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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Li Shenron" data-source="post: 6173225" data-attributes="member: 1465">Yesterday evening I just took out my early 3.0 splatbooks and browsed through prestige classes, thinking how we might see those character concepts and their specific features/ability again in 5e...3e prestige classes were a great idea conceptually, giving the opportunity to represent specializations, memberships in closed groups, and more. Unfortunately many of them were poorly designed for various reasons, and IMO it was also boring to see them used as "tricks" to attempt at fixing some shortcomings of the core rules (e.g. PrCls used just to make some multiclass combo more feasible). IMHO the biggest issue with PrCls was actually players' fault to see them as pure exploitation territory since it was freely allowed to multiclass into as many as you wanted.Nevertheless, the concepts of prestige class and paragon path are sound, the problems were in their design (as a whole, and individually) and exploitation. If you detest the concept itself, please avoid this thread, thank you <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" />Please note that I don't play 4e, therefore I am not familiar with how paragon paths work, and what paragon paths exist, but since I guess they are a related concept, feel free to add your opinions on them to this discussion!---The current situation: we have at least 2 different mechanics in 5e to represent character concepts previously implemented as prestige classes, subclasses and feats. Let's take a look at the implications of using either...Subclasses:1) each subclass belong to one and only class (so far)2) you choose yours at 3rd level or similar, in any case it is an early choice, and you must choose it at that point3) the benefits are granted gradually over the course of your 20 levels, split into 4-6 steps, benefits can either represent a progression or be separate4) in the standard game a subclass has a fixed progression (once chosen, you take the whole path)*5) subclasses are exclusives, you can only have one*6) some classes currently follow a pattern in their subclasses (e.g. domain spells) but in general it should be possible to design a subclass features quite freely, as long as it can be "plugged in" at those levels[*but in the advanced game it's possible for the DM to allow mixing subclasses benefits]Feats:1) feats are generally available to all classes, but sometimes have prerequisites that might restrict some class2) you choose feats at different levels, first one at 4th the others later, 4-7 per class3) each feat is a self-contained, all-or-nothing bunch of 1-3 benefits, however there are also feat chains to represent progressions4) a feat chain doesn't have to be taken all, you can stop at any point5) feat chains are not exclusives, you can freely mix them6) feat design is bound only to the magnitude of each, if a wanted feature exceed the magnitude then a feat chain is requiredAnd let's check what were the characteristics of prestige classes in 3e...Prestige Classes:1) prestige classes are generally to all classes, but sometimes have prerequisites that might restrict some class (and this was actually very common)2) you can enter a prestige class at any level, usually 6th is the minimum3) each prestige class necessarily offers a progression (usually up to 10 levels max) because it actually replaces your advancement in the base class; the prestige class own features can be either progressive or separate4) a prestige class doesn't have to be taken all, you can stop at any point5) prestige classes are not exclusives, you can take multiple ones6) prestige classes design is bound by the fact that they replace levels advancement in your base class, i.e. they have to let you increase basic stats and possibly spellcasting---Some observations...Subclasses directly modify a class, so they can be great for representing prestige classes that are stylistic variations of a specific class or may imply heavy alterations/improvements to how that class feature works, and may not be applicable to other classes anyway. The main limitations IMO are (1) they are not good to represent concepts that should instead be applicable across classes, (2) they start so early that they don't represent well membership in "elite groups", (3) you can't have more than one unless you're willing to do some adaptation work with the DM.Feats are great for stuff that you want applicable to different classes, e.g. to represent membership in a group that includes a variety of characters united by something else than skills. Also, they could easily have a level requirement (explicit or implicit) to represent truly a "prestige" group. If you want to allow more than one membership in your high-level games, feats already do that. I don't see any significant downside in using feats to represent prestige classes, except maybe that some class gets almost twice as many compared to others.Overall feats look more suitable than subclasses, however there are some old prestige classes that aren't really needed by anyone else than a single class, and still look like they would be easier to design as a subclass.Now one of the questions is: with subclasses and feats, do we have enough mechanics to represent well the concepts covered by 3e prestige classes and 4e paragon paths, or do we need yet another set of rules?In my next posts, I'll present some thoughts of mine on a few specific prestige classes from early 3e splatbooks.</blockquote>

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