XCorvis
First Post
I'm on the FANCC Netbook of Classes . We see a lot of different prestige classes go through our review process. Some are good, some are bad. A few are excellent. And a few are downright terrible. So we got together and wrote up some advice on designing a well balanced prestige class.
This is a draft version. We're looking for feedback on it. Too preachy? Not worded strongly enuf? Did we miss anything?
One last note - this is not OGC so please don't reprint it. When the final version is done, we'll make it availible.
Thanks,
The Netbook of Classes Team.
------------------------------------------
Advice on designing well balanced prestige classes
The purpose of this document is to help the designers of prestige classes to write balanced classes. In this case, balanced refers both to rules - a balanced class should not be much more powerful (or much weaker) than existing classes, and to flavor - a balanced class should not be less exciting (or too far over the top) than existing classes. In short, a class should not cause problems in the game by its presence.
Below is our advice concerning some of the most common flaws and loopholes of prestige class creation.
Basic Starting Information
Read the section in the SRD on creating classes and prestige classes.
These sections are the starting point for all DMs who wish to create more classes for their players. Good information is given in areas such as power, reason, balancing, and more.
Read Monte Cook's Prestige Class Online Design Workshop, parts 1 and 2.
http://www.montecook.com/arch_dmonly9.html
http://www.montecook.com/arch_dmonly10.html
Then come back and read this. These are good articles on basic class design and are an excellent second step on the way to designing great classes. Monte Cook was instrumental in the creation of the d20 system and of the Third Edition of D&D, and is a legend in the RPG industry.
Generating Ideas for your Prestige Class
Focus.
A prestige class should focus on a specific area of expertise. Core classes are general; prestige classes are specific. The Fighter is an all-purpose warrior, but the Duelist is a lightly armed and armored warrior that relies on quickness of body and mind.
Don't forget the flavor.
Flavor is the reason the class exists. Instead of making just another Assassin prestige class, make the Brotherhood of the Weeping Blade, or The Servants of the Black Lotus. A plain vanilla assassin is boring, but a class that has a well-developed reason for its existence is more fun to play. Flavor includes background, history, who takes the class and why, the member's motivations, goals and organizations, enemies and opposing organizations, story hooks, and anything else that is needed to flesh it out. This isn't a balance issue, but it is a requirement for a good class. A class with good flavor will practically write itself.
Don't take one feature to an extreme and expect to make a balanced class out of it.
In other words, don't over-focus. Being able to manufacture a situation at will that allows the use of a special ability that normally is not used frequently is a game-breaker and munchkin in its purest form. Consider sneak attack: a class that can create opportunities for multiple sneak attacks every round, regardless of the nature of it's opponents, is taking sneak attacking to an extreme. Even more important than it being munchkin is the fact that it is boring. I can't think of a legitimate role-playing reason to have a class like that. While it has been done in the past (the Shifter, for example), it rarely works out well.
There should be a reason not to take the class.
If everyone wants to take it, it shouldn't be a class. Most prestige classes balance this with high requirements, forcing you to specialize in certain areas, making you weak in others. The Toughness, Great Fortitude and Iron Will feats of the Ghostwalker are good examples. You're tough, but in being tough it means you probably don't have access to Whirlwind attack or lots of combat tactic feats. Other classes give you abilities that have negative impact. Outlaw of the Crimson Road has a nasty reputation with law enforcement.
As a counter-example, take the Exorcist. It has every ability that normal clerics have, plus a few more. By taking the prestige class, you have access to all the same skills, spells and abilities that you did previously (as a cleric, at least) and you continue to gain in those areas. You also gain access to additional abilities. The requirements are minimal and completely in line with what an undead-slaying cleric would normally take, with the exception of the "join the church" requirement. So, with minimal effort (in my opinion), a cleric can simply increase the number of abilities he has, adding some really powerful anti-undead and demon powers. There are few reasons for a cleric not to take this class, among them the use of undead/demons as minions or masters.
A good DM will take advantage of this and make sure that the Exorcist is spending a lot of time and effort on the church, but many role-playing disadvantages and requirements are simply ignored by players and DMs alike, requiring more explicit disadvantages to combat munchkinism. For instance, tithes, well-defined codes of honor and taboos are all hard, fast and entirely appropriate ways of limiting a class.
Build your class intending that someone would want to take all available levels.
