Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Arkiana 02-05-05, 02:47 AM	Ok, i know its each DM's decision on what goes on in their campaign, but I'm beginning to believe my DM is just bitter over a ruling by another DM. Let me give you the story first. The DM (DM1) in question wanted to play a Half-Orc Palidin in a campaign in which his older brother was DMing (i'm also a part of that group). But the older brother would not allow it, and in fact they spent the better part of an hour and then another week of off and on with the subject before DM1 backed down and made a different character. The older brothers point was that because Paladin's are open and charasmatic and orcs are generally looked on with hatred and distruss it would be impossible for a Half-Orc paladin to interact with anyone. Move forward to DM1's campaign, i want to make a Gnomish Paladin, because at first i thought it would be very interesting to play (roleplay and combat wise) and I had almost thought of a storyline, but since it wasn't going anywhere i asked other for ideas, and the DM immediatly shot it down, saying gnomes cannot be paladins. I mentioned the half-orc paladin and he said that a half-orc has more of a chance to be a paladin than a gnome. I replied with the fact that half-orcs are normally CHAOTIC EVIL and gnomes are chaotic good/neutral good. He said a races normal alignment has little to no bearing on the PC's alignment.The argument eventually boiled down to "gnomes cannot be melee's because they get a negative modifier to strength" when i mentioned that i would be a Gnomish Fighter. another part of the argument started up when i sayed i would change to halfling ranger, and he said that it was worse, but quickly took it back in favor of the "I don't like it, and you better have a perfect reason for being one otherwise you cannot have it" I think hes bitter that he could not play his paladin and thus any non-humans cannot be paladins. Or the fact that we just switched to 3.5e from 2e and in 2e only humans can be paladins (the half-orc part was him saying that it was half-human and therefore qualifies). Is there anyway that anyone of you can see to pursuade him to let me use my gnomish paladin? (or even a gnomish fighter)
Wil Harvey 02-05-05, 03:15 AM	Members of the other common races rarely hear the call to become a paladin So, they rarely hear the call, but they can, in fact, hear the call every now and then. There is absolutely nothing wrong with a gnome paladin should a sufficient backstory accompany said character. Furthermore, should one read the gnome description, one will find this piece of information: Lawful gnomes may adventure to set things right and to protect the innocent, demonstrating the same sense of duty toward society as a whole that gnomes generally exhibit toward their own enclaves. Can't get much more paladin-ish than that. Frankly, you should be applauded for having the balls to play a character that breaks a stereotype, despite it not being the most effective character available.
pres_man 02-05-05, 03:20 AM	Privately tell him, just because his brother is an idiot, that doesn't mean that he as to be. Half-orc paladins are perfectly ok, they aren't going to be the diplomatic leader of the party probably. But put a demon in front of them and step out of the way. In fact a good second level character would be former barbarian/paladin. By the way half-orcs lean towards neutral, not chaotic evil. That's pure orcs. Basically in 3.5, any race can be any class. There maybe more roleplaying necessary for gnomes to be paladins (perhaps he plays pranks, not because he feels the need but he feels it is responsibility to uphold his race's characteristics). Also mention to him that in the long run you'll have things like flaming and frost on your weapons. You're -2 on str will be little worry then. Halfling rangers rock! Their natural abilities just scream range fighter. Get a riding dog and go mounted archery. Also halflings in 3.5 are more nomadic, so they would have rangers patroling their every changing borders.
Draco Strang 02-05-05, 04:15 AM	I think your DM is being unnecessarily restrictive, and you really should be allowed to do the gnomish paladin thing. Actually, it sounds like an interesting concept. Can you imagine the big, hulking soldiers backing down in front of the ballsy paladin that's half their size?
Tenzhi 02-05-05, 04:39 AM	It's the DM's prerogative to make such restrictions. They seem kind of silly, but then just look at the restrictions that were actually part of the rules back in 2nd Edition.
dknight100 02-05-05, 05:25 AM	you said you were playing by second ed rules, which IIRC stated that only humans can be paladins. If thats the case (and you're playing by those rules in your current game) then he would be right in disallowing your paladin. the others might not be correct, but dont be too hard on him. in any case, what goes for players should also go for dm's, so if he keeps restricting your characters, then remember it, and you can catch him out if he uses a race/class combo he restricted, and watch him squirm
CapnSwashbuckler 02-05-05, 05:58 AM	You're getting screwed. By the RAW, anyone can do anything, even with a supposed mechanical inferiority. The DM's role, at character creation, is to look at your sheet and say 'well, you're not breaking any rules and you're meeting your prereqs for these feats, so happy gaming.' As far as convincing him? Just try to be reasonable and rational. 1) Paladins do not have to melee, as they are proficient with ranged weapons as well. 2) supposed mechanical inferiority is nowheres near a good enough reason to disallow a race/class combination. 3) His residual bitterness shouldn't be allowed to affect others.
