Why can't PRC's do the opposite? Maybe that's why they touch a nerve.

[Emirikol]

I've been thinking about PrC's and I think I may have found part of the problem why so many people are so unhappy with them.

Other than the fact that there are so many in poor execution...I'm thinking the crux of the problem is that they "overspecialize" a character. You have to overspecialize to get there and then you are cornered into even more overspecialization when you get there.

Why can't PrC's do the opposite of overspecialization? Wouldn't that solve a huge chunk of the problem?

Thoughts?

jh
P.s. that and just having a level minimum rather than all the other 'stuff.'

 

[Storyteller01]

Don't take them if you don't want to be pigeon hole'd?

 

[Emirikol]

Don't take them if you don't want to be pigeon hole'd?

That doesn't address the problem though. The problem is that they overspecialize. Why can't they do the opposite for the same level of power?

jh

 

[Mouseferatu]

That doesn't address the problem though. The problem is that they overspecialize. Why can't they do the opposite for the same level of power?

Because that's simply not feasible under D&D's basic design assumptions.

There's a reason the game assumes the whole "every niche is filled by someone" mentality. Everything aboud D&D's class system assumes, encourages, and even requires an increasing level of specialization. By the time they're high level, rogues can do things without even rolling that a fighter could scarcely manage on a natural 20; fighters routinely hit foes that wizards couldn't dream of touching, and so forth.

Multiclassing offers a wider range of functionality at the expense of power and expertise. In some cases, it does so perhaps a bit too much, but that's where the "theurge" PrCs come in. But even they sacrifice top-level power for a wider scope.

A PrC that offered an increase in scope without any corresponding decrease of overall power would, to be blunt, shatter the game as it's currently designed. D&D is intended to force party cooperation, to give everyone a chance to shine under different circumstances, and to ensure that no one character or character type can "do it all," and still do it well.

What you're asking for isn't a change to PrCs. It's a ground-up change to the entire game engine, and even the flavor and settings designed around those assumptions.

 

[Mouseferatu]

And BTW, you're once again taking a relatively tiny subjective sample and declaring it an objective truth. If sometimes seems like "so many" people have a problem with PrCs, but they're still an immensely popular mechanic over the length and breadth of the audience as a whole.

 

[Andor]

Specialization is generally the point of PRCs. You could make a generalist PrC sure, but why would you ever need more than one?

My personal problem with PrCs is that they often imply that the members of the PrC are members of some large organization of people with this PrC, which flies in the face of the "High-level characters are rare" meme which most game worlds (Forgotten Realms excepted, obviously) employ. Why is my PC the only guy who can save the day when a standard chapter house of the Knights of the Mystic Codpiece has 25 higher level characters according to the 12 pages of fluff on the order in the Book of Iron Spam?

 

[Satori]

All the base classes are designed to be "Generalists". A "Generalist" can do a number of things moderately well, but nothing extraordinarily well. They are the "Swiss Army Knife" of classes...when you aren't sure what you want your PC to do, play a Base Class.

A Prestige Class is a "Specialist". If, at any point, you decide you want your PC to do "X" better than "Y", you choose a Prestige Class that gives bonuses to "X" while minimizing "Y".

You don't become a "Specialist" to "Generalize", nor do you become a "Generalist" to "Specialize".

 

[Celebrim]

Because that's simply not feasible under D&D's basic design assumptions.

You are wrong to assume that this is a problem native to the D20 system, or that it is not feasible under D&D basic design assumptions. While it is certainly true that D&D encourages a 'niche', the whole point of a class system is to encourage the opposite of specialization by forcing players to 'pay' for broad variaty of class benefits that you don't need and which - if you were inclined to power game - you would willingly trade for being better at the one thing that you do.

In fact, the problem 'Johnny-One Shot' - the hyper-specialized character that does only one thing but that one thing phenomenally well - is even more of a problem in point buy systems like GURPS or even White Wolf's story-teller. The class system is in part designed to stop this sort of hyper-specialization.

There is a thing which already exist which does the opposite of what (at least some) PrC's do, and that thing is called a 'base class'.

Once again, I reiterate that the single biggest design failure of 3rd edition is the existance of PrC's.

 

[Destil]

What do you mean by "do the opposite of overspecialization"? I'll argue that the Mystic Thurge, Elderitch Knight and Arcane trickster type classes do just that, for instance. Each lets you fill two rolls, but you're not as good at either (while not sucking entirely at either, like a pure multiclass PC may in many cases).

We already have broad, generic core classes for 2 of the 3 big rolls: Fighter (meatshield / smack people around) and rogue (sneaky / social skills / traps).

Magic is of course a mess with Cleric / Wizard / Sorcerer all competing and filling two separate sub-niches (a pison is about the best general mage type out there).

The remainder of the classes are a bit more specific, but still fairly broad. If you want a more general class what would it look like? A bard without the musical flavor I'd guess. May make an interesting PRC, but if you do it right you should only ever need one such class.

 

[Celebrim]

My personal problem with PrCs is that they often imply that the members of the PrC are members of some large organization of people with this PrC, which...

I would like to point out that as I understand it Monte Cook justified the inclusion of PrC's into the game primarily on the grounds that they encouraged the DM to invent just these sorts of large organizations and that the benefit to the game of this was greater than the negative impact mechanically of having the PrC's.

I reiterate, the inclusion of PrC's is the single biggest design failure of 3rd edition.