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Message: <blockquote data-quote="RangerWickett" data-source="post: 165776" data-attributes="member: 63">I hope everyone will calm down a little bit, since we don't want a flame war here.  People disagree, so no big deal.As a designer of many rules, including a lot of prestige classes, I try to make sure that they're balanced, because a lot of players like balanced games.  As a game master and player, I realize that the average prestige class is less likely to unbalance a party than a character who rolls an 18 for his Strength.  In truth, as long as everyone has a chance to contribute, either mechanically or dramatically, I don't care if I have a group with 10 1st level characters and one 20th level character.  The goal is to have fun and tell a good story, and balance is not necessarily required for this.I mostly just make magic-based prestige classes, because for non-magic classes, most of the abilities _can_ be emulated with feats.  That being said, though, I tend to view non-magic prestige classes as a package deal, an easy way to balance a diversity of powers.  I would let a fighter take "Third Hand" (a Lasher ability) as a feat, or take a level in the class, depending on how much he wants to devote his character to the concept.Really, why have classes and levels?  You could just make everything skill-based, letting you craft a character however you want.  But then you lose some of the feel of D&D, which is that you can say, "I'm a 10th level fighter."  Everyone knows you've got a pretty powerful combat character there, and it's easier to make a mental image of the power and role of that character.  True, you'd have more depth if you said, "I'm Regdar the Mighty, who slew the white wyrm Calcryx only ten days after I left my warrior academy, and has since claimed the lives and treasure of a dozen more fiendish drakes."Cool, we know a lot about you.But from a rules standpoint, it's a lot easier to wrap your head around "I'm a 10th level fighter."Likewise, prestige classes are a way to define your character quickly and easily.  They're not necessary at all, but they are useful in helping players realize how their character is different from other characters.  They're an interesting tool, but not for everyone.Oh, and one last thing, on the matter of whether prestige classes should require organizations, consider this: if you say that some prestige classes can be emulated by feats, then all a prestige class inherently is is a combination of powers that a character can gain.  If you don't require your PCs to join an organization to learn Cleave, Great Cleave, and Sunder, why make them _have_ to join one to become a Lasher?  And if spellcasters can learn all kinds of spells on their own, who's to say that they _have_ to visit the library of the Loremasters to gain all the powers of a loremaster.Don't decide whether you want an organization in your game.  Decide if you'd have a problem with there being a character with a given power.  Then, if the player really wants that ability for his character (and afterall, it's a communal game, so you shouldn't dash your players' hopes), then you could just say that he trains himself.  Logically, if there are Loremasters now, or Lashers, or Ninjas of the Crescent Moon, or Void Disciples, then some time in the past, somebody was the first member of that group.  If he could train himself, so can your PC.  The organizations are one way to explain a prestige class, just like saying, "I stab him in the lung with my sneak attack."  There can be alternate explanations, though.  "I jam my dagger into his wrist and dislocate his elbow," or "I stab him in the lung" are just two ways to describe +5d6 sneak attack damage.  The rules are just mechanics, a skeleton.  It is up to the players and the GM to decide what the flesh should look like.</blockquote>

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