[Animayhem]

As for Arcane Archer, I have no problems with it. I think the key is on the early build you do to get there.

For Rimeth I took wizard for the arcane aspect and to get her to minimum requirements for AA, I used fighter. Once I got my first level of AA I have continued to take AA levels. This build has made her quite flexible in combat as either melee or ranged.

As for shifters, I only have taken one level with Cara by which she can change into five wyrmlings. Rp wise it did not make sense for her to take more.

As to Dwarven defenders and dwarves in general. They key in my opinion is to have some sort of dwarven area or home base. I have played on two worlds by which the dwarven population was decent because there was a Dwarven stronghold.

On one of these worlds, the dwarven defender was slightly modified in that the more drunk a dwarf became, the better the fighter. It is common lore that dwarves like their drink.

As for PDK, I only played it briefly in the single campaign and it seemed to be a glorified bard/fighter.