The rest of the group had a character creation session two weeks ago, before I was invited to join the group, so they're already set. They've got a warlord, ranger, rogue, fighter, sorcerer, and druid. So we've got three strikers and one of each other role. The DM told me not to worry about the rest of the group and just play whatever I want, since they've already got all the roles covered at least once.
Recently, I've mostly been playing a barbarian in Pathfinder, so I'd like to avoid another melee combat specialist, just for variety. Obviously, another striker would just be silly at this point, besides being similar to my PF barbarian as a heavy damage dealer. And I'm pretty sure defenders are all mostly front line melee fighters, which as I said, I'd rather not do again. So that leaves me playing either a leader or controller, both of which sound like they could be interesting, though I don't know much about either type of character, or the specific classes in the PHB and PHB2.
So what would you all recommend? I could go for a classic wizard character, though I don't know much about them in 4e (my Heroes of Fallen Lands character was a thief). Or I think bards are leaders, aren't they? But do they normally fight on the front line with swords, or just stay in the back using powers like a spellcaster? I don't know how bards work in this version. What other classes from PHB and PHB2 would meet my requirements?
Ranged cleric would be another option that is a ranged leader with some control. Its has lots of party friendly area attacks.
Shaman is another possible choice. It has a spirit that fights on the front lines for it. It also has ranged powers and is a leader. Its one of the more complex classes of the two books. Bear shaman would work for your group.
Invoker or Wizard are the other two ranged controllers, but I would go with bard or cleric for your situation.
Laser cleric is certainly a nice viable option. You're not blessed with a lot of long range stuff, but you can sit back a couple squares beat on stuff, and heal, drop in some buffs, etc. Either of the Invoker covenants would probably work well, basically you have a leaderish controller or a strikerish controller there. Wizards aren't that tough to play in 4e, but again you're somewhat limited with PHB1 only. PHB2 does have some good feats you can use though, which helps, so it is certainly a good solid choice and can be quite fun. Bard would definitely make a good leader, but the archer bard is really only in Arcane Power. Still, bards don't really rely on getting into melee, though they do have some up close powers you don't have to take them.
Really, the thing is with recommending 4e classes, they are all about equal, lol. I mean they are all quite different, but there really aren't any "this is terrible, avoid" or "this is going to kick everything's butt" classes. They all pretty much do what is advertised. Dream up a character concept and pick a class that will do that and just have fun with it.
I'd go with a Leader - 7 PCs and only one leader (and a Warlord at that) seems a little fragile to me.
I mostly agree with that; a party that size does need two healers.
But not the parenthetical comment. An Insplord can bring more healing than most Clerics (not a Pacifist, obviously) while also providing striker-level (or better) damage between his own hits, granted actions, and attack/damage boosts.
That said, if the first leader is an uberhealer like a max-healing Insplord or a Pacifist Cleric, the second leader can have pretty minimal healing - primarily reserving it for keeping the uberhealer standing.
Really, the thing is with recommending 4e classes, they are all about equal, lol. I mean they are all quite different, but there really aren't any "this is terrible, avoid" or "this is going to kick everything's butt" classes. They all pretty much do what is advertised. Dream up a character concept and pick a class that will do that and just have fun with it.
Well, it's good that they do what's advertised. The problem is that as a newbie who hasn't had time to look at the books, I don't know what's advertised. And I'm limited on time, so instead of spending the time to read up on each class, I asked here.
Thanks for all the suggestions, everyone. Since bards and clerics were both described as leaders who can do some controller type stuff, and those are the two roles I was considering, I think I'll start by looking at them. Of course, besides coming up with all the stats and powers in two days, I'm also going to need a back story and personality for my character, but I'll worry about that after I pick a race and class.
I'd go with a Leader - 7 PCs and only one leader (and a Warlord at that) seems a little fragile to me.
I mostly agree with that; a party that size does need two healers.
But not the parenthetical comment. An Insplord can bring more healing than most Clerics (not a Pacifist, obviously) while also providing striker-level (or better) damage between his own hits, granted actions, and attack/damage boosts.
That said, if the first leader is an uberhealer like a max-healing Insplord or a Pacifist Cleric, the second leader can have pretty minimal healing - primarily reserving it for keeping the uberhealer standing.
Bear in mind that he's restricted to PHB1 & PHB2 ;)
Thanks for all the suggestions, everyone. Since bards and clerics were both described as leaders who can do some controller type stuff, and those are the two roles I was considering, I think I'll start by looking at them. Of course, besides coming up with all the stats and powers in two days, I'm also going to need a back story and personality for my character, but I'll worry about that after I pick a race and class.
So I started looking at bards last night, and I didn't even get as far as looking at clerics. There's just a ton of material to read about with bards. Once I started reading, the first page mentioned multi-class feats, implements, and rituals, which are all things that aren't in the red box or Heroes of Fallen Lands, which were my first sources in learning 4e. So I first had to go look those up to see what they were and how they work. This is a good way to learn more about the game, anyway.
Bards in general always sound like they can be a fun class to play for RP purposes, and it looks like they have some good spells and stuff that could be interesting to use, so I think I'll go with that. Look for a new thread shortly in the "4e Leaders" subforum asking for advice on actually building my bard.
Bear in mind that he's restricted to PHB1 & PHB2 ;)
I'm actually thinking of asking the DM for permission to add Heroes of Fallen Lands to that, just for the sake of making an eladrin with bonuses on int and cha. Being able to take cha as a bonus stat instead of dex appears to be the only difference between eladrin in the PHB and HoFL, so I may be able to talk him into it, since it's such a minor addition to the rules.
I also reccommend a glance at the PHB errata, if you have time to spare, since some changes might be important.