The Gaming Den

And boy do I hate digging ditches for 9 hours straight...it's almost as rough as foodservice.

Anyways, stuff I disagree with

s it unreasonable to make the final level in a PrC one that is just chock-full of benefits, perhaps moreso than the current WotC formula?

Yes, in fact it is unreasonable to design prestige classes with levels which have the design intent that level 10 is far better than levels 1-9.

If this design intent is followed, it is going to result in grossly imbalanced characters. In order for a <Core Class> 5 / <Capstone PrC> 10 to be balanced against say a <Core Class> 15, each build has to offer roughly the same total value of abilities; and to make this work in the set-up you are describing, that means that <Capstone> PrC levels 1-9 need to offer a lower value of abilities than <Core Class> 6-14, which means that the first 9 levels of the PrC need to be intentionally underpowered. The only other option in this scheme is to keep <Capstone> 1-9 balanced against Core 6-14, but then <Capstone 10> definitionally is chock-full of benefits, which means that it will be overpowered.

Now, it is enitrely valid to point out that the current WotC formula does not do a passable job of balancing PrC builds against CoreClass builds, but that doesn't mean that I'm going to endore a change which is not any sort of improvement.

Classes rewarding you with organisation bonuses are just silly.

This too, I disagree with.

Granted, in many cases, the implementation of those organization bonuses is piss-poor (see MotAO 10), but the concept itself is enitrely workable. If you are a Knight of the Round Table, it is entirely valid to have the ability to call on other Knights for help, and it would be entirely valid to have mechanics for it, and it would be entirely valid for those mechanics to scale with your Knight of the Round Table class level - the more time and effort and levels you put into the organization, the more resources you get out of them.

****

Now then, getting to my core point:

I personally see PrCs as definitionally optional classes which the DM chooses to include in his game because they either
A. give characters game-mechanical benefits to players who choose to play character types who are especially appropriate to the game world.
or B. provide a minor rules-patch for some aspect of the game the DM is unsatisfied with.

Now working from this set of premises, a number of corrolarries emerge:

• 
  
• Since PrCs are definitionally optional, DMs should only include them if they actually want players to take them.
  
• Since the DM only includes PrCs which he wants player characters to take, (either because they reinforce the game world or help fix rules the DM dislikes) all PrCs should be appealing to one or more players.
  
• Since PrCs have to be appealing to players, they should never ever be mechanically inferior to taking more levels in the core class(es) needed to qualify.
  
• Since the DM wants PrCs to be appealing, it is okay if they are mechanically superior to taking more levels in likely core classes. As per the general concept of game balance, they should not be massively more powerful than core class builds.
  

But the thing is, this all follows from my personal views about PrCs, which not everybody shares. Some people have been known to say stuff like "3rd edition is all about the PrCs" or "You gotta allow it, it's in the Core Rules" - and those people aren't objectively wrong. And when you use a different set of assumptions about what PrCs are, you get a different set of design principles for PrCs.

Josh_Kablack wrote:

Classes rewarding you with organisation bonuses are just silly.

This too, I disagree with.

Granted, in many cases, the implementation of those organization bonuses is piss-poor (see MotAO 10), but the concept itself is enitrely workable. If you are a Knight of the Round Table, it is entirely valid to have the ability to call on other Knights for help, and it would be entirely valid to have mechanics for it, and it would be entirely valid for those mechanics to scale with your Knight of the Round Table class level - the more time and effort and levels you put into the organization, the more resources you get out of them.

But that means you have an organisation where it is impossible to be a grandmaster of the order without taking x levels in a specific class. Even if you grab every single ability the class grants from other sources, even if you are better then the current grandmaster in everything he can do you can never replace him. Isn't that odd? Doesn't it make more sense to have requirements such as "must fulfill a dangerous quest for the order" or even "BAB +10, be able to cast cure spells or lay on hands" to attacin a certain rank?

Also, PrCs wherein the Grand Master has to be level 10 of their PrC have the causation issue: if you have to have 10 levels of this PrC to be Grand Master, and the first-ever Grand Master had 10 levels of this PrC...where did the Grand Master learn the PrC from?

