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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 483565" data-attributes="member: 4937">Wulf: I DM maybe 90% of the time.  But, I probably wouldn't consider playing a PrC either except for a one off dungeon crawl where power gaming was the only consideration.  I think people like PrC's for the same reason that they like +5 vorpal swords, and I think that the arguments here are basically similar to disagreeing over whether introducing a +5 vorpal sword to the campaign is a good idea.  Even most 'PC types' will eventually balk at too much power being offered them; DM's just tend to balk at it sooner.  "Would the "feat chain" proponents recommend deconstructing the paladin and monk into variants of the fighter class that can be just as easily defined with "feat chains"? Same for the druid, bard, sorcerer, etc."I wouldn't necessarily recommend that, but I could see the point of where that is going.  I think there is something to be said for a class based system, but I think that the more classes you get the more cumbersome and fragile the system begins to become.  The same is true of a skill based system too.  After a certain point, the introduction of additional skills are hurting the system not helping it (see GURPS).  You want your initial skill set to be sufficiently broad that it covers most anything you would want to do.I think that the 6 basic classes of D20 modern are an excellent example of how to structure a class based system.  I'm less thrilled about the advanced classes, for much the same reasons that I'm less than thrilled about PrC's.One of the big advantages of moving down to few more broadly defined classes (or no classes), and class powers defined as feat chains, is that I think that with care you could get past the hurdle of front ended classes.  Alot of the basic classes carry huge advantages at first level (or to a lesser extent to up to third level).  This happens because people expect even the lowest member of this class to have certain basic attributes.  If you made class powers more feat like, you could load a person up at character level 1 and allow them to acquire that array of powers, but then taking a first level in any given class wouldn't load anyone with any extra powers acquired.The big disadvantage of dropping classes entirely is game balance becomes just as hard as it would be with hundreds of classes.  By making advancement somewhat predictible, its just easier to keep track of what people are going to have.  The same logic would be used to restrict customizing a space fighter in a sci-fi sim game.  You don't necessarily want to make everything tradable for everything.  The same logic is involved with introducing a new card to MtG.   You have to ask how this card is going to interact with every other card in existance.  If you limit the rules for 'making the deck', then you can introduce cards far more freely because you can predict what 'the deck' will look like.GURPS and WoD are excellent examples of completely open systems that work great if everyone plays by the unwritten rule of making deep characters with diverse skills, but if you just pour all of your points into doing one thing very very well, you break the system in a hurry.So, no its not like I think one system is just perfect, but I don't think 'advanced classes' of any sort really help the game.</blockquote>

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