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Tvtyrant
2011-01-08, 10:55 PM
I was thinking about making a more stripped down campaign and was wondering if anyone has used the Prestige Bard, Ranger, or Paladin classes and how well they did with them. Also, what Tier would they be placed at, and does anyone know of a prestige monk or rogue that could be added to the group?

Xiander
2011-01-08, 10:57 PM
Out of curiousity, where can they be found?

dextercorvia
2011-01-08, 10:58 PM
Out of curiousity, where can they be found?

In the SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/indexes/variantClasses.htm)

Psyren
2011-01-08, 11:00 PM
Prestige Paladin is used all the time, usually to get +1 BAB and Smite Evil onto a cleric without losing CL, or Divine Grace with only a 1 CL loss. And Battle Blessing as mentioned below (edit.) Not sure about the others though.

What would you put Prestige Rogue on? A rogue seems too basic a concept, to me. Maybe fighter, except Rogues as a concept don't have to be particularly good at fighting, and the skill points leading into it would hurt.

Prestige Monk is complex enough though that I think it could work on an Unarmed Fighter or a particularly martial cleric. for other classes, War Mind is effectively Prestige Psychic Warrior, especially the Pathfinder version.

Dusk Eclipse
2011-01-08, 11:01 PM
Unearthed Arcana and the SRD.

I have never seen them used in play; but I have seen some tricks and builds idea to rely on them

From memory:

Prestige Bard was used in somehow to get 9th level maneuvers and 9th level spells... It also used Sublime chord.

Prestige pally, is normally used to abuse battle blessing to auto-quicken all your spells, besides it is actually nice since you get most of the benefits of paladin with just a small hit to CL.

And prestige ranger was used in a Swift hunter build, something like cleric 1/Scout 3/ Prestige ranger 15/cleric +1 or something along those lines

DeltaEmil
2011-01-08, 11:03 PM
The prestige bard is kinda okay, but prestige paladin and prestige ranger are just bad, having dead levels and advancing spellcasting at half the pace. One might as well take paladin and ranger normally.

Tvtyrant
2011-01-08, 11:27 PM
What would you put Prestige Rogue on? A rogue seems too basic a concept, to me. Maybe fighter, except Rogues as a concept don't have to be particularly good at fighting, and the skill points leading into it would hurt.


I would probably go Fighter->Rogue, and then have increased class feature rates. They get those special abilities starting at tenth level, so 1 every 5 levels for the prestige class, and then increased sneak attack rate/trap sense rate. So increases every other level for sneak attack and then twice in a row in the beginning and end. Trap sense would be every other level instead of once in every three.

Monk would be Fighter based as well, but would be a Wisdom fighter instead of an Intelligence fighter. It would Wisdom to AC, Unarmed Strike increasing 1/3 levels, and basically would be crammed full of the same stuff they normally get. I'm thinking of making them stronger then the normal monk by allowing them to flurry with any melee weapon they specialize in (since they have 4 levels in Fighter) and then increase abundant step to 3/day at level 20.

Urpriest
2011-01-08, 11:32 PM
It's pretty difficult to get into Prestige Bard without a level or so in Rogue, it's kind of the intended entry...I'd really advise keeping Rogue as a base class for that reason.

Coidzor
2011-01-08, 11:33 PM
I was thinking about making a more stripped down campaign and was wondering if anyone has used the Prestige Bard, Ranger, or Paladin classes and how well they did with them. Also, what Tier would they be placed at, and does anyone know of a prestige monk or rogue that could be added to the group?

PrC rogue has nothing to go as a good base for getting into it in core. Factotums are better at it just by staying in their base class, Scouts there might be some small argument for going into a PrC Rogue, especially if they can advance skirmish instead, Thug Fighters don't have a good skill list fit as a base class for it.

And it's a bit of an unnecessary nerf to the party to require them to reach PrCing levels to get trapfinding. So I'd say making Rogue a PrC is both unnecessary and damaging to the game to make it that way.

Monk can at least be seen as a grappler/brawler PrC, even if it'd be very, very bad at it if you didn't also buff up the class to fill that niche better. Actually, PrC Monk without being fixed would just be a trap.

Now, Barbarian, you might be able to get away with the justification of making into a PrC for a slightly better version of rage for having to wait a quarter+ of a character's life span to get it.


