Question about Shadow Thief PrC and Persuasive feat.

[Oddstar]

The Shadow Thief of Amn PrC, from the Player's Guide to Faerun, p. 74, requires the feat Persuasive as a prerequisite, but also lists Persuasive as one of the bonus feats you can get from the class. May one take Persuasive to qualify for the class, then take Persuasive as a bonus feat, then use the feat retraining rules in the Player's Handbook II, p. 193, to swap out the earlier taking of Persuasive for some other feat?

[Thrice Dead Cat]

I'm away from book, but my first guess would be that the errata covers this oversight.

[Oddstar]

So one might have thought, but the only thing I could find in the errata was this:
Page 74: Table 2–19: The Shadow Thief of Amn: The sneak attack damage for the 5th-level shadow thief of Amn (+3d6) was dropped inadvertently from the table.

[Vaz]

Speak to your DM. You still meet qualification for Shadow Thief, but it may have been an unintended oversight. If your DM says "yes", ask your DM if you have to take the feat in the first place (and make sure you take it for the first bonus feat option for the class) to save the weird metacharacter interaction.

[Oddstar]

"But, Doctor, I am Pagliacci!" Kidding aside, I cannot ask the DM because I am the DM; what I'm looking for is advice on how I should rule on this question.

[Divayth Fyr]

Going by RAW, I'd say this would require retraining two feats - since you can't take Persuasive a second time nor can you level up in the Shadow Thief without the feat, one would basically need to pick their first bonus feat, and then retrain Persuasive into something else, and the picked bonus feat into Persuasive.

[Oddstar]

That makes sense, but would you please remind me of the source of the rule that says that you cannot advance in a class if you no longer meet the requirements for the class. I remember reading that rule somewhere, but when I checked the DMG, all it said on page 176 was
If a character does not meet the requirements for a prestige class before that first step, that character cannot take the first level of that prestige class. Nothing about what happens if you no longer qualify later. Furthermore, if you look at the descriptions for some prestige classes, such as Celestial Paragon and Void Incarnate (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ei/20030418a), the former specifies that if a Paragon becomes evil, he loses all Paragon class abilities and may not progress in the class, while the latter specifies that if a Void becomes lawful, he may no longer progress in the class but retains all existing class abilities. If the latter is just the standard rule for every prestige class, that if one loses a requirement, one retains all class abilities but may not progress in the class, why bother to specify it? To be clear, I am almost certain that you are right about that rule, but I just cannot remember where I read it.

Also, if I were to adopt your construction, what real difference would it make? How is it any different from saying that the Shadow Thief can take any feat he wants as a bonus feat, as long as he would have qualified for it at the time he originally took Persuasive? Also, do we really buy that the character in the game is unlearning how to be persuasive, but then learning it again almost immediately thereafter?

[elonin]

There are a few Prc's that by their progression make themselves ineligible for entry into their own class. I'd say let the player select another feat.

[Oddstar]

There are? I did not know that. Would you please give me some examples, because that is something I would love to see.

[georgie_leech]

There are? I did not know that. Would you please give me some examples, because that is something I would love to see.

An obvious example would be Urpriest, which requires having no ability to cast Divine Spells, and grants the ability to cast Divine Spells.

[Deadline]

There are? I did not know that. Would you please give me some examples, because that is something I would love to see.

Dragon Disciple, in the DMG. Pre-requisite is you cannot be a half-dragon. Capstone of the class makes you a half-dragon, thereby meaning you no longer qualify for the class.

And the ruling for having to qualify for a feat or PrC is in Complete Warrior. Lots of folks consider it to only apply to the stuff that is actually in Complete Warrior, not to everything.

Personally, I hold that rule true across the board, and ignore things like the Dragon Disciple conundrum.

[Oddstar]

And the ruling for having to qualify for a feat or PrC is in Complete Warrior. Lots of folks consider it to only apply to the stuff that is actually in Complete Warrior, not to everything.

Personally, I hold that rule true across the board, and ignore things like the Dragon Disciple conundrum.
Thank you for letting me know. So how would you approach my problem?

[Vaz]

Usually by speaking to your DM. Most DM's tend to be reasonable creatures. Alternatively, assume Persuasive as a bonus feat was a mistake and feel free to ignore it.

[georgie_leech]

Usually by speaking to your DM. Most DM's tend to be reasonable creatures. Alternatively, assume Persuasive as a bonus feat was a mistake and feel free to ignore it.

He's the DM. Personally, I'd have no issues allowing retraining for the original Persuasiveness feat. I don't think it's terribly unbalancing to let the PRC qualify for itself once you enter it.

[elonin]

I might be mistaken but Prc's that add a template at the end have that problem, but i'm not sure. My thoughts were with dragon disciple, green star adept, and alienist. The issue isn't insurmountable just requiring a statement explaining that the prc doesn't invalidate itself.

[Deadline]

Thank you for letting me know. So how would you approach my problem?

Retraining either feat would work fine. Alternatively, replacing the bonus feat with a different feat could also work (i.e. replacing the persuasive bonus feat with the player's choice of skill focus(bluff) or skill focus(intimidate)).

[Gildedragon]

Since it is only one of the many allowed bonus feats... well, just ignore it there.

[elonin]

Unless the feat stacks with itself, you'll have to talk to your DM. Many of the DM's I've played with would allow substitution for a class ability given twice. And, have had that happen with rogue abilities that don't stack that are given by rogue and rogue-like prc's. Can't remember the details but Assassin which seems to be meant to continue rogue gives the same ability you get as rogue.

[deuxhero]

I'd just ignore how the feat is on the bonus feat list or replace it.

[nyjastul69]

I would probably keep it as a prerequisite and alter the bonus feat. I don't see any problem with eliminating the prerequisite and giving it as bonus feat though. I wouldn't make a player take it twice and have to retrain the feat.

[Oddstar]

I thought some people might be curious about how I ultimately decided to rule on this. I took into account everything everyone here said, but I also considered another fact: Shadow Thief requires 8 ranks in Hide, as compared to 3 ranks in all the other skills it requires, but does not give Hide as a class skill itself; one of the skills it requires 3 ranks in, Gather Information, is also not a class skill. I also took account of the fact that to become a Shadow Thief is to join a particular organization, and that at least some of the class features, like Reputation, are at least partly benefits of membership as much as anything else. I inferred from all this that the organization has certain requirements to join, but, once you are in, you are in. At the same time, at least some of the class features, like Doublespeak and, for that matter, Reputation again, might be functions of the Shadow Thief's persuasiveness. So I ruled that the player-character could take Persuasive to join the Shadow Thieves and retrain that feat, but would lose persuasiveness-dependent class features until he had taken Persuasive once again. That seemed like a sensible approach to me.

[nedz]

We have this in the Completely Dysfunctional Handbook from Dysfunctional Rules thread 2 page 40 — so it's quite well known.