Hi Ken. There are seven base classes in the Dragon Compendium. I’ll give you a run-down now. In general, it seems that they all have fairly specific campaign niches.
Battle Dancer: A chaotic, unarmed, and unarmoured warrior, something like a dervish. They have a Cha-based AC bonus and unarmed damage like a monk. Unlike monks, they are more combat-focused, and have special “dance” related abilities, which depend on their Tumble skill ranks.
Death Master: Servants of Orcus, something like a cross between a cleric and a necromancer wizard, and they gain a few special powers over undead (as well as rebuke undead). Definitely for villains only.
Jester: Self-explanatory, really. A bit like a bard, but their “jester performances” are jokes aimed at infuriating enemies, or inspiring confidence in allies.
Mountebank: This is a flavourful “adventurer” class. They are tricksters who have sold their souls to archdevils, demon princes, and the like for interesting infernal powers. Their mass beguile ability is particularly good when linked to their deceptive attack ability, although I’d recommend giving a “boss” mountebank some rogue allies. Unless you want a “tragic hero”-type PC, definitely for villains. I’ve not used one of these, but from reading the class description, they look like they’d make good “book villains”, if you know what I mean.
Savant: Another “adventurer” class that does a bit of everything, like a bard. They gain (at various levels) a few wizard spells, a few cleric spells, sneak attack, and “academic lore” (like bardic knowledge). They can also aid their allies on certain skill checks. I’m not that inspired by it, but then I’m not a fan of bards either.
Sha’ir: The Dragon Compendium’s summary (page 26) says: “A flexible arcane spellcaster who relies on a spirit ally to fetch his spells from across the planes”. This is an update of the old Al-Qadim variant wizard; if you don’t know, Al-Qadim was a campaign setting inspired by 1,001 Arabian Nights, Sinbad, and the like. They have links to geniekind, and can travel to elemental planes later on. It’s a fun class.
Urban Druid: Self-explanatory. They’re variant druid that spend most of their time in cities/urban environments, so their class abilities are city-based rather than wilderness-based, and they have heavy social skill emphasis.
I hope the above helps. These are just my opinions, and others may have a different view. I imagine that the death master class works better if they have access to Libris Mortis-related material, such as feats. The “Tomb-Tainted Soul” feat (LM) allows them to heal themselves, which is particularly useful for a recurring death master. If you have LM, you might also want to add some of that book’s spells to the death master’s spell list.
