If the Fighter class doesn't make the best Fighter, what does?

[Soranar]

guessing your paladin is really unoptimized

assuming 32 pts buy

STR 26 (main stat, 18 base +2 from levels +6 from magic item)
DEX 8 (enough with full plate, eventually you get a +4 to DEX)
CON 12
INT 8 (you just need ride)
WIS 10 (eventually you can get a magic item to cast spells but core spells are meh)
CHA 16

ideally you'd want a belt of magnificence eventually but I don't know if that's core

mount:

You can get an alternate mount by level 7 +, the rhinoceros (this rule is in the DMG) costs you 2 effective levels of paladin for your mount's abilities and it's totally worth it. Even without rhino's rush (not a core paladin spell) it still deals a massive amount of damage on a charge.

your feats:

just a standard mounted charger build

mounted combat, ride-by attack, spirited charge, power attack, divine might or aim for shock trooper next

if you wield your lance 2 handed

you deal 1d8 + 12 (STR 2 handed) x3 (mounted charge + spirited charge) = 49.5

-if you're facing something easy to hit, remove 10 BAB to get +60 damage
-if you're facing something evil, smite it for +30 damage

a CR 10 encounter would mean you either drop a minion every turn or you deal half the damage of the creature you're facing on a charge even with DR assuming you don't kill it outright too

as for your rhino, it deals 4d6 +24 damage on a charge

even if you're not charging you still deal 1d8+12 damage per attack while your rhino deals 2d6+12 damage

[Biggus]

This DM doesn't allow Monks or Sorcerers and some other stuff. I get the feeling someone else abused those classes in the past.

If you're looking for something that can do decent damage but is definitely non-abusive, a multiclass Barbarian/Fighter is probably the simplest option. Barbarian 6/Fighter 4 gets you both rage and Weapon Specialisation, and requires very few good ability scores: you can dump Int and Cha completely, put a few points into Dex and Wis and all the rest into Str and Con. Take the Melee Weapon Mastery feat form Players Handbook 2 for another +2 to attack and damage, and the Reckless Rage feat from Races of Stone to increase the strength of your rage.

You will definitely want Power Attack and a two-handed weapon.

This isn't a super-strong build, but in a relatively unoptimized party it should do just fine.

Alternatively, there's the Frenzied Berserker prestige class from Complete Adventurer which gives huge bonuses to damage, but there's a danger of attacking your allies if the combat ends before your frenzy does (as will often happen). There are ways round that though; for example the spell Calm Emotions.

[pabelfly]

If you're looking for something that can do decent damage but is definitely non-abusive, a multiclass Barbarian/Fighter is probably the simplest option. Barbarian 6/Fighter 4 gets you both rage and Weapon Specialisation, and requires very few good ability scores: you can dump Int and Cha completely, put a few points into Dex and Wis and all the rest into Str and Con. Take the Melee Weapon Mastery feat form Players Handbook 2 for another +2 to attack and damage, and the Reckless Rage feat from Races of Stone to increase the strength of your rage.

You will definitely want Power Attack and a two-handed weapon.

This isn't a super-strong build, but in a relatively unoptimized party it should do just fine.

Alternatively, there's the Frenzied Berserker prestige class from Complete Adventurer which gives huge bonuses to damage, but there's a danger of attacking your allies if the combat ends before your frenzy does (as will often happen). There are ways round that though; for example the spell Calm Emotions.

I'm a fan of dipping Barbarian and combining with Fighter, but I'd do Barbarian 1/Fighter X. You still get Rage but you get more Fighter feats, and there are only minimal benefits from Barbarian once you get Rage. I'd also suggest using a spare feat or two to pick up "Extra Rage" so you can get the bonuses from Rage all day.

[Biggus]

I'm a fan of dipping Barbarian and combining with Fighter, but I'd do Barbarian 1/Fighter X. You still get Rage but you get more Fighter feats, and there are only minimal benefits from Barbarian once you get Rage. I'd also suggest using a spare feat or two to pick up "Extra Rage" so you can get the bonuses from Rage all day.

I think minimal is overstating it a little. But you're right, like all the martial classes in the PHB Barbarian is front-loaded. If the UA Paladin variants were on the table, I'd have been half-tempted to suggest Fighter 2/Barbarian 2/Monk 2/Ranger 2/Paladin of Freedom 2.

[Mars Ultor]

So… if you’re a Paladin, and you’re not doing mounted charges whenever possible, what are you doing?