Essence wrote:Also, PrCs wherein the Grand Master has to be level 10 of their PrC have the causation issue: if you have to have 10 levels of this PrC to be Grand Master, and the first-ever Grand Master had 10 levels of this PrC...where did the Grand Master learn the PrC from?

Umm . . on his own? Now, if the PrC also requires you to learn from a grandmaster to join you get a problem, but you get that everytime a class requires you to "learn from a master" or "learn from a sacred book".

Essence at [unixtime wrote:1112283160[/unixtime]]Also, PrCs wherein the Grand Master has to be level 10 of their PrC have the causation issue: if you have to have 10 levels of this PrC to be Grand Master, and the first-ever Grand Master had 10 levels of this PrC...where did the Grand Master learn the PrC from?

This problem is non-unique to Organizational PrCs. A number of published PrCs have "must be inducted/accepted/trained by a <PrC>" as a requirement, which makes it impossible for the PrCs to have come into existence in the first place by any means short of time travel or omni-temporal existence.

Murtak wrote:
But that means you have an organisation where it is impossible to be a grandmaster of the order without taking x levels in a specific class.

I think you mean something different by "organization bonuses" than I do. Please clarify.

Josh wrote:his problem is non-unique to Organizational PrCs. A number of published PrCs have "must be inducted/accepted/trained by a <PrC>" as a requirement, which makes it impossible for the PrCs to have come into existence in the first place by any means short of time travel or omni-temporal existence.

The problem is that you are over-thinking this. Obviously, there is a PrC with an entire class level that says "they can train people into this PrC." That level probably doesn't come with a caster level or a BAB, and its surrounded by empty levels..

Josh_Kablack at [unixtime wrote:1112426692[/unixtime]]

Murtak wrote:
But that means you have an organisation where it is impossible to be a grandmaster of the order without taking x levels in a specific class.

I think you mean something different by "organization bonuses" than I do. Please clarify.

Organisation bonuses are abilities that do not actually give your character extra powers but that either give him some position of power over the organisation or that let him make use of the powers of the organisation. What bugs me is that these sort of bonuses generally correspond to you gaining ranks in the organisation as you gain levels in the class.

And that just means that the holy order of Dago can never be infiltrated by evil spies. After all, every member of the order must be a paladin, right? On top of that the group's fighter can not join the order. No matter how lafwul good he is, how he takes cleric levels to gain some healing, how he gains ranks in the order's favored skills - he is a fighter 10 instead of a paladin 5/guy of the order 5 and he can never gain rank in the order. But his paladin friend can. To the observer they look alike and act alike, heck, the fighter might well be the holier one of the two, the one who undertook the quest, who slew the dragon - it does not matter. No ranks in the PrC, no membership for you, no matter for how long you have been fulfilling our quests.

The alternative to this is allowing those without levels in the PrC to gain ranks in the order - and in that case, why bother having the same powers be available both through class and campaign mechanics? Just make it a sidebar in the book of religious orders of Faerun, right next to the class descriptions. Then most of the Knights of Dago can also have significant rank in the order and few outsider can become members. But the paladin/knight of dago and his friend, the fighter who acts like a paladin can both gain ranks in the order by the same means.

Yeah, the big problem is the same as Leadership. There's nothing to stop you from going on an adventure where you gain the loyalty of an NPC or small army through some combination of personal heroics and cold hard cash.

There are a lot of things like this. People sometimes expect you to pay a feat or class level for stuff like "has a cool familiar" or "has a magic item", and the blunt fact is that people also give that shit out as adventure awards over and above XP all the damned time. Permanent character resources =/= having been on a particular adventure instead of another.

Having a class level "now commands 50 troops in the Zandaz Army" is an insult when you could have jolly well married the princess of Zandaz and commanded their entire army for no class levels at all.

---

I don't have a problem with a note that people who have 4 or more levels of Zandaz Warrior are well respected in the Zandaz Army and can call upon troops to aid in specific tasks. I do have a problem with the game acting like that's not a story effect that has nothing to do with how many character resources that player should have.

There are only two choices:

1> You don't get charged character abilities for having pirate crews, imperial ranks, or special familiars.

2> You can't get social advantages without spending character abilities on them.

Either one could work, but I don't think I'm ready for a game where I can't actually marry the princess I saved until I first take levels in "has totally married the princess".

