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Bards. Always bards. Paladin might be an option, but Bards are rock solid and as Rynjin put it: “Bards make everything better” or as Pan put it: Everything goes better with Bard.
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With Virtuoso Performance the bard may have 2 bardic performances active the same time. So inspire courage + Dirge of doom the same time.
Allies that use weapon will love inspire courage and casters will love Dirge of doom.
When wizard cast blast spells or battle field control spells the bard can cast haste. So the bard can help unlock the Power of the wizard.
Other nice utility spells from the core book: Ghost Sound, Identify, Grease, Feather Fall, Silent Image, Glitterdust, Invisibility, Heroism, Pyrotechnics, Locate Object, Silence, Tiny Hut, Dispel Magic, Haste, Good hope, Phantom Steed, Dimension Door, Freedom of Movement, Dispel Magic, Greater, etc. Let’s not forget the cure spells.
Great spell selection that is especially helpful to the rogue and fighter. Heroism as a 2nd level spell :-)
And The bard can help the cleric with its workload. Any cleric that can remove the stunned condition with a 3rd level spell? The bard can. The bard can help the casters with their workload and at the same time boost the party members that use weapons.
Lot of nice spells in the APG, some of them:
UM and UC has a lot of cool de-buffs, utility spells and other nice stuff. Liberating Command: and Phantom Steed, Communal are just two of them.
- Make the bard human so you get more spells known.
- Make the bard the party face so the cleric can save its skills for other stuff than diplomacy and so the cleric doesn’t have to boost the charisma too high.
- Archery. My experience is that a lot of players forget archery. Let the Bard pick some archer feats and just rock on with arrows (or bolts) buffs and de-buffs and help out with skills and utility spells.
Bard, Always the bard.
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Semi-rant:
Ultimately the best 5th man is the class that contributes the most to the party OR the one you want to play the most depending on how whether one roll-plays or role-plays. All of the posters here are saying what they feel is going to be the MOST COMMONLY best in terms of game mechanics but that isn't THE answer.
There is no best in the end. change ur tactics to ur group.
I dunno, I think the bard takes it by spooniness alone.
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Always a bard. Every time. They make everyone else look good, A) by buffing, B) by debuffing the enemy, and C) by not being quite as competent at combat, offense magic, or defense magic as others. Not to say that they can't be good at these things, just that they usually aren't.
They might make the rogue cry, but the rogue has sneak attack and better combat ability with a little setup.
Seconding the theme music plan as well. And we all know that bards tend to come with endless copies of themselves, so they're virtually immortal.
Actually, they only come with 49 copies(50 total)...
Always a bard. Every time. They make everyone else look good, A) by buffing, B) by debuffing the enemy, and C) by not being quite as competent at combat, offense magic, or defense magic as others. Not to say that they can't be good at these things, just that they usually aren't.
They might make the rogue cry, but the rogue has sneak attack and better combat ability with a little setup.
Make the rogue cry? Are you kidding me? I play a bard with focus mainly on buffing before anything else, and our rogue LOVES me. Maybe because I also chose to learn Greater Invisibility for her sake.
It seems to me that everyone's problem with rogues is that they have a hard time hitting anything, so why would a bard (aka a significant bonus to hit) make them cry from anything other than happiness?
Depends on what we're talking about in terms of Wizard, Fighter, Cleric Rogue.
A bard is kind of a silly choice if the Rogue plays like a face and the cleric is an Evangelist.
A druid might be a touch redundant if the cleric and wizard are summoning focused guys and the cleric worships a nature diety.
So the answer is "what does the party need?"
I don’t think a bard is kind of a silly choice if the Rogue plays like a face and the cleric is an Evangelist and we don’t know what kind of rogue, cleric or fighter and wizard we dealing with, so we work with what we got.
The Question was: What’s best and we only know Fighter, rogue, Cleric and Wizard.
So I assume that it’s the usual line up as in that the classes play pretty much as the iconics.
Even if the Cleric is an Evangelist there is more to the Bard than countersong, fascinate, inspire courage, inspire greatness and inspire heroics. The Evangelist and the bard could actually work together and have two (or more) performances going on at the same time.
As for rogues vs. bards I think it is pretty obvious bard isn’t just a face and that a rogue could get tons of help from a bard. Bonus on saves, skills, attack and damage and stuff like Feather Step and Greater Invisibility. My bard always cast extended Feather Step and extended Heroism on the rogue and the same stuff on the fighter. The fighter also got freedom of movement. They both loved it. And when the Cleric and the wizard was busy showing of, the Bard kept track of what was going on and made every one better. A stunned or paralyzed cleric or fighter is no good. Purging Finale saved the day more than once. And when the Rogue or the fighter needed a quick teleport, Jester's Jaunt was priceless.