The Freaking PHB 02-05-05, 07:54 AM	Members of the other common races rarely hear the call to become a paladin I never said that, but it's sooo true.
Arkiana 02-05-05, 03:42 PM	Furthermore, should one read the gnome description, one will find this piece of information: Quote: Originally Posted by The Freaking Player's Handbook Lawful gnomes may adventure to set things right and to protect the innocent, demonstrating the same sense of duty toward society as a whole that gnomes generally exhibit toward their own enclaves. Wow, i totally missed that when i first read through the gnome description, that should just about do it for convincing him. Thank you for your feedback.
Super_Demolition_Christ 02-05-05, 04:38 PM	You know whats funny, If you see the OFFICIAL book that is meant for playing "Good Characters" (I forgot the name of the book), in the sectionabout mercy, it shows a picture of a Half Orc Paladin sparing a pair of fiends. In fact Half Orcs would make very good paladins. A Half Orc that was mistreated in a Human Society might seek to prove that he is a good person and not a monster, while one raise with orcs might have enough human compassion to feal the Orcs way of life is to selfish. As for Gnomes and fighting classes, Well for one, the example barbarian in the Eberron book is a Halfing. Also, as gombat goes, Halflings and Gnomes could make good barbarians and fighters, the Halfings Dexterity Bonus helps a lot. And Halfing's bonus on through weapons could help, also its slight bonus on saves will help in any compat situation. And Gnomes, well a Barbarian Gnome benefits from the Con bonus for extended rages. Any fighter type could use the constitition. A Gnome Paladin might be better than a dwarven one because the Gnome doenst loose charisma (for turning abilites). Also Gnome could take great advantage of the fighter feats to became and exelent Giant slayer. The part will thank you in your skills when fighting anything Large or larger. And keep in mind that the decrease in str would mostly only effect damage rolls, since your -1 to hit in melee is nutralized by your +1 to hit for being small
Callista 02-05-05, 05:06 PM	Gnomes and Paladins... Well, I hope you have a good backstory. Other than that, I dont see anything mechanically wrong with it. You'll have to compensate for the low Strength and small size somehow, though. You'll obviously want to put a high stat in either Strength or Dexterity, so you can focus on either ranged or melee combat. Yes, you *can* Smite Evil with a longbow. But, here's the thing: Gnomes get a bonus to Constitution. Build 'em right, and they can take a lot of punishment; so their enemies will be whacking at him with big-dice weapons, and the Gnome will just take it and keep going--and eventually, the smaller amounts of damage they do will add up. I can see that being Paladin-like: The guy that just won't quit, no matter how many times the demon with the plank-sized sword hits him. Work on his AC to reinforce the high HP. You've already got a Size bonus to AC; and paladins are proficient with all sorts of armor. Get him in full plate, sit him on a well-armored pony, and have him Charge away. Or have him proficient with a longbow or other ranged weapon, take ranged-weapon feats, and have him hail arrows down on his opponents from afar. Check out the other members of the party as well: Have you got a cleric to buff you? Will you be the party healer (if so, check out the price on a Wand of Cure Light Wounds... a spell which is in your spell list!). What about wizards, who'd prefer you stayed out of melee, or Barbarians, who'll be dishing the damage so you can think about tactics? Do you have a Rogue to flank with? Another plus of having a Small character on a mount is that a riding dog can go a lot of places that a horse or pony can't--do consider a riding dog for your mount if you do a lot of dungeon delving. So you get the benefits of having a mount, without the problems of getting a horse to go into a big dark hole, and then leaving it behind at the first obstacle. Good luck :)
DM Zoc 02-05-05, 05:17 PM	Yes, you *can* Smite Evil with a longbow. Actually, you can't. Smite Evil is melee attacks only. Back to the topic at hand, though, you should ask whether the campaign will be run more like 2E (racially-defined classes, pseudo-european feudal society, no magic items for sale) or more like 3E (race/class combinations allowed based on probability, magic item shops in every town). It's something I kind of like about how they structred the race/class system: the chance that a half-orc paladin would show up is exactly the chance that someone playing a paladin would be willing to eat the penalties associated with being an half-orc. If it's a fairly large world, then chances are you'll find one somewhere. They just aren't very common. Likewise, the chance that you'll find a gnome paladin is exactly the chance that a pladin is willing to eat the weapon-size/strength penalty. There are pictures of both half-orc and gnome paladins in the books, though. It's even easier to justify if the character grew up in a human society.
