Prestige Classes as Enhancements

[JayDubya]

Hrmm.. Extemporaneous concept here. Be nice.

Example: to "simulate" an Arcane Archer via enhancementsThese could be either boosts or permanent, depending on playability issues.

• Enhance Arrow I, II, III, IV,V
  • Provides a +1 -> +5 non-stacking magical bonus to your arrows
  • Requirements:
    • various bow/ranger feats
    • 1 level of Wizard _or_ 1 level of Sorcerer _or_ 1 level of Bard.
    • race: Elf
    • BAB: 6
• Imbue Arrow: Acid, Fire, Cold, Shock, Sonic
  • Adds 1d4 elemental damage to every arrow, based on which enhancement you choose (you can choose more than 1)
  • Requirements:
    • Same as before
    • BAB: 7
• Seeker Arrow: I, II, III, IV
  • Adds +2/+4/+6/+8 confirm critical bonus to your arrows
  • Requirements:
    • Same as before
    • BAB: 9

• Phase Arrow
  • Uses the touch AC of the target instead of regular AC for a short time.
• Hail of Arrows
  • Increases the number of times you can activate Multishot, or alternatively, increases the duration of Multishot
• Arrow of Death
  • Can't quite do this the same way, what about:
  • Arrow of Paralyzing - turns all of your arrows into paralyzers for 20 seconds
  • Arrow of Disruption - ...
  • Arrow of Banishment - ...

These would be _expensive_ enhancements. You wouldn't be able to carry these, and a bunch of other enhancements at the same time.



I bet clever folk on the forums could come up with alternate builds for most of the other prestige classes. Try not to make them over-powerful

[Gennerik]

Hrmm.. Extemporaneous concept here. Be nice.

Example: to "simulate" an Arcane Archer via enhancementsThese could be either boosts or permanent, depending on playability issues.

• Enhance Arrow I, II, III, IV,V
  • Provides a +1 -> +5 non-stacking magical bonus to your arrows
  • Requirements:
    • various bow/ranger feats
    • 1 level of wizard _or_ 1 level of sorcerer
    • race: Elf
    • BAB: 6
• Imbue Arrow: Acid, Fire, Cold, Shock, Sonic
  • Adds 1d4 elemental damage to every arrow, based on which enhancement you choose (you can choose more than 1)
  • Requirements:
    • Same as before
    • BAB: 7
• Seeker Arrow: I, II, III, IV
  • Adds +2/+4/+6/+8 confirm critical bonus to your arrows
  • Requirements:
    • Same as before
    • BAB: 9

• Phase Arrow
  • Uses the touch AC of the target instead of regular AC for a short time.
• Hail of Arrows
  • Increases the number of times you can activate Multishot, or alternatively, increases the duration of Multishot
• Arrow of Death
  • Can't quite do this the same way, what about:
  • Arrow of Paralyzing - turns all of your arrows into paralyzers for 20 seconds
  • Arrow of Disruption - ...
  • Arrow of Banishment - ...

These would be _expensive_ enhancements. You wouldn't be able to carry these, and a bunch of other enhancements at the same time.



I bet clever folk on the forums could come up with alternate builds for most of the other prestige classes. Try not to make them over-powerful

JayDubya, why would these enhancements be expensive? You're already sacrificing power as both a Ranger or a Wizard by picking the other class. The whole goal of adding Prestige Classes is to either add flavor to the game or to increase the power of multiclassing nearer to their single class counterparts. By having the enhancements be really expensive, you're basically reducing the power, because now you sacrifice not only the higher level enhancements of each class, but also the number of total enhancements you get outside of these.

[Mourning_Star]

I think it's a pretty fun idea and has some merit in it's ability to better utilize the enhancement system in place. But honestly, I want Turbine to suffer and code the actual classes! In the interim, yes, this is the kind of creative customization I would like to see in enhancements. And as Gennerik mentioned, these aren't overpowered, so no need to make them expensive.

[Solik]

?

Hasn't Turbine been implementing these for several updates now?

Is this a request for ideas for more of them?

[Elfvyra]

Umm.... No. Main reason being that Classes cannot, and should not, be reset. Unlike Enhancements....

[Solik]

Umm.... No. Main reason being that Classes cannot, and should not, be reset. Unlike Enhancements....

Sure.

But in PNP, you can retire a character, then roll up a brand new one at only one level lower (if that).

Couldn't do that in DDO last I checked

[Mourning_Star]

Sure.

But in PNP, you can retire a character, then roll up a brand new one at only one level lower (if that).

Couldn't do that in DDO last I checked

That's not a rule, that's a nice DM. You also can't make a lower level char in a different campaign and just send him a bunch of gold and equipment from your higher level character.

[KristovK]

Bump the BAB of some of the enhancements, since they should correspond with the actualy PrC requirements for those feats, so that that Embue is a +8 BAB, Seeker is +10, Phase is +12, Hail of Arrows is +14 and Arrow of Death is +16.

Arrow of Death is actually pretty easy, create 1 Arrow of Slaying every 20 minutes, must be used within 20 mins or it vanishes, since we can't exactly replicate the 1 day to create and 1 year before it vanishes, with only being able to have 1 Arrow of Death at any given time. Can't be given to anyone else and so on.


Personally, I'd rather see the actual PrC's done as opposed to using enhancements to mimic them, just doesn't do them justice. Way of the Assassin for example doesn't even come close to the Assassin PrC.

[JayDubya]

?

Hasn't Turbine been implementing these for several updates now?

