Choosing a class

I'm a big rpg gamer, and far and away the most important decision you have to make when starting roughly ninety percent of rpgs is what class you are going to be playing. In multiplayer games, this determines what role you're going to be playing in group battles, how important you are to the people around you, and how fellow players are going to view you. In single player, it determines what the most effective way to win each fight is going to be, and what your main method of survival is going to be. But above all, it determines how you are going to play the game.

But assuming you've never played an rpg before, or any other form of game that allows you to pick a class in this way, how are you supposed to know which class to pick? Every class has its advantages and disadvantages, they're all going to have their own playstyle, and they're all going to have certain things that are unavailable to them. While you may think that a particular class sounds like something you might enjoy, you won't know for sure until you actually play your character.

And if you don't actually like the class that you picked? Well, in most games, and especially that early on into the game, really your only choice is going to be to start the game over entirely. That, or you can suck it up. But that's not a fun way to play the game, and if you're not having fun with the game, then you're doing it wrong.

In some games, this can be a huge punishment. Having to go through the early tutorials again, gaining enough skills to actually see what the class is about, and even whether or not you are actually skilled enough to play the class and deal with the restrictions that it places upon you. In games where you take massive amounts of damage from an enemy's single attack, choosing to start as a class with low health is extremely detrimental, especially if you have never played the game before.

Even for someone like me who has played many, many games where classes are an integral choice in how you play, I can be taken by surprise when in a new game, I prefer a class that in any other game I would have hated. Something about the new mechanics, the flow of the game, it all just leads me into making a choice that I never would have otherwise. Normally I most enjoy playing quick, low damage but frequent hit style characters. But every once in while, that powerful tank who hits like a truck is exactly what I need to get through.

Why did I feel like talking about this? I don't know. I thought about making a fictional piece out of it, with a character being forced into making a decision about what class they would be for the rest of their lives, never able to change their course. But I couldn't really make it make sense. So there you go.