Starting Jade Regent with a small group, need character advice.

[Christopher Lee]

We are starting next week. We played through We Be Goblins last week.

My issue is that the group only has 3 PCs. We MAY be getting a 4th, but he's not sure.

So far we have:

Paladin
Rogue
Gunslinger (Guy who may or may not show).

Obviously, we are missing both arcane and divine spell casting. I still haven't settled on a class, and am torn because I have a compulsion to fill holes in the party. I WANT to play a Metal Oracle or similar, but we could probably use a wizard more. Any advice on what would be the best fit?

[Old Drake]

Since we only have the first part of the AP so far, nobody can give you long term advice - we simply don't know yet.

There are two common advices so far:
First (the one I dislike somewhat) is to start with more attribute points and hope for the best.
Second is to use gestalten characters; gestalten means that you advance in two character classes instead of one and pick the better where there's overlap (saves, HP, BAB, ...). The important issue when using gestalten is to not allow power-playing - it's not designed to make the characters much more powerful, but to ensure that they have no missing skills. That's the option I'd recommend you suggest to your group.

Other ideas include having a NPC join the party on adventures (which is a lot of extra work for DMs durign sessions) or re-balancing the encounters (a lot of extra work between sessions).

[LeadPal]

You could play a metal oracle, but take an archetype that switches out some of the combat abilities for something more useful. Dual-cursed, Seer, and Stargazer probably work best for that. It also helps that they offer additional revelations, since Metal Oracle doesn't have many good ones. Take Steel Scarf first unless your archetype requires something else, then Dance of the Blades, Armor Mastery, whatever else your archetype has, and eventually Iron Skin and Vision in Iron.

Focus spell selection on party buffs and versatility. Focus feats on improving spellcasting, plus maybe a combat maneuver to use with Steel Scarf. Take Haunted as your curse for the extra spells and Human as your race for the favoured class bonus that gives you even more spells.

[Ross Byers]

Duplicate thread. Please go here.