Awhile back I made a post that garnished a fair amount of replies and discussion regarding why I felt that the Paladin was the most hated class in D&D, or at the very least, in 5E. I have since this time posted several game applications here on the forums, as well as on other sites, all of which were Paladin characters. The parties, if any mentioned, were generally made up of your usual mage, rouge, ranger or druid classes, and didnt have a relative tank or frontliner at all. My logic says "Paladin would be a perfect fit! Of course the DM will consider!" Only to be left in the cold and never hearing a single word about the game at all.
This is leading me to believe that the Paladin is a cursed class and needs a serious overhaul from the folks over at WotC to even make it viable for players to be considered for games. I write amazing character back stories to give the character depth and leave plenty of room for the DM to incorporate into the theme/arcs that they wish to plan, but am never able to find a game to actually pick me up.
Im a dedicated Paladin player, I genuinely love the character class and the flexibility that comes with it, but it's incredibly discouraging to even want to keep putting myself out there for games when DMs never even respond back or let you know why your character didnt get chosen. Im at a point where I just dont even know if I want to keep trying to play anymore.
Would love to hear your thoughts on the subject of whether the Paladin is a dead weight class and if youre a DM, would love to hear why you would or would not choose a Paladin to be a player character in your party of adventurers.
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I’ve played in groups where someone was playing a paladin and they’re far from deadweight! It’s awesome having a paladin in thr group, especially when you prefer playing other types of characters! However, played well a paladin doesn’t fit in with murder hobos.
The paladin is hated? By who? They are strong and fairly versatile. Able to lock down enemy movement, support other front liners, or do massive nova damage. Role play wise they are no more restrictive than your average cleric or druid.
My party had an oath of the crown paladin, knight background, that went on adventures fighting monsters and bandits in service of the kingdom. One (low level) encounter, they smited a bandit captain, which then tried to escape, but they prevented the bandit from moving away with channel divinity and we captured him.
I am a DM for a party which includes a Paladin. The funny thing is the only person in the party of 5 (plus me) that thinks the Paladin sucks is the person who is playing the Paladin. And the only reason he thinks it sucks is because he sees other class abilities that he thinks are powerful and for some reason thinks his isn't. Even though he is sitting there at 22AC without shield of faith (+1 plate, defensive fighting style, shield) so is hard to hit. He might go down a lot but he is the tank and so if the others were going down as often he would be doing a bad job. Personally, I think paladins are great, smite being a great class ability that is hard to beat
What venues are you posting to play in games for? I ask because if it's Roll20 I've applied for lots of games and not gotten invited, I think that's fairly common with so much competition for spots. I don't know that it's so much your choice of class. Are you getting any feedback when you are being denied admission to a group? Unless they are saying "we don't want a paldain" I would not assume it's your chosen class they are rejecting could be any number of other factors.
As for paladins they are amazing, they have healing, buffs, good damage, good survivability, and can be made in any number of ways to excel at various roles. It's my favorite class as well and I have never experienced a party member that didn't appreciate having me around.
Paladins are great! Though in 5e I find there is too much overlap with Cleric (my favorite class). I kinda wish they went back to alignment restrictions for Paladin like the old days, but I have never seen any hate for them.
I find the roll20 group finding to be a hit or miss. I've had better luck directly here on dndbeyond for finding groups.
For what I gather, you've never been told the problem is the class you want to play.
Did you always include your back story in each of your game "application"?
Could it be that your back stories are too detailed? A character with a detailed story is indeed nice to have, but I feel it has two drawbacks: 1) it can be daunting for a DM to have to read through and take into consideration a too detailed character story, which can lead to think "this is too much work to integrate" , it could give the feeling that your expectation on how your character would fit in are too high ; 2) you bind yourself too tight to a specific back story, making it difficult for yourself and your fellow players to develop your character outside of that narrative, potentially creating the feeling that your character is not "fed" what it needs to grow
I do not mean to lecture anyone on how to prepare their characters, but I feel a more streamlined back story (a couple of lines to one paragraph with the most important info) is more than enough to give the idea of what you want to play, and leaves tons of options to everyone at the table (you first) to develop the character as the story progresses, and not being "limited" by a too specific past.