Don't make classes where you expect PCs to switch away after just a couple of levels. Make sure there are worthwhile abilities at higher levels, and try to spread abilities and powers out so that too many aren't gained at once. One counter-example of this is referred to as "front-loading." The Ranger class is often considered front-loaded because they gain a significant number of abilities and powers at first level: 1 feat, two (powerful) virtual feats and a favored enemy. It is a common munchkin tactic to take one level of ranger to get Two Weapon Fighting and Ambidexterity, and their remaining levels as a fighter.
If you are having trouble making the last few levels worthwhile, consider dropping them. There is no reason a prestige class must have 10 levels. Five, or even three may be more appropriate.
The Abilities of your Prestige Class
When deciding how many abilities to give a class, don't simply choose a number.
Instead, gauge the relative power levels of the abilities granted. The fighter gains a feat about every other level, so if a prestige class grants a few more feats than that it must be more powerful, right? Not necessarily. The prestige class could have access to many fewer feats, less combat oriented ones, etc. A class that can't progress up many of the feat chains a fighter normally does is probably not going to be as strong in combat, but might have advantages in other areas.
Also, nothing says you have to give an ability at every level. Assign abilities as appropriate, not to simply fill holes. A commonly used type of ability is a "scaling ability". These abilities scale (increase) in either power or in frequency of use as the character gains levels in the class. This removes the problems of "outgrowing" abilities (when an ability is no longer useful to the character due to level and power increases). Examples of scaling abilities are Sneak Attack, Uncanny Dodge, and (to a certain extent) BAB and saving throws.
Classes that consist of lists that you can choose special abilities from are usually unbalanced.
You can take the most powerful ability at 1st level and take the weakest at 10th. These classes are inherently front-loaded and lack focus. This type of setup really detracts from the flavor of the class by allowing too much customization and it tends to create problems, like people only taking a few levels of the class and never taking the rest, or winding up with abilities that do not make sense together (because intermediates are missing).
If you want a class that allows for very different "paths" or areas of concentration (such as path for fighting and a path for spellcasting), consider breaking it into two separate classes instead. Then they can be as similar or as different as necessary. (It also makes the classes easier to understand.)
Don't confuse abilities with feats.
Pounce, from the MM, allows you to charge and make a full attack action in the same round. This is not a feat and is not a feat-equivalent ability. It is special, and if it is added to a class, the author needs to remember that it is more powerful than a feat - namely, it has no requirements or limitations. Plus, it was never intended to be added to a class. If you want to use this ability in your class, make sure you balance it out - don't give it at first level, and maybe add some restrictions concerning where and when it can be used. Examples of restrictions could be a finite number of uses per day, limiting the weapons that it can be used with, restricting it's usage to rocky terrain or limiting the move distance to 10', etc.
Likewise, the ability to fly, dig, swim, etc. are all "monster" related abilities - use caution when making them available to a class. There are many others as well.
Useful does not mean appropriate.
Many authors are tempted to add the Heal skill to a combat class because of its usefulness in stabilizing wounds. While this is indeed useful, it's not something that they would necessarily have as a class skill. It may help to ask yourself the question, "What core classes have this skill and why do they have it?" Listen, Spot, Search, and Heal are useful to all classes, but they were given to specific classes for a reason. It is the difference between wanting and needing. Similarly, any skill that is marked "trained only" should only be available to the class if it is necessary for the class to function. The character can learn many skills as cross-class skills, and even if they don't have the skill, they can still attempt most (including Heal) without training. Note that this extends to other abilities, not just skills.
A few guidelines and examples for skills:
Some abilities and maneuvers are powerful and need disadvantages to prevent them from being too powerful. For instance, a class that ignores the "provokes an attack of opportunity" feature when making a coup de gras means that it can be done with virtually no chance to interrupt it. This is already a "save or die" type of maneuver that is powerful enough without any additional help.
Another example would be a class that gives the Wisdom bonus to AC that the monk has while removing restrictions such as the inability to wear armor. Allowing armor in this situation allows for a very high AC, which could easily create problems in the game.
Finalizing your Prestige Class
Requirements should be appropriate for the abilities.
You should never have to look at a class and wonder "Why is that a requirement?" BAB requirements on spellcasting-focused classes are common mistakes. Spellcasting classes should have requirements like ranks in spellcraft or knowledges, or the ability to cast spells of a certain level. Fighting classes should have BAB requirements. Similarly, abilities gained should match the requirements. Classes that grant Spring Attack as a bonus feat should (usually) require Dodge and Mobility as prerequisites.
