Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General Poll - Which Class do you prefer so far

I'm not familiar with 5th ed. of DD. I played the 3rd ed. based games years ago like BG 1 & 2, Icewind Dale 1 & 2, Neverwinter Nights 1 & 2. So is a Battlemaster Fighter so much better than the Eldritch Knight? I chose the latter in my current playthrough of BG 3. I just thought being able to cast some spells, can't hurt. Seems like I was wrong, since Battlemaster fighters seem to be much more common.

Battlemaster and Eldritch Knight are both great options in tabletop 5e, roughly equal in strength. However, there's a few things in BG3 that make Battlemaster the superior option.

• The Frightened condition caused by Menacing Strike is supposed to only cause disadvantage on the enemy's attacks and prevent them from moving closer to the source of their fear. Larian has changed this to force the enemy to run away (provoking opportunity attacks) and they lose their entire turn. This changes Menacing Strike from a fairly useful debuffing ability into an OP fight-winner, especially against solo powerful enemies.
• In BG3 every class can use scrolls, so why would you play a Eldritch Knight when you can instead play a Battlemaster and get all the benefits of the EK subclass via scrolls?
• BG3 hasn't implemented some of the spells that make EK so good in tabletop, specifically the cantrips Booming Blade and Green Flame Blade (spells that add damage/effects to a melee attack) and the 1st-level reaction spells Absorb Elements and Shield.

I've played 2 Hunter Rangers. The 1st was right before patch 3. He was a strength based Shield Dwarf + Far Traveler (mods) + Ranger Knight (for heavy armor) + Urban Tracker + Hunter's Mark + Horde Breaker. I took 2 Weapon Fighting style, and used 2 hand axes. Then took the Duel Wield feat, and upgraded to 2 battle axes. I would jump into the middle of mobs and hack away.

My 2nd Ranger went with Keeper of the Veil + Beast Tamer + Colossus Slayer. Everything else I kept the same except I upped his Dex to 14 in character creation. Both were a lot of fun.

Rogue Thief for me. Assuming we get Bard, and the right "prestige classes", assuming they're still a thing, I want to recreate my Bard/Assassin/AA from Neverwinter Nights. Should be fun in this setting, if I can get it.

Thank you for this input and insights, which make sense. We don't know, yet, how this may change once the level cap is increased, maybe the Eldritch Knight will be more worthwhile then. I'm not a powergamer anyway I'm in it more for the roleplay and a mystic knight still is quite appealing to me. But your arguments really make a lot of sense.

Once the game is released I might switch to Paladin anyway.
Cheers and so long.

Ranger is my favorite to play (role and damage). With hunter's mark and colossal slayer you can put down some pretty good damage, plus Larian has made the ranger even better (verticality, heavy armor variant).

But my favorite ranger is the human variant with crossbow expert and sharpshooter (so I have to wait on while on those to be in game.)
Use hand crossbow @ 4th level 2 attacks due to using bonus action to shoot another bolt.
1st round (cast hunters mark) and the damage is 2d6+3 (+1d8 if someone already hit him)
2nd round is 4d6+1d8+6
@5th you would get 3 attacks

Crossbow expert gives you non-disadvantage if someone is within melee range (so I wonder how Larian is going to deal with this.)
You also can use your bonus action to shoot another bolt with a hand crossbow

Sharpshooter is much like greater weapon mastery +10 damage with -5 to hit but most people forget these 2 things it also gives
Attacking at long range doesn't impose disadvantage on your ranged weapon attack rolls. Although all ranged weapon are now 60 feet, I wonder if that will change in full game.
Your ranged weapon attacks ignore half cover and three-quarters cover - so basically they have to be behind a house for you not to shoot at them regularly.

If the full game launches with just these 2 subclasses (Hunter, Beastmaster) I would probably go 5th ranger / 5 rogue to get the extra damage, Gloomstalker I would go all the way ranger.

