Handbooks to early?

[CyberThread]

Do you think we should hold off on handbooks until the info has been out longer, or start mining and arraigning data now?

[Theodoxus]

Given I won't get my PHB until the 19th, I'm more than happy to read up on other people's concepts. Makes it easier to track down ideas I find interesting and study up before I get the book - so I'll know where best to spend my energies once it's here.

[Yuukale]

given that my shtick is archery, I don't think I have enough to write a handbook on it (darn, couldn't completely finish the one in my sig - even though it's fairly comprehensive -).

If you want a really slick sniper, go Fighter 2/Rogue 18
If you want just raw dmg and cool trickshots, go Rogue 3 / Fighter 17.
You could also go Rogue 4 / Fighter 16 for an extra feat or ability bonus instead of another action surge and indomitable use.

Any other martial class combination would be up to the person's flavor but nothing of great remark, neither in sniping nor in dmg. One could make a point for Ranger's volley. Rangers have cool abilities and spells which make for better versatility OoC, even if quite short on the pew-pew department.

[Squirrel_Dude]

It would probably be best to wait until the big three are out. After we find out everything that is available to the classes in the PHB. After we see what the players will be facing in the Monster Manual. After we see what the game's assumptions are on the DMG.

Let's wait until we know things.

[Yuukale]

I believe we'll have prestige classes on DMG.

I hope really hard that PrCs won't replace class features, but add to them, much like 4e paragon paths.

[Tholomyes]

I believe we'll have prestige classes on DMG.

I hope really hard that PrCs won't replace class features, but add to them, much like 4e paragon paths.Haven't seen any indication of that. Maybe you're thinking of the fact that the DMG will have Blackguard, but that's going to be a subclass. Nothing I've seen so far tells me that there's going to be any Prestige classes, and the fact that many things which were once PrCs (EKs, Shadow Dancers, ATs, ect) are now subclasses, and others, such as Mystic Theurge are unnecessary due to the way Multiclassing works with casters.

I, for one, am glad. Never particularly liked them in 3e (one of the reasons I like PF above 3.5 is that PrCs aren't as mandatory, and single class characters are more viable), and even with 4e's Paragon Paths, I liked them only passably.

[Dienekes]

Ehh, prestige classes served a purpose; providing niche focuses and mechanically thought out combinations of classes. I will say their use in 3.5 didn't really live up to that, with often the prestige classes just providing a power boost to the class that would have gone into it, or end up just being useless. But the idea is sound.

As for handbooks, ehh. I don't think there's a wrong time to start writing them, they're a fine place to start spreading tricks and combos that have been discovered. But I do think they will need to be rewritten when the DMG comes out, new tricks get figured out, and of course splats. But that happens anyway when new material comes out.

[Morty]

Prestige Classes were mostly band-aids for some of the holes in the 3e ruleset, like multi-classing. Very ineffective band-aids, because you needed to suffer several levels of mediocrity before you could take one. They probably sounded like a good idea way back then, when they were trying to take the AD&D rules into a new direction, but in hindsight, I don't think they were. If 5e doesn't use them, then it's at least one mistake it doesn't repeat. And we didn't see anything about them in the leaked list of contents for the DMG.

[wolfstone]

And we didn't see anything about them in the leaked list of contents for the DMG.

Do you have the link to this? I've searched online, but can't find it. :(