Is this a request for ideas for more of them?

I have only seen minor kits - like the religious kits for Clerics and Paladins, and the vague Warchanter/Spellsinger concepts.

I thought it would be interesting to attempt recreate a complete prestige class with enhancements.

And yes, this is a solicitation for more ideas, more enhancement-based implementations. I wonder who might attempt Mystic Theurge...

[JayDubya]

Umm.... No. Main reason being that Classes cannot, and should not, be reset. Unlike Enhancements....

This is true, however:

• a casual perusal of the SRD seems to indicate that very few prestige classes "overlap" in that you can easily switch from one to another
• Many, many people seem to want to be able to respec, and this allows Turbine to offer that capability for prestige class "kits"
• When Turbine fixes a core feat or class ability, it can be devestating to the players who feel nerfed by it. By using enhancements, they can tweak the prestige class abilities, and if someone doesn't like it, they can switch away to a normal build, or change their prestige "architecture" without significant penalty

Flexibility isn't a bad thing. You may want people to suffer for their ignorance , but I'm more charitable. And it isn't like I'm saying they can re-build themselves from the ground up.

[JayDubya]

Bump the BAB of some of the enhancements, since they should correspond with the actualy PrC requirements for those feats, so that that Embue is a +8 BAB, Seeker is +10, Phase is +12, Hail of Arrows is +14 and Arrow of Death is +16.

Fair enough.

Personally, I'd rather see the actual PrC's done as opposed to using enhancements to mimic them, just doesn't do them justice. Way of the Assassin for example doesn't even come close to the Assassin PrC.

If you had to choose between no PrC in the next 3 years, or an enhancement based approach by the end of thise year, which would you prefer? Turbine only has so many people to do the coding, and sometimes an 80% solution in 6 months is better than a 100% solution in 3 years.

[Mourning_Star]

After more consideration and reading some other comments I must say that substituting a prestige class for a set of enhancements is a bad idea. I think that road only leads to trouble.

Implement prestige classes: YES!
Implement more enhancements and more creative enhancements: YES!
Flat out sub a prestige class for enhanements: NO! Arcane Archer should be a prestige class!

For some prestige classes that have a couple of cool abilitities that can be implemented, but others that would be impossible/ludicrous to implement (thus making the prestige class a "never going to implement"), your idea makes sense. In this case, the prestige class isn't being substituted, but some of the abilities are being imported because they are just that cool.

[Mourning_Star]

If you had to choose between no PrC in the next 3 years, or an enhancement based approach by the end of thise year, which would you prefer? Turbine only has so many people to do the coding, and sometimes an 80% solution in 6 months is better than a 100% solution in 3 years.

I'd go for a balanced approach. Implement the prestige classes that can be implemented in game. Implement cool abilities from classes that can't be implemented in other forms such as enhancements.

[nabrendel]

Just to throw some more fuel on this fire, I commented this in another thread where I saw a second mention of something like this.. In the "recalling for mana thread" Elardin posted a response mentioning something called "Spellsinger" as being in the next update.. and also in the loading screen if you note, there is mention of Holy Sword and Warchanter.. Holy Sword we know is the pally spell however... warchanter and spellsinger are both prestige classes soooo one wonders are they really going this route.. prestige classes being open via enhancements.. just like basically clerical domains(faiths) are now open via enhancements..

and if this is the case.. I need more enhancement points lol...

[Gimpster]

That's not a rule, that's a nice DM.

No, it's something strongly suggested as standard operating procedure all over the Dungeon Master's Guide.

It's not a "rule" insofar as D&D has no rule specifying what level characters start at. Also notice that the PHB2 includes sundry rules and suggestions on how PCs can be allowed to respec their skills, feats, classes, races, or anything.

[Cinwulf]

Personally, I'd rather see the actual PrC's done as opposed to using enhancements to mimic them, just doesn't do them justice. Way of the Assassin for example doesn't even come close to the Assassin PrC.

I agree but I have a sneaking suspicion they are going to go the enhancement route.

[Mourning_Star]

I agree but I have a sneaking suspicion they are going to go the enhancement route.

is that why hsinclair said to never multi-class? because she saw the evil plan behind the prestige class - enhancement merger??

[Racer_Xonclar]

My 1.5 cents...

We already have enough problems getting all the enhancements we want because there isn't enough action points...and we want to add more stuff to get? Come on here lol.

Prestige classes are hard to qualify for...I would not want Turbine to be lazy (again) and poorly implement something that's so hard to get into a system they already have instead of properly creating separate classes to level in

[Solik]

That's not a rule, that's a nice DM. You also can't make a lower level char in a different campaign and just send him a bunch of gold and equipment from your higher level character.

You may want to double-check on the rules for rolling up a new character if your previous one perishes. If your DM disallows simple retiring, then just do something stupid and die.


I don't think we'll ever see "standard" PrCs. Fight for the PrCs you want as enhancements and focus on getting their signature abilities added as enhancement lines.

I don't know that it's reasonable to assume that there will never be multiclass enhancement options as well. A Mystic Theurge enhancement line, for example, could require various enhancements from Cleric and (Wizard or Sorcerer) to enter.

[Shaamis]

JW,

without getting into the particulars, I think this is a GREAT idea on how to introduce Prestige classes into DDO!
I am not even beginning to look into the particulars, because I am imagining the possibilities.

A reason to use enhancements (non-PnP concept) to get Prestige classes (PnP staple) into teh game...

Beautiful, and it should work too!I promise to read into it fully, and see if I can contribute.

Sincerely,