I'm charging on horseback (actually Pegasus back) outdoors, but the overwhelming majority of the time the adventures are indoors or underground.

[Mars Ultor]

guessing your paladin is really unoptimized

assuming 32 pts buy

mount:

You can get an alternate mount by level 7 +, the rhinoceros (this rule is in the DMG) costs you 2 effective levels of paladin for your mount's abilities and it's totally worth it. Even without rhino's rush (not a core paladin spell) it still deals a massive amount of damage on a charge.

your feats:

just a standard mounted charger build

mounted combat, ride-by attack, spirited charge, power attack, divine might or aim for shock trooper next

if you wield your lance 2 handed

a CR 10 encounter would mean you either drop a minion every turn or you deal half the damage of the creature you're facing on a charge even with DR assuming you don't kill it outright too

We rolled for ability scores, I had two fifteens, one went to Strength, the other to Charisma. They're both 16 now.

Magic Items are limited, I've got a bunch of Bull's Strength potions, but no permanent Strength items.

The mount is a pegasus, mostly for campaign reasons. It's not the absolute best, but I like it. I have the mounted combat feats and do well outdoors, but we're mostly inside where I can't use my mount.

[Mars Ultor]

If you're looking for something that can do decent damage but is definitely non-abusive, a multiclass Barbarian/Fighter is probably the simplest option. Barbarian 6/Fighter 4 gets you both rage and Weapon Specialisation,

This isn't a super-strong build, but in a relatively unoptimized party it should do just fine.

This is probably the way I'll go, it's simple and the Metamagic Cleric seems too much and not enough at the same time. I wasn't aware of the Weapon Mastery Feat, that sounds useful. Thanks for the suggestions.

[pabelfly]

I think minimal is overstating it a little. But you're right, like all the martial classes in the PHB Barbarian is front-loaded. If the UA Paladin variants were on the table, I'd have been half-tempted to suggest Fighter 2/Barbarian 2/Monk 2/Ranger 2/Paladin of Freedom 2.

That build is ugly and beautiful all at the same time.

[Mars Ultor]

I'm a fan of dipping Barbarian and combining with Fighter, but I'd do Barbarian 1/Fighter X. You still get Rage but you get more Fighter feats, and there are only minimal benefits from Barbarian once you get Rage. I'd also suggest using a spare feat or two to pick up "Extra Rage" so you can get the bonuses from Rage all day.

Improved Uncanny Dodge at 5th level would be useful, but that's a lot to invest when I could be getting feats instead. The Extra Rage feat is good, thanks for the suggestion.

[pabelfly]

Improved Uncanny Dodge at 5th level would be useful, but that's a lot to invest when I could be getting feats instead. The Extra Rage feat is good, thanks for the suggestion.

No problem, hope you have fun with your character.

[MultitudeMan]

If you don't think it'll be treading on the other Ranger's toes, you could use the Horizon Tripper build. You get BFC, lots of skills, and at level 11, you get nearly-at-will Dimension Door .

[H_H_F_F]

Magic items are limited... is Vow of Poverty on the table? I'd assume no, but it'd make you mucj more competitive if the table is significantly under wbl.

And again, are templates fair play, or do they count as non-core races?

[Fizban]

I'm charging on horseback (actually Pegasus back) outdoors, but the overwhelming majority of the time the adventures are indoors or underground.

Where are your Paladin spells? You've made no mention of them at all. Spell Compendium has combat tricks for Paladins, primarily Rhino's Rush, which would let you get the same charge effect indoors.

[barbarian fighter]

Barb 2/Fighter X, get all the frontloaded barbarian features, take Extra Rage once, maybe twice if you really need it, Spec/Mastery/Greater Spec, Blind Fight because it's nearly the only way to address miss chances, you're fine. Improved Uncanny Dodge only matters against like one monster in MM1 and a couple more elsewhere- unless of course your DM is using nothing but classed NPCs instead of monsters.

1 Extra Rage (total 3/day)
3 Extra Rage (total 5/day)
F1 Weapon Focus
(4) F2 Blind Fight
6
F4
(8) F6 Weapon Specialization
9 Weapon Mastery
(10) F8 Improved Crit

Two feats open, no human, plenty enough room if you want to join the cult of Power Attack even up to basic Ubercharge, or take TWF yourself. And since Mastery applies to a wide range of weapons (and at +2/+2 those weapons are equivalent [actually better] than previous Focus/Spec), you're still not actually locked to one weapon at that point, able to switch between two-hand/shield/dual wield as gear permits.

