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We've got a new player. He is not only new to PF, I think he is completely new to PnP RPG's.
He has played some of the online RPG's (don't remember which ones) but that is the closest experience he has.
He wants to be a healer. I would guess because in a lot of the online RPG's they are easier and always desired for any group.
Now our group is 6th level (we were 5th when he started). I no that is not perfect for a noob, but we were tryin to integrate him into the group quickly and didn't really expect thim to have a lot of problems.
One of the other players made him a kind of generic cleric. It didn't go so well.
He had a hard time understanding the concept of the prepared caster and was largely paralyzed by the plenitude of spells available.
It didn't help that many of the other players kept suggesting fairly advanced spells and tactics when he didn't have down the basics yet.
So I am trying to help him with a rebuild of the character. (I'm the GM by the way.)
I was thinking about trying to talk him into a martial character since there are comparetively fewert hings to learn.
But if he still wants a healing caster, I was thinking an oracle. Spontaneous casting would make it so he only has to learn a very limited number of spells. (As GM I will allow a noob to retcon quite a bit so if he finds out selections of spells or feats just aren't working they can fairly easily be switched.)
The wasted curse seems like it would affect his play the least (mostly a constant -4 to socal skill checks). So less to keep track of.
Life oracle seems like the obvious choice. But I don't want him too hammered into the healbot role. I want him to be able to try some other things.
Which mysteries and revelations seem like the would be easiest for a learning noob? I was thinking maybe battle mystery with the skill at arms and weapon mastery revelations. Gives proficiencies and static bonus. The spells are not complex. What do you think?
Please note: I am not asking for optimal suggestions, kool combinations, high level culmination builds, etc... This is for a noob that has been having trouble learning the game.
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You really like the word noob.
Make him a Life Mystery Oracle. Best healer, and spontaneous casters are easier for new players.
Look into printing out some Spell Cards. Find out here.
For simplicity, give him the Lame Curse.
For Race, give him Human for simplicity.
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You really like the word noob...
Well yeah, not trying to insult him. But, I tried to get help for him a while ago. I couldn't seem to get it through to people that this guy was not already an expert on RPG's and PF in particular. Almost all I got were suggestions for super optimized, multiclass, one-trick-pony builds, using 14 source books, that would be the ultimate whatever by level 20.
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A single point in Linguistics for everyone in the party and suddenly the Tongues curse doesn't even matter anymore.
You can even explain it during roleplaying as the Oracle teaching their cursed language to everyone else during their travels, as a matter of convenience on everyone's part. Surely you'd want people to be able to understand you in combat, no?
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Yes, I will definitely print out spell cards for every spell known.
Tongues isn't too bad. But I'm not sure how he would do with not being able to talk to or understand anyone in every single combat or crisis situation.
We always read that as the Haunted would override the convenience of the haversack, BoH, or belt.
He has already said he wanted to play a dwarf I don't think I want to slow him down even further with lame. But if I can talk him into human that might not be too bad.
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A single point in Linguistics for everyone in the party and suddenly the Tongues curse doesn't even matter anymore.
You can even explain it during roleplaying as the Oracle teaching their cursed language to everyone else during their travels, as a matter of convenience on everyone's part. Surely you'd want people to be able to understand you in combat, no?
Same group of players but different GM. I am playing a oracle with the tongues curse. We've advanced 2 level up to 8th. So far, not one other PC has bothered to spend a single point to learn celestial. So I don't know that they will for him either. Although maybe they would take pity on the new guy and learn it. I can ask.
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If he's intending to hang back and maybe use a longspear or other reach weapon when he's not healing people, then 15 ft. move speed might not hurt too much.
Same group of players but different GM. I am playing a oracle with the tongues curse. We've advanced 2 level up to 8th. So far, not one other PC has bothered to spend a single point to learn celestial. So I don't know that they will for him either. Although maybe they would take pity on the new guy and learn it. I can ask.A single point in Linguistics for everyone in the party and suddenly the Tongues curse doesn't even matter anymore.
