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personally i would like your suggestions on tips to help newbies play dnd 3.5. please post your advice.
Tips
1. Armor class will only save you until level 3 or so, after about level 4, monster accuracy really starts to take several huge leaps making your plate clad dwarf tremble in his socks.
2. an amulet of health will always be better than one of natural armor. a tunic of resistance is better than a cloak of resitance.
3. if your dm allows an item's enchancement to occupy a different slot, exploit it. but be reasonable where you put the slot.
4. don't bother with a ring of protection after level 5. a ring of sustenance combined with a ring of feather falling, evasion or blinking is always better.
5. don't put all your eggs in one basket. a 2nd or 3rd basket may help one day. for example, everybody wants a ranged weapon and possibly a dagger. a spellcaster should take a few spells from a different specialty as well. the blast sorcerer can't be all AoE damage, a few buffs and rays come in handy.
6. if you are not a monk spend that 5 gp on spiked gauntlets. threatening squares is a good thing.
7. if you are a wizard, go for a non conspicuous avian familiar with a high spot modifier. nobody cares about the fact hawk is flying around. rangers and druids being the enviormentalists they are will protect the hawk while it's out scouting. should they be in the area. it may encourage dm kindness too.
8. if you are a druid or ranger, look up at number 7.
9. don't play a hybrid unless your group has 6 or more players. you need the extra people to pad off the damage that could kill your hybrid.
10. if you want to please your new dm as you just joined the group. study the party as efficiently as possible. if all else fails, bring a blank sheet and roll up a cleric.
11. if your dm says no to a particular class, don't question why, he will reveal. most of the bannings come from lack of understanding these classes. or just plain genre discrimination due to not liking the fluff. the books you should avoid are tome of battle, unearthed arcana, magic of incarnum, and anything psionic as dms will reject these for an unkown reason that will be revealed evenutally.
12. if your character dies, roll up a new one, and save the party the cost of that ressurection. a carbon copy is essentially a free true ressurection at the cost of brainstorming a name. be careful with the carbon copies. dms get wary fast. a family tree only extends so far.
13. try not to antagonize a party member. whether by theft or pvp. the dm can hit you both with the hammer of exile.
14. unless you have a good reason why, you are better off playing a human, thier benefits are always fewer but better, and they are the majority race. humans are more expendable than that rare unique race you wanted to play. even kobolds don't match the number of humans. take the number of non human indivudals (not the number of races but the amount of combined indiviudal members, including halfbreeds) in the material plane, humans are 100 or even 1,000 times that total population. in just the material plane, other planes have thier humans too. in the same quantity, albeit with slight differences.
15. should you specialize in a weapon, it should be something extremely common. or easy to aquire. such as a longsword, shortsword, dagger or greatsword, which are always your best bets.
anybody want to post other tips. posts are welcome.
personally i would like your suggestions on tips to help newbies play dnd 3.5. please post your advice.
1. Armor class will only save you until level 3 or so, after about level 4, monster accuracy really starts to take several huge leaps making your plate clad dwarf tremble in his socks.
Disagree.
There are five basic ways of boosting armour and a handful of other options (feats specific items). Armour Bonus, Shield Bonus, Natural Armour, Dodge and Deflection. Many of these are extremely reasonably priced. For example I believe you can get +2 armour and a +2 shield for the same price as a +2 weapon and this continues for some time (+3 for both of these is the same as a +3 weapon). If you always upgrade the cheapest option gaining +1 one in most categories and then +2 in most categories etc. then you should be able to easily keep up with the monster advancements in most cases. Even where you are facing some monster with great accuracy good armour will mean that the creature can't easily trade in its hit bonus' for big benefits to damage using things like power attack. Even things that improve ones dex, grant deflection bonus' or natural armour, while more expensive then armour and shields are going to often be well worth it - For the same price as making your swords a +3 item you can make your Amulet of Natural Armour +2 and your Ring of Protection +2 and be a good way towards paying for that Dusty Rose Ioun Stone (+1 insight bonus to AC). As a rule your going to be getting the biggest bang for your buck by boosting AC simply because you can spread the money on a lot of smaller cheaper magic items that all enhance your AC.A player that does this will be able to handle the creatures in most adventure modules extremely well - in fact the DM will likely counter by reworking all the monsters in the adventure module to increase their accuracy just because that is the only way to keep up with the players ballooning AC.
As a thought exercise consider that for the same price a +4 weapon (32,000 gp)
you could get Ring of Protection +2, Amulet of Natural Armour +2, Armour +3, Shield +2.
So we are comparing +4 to hit with +9 to AC.
Furthermore you did not even spend 3000 gp out of you 32,000 allotment so your not to far off getting your Ioun Stone. The next 5 grand after that can make the Shield +3 and then its probably time to buy those Gauntlets of Dexterity for 8 grand as the next cheap upgrade - certainly there are a lot of cheap options to boost AC at this point compared to the 18,000 you need to boost your weapon to +5.
6. if you are not a monk spend that 5 gp on spiked gauntlets. threatening squares is a good thing.