Other than the above, any LFP post in any offering can receive any number of applications, it might blow even before it starts from any number of reasons, and either can be why you didn't get any reply: sheer amount of applications or the game was dead (or the party filled in) even before you applied.
All this being said: if there is any class that gets "hate" either from DMs or players, I feel the Paladins pretty down the list, with Ranger and Warlock being in the top spots (this is due to a number of posts and comments I have seen going around, so it might still be wrong).
+1 to Lek. I personally find it contrived to have a HUGE character backstory at level 1, though I don't think I would ever turn someone down because of it.
The only times I've found Paladins to be objectionable were the players who played them as insufferable, inflexible jerks. :) I honestly haven't seen that kind of play in a while--I think the influence of Sturm from Dragonlance has died off, and people playing paladins no longer feel like they have to lecture the rest of the characters about morality. Seriously, sometimes it was like your character was fighting through a dungeon next to Jack Chick. But that was entirely on the players, not the class. And again, I don't see that sort of RPing much anymore. Just my perspective.
I currently play a paladin now. I love my paladin. Yes, he lacks in a lot of situations but when it comes to a bulky bruiser who decides its go time, then its freaking GO time! I have yet to encounter a creature in my campaign that can survive 2 rounds staring my pally in the face. Divine smite is disgusting and lets not even talk about if I hit that nat 20.
Most people are turned off by a paladin because of the Lawful Stupid players they get. While its understandable I think if you can present a good case for your own paladin as a unique character most players will vibe with it. Im playing a Lawful Good paladin and even though some of my PC's are selfish have done some Unlawful deeds hes not dragging them to the stockade. Hell after almost every encounter they cheer me on and most of them are buying into the all mighty god Tyr! its just a blast.
The only way i can see the paladin being "dead weight" is because they do get pigeonholed into fulfilling a singular role. Shitty healer and Radiant damage dealer. Honestly, im ok with that and my paladin is ok with that. sometimes thats just the way the game works. again maybe you can get with your DM and say "Look dude hes not slapping them with heals and radiant damage, hes a paladin of the night and he uses cold damage" that would be pretty cool and could add some randomness to it. idk that's my take.
I have not received feedback at all pertaining to why I have not been accepted into any of the games, Ive only ever heard back from one DM before about not being accepted, and even then they never said why, just that I wasnt a good fit.
Generally my backstory writing consists of about a paragraph worth of character beginnings, couple of details about family/status, and rnds with the characters decisions on heading out to adventure. For example:
My last application involved the character being found as a baby in the desert amidst the remains of an attacked caravan that appeared to be traveling to a city nearby. It was attacked by what appeared to be bandits, and the babe was wrapped in silken blankets, undisturbed and cool to the touch. He was adopted by the noble family that stumbled upon the carnage, and raised as their own. As he came of age he was given his own keep, land and workers to farm etc, but he soon set out to find adventure and spread his families name/wealth, leaving the keep in the care of his brother.
A quick and dirty version of the paragraph. Plenty of room for the DM to fill in his own blanks if need be, and plenty of room for the character to grow.
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Currently on Version 1 of a custom Bard Subclass. Would love to hear your feedback! Give a look in the link down below!
I have not received feedback at all pertaining to why I have not been accepted into any of the games, Ive only ever heard back from one DM before about not being accepted, and even then they never said why, just that I wasnt a good fit.
Generally my backstory writing consists of about a paragraph worth of character beginnings, couple of details about family/status, and rnds with the characters decisions on heading out to adventure. For example:
My last application involved the character being found as a baby in the desert amidst the remains of an attacked caravan that appeared to be traveling to a city nearby. It was attacked by what appeared to be bandits, and the babe was wrapped in silken blankets, undisturbed and cool to the touch. He was adopted by the noble family that stumbled upon the carnage, and raised as their own. As he came of age he was given his own keep, land and workers to farm etc, but he soon set out to find adventure and spread his families name/wealth, leaving the keep in the care of his brother.