What you could do is have a separate tally of "social awesomeness" that functions like XP or GP does, where you get a big pile of social advantages that you "buy" with the points that you get from your quests. It could be called "fame" or something. And undertaking certain quests would get you more or less or something. That could potentially work, but it still doesn't look anything like what we have now.

-Username17

Personally I think prestige classes should just go away and not come back.

There are a lot of competing ideas as to what they are supposed to do or be, but the thing is they just don't really work for any of them. In fact they pretty much can't work for a lot of them (like the whole rank in guild of racist elf dudes type of mess) simply because they are classes.

The only workable answer I see for prestige classes is in the form of the DM writing custom ones as per the campaign, the player and the character.

And at that point they should cease to exist entirely in their current form and be replaced by modular selectable/awardable prestige ABILITIES(not classes just abilities, like feats but not crap and possibly not limited by level) that everyone just seeks out or gets handed to them as the story progresses, like magic items.

Its the sane way to do it and could be done in ways that actually satisfy a lot of the odd ideas of what this part of the rules is supposed to actually do.

Murtak at wrote:
Organisation bonuses are abilities that do not actually give your character extra powers but that either give him some position of power over the organisation

This is usually lame and a bad idea.

or that let him make use of the powers of the organisation.

Here's the one where I disagree with you.

This is entirely workable, if (and only if) done right.

There is not really a major mechanical difference between a level of Knight of the Round Table letting you call upon a squire or junior knight of the order and a level of cleric letting you call upon a Planar Ally.

There's really no problem with a level "Axe Gang Thief" giving out a bonus to Gather Information to represent the Axe Gang's tremendous network of informants.

Both of those are powers of the order.

It however, sucks donkey balls if done poorly. Getting a bonus to intimidate a squire of your order or a bonus to gather info about only about other people already in the Axe Gang is really lame. Unless the game is highly political, you probably will not frequently be using skills against fellow memebers of the organization you belong to.

What bugs me is that these sort of bonuses generally correspond to you gaining ranks in the organisation as you gain levels in the class.

This is probably a bad idea, for the reasons you mention. A loose correlation is entirely workable, but a strict adherence to Position = PrC Level X is a bad idea, both for the reasons you mention and for the plot hooks it closes off.

I say get rid of PrCs altogether for the most part.

Advantages in certain positions or orders should just be roleplaying benefits and a consequence of joining that order. Your character shouldn't need a special class to join the thieves guild. He should just be able to do it.

If you want special talents which only a member of a given order can do, they should be represented with feats, not PrCs. So if you wanted a mage guild access to spell pool, spellpool should just be a feat.

We really could get by with just three basic classes, fighter, cleric and wizard. And yes, I'm in favor of just giving skill points to other classes and ditching the rogue as a class. There's no balance based reason why you can't disarm traps and be as good a fighter as a fighter.

RandomCasualty at [unixtime wrote:1112508359[/unixtime]]
We really could get by with just three basic classes, fighter, cleric and wizard.

If you want to go this route, I'm not sure that there's enough differentiation between divine and arcane magic to need all three of these. I'd go noncaster, semi-caster, pure caster myself in a three class scheme.

Josh_Kablack at [unixtime wrote:1112509625[/unixtime]]

If you want to go this route, I'm not sure that there's enough differentiation between divine and arcane magic to need all three of these. I'd go noncaster, semi-caster, pure caster myself in a three class scheme.

True. Though cleric sort of forms the "fighter/mage" class. Assuming that straight multiclassing is going to produce a pretty weak caster normally.

If you dumped vancian magic, then you could just have fighter and mage, and then combine the two to form clerics and other kinds of stuff.

Josh_Kablack wrote:There is not really a major mechanical difference between a level of Knight of the Round Table letting you call upon a squire or junior knight of the order and a level of cleric letting you call upon a Planar Ally.

There's really no problem with a level "Axe Gang Thief" giving out a bonus to Gather Information to represent the Axe Gang's tremendous network of informants.

Both of those are powers of the order.

1. So can you gain these powers without actually gaining levels in the PrC? From what you wrote it seems to me like you can. And if you can indeed gain access to the spy network as a member of the Axe gang (but not a member of the PrC), why do only the members of the PrC gain the bonus?
2. What happens to those powers when you leave the order or even just change cities? A cleric can summon his planar allies pretty much anywhere. A rogue's skill focus: gather information works in every city. But you can lose organisation bonuses pretty easily. And both as a player and a DM I do not like powers bought with levels to go away that easily.

