No prestige classes? I'm digging it.

[Dykstrav]

One of the things about Pathfinder that I really like (that I've realized perhaps a bit slowly, over several months of regular play) is that very few Pathfinder players aspire for their characters to take levels in a prestige class.

With abilities that scale through single-classing (barbarian rage powers, cleric domains, fighter's weapon training, sorcerer bloodlines, wizard schools, and so forth), players have a strong incentive to stick with their first class--especially since every class has a capstone ability at 20th level. Add favored class bonuses into the mix, and there's even stronger incentive to stick with a single class.

Character archetypes (introduced in the Advanced Player's Guide, and expanded in further source books such as Ultimate Magic and Ultimate Combat), allow players to customize their characters for a certain theme from the ground up. No need to wait six to eight levels to make an undead-hating paladin, a viking skald-type bard, or an acrobatic rogue--there are build options from the ground up to accommodate a wide variety of character concepts and the mechanics to realize them.

At first, I found it a bit odd that Pathfinder players were rarely interested prestige classes--they were a mainstay of the third edition era. The more that I think about it, the more I dig the idea of downplaying prestige classes. Players seem to get less tunnel vision about rigorously following a certain build so they can qualify for a prestige class. They have more freedom to select class features, feats, and other options as the campaign develops without having to diverge radically from their established class abilities. Furthermore, one thing that I personally like... It reinforces the idea that characters don't have to wait to get cool abilities, they can do something cool now.

Yeah, I'm not missing prestige classes. Keep the archetypes and alternate class features coming.

 

[Ahnehnois]

I think the problem was not prestige classes, but the fact that base classes were poorly designed and did not continue to gain useful abilities at high levels. Fighters are notoriously weak at higher levels, but even the powerful spellcasters have no class abilities to dissuade them from prestige classes.

Some of the late 3.5 stuff began to show improvement in that area, but it is true that one of PF's successes is a focus on making a core class viable at high levels by eliminating dead levels and adding capstones. Archetypes are also a great addition.

Now prestige classes can be what they were meant to be: highly specialized and optional.

 

[DumbPaladin]

I agree with most of your post, and especially your point about the near-death of prestige classes being a very good thing.

But I must disagree that every class in Pathfinder gets a capstone ability at 20th level. I wish this were so, because it would be fair, but the main arcane and main divine spellcasters -- wizard and cleric -- do not get a capstone ability.

To be perfectly honest, the barbarian doesn't get one either: the bonuses while raging scale up another notch, but that's pretty lame compared to many classes' capstone ability to slay a target instantly.

Still, 17 out of 20 classes (including the 3 alternate classes) ain't bad.

 

[TheAuldGrump]

Heck, they have had entire hardcover books that don't add a single prestige class!

And yeah, archetypes are cool. Replacing a lot of both prestige classes and the non-core base classes of late 3.X.

The Auld Grump

 

[Stormonu]

I hate prestige classes and wish they would go away.

I'd far rather go with traits and themes; things picked when you make the character to help define your background. In a way, they remind me of kits, though a little better balanced (so far).

 

[Mad Hamish]

I agree with most of your post, and especially your point about the near-death of prestige classes being a very good thing.

But I must disagree that every class in Pathfinder gets a capstone ability at 20th level. I wish this were so, because it would be fair, but the main arcane and main divine spellcasters -- wizard and cleric -- do not get a capstone ability.

as a cleric or wizard you don't particularly need a capstone ability when you have 9th level spells.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

A lot of domains/schools/etc... give things at 20th level like immunity to a type of energy, so that's sort of a capstone.

I miss prestige classes. The caster ones that were just plain better than the base class were a blight, but I liked the others as viable options. Now prestige classes just suck, and some of their drawbacks are infuriatingly arbitrary. Why can't a prestige class be your favored class? Why?! Why do prestige classes get nerfed save progressions, yet the medium BAB ones all still start at +0 instead of +1? If they meant to continue the save prgoressions and BAB a base class would've had, the BAB should start at 1. That way it might boost the progression by a level or two, but at least won't destroy your BAB. With it at +0, it will definitely hurt you.

