This is so hard to answer! I enjoyed my lore bard, wild heart barbarian, moon druid and Lolth-sworn ranger from both combat and RP perspectives, but I think my wild mage sorceror just squeaks it.
"You may call it 'nonsense' if you like, but I've heard nonsense, compared with which that would be as sensible as a dictionary!"
Mine too, though bard is a very close second. I start my Patch 9 playthrough with a wild magic sorcerer (can we turn into a potted plant during a wild magic surge, please? 😂)
Generally bard is my favorite class and I love to play it here, especially lore bard. I do like rogue too and draconic sorcerer. I love most of the spellcaster classes tbh. I had a fun playthrough with a githyanki wizard too. For me, it is often the whole character concept.
"We are all stories in the end. Just make it a good one."
I should have added that I made my choice, wild magic sorcerer and lore bard, from a role playing perspective.
If I'd come up with an interesting character concept for a rogue, this could also be a lot of fun. Combat wise, I think they are quite interesting, especially the arcane trickster.
Thief (mostly for RP), Berserker and the Bard. I've only played the latter briefly, but has already successfully supplanted the cleric as a support class for my party.
Life cleric. It feels really good to play a character who regularly resists mental attacks like fear and mind control through their will and the support of their deity. Also, you feel like a real party leader - buffing your allies, healing them, and surviving about anything the enemy can throw at you (heavy armor + high wisdom saves). And there are some incredibly useful spells for disabling dangerous enemies, like Silence.
Ranger Hunter > Barbarian Berserker > Rogue Thief, both for combat and roleplay since I play as Drow/Githyanki/Tiefling and always take 14 Charisma regardless of class, so it is a beautiful blend.
I love all equally, but it mostly comes down to already having Astarion as a rogue and Lae'zel as a fighter. So I usually play Ranger with a raven to pluck eyes out.
1) Berserker 2) Valor Bard 3) Thief 4) Fiend Warlock (esp. with a Tav Bard) 5) Ancients Paladin
I did a Berserker solo run and played workout music the whole time like Sin Tee here. That was really fun. Because of the agressive play, it almost felt like a different game.
Top 3. I really love the arcane trickster. Even if I know it isn't currently as strong as the thief. Once we have higher lvl caps though I can see it being super deadly. Even at lower levels it offers some nice utility with fog cloud. Picking up chromatic orb can also add some versatility because that spell covers all element types. Nice to carry an additional field creator/detonator incase you need one.
Wild magic sorcerers are tremendous fun. The extra dialogue is great and the surges can be really funny. I recall casting mage armor fresh out of a long rest and hitting the whole team with a massive fire attack and debuff. Hard to be mad at such grade A comedy.
Warlock. The fiend is currently better because of Dark ones blessing, but thematically I prefer great old one. I really like this class though I do have kind of a hard time playing though with it because I really like Wyll and taking him places. I'm not a huge fan of double classes in a group. Will need to make a warlock that ignores him.
Ranger also gets an honorable mention. I really like how they redid the creature enmity. My favorite class in OG Baldurs gate and especially Icewind dale was the half-elf ranger cleric. Sanctified stalker sort of feels like it honors that old multi-class. Because of how much time I spent playing ranger/clerics I'm honor bound to like this class and the subclasses.
I need to put more effort into using the in your face melee classes more. I keep trying to make a wide variety of characters, but keep making half-drow because i really like them and they make excellent arcane tricksters, wild magic sorcs, and warlocks. Also passable sanctified stalkers.
I would say, so far I enjoy dragon ancestor sorcerer a lot, wonder how the later levels will look, but so far it is fun for me. Just need more levels to plonk a little more defensive spells into the mix. Although wizard has more flexibility I kind of like the offensive nature of sorcerer. Apart from that I enjoyed bard and ranger equally I think.