A quick and dirty version of the paragraph. Plenty of room for the DM to fill in his own blanks if need be, and plenty of room for the character to grow.
I don't have any experience with finding groups online, so take this fwiw. But if you think it's paladins they are hating, but you don't want to give up, you could consider contacting the group with a couple of options. "I could play a paladin who was found as a baby etc etc. Or if you don't think that's a good fit, I could go with my other idea, an Eldritch Knight who etc etc."
When the entire party has a good alignment, i guess it's okay, i never had problem with my own paladin (i played him a little more flexible, and the dm loved to put him in situations where he needed to make difficult choices ). But i feel that having a paladin, for anything else than hack'n slash, is a huge pain in the ass, because it often means that the player is going to stop any rp that he doesn't like. You want to play with a roguish ambiance ? the paladins kills it. You want to play with a pseudo-lovecraftian ambiance, with cultists and strange creatures ? the paladin kills them all. The defining word of the paladin is "SMITE!" and when you're no looking for something like that, paladins are terrible to play with.
When the entire party has a good alignment, i guess it's okay, i never had problem with my own paladin (i played him a little more flexible, and the dm loved to put him in situations where he needed to make difficult choices ). But i feel that having a paladin, for anything else than hack'n slash, is a huge pain in the ass, because it often means that the player is going to stop any rp that he doesn't like. You want to play with a roguish ambiance ? the paladins kills it. You want to play with a pseudo-lovecraftian ambiance, with cultists and strange creatures ? the paladin kills them all. The defining word of the paladin is "SMITE!" and when you're no looking for something like that, paladins are terrible to play with.
I feel this is very dependant on the conception a player has of a Paladin, and in D&D terms the Oath they choose.
Different Oaths can play VERY differently, and nowhere in the rules it says a Paladin HAS to be good aligned (or good in general), that is a refuse of age past that is no longer valid or necessary (the whole concept of Alignment is completely obsolete and useless imho, but that's another matter).
I would also argue that anyone "stopping RP they do not like (for any reason, be it their class or anything else) is not really a good team-player. If you believe your character would respond negatively to a certain situations, it is your duty (with the help of the rest of the table) to wave that into the current narrative, instead of outright putting a stop to the scene. I am also not entirely clear what you mean with "You want to play with a roguish ambiance ? the paladins kills it.", and I'd be curious to know. As to the horror/cultist vibe, a Paladin can indeed be an Inquisitor-like figure, but there's a wide range of flavors to go with that, imho.
I also feel that reducing the Paladin to just "SMITE!" as one could do with a Barbarian being just its "RAGE!" is doing a disservice to one of the most complex classes to play, one that usually should be, much more than others due to the "dictat" of their Oath, prone to moral choices and dilemmas, as well as being able to cover several roles inside the party.
This is all my opinion, of course, and with the Barbarian just being their "RAGE!" I do not mean to belittle the class, as there might be a thousand reasons why a Barbarian flies into a rage and how a player could play it at the table, but it's the most immediate comparison that sprang to mind.
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Born in Italy, moved a bunch, living in Spain, my heart always belonged to Roleplaying Games
Paladins don't have to be lawful good in 5e. In fact many make more sense going more neural (and evil is certainly possible). It sounds like you are stuck imagining the old cliche.
Even Lawful good can have a wide variety of ethics, morals, and personalities. They are not all Goody Twoshoes, Dudley Do-right types.
Paladins have always had as wide a variety of possible role playing options and approaches as any other class. Is a Thief limited to "Steal!", an Assassin to "Kill!" a Bard to "Sing!" or a Wizard to spell casting?
Nothing. It is more about how people think they have to play lawful good as someone who can't break any rules and will encourage the entire party not to either, then punish them for any violation.
There is more nuance to alignment than most people acknowledge.
Nothing. It is more about how people think they have to play lawful good as someone who can't break any rules and will encourage the entire party not to either, then punish them for any violation.