Josh_Kablack wrote:It however, sucks donkey balls if done poorly. Getting a bonus to intimidate a squire of your order or a bonus to gather info about only about other people already in the Axe Gang is really lame. Unless the game is highly political, you probably will not frequently be using skills against fellow memebers of the organization you belong to.

I am not talking about the actual usefulness of the abilities at all. Even if a class was in my opinion perfectly balanced I would still consider it's organisation-based abilities crap.

One of us is being obtuse here. I hope it's not me.

Lemme try and explain one more time, this time with a hypothetical ability writeup, and then maybe you can point out what your conceptual problem is in a way that I can understand it:

a purely hypothetical PrC wrote:
Well Connected(Ex) At 2nd level, an Axe Gang Thief has proven herself enough that other members of the gang will pass helpful information to her. Since the Axe Gang has a tremendous network and informants, this grants the Axe Gang Theif a +1 circumstance bonus to her Gather Information tjecks. At every even level, this bonus increases by another +1.

There ya go - that's an organization based ability, you get a bonus due to the influende of the organization.

Now what's you're beef with that?

Too much flavor text for ya? (It is too much for me)
Don't like the potential interaction with an "Ex-Axe Gang Thief" section detailing that members in bad standing lose this ability?
Have issues with the implausibility of the Axe Gang having informants *everywhere* in the planes (or the opposite problem of having an ability which activates only at DM whim) ?

another purely hypothetical PrC wrote:
All for one and one for All (Sp) At 4th level, a Knight of the Round Table has won such respect from the saints and heroes of yore that he can call upon them for aid. Up to once per day, he may cast Lesser Planar Ally to make a bargain with one of the patrons or supporters of the order.

Now, with these example as explicit as I can make it, lemme try and field your questions:

" So can you gain these powers without actually gaining levels in the PrC? From what you wrote it seems to me like you can."

Well you can totally pick up Skill Focus in Gather Info, and say that it's because of your ties to the Axe Gang.

Or you can totally just cast freakin' Lesser Planar Ally and summon yourself up an angel who's loyal to the ideals of the Round Table.

You don't however, get to go out, join a gang or order of knighthood and get to add free skill bonuses or ally summoning to whatever other classes you already have just because you joined a club.

And if you can indeed gain access to the spy network as a member of the Axe gang (but not a member of the PrC), why do only the members of the PrC gain the bonus?

For the same bloody reason that fighters get a +1/level BAB, even though wizards can also swing swords...that reason being that D&D uses a class and level based character generation and advancement system. In D&D, you get crunchy mechanical modifiers based on your class and level. And while you can use whatever pieces of fluff or backstory you want to justify those abilities, you do not get the abilities unless you take a race, class, feat, skill, spell or item which grants you the abilites.

Josh_Kablack at [unixtime wrote:1112852757[/unixtime]]
There ya go - that's an organization based ability, you get a bonus due to the influende of the organization.

Now what's you're beef with that?

I believe the issue is in the idea that your second level Axe Gang Thief who has the Axe Gang Thief class will be more important to the organization than a character whose been a member twice as long, and is twice the character level, but didn't bother to take the PrC.

Ok, I am going to try to explain what I mean once more. I am going to use your axe gang example.

That "Well-connected" ability represents full membership in the gang, right? You are a member, so you can use the spies and on top of that other members help you out too.

Now tell me, does every single member of the gang also have levels in this class? I am going to have to split my argument here, depending on your answer. If you say "Yes, every single member of the gang has levels in the PrC", then I have to ask you why you can not gain access to the network as, say, a fighter 6/rogue 5, who is better at everything the rogue 5/axe ganger 1 can do. You have more and better skills, better saves, better BAB, better HPs, you did the same things for the gang - yet they don't trust you. Why?

If you say "No, not every single member of the gang has levels in the PrC" then I have to ask, why can these other members not also access they spy network? And if they can, how come they do not gain the bonuses associated with access?

