Character suggestions for a friend (Red Hand of Doom spoilers)

[Tonymitsu]

I'm going to be starting up Red Hand of Doom for a few of my players soon.
One of them is interested in playing, but he has no idea what he wants to be.

-He is a creative player and does well with most 3.5e mechanics, but generally dislikes primary spellcasters and their largely limitless spell lists. In his words, it's just too much to read and keep track of. He tried a Factotum once, and didn't like it for exactly this reason.
-On the other hand, he does like primary casting classes with limited lists. Dread Necromancer is his favorite class. He played a Favored Soul once with help picking out his spells and enjoyed it. He likes Warlock. And he expressed mild curiosity in Beguiler.
-He also does generally well with anything that has a melee focus

I am specifically forbidding for this game:
-Mindsight
-Large scale undead minionmancy, mostly because of the massive graveyards at Rhest, and the huge amounts of unattended corpses that they will find at the Battle of Brindol. because I don't feel like upscaling encounters to compensate.

The party so far consists of:
-A druid
-A goliath warblade
-An undecided, but definitely a (horrifically unoptomized) cleric or a (mostly competent, if attention-deficit) rogue
-An egoist focused psion

I'm hoping for some advice on something that might appeal to him, and that would give him plenty to do throughout Red Hand of Doom.

Any thoughts?

[Shadowhunter]

If he likes self-contained options and melee combat, my brain tells me maybe a Totemist or Incarnate?

[Nifft]

If he liked Warlock, then he might like a Dragonfire Adept? It's similar in overall power, but IMHO the Dragonfire Adept has more tactical utility for a creative player.

I like playing a Binder, but that's usually with an eye towards the Anima Mage (which is a Binder / Wizard hybrid PrC).

I would also recommend a Totemist / Psion (Nomad) / Soul Manifester, but that might tend to be a primary spellcaster.

How does he feel about being a Bard or Sorcerer? Is Sorcerer too close to being a primary caster?

[Nanshork]

By limited lists do you mean Sorcerer (limited known) or Dread Necromancer (limited available to choose from) or either?

[Tonymitsu]

Nanshork:
Limited available to choose from, as Dread Necro. Favored Soul only worked because he had help picking out spells. I'd definitely be building a sorcerer with him in the same way.

Nifft:
DFA is good. Thanks for that.
Binder I think might run into some of the same problems as primary casters. The different vestiges and all of their abilities are a lot to keep on your mind each adventuring day.

Psion will require the same help that sorcerer would, and I think he'd get into it. But I just worried about stepping on the other player's toes by having two full manifesters in the party.

I should clarify that the Druid is playing one for the first time, but he's done a lot of homework and looks pretty solid. The egoist knows at least as much about system mastery as I do, if not more, so he is definitely solid. The maybe cleric/maybe rogue is, well... he doesn't always want the help.

I've also considered a swift hunter build, but I'm worried it might turn into too much ranger spellcasting for his tastes.

[Nanshork]

I can't come up with anything that wasn't already mentioned that wouldn't have a lot of prep work of some sort.

[Nifft]

Nifft:
DFA is good. Thanks for that.
Binder I think might run into some of the same problems as primary casters. The different vestiges and all of their abilities are a lot to keep on your mind each adventuring day.

Psion will require the same help that sorcerer would, and I think he'd get into it. But I just worried about stepping on the other player's toes by having two full manifesters in the party.

Well, he could always be a non-full-manifester.

Totemist 2 / Nomad 3 / Soul Manifester is a whole power level behind a normal manifester. (If the DM allowed Soul Manifester to advance bonus feats, then Totemist 2 / Psychic Warrior 4 / Soul Manifester 10 becomes really interesting, and very much unlike a regular full-manifester.)

Another way to not be a full-manifester is to multiclass & take a PrC that loses manifester levels: stuff like Ranger 1 / Nomad 4 / Elocator 10, or Ranger 1 / Nomad 4 / Slayer 10, or Ardent 5 / Crystal Master 10, or similar.

I've also considered a swift hunter build, but I'm worried it might turn into too much ranger spellcasting for his tastes.

Hmm, thinking about Ranger, what about a Wildshape Ranger 5 / Master of Many Forms / Warshaper ?