There is more nuance to alignment than most people acknowledge.
I agree. But I also think that depending on the table a lawful good character might not be a good fit. For better or worse. Esp. some more Murder-hobo scenarios. I’m just not sure I understand all the hate for LG alignment. Also so what if you encourage the party to not break any rules, sometimes that dynamic is fun.
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Awhile back I made a post that garnished a fair amount of replies and discussion regarding why I felt that the Paladin was the most hated class in D&D, or at the very least, in 5E. I have since this time posted several game applications here on the forums, as well as on other sites, all of which were Paladin characters. The parties, if any mentioned, were generally made up of your usual mage, rouge, ranger or druid classes, and didnt have a relative tank or frontliner at all. My logic says "Paladin would be a perfect fit! Of course the DM will consider!" Only to be left in the cold and never hearing a single word about the game at all.
This is leading me to believe that the Paladin is a cursed class and needs a serious overhaul from the folks over at WotC to even make it viable for players to be considered for games. I write amazing character back stories to give the character depth and leave plenty of room for the DM to incorporate into the theme/arcs that they wish to plan, but am never able to find a game to actually pick me up.
Im a dedicated Paladin player, I genuinely love the character class and the flexibility that comes with it, but it's incredibly discouraging to even want to keep putting myself out there for games when DMs never even respond back or let you know why your character didnt get chosen. Im at a point where I just dont even know if I want to keep trying to play anymore.
Would love to hear your thoughts on the subject of whether the Paladin is a dead weight class and if youre a DM, would love to hear why you would or would not choose a Paladin to be a player character in your party of adventurers.
Currently on Version 1 of a custom Bard Subclass. Would love to hear your feedback! Give a look in the link down below!
College of Ancestral Balance
Links will open in a new page. Comment HERE with feedback! Thank you!
I’ve played in groups where someone was playing a paladin and they’re far from deadweight! It’s awesome having a paladin in thr group, especially when you prefer playing other types of characters! However, played well a paladin doesn’t fit in with murder hobos.
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The paladin is hated? By who? They are strong and fairly versatile. Able to lock down enemy movement, support other front liners, or do massive nova damage. Role play wise they are no more restrictive than your average cleric or druid.
My party had an oath of the crown paladin, knight background, that went on adventures fighting monsters and bandits in service of the kingdom. One (low level) encounter, they smited a bandit captain, which then tried to escape, but they prevented the bandit from moving away with channel divinity and we captured him.
I am a DM for a party which includes a Paladin. The funny thing is the only person in the party of 5 (plus me) that thinks the Paladin sucks is the person who is playing the Paladin. And the only reason he thinks it sucks is because he sees other class abilities that he thinks are powerful and for some reason thinks his isn't. Even though he is sitting there at 22AC without shield of faith (+1 plate, defensive fighting style, shield) so is hard to hit. He might go down a lot but he is the tank and so if the others were going down as often he would be doing a bad job. Personally, I think paladins are great, smite being a great class ability that is hard to beat
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What venues are you posting to play in games for? I ask because if it's Roll20 I've applied for lots of games and not gotten invited, I think that's fairly common with so much competition for spots. I don't know that it's so much your choice of class. Are you getting any feedback when you are being denied admission to a group? Unless they are saying "we don't want a paldain" I would not assume it's your chosen class they are rejecting could be any number of other factors.
As for paladins they are amazing, they have healing, buffs, good damage, good survivability, and can be made in any number of ways to excel at various roles. It's my favorite class as well and I have never experienced a party member that didn't appreciate having me around.
Roll20 is the other avenue I post on. I cannot find a game for the life of me, and Im about to hang up the dice digitally and physically
Currently on Version 1 of a custom Bard Subclass. Would love to hear your feedback! Give a look in the link down below!
College of Ancestral Balance
Links will open in a new page. Comment HERE with feedback! Thank you!
Paladins are great! Though in 5e I find there is too much overlap with Cleric (my favorite class). I kinda wish they went back to alignment restrictions for Paladin like the old days, but I have never seen any hate for them.
