Level 1 free-for-all, who is likely to win?

[Cannotthink]

What if we just settled the dispute with a children's card game?

(click to show/hide)

Dragonfire Adept 1
Feats: Intensify Darkness, Bind Vestige, Practiced Binder, Cards over Swords
Traits: (any that'll boost diplomacy checks if charisma is too low. An 18 CHA is assumed here, and that's good enough)
Flaws: Non-Combatant/ Shakey
Other: Soul sold in a Pact Certain for a +7 bonus to Diplomancy.
Invocation: Darkness
Vestige Bound: Naberius

Diplomacy Check: 10 (Naberius) + 4 (ranks) + 4  (charisma) + 7 (Pact Certain) = 25
DC to challenge to a card game= 25

Equipment: Cards, pants, whatever.

Strategy
Hide inside Deeper Darkness all day. Challenge smart people with card games. Challenge dumb people with fire to the face.

Additional Option
Make another pact with devils for additional power in exchange for additional stakes in the card games: the loser's soul (which will ultimately be dragged into the devil's shadowy realm)

[SorO_Lost]

Too lazy to download that card game, but your tactic needs flight. Otherwise, the Druid's Greenbound Summon will find you through Tremorsense which makes any hide bonus worthless.

[Arz]

What if we just settled the dispute with a children's card game?

(click to show/hide)

Dragonfire Adept 1
Feats: Intensify Darkness, Bind Vestige, Practiced Binder, Cards over Swords
Traits: (any that'll boost diplomacy checks if charisma is too low. An 18 CHA is assumed here, and that's good enough)
Flaws: Non-Combatant/ Shakey
Other: Soul sold in a Pact Certain for a +7 bonus to Diplomancy.
Invocation: Darkness
Vestige Bound: Naberius

Diplomacy Check: 10 (Naberius) + 4 (ranks) + 4  (charisma) + 7 (Pact Certain) = 25
DC to challenge to a card game= 25

Equipment: Cards, pants, whatever.

Strategy
Hide inside Deeper Darkness all day. Challenge smart people with card games. Challenge dumb people with fire to the face.

Additional Option
Make another pact with devils for additional power in exchange for additional stakes in the card games: the loser's soul (which will ultimately be dragged into the devil's shadowy realm)

That is a fun game, but sadly the wizard is gonna cast Cheat! and Cheat! again.

Robby has a good point but I just couldn't sit back and not kill that Samurai myself, even if just to Fell animate him and kill him again.

Woops, derail move along.

[Tshern]

Worth noting that Sanctuary does offer a will save. DMM (Heighten) to crank that up maybe?

[littha]

Going to be struggling to find all the turn undead uses needed. Probably better to invest feats in it.

[Mnemnosyne]

After giving it some additional thought, it occurs to me the cleric would lose to another of the top contenders: the Dragonfire Adept.  DFA attacks with breath weapons that are areas of effect and thus ignore sanctuary, and deal half damage even on a successful save.  She also probably has entangling exhalation which at 1st level actually increases damage (base damage is halved, so half of 1d6, but entangling exhalation adds an additional 1d6 on top of that) along with the entangling effect, which has no save, either.

If it came down to DFA vs. druid, I think it'd be determined by whether the DFA is in range of the druid when the druid starts casting Summon Nature's Ally.  If she's not, then the druid will probably win if her animal companion can prevent the DFA from getting in range (riding dog's trip attack is useful here) during the 1-round casting time.  If the DFA is in range or gets in range, the druid's got a good chance of having her spell interrupted during its casting time.  Even if she succeeds in finishing the cast, she could die from the 1d4 rounds of 1d6 damage if she's unlucky.

[Dr emperor]

I think wizard has a shot at this maybe.  I'll toss out a build that needs refinement.
conjurer wizard with abrupt jaunt.   

Feats: shape soulmeld (soulmeld for ranged acid spit attack), precocious apprentice for invisibility.  feat any for essentia
Flaw: vulnerable

Tactics: go invisible trying to keep in range of the likely winner, hope invisibility lasts long enough that human nature takes over and all the other people hiding or delaying reveal themselves to win.  kill that guy with spit if that seems likely.  Use abrupt jaunt to get out of the way of the inevitable person you did not account for and counter attack.

invisibility should help with staying power,  and abrupt jaunt is the best defense available so it might work out.