That's probably got some novelty, and allows a steady growth of power. It kinda does step on the Druid's feet, but the Druid gets to also be a full spellcaster.


Finally, what about a Spellthief? It's a very advanced class for very creative players who love thinking on their feet, and who love stealing spells from a party full of full-spellcasters. It's neat because he gets all the fun of (ab)using level-appropriate spells, but none of the drudgery of picking spells for the day. He picks from whatever the OTHER characters chose.

[Tonymitsu]

I'd been a little leery of totemist because I distinctly remember playing one in a game with him at one point and he didn't seem to interested in the class.
When you say allowing Soul Manifester to advance bonus feats what did you mean by that?

Wildshape Ranger probably isn't the entry I would have gone with but Warshaper could be interesting.

I played a spellthief a while back. Aside from the Trickster Dragon Mag variant (which pretty much turns it into Bard+), I remember being really underwhelmed by the class.
Can it really stand alongside a druid and an egoist and not be marginalized to uselessness?

As an aside, he's just not into bards for some reason.

[Nifft]

I'd been a little leery of totemist because I distinctly remember playing one in a game with him at one point and he didn't seem to interested in the class.
When you say allowing Soul Manifester to advance bonus feats what did you mean by that?

Basically, a variant on manifester advancement which says:
- If you're advancing Psion, great, you get more manifesting (your main class feature). Your HD stays the same, your saves are the same, your BAB is still 1/2.
- If you're advancing Psychic Warrior, you are giving up your 3/4 BAB and d8 HD, and advancing manifesting is not as big a deal for you. So you also get bonus feats in addition to the manifester advancement.

It's like when a Bard takes a Wizard-oriented PrC, he loses more than a Wizard would have lost. So I sometimes compensate for that by having the PrC also advance Bardic music. It's purely a house rule.

That said, if he's just not into Totemist, then buffing Soul Manifester for Totemist + Psychic Warrior synergy isn't very useful.

Wildshape Ranger probably isn't the entry I would have gone with but Warshaper could be interesting.

IIRC it's the fastest entry into Warshaper.

Also, the Wildshape gives entry to MoMF, and the level 2 Ranger bonus feat helps with MoMF entry prereqs as well.

I played a spellthief a while back. Aside from the Trickster Dragon Mag variant (which pretty much turns it into Bard+), I remember being really underwhelmed by the class.
Can it really stand alongside a druid and an egoist and not be marginalized to uselessness?

It's specifically when he's standing next to a Druid (or other full caster) that he's better than useless.

What he does is double the primary caster's action economy by casting their spells.

(Is this worse than having your own spells? Yes, it certainly is. But it's still better than useless.)

((Would I personally play this? No.))

= = =

Anyway more ideas:

- Dragonborn (RotDr) Crusader (ToB) with the Entangling Exhalation (RotDr) feat. Lots of tactical options.

- Ranger / Scout with Swift Hunter who has campaign-appropriate enemies, especially Undead, since being able to inflict precision damage on them is nice.

- A-Game Paladin (which is primary melee, plus Bardic Inspiration without being a Bard, plus decent casting to cover the party's Wizard gap).

[Samwise]

Limited spells + melee = duskblade?

[Solo]

I invoke the power of kung-fu!

[Vizzerdrix]

Limited lists and melee? Has he tried psychic warrior, mystic ranger, or duskblade?

[Tonymitsu]

It's specifically when he's standing next to a Druid (or other full caster) that he's better than useless.

What he does is double the primary caster's action economy by casting their spells.

(Is this worse than having your own spells? Yes, it certainly is. But it's still better than useless.)

((Would I personally play this? No.))

So, the plan is he will stab party members in order to cast their spells for them?
  Because that... that probably won't fly at our table.

Way back when we first started playing 3rd Edition, this particular player started with Rogue. He really really wanted to multi-class into Assassin, but our mutual friend who was DMing wouldn't waive the RP requirement (killing someone). So he hatched a plan.

During a dungeon run, he was searching a body and palmed an amulet from his belt pouch he had acquired earlier. We didn't have an arcane caster, and based solely on the description, it looked to be an Amulet of Health. He offered it to the monk, who was out in front more than anyone else.

