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| The Worst Classes | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Jan 7 2017, 07:25 PM (3,577 Views) | |
| l33tmaan | Jan 7 2017, 07:25 PM Post #1 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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I still haven't been able to find a search function on this forum, so feel free to point me in the right direction if a thread's been made before. What are generally considered some of the "worst" classes in the game? Either through being underpowered or too niche or some combination thereof. I've read that Druid isn't too hot of a class, but one of my players just picked up the Fungal Path and it looks fine to me, in my admittedly limited experience. I heard Herald of Pride sucks, too, which is a class I was planning on a reoccurring NPC to pick up off-screen. Are these guys going to feel underpowered compared to the Hex Maniac/Telekinetic/Apparition? |
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| Dark Shadow | Jan 7 2017, 08:25 PM Post #2 |
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Reploid
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I'm no expert on class balance, but I'm fairly certain if that's one character, most things will feel underpowered, as two elemental-connection classes is generally not allowed. So, having the type coverage, abilities, and capabilities of a trainer with two connection classes, especially involving those two (plus Wind Runner and Aura Guardian), is not a very good benchmark for 'power'. If you mean separately... you should probably look at someone else. As mentioned, I'm not the best at that sort of stuff. |
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| l33tmaan | Jan 7 2017, 08:41 PM Post #3 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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Let's assume that both PCs have two elemental-connection classes, or are soon to pick them up. The Druid was considering either Glamour Weaver or Shade Caller, but I'm just wondering about in a general context. I sort of want my trainers to be stronger than your average person, so don't worry about my weirdo scenario unless you know the particulars of the combination. What are just generally bad classes to take? |
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| Professor Scamander | Jan 7 2017, 09:01 PM Post #4 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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Speed Ace is pretty horrible as is (all the Stat Aces class are pretty underwhelming, although Speed is the only one I'd flat out call bad). Fashionista depends a bit, but generally requires a lot of support to be good. Medic can be replicated with features/edges without taking the class. Dragon Ace isn't great. Dancer can be good, but suffers from the CS aren't that useful in PTU syndrome, so its very niche. Climatology sucks because without extreme party synergy you mess with your own party. This being said, that's looking at them in isolation. And while I may consider them weaker than others in general, that doesn't mean that they can't serve a killer purpose in specific situations/class combos. |
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| Hungrygnome | Jan 8 2017, 03:13 AM Post #5 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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Ill disagree on the non-stat Aces: Attack, Special Attack, and Defense Ace are all great. They may be bland, but like Ace Trainer, they are mechanically strong. Tree/Wood Oath druids arent bad, as they get some very good path specific moves. Earth shaker is a bit underwhelming, esecially if you use the alternate groundsource rules. Herald of Pride is junky. Commander isnt BAD, its just that it doesnt become good until VERY deep into the class. The playtest cheerleader is gutted compared to what it was. Enduring soul is underwhelming. Fashonista is very strong mid to late class. Athlete is very unfocused in its abilities. Roughneck isnt BAD, its just less effective than Provocatuer at doing similar things. Sage have too many things that all take standard actions, and sub-par granted abilities. |
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| Eisen | Jan 8 2017, 05:10 AM Post #6 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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Devs seem to have a hate-on for Speed and certain Type Aces... |
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| tulpacat | Jan 8 2017, 05:14 AM Post #7 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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Like in almost any other paper and pen game, specialization, synergy, and action economy are the "tell-tales" of good/bad classes or more importantly in PTU - class combinations. It's important to not look at a PTU class in a vacuum, since you're sort of expected to have two or three others. On top of that, synergy or redundancy with one's pokémon must be taken into account. Capture Specialist is a great class for its job, but has practically no synergy with any other class when it comes to trainer battles or fights where capturing isn't a consideration. If the party has pokémon set up to create "safe" capture environments (Feint Attack, anything focused on Trip+Grapple, Sleep effects, etc.), the class' marginal utility in their role is reduced as well. Generally speaking, combining any "direct" combat classes such as Martial Artist, Rogue, Herald of Pride, etc. is going to give middling results: You can only use one Standard action a turn (for the most part), and for the most part any two "Melee 1Target DB6-8" moves are going to behave similarly enough that the differences probably won't be worth giving up a class slot and up toward a half-dozen features. Despite what Gen 1's Poison Gym Leader suggests, Ninja has very poor overlap with Poison Ace whose features never benefit the Ninja's own ability to poison enemies, and poor overlap with Poison type pokémon in general - since they should be able to consistently inflict poison and/or deadly poison on targets without their trainer's help. The Sage, adorable Touhou references aside, is hard to use because a lot of its abilities are done better elsewhere and most things it does eats up its Standard actions for an effect that, while helpful, can be provided more efficiently by other classes - some of them even without using any actions at all. |
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| Domo | Jan 8 2017, 11:13 AM Post #8 |
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Kawaii Detective
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In a core-only environment, the absolute worst classes are the non-Cool Style Experts (unless the game is somehow 100% contest focused), Speed Ace, and playtest Cheerleader. They don't provide a lot of useful support, and the support they do provide sucks up a lot of feature investment relative to other classes with better benefit per feat. I would argue that NONE of the Elementalists would ever qualify for 'worst class', not even the much maligned Herald of Pride. Every single one of them provides bonus stats, decent to ridiculous Abilities and Moves, and access to Typed damage - Prism notwithstanding, but Prism has its own AoE heavy spread. At very worst, Herald of Pride is the worst of a generally overpowered set of classes, and a full feat HoP is on par with a full feat Marksman in terms of 'this wasn't the best idea'. Basically, the kind of people who say Herald of Pride is objectively bad are also the kind of people who a) never run Core only and b) probably do things like double ele-connection, then wonder why Dragon damage isn't as useful as Electric/Ice coverage. The issue with labeling combat classes as 'bad' is that they DO have a multiplicative effect. More stats = more power, more Types = more power, and there often is synergy between them, whether it's Martial Artist's Iron Fist affecting elemental Punches or whatever else. If you only take a single combat class, then that class might feel like the worst part of your build. But if you are only taking a single combat class, your build just isn't very good, because it obviously doesn't want to focus on combat at all. |
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| Magnyr_Delorn | Jan 8 2017, 12:38 PM Post #9 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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For my money, Enduring Soul is precisely the sort of class that I would take as a defense-oriented player, but it is so profoundly bad that IMO, it is likely the worst class in the game. I'm also very underwhelmed by Survivalist. |
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| Quagsires | Jan 8 2017, 03:17 PM Post #10 |
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Pokémon Trainer
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I would agree that Enduring Soul is pretty bad, but HP is a strong stat, so there is some merit in just grabbing the base feature to help out Pokémon like baby Pokémon (pichu, magby, etc.) or make shuckle super strong, but focusing the class on "taking a breather" is pretty boring and useless compared to the base feature. I think it would be cool to see some tutor moves for tank Pokémon since there are not many of those. |
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