What I really miss from "the olden days"...

[Dannyalcatraz]

This has long been one of my most serious reservations about d20 games.

When prestige classes were introduced, the initial idea was that these could be uses as tools for the referee to use in world-building, but in my experience soon they became just another set of stats for the players to eye when considering what their characters would be in five, ten, or twenty levels.

Much like the 2Ed kits that inspired them, PrCls are just tools, and what you get out of them depends on what you put into them. Speaking only for myself, I use them only when appropriate for the PC: some of my 3.X PCs have non prCls, some have 2-3.

(FWIW, I also have DMs that control what classes are available, base and PrCl alike.)

 

[The Shaman]

Much like the 2Ed kits that inspired them, PrCls are just tools, and what you get out of them depends on what you put into them.

Obviously.

(FWIW, I also have DMs that control what classes are available, base and PrCl alike.)

Which is how they were originally presented, and, in my opinion, how they are used most effectively.

I no longer own any of three-point-x-ray books, so I can't quote the exact language to you anymore, but there was a shift in the approach to prestige classes between three-oh and three-point-five; my feeling was that Whizbros discovered prestige classes sold well to players at least as well as to, and perhaps moreso than, dungeon masters, so they became more player-centric than setting-centric during the publication history of the game.

In any case, my point remains: d20 character construction can be, and in my experience often is, divorced from the events of the game itself. The game becomes more about what the character is going to be and less about what the character has actually done, and I don't find that to be a worthwhile tradeoff.

 

[Ourph]

Well... a large part of real world nostalgia is simply the human mind / psyche at work... we have a natural tendency to forget a lot of the bad and remember mostly the good...

So looking backwards in time, trying to remember how things were, includes a natural tendency towards those rosy glasses...

I think you should be aware that there is no basis in scientific fact for this statement. We tend to remember things that support our biases and forget things that disprove them. This is called the Confirmation Bias and it affects both memories for the past and our judgement of evidence in the present. For example, a person biased against a certain game might insist that someone's positive memory of past experiences with that game is distorted by "rose colored glasses", while accepting that other people's negative memories of past experiences with the game are completely valid (because those testimonials agree with the bias). However, there is no preset preference for either positive or negative experiences in this particular psychological phenomenon. Both negative and positive memories are just as likely to be distortions of reality.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

Obviously.Which is how they were originally presented, and, in my opinion, how they are used most effectively.

That's great in theory, however I find that it only tangentially applies to many, many PrCs.

Yes, becoming a Knight of the Whatever and taking levels in their associate PrC fits the sort of mold you prefer. Sometimes. The Red Wizard PrC also fits in here, as well as the Assassin PrC, since they largely fit the mold of "This is the sort of special training offered only by certain groups."

Take, on the other hand, the Eldritch Knight PrC. Why does my character need to find a secretive order to, essentially, learn to do what I'm already doing, more effectively? I'm already playing some form of Fighter / Mage - the PrC just lets me do it in a single class (and, perhaps more importantly, suck less while doing so).

Or, perhaps, the Thief-Acrobat PrC, which says, "You've been investing all your skill points in ways to mundanely-but-expertly move around the battlespace; this PrC is exactly that, only moreso." Again, the requirement to "find an in-game group to teach you these skills" seems a little thin, since my character has been self-teaching himself Tumbling, et al., for 5 or 6 levels now.

If there weren't any "Math Fix" or "Specialization in Something You're Already Doing" PrCs, I might agree that the original rationale could be more broadly applied. There are, though, so I don't agree.

 

[Aus_Snow]

DMG 3.5, p. 176:

"Prestige classes are purely optional and always under the purview of the DM. We encourage you, as the DM, to tightly limit the prestige classes available in your campaign."

Following on from that, assuming you might want to use PrCs at all:

"The example prestige classes are certainly not all encompassing or definitive. They might not even be appropriate for your campaign. The best prestige classes for your campaign are the ones you tailor make yourself."

 

[The Shaman]

"Prestige classes are purely optional and always under the purview of the DM. We encourage you, as the DM, to tightly limit the prestige classes available in your campaign."

Not the language to which I was referring, which had more to do with making prestige classes specific to the setting.

Again, I no longer have the books, or I would quote it for you.

Be that as it may, the massive proliferation of prestige classes and the marketing of books with PrCs to players as well as dungeon masters worked against what was written in the DMG, from what I observed.