Greatsword, no PA raging no magic: 2d6+4+7 =~ 18 per hit, way more attack bonus so your -5 iterative should be just fine, for 36 on a full attack. Trade some base damage by going scimitar+shield primary, still 12.5 per hit and with higher crit chance. I wouldn't really recommend competing on TWF with someone loading multiple bonus damage tracks, but dual kukri crit fishing is still possible.


If you really want to cut into their damage, assuming the reason they're always flanking is because your character is there, you switch to a ranged build. All those Str and feat bonuses work just fine on a bow, plus you really can just full attack anything in line of sight. Dropping Improved Crit, there's room for PBS, Precise, and Rapid, drop an Extra Rage and there's room for Manyshot.



I would also question what it is you're fighting, since all these no-shield light armor characters supposedly being the the standard of damage when "AC is useless" and thus they should be dying to any melee monster, doesn't make sense. The game only turns into a dps contest when people are allowed and encouraged to stand there and dps. And this guy is apparently critting a bunch through TWF penalties, when people complain that Fighters can't even hit monster AC (but everyone else somehow does automatically of course)? See speculation re: classed NPCs.

Honestly, I'd expect the Ranger's damage to be coming from Favored Enemy where the DM only ever uses their favored enemies. Combine that with crits and a dash of sneak attack and yeah, that's something you can't match normally. Because the DM is in that situation just letting them have it it- two abilities which are meant to be situational damage which are instead always on should have a predictable outcome. Meanwhile the Paladin is getting hosed by a series of missions where their most basic damage option isn't allowed. Fair.

Also no one's mentioned energy buffs I don't think, but at 10th level those are another easily resisted/potentially always on set of d6's.

[Rakaydos]

Isnt Druid a classic "melee fullcaster"? With summons, it can revive the AD&D Fighter's "I have an army now" ability, without the messy logistics that were AD&D's bread and butter, while still having combat wildshape.

[pabelfly]

Further suggestions:

Check out the Sugliin weapon from Frostburn. Since you don't have Pounce or an equivalent, getting 2d8 on your single attack each turn after a charge is pretty solid, even if you have to take a -4 if you choose not to have an Exotic Weapon Proficiency feat. The downside of this is you don't get multiple attacks when you don't have to move. You can fix that by taking Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Sugliin) and the Sugliin Mastery Feat, but I'd question if it was worth taking two feats to wield.

I'd also check out Powerful Charge and Greater Powerful Charge, which would add 2d6 to your charge attack damage as a medium character. You won't get the damage outside of a charge attack though.

[Quertus]

We rolled for ability scores, I had two fifteens, one went to Strength, the other to Charisma. They're both 16 now.

Magic Items are limited, I've got a bunch of Bull's Strength potions, but no permanent Strength items.

The mount is a pegasus, mostly for campaign reasons. It's not the absolute best, but I like it. I have the mounted combat feats and do well outdoors, but we're mostly inside where I can't use my mount.

This DM doesn't allow Monks or Sorcerers and some other stuff. I get the feeling someone else abused those classes in the past.

Low wealth 3e, GM has banned Monk (!) and Sorcerer as OP, GM will crush the strong but not buff the weak? This… has all the makings of a horror story.

If you ever get another GM, and come to realize what you’ve lived through, the Playground will be here for you.

Until then… look, you don’t play a Fighter under a low-wealth GM who doesn’t have your back. You also don’t play a “Fighter” when you don’t have full splat support. “Linear Fighter, Quadratic Wizard” isn’t as bad as some Playgrounders claim, but “low wealth Fighter”? That simply can’t keep up without very specific builds (the type that will get the poor under-performing Monk class banned).

If you were never leveling again past level 10? Maybe. Maybe then we’d have a nice, static target to try to hit, and could build you a low-wealth Fighter that was competitive.

But in this scenario, possibly going to 20th (or epic)? Yeah, no. I’m afraid I’ve got to pull the classic Playground card, and respond to “how do I build a Fighter to…” with “play a Wizard”.

Because low wealth, ban-happy GM who doesn’t give underperforming Fighter a GM pity artifact? I don’t think you’ll be happy otherwise. I know I wouldn’t be.

[H_H_F_F]

Low wealth 3e, GM has banned Monk (!) and Sorcerer as OP, GM will crush the strong but not buff the weak? This… has all the makings of a horror story.

If you ever get another GM, and come to realize what you’ve lived through, the Playground will be here for you.