No Prestige Classes in 5e. The have Sub-Classes though, like the Thief. They wanted to put the focus back on the classes, rather than number crunching to gain a Prestige Class.

After the full game launches, I plan to multiclass my Strength based Duel Wielding Hunter Ranger with 3-5 levels of Thief Rogue. Two attacks a round plus two bonus attacks a round, and all of the bonus damage; very nice.

That's too bad. I fell in love with that character in NWNs. She was an absolute beast.

Ranger-Hunter. Soooo fun!

I know, right? Looking forward to lvl 5 for multiattack. Sadly Rangers don't scale too well above lvl 5, but multiclassing fixes that easily. I'm thinking maybe going into Druid for a real old school Bard feel.

I'm sorry if I have missed it in another thread, but has there been any discussion on any of the 5e sub classes coming to BG3, like Gloom Stalker for instace?

Not here ...
But i gues we can start it. :P

I would really love to see Circle of Sheppard for Druids ...
Since im in general huge fan of classes that are summoning their own armies, and since Warlock in DnD isnt exactly what im used to ... it seem kinda sad to me, that the only summoner we get is supposed to be Necromancer. :-/

Current Druid/Land; however, a Modded (nexus) "True" Paladin Oath breaker is fun - especially if you choose his god as Mykul(sp). You get some interesting dialogs with some NPCs as a paladin of this god. As with any mod, this one is still a WIP and you do not get your Origin powers. These dialogs are in the base game, so it seems you will be able to make a Paladin type with pretty much any god in game. To be able to choose a god, you will need to first start as a Cleric in char creation screen, choose your god and then change to paladin. The dialogs are specific to paladins.

I hope they allow multi classing and add an oath breaker officially to the game - A janked up Human/Vampire multiclassed shadow Druid/Oath breaker may be fun if allowed - odd combo and may not be allowed.

My other "Tav" charecters/classes will be an Ice Focused Elf/Tiefling? sorcerer (and no not Elsa(sp) inspired lol, I created her "Myst Windlore" in BG1), Drow Rogue with a focus on Chr/dialog, Half elf multiclassed Ranger/Druid. Not sure on race with a couple yet...

My janked up class character is a bit off his rocker with a hatred of the current gods and somewhat of a power trip. He has a sense of balance but draws his inspiration from the primal and sees the gods as a diversion from the true source. His story is a bit deeper than that... I am sure I will not be able to make him as noted, but there are a few ways to skin an owl bear.

My favorite is the great Old One Warlock, but for no other reason than I'm somewhat of a Lovecraft fan, and I like the idea that my Warlocks get their abilities from a Yog-Sothoth esque being.

I'm a wizard guy, always have been. But seems like wizards are overly weak with things set up the way they are now. Thoughts? So far my best play throughs have been with the Warlock and Druid.

For me, it is the Warlock for the Fiend Patron, mainly because of the huge role the Hells and Devils seem to be playing in the story, and seeing as this game begins following the end of Descent into Avernus this makes a great deal of sense for someone like this to be in the story. So until I can play as Wyll, I will be happy with a Fiend Patron Warlock.

I surprisingly enjoy the ranger even though I play it kinda weird with STR and greatsword

Always tend to play fighter types, just reminds me of the classic hero of the films.

What I don't like is that due to the limited choices available in the companions you tend to be restricted somewhat if you want a party that contains companions that are at least not in total opposition to your character's ethos (tend to be neutral good). Hopefully IF they bring in more companions or at least let us built a second player made character that will be less of an issue and you can then have a bit more flexibility with your class choices for your character.

That's tough, I generally will play sneakier characters in most games so I went rogue first. It was fun, but I also really enjoyed druid.

I ended up choosing Moon Druid because the Wildshape was a fun wrinkle to use through EA, but I've enjoyed both of them. When I play again I'm think of trying either a Wizard or Cleric. I'm most excited to see how they handle Monk and Barbarians though!