Rogue as a face? With Innocence or Glibness the rogue don’t stand a chance. Rogue needs help scouting? Bard cast invisibility on him/her.
Problems with full casters is that the often only got access/prepare the spells that are most often used in a typical adventuring day. As a fifth member you can have cool spells and utility stuff that saves the day.
But true. The best fifth member depend on what the party needs. Is it a campaign were they mostly face a lot of undeads a life Oracle or Paladin would probably be a good or even better choice. That said: Bards rock. There is even Bard archetypes that can affect undeads and the bards write the songs about your epic battles that everyone remembers.
Always a bard. Every time. They make everyone else look good, A) by buffing, B) by debuffing the enemy, and C) by not being quite as competent at combat, offense magic, or defense magic as others. Not to say that they can't be good at these things, just that they usually aren't.
They might make the rogue cry, but the rogue has sneak attack and better combat ability with a little setup.
Make the rogue cry? Are you kidding me? I play a bard with focus mainly on buffing before anything else, and our rogue LOVES me. Maybe because I also chose to learn Greater Invisibility for her sake.
It seems to me that everyone's problem with rogues is that they have a hard time hitting anything, so why would a bard (aka a significant bonus to hit) make them cry from anything other than happiness?
I think you misread his point, which is the often-stated position that the bard is a better rogue than the rogue (on top of all the bard goodies).
What I don't get is if the bard is as respected as it is then why is a rogue the 4th guy at all? Then the question changes.
Because the rogue is the "traditional" fourth guy. Despite the fact that the traditional 4-person party isn't really a thing anymore in terms of how the the game rules work, a lot of people still think that way.
I still can't get over this "the GM should cater to the players" crap.
Nobody plays a trapfinder..then you will probably get killed by traps.
LOL, there are too many classes that offer trapfinding that any group larger than 3 people should not be without it. considering that, I'd rather play a rogue than any of the alternatives. I'd never nerf my ranger or bard and play one of their trpafinding variants. YMMV
The Question was: What’s best and we only know Fighter, rogue, Cleric and Wizard.
So I assume that it’s the usual line up as in that the classes play pretty much as the iconics.
Correct, Zark. The party configuration follows the conventions of the Ancient Ways, as more parties will follow this - in one way or another - than any other, even if that number does not represent any kind of majority. Essentially the assumption is Tank DPS Healer Control(sorry about the modern gamin terms!) as represented in its original configuration.
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....Nature Oracle, with the Friend to the Animals mystery.
..don't ask me how an AC with evasion saves vs. fireball while the rider doesn't...
We referred to that as the "Ablative Rider" in my game, an oddly nimble riding wolf with a habit of turning the rider towards every fireball to shield himself from the blast.
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How come our one round burst damage battle field control party keeps dying? Maybe we should switch to he classes that suck to stay alive.If you must have trapfinding bard still out-rogues the rogue, it's just a bard that does less buffing. Or if you're really with it the fighter swaps for a fighter ranger.
But most GMs don't feel the need to force the players to play classes that suck.
This does not follow logically from what was said. Did you even read what he posted?
The whole reason rogues tend to be looked down on is that other classes can do just about everything they can, plus more. Bards make better skillmonkeys, and are the best buffers in the game on top of that.
The only really unique thing rogues have to push them into "must-have" territory is Trapfinding. Except when you actually look at it, it's not essential at all. A bonus on perception and disable device for finding traps is nice, but the DCs on standard traps are rarely high enough to absolutely require it. Heck, in my experience Trapfinding barely lets a rogue keep up on perceiving traps compared to a character like a cleric who pumps wisdom. That's not to mention that if your party is having trouble, boosting up skill rolls is pretty easy using cheap items like Eyes of the Eagle and Trapspringer's Gloves.
Aside from a bonues, the only really unique thing the rogue gets as far as disabling traps is being able to disarm magical traps using disable device. Which is nice, but there are plenty of other options for dealing with magical traps once you've found them. Plenty of traps can be bypassed or harmlessly triggered, and for those that can't there's dispel magic.
And if you really insist that Trapfinding is a must-have or the DM loves spamming dozens of auto-resetting unbypassable magical traps in every dungeon, then the Alchemist, Bard, Oracle, Ranger, and Sorcerer all have archetypes that include it. All of them also have a lot more to offer the party than the rogue.
Though bards are very useful, IMHO, a character that makes others better is most fun for the others characters.
As such I like mixed characters that can hold their own, Magus and Inquisitors in particular :)
Have no doubt. A can hold their own, and buff the others.
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Sounds like most people just use generic traps instead of creating stuff that's more interesting (and harder for anyone other than the "trap" character to deal with.)
If Dispel Magic replaces your rogue, then your GM's traps are boring.
And can we please look specifically at exactly what is able to replace a Rogue?