Prestige Paladin is used all the time, usually to get +1 BAB and Smite Evil onto a cleric without losing CL, or Divine Grace with only a 1 CL loss. Not sure about the others though.

Don't forget weapon proficiencies and getting a better mount for bone knight builds. :smallbiggrin: And battle blessing for certain spells as well as being able to cast certain spells using either lower or higher level slots as needs demand them to be cast.

Prestige Paladin can also be used with dragon magazine material (Holy Mount feat) to get a very nice special mount with only two levels of paladin and a lost caster level spent on it. Combined with, say, Dragon Mount, that can definitely beef up a melee cleric's capabilities. I'm trying to think of other divine casting classes other than Cleric that could get into it without dipping into cleric 1 for Turn Undead... With multiclassing, certain divine builds could use another PrC like Sacred Exorcist or Knight of the Raven (v. easily qualified for) in order to qualify, but might risk losing too many CL levels to grab the mount and 9ths too. Wouldn't be enough to get higher than Tier 3 if the class was already tier 4 though.

And that much multiclassing and build finesse would be one of those cases where the tier of the classes involved matters less due to the system mastery of the person playing it. I mean, an adept that's managed to get into PrC Paladin and Ranger and has a dragon animal companion-mount in order to have melee capabilities isn't really the point of the tier system. Though now that I've mentioned it, I'm going to go see if that's actually possible.

Prestige Bard Well, that would put Beguilers that use it into high tier 3 or low, low tier 2 depending upon whether they get all Bard Spells or just Core Bard Spells or Core Bard Spells with the ability to add all Bard Spells provided certain actions are taking (which depends upon how onerous the actions are). At least until 7th+ level Spells come into play, where they're then just playing with the Beguiler List, but are still higher in Tier 3 than they would be otherwise.

I can't really think of any other classes that benefit from it much, other than a determined warmage that can enter it and really have it effect them. I'd say a warmage almost makes it into tier 3 with bard spells in addition to their warmage spells. Requires, I believe, 3 eclectic learnings of 1st level spells though, so it's not until fairly late into the class.

Wizards, if they're gishing, would find several of the more gishy bard spells useful to have on their list, though the lost CL from the first level means a bit less versatility in PrCing. I don't think a straight casting Wizard would get much advantage from it though, and the first level does lose a caster level. Sorcerers wouldn't really benefit either as they'd still have to pay spells known for the bard spells and I don't see any real winners. I don't really see it altering either's tier with the most reasonable 1-2 level dip.

Wu Jen... Basically same thing as the wizard, though I believe its spell list would be more expanded by the addition of bard spells. So it might move slightly higher in its tier but I don't think it would cross tiers. Though that also requires on knowledge of what tier they're placed in. If they're High Tier 2, they might cross into Tier 1 with the expanded range.

PrC bard does offer Sublime Chord as an option, though I'm not sure how useful that is compared to just continuing on in the base spellcasting class. I think Virtuoso is opened up though, which is more or less a full spellcasting PrC that also boosts bardic music into being a useful part of one's arsenal... but still, I think it raises one's standing within one's tier rather than really tier-jumping unless there's a Tier 4 or 5 class that can benefit from it.

Prestige Ranger... If an Adept could enter the class using the feat "Extra Spell" or some other means of getting Calm Animals on its spell list, that would expand its spell list considerably, especially if the mystic ranger's 5th level spell list is OK'd for use. It'd require a 9th level human/X with relevant bonus feat or a 12th level adept though. I don't know that it would really bump it up a tier though, certainly it'd get a higher standing in the tier it's in though.

For a Druid, it'd give them some new spells and some of their spells available at a lower level, but not really shake things up for them tier-wise, same for a Cleric that would qualify...

Favored Soul has the same problems with PrC Ranger and PrC Paladin as the Sorcerer does with PrC Bard...

Shugenjas though, I imagine those would appreciate the boost in power by broadening their spell lists away from their elemental focuses, if they can qualify or use Extra Spell to do so. But I can't see any indication of what tier they are.

Tvtyrant
2011-01-08, 11:49 PM
So in terms of core they balance better against casters then the base classes? Good to know; that is actually more incentive then not. Urpriest makes a good point, so Rogue is going to stay a base class, but I definitely think monk would be better in this system then in the normal one.