Why does it seem like the entire design philosophy behind prestige classes seems to be "make it suck, but then its last level is a capstone and thus awesome, making the other 9 levels worth it, but it can't be too good because they're getting their capstone 3-4 levels before a base class." That's as succinct as I can describe the thought process. The point of a PrC in many cases seems to be "get your capstone a little early."

Finally, I hate archetypes. The only one I like is Qinggong Monk, because the changes are all optional. Other archetypes don't have to be that loose, but cripes is it annoying when you can't merge two because they're all different except they both replace a level 20 ability (definitely some cases of this, especially with monks). Or both remove heavy armor proficiency but otherwise don't interfere (like Emissary and Beastrider Cavalier), and you can't even pay a feat on heavy armor proficiency just to pay for the second archetype by RAW. Or how by RAW a Ninja can't take all the Rogue archetypes that trade trapsense and trapfinding, even though the Ninja's Poison Use and...the no trace thingy... are probably about equal in power and several of the archetypes thematically fit ninja BETTER... Just some examples. Archetypes are way, way too rigid. I miss the good old "alternate class feature." Stuff that's just line item "replace X with Y," and is (hopefully) a balanced trade on the face of it. None of this archetype crap where a Paladin ends up trading charisma to saves for Celestial as a language (are you kidding me?!) and it's ok, because later on he gets a souped up mount. Or archetypes that give the goodies early and have you pay later. It's so screwed up. The best part of alternate class features is that since they were tied to a certain ability, often times variants or new classes that came out later on with that class feature could then gain that functionality and use the swap themselves, no need for a new printing or special language/rules.

 

[Felon]

I love the idea of prestige classes, that a unique class can be unlocked through dedication. The big problem is that they mostly seem to be designed so that they can be accessed no earlier than 8th level. That is simply a mite too late for most players to care. For that matter, ten levels is probably too much of an investment. Good concept that needed some touching up.

Not sure why the OP finds it odd that players don't show interest in PrC's. All the core classes from 3e got extra stuff lathered onto them, while the PF core PrC's are pretty much copy-pasted without any commensurate extra features. Considering that the core PrC's were generally considered no great shakes in 3e, it's rather peculiar to include but not tweak them.

 

[Osagasu]

Well, the concept of players not taking PrCs doesn't confuse him anymore, just at first.

Though I would like to point out that you're incorrect that the converted PrCs didn't get anything. In fact, most, if not all, of the ones that were converted were given some extra abilities in the conversion to bring them up to Pathfinder power specs.

 

[Dykstrav]

I agree that the prestige class concept needs a bit of work. This is another area where Pathfinder could really shine, if people wanted it to.

In the third edition era, prestige classing was basically a foregone conclusion. I remember playing spellcasters and picking from among prestige classes that didn't subtract from spellcasting. The radiant servant of Pelor was a notorious cleric choice for this--why play a cleric when you could play a radiant servant of Pelor, and get all the cool stuff that clerics got and more? In my neck of the woods, the alienist, mage of the arcane order, and wild mage were the most popular choices for arcane casters because they flat-out gave you more stuff than single-classing as a sorcerer or wizard.

In Pathfinder, prestige classing simply isn't the only viable option. You actually have to give up some cool stuff in order to do it. Consider the probability that the vast majority of campaigns come nowhere close to getting that cool capstone ability. (How many games go all the way from 1st to 20th level?) Prestige classing, as it stands, is an option. That's kind of cool.

For what it's worth, I dig the assassin. My Pathfinder game is set in Greyhawk, the characters will run afoul of Vesparian Lafanel at some point... I'm looking forward to seeing the Pathfinder assassin in action.

Now that the base classes have such a wide selection of customizable abilities to build on, there's less of a need for prestige classes to reflect different builds. I do think that the opportunity for prestige classes now is to ground them in social roles and organizations within a given campaign setting. It might be interesting to see some sort of reputation system and tie certain prestige classes to that some how.