I find the roll20 group finding to be a hit or miss. I've had better luck directly here on dndbeyond for finding groups.
For what I gather, you've never been told the problem is the class you want to play.
Did you always include your back story in each of your game "application"?
Could it be that your back stories are too detailed? A character with a detailed story is indeed nice to have, but I feel it has two drawbacks: 1) it can be daunting for a DM to have to read through and take into consideration a too detailed character story, which can lead to think "this is too much work to integrate" , it could give the feeling that your expectation on how your character would fit in are too high ; 2) you bind yourself too tight to a specific back story, making it difficult for yourself and your fellow players to develop your character outside of that narrative, potentially creating the feeling that your character is not "fed" what it needs to grow
I do not mean to lecture anyone on how to prepare their characters, but I feel a more streamlined back story (a couple of lines to one paragraph with the most important info) is more than enough to give the idea of what you want to play, and leaves tons of options to everyone at the table (you first) to develop the character as the story progresses, and not being "limited" by a too specific past.
Other than the above, any LFP post in any offering can receive any number of applications, it might blow even before it starts from any number of reasons, and either can be why you didn't get any reply: sheer amount of applications or the game was dead (or the party filled in) even before you applied.
All this being said: if there is any class that gets "hate" either from DMs or players, I feel the Paladins pretty down the list, with Ranger and Warlock being in the top spots (this is due to a number of posts and comments I have seen going around, so it might still be wrong).
Born in Italy, moved a bunch, living in Spain, my heart always belonged to Roleplaying Games
+1 to Lek. I personally find it contrived to have a HUGE character backstory at level 1, though I don't think I would ever turn someone down because of it.
The only times I've found Paladins to be objectionable were the players who played them as insufferable, inflexible jerks. :) I honestly haven't seen that kind of play in a while--I think the influence of Sturm from Dragonlance has died off, and people playing paladins no longer feel like they have to lecture the rest of the characters about morality. Seriously, sometimes it was like your character was fighting through a dungeon next to Jack Chick. But that was entirely on the players, not the class. And again, I don't see that sort of RPing much anymore. Just my perspective.
Looking for new subclasses, spells, magic items, feats, and races? Opinions welcome :)
I currently play a paladin now. I love my paladin. Yes, he lacks in a lot of situations but when it comes to a bulky bruiser who decides its go time, then its freaking GO time! I have yet to encounter a creature in my campaign that can survive 2 rounds staring my pally in the face. Divine smite is disgusting and lets not even talk about if I hit that nat 20.
Most people are turned off by a paladin because of the Lawful Stupid players they get. While its understandable I think if you can present a good case for your own paladin as a unique character most players will vibe with it. Im playing a Lawful Good paladin and even though some of my PC's are selfish have done some Unlawful deeds hes not dragging them to the stockade. Hell after almost every encounter they cheer me on and most of them are buying into the all mighty god Tyr! its just a blast.
The only way i can see the paladin being "dead weight" is because they do get pigeonholed into fulfilling a singular role. Shitty healer and Radiant damage dealer. Honestly, im ok with that and my paladin is ok with that. sometimes thats just the way the game works. again maybe you can get with your DM and say "Look dude hes not slapping them with heals and radiant damage, hes a paladin of the night and he uses cold damage" that would be pretty cool and could add some randomness to it. idk that's my take.
I have not received feedback at all pertaining to why I have not been accepted into any of the games, Ive only ever heard back from one DM before about not being accepted, and even then they never said why, just that I wasnt a good fit.
Generally my backstory writing consists of about a paragraph worth of character beginnings, couple of details about family/status, and rnds with the characters decisions on heading out to adventure. For example:
My last application involved the character being found as a baby in the desert amidst the remains of an attacked caravan that appeared to be traveling to a city nearby. It was attacked by what appeared to be bandits, and the babe was wrapped in silken blankets, undisturbed and cool to the touch. He was adopted by the noble family that stumbled upon the carnage, and raised as their own. As he came of age he was given his own keep, land and workers to farm etc, but he soon set out to find adventure and spread his families name/wealth, leaving the keep in the care of his brother.
