Codex Sloth :: Class Orders

When you create your character - you only choose your primary class (go back and read the Classes introduction if you need to). The other seven classes are available to you in the game - you simply decide the order you want to have them in (this is your class order). Please note that your secondary class directly impacts your stat rolling - and in general, your first two classes are usually the most important classes you have - your enjoyment of the game can be found within the first two classes! If you stick around, the rest of the classes will improve your experience, but for most people, pick your favorite two classes (especially if they work together).

My personal method of selecting the first additional class of a new character is to think about what I want to do with the character and what will best support that (I also take a look at the statistic rolling table for the class orders so that I get a better idea of what works the best together):

Prime	Warrior	Bard	Thief	Cleric	Druid	Mage	Necromancer	Monk
Warrior	Strength	D/S/I/C/W	D/S/C/I/W	W/S/I/D/C	W/S/D/I/C	I/S/W/D/C	I/S/C/W/D	C/S/D/W/I
Bard	S/D/C/W/I	Dexterity	D/I/S/C/W	W/I/S/D/C	W/D/I/C/S	I/D/W/S/C	I/D/C/W/S	C/D/S/W/I
Thief	S/D/C/W/I	D/S/I/C/W	Dexterity	W/D/I/SC	W/D/I/C/S	I/D/W/S/C	I/D/C/W/S	C/D/S/W/I
Cleric	S/W/D/C/I	D/W/I/C/S	D/W/S/C/I	Wisdom	W/I/D/C/S	I/W/D/S/C	I/W/C/D/S	C/W/D/S/I
Druid	S/W/D/C/I	D/W/I/C/S	D/W/S/C/I	W/D/I/S/C	Wisdom	I/W/D/S/C	I/W/C/D/S	C/W/D/S/I
Mage	S/I/D/C/W	D/I/C/W/S	D/I/S/C/W	W/I/S/D/C	W/I/D/C/S	Intelligence	I/W/C/D/S	C/I/D/S/W
Necromancer	S/I/D/C/W	D/I/C/W/S	D/I/S/C/W	W/I/S/D/C	W/I/D/C/S	I/D/W/S/C	Intelligence	C/I/D/S/W
Monk	S/C/D/W/I	D/C/I/W/S	D/C/S/W/I	W/C/I/S/D	W/C/D/I/S	I/C/W/S/D	I/C/W/D/S	Constitution

For example - let's say that I began a Monk prime character - knowing that Monks need strength for their melee and gripping variants, it'd be a good idea to have Strength roll at least third so we would ensure ourselves of a high enough Strength to maximize all the Monk skills. For that reason, I could select Warrior secondary, Bard secondary, or Thief secondary. Warriors offer me a wealth of combat skills and boosted +hit / +dam, rolling Strength second, and a maximum possible strength (very far down the road) of 24. Thieves offer me their stealthy arts and some hit/damage as well. They roll Dexterity second but Strength will roll third - which is acceptable. Bards offer songs, some mana, spells, and the same statistic roll as Thieves but also offer nearly comparable hit points to a warrior. It's a hard decision to make and I couldn't go much wrong with either one of these three. But knowing that I'll end up with low mana (due to picking two non-caster classes first) - I don't want to have to use a lot of mana but would like to have some mana available, so I decided to select Bard secondary. I'll have hps, boosted hitroll/damroll from songs that I sing, and slightly more mana than warrior or thief would have offered me. I can then flesh out the character by selecting caster classes to maximize my mana and regeneration to be able to cast powerful spells later on down the road.

But there's also another concern. Many powerful skills/spells are capped according to where they fall in your class order.

There are several caps in place - and it'll make more sense if we have some examples available. For example, let's say you want to know about the summon undead creature caps. The summon undead spell is a Necromancer spell that summons an undead creature to do your bidding:

help summon undead creatures
"SUMMON UNDEAD CREATURES" "SUMMONED CREATURES"

See Also: SUMMON UNDEAD DISMISS ORDER CALL FOLLOWERS

Here are the various extra undead that can be conjured up.

Form Necromancer Mana
Level Cost
---- ----------- ----
Ghost 10 5
Spectre 20 10
Poltergeist 40 20
Wraith 2x40 30
Banshee 4x40 40
Phantom 6x40 50
Swordwraith 8x40 60

This spell only calls undead spirits that can flock to the caster through
the constraining walls of the earth. To generate the walking dead (such
fell beings as liches, zombies, etc.) the 'animate dead' spell must be
cast instead, and a corpse must be available to animate.

Currently, a prime Necromancer will be able to access all of those pets when they meet the required levels (ie: Ghost when they hit level 10, Wraith when they hit prime 40 and secondary 40). Non-prime Necromancers have to count from where Necromancer falls in their class order. If you were a secondary Necromancer, you'd be able to access Wraith undeads when you hit triple 40 (2nd 40 after Necromancer 40). Swordwraiths would be available at full 9x40. Tertiary Necromancers will never be able to access a Swordwraith (they would max out at 7x40). Quad Necros will be able to access 6x40 pets, but a 5th Necro will not be able to access the 6x40 pets. These tradeoffs are present with every capped spell/skill that exists (supplication, animate dead, shapeshift forms, summon undead, and the like).

Warriors - ac cap (primes, uncapped, bards can get -12 with a song, everybody else, -11 (although piasa form for druid primes will have -12 ac))

Thieves - backstab multipliers (primes get more multipliers - they get reduced the further down in the order thief is)

Monks - damage reduction cap (points of damage reduction available - you get 1 point naturally for monk 40 and every 40 after that grants an additional point - also larger cap for equipment dam reduce)

Necromancer - animate dead creatures cap, summon undead creatures cap, undead control cap (you get fractional UC for necro 40 and every 40 after)

There are a variety of things to think about but it'd probably be more fun to play a hybrid character - by which you try not to maximize one end of the spectrum (like taking all non-caster classes in a row - leaving you with very poor mana and a very hard life at the start, or same for taking all caster characters, but both can be quite powerful.... years from now). To keep from going insane, I'd highly recommend that you select either a non-caster (NC) prime and then select either a caster (CA) or non-caster (NC) secondary, but after that, take CA classes unless you have a specific reason for taking a NC class before a CA class. Or take a CA prime and then select a NC or a CA secondary (but if you go CA/CA, you will need a NC class either tert or quad to not go crazy).

Some sample class orders using the above rules: wa/ne/cl/ma, wa/ba/cl/ne, wa/mo/cl/ma, th/dr/ma/cl, cl/wa/ma/ne, cl/dr/ba/ma, cl/dr/ma/wa, and the like.

If you'd like to see what some other Sloth players think about class orders - visit this thread on the SlothMUD website. (Or an abridged summary - taking cleric early is good - you always want to heal yourself and having cleric later on in your class order will make life VERY hard. For the primes - Thieves like to stab things, Monks like to grip things, Warriors like to get killed and to melee, Bards are primarily group characters / strange to play, Mages level very easy, Clerics are always loved, Necromancers can solo huge stuff but takes a lot of work/mana, and Druids don't need equipment and can solo using shapeshift.)