Until then… look, you don’t play a Fighter under a low-wealth GM who doesn’t have your back. You also don’t play a “Fighter” when you don’t have full splat support. “Linear Fighter, Quadratic Wizard” isn’t as bad as some Playgrounders claim, but “low wealth Fighter”? That simply can’t keep up without very specific builds (the type that will get the poor under-performing Monk class banned).

If you were never leveling again past level 10? Maybe. Maybe then we’d have a nice, static target to try to hit, and could build you a low-wealth Fighter that was competitive.

But in this scenario, possibly going to 20th (or epic)? Yeah, no. I’m afraid I’ve got to pull the classic Playground card, and respond to “how do I build a Fighter to…” with “play a Wizard”.

Because low wealth, ban-happy GM who doesn’t give underperforming Fighter a GM pity artifact? I don’t think you’ll be happy otherwise. I know I wouldn’t be.

Keep in mind that this is a low op table. I refuse to believe that the GM has banned monk while the casters are planar binding their way to power.

I again suggest Vow of Poverty, if allowed. I'd say VoP MoMF can be adjusted to balance with a table quite easily, and can stay relevant to 20 in any table that isn't very high op (which this obviously isn't).

[Mars Ultor]

Magic items are limited... is Vow of Poverty on the table? I'd assume no, but it'd make you mucj more competitive if the table is significantly under wbl.

And again, are templates fair play, or do they count as non-core races?

No templates, I'm not sure about Vow of Poverty.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

If it's low wealth and you're intent on playing a muggle, how about Ancestral Relic + Item Familiar + Leadership (for a fiend of possession cohort or something) + Wild Cohort (for a mount) to ensure you get enough magic/WBL to function? I wouldn't suggest it in most other circumstances (other than high op, of course), but 'muggle in a low wealth campaign' is a viable circumstance, I think.

Could be a reason to lean into fighter, since you'll need feats.

[Metastachydium]

Further suggestions:

Check out the Sugliin weapon from Frostburn. Since you don't have Pounce or an equivalent, getting 2d8 on your single attack each turn after a charge is pretty solid, even if you have to take a -4 if you choose not to have an Exotic Weapon Proficiency feat. The downside of this is you don't get multiple attacks when you don't have to move. You can fix that by taking Exotic Weapon Proficiency (Sugliin) and the Sugliin Mastery Feat, but I'd question if it was worth taking two feats to wield.

I have a better suggestion on the "crazy stupid weapon dealing a lot of damage" front! It's a thing whereof I always wanted to try a variant: be a Tempest^CAdv. With warmaces^CW, in the plural. It's a straightforward Fighter 6/Tempest 4 build that eats up all your feats (stupid Dodge line!) and requires that you pump your DEX up to 17 (stupid TWF line!), but taking Oversized TWF at 6th level alongside ITWF and Two-Wepon Pounce at 9th level, you get a beefy dude who can charge and then hit something with two stupidly big maces (for 1d12 bludgeoning damage from each) taking no penalty to hit for fighting with two weapons (because Tempest). When not charging, you also still get four attacks for a total of up to 4d12+(3×STR) points of damage and still with no penalty to hit.

[Mars Ultor]

If you don't think it'll be treading on the other Ranger's toes, you could use the Horizon Tripper build. You get BFC, lots of skills, and at level 11, you get nearly-at-will Dimension Door .

That's pretty amazing. There's nothing that won't be allowed and it doesn't rely on magic item to make it work. Thank you.

[Quertus]

Keep in mind that this is a low op table. I refuse to believe that the GM has banned monk while the casters are planar binding their way to power.

I again suggest Vow of Poverty, if allowed. I'd say VoP MoMF can be adjusted to balance with a table quite easily, and can stay relevant to 20 in any table that isn't very high op (which this obviously isn't).

Sure. If the GM has banned Monk, low-OP is almost certainly true! But “everyone else at the table is doing fine; ‘everyone else‘ is a bunch of casters in a low wealth 3e game (and one muggle with a viable strategy I don’t want to copy), help me build a Fighter that can keep up with no splat support under a ban-happy GM who already banned Monk as OP”? That doesn’t ring any warning bells?

The OP knows enough to make a charging Paladin (and give them a flying Mount no less!), but not enough to make them with an adequate secondary schtick (btw, OP, were you aware that most of your adventures would occur where the Mount couldn’t go when you made the character, or did the GM suddenly change what y’all were doing when you made the replacement character?).

It’ll be really hard to give the OP advice that lets them tailor the character to match the unknown power level of the rest of the party over the next 5-15 levels. It’ll be really hard to teach them enough to build such a character themselves.