[phaedrusxy]

What are the DFA, Warlock, and wizard with Shape Soulmeld doing against the druid that is riding around on a horse shooting people with a crossbow/sling/etc? Let me throw up a build skeleton. I'm going to go with the default array for stats, since we have no criteria, and that seems like a good baseline:

Human Druid 1
Str 12
Dex 14
Con 13
Wis 15
Int 10
Cha 8

AC: 15
HP: 9
Saves: F +3, R +2, W +4
Ranged Attack: Sling +2 (1d4+1), range increment 50'

Animal Companion: Light Horse (HP 19, Move 60)

Skills that we care about: Concentration +5, Handle Animal +4 (+8 w/AC), Ride +6

Feats: Mounted Combat, Mounted Archery

Prepared Spells: Lesser Vigor x2

Equipment: riding saddle (10 gp), bit and bridle (2 gp), hide armor (15 gp), sling and 100 bullets (1 gp)

Tactics: He rides his horse around, staying as far away as the arena will allow from the other combatants, and fires his sling at them repeatedly. Even if his horse runs full speed (240'), he only gets a -4 to hit from movement (-2 if it only double moves 120'). Sling bullets are cheap, and his horse has a lot of stamina. So he can keep it up all day if needed. He shares a Lesser Vigor with is mount if either of them are injured. He can negate attacks against his mount with a successful Ride check, and use his mount for cover if desired as well. Since he likely will need a 20 to hit anyway, against most opponents he'll just stay at maximum range and keep plinking at them till he connects.

Weaknesses: If he can't get out of range of the other combatants attacks for some reason, he is quite vulnerable. His damage and attack bonus are also weak. So against opponents with damage reduction or high ACs, he will take a long time to hurt/kill them.

[Halinn]

Is there any reason the DFA wouldn't have a mount and some mounted archery in addition to entangling exhalation and [soulmeld of choice]?

[littha]

Mounts are expensive at level 1...

[phaedrusxy]

Is there any reason the DFA wouldn't have a mount and some mounted archery in addition to entangling exhalation and [soulmeld of choice]?

Cost (fairly minor if you go with a mule and sling, total 21 gp), and it takes a move action for him to direct the mount, instead of a free action for the druid. Other than that, no.

[oslecamo]

Well, I would say this falls more to politics than anything else. Anybody can be overwhelmed by sheer numbers, but nobody will be foolish enough to kill each other while there's a sanctuared cleric watching by the sidelines or a druid slinging people from the top of its animal companion. Truces, temporary alliances and backstabbing would be the name of the game.

[phaedrusxy]

Well, I would say this falls more to politics than anything else. Anybody can be overwhelmed by sheer numbers, but nobody will be foolish enough to kill each other while there's a sanctuared cleric watching by the sidelines or a druid slinging people from the top of its animal companion. Truces, temporary alliances and backstabbing would be the name of the game.

Round 1: Druid plinks someone with his sling for puny damage (or misses), and rides away at a full run. He's now 300' away.

Now what are the rest going to do? All chase after him (futilely) without fighting each other? Yeah, right.

Go look at the Natural Selection game to see how this kind of thing really goes down. It's basically exactly the same scenario, except the PCs are level 6 and aren't restricted to being humans. There are people running away to avoid the initial melee brawl, but so far no one has bothered to chase them down. Those who didn't run are too busy killing each other to bother.   

[RobbyPants]

Human Druid 1
Str 12
Dex 14
Con 13
Wis 15
Int 10
Cha 8

AC: 15
HP: 9
Saves: F +3, R +2, W +4
Ranged Attack: Sling +2 (1d4+1), range increment 50'

For this build, you might as well switch his Str and Wis, unless you're going for a more "realistic druid" (as in what his stats would look like if he were expected to play out of the arena).

[awaken_D_M_golem]

Air Elemental 1 from the SS racial class.
Flyby Attack feat + whatever.  It's dumb enough
it ought to make int checks to make sure it doesn't
do anything really stupid.

A dedicated ranged / archer build can beat it.
Might get lucky and make it to the sweet 16.