Coidzor
2011-01-08, 11:57 PM
So in terms of core they balance better against casters then the base classes? Good to know; that is actually more incentive then not.

You do realize that they're only really approached as things to dip for 1, maybe 2, and in rare cases 3 levels right?

In terms of Core, the only ones who can get into the ones that exist are casters, and they're designed to have less power but more interesting/useful class features than going full-caster.

Monk doesn't really satisfy the useful class features thing...

And non-casters don't really have that much power they can give up in exchange for useful/interesting class features.


Urpriest makes a good point, so Rogue is going to stay a base class, but I definitely think monk would be better in this system then in the normal one.

Only if you made it better, as even if you compressed its 20 levels of abilities into 15 levels it's still not giving that much. And the character has to meet feat and skill requirements to qualify for it, which depend upon your preferences and theme, so, yeah.

Tvtyrant
2011-01-09, 12:16 AM
Well obviously its not going to be amazing, but it won't be as bad as it is now. I might just remake it and have it be more western monk as opposed to eastern monk. Consolidation!

As I said at the top, the campaign is stripped down. These would be the prestige classes in the game; the classes would be essentially:
Wizard
Druid
Cleric
Rogue
Fighter
Barbarian

With the Fighter and Rogue perhaps being altered a little and some Barbarian variants introduced. Then then prestige classes would be Prc Bard, Prc Paladin, Prc Ranger, Prc Monk, and Prc Sorcerer. Sorcerer would be... Different, but that belongs to the homebrew section. What I really wanted to know here is how useful the prestige classes were in a campaign/how powerful they are.

Bang!
2011-01-09, 03:26 AM
PrC Sorcerer would be weird to roleplay.

JaronK
2011-01-09, 07:31 AM
PrC Ranger and Paladin are both key parts of ubermount builds, due to their far better companions (a two level dip in Paladin gives +5 to paladin mounts, which when combined with Holy Mount on whatever the base divine class was can be amazing, while PrC Ranger grants double speed compared to normal Ranger Animal Companions, and that's huge with Halfling Outrider). Furthermore, a Cleric with a two level dip into PrC Ranger taking Holy Mount has all the abilities of a regular Paladin and then some (though they'll need persistant Divine Power to get the full BAB). As for their tier, that will depend on how many levels you take (you probably don't want many) and what the base class was. Also, you have to decide the interaction between Battle Blessing and PrC Paladin.

Don't forget that all three classes add any spells unique to those classes to your spell list... there's a few awesome ones.

JaronK

Coidzor
2011-01-09, 08:36 AM
PrC Ranger and Paladin are both key parts of ubermount builds, due to their far better companions (a two level dip in Paladin gives +5 to paladin mounts, which when combined with Holy Mount on whatever the base divine class was can be amazing, while PrC Ranger grants double speed compared to normal Ranger Animal Companions, and that's huge with Halfling Outrider). Furthermore, a Cleric with a two level dip into PrC Ranger taking Holy Mount has all the abilities of a regular Paladin and then some (though they'll need persistant Divine Power to get the full BAB).

I'm not seeing what PrC Ranger 2 has over Druid1/Beastmaster1 other than that the 2nd level of PrC Ranger's CL boost stacks with the base class. Or really what PrC Ranger 1 has over Druid 1 or Beastmaster 1 considering the feats needed to get into the PrC.

Unless you're talking about a strict reading of Devoted Tracker that requires levels in ranger to get the animal companion-mount combination to work?

Cog
2011-01-09, 12:18 PM
I can't really think of any other classes that benefit from it much, other than a determined warmage that can enter it and really have it effect them. I'd say a warmage almost makes it into tier 3 with bard spells in addition to their warmage spells. Requires, I believe, 3 eclectic learnings of 1st level spells though, so it's not until fairly late into the class.

It only requires two; Warmages get True Strike (divination) already. The second Learning is at 6th level, right when they hit the BAB requirement, so as long as you can swing Skill Knowledge or something to pick up Perform, it works out pretty neatly. Dragon Compendium's Bloodlines can get you an illusion or an enchantment as well, if you've got something better in mind for one of your Learnings.