Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 battlesong72_dup Jul 09, 2008 13:04:10	I am about to start a new 4e game, however, it seems that we will only have 3 people interested, 1 of which of course will be the DM. What would be the best classes to create for such a limited party? It seems to me that not all classes would work for this. Thanks, Battlesong
#2 Shiftkitty Jul 09, 2008 14:59:55	The two classes I've always had in smaller groups have been the fighter and wizard. The wizard can soften up the enemies before the fighter goes in and starts whuppin'.
#3 cart_man31 Jul 09, 2008 15:01:39	I really don't think that it would matter too much what classes are present. I am in a campaign that (so far) has only had to PCs (Fighter and Rogue), and we have fared well thus far. We've had a few close calls, mainly because we ask for challenging fights. As long as whomever DMs knows what the group can handle, it shouldn't be hard.
#4 yarskath Jul 10, 2008 2:01:01	Truthfully, if the DM is good he will be able to make appropriate encounters regardless of which classes are present. Now as far as optimal choices: 1) Tank and Healer I'd suggest a cleric or warlord to add healing capability. Both can be effective in other capacities as well and will diversify the team. The second member should be a fighter or paladin. The fighter will have better control of the field, but the pally adds extra healing to the mix. 2) tank and striker A pally or warlord will give a bit of healing to the team. the pally will have better damage by himself, but the warlord will increase the striker's performance. A melee striker may benefit more from the warlord, but all you really need is a super hard hitter. A wizard would be great for his aoe control if paired with a fighter who can forcefully group enemies around him. 3) double striker The most risky choice is having two strikers. You lack a character that can take hits, so you will have to focus on dropping enemies fast with high damage attacks. Ranged attacks will be your friend in this set up, so a rogue may be the worst choice unless played very well. A ranger has the benefit of doing heavy range damage while not being helpless is something gets in his face. Warlocks have all kinds of nasty ranged powers, and nothing keeps things off you better than invisibility (go Eyebite!). Again, wizards are the kings of ranged blams, and with their various movement restricting powers and wide array of helpful utilities a wizard could stall the enemies while the partner knocks the down. These may not be the best of the best, but they are all logical pairings that do support teamwork. The key though, is having the DM set up encounters that are appropriate. Once the players pick a class , it might be a good idea to run a test battle to see how the two work together before making the final decision on their classes. Oh and both characters being trained in the Heal skill will help.
#5 minesril Jul 10, 2008 8:51:23	The one 2 person party I've played in was bard (me) and monk, although several weeks in we were joined by a sorcerer. Although there were a lot of powerful NPCs to make sure we didn't die. Even so, we did quite well.
#6 chriscrouch Jul 11, 2008 3:17:31	DMG p31 suggests Striker + Leader, which seems like a reasonable suggestion. I think Defender + anything else would work OK. What won't work as well is Striker + Striker, or Striker + Controller, unless you have some schtick like stealth or teleporting to get out of trouble. Chris
#7 defender_of_odintyr Jul 11, 2008 9:40:19	well any 2 classes would work, the campaign would just have to be slightly fixed. pending on what you had. For example I wouldn't be pciking fights with altillery if the party was just 2 fighters. Any combination would work really.
#8 nemit Jul 11, 2008 14:08:59	If you want all of your bases covered at least a little bit, then there are a couple of ways you can do this with only two character classes. 1. Warlock+Paladin. The warlock has a little controller in him, and the paladin has a little healer in him. 2. Fighter+Cleric. Cleric has some controller in him too, while the fighter has a bit of striker in there. 3. Multiclass. You can use the above examples, but have the characters multiclass into the roles that they are only a little good at (paladin multi into cleric, warlock into wizard, so on and so forth). 4. Have each player play two PCs. Easy as cake.
#9 cthulholor Jul 12, 2008 11:30:39	Two paladins! You'll be near impossible to kill! You can heal eachother, take a ton of beating, and still keep unleashing a beating of your own.
#10 doomsought Jul 12, 2008 12:02:30	go back to 3ed and play some gestalt. 3ed has a lot to offer, so you should play around with it while you can still find the books at Half Price.
#11 darkgoldfish Jul 13, 2008 23:23:19	As a word of warning...I had a couple of my players try an encounter (as a warlord and a wizard) and it was horrible. They took on at level 1, a bugbear and a goblin sharpshooter (EL 3) I was trying to show off how the combat system works. The bugbear ate the warlord in two rounds, and the wizard couldn't do anything but cry. If one of the charicters wants to play a leader, make sure the other one is playing a hand to hand charicter. That and don't put them up against EL3 encounters...and don't use bugbears (that stun attack is insane!) Try not going more than 1 past the parties encounter level, and not feeding them any monsters more than 2 levels past their own.