The number of requirements is also important. Having a lot of requirements, or specialized requirements limits who can take the class. Requiring 10 ranks of Animal Empathy and 10 ranks of Read Lips would limit a class to Ranger 7 (or Druid 7)/Rogue7 characters. Requiring lots of ranks in multiple skills is a sure way to keep characters with low skill points out of a prestige class. When making requirements, work out what class combinations can take the prestige class, and when it is first available to them.
One last tip about requirements: BAB is not the only option! Skills, feats, races, base save bonuses, spell levels, specific spells, spontaneous (or non-spontaneous) casting ability, divine or arcane spell access and special role-playing restrictions are all good requirements. There are really only two things that are not: class level and ability score. These are mentioned in the DMG.
Requirements should limit the class to characters of appropriate power levels.
In Monte Cook's Prestige Class Online Design Workshop, he states that requirements should not be used for game balancing. That being said, there are times when it's necessary to do so and they are often the easiest things to adjust. Specify the requirements as one of the last steps in class creation. If your class is powerful, make the requirements high to balance out the power gain. If the class is not powerful, make the requirements low. It should take high-level characters to qualify for powerful classes and low-level characters to qualify for weaker classes.
When writing codes of behavior (and similar lists of guidelines/restrictions), don't leave a lot of room for interpretation.
Codes of behavior should restrict options for a given situation. Choosing a favored weapon but allowing it to be changed later without penalty is a bad example of a code for a couple reasons: a favored weapon restriction would be more appropriate as an explicit class restriction, rather than as a code of behavior, and the character can simply change the favored weapon as soon as he finds one better than the one he has. Someone with rapier as a favored weapon should not choose to switch it just because he finds a +5 Vorpal Greatsword. If it's not a restriction, it shouldn't be in a code. It's just flavor.
Assume that your class will be exploited.
When publishing a class in any form, you lose all control over who gets to play your class and how they play it. This means that some people will want your class for the flavor and role-playing possibilities, while others will look for some loophole of the class that allows a power combo or munchkin tactics. If you expect this to happen and look for it when designing the class, you can (hopefully) cut out most of these ahead of time.
Playtest.
Even if it is just a few combats. Run through hypothetical situations and figure out where your class has problems. Also remember that a class that playtests well with one group may not with another.
This is a draft version. We're looking for feedback on it. Too preachy? Not worded strongly enuf? Did we miss anything?
One last note - this is not OGC so please don't reprint it. When the final version is done, we'll make it availible.
Thanks,
The Netbook of Classes Team.
------------------------------------------
Advice on designing well balanced prestige classes
The purpose of this document is to help the designers of prestige classes to write balanced classes. In this case, balanced refers both to rules - a balanced class should not be much more powerful (or much weaker) than existing classes, and to flavor - a balanced class should not be less exciting (or too far over the top) than existing classes. In short, a class should not cause problems in the game by its presence.
Below is our advice concerning some of the most common flaws and loopholes of prestige class creation.
Basic Starting Information
Read the section in the SRD on creating classes and prestige classes.
These sections are the starting point for all DMs who wish to create more classes for their players. Good information is given in areas such as power, reason, balancing, and more.
Read Monte Cook's Prestige Class Online Design Workshop, parts 1 and 2.
http://www.montecook.com/arch_dmonly9.html
http://www.montecook.com/arch_dmonly10.html
Then come back and read this. These are good articles on basic class design and are an excellent second step on the way to designing great classes. Monte Cook was instrumental in the creation of the d20 system and of the Third Edition of D&D, and is a legend in the RPG industry.
Generating Ideas for your Prestige Class
Focus.
A prestige class should focus on a specific area of expertise. Core classes are general; prestige classes are specific. The Fighter is an all-purpose warrior, but the Duelist is a lightly armed and armored warrior that relies on quickness of body and mind.
Don't forget the flavor.
Flavor is the reason the class exists. Instead of making just another Assassin prestige class, make the Brotherhood of the Weeping Blade, or The Servants of the Black Lotus. A plain vanilla assassin is boring, but a class that has a well-developed reason for its existence is more fun to play. Flavor includes background, history, who takes the class and why, the member's motivations, goals and organizations, enemies and opposing organizations, story hooks, and anything else that is needed to flesh it out. This isn't a balance issue, but it is a requirement for a good class. A class with good flavor will practically write itself.
Don't take one feature to an extreme and expect to make a balanced class out of it.
