sneaky type with a smaller list? Not even sure if that is possible.

Cleric is a great class, if you know what to memorize. When I explain to kids that they can memorize a new list in the morning, they spend half the game looking at each spell to figure out what they need, even with my coaching. for other kids, sending them home with a spell list just feels overwhelming for them.

Favored soul sounds perfect though :)
You know your kids better than I do, so it was a suggestion. Maybe once they get used to Favored Soul, they could branch out to become a Cleric.

And if they want a rogue like character, a Swashbuckler could be alright. Has the same sort of feel to it (that is, wandering around with a light weapon and generally a devil-may-care attitude). You may not have the ability to find traps or even sneak around that well, but you could play a "rogue" that way. You'd just have to be willing to have one of the older kids play a true rogue, or tone down the "Solid Snake" encounters.

[Hamste]

The problem is anyone who wants to play a sneaky type in d&d needs to by definition have a lot of skill points resulting in a large skill list (a fact that has always annoyed me). After hide, move silently, disable traps, spot, open lock, search, sleight of hand and listen they will have only intelligence skill points left and most of those skills listed are required for a good sneaky character (sleight of hand and open lock are not very important for a sneaky build but are nice to have). Anyone who wants to have even a good sneaky build that doesn't just die or fail to be useful needs atleast 6 skill points with more being preferable and the more skill points you get the longer the skill list becomes.

That being said it is totally possible that there is one out there (that is not a spell caster) but I do not know it.

[Lanaya]

Crusader is an excellent one in my experience. They're straightforward to play (get manoevers, use manoeuvers on the baddies), effective, and really fun.

[Ignominia]

I just helped one of my players build a Dragon Shaman. When it comes down to it, the class only has 3 things to do.
1)Breath Weapon
2)Hit it with a mace
3) Lay on hands.

Of course they get their auras, but they are "set and forget" and are very easy to explain. Id say this would be a very easy class to give to a younger player.

Also, I wouldn't be afraid to have "pre-built" fighters. Give them a choice of either a Ranged fighter, Two Handed Great sword fighter, or a sword and board fighter... pre plan the feat selections for them. Still gives them options, but allows you to take some of the confusion of choosing from a million feats.

[Maginomicon]

Take a look at Generic Classes (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/genericClasses.htm). They're explicitly designed to be less complicated in play than any other class out there. Sure they might have more options to pick from, but since you're helping them build their character that's a non-issue. They can be as simple or as complex as you like.

Once they get the gist of play, I'd recommend they build a non-generic character though.

[bekeleven]

And if they want a rogue like character, a Swashbuckler could be alright. Has the same sort of feel to it (that is, wandering around with a light weapon and generally a devil-may-care attitude). You may not have the ability to find traps or even sneak around that well, but you could play a "rogue" that way. You'd just have to be willing to have one of the older kids play a true rogue, or tone down the "Solid Snake" encounters.
Swashbuckler's a pretty underwhelming class. Assuming you can do so without cries of favoritism, just give the class trapfinding for free.

If you start above level 1, you can trade the first point of Grace for it.

If anybody plays lawful good, try and explain to them this concept (http://i.imgur.com/fQWag.png), only maybe sanitize it a bit first.

[Epsilon Rose]

I would suggest looking at the Tome of Battle Classes for your melee needs. Technically they have a lot of choices in terms of maneuvers, but the maneuvers themselves are fairly straight forwards and it's hard to really mess up your picks. I also find them more engaging to play than the more traditional fighter-types, since they give you more options than "I attack it with my sword." and "I trip it with my chain."

I'd also suggest looking at Incarnum, particularly the Incarnate and Totemist. Again, each class has a lot of available Soulmelds, but you can pick those on a daily basis, so even if you pick something you don't like, you're not stuck with anything.

The fixed list casters (Warmage, Beguiler, and Dread Necromancer) are also fairly good. They let you have all the magical goodness of a caster, without having to pick spells known or prepare spells for the day and they're relatively balanced.

Finally, Warlock might be an interesting choice. Their powers are all day, at-will, abilities, which takes the headache out of resource management, but you might need to help them choose invocations (it should still be less work than a sorc).

For Rogue/skill-monkey types, Beguiler, Warlock, Incarnate and Swordsage are good choices. The Beguiler and the Warlock have abilities that replace many of the necessary skills for sneaking and diplomacy (Invisibility and Charm are big ones). The Warlock even gets to use those abilities at-will. The incarnate can pick up soulmelds that give large boosts to various skill + a related bonus, letting them fill in for skill monkeys when they need to, though this does have a bit of the "too many skills" problem that normal rogues run into. The swordsage is more for the combat side of Rogue types. They have stances and maneuvers that let them pick up sneak attack and act in a sneaky fashion, but they can be more survivable than standard rogue.

The Unarmed Swordsage variant can also fill in for monk.

[Fax Celestis]

Knight and scout are probably good fits too. Scout is a little less skill-y than rogue, and skirmish is a bit easier to teach and adjudicate than sneak attack ("did you move 10'? Have your free damage.").

[bekeleven]

Rose: With the exception of Factotum (and possibly some psionics), you've named all of the most complicated classes outside tier 1.

[Epsilon Rose]

Rose: With the exception of Factotum (and possibly some psionics), you've named all of the most complicated classes outside tier 1.

:smalleek: I may have no ability, whatsoever, to judge complexity. That said, I do think those are honestly easier to play, especially after you've built them.

For the tome classes, once you've picked your maneuvers, you can just write them on cards and play one or two on your turn. You can even color code the cards for the type of action.

The warlock gets his invocations and then uses them at will. If you're already helping them build sorcs, then Warlock just means you're helping them pick a smaller set of abilities from a smaller list and they don't have to worry about spell slots.

I certainly don't see how The fixed list casters are worse than Sorc either.

Edit: I also didn't name Shadow Caster or True Namer. :smalltongue:

[Captnq]

I'm not happy with it, but for what it's worth...

THE NOOB HANDBOOK (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=9479.0).

Steal it. Edit it. Whatever.

[Tvtyrant]

My suggestion:

Dragon Fire Adept: Uses simple but effective attack patterns, powers that are "always on" or "at will.