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Dungeons and Dragons(D&D) is a role-playing game created by Dave Arneson and E. Gary Gygax back in 1974 based upon their previous creation Chainmail, a tactical miniatures game. Since 1974, this game has gone through several permutations as it has evolved to suit the ever changing dynamic of the roleplaying world. No matter what the edition of the game is you play, however, there are certain basic choices that need to be made before you ever actually join in the game. The choices needed include what race to play, which class your going to be, where do you come from, what gender is your character, what is your character's basic outlook on life (alignment) who does the character worship (diety), what skills does the character focus on, what special feats are they adept at, and what are their personal quirks and personality traits, all these should at least be started upon before joining the game.

Of the choices outlined, probably the key choice, to which just about all the other choices are linked, is that of class. For someone who has never played D&D before, a class is the character's profession. What type of character they are, and how they go about solving the problems put before them by the Dungeon Master(DM) in the game. Throughout the various editions and supplements of D&D, there are literally thousands of classes and subclasses to discuss, so here let's focus on the most recent edition, 4th or 4e as it's commonly referred to, that came out just last year (2008). The classes currently available in this edition of D&D from the Core books(Player Handbook 1 & 2, or PH1 & PH2) only, are: The Avenger (PH2), The Barbarian(PH2), The Bard(PH2), The Cleric(PH1), The Druid(PH2), The Fighter(PH1), The Invoker(PH2), The Paladin(PH1), The Ranger(PH1), The Rogue(PH1), The Shaman(PH2), The Sorcerer(PH2), The Warden(PH2), The Warlock(PH1), The Warlord(PH1), and The Wizard(PH1)

As you can see, from the start, you have a choice of 16 different classes to make, and that's just in the core set. Of course, prior to the recent(March) release of Player Handbook 2, there were only 8 classes in the core set, and now there are 16. In addition to these core classes, there is currently 1 campaign setting published for 4e out there called Forgotten Realms, which introduces one other class, the Sword Mage, along with several digital copies of Dragon Magazine which every month puts forth new material including such classes as the Artificer, and bring out previews

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