Now on top of that you have an ability that a player payed levels for that he loses when he leaves their axe gang's area of influence or leaves the gang, but that is not even the core of argument. Simply put, unless the axe gang is 100% made from axe gangers, organisation-based benefits belong in a sidebar. Even if they are, they probably still do.

You get exactly the same issues in your second example. Why can't a paladin/fighter/Cavalier 20 call upon the saints, while a fighter 4, knight of the order 4 can, due to the respect he has gained? And why does being handed a scroll of lesser planar ally from the temple you are questing for not cost you levels?

Organisation-based abilities are background mechanics and as such they belong in the background (i.e. sidebar). If you charge levels for using the resources of an organisation you should charge levels for using the resources of any and all organisations the players might join. That includes the temple of the cleric where the players got their current quest, the elders of the paladin who he asks for advice, the members of the mage guild your wizard trades spells with and the money of the princess your rogue wed.

Or do these abilities not cost levels simply because there is no PrC to go along with the organisation? If so, do spy networks not exist without PrCs?

This post has ended up with me rambling on and on again. Let me try to summarize:
Any ability that represents you gaining membership in or access to the resources of an organisation or gaining status within an organisation needs to be available to every single member of the organisation. That means you can either gain the ability without gaining levels in the PrC (if non-PrC-members can be members of the organisation). In that case the ability has no place in the PrC. Or it means you are barring characters who are for all purposes exact copies of PrC members from gaining the abilities of the orgqanisation, simply because they took an alternate path (say, the paladin/fighter/knight protector who has quested for the knights of the round table for 10 levels).

Oops, missed explicitely responding to this bit:

Josh_Kablack wrote:You don't however, get to go out, join a gang or order of knighthood and get to add free skill bonuses or ally summoning to whatever other classes you already have just because you joined a club.

Why? Why doesn't the commander of the king's guard get an intimidate bonus vs. some city watchman? Why can't the grand heirophant command a member of the order to go and find the sacred relic of Odo?

Murtak at [unixtime wrote:1112863387[/unixtime]]
This post has ended up with me rambling on and on again. Let me try to summarize:
Any ability that represents you gaining membership in or access to the resources of an organisation or gaining status within an organisation needs to be available to every single member of the organisation. That means you can either gain the ability without gaining levels in the PrC (if non-PrC-members can be members of the organisation). In that case the ability has no place in the PrC. Or it means you are barring characters who are for all purposes exact copies of PrC members from gaining the abilities of the orgqanisation, simply because they took an alternate path (say, the paladin/fighter/knight protector who has quested for the knights of the round table for 10 levels).

This strikes me as an odd viewpoint, although that may be my head cold speaking.

To extend your argument, say I'm playing a 6th level wizard who is a graduate student at some magical research facility, and I attain 7th level. I explain my knowledge of two new fourth level spells as being the result of passing my exams and hence being initiated into the higher mysteries. Why shouldn't someone else who's also a graduate student at the same place be able to get the same ability without investing 7 levels in "Wizard"?

Well, he can -- all he needs to do is invest enough levels in some class that provides spellcasting levels! It doesn't have to be "wizard". It doesn't have to be anything -- what's important is the mechanical benefits it provides.

Axe Gang members who take the Axe Gang PrC are not getting the +X to whatever for being in the Axe Gang -- they're getting it for taking an appropriate number of levels in the PrC! And the explanation for that is that they're really hardcore gang members. If you're getting a +4 to all your Gather Information checks because of your 8 levels in Axe Gang Thief -- so what? Someone who has zero levels in Axe Gang Thief can still have as high (or higher) a Gather Information check, and if he has the appropriate background -- he can even explain his awesome Gather Information expertise as due to all his contacts from his days in the Axe Gang.

Someone who is in the Axe Gang but doesn't have as high a Gather Information check just isn't as well-known in the gang, or hasn't devoted enough time to learning the ins and outs of the information network, or isn't trusted enough by gang leadership to get access to all the best information. Why can't he get the same Gather Information bonus? For exactly the same reason someone who's invested 10 levels in Wizard can't have as good a BAB as someone who's invested 10 levels in Fighter. And that has to be true, or else the system collapses in on itself entirely.