Of course it wasn't an Amulet of Health, and as soon as the monk put it on it killed him instantly. He felt legitimately terrible about it and tried to explain his reasoning to the group.

Me: "...You know you it didn't have to be a party member to qualify right?"
Him: "...Huh?"
Me: "Yeah, it could have been anyone. Like, literally any NPC anywhere."
Him: "...Really?"
Entire Group: "YES!!"
Him: "aw shit... my bad."

Now this was almost nine years ago, and there's no hard feelings between the two, but thanks to that he is forever known as the sneaky, backstabbing, never-take-your-eyes-off-him type of character. No matter what kind of character he is playing.
So as hilarious as it would be I really can't in good conscious recommend he play a character who operates by routinely stabbing party members. 

I invoke the power of kung-fu!

...that's clearly a barbarian.
 Ah ok, I read the thread, and that was the joke.  /facepalm 

Limited spells + melee = duskblade?

Limited lists and melee? Has he tried psychic warrior, mystic ranger, or duskblade?

He never seemed interested in psionics at all for some reason.
But that is two more votes for duskblade. Not a bad idea either.

Thanks again guys.

[Nifft]

It's specifically when he's standing next to a Druid (or other full caster) that he's better than useless.

What he does is double the primary caster's action economy by casting their spells.

(Is this worse than having your own spells? Yes, it certainly is. But it's still better than useless.)

((Would I personally play this? No.))

So, the plan is he will stab party members in order to cast their spells for them?
  Because that... that probably won't fly at our table.

Ha ha ha. No.

Steal Spell (Su): A spellthief can siphon spell energy away from his target and use it himself. A spellthief who hits an opponent with a successful sneak attack can choose to forgo dealing 1d6 points of sneak attack damage and instead steal a spell, or the potential to cast a specific known spell, from his target. If the target is willing, a spellthief can steal a spell with a touch as a standard action.

(Emphasis added.)

So as hilarious as it would be I really can't in good conscious recommend he play a character who operates by routinely stabbing party members. 

That would be pointless and stupid, yes.

- - -

Anyway, what did he think about the A-Game Paladin?

[awaken_D_M_golem]

I invoke the power of kung-fu!

...that's clearly a barbarian.
 Ah ok, I read the thread, and that was the joke.  /facepalm 

It is no joke ...

[Solo]

I invoke the power of kung-fu!

...that's clearly a barbarian.
 Ah ok, I read the thread, and that was the joke.  /facepalm 

It is no joke ...

It's a space station!

[Nanshork]

I invoke the power of kung-fu!

...that's clearly a barbarian.
 Ah ok, I read the thread, and that was the joke.  /facepalm 

It is no joke ...

It's a space station!

 

[Tonymitsu]

Okay so I checked with him this Saturday and laid out some of the options things you guys came up with and asked him what he wanted to be able to do in game. His response was:

1) Make things die

2) Not be made redundant by another party member.

In addition, it looks like the cleric or rogue player might not be participating.


So this leads me towards duskblade even further, since he'd be able to fill the arcane caster niche, and could certainly make things die. I showed him a build I'd done a little while ago and he seemed intrigued but wanted more time to think about it.

With those two new stipulations, is there anything else more specific that might be a good fit for the group?

[Nifft]

If there's a chance that your Rogue isn't participating in a published adventure, then I'm going to assume that the party will need a trap-finder.

I recommend the Kung-Fu -- er, I mean, a Barbarian with the 3rd level Dungeonscape "Trapkiller" ACF.

He'd get to use Survival to find traps, and disarm them with a melee attack.

Plus, of course, he would be a Barbarian.

"Make things die" -- check.

= = =

If he wants to not be made redundant over the long haul, then he need to have a plan other than just "be a Barbarian" by level 8 or so.

A melee build might go something like ... Barbarian 3 / Psychic Warrior 2 / Fist of the Forest 3 / Warmind 10

A more shape-oriented build might go like ... Barbarian 3 / Ranger 3 / Abolisher 1 / Master of Many Forms 10

A not-full-caster build could go like ... Silverbrow Human Barbarian 3 / Swordsage 2 / Chameleon 10

... or just check out a Barbarian handbook.