NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pming" data-source="post: 6467906" data-attributes="member: 45197">Hiya!  If you look at your 4th sentence...that's what you should be focusing on for creating your "prestige classes". You say you "...liked that concept alot...". But then you make the mistake, IMHO, of assuming that primarily mechanical combat-oriented bonuses will somehow give you that "concept". It won't. It will lead to a more combat-oriented "My Normal Class, but turned up to 11!", and all that flavour...all that potential "role-playing and exploration based pillar" will be lost.  I would HIGHLY suggest you try and make your version of prestige classes "balanced" from the three-tier aspect of the game. A couple of interesting and different (note that I said different...) combat nuggets make that third of the 5e pie interesting....not simply "yeah, that...but better!". For the RP third of the 5e pie, I'd DEFINITLY encourage a "you are invited" or "they will accept you as a student after you do X, Y and Z; not simply let the player "choose". It seems you are already leaning in this direction. Good for 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=":)" /> As for the last third of the pie, exploration, a mix of RP and mechanics seems to fit the bill for me. I'd look into creating a particular Skill that is only taught by the PrC guild/cabal/whatever. The skill shouldn't be simply a "one-up" of an existing skill; it should be something that gives the character something different he can do with it. For an example, perhaps the arcane archer could have a "Skill Focus" (lets call it) of "Perception (SF: Distance)" when he gets his first level of the PrC. This would let the character be a better judge of distance; "Any Perception skill check involving the need for accurate distance (distance to target, size of target, speed of target, etc.) is made at Advantage". Then, maybe a couple PrC levels later, add in "If a Perception (SF: Distance) check is made, the short range of the bow becomes the entire maximum distance of the bow". That gives a mechanical bonus (good), but doesn't really "add something completely new" to the game. The first part of that Skill Focus doesn't even do that...it just adds a 'bonus' to the Exploration aspect of the game (you can see at distance, 'better' than most others).  Anyway...if/when you get to the "spells into arrows", I'd work with the existing rules. I'd probably make the Arcane Archer have to "pre-cast" spells into arrows...using up their Spell Slots. I'd also make them have to attune to a particular bow, and any of their ensorcelled arrows would only be effective when shot with that bow by that Arcane Archer. That kind of thing. You don't want to make being an Arcane Archer "better" than being a regular bow specialist...you want to make them different and interesting. Basically, what you don't want is an Arcane Archer to be a mechanically better choice as far as "spellcasting" goes; if an Arcane Archer is upstaging the Wizard...you did something wrong.Remember: "Here's another +1" = BAD.... ... "Heres something different you can do" = GOOD. All IMHO, of course.^_^Paul L. Ming</blockquote>

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