You can even explain it during roleplaying as the Oracle teaching their cursed language to everyone else during their travels, as a matter of convenience on everyone's part. Surely you'd want people to be able to understand you in combat, no?
When you mention the Tongues curse to him, suggest he could try and roleplay teaching the other characters the language. You wouldn't have to FORCE the others to learn it, but give them a friendly nudge. Maybe a single free skill point to drop in Linguistics if they are willing to go along with you and your new player?
It'll get them all involved, and make some good RP for the table as a whole. And it'll help out your new player.
Try to let him do as he pleases, if he has to be a healer let him do it. If it is a cleric he want to play, do this:
Buy a Phylactery of Positive Channeling
Take the feat Extra Channeling
And if you allow it, tell him to try playing an Aasimar with no negative levels
If you're looking for simple, lame is much easier, conceptually, than tongues.
I'd start him out with healing damage, and then as the game progresses, teach him about removing poison, curing disease,...
Then, move toward things like resist energy, shield of faith, etc...
You seem to think that you're going to teach the entire game very quickly. Won't work. Instead, introduce one thing a time, and you'll get there over time.
Let him take on as much as he feels comfortable handling.
I say this because he will learn faster if he is motivated to learn. Letting him set his own pace will help motivate him. Also trust him on any choice not directly tied to game mechanics. Remember he has an online rpg background so playing a dwarf shouldn't be an issue for him. Encourage him as well. I agree with switching him to a spontaneous caster however. When I first started GMing 3e trying to learn the entirety of every spell for every class all at once was overwhelming. So knowing all cleric spells might be hard to digest all at once too. The best thing would be to start fresh at level 1 and let him learn one spell level at a time... but I can understand if the others don't want a reboot.
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Seriously, Aasimar can be borne of any Humanoid race, so the idea of an Aasimar borne of two Dwarves will allow him the flavor he wants, and the stats to match. He can be short, bearded, and love to sing Dwarven drinking songs.
Heck, that makes a great story for being a Life Oracle.
The whole thing wraps it up quite nice.
What about a hedge witch? can drop for healing, can still cackle and evil eye to bring some utility.
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Rule number one: help him play the character he wants to play. You can discourage truly difficult concepts, but don't push him to play a human instead of a dwarf because a human is a little bit easier. Don't push him to play a Battle Oracle instead of a Life Oracle because you think that he doesn't really want to heal. He says he wants to heal, help him be effective at it and he will probably enjoy himself. If he actually doesn't enjoy the Life Oracle you can always rebuild the mystery after the fact.
That said, the Cha penalty makes Dwarves very poor oracles. If he just wants a dwarf for the flavour, I'd second an Aasimar with dwarven heritage - he'd generally be dwarven in appearance and culture (and could speak dwarven) but would have the physical/magical stats of an aasimar. Let him take "Scion of Dwarvenkind" instead of "Scion of Humanity" and he'll count as a dwarf for race effects.
If he likes the stats of a dwarf you could always let him play an Oracle that casts off of Wis instead of Cha. There's a sorcerer bloodline with that ability, so it isn't too weird, it won't be too overpowering compared to a cha-maxed oracle (will saves will be higher and his skill bonuses will shift, and the low cha will reduce channel anyway), and you'll be helping a newbie have fun without bogging him down in strict character building. Just get your other players to OK this and let him know that you're making an exception to the usual rules.
Lame or Wasting would be the easiest curses to deal with - let him pick either.
I'd recommend Channel, Combat Healer, Safe Cures, and Life Link as Revelations since they are effective and not too hard to handle.
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Optimization is not a concern. A dwarf with average charisma being a spontaneous caster is 100% fine since he is just learning. Being concerned about his movement speed by taking Lame shouldn't be a problem. Give him a mount or boots of speed or whichever increases your movement. Focusing him on getting the character created and a general understanding of the options is best. I play with a few people who are new to pen and paper and I took the path of letting them learn through game play and keeping everything simple.
1.) Get the character created.
2.) Make sure they have a rough understanding of the options.