 

[Locien]

To be honest, the role that PrCs eventually filled was something that people liked, and tended to fill niches that the rules didn't quite support. An eldrich knight made arcane magic user/fighter builds more viable, and other PrCs did other, interesting things. In all honesty there should have been advanced classes(secondary classes that offered new features as a part of the main system, and not an add on) that were all the non-setting type PrCs should have been-fulfill the requirements and then you take it like any other level. It was just that PrCs were more useful in creating more character options for growth than as a setting aid. If you did introduce advanced class like options PrCs are less likely to be highjacked.

 

[Tuft]

Anything with heavy preconditions enforces preplanned builds instead of characters organically grown as reaction to the world and in-world events. Pre-conditioned feats and feat chains are just as guilty as prestige classes and paragon paths.

When I played 3.X, my favorite part of leveling was always assigning skill points. One meager part (skill points are always meager, no matter how skill-heavy class you have ) to skills that "belonged" to the character, one meager part to skills you recently had used, one part to those you could foresee use for in the future. Delicious decision agony indeed. When selecting feats, in contrast, you followed pre-planned feat chains. Boooring...

When my DM did his 4E try-out campaign, not only did I lose the simple joy of skill-point selection, but everything felt as it needed pre-planning, including magic item selection - no during-play decisions at all . My DM soon got tired of ever-shifting wishlists and instituted a 100% buy-back policy on magic items. He put in items with cool-sounding names, and we could use 100% of their value to buy the stuff we really wanted. We looked at stuff he had picked, though, and one stuck in the mind. If I recall correctly, it was a halberd that was usable only for a tiefling warlock multiclassed to warlord, who had picked a certain paragon path, and I think picked a certain feat on top of that. Just how would that item even get into play if not through heavy pre-planning and heavy wish-listing? (Note: Example included to illustrate a trend, not for edition warring!)

Now I play in my DMs homebrew system, which is point-buy-based with very few and simple preconditions. He allows you to spend points to buy character abilities, skills and powers in mid-play, as you discover you need them, which means that character growth is extremely tied to what happens during game play. What your character becomes is a record of what happened in actual play, instead of the game-play merely being a test-bench to verify the performance of your pre-planned build. And as you can surmise, I love that kind of organic growth...

 

[LostSoul]

I am playing (4E) with the notion that players only have access to character build material from the PHB, and if they want to use anything else they have to discover it in the game world.

It's not really working out well. I think it's because I didn't support it enough during setting creation. The one exception is wizard spells - I have a (crappy) system to generate spells & rituals for NPC wizards, and wizards don't automatically get new spells when they level up.

I still think the idea has merit but my implementation so far has been poor.

 

[JamesonCourage]

Now I play in my DMs homebrew system, which is point-buy-based with very few and simple preconditions. He allows you to spend points to buy character abilities, skills and powers in mid-play, as you discover you need them, which means that character growth is extremely tied to what happens during game play. What your character becomes is a record of what happened in actual play, instead of the game-play merely being a test-bench to verify the performance of your pre-planned build. And as you can surmise, I love that kind of organic growth...

That's exactly how my game works, too. It was tough to create (from a "balance" sense), but it's pretty great. I love seeing characters buy things like Endurance because they think their character should have it, and it's useful to the situation at hand. Then, a few hit die later, they decide to sleep in their armor, and I say, "you'll get fatigued." They just smile and reply with "nope, I got Endurance when I was sleeping in the forest every night, on the run from the guards with Vordin."

It's nice to see that their decisions pay off. Lots of people sprinkle in a couple ranks in Survival, or in a Knowledge, or even Gather Information. It leads to characters with more "life experience" than "level 2, I get Evasion."

Also, to anyone else interested in this style of play, one major upside to the players is constant growth. I broke each level down, and every X amount of experience, you earn 1 character point (that you can save or spend on things). Every level offers 15 character points. Which means that after, say, 3 points into level 1, a warrior can boost his base attack to +2. You don't get all of your abilities in one lump sum at level up, like you do in most games with levels. This causes players to feel a sense of constant growth in game, and they are much more likely to be okay with slower leveling, as they are still constantly rewarded with new abilities of their own choosing.

But, a lot of people like a more streamlined system, and I can understand that. I just saw someone who talked about "homebrew point-buy" and had to chime in. Don't mind me In the end, play what you like