why not 1st level Expert?

[skywalker]

If you want to be a good fighter or wizard you are better off taking them at first level. You get access to 4 feats at first level and being unable to take warrior or adept feats can be a real handicap, leaving you scrapping the barrel in level 1 to 4 to catch up.

In exchange the Expert gets 4 more Skills. This is just 2 General feats, and can be taken by the other 2 Roles. It isn't such a great advantage.

Also, remember that though Skills increase with level you can:

a) gain them through Conviction, and
b) gain them at later levels at equally high ranks.

So getting Skills early ins't that important. On the other hand Base Combat and Power ranks suffer if you don't dedicate to them. You can't fully recover later on. So that level of Expert will hurt you in these areas, where not taking Expert doesn't.

Overall, point out that the best warrior will be a dedicated Warrior, the best wizard a dedicated Adept. Experts are generalists and cover most other areas, but they will never be as good at combat or spells as either the other Roles. However, the other Roles can have equally good skills (even if they have less of them).

[mrfusion]

In our sci-fi setting we're thinking of getting rid of the other two classes. Every PC will be an Expert (and have access to all of the feats). That's one way to solve the problem.

[timemrick]

To elaborate on what skywalker said, if you want a warrior with both heavy armor and skills, you're better off starting as warrior (which effectively gives you Armor Training [heavy] for free), and taking Skill Training. And play a human, for the bonus skill and feat.

Here are a few other points to keep in mind, especially if you're looking at role choices from a min/max point of view:

1) You can only take Martial, Expert, or Supernatural feats at 1st level if you belong to the right role, or if your background has the ones you want as favored feats. Sometimes that's more important to a character concept (munchkiny or not) than min/maxing skills.

2) All new roles' saving throw bonuses are reduced by 2, so none of your saves wil increase until your second level in a new role. (This is a major change from d20 and Blue Rose, where they simply stack.)

3) Mixing roles always hurts your overall Combat score during the first level of either adept or expert. In fact, expert 1/adept 1 (Combat +0) is worse than level 2 in either role (Combat +1).

[The Shadow]

Yes, it does appear that True20 seeks to discourage multi-roling a bit. The saves thing took me aback.

And that bit about an Expert 1 / Adept 1 being worse than either at 2nd level is odd, but I don't see what can be done about it - it's a quirk in the progressions.

[Michael Tree]

2) All new roles' saving throw bonuses are reduced by 2, so none of your saves wil increase until your second level in a new role. (This is a major change from d20 and Blue Rose, where they simply stack.)

This actually makes Expert even more attractive to take at first level, since it's the only role that has two good saving throws.

I do agree that the roles are balanced though. Taking your first level in expert looks the most attractive at first glance, but getting a free heavy armor proficiency and a high combat bonus, or being able to take four powers at first level are also very good choices.

[GoRocket]

I have no problem whatsoever with Experts being more prevalent than Warriors or Adepts. I see Warriors and Adepts as being rarer than Experts anyway, so there's some justification in the disparity.

Certain players will choose Warrior or Adept because you get certain advantages by taking those classes first. Experts excel in skills, yes, but not in their starting feats. Warriors and Adepts are both better at what they do, and get access to feats that Experts do not.

[mrfusion]

The problem I have is NOT with experts being more prevalent; its with people choosing one level of expert for the skills and then never taking expert again.

RPGPundit

Sooo.... just don't allow multi-classing. Problem solved.

[Dork Elf]

The problem I have is NOT with experts being more prevalent; its with people choosing one level of expert for the skills and then never taking expert again.

RPGPundit

Sooo.... just don't allow multi-classing. Problem solved.

Well, the problem there is that one might want to allow multi-classing for versatility, but not want the munchkiny aspect of the 1st-level Expert to make the system more formulaic than it perhaps should be.

I am considering this: when taking a level in a role, the number of known skills THAT role begins with naturally advance by one. For warriors and adepts, this would be 2 + Int skills, and for Experts 6 + Int. This would mean that taking first level as an Expert would be advantageous, but if no more Expert levels were taken, those extra skills would progress slowly or perhaps not at all (player choice which skills to advance). Extra skills taken with Skill Training and background skills are counted among base known skills for the purpose of advancement of course.

I think this would make the bonus feat a warrior gets and the Supernatural feats adepts have access to quite attractive in relation to 4 extra known skills. Just an idea though. I think Experts are fairly well balanced anyway hehe.

[skywalker]

The problem I have is NOT with experts being more prevalent; its with people choosing one level of expert for the skills and then never taking expert again.

Pros: Gain 2 Feats (4 Skills) and 1 good save.

Cons:
Warrior: Loose 1 extra Feat for Armour, -1 Combat bonus (to Attack and Defence) and loose the ability to choose 3 Warrior only Feats at 1st level.
Adept: -1 to all Powers, loose ability to choose 4 Adept only Feats at 1st level (including Powers) and forced to waste a feat on Armour Training Light.

Seems pretty balanced to me. If you want the best Warrior, take Warrior. If you want the best Adept, take Adept.

Taking 1 level on Expert is not necessarily a better option. Actually, I think a better option in terms of being a better Warrior or Adept and acheiving a similar result would be to take Warrior or Adept and simply take Skill Training twice on levels 1 through 3. You can recover Skill ranks at later levels but not Combat Bonus or Power Ranks.

[JBowtie]

I've attacked this by slightly restricting multi-classing; characters can only change classes on levels 5,10,15, and 20. Mind you I have looser coupling between feats and roles.