Callista 02-05-05, 05:23 PM	*reads PHB* :banghead: You'd think I'd know that by now... Thanks for pointing it out. But you *can* Smite Evil with a mounted charge. Including Ride-By Attack...
TheUnknownZombie 02-05-05, 10:16 PM	Depends on the campaign setting. In my DM's setting, all clerics & paladins must have gods (none of this being "a cleric of an ideal"). Paladins are restricted to two gods of the pantheon (one of which is a god of sun and justice and the other is of community and law). Due to these churches' dim view of orcs & half-orcs (and they're not very keen on elves either, who tend to worship fithy heathen gods) there's no way that they'd allow a half-orc to become a cleric or a paladin. Actually there was quite a good storyline going on with a Half-Orc Favoured Soul of one of these churches. Obviously the god liked him, but his representatives on earth weren't as accepting. Therefore no half-orc Paladins in this world. Unless your DM has a justification like this, then yes, your DM is unreasonable.
CapnSwashbuckler 02-05-05, 10:24 PM	I dunno, I would still say that's not enough of a justification. It seems to me that rather than the church allowing the character to become a paladin or cleric, it would be the individual deity's decision to give the character his power. While it makes for a neat character storyline, I don't think it's justification enough to deny the players a potential choice.
TheUnknownZombie 02-05-05, 11:14 PM	I dunno, I would still say that's not enough of a justification. It seems to me that rather than the church allowing the character to become a paladin or cleric, it would be the individual deity's decision to give the character his power. While it makes for a neat character storyline, I don't think it's justification enough to deny the players a potential choice. Hence the Favoured Soul option. We go along the lines of "Clerics & Paladins have religious training and are taught how to harness the abilities of their god" and Favoured Souls are individuals that are so dedicated to their god, or represent his ideals to such a degree that they are handed powers without any training. If a character wanted to play a half-orc paladin type, then I'd point them towards the Pious Templar prestige class from CW. Taking it less as a guardian of the church, and more of a crusader type, it works adequately. It loses a lot of the paladin's abilities (like lay-on-hands and the special mount) but replaces them with more combat-related abilities quite well. A Favoured Soul/Pious Templar would make for an excellent Paladin stand-in - completely unsanctioned by the church.
Zendu 02-06-05, 12:02 AM	Your dm just hasnt played enough dnd to realize that 'iconic' builds get DAMN boring really fast. I mean the thought that gnome society is all illusinists is retarted, and i think i should point out blade bravo and halfling outrider and gnome giant killer for that matter. Martial, small sized, prestige classes, how does he propose you meet those requirments? If he wants to still make these rules, play a incredably boring human fighter (i like swords!) If he isnt screaming for better roleplay at the end of two sessions, he isnt cut out for dming anything more than "get the x from the x" sessions
Wil Harvey 02-06-05, 01:59 AM	I mean the thought that gnome society is all illusinists is retarted I have issues with people who use words like 'retarded' or 'gay' as if they're derogatory in some way. But, I guess I can take solace in the satisfying irony when those words are used in such a manner like they are here.
Arkiana 02-06-05, 03:15 AM	The older brothers thing was not about half-orcs cannot be paladins, it was more "Due to orc activity in this world their would be zero chance for a half-orc to be a paladin because they would have killed you at birth (either side, humans or orcs) or if you managed to live you could never have a good enough relationship with any church organization, and therefore any gods, that would be able to have paladins." I did not really care about the fact that the half-orc could not be a paladin, i was more annoyed that just because he could not make a half-orc paladin in a campaign i couldn't make a Gnomish paladin in his. When i showed him the whole lawful part he seemed to be a little bit pursuaded, but i do not know. The funny part was I just made him as a backup because i was not so sure my character would survive. I beleive i can keep hitting him up until he gives in, but for now it is a backup character to two campaigns (one from each brother) But that leads me to my next question. Which class would you see most able to "tank" for a group. Because i was going for a large chunk of irony here when i came up with a 3 foot gnome taking the hits for a group of humans/elves/dwarf (and being a paladin would add to that irony). Could a fighter do it better? Remember i'm not going for damage here, just tanking (so i could care less about a fighter doing less damage)
Wil Harvey 02-06-05, 03:21 AM	The older brothers thing was not about half-orcs cannot be paladins, it was more "Due to orc activity in this world their would be zero chance for a half-orc to be a paladin because they would have killed you at birth (either side, humans or orcs) or if you managed to live you could never have a good enough relationship with any church organization, and therefore any gods, that would be able to have paladins." Um, according to the Player's Handbook, paladins don't necessarily have to serve a god. They can just as easily crusade with the ideal of righteousness as they can in the name of any god. Just thought I'd throw that out there.