But it’s really easy to play a tier 1 caster, and change your load out from day to day, to Balance to the Table on the fly.

That said, yes, VoP, Weapon of Legacy, etc, have built-in scaling that might be appropriate to this environment.

Much better than wasting combat rounds chugging potions.

[Mars Ultor]

Where are your Paladin spells? You've made no mention of them at all. Spell Compendium has combat tricks for Paladins, primarily Rhino's Rush, which would let you get the same charge effect indoors.


Barb 2/Fighter X, get all the frontloaded barbarian features, take Extra Rage once, maybe twice if you really need it, Spec/Mastery/Greater Spec, Blind Fight because it's nearly the only way to address miss chances, you're fine. Improved Uncanny Dodge only matters against like one monster in MM1 and a couple more elsewhere- unless of course your DM is using nothing but classed NPCs instead of monsters.


Two feats open, no human, plenty enough room if you want to join the cult of Power Attack even up to basic Ubercharge, or take TWF yourself. And since Mastery applies to a wide range of weapons (and at +2/+2 those weapons are equivalent [actually better] than previous Focus/Spec), you're still not actually locked to one weapon at that point, able to switch between two-hand/shield/dual wield as gear permits.


If you really want to cut into their damage, assuming the reason they're always flanking is because your character is there, you switch to a ranged build.


I would also question what it is you're fighting, since all these no-shield light armor characters supposedly being the the standard of damage when "AC is useless" and thus they should be dying to any melee monster, doesn't make sense. The game only turns into a dps contest when people are allowed and encouraged to stand there and dps. And this guy is apparently critting a bunch through TWF penalties, when people complain that Fighters can't even hit monster AC (but everyone else somehow does automatically of course)? See speculation re: classed NPCs.

Honestly, I'd expect the Ranger's damage to be coming from Favored Enemy where the DM only ever uses their favored enemies. Combine that with crits and a dash of sneak attack and yeah, that's something you can't match normally. Because the DM is in that situation just letting them have it it- two abilities which are meant to be situational damage which are instead always on should have a predictable outcome. Meanwhile the Paladin is getting hosed by a series of missions where their most basic damage option isn't allowed. Fair.

Also no one's mentioned energy buffs I don't think, but at 10th level those are another easily resisted/potentially always on set of d6's.

I typically use Silverbeard because my AC isn't great (some armors aren't allowed because of campaign setting) and Rhino's Rush. Rhino's Rush is good, especially when combined with Smite Evil, but it's only once.

The Barbarian/Fighter combo sounds good. I'm going to think it through and see which levels give me what I'd like. The Mastery feat would be useful in that magic weapons aren't typically for sale, they're just what the party comes across. Being able to use any slashing weapon would be a benefit.

The majority of the time the villains are NPCs with class levels, them having feats and using basic tactics is pretty common.

I'm not looking to out due the Ranger or restrict him. It's that my character is assumed to be the primary fighter, but armor is limited and I do good damage for only one attack. The character is good when we're role-playing but feels useless in combat. Except for Strength and Charisma, which are 16s, his other ability scores are around 10. That's part of it, too. I've been much luckier and had more options in the past.

I don't know what "DPS" means. I really don't understand how the Ranger is so effective, although I suspect some of it is the personal dynamics within the group. I've known these guys for years, but some of them go back decades and I feel that plays in part in what allowances are made during character creation.

As far as the Ranger getting favored enemies and my Paladin's mount being of limited use, I think it's just how this campaign worked out. A Pegasus would have been extremely useful last campaign, which is what led me to make that choice this time.

What are energy buffs?

[Mars Ultor]

Further suggestions:

Check out the Sugliin weapon from Frostburn.

I'd also check out Powerful Charge and Greater Powerful Charge, which would add 2d6 to your charge attack damage as a medium character. You won't get the damage outside of a charge attack though.

I'd be surprised if Frostburn is allowed.

I was not familiar with those charge feats, I'll check them out. Thanks.

[Mars Ultor]

Low wealth 3e, GM has banned Monk (!) and Sorcerer as OP, GM will crush the strong but not buff the weak? This… has all the makings of a horror story.

If you ever get another GM, and come to realize what you’ve lived through, the Playground will be here for you.

Until then… look, you don’t play a Fighter under a low-wealth GM who doesn’t have your back.

I moved when I got married and left the guys I originally played with. I played D&D with people on and off over the years, but then had kids and other things going on. Then I ran into an old friend who'd moved out to where I live and hed mentioned that he plays D&D with a local group, I joined them.

