Monday, August 17, 2009

Obiri rates the revised Pathfinder classes and races

I'm lazy so excuse the formatting.

Races

Dwarf
Still one of the best races. Strong vs spells and poisons. Darkvision. Not slowed down by medium or heavy armor. Too bad I like my characters to more mobile.

Elf
Great wizards, ok rogues and rangers.

Gnome
Small. I still don't see why anyone would play one over a halfling.

Halfling

Small but good at what it does. Great for sneaky or talky characters.

Half Elf
OMG, they fixed the half elf. Bonus to perception, free Skill Focus feat, two favoured classes, and a bonus to any one stat. I would actually play a half elf now.

Half Orc

Unfortunately still kinda sucks. A bonus to Intimidate and darkvision. That's pretty much it.

Human
I always thought the human was pretty good before and aside from the extra +2 to any stat which is shared with the other two half human races they got nothing new. Still a very solid choice.

Classes

Bard
Undecided on the bard. I thought they sucked before but with better casting and being able to maintain bardic music as a free action I think they have hope now. Maybe Derobane will try one out for us.

Barbarian
Given more options but not made much stronger. Probably made more fun to play but I don't see him being more effective in combat (I would argue the Barbarian was the best melee fighter before)

Cleric
All of the clerics melee spells have been nerfed severely and with no divine metamagic equivalent they are no longer uber front liners. They are even better healers then before but that job gets boring pretty quick.

Druid
Another nerf bat victim. Wildshape is now more for utility than combat unless you severely hamstring your casting abilities. I do like what they've done with the animal companions however.

Fighter
The fighter has lost some of his AC bonus he got in Beta but gained the ability to move at full speed in heavy armor which I think is still worth it. At least with my test builds the fighter was able to outperform the barbarian at the low to mid levels damage wise and can tank much better.

Monk
I am going to have to see the monk in action before I can decide. In the beta, they start off really weak but became quite decent by the upper mid levels. I think someone taking a flurry of blows is going to feel some serious pain and you could probably build a very effective grappler. I'm still worried that they are kinda squishy like the rogue.

Paladin
The paladin went from one of the worst classes to one of the best. The paladin can now out tank the fighter, out damage the barbarian (at least when it counts), and heal almost as well as the cleric. Their caster level is no longer gimped and they can give bonus abilities to their weapon as the need arises. They don't have great mobility, low number of class skills, and still have the alignment restrictions but its all worth it now.

Ranger
As a ranger fan I was unhappy with the 3.5 version. The fighter could out fight them in every way, their animal pet was useless, and their caster level was gimp. They now get favoured terrain as well as favoured enemy. They get a decent animal companion, and their caster level is now ok. As an archer I think it is now worth it although I'm still not sure the two weapon version is all that.

Rogue
The rogue is like the barbarian in that it was pretty good before and only got a small upgrade. Rogues are now even better at what they do outside combat and while they have a few more options in battle they are still going to suffer at the high levels trying to get off sneak attacks.

Sorcerer
Sorcerers now have a lot more flavour with bloodlines. I still think the wizard edges them out a bit but it's closer now than before and I may change as I see them in action.

Wizard
Wizards still rock but have been toned down a bit from Beta. The other specialties are now worth playing with conjuration and alteration still stronger than the rest.

I think an interesting party would be Paladin, Ranger, Sorcerer, and Bard.

10 comments:

Rognar said...

Just curious, which cleric spells got nerfed?

Obiri said...

Divine favor was changed back to the 3.5 version
Divine Power got hit hard. I thought Righteous Might got it as well but after looking at it again, if anything they bumped it up a bit.

I feel for the druid though. Poor thing.

Derobane-bane said...

Paladin (Obri) Ranger (?) Sorcerer (Rognar?) Bard (DBB)... sounds like fun!

Rognar said...

Obiri, I think you got those backwards. Righteous Might got smoked, lower Str bonus, lower natural armour bonus, lower DR bonus and a Dex penalty to boot.

Divine Power is a bit more subtle. Definitely weaker at low levels, but I think at higher levels, the Pathfinder version is better because of stacking rules. Luck bonuses are better then enhancement bonuses any day.

Obiri said...

This spell causes you to grow, doubling your height and multiplying your weight by 8. This increase changes your size category to the next larger one, and you gain a +4 size bonus to Strength and a +2 size bonus to Constitution. You gain a +2 enhancement bonus to your natural armor. You gain damage reduction 3/evil (if you normally channel positive energy) or damage reduction 3/good (if you normally channel negative energy). At 12th level this damage reduction becomes 6/evil or 6/good, and at 15th level it becomes 9/evil or 9/good (the maximum). Your size modifier for AC and attacks changes as appropriate to your new size category. This spell doesn’t change your speed. Determine space and reach as appropriate to your new size.

vs

Your height immediately doubles, and your weight increases by a factor of eight. This increase changes your size category to the next larger one. You gain a +4 size bonus to Strength and Constitution and take a –2 penalty to your Dexterity. You gain a +2 enhancement bonus to your natural armor. You gain DR 5/evil (if you normally channel positive energy) or DR 5/good (if you normally channel negative energy). At 15th level, this DR becomes 10/evil or 10/good (the maximum). Your size modifier for AC and attacks changes as appropriate to your new size category. This spell doesn't change your speed. Determine space and reach as appropriate to your new size.

The old divine power gave you full Bab which is an extra 5 to hit at level 20. I do admit the extra attack is nice.

Obiri said...

I still think the paladin is cool but I'd also give the fighter, ranger, rogue and barbarian a try. I think I'm just tired of playing casters.

The monk just doesn't do anything for me. Although if someone wanted to throw in a custom feat that allowed the use of a longspear as a monk weapon I'd give it a go. (Call it scorpion strike or something).

Rognar said...

Whoa, wait, are we talking Pathfinder RPG vs. D&D 3.5 or Pathfinder RPG vs. Pathfinder Beta? In D&D 3.5, Righteous Might gave you +8 bonus to Str, +4 bonus to Con, +4 bonus to natural armour and up to DR 15/evil.

Obiri said...

Aha. Someone else with an old copy of a players handbook. They nerfed the spell in later printings. I copied Righteous Might from the D20 SRD.

Divine Favor got capped at +3 at the same time.

Rognar said...

I did not know that. But yes, my PH is very old, I took advantage of the trade in option when they switched from 3.0 to 3.5, so I guess mine is first printing.

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