My understanding is you're considered holding a weapon when using the spiked gauntlets, thus you'd lose the ability to weild other weapons. I could be wrong, but that's how all my groups played it.
14. unless you have a good reason why, you are better off playing a human, thier benefits are always fewer but better
I disagree. For example, a halfling caster has many benefits over humans, such as having higher AC (+1 size, +1 from 2 extra Dex) and better touch/orb/ray attacks (+1 size bonus to melee, +1 size and +1 from 2 extra dex ranged). Added benefits include being able to stealth inherently better in case the party might actually want to *gasps* go in tactically.
Humans just can't get +1 to AC and Attacks, plus derrived bonuses from increased dex, from their bonus feat and skill point. Sure, they can cast permanent Reduce Person on themself, but they sure aren't doing that at level 1. And besides, a halfling could do the same thing and get another +1 to AC and attacks by making themselves tiny size at the same level.
And this is just an example. Most races are actually better to use in certain situations than a human. Maybe you meant that as a starting player they shouldn't worry about these niches, since a human can fill any role sufficiently well. I'm just saying that other races fill the same role better. Besides functioning better, some people enjoy playing Kobolds, who are not functionally better at anything. But that's another discussion.
My only advice is to play your charecter the way YOU want to play it.
Dont let anyone tell you "well you chose this class so you should be up front or you must never ever melee" play the charecter the way you think they would react to situations.
Best example I can think of. This was a historical greek campaign my wizard was from sparta, very militant society, I never cast spells till 3rd level because I was doing great with my crossbow and club. I was as strong as the fighter and had a better con than anyone else in the party. I listened to the other players tell me that I was playing my wizard wrong but I was having a blast so I didnt care. I still worked within the group and I wasnt a mean spirited person about it, they were just trying to help a new player,eventually they realised that as a new player I had no perconcived "gandolf/merlin" notions.
This can work for any charecter try something outside of the stereotypes and you'll have alott more fun.
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* Start with a 1st or 2nd level PC.
* Pick a class with few options in a fight (Sorcerer, Monk, Fighter) and have an experienced Player describe a few Feats or Spells for you to choose. ("Wanna play a Sorcerer? Here's 6 spells and what they do; choose 3... Wanna play a Fighter? Here's 6 Feats and what they do; choose 3)
* Don't take any treasure that gives choices in combat or any feature that affects you differently at different times (like how Rage changes your attack and HP). A Ring of Protection is good because it's always there; there's no math in the middle of the game.
4. don't bother with a ring of protection after level 5. a ring of sustenance combined with a ring of feather falling, evasion or blinking is always better.
12. if your character dies, roll up a new one, and save the party the cost of that ressurection. a carbon copy is essentially a free true ressurection at the cost of brainstorming a name. be careful with the carbon copies. dms get wary fast. a family tree only extends so far.
14. unless you have a good reason why, you are better off playing a human, thier benefits are always fewer but better, and they are the majority race. humans are more expendable than that rare unique race you wanted to play. even kobolds don't match the number of humans. take the number of non human indivudals (not the number of races but the amount of combined indiviudal members, including halfbreeds) in the material plane, humans are 100 or even 1,000 times that total population. in just the material plane, other planes have thier humans too. in the same quantity, albeit with slight differences.
15. should you specialize in a weapon, it should be something extremely common. or easy to aquire. such as a longsword, shortsword, dagger or greatsword, which are always your best bets.
I agree with some of your tips, but not these.
4. Rings of Protection are great items. Deflection adds to all 3 AC types, and boosting AC is a good thing.
12. This is why replacement characters should come in with less wealth and/or xp than existing ones. Carbon copies are super cheesy.
14. I disagree. Without a high point buy system it's hard for a human to get an 18 in an ability. Halfling rogues and dwarven fighters are better in almost every way than their human counterparts. I don't see where being of the majority race is preferable, unless there's a lot of racism in the campaign. In fact, rangers are alot more likely to have humans as a favored enemy than non-humans.
15. That depends on whether buying magic items is easy in your campaign. If it is, any weapon you choose works.
My only advice is to play your charecter the way YOU want to play it.
Dont let anyone tell you "well you chose this class so you should be up front or you must never ever melee" play the charecter the way you think they would react to situations.
I have to second this. This guide sounds just like a guide to making cookie-cutter characters every time around.
I can't remember the last time I had a vanilla human fighter in the party and I consider this a very, very good thing. There are lots of books with lots of races, I want more variety in my party than that dangit.
12. if your character dies, roll up a new one, and save the party the cost of that ressurection. a carbon copy is essentially a free true ressurection at the cost of brainstorming a name. be careful with the carbon copies. dms get wary fast. a family tree only extends so far.
At my table, that number is Zero. A standing rule in my gaming group is that if you make a new character, the class (or particular multiclass combination) you just played is off-limits. Exceptions pretty much are limited to spellcasters - switching from a Necromancer to a Conjurer, or from a Kinetecist to a Seer, for example, make the character different enough to qualify.
If your party has access to Rez magic and the funds/resources to do so I expect them to use it. No clones running about unless someone's casting Simulacrum and I lost track.