Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
ShortQuests -- individual adventure modules! An all-new collection of digest-sized D&D adventures designed to plug in to your game.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="GuardianLurker" data-source="post: 2837198" data-attributes="member: 786">On point #2 : I agree. Which of course means that the bard, druid, monk, paladin, and ranger go. On point #4: sufficiently broad, in my mind, means that you can build other concepts by multiclassing two or more base classes; the bard, for instance, is an instantiation of rogue/wizard (with some flavor tweaks), an both the paladin and ranger are fighter/clerics. Having said that, I'm not against semi-base classes - base classes that optimize/combine a very common build.On point #5: That's where things start getting slippy - is the Berserker/Barbarian sufficiently different from a Fighter that you wouldn't want to emulate it as a tree? How about Swashbuckler?If WotC is going to go down this road, which I think is a good one, they could do a lot worse than look at Rolemaster's class relationships. (Rolemaster has other problems, but there's a lot of sound theory in there too.)Rolemaster break classes down into "realms", and the proportion a class mixes those realms, as well as the role each class fills within the realm.For instance, assuming the realms are Arms, Divine, Arcane, and Psionics, and using 3e classes :Realm of Arms: (pure/tank) Fighter, (pure/unarmed) Monk, (pure/mobile) Swashbuckler, (pure/ranged) *unfilled*, (pure/berserker) Barbarian, (semi-divine) Paladin or Ranger, (semi-arcane) Warmage, (semi-psionic) Psychic WarriorRealm of Skills: (pure) Rogue or Expert, (semi-arms) Scout, (semi-arcane) Bard, (semi-divine) *unfilled*, (semi-psionics) Lurk Realm of Divine: (pure/deity-worshipper) Cleric, (pure/animist) Spirt Shaman or Druid, (semi-arcane) *unfilled*, (semi-psionic) ArdentRealm of Arcane: (pure) Wizard, (semi-psionic) *unfilled*, (semi-arcane) BardRealm of Psionics: (pure) PsionYou may also want to add the distinction between Spontaneous and Prepared casters, in which case:Realm of Divine: (pure/spontaneous) Favored SoulRealm of Arcane: (pure/spontaneous) SorcerorRealm of Psionics: (pure/prepared) EruditePersonally, it think Monte's AE classes do a better job at many of those slots: Warmain over Fighter, Oathsworn over Monk, Unfettered over Swashbuckler, Mageblade over Warmage.Basically, you design your class matrix with orthagonal categories for your base classes; anything above that, or more specialized, you make a PrC or Feat/Talent-tree based on how much it diverges from the main concept. The Realms and roles breakdown is variable to some degree. There may not be a whole lot of difference between mobiled and ranged Arms, for instance, and you could argue for a Realm of Skills. And the role division is certainly varied. But the basic point remains the same.</blockquote>

Verification