Best Player Class

[TismeVader]

out of all of the classes in the Players Hand Book, which IYO do you enjoy playing the most???

[AvatarOfLight]

I'm not too sure a thread like this will survive, but very well.

Paladin! Fight in front and can even heal. As for roleplaying; paladins have great potential to be a nuisance to parties and NPC's ^_^

[Siberys]

Paladins are ungodly WEAK! They only get up to fourth level spells and the selection itself is ridiculously weak, they don't get a good will save even though one of their primary scores is wisdom, there mount is pretty much useless in combat and can die pretty much the easiest out of any companion, and lets not forget the required lawful good aspect, where you HAVE to act on what you would stand for or start to lose your paladin powers, which if someone in your party does something against your morals or standards, you'd be required to punish him even though he's your friend, creating a rather useless party member.

Best class in the players handbook is more than likely ranger; sure you're limited to archery or two weapon fighting, but you get a whole bunch of extra features to make up for it. And unlike some features from other classes, each and every single class ability not only makes perfect sense to the "ranger" idea, but has it's uses from level 1 to level 20.

[GawainBS]

If you mean best, thus most powerful, it's a tie-up between Wizard, Cleric or Druid.
As for favourite class of mine, I'd say either a Ranger, or a Gish.
Gish is a term for a Fighter/Wizard, which is pretty do-able in Core-only: Ftr2/Wiz8/EldritchKnight10: 16 BAB, 9th level spells.

[Sabeather]

Warblade All The way.

Raakar Wightblade.
lvl6 Warblade
Wielder of Kamate

[GawainBS]

Warblade isn't exactly from the PHB, eh? But it's a very, very fun class. ToB is one of the best things that happened to D&D, I'll give you that.
BTW, the Legacy weapon are bad, from a mechanical point of view.

[Pandaroon]

It clearly states he asks 'our opinion on what we ENJOY most'.
You can't dis his answer since there is no right answer on these kind of questions.
To the topic: I enjoy monk and druid most. I hate to see the monk so sub-par, but the flavor really hits me. Get it? Hit? Cause it's a monk...and he pummels things...

[Sabeather]

true Legacy weaps arent my first choice. but its the best weapon ive got for a while. plus i wanna level it so i can get the electric strike bonus XD.

[GawainBS]

Personally, I think the penalties are too harsh. -4 on ALL saves is harsh, really harsh. I'd rather have the possibility to customize my weapon. Look at the Discipline Weapon enhancement. Now that's sweet stuff.

[Siberys]

Originally Posted by Pandaroon

It clearly states he asks 'our opinion on what we ENJOY most'.
You can't dis his answer since there is no right answer on these kind of questions.
To the topic: I enjoy monk and druid most. I hate to see the monk so sub-par, but the flavor really hits me. Get it? Hit? Cause it's a monk...and he pummels things...

Technically, he also did say the players handbook. The point of that is because the PHB is accessible to anyone with an internet connection (meaning all who post here). However, terms of posting disobeyed or not, lets try to stay on topic.

My personal favorite is still Ranger from the regular PHB. But if we're going with any class in any book, Artificer for me. I hate the fact that Combat is the majority of gaming, and since the Artificer is nowhere near meant for quick, small combats, and even the big, long "boss battle" like combats aren't their forte.

So, since my group of players are all DM's as well, we've always had the personal goal of making a campaign 50% roleplaying (which is nowhere near as close as the typical D&D game). Whether it's traps, puzzles, or just NPC interaction, this is where an Artificer comes in, as an Artificer's prowess lies in there mental ability scores, not their physical.

[GawainBS]

Artificer is quite a nice class, but you know they are just as game-breakingly powerful as a Wizard or Cleric, right? Anyway, this doesn't mean by far and a stretch beyond that you can't roleplay them. Heck, "Power" of a class and RP aren't even correlated. On a personal sidenote, I hate the WoW-posts that review races and say about the Dwarf: "gud 4 RP, lolzorz." Or something atrocious as that.
But I have to confirm again, Ranger is indeed cool. Spells, combat styles, skills,... It lets you do something else in combat then "I shoot/hit stuff." Outside of combat, it gives you quite some other options. Personally, I'd like a little bit of Scout mixed in it.