Mechanical effects can be explained by backstory -- in fact, where possible, they really should be explained by backstory, because it's cool to be able to tell people how you learned to use a Bastard Sword from the Weapon Master Haku Sochka, Terror of the East. Or how your skill at sneaking up on the enemy guards without making so much as a sound stems from the years you spent walking through forests full of dry leaves in the eternal autumn of your homeland of Emberfield. But -- as anyone who's ever dealt with a player who wants to start out with a wagonload of gold, a sheaf of magic items and a train of loyal followers because his character is the Prince of Vellin Laar can tell you -- mechanical effects are not justified by backstory.

--d.

Guest (Unregistered) at [unixtime wrote:1112894322[/unixtime]]-- mechanical effects are not justified by backstory.

Sure they are. You can get bonuses or penalties for backstory all the time. Sometimes backstory automatically lets you succeed at stuff. If you're a cleric of Pelor, the clerics in the temple are going to react to you on friendly terms without a diplomacy check. That's a mechanical effect. They're going to sell you stuff, and do other nice stuff for you, possibly even heal you for free and other benefits.

And that's what a spy network is. You go to a bunch of guys you know in the axe clan and they tell you stuff. Trying to make that into a PrC ability is just dumb.

Trying to eliminate the effects of backstory is a waste of time. Backstory will always have some effect on the game. If your character has a life long friend, you are getting a circumstance bonus on diplomacy checks with him, or are at the very least getting a favorable reaction and you are paying nothing for it level wise. That's just the way RPGs work.

The question isn't whether or not backstory should grant bonuses, the question is whether we should have class abilities that emulate backstory. Do we want to allow people to spend levels or feats that let them get friends and allies without doing anything in character to get them?

Personally I'd say that's what we should eliminate from the game. An ability should be something the character can do, not some relationship to others.

d wrote:This strikes me as an odd viewpoint, although that may be my head cold speaking.

To extend your argument, say I'm playing a 6th level wizard who is a graduate student at some magical research facility, and I attain 7th level. I explain my knowledge of two new fourth level spells as being the result of passing my exams and hence being initiated into the higher mysteries. Why shouldn't someone else who's also a graduate student at the same place be able to get the same ability without investing 7 levels in "Wizard"?

Well, he can -- all he needs to do is invest enough levels in some class that provides spellcasting levels! It doesn't have to be "wizard". It doesn't have to be anything -- what's important is the mechanical benefits it provides.

There is a subtle difference here. The wizard is getting a nonunique (as in "the assistance of tha organisation" being unique) benefit that is not tied to the organisation. In the axe gang example the benefit is not unique (although the explanation for it is), but is is tied to the organisation. I would have no issue with an ability giving out a flat bonus to a skill check - say "gain +4 gather info". I have an issue with "gain +4 gather info, because you can access the spy network of the gang", simply because there is no reason why one would not get this bonus if he joined the gang without taking levels in the PrC. And I have an issue with one losing the benefits he payed for with class levels when he travels.

In my opinion bonuses of this kind are better off being circumstance bonuses the DM hands out depending on the campaign. Stay in your hometown for a while, learn how it works, gain a gather info bonus. Explore the mountains, gain a survival bonus in these mountains. Marry the princess, gain a circumstance bonus of a lot of gold at your disposal. What is the advantage of writing these sort of bonuses into classes? Are all axe gang members the sort of people who would hang out gathering info all the time, but only while in their hometown? That is exactly what you are saying when you have a class give a bonus like that. If axe gangers all gather info all the time just give them a skill bonus and be done with it. If just some axe gangers do give them gather info on their skill list and perhaps skill focus: gather info on their bonus feat list of they have one. But if they merely have a spy network that members can access, then why tie it to a specific class? That is simultaneously saying "all full members have at least one level in the PrC", "any organisation that does not have a PrC does not have a spy network" and "axe gangers only like to gather info in their hometown".

RandomCasualty at [unixtime wrote:1112895094[/unixtime]]
And that's what a spy network is. You go to a bunch of guys you know in the axe clan and they tell you stuff. Trying to make that into a PrC ability is just dumb.

If the effect of the spy network is "you know some guys you can to talk to in order to get to learn whatever the DM thinks you should know anyway" -- then that's not an ability at all, and you should pay nothing for it, beyond the time you spend roleplaying to make those contacts. If the effect of the ability is "you get a +X bonus to all your Gather Information checks" -- that's an actual ability with an actual game effect, and that has to cost something.