A quick and dirty version of the paragraph. Plenty of room for the DM to fill in his own blanks if need be, and plenty of room for the character to grow.
Currently on Version 1 of a custom Bard Subclass. Would love to hear your feedback! Give a look in the link down below!
College of Ancestral Balance
Links will open in a new page. Comment HERE with feedback! Thank you!
I don't have any experience with finding groups online, so take this fwiw. But if you think it's paladins they are hating, but you don't want to give up, you could consider contacting the group with a couple of options. "I could play a paladin who was found as a baby etc etc. Or if you don't think that's a good fit, I could go with my other idea, an Eldritch Knight who etc etc."
Looking for new subclasses, spells, magic items, feats, and races? Opinions welcome :)
When the entire party has a good alignment, i guess it's okay, i never had problem with my own paladin (i played him a little more flexible, and the dm loved to put him in situations where he needed to make difficult choices ). But i feel that having a paladin, for anything else than hack'n slash, is a huge pain in the ass, because it often means that the player is going to stop any rp that he doesn't like. You want to play with a roguish ambiance ? the paladins kills it. You want to play with a pseudo-lovecraftian ambiance, with cultists and strange creatures ? the paladin kills them all.
The defining word of the paladin is "SMITE!" and when you're no looking for something like that, paladins are terrible to play with.
I feel this is very dependant on the conception a player has of a Paladin, and in D&D terms the Oath they choose.
Different Oaths can play VERY differently, and nowhere in the rules it says a Paladin HAS to be good aligned (or good in general), that is a refuse of age past that is no longer valid or necessary (the whole concept of Alignment is completely obsolete and useless imho, but that's another matter).
I would also argue that anyone "stopping RP they do not like (for any reason, be it their class or anything else) is not really a good team-player. If you believe your character would respond negatively to a certain situations, it is your duty (with the help of the rest of the table) to wave that into the current narrative, instead of outright putting a stop to the scene.
I am also not entirely clear what you mean with "You want to play with a roguish ambiance ? the paladins kills it.", and I'd be curious to know.
As to the horror/cultist vibe, a Paladin can indeed be an Inquisitor-like figure, but there's a wide range of flavors to go with that, imho.
I also feel that reducing the Paladin to just "SMITE!" as one could do with a Barbarian being just its "RAGE!" is doing a disservice to one of the most complex classes to play, one that usually should be, much more than others due to the "dictat" of their Oath, prone to moral choices and dilemmas, as well as being able to cover several roles inside the party.
This is all my opinion, of course, and with the Barbarian just being their "RAGE!" I do not mean to belittle the class, as there might be a thousand reasons why a Barbarian flies into a rage and how a player could play it at the table, but it's the most immediate comparison that sprang to mind.
Born in Italy, moved a bunch, living in Spain, my heart always belonged to Roleplaying Games
Paladins don't have to be lawful good in 5e. In fact many make more sense going more neural (and evil is certainly possible). It sounds like you are stuck imagining the old cliche.
[Edit: sniped by a better written comment]
Even Lawful good can have a wide variety of ethics, morals, and personalities. They are not all Goody Twoshoes, Dudley Do-right types.
Paladins have always had as wide a variety of possible role playing options and approaches as any other class. Is a Thief limited to "Steal!", an Assassin to "Kill!" a Bard to "Sing!" or a Wizard to spell casting?
what's wrong with being lawful good?
Nothing. It is more about how people think they have to play lawful good as someone who can't break any rules and will encourage the entire party not to either, then punish them for any violation.
There is more nuance to alignment than most people acknowledge.
I agree. But I also think that depending on the table a lawful good character might not be a good fit. For better or worse. Esp. some more Murder-hobo scenarios. I’m just not sure I understand all the hate for LG alignment. Also so what if you encourage the party to not break any rules, sometimes that dynamic is fun.