ehrin 02-06-05, 10:11 AM	I always thought dwarven fighters, rangers and paladins are good tank builds... ranger less so because of the armor restrictions, but still a solid build. extra hit points from con, good strength, good weapons, and armor, lots of it and it doesn't affect your speed... that's the start of a tank.
TheUnknownZombie 02-06-05, 02:10 PM	But that leads me to my next question. Which class would you see most able to "tank" for a group. Because i was going for a large chunk of irony here when i came up with a 3 foot gnome taking the hits for a group of humans/elves/dwarf (and being a paladin would add to that irony). Could a fighter do it better? Remember i'm not going for damage here, just tanking (so i could care less about a fighter doing less damage) I don't see why a gnome can't tank - it gets the Con bonus to up the HP and a size bonus to AC. Equip it with some decent armour and a shield (or use the Gnome Hooked Hammer and invest in some 2WF feats (especially defence). If you want to go the 2WF route, then the Fighter class will give you the feats you need, otherwise Paladin is just as valid. You'll never reach the heights of a well played tanking Dwarvern Defender, but you'll be no slouch either.
Nuke 02-06-05, 03:24 PM	Yeah dwarves make excellent tanks. If you use Races of Stone, they make even better ones - Mountain plate or Battle plate. So if you wanted a character who can absorb a lot of attacks, I'd go with that. To get back to the original post, it's at the DM's discretion to determine what classes/race combos to allow. That being said, deciding not to allow any melee classes for halflings and gnomes is simply asinine. Hopefully from what you've posted since your initial post, he's already realized such. If not, he needs to.
was_fired 02-07-05, 07:52 AM	Gnomes make okay paladins, but that -2 to average damage hurts (-1 due to strength, -1 due to weapon size). The other annoying features are your slower speed (mount helps this) and vulnerability to grapple (it will take a lot of resources for a paladin to patch this). Halflings are a bit worse than gnomes since the paladins immunity to fear makes the halflings resistance worthless, but a +1 on all saves is nice.
On_the_wings_of_TPK 02-07-05, 11:28 AM	*reads PHB* :banghead: You'd think I'd know that by now... Thanks for pointing it out. But you *can* Smite Evil with a mounted charge. Including Ride-By Attack... Actually..............there is a feat in either the BOED, or the CW (not sure witch) that allows you to make a ranged smite attack, it's called "Ranged smite" ironically enough. Hmm becst class for tanking it eh? Well both gnome and drawf have been menchioned, so I won't go there. But has anyone ever thought of the barbarain. Yaa they are restricted to light armour but the d12 hit dia is nice, and well i haven't seen a class ability yet compares to rage for tanking ability. If the races of stone is allowed i recomend playing a Golith barbarain with monkey grip wilding a huge bastard sword, or maybe greatsword. The bastard sword would allow you to fit sword and board style, but the greatsword has silightly better average damage. Mind you out of that book the best Tanking race is definately the stone child. +8 to con and str!?!
fallabel 02-07-05, 12:01 PM	A Monk with Vow of Poverty isn't too bad either...
Stuntman 02-07-05, 05:46 PM	I can see if you came from 2E, your DM would put similar restrictions on class/race combos. It is not unreasonable for a DM to do this because it fits his campaign. If he is just used to the combos allowed in older editions, you're probably out of luck. If your DM is doing this because he wanted others to share in his misery, then it is more of a personal issue with the DM in question. No DM should screw his players because he got screwed himself. With regard to the differences in 2E and 3E+, 3E allows the players more flexibility in almost every aspect of their character. There are way fewer restrictions in 3E than in the previous editions. The class/race combinations are just one example. I really do feel that if you have a good idea for a character, you should be allowed to play it as long as it is within the rules and does not clash too much with the campaign setting. The DM make the final decision and if you want to play in his campaign, you do need to respect the DM's decision.
Dragoloth 02-07-05, 10:41 PM	Best tank in my eyes is a half-orc fighter/barbarian.Barbarians only lose fast movement for heavy armor penalties.4 fighter levels for the proficiencies and feats and then barbie all the way. Rage, uncanny dodge, and DR oh my.