[SorO_Lost]

The posted Druid build needs more Druid imho. It reads off like a Commoner. So here is a sort of hybrid between the one and page one, my ideas, and the ride around with a sling one.

Huntsmen
Human Druid 1
ACFS: Deadly Hunter, Phynxkin Companion, Druid Domain.
Abilities: Str 10, Dex 14, Con 14, Int 10, Wis 18, Cha 8.
Feats: Greenbound Summoning, Track, Nightbringer Initiate, Primitive Caster, Shape Soulmeld(Kruthik Claws), Shape Soulmeld(Soulspark Familiar).
Skills: Profession (herbalist), Survival, Hide, Move, Listen.
Stuff: Favored Enemy(human), AC Bonus, Swift Tracker, Nature Sense, Wild Empathy.
WBL: 100gp, Spellcasting Service(cl3 divine substitution[summon domain], 60gp), mule (8gp), 22gp left for sling and such.

Pets
Phynxkin: 6HP, init +5, 40ft speed, AC 13, bite +2 (1d6+2) & 2 claws -3 (1d4+1), pounce, hide/move +4.
Soulspark Familiar: 13 HP, +5 init, 30ft flight, ac 14, +5 ranged touch (1d4+1).

Before embarking on this event, for several weeks he tries to make a DC 15 Profession (herbalist) check to gather plants for Primitive Caster. For the first three days of the battle Hunstmen has the Summon domain for +2 to his CL with SNA spells which gives him a total of CL4. Typically he stalks his target (+10 to hide/move, +12 to tracking humans) and tries to use the surprise round to cast a Greenbound animal if possible, which for the next four rounds will dominate combat. When the situation calls for it, he can befriend nearby animals, such as a bird to scout for him. He has a mule to allow for movement while summoning, his Soulspark Familiar makes a nice shoulder cannon when deployed (else it hides in a leather bag). And the Phynxkin runs interference as needed, typically it can be up to 80ft form it's target and still make a full attack which let's it follow it's master with some distance between them.

I could have sworn Survival can be used to make rudimentary traps (like snares and such), but I can't think of where I seen that or maybe it's just wishful thinking.

Note on DFA: 30ft line of breath is 50ft closer than the pet needs to rip him a new breathing hole. It's in range of the Soulspark's lasers, and let's face it. As long as the Druid has a 1st level spell slot left, Greenbound is his auto win trump card.

[snakeman830]

Only have one day to prepare, Soro That's been in the OP all along.

[phaedrusxy]

For this build, you might as well switch his Str and Wis, unless you're going for a more "realistic druid" (as in what his stats would look like if he were expected to play out of the arena).

That's exactly why I didn't.

[Halinn]

My entry:

Human Commoner 1
Abilities: Str 13, Dex 15, Con 14, Int 12, Wis 10, Cha 8
Feats: Skill Focus (Hide), Skill Focus (Move Silently), Stealthy, Shape Soulmeld (Kruthik Claws)
Flaws: Chicken Infested, Weresheep
Skills: Crossclass Hide (+13), Crossclass Move Silently (+13), Ride (+6), Use Rope (+6)
WBL: 900 gp - 29 War Trolls for a day (870 gp), Mule (8 gp), Spell Component Pouch (5 gp), 12 gp on sling + ammo

Tactics: Hide. Ride away from stuff. Have the War Trolls kill all enemies. In case of emergency, spend 4*10^2000 free actions drawing things from your spell component pouch, then dropping them. This will result in everything being flooded with vastly more chickens than there are particles in our universe.

Can be done with the non-elite array as well, stats would then be: 11, 12, 13, 10, 9, 8, and there would be no ranks in Use Rope.

[johnboy069]

I would go with a Battle Sorcerer with Precocious Apprentice: Alter Self, changing into a lizardfolk or troglodyte; or maybe a Battle Sorcerer with Precocious Apprentice: Command Undead. It may not win the whole shebang, but it may be a decent contender. One question though. If a Battle Sorcerer trades his familiar for an animal companion at level 1 (UA or srd variant, treat as druid 1/2 level), would the companion (wolf) be equivalent to a 1st level druid's? I ask because some modifiers are minimum level 1 when it comes to certain things, and the srd or UA does not really specify.