•Crypt Breaker Alchemist - Your bombs take a hit against anything not undead or construct, and you don't have the skills covered. If your GM says there will be lots of constructs and undead, sure, this'll be great. If not, Rogue is absolutely better.
•Archaeologist Bard - You give up Bardic Performance. Um, isn't that ability the main reason people like to have Bards around in the first place?? You also give up Versatile Performance. Congrats, that was the second-best reason parties like you. Sure, you can do combat better than a Rogue but that wasn't the role the party needed filled. A Rogue with a high UMD is now just as valuable to the party, if not MORE so because they go back to having more skills.
•Seeker Oracle - Ya got me here. It's a full caster, so obviously it's going to be better than a Rogue. It doesn't feel like an archetype most people will think about when they say, "I wanna play an Oracle" in my mind, but hey, that's arguable, so I'll concede the point.
•Trapper Ranger - Half of this archetype is using traps, and most people would agree that traps are a bad investment for PCs. The other downside is that you give up spells (including things like Instant Enemy). That's a HARD sell for a Ranger IMO. But, I'll admit again, it's better than a Rogue.
•Seeker Sorcerer - Ditto Oracle. Is this archetype just a "must-be-available" for spontaneous casters or something? :P
So the list breakdown? Caster is better than non-caster, duh. And Bards/Alchemists/Rangers give up a LOT to actually replace a Rogue (Rangers being the easiest choice, and it's still a tough one).
Correct, Zark. The party configuration follows the conventions of the Ancient Ways, as more parties will follow this - in one way or another - than any other, even if that number does not represent any kind of majority. Essentially the assumption is Tank DPS Healer Control(sorry about the modern gamin terms!) as represented in its original configuration.
The Question was: What’s best and we only know Fighter, rogue, Cleric and Wizard.
So I assume that it’s the usual line up as in that the classes play pretty much as the iconics.
Thanks for your reply.
Best Fifth Party Member obviously depends on many factors such as the kind of campaign the GM runs, how the rest of the characters in party are built, etc. In that regard TarkXT, Renegadeshepherd and strayshift all got valuable points. That said if I had to make a list from the information I’ve got so far, my vote would be:@ Neo2151 and Nicos
a) If traps are needed to make the rogue a unique and indispensable part of any team then it only proves how problematic the rogue is. Thankfully PF has not been trapped in the 3.x way of thinking (pun intended): The only thing that truly makes the rogue unique and indispensable is its ability to deal with traps. Therefor we must add traps.
b) Let’s not derail this thread. The premise we got to work with is that the rogue is part of the party. Same goes for the fighter.
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If the first four MUST be fighter, wizard, rogue, cleric, then...
- The much loved bard (pretty much created to help fill in gaps and support party, has some healing spells, has Use Magic Device)
- Ranger, especially if it's a game with a lot of wilderness stuff, and preferably ranged since the classic lineup will usually be melee heavy save for the wizard.
- Inquisitor - can cover some party face stuff (like the bard), ranged combat, some survivaly stuff like the ranger, some additional healing/divine spells
- Alchemist - another good support class
All of the above can be designed to scout along with the rogue, support other spellcasters, provide some buffs/heals. Anything else that also does same can be valuable.
'Course, it's seldom I've been in a party where we've had exactly fighter, wizard, rogue, cleric... -- the only party I can think of that's been like that, our "fifth guy" is a monk -- a very effective one. Fighter (me) dipped into ranger for some survival skills, etc. Then we got a druid so some of that was moot, but then we lost the cleric so druid became primary healing caster and fighter/ranger can use wand of CLW so that worked out. (Current party is fighter/ranger, wizard, rogue, druid, monk)
Whatever you will have fun playing. Ideally, this is what every party member should be. A good GM can adapt the adventures to be fun for any party.
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Bard. The class is a force multiplier.
Rogue debate aside, the bard is clearly the best choice.
I'd actually be a bard in a 4 man group rather than a wizard/sorcerer.
3 man is - Ranger(Trapper); Bard; Cleric all day...
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Sounds like most people just use generic traps instead of creating stuff that's more interesting (and harder for anyone other than the "trap" character to deal with.)
In my experience, most custom traps are actually designed to make a traps-character even less effective than the ones in core. Most the elaborate custom traps a GM will comes up with take more than a single Disable Device roll to beat.
Heck, I GMed a party through a very trap-heavy dungeon once, when the party had no designated trap person. It actually made the game far more enjoyable. Instead of resolving every single trap with the rogue just rolling Disable Device, the players had to think and come up with strategies to bypass/get around traps.
Druid. It has access to different spells than the cleric and wizard, access to naturey skills, a pet, and can be very versatile with its summons and wildshapes.
Edit: Go elf, and go archer!!! Increases versatility and probably fills a non-magical combat niche, too.