This is exactly the difference between "clerics of the same god will cooperate you when the DM feels like it and not cooperate with you when they don't" and "you get a +X bonus on all your Diplomacy checks with clerics of the same god" (which is a pretty awful ability, but there it is). Backstory justifies the former, which is a nonmechanical effect dispensed at the DM's whim. It does not justify the latter. It can explain it -- but not justify it.

RC wrote:The question isn't whether or not backstory should grant bonuses, the question is whether we should have class abilities that emulate backstory. Do we want to allow people to spend levels or feats that let them get friends and allies without doing anything in character to get them?

The "without doing anything in character to get them" part is a little odd. Presumably you have to, you know, actually join the Axe Gang in order to take levels in Axe Gang Thief -- you don't get to just take the level and declare yourself a member and the rest of the Axe Gang goes along with that unquestioningly.

However -- all class abilities can emulate backstory. Every last one of them! Barbarian rage? Raised by the howling berserkers of the Frozen North to invoke the spirit of the enraged bear in combat! Trap Sense? Subjected to years of brutal "testing" by Granny Goodness on the distant planet of Apokalips! Turn undead? Returned to life from beyond the grave by the eternal consuming flame of the Sun God to deal destruction to the unquiet dead!

Seriously. So if we want to adopt the standard that you can have +4 to your Intimidate checks because you took a level of Brutal Mauler -- but we can't say that you can have a +4 to your Intimidate checks because you took a level in Axe Gang Thief and everybody's scared of the Axe Gang -- sorry, but I think that's retarded. As long as the mechanics of actually having the ability are balanced, I couldn't possibly care less what flavor text is associated with it, as long as it doesn't sound completely stupid to my ear as a DM.

--d.

Murtak at [unixtime wrote:1112895605[/unixtime]]
I have an issue with "gain +4 gather info, because you can access the spy network of the gang", simply because there is no reason why one would not get this bonus if he joined the gang without taking levels in the PrC. And I have an issue with one losing the benefits he payed for with class levels when he travels.

The latter is a valid complaint -- but note that Josh's "Well Connected" ability specifically does not stop working when you leave town, and, in fact, one of the questions he asked was 'Is the plausibility of the Axe Gang having informants all over the planes a problem?' (my paraphrase).

Why would you not get the ability if you joined the gang, but didn't take levels in the PrC? See above. The gang doesn't completely trust you? You're not deeply involved enough in the gang to spend time learning who's in the know and who the best people to go to for gossip are? Who knows? There's no shortage of reasons why you would not have an ability.

Murtak wrote:
In my opinion bonuses of this kind are better off being circumstance bonuses the DM hands out depending on the campaign. Stay in your hometown for a while, learn how it works, gain a gather info bonus. Explore the mountains, gain a survival bonus in these mountains. Marry the princess, gain a circumstance bonus of a lot of gold at your disposal. What is the advantage of writing these sort of bonuses into classes?

For things that are very limited in scope and utility, you're probably better off with just a circumstance bonus, which to my way of thinking is really just a special case of the DM saying "okay, I feel like making this easier on you because you came up with a good story". I probably wouldn't bother writing up a prestige class that gave a bonus to Gather Information with the limitation "only in the City of Gunderford" -- if the whole campaign is going to happen in Gunderford anyway, what's the point, and if it's not, it's not really worth having the ability.

But we in no way have to conclude that organizational prestige classes that don't include a Gather Information bonus don't have spy networks -- any more than we have to conclude that someone who doesn't have any ranks in Disable Device isn't a Rogue. You could very well just have a spy network that grants the ability "learn whatever the DM wants you to know anyway", and you don't need to get a class feature to have that.

--d.

Oops. In swear I saw a "not" in that sentence. In that case my only beef with that ability writeup is that the flavor text does not match the ability it gives. Well, and that the ability itself is crappy, but we are not discussing power levels here.

However in that case it is not an organisation-dependant ability anymore - it works everywhere, without any dependancy on the organisation at all. In fact, if the "All for one and one for All" ability does not merely use some of the mechanics of the planar ally spells as I assumed but indeed replicates the entire spell it is not an organisation-dependant ability either.