In other words, don't over-focus. Being able to manufacture a situation at will that allows the use of a special ability that normally is not used frequently is a game-breaker and munchkin in its purest form. Consider sneak attack: a class that can create opportunities for multiple sneak attacks every round, regardless of the nature of it's opponents, is taking sneak attacking to an extreme. Even more important than it being munchkin is the fact that it is boring. I can't think of a legitimate role-playing reason to have a class like that. While it has been done in the past (the Shifter, for example), it rarely works out well.
There should be a reason not to take the class.
If everyone wants to take it, it shouldn't be a class. Most prestige classes balance this with high requirements, forcing you to specialize in certain areas, making you weak in others. The Toughness, Great Fortitude and Iron Will feats of the Ghostwalker are good examples. You're tough, but in being tough it means you probably don't have access to Whirlwind attack or lots of combat tactic feats. Other classes give you abilities that have negative impact. Outlaw of the Crimson Road has a nasty reputation with law enforcement.
As a counter-example, take the Exorcist. It has every ability that normal clerics have, plus a few more. By taking the prestige class, you have access to all the same skills, spells and abilities that you did previously (as a cleric, at least) and you continue to gain in those areas. You also gain access to additional abilities. The requirements are minimal and completely in line with what an undead-slaying cleric would normally take, with the exception of the "join the church" requirement. So, with minimal effort (in my opinion), a cleric can simply increase the number of abilities he has, adding some really powerful anti-undead and demon powers. There are few reasons for a cleric not to take this class, among them the use of undead/demons as minions or masters.
A good DM will take advantage of this and make sure that the Exorcist is spending a lot of time and effort on the church, but many role-playing disadvantages and requirements are simply ignored by players and DMs alike, requiring more explicit disadvantages to combat munchkinism. For instance, tithes, well-defined codes of honor and taboos are all hard, fast and entirely appropriate ways of limiting a class.
Build your class intending that someone would want to take all available levels.
Don't make classes where you expect PCs to switch away after just a couple of levels. Make sure there are worthwhile abilities at higher levels, and try to spread abilities and powers out so that too many aren't gained at once. One counter-example of this is referred to as "front-loading." The Ranger class is often considered front-loaded because they gain a significant number of abilities and powers at first level: 1 feat, two (powerful) virtual feats and a favored enemy. It is a common munchkin tactic to take one level of ranger to get Two Weapon Fighting and Ambidexterity, and their remaining levels as a fighter.
If you are having trouble making the last few levels worthwhile, consider dropping them. There is no reason a prestige class must have 10 levels. Five, or even three may be more appropriate.
The Abilities of your Prestige Class
When deciding how many abilities to give a class, don't simply choose a number.
Instead, gauge the relative power levels of the abilities granted. The fighter gains a feat about every other level, so if a prestige class grants a few more feats than that it must be more powerful, right? Not necessarily. The prestige class could have access to many fewer feats, less combat oriented ones, etc. A class that can't progress up many of the feat chains a fighter normally does is probably not going to be as strong in combat, but might have advantages in other areas.
Also, nothing says you have to give an ability at every level. Assign abilities as appropriate, not to simply fill holes. A commonly used type of ability is a "scaling ability". These abilities scale (increase) in either power or in frequency of use as the character gains levels in the class. This removes the problems of "outgrowing" abilities (when an ability is no longer useful to the character due to level and power increases). Examples of scaling abilities are Sneak Attack, Uncanny Dodge, and (to a certain extent) BAB and saving throws.
Classes that consist of lists that you can choose special abilities from are usually unbalanced.
You can take the most powerful ability at 1st level and take the weakest at 10th. These classes are inherently front-loaded and lack focus. This type of setup really detracts from the flavor of the class by allowing too much customization and it tends to create problems, like people only taking a few levels of the class and never taking the rest, or winding up with abilities that do not make sense together (because intermediates are missing).
If you want a class that allows for very different "paths" or areas of concentration (such as path for fighting and a path for spellcasting), consider breaking it into two separate classes instead. Then they can be as similar or as different as necessary. (It also makes the classes easier to understand.)
Don't confuse abilities with feats.
Pounce, from the MM, allows you to charge and make a full attack action in the same round. This is not a feat and is not a feat-equivalent ability. It is special, and if it is added to a class, the author needs to remember that it is more powerful than a feat - namely, it has no requirements or limitations. Plus, it was never intended to be added to a class. If you want to use this ability in your class, make sure you balance it out - don't give it at first level, and maybe add some restrictions concerning where and when it can be used. Examples of restrictions could be a finite number of uses per day, limiting the weapons that it can be used with, restricting it's usage to rocky terrain or limiting the move distance to 10', etc.