3.) Where they are overwhelmed or confused, don't be afraid to take charge or move on. It's ok to make the decision that they are getting a mount and taking ride, or that they have free magic item of X to resolve issue Y. These things, as long as they don't bother the player, will help them learn the game.
4.) Focus on 1-2 general concepts (like you have X castings of this group of spells each day). I preferred to focus on skill checks and spellcasting or combat and skill checks. I let the rules slide or everything else and kept those things I focused on simple but progressive throughout the sessions. With people of average intelligence (which today means genius) they should have a general understanding of how to do most things within 1-3 sessions.
As GM, you don't have to play by every rule when working with a complete newb. If you have to, tell the party (in advance when he is not there) that you have a new player who you'll be helping along and keeping things simple for. Some rules may be fudged for a few sessions so that he can learn the basics. Easy solution and the party should be willing to help.
PS. You can ALWAYS find in game and acceptable metagame reasons to get him more optimized and/or refined to what he wants to do later, once he understands how to actually play and enough about the game to know something of what he wants. There is even an artifact (meta artifact) just for that purpose exactly...
^ +1 to Dark Immortal.
Let him keep playing his cleric. I think you could just point him to some spells that work pretty well. Just stick to the CRB until he gets a handle on it. The essential spells are there, and deciding what to do in a round is easier without overthinking it with a zillion options.
Let's not forget how much time we took to really understand the game. I remember learning 3.0 after having only played earlier editions. There was a learning curve there, for me. 4.0 was similar, though it didn't take me long to decide that I didn't care for it, personally.
I'd let him continue with his cleric, and give him a little coaching (out of game) to ease spell selection. Some people have more time than others to pore over rulebooks and plan their character out. It IS a little daunting at first, especially starting at 5th.
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Dark Immortal has some very good points, especially this:
As GM, you don't have to play by every rule when working with a complete newb. If you have to, tell the party (in advance when he is not there) that you have a new player who you'll be helping along and keeping things simple for. Some rules may be fudged for a few sessions so that he can learn the basics.
But I want to point one thing out:
Optimization is not a concern. A dwarf with average charisma being a spontaneous caster is 100% fine since he is just learning.
While a newbie doesn't need to be super optimized, you usually want them to be effective at whatever their character is supposed to do. If they aren't effective, they are going to feel frustrated.
You don't want the beefy melee combatant to always go down in round 2 because he has low AC and HP. You don't want the "stealthy scout and guide" to not have enough skill points to cover stealth, perception, and survival at minimum. You don't want the healer to be missing important healing spells or to not have enough spell slots to cast them when needed. I played an Inquisitor healer and it sucks not be able to produce Neutralize Poison or Restoration in an emergency.
Can you play and enjoy a dwarf Oracle with a starting Cha of 13-14? Of course. But if you're casting offensive spells your save DCs are going to be low, you're going to lack bonus spells (particularly annoying for someone using Combat Healer to trade an extra spell slot for Quicken), and any cha-based revelations are going to suffer (in this case, Channel). And if your Cha is low because of a racial penalty then you're putting a good score into Cha to get a moderate score rather than intentionally saving your best stat for something physical as a typical combat oracle would do.
Does a newbie (or any player) need to be optimized? No, but dwarves are not only non-optimal oracles but they are the least effective core race for that class on account of having a Cha penalty and nothing to make up for that handicap. It's the kind of race-class combo you play purely for RP reasons or because you want a challenge, and the newbie at least deserves that warning. Personally, I'd let the newbie play a Wis-based oracle before I'd risk them feeling like they're the least effective party member.
Let him keep playing his cleric. I think you could just point him to some spells that work pretty well. Just stick to the CRB until he gets a handle on it. The essential spells are there, and deciding what to do in a round is easier without overthinking it with a zillion options.
This might work if the other players ease off on their "help," and you should try and get them to ease off on the complex tactics anyway. But you said he's having problems even with the concept of the prepared spellcaster (too different from MMOs?) so switching him to something spontaneous sounds like a better idea.