[Siberys]

Originally Posted by GawainBS

Artificer is quite a nice class, but you know they are just as game-breakingly powerful as a Wizard or Cleric, right? Anyway, this doesn't mean by far and a stretch beyond that you can't roleplay them. Heck, "Power" of a class and RP aren't even correlated. On a personal sidenote, I hate the WoW-posts that review races and say about the Dwarf: "gud 4 RP, lolzorz." Or something atrocious as that.
But I have to confirm again, Ranger is indeed cool. Spells, combat styles, skills,... It lets you do something else in combat then "I shoot/hit stuff." Outside of combat, it gives you quite some other options. Personally, I'd like a little bit of Scout mixed in it.

Well, realistically, in terms of just raw power, Artificers are the Third Strongest class in the entire game, next to Psion as number 2, and Psychic Warrior as number 1.

However, even though most of their abilities are far more powerful than the standard character, unlike the wizard almost nothing they do is instant. Most infusion casting times are 1 minute, and even with action points you only have so many of those. Creating items also takes game time, and you can make that uber powerful sword that's just barely within your XP reserve range, gold range, and time range, considering you have all three Artisan feats, but that sword is probably best suited to someone else and NOT you. Not to mention, there are only two races that are really effective with Artificer.

Elves, because of the martial weapon proficiencies, I mean lets face it, you don't do actual hard damage with a weapon unless it's martial. Compare a Spear, 1d8 with a x2 modifier, and a voulge, 1d10 with a x3 modifier, even though both are essentially the same weapon. Having proficiency in the Composite Longbow is really icing on the cake for elves, and in an item crafting class, include a friggin cherry.

And humans, due to the skill and feat bonuses, as well as NO penalty to any score. Artificers don't need high scores to be effect, but they lose effectiveness significantly more than the standard character with lower scores. The extra feat, probably used to improve some artificer related ability (Such as the Artisan feats or even the feat that gives you more Action points) comes in extremely handy early on, and lets not forget that with a normal character you'd have to really budget some of your feats if you want to get your character pretty alright by around 6th level, but with human and the extra feat, you could essentially have a bonus sixth level feat of any kind and be just as good as the person who saved up for 6th. The bonus feat could be Improved Toughness, making your character that much harder to die in the game. And you would get something like that because you would worry about dying much more so than you would with say a rogue or bard or something.

The only downside to Artificer is that they need at least a 13 in Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma just for infusions and magic item handling and other skills. I say 13 because of the +1 ability score per four levels, primary scores should always be odd scores. But other than needing three scores instead of 1 or maybe 2 like normal classes, Artificers make for a rather nastily powerful character IF done right. If you make an artificer on a whim without paying too much attention to some of it's features, I guarentee you'd die within the first 5 levels of the class.

[GawainBS]

Well, yes, they are about third in terms of power, behind a wizard, druid, or cleric. The real power of the Artificer is in it's UMD-use and its ability to craft all the scrolls or wands he needs. Psions don't lag too far behind, but Psychic Warriors really aren't that good. Good meaning here, to cite a famous adage: "Playing Rocket Launcher Tag and boning reality up the backside", like the "Big 5" (Wizard, Druid, Cleric, Archivist, Artificer) are wont to do. Psychic Warriors are pretty balanced, leaning toward the powerful side. They're better than Paladins and Fighters, more versatile than a Barbarian.
Ofcourse, anything in D&D can be made broken if you know what you do. Check out the Optimisation Fora of Wizards. They have found ways to give everybody with Knowledge (Religion) as a class skill god-like status, completely legal. Of course, no sane DM would allow it.