Likewise, the ability to fly, dig, swim, etc. are all "monster" related abilities - use caution when making them available to a class. There are many others as well.
Useful does not mean appropriate.
Many authors are tempted to add the Heal skill to a combat class because of its usefulness in stabilizing wounds. While this is indeed useful, it's not something that they would necessarily have as a class skill. It may help to ask yourself the question, "What core classes have this skill and why do they have it?" Listen, Spot, Search, and Heal are useful to all classes, but they were given to specific classes for a reason. It is the difference between wanting and needing. Similarly, any skill that is marked "trained only" should only be available to the class if it is necessary for the class to function. The character can learn many skills as cross-class skills, and even if they don't have the skill, they can still attempt most (including Heal) without training. Note that this extends to other abilities, not just skills.
A few guidelines and examples for skills:
- Knowledge skills require formalized training, such as schooling or intensive study. It's tempting to give a nomad class Knowledge: Nature, but Wilderness Lore is really the more appropriate choice.
- Spot and Listen are for classes where alertness is very important.
- Craft and Profession are catchall skill categories that should be available to all but the most specialized classes.
- Heal is for healers - those who spend time with the sick or wounded.
- The use of psionic skills should be limited to those classes that involve psionic abilities.
Some abilities and maneuvers are powerful and need disadvantages to prevent them from being too powerful. For instance, a class that ignores the "provokes an attack of opportunity" feature when making a coup de gras means that it can be done with virtually no chance to interrupt it. This is already a "save or die" type of maneuver that is powerful enough without any additional help.
Another example would be a class that gives the Wisdom bonus to AC that the monk has while removing restrictions such as the inability to wear armor. Allowing armor in this situation allows for a very high AC, which could easily create problems in the game.
Finalizing your Prestige Class
Requirements should be appropriate for the abilities.
You should never have to look at a class and wonder "Why is that a requirement?" BAB requirements on spellcasting-focused classes are common mistakes. Spellcasting classes should have requirements like ranks in spellcraft or knowledges, or the ability to cast spells of a certain level. Fighting classes should have BAB requirements. Similarly, abilities gained should match the requirements. Classes that grant Spring Attack as a bonus feat should (usually) require Dodge and Mobility as prerequisites.
The number of requirements is also important. Having a lot of requirements, or specialized requirements limits who can take the class. Requiring 10 ranks of Animal Empathy and 10 ranks of Read Lips would limit a class to Ranger 7 (or Druid 7)/Rogue7 characters. Requiring lots of ranks in multiple skills is a sure way to keep characters with low skill points out of a prestige class. When making requirements, work out what class combinations can take the prestige class, and when it is first available to them.
One last tip about requirements: BAB is not the only option! Skills, feats, races, base save bonuses, spell levels, specific spells, spontaneous (or non-spontaneous) casting ability, divine or arcane spell access and special role-playing restrictions are all good requirements. There are really only two things that are not: class level and ability score. These are mentioned in the DMG.
Requirements should limit the class to characters of appropriate power levels.
In Monte Cook's Prestige Class Online Design Workshop, he states that requirements should not be used for game balancing. That being said, there are times when it's necessary to do so and they are often the easiest things to adjust. Specify the requirements as one of the last steps in class creation. If your class is powerful, make the requirements high to balance out the power gain. If the class is not powerful, make the requirements low. It should take high-level characters to qualify for powerful classes and low-level characters to qualify for weaker classes.
When writing codes of behavior (and similar lists of guidelines/restrictions), don't leave a lot of room for interpretation.
Codes of behavior should restrict options for a given situation. Choosing a favored weapon but allowing it to be changed later without penalty is a bad example of a code for a couple reasons: a favored weapon restriction would be more appropriate as an explicit class restriction, rather than as a code of behavior, and the character can simply change the favored weapon as soon as he finds one better than the one he has. Someone with rapier as a favored weapon should not choose to switch it just because he finds a +5 Vorpal Greatsword. If it's not a restriction, it shouldn't be in a code. It's just flavor.
Assume that your class will be exploited.
When publishing a class in any form, you lose all control over who gets to play your class and how they play it. This means that some people will want your class for the flavor and role-playing possibilities, while others will look for some loophole of the class that allows a power combo or munchkin tactics. If you expect this to happen and look for it when designing the class, you can (hopefully) cut out most of these ahead of time.
Playtest.
Even if it is just a few combats. Run through hypothetical situations and figure out where your class has problems. Also remember that a class that playtests well with one group may not with another.