It's a good fit for the most part, but there are some recurring issues. My first PC with them (and 3.5) was a Fighter who got killed very quickly. They helped me make him and suggested feats like Exotic Weapon Proficiency: Bastard Sword. After my PC's death I started looking online and saw what poor choices I'd been recommended. There's a view of the game they have which I think doesn't matches the reality of the rules.

I'm not against low-magic campaigns, I run one myself using the E6 rules, but that doesn't work when the martial PCs have campaign restrictions in regards to equipment and magic items but every spell is available for the casters.

The role-playing aspect is really good though, and they are good guys, it's just a fundamental disagreement in how some things work. Part of my frustration this time is that I really don't understand how the Ranger is so effective, something doesn't make sense to me.

[Mars Ultor]

Keep in mind that this is a low op table. I refuse to believe that the GM has banned monk while the casters are planar binding their way to power.

I again suggest Vow of Poverty, if allowed. I'd say VoP MoMF can be adjusted to balance with a table quite easily, and can stay relevant to 20 in any table that isn't very high op (which this obviously isn't).

The DM doesn't think Monk is overpowered, I get the sense a former player found ways to abuse things and the DM associates that with that class.

A big part of the issue, as I see it, is that this group has been together for years and they all see things the same way. Somebody played a Paladin once and everyone like it, so Paladins are obviously a powerful class. Someone had a Druid that only cast Entangle and shied away from combat, so Druids are not that great a class.

The more I think about what's happening now is that the Ranger's player is doing something I don't understand. I suspect that player (who's an honest guy) is doing something wrong and that's skewing things. Maybe he doesn't understand how critical hits work or something, but something doesn't add up.

[Mars Ultor]

If it's low wealth and you're intent on playing a muggle, how about Ancestral Relic + Item Familiar + Leadership (for a fiend of possession cohort or something) + Wild Cohort (for a mount) to ensure you get enough magic/WBL to function? I wouldn't suggest it in most other circumstances (other than high op, of course), but 'muggle in a low wealth campaign' is a viable circumstance, I think.

Could be a reason to lean into fighter, since you'll need feats.

I'm not sure these things would be allowed, but I'll look into it. Thanks.

[pabelfly]

The more I think about what's happening now is that the Ranger's player is doing something I don't understand. I suspect that player (who's an honest guy) is doing something wrong and that's skewing things. Maybe he doesn't understand how critical hits work or something, but something doesn't add up.

How much damage is the Ranger doing each turn?That would give us a good ballpark to optimize to.

[Mars Ultor]

Sure. If the GM has banned Monk, low-OP is almost certainly true! But “everyone else at the table is doing fine; ‘everyone else‘ is a bunch of casters in a low wealth 3e game (and one muggle with a viable strategy I don’t want to copy), help me build a Fighter that can keep up with no splat support under a ban-happy GM who already banned Monk as OP”? That doesn’t ring any warning bells?

The OP knows enough to make a charging Paladin (and give them a flying Mount no less!), but not enough to make them with an adequate secondary schtick (btw, OP, were you aware that most of your adventures would occur where the Mount couldn’t go when you made the character, or did the GM suddenly change what y’all were doing when you made the replacement character?).

It’ll be really hard to give the OP advice that lets them tailor the character to match the unknown power level of the rest of the party over the next 5-15 levels. It’ll be really hard to teach them enough to build such a character themselves.

But it’s really easy to play a tier 1 caster, and change your load out from day to day, to Balance to the Table on the fly.

That said, yes, VoP, Weapon of Legacy, etc, have built-in scaling that might be appropriate to this environment.

Much better than wasting combat rounds chugging potions.

Prior campaigns had a lot more outdoorsy stuff. We used to play in person but various circumstances forced us to play online, I think that led to a different approach from the DM. There was also some confusion (on everyone's part) early on about how flying combat worked, I think that contributed to things as well.

"The Druid and the Wizard are doing okay, it must be something you're doing," is the prevailing view. I think Paladin and some of the other classes work fine early on, but now we're approaching the point where even the heal-bot Cleric is doing 10d6 and the my character's damage is still based on Power Attack and a +1 sword.

[Mars Ultor]

Isnt Druid a classic "melee fullcaster"? With summons, it can revive the AD&D Fighter's "I have an army now" ability, without the messy logistics that were AD&D's bread and butter, while still having combat wildshape.

My preference is to play a melee character, I'm not a fan of Druids and the metamagicked Cleric to Fighter doesn't appeal to me either.