Just finished reading over the preview of the next "new" race to be a part of the PHB3. The Githzerai.
Due to my hatred of the sci-fi peg of psionics in the round hole of fantasy dnd, I never was much of a fan of the Gith. They were like Drow. Fun to fight as antagonists but I had zero interest in every making one into a hero.
They do have an interesting backstory though. Enslaved until they fought their way to freedom. It's a story that's pretty cliche but it still holds power and speaks to me in a way. Probably because I, like most everyone, love a good underdog. On the downside the whole githzerai/githyanki split is too close the whole elves/drow split. You can use the cliche WotC, but please, give it a new twist.
As for their powers, well, I like them. In general they reflect the new slant on psionics quite nicely and are definitely very useful (unlike the Dragonborn's lame breath "weapon"). If anything they might be a little too good. Getting a free shift of up to 3 squares is a super boon when using a second wind. Not only do you get HP back, but you also get to put some space between yourself and who or whatever was whaling on you. Iron Mind is also a tad strong, giving a short lived +2 bonus to all defenses. Compare that to the wizard's Shield utility spell. Both are Encounter powers and Shield gives a +4 bonus to defenses but the Iron Mind doesn't take up a power slot. Also, Iron Mind can be boosted to +4 and give damage resist with a couple of Epic Tier feats.
The Paragon path isn't bad but not especially gripping either. Much like any Paragon path I suppose. A couple of bonuses and a fancy title. Meh.
Their racial feats are nice. Again much like any feat they give some bonuses but their nothing to get excited about. My favorite is probably Iron Resolve of Zerthadlun because it gives the player a potentially difficult choice. Do you hold on to that last psionic power point for a +2 to saving throws, or spend it and hope you don't roll an 8 or 9 on your next save? I love that kind of decision and find that it's sorely missing in 4E.
A comment by Robert J. Schwalb, in regards to the racial feats got me to thinking. He said that, "Githzerai feats reinforce and expand the race's existing themes and mechanics." I can't argue with that, although I might quibble over the "expand" portion. The thing that occurred to me is that this is the big difference in feats in 4E as compared to 3.5.
In 3.5 feats were arguably the thing that defined one's character. Four fighters could be wildly different from one another based solely on the feats selected. In 4E feats have been relegated to small boosts to existing powers. One method was wildly liberating while the other almost forces feat selection to min/max. A number of 4E feats might sound good, or make for interesting character development, but if they don't synergize with your powers they're kinda wasted.
Anyways, back on track, I liked the Githzerai overll. I probably won't ever play a Gith character, but they're at least somewhat interesting now. Some nice powers. A few interesting feats. Good backstory. Really, what more could I ask for from any race?
Showing posts with label paragon paths. Show all posts
Showing posts with label paragon paths. Show all posts
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Revenants
Last month's Dragon had a Features article on an Insider-only race, the Revenant. I've always liked the idea of a revenant, a figure brought back from the dead for a sole purpose, driven to accomplish it. The novels that introduce the well-known drow Drizzt Do'urden have him chased by a revenant (his father? It has been years since I've read them), and the MMO Ultima Online had the revenant as a summonable creature that doggedly followed its target, outsmarting invisibility and teleportation.
Allowing players to play this race is definitely an interesting idea, though not likely a choice that is going to work for a casual campaign. While I'm sure DMs would be accommodating to a player that wanted to try it out for a lark, I think the whole concept of the revenant -- the back-from-the-dead, single-minded driven creature -- requires a campaign that has this idea interwoven into the plot, instead of just something that might come up once in a while.
I think the revenant would work well for a single-player campaign, providing a great hook into why the character adventures alone, and also providing the motivation to advance through the adventure (if you have problem players that like to (jokingly?) NOT follow the hints that the module provides.) The revenant can provide a basis for a single-session game, being brought back to take down this cult stronghold or that evil warren, and upon success or failure, returning to the afterlife from whence he or she came.
Of course, it works well for a whole party, too: a whole campaign could be based around some of the ideas hinted at in the article, with the party being pawns in the games of gods, or representing a party that, in service of one deity or another, was wiped out, and brought back as a favour to the deity for another try. In fact, the idea of bringing a group's party back from the dead after a Total Party Kill works well if you really wanted to see a campaign to the end. In fact, the 3.5 Ghostwalk sourcebook was useful for this, and was a backup plan that I had had for a few adventures in the past.
One of the interesting ideas of the revenant is that you choose a race that you were before, and gain benefits based on that race, most importantly, satisfying prerequisites that require the race. This applies most directly to most of the revenant feats, which specify both "revenant" and an additional race as the prereqs, such as the "Soul" feats which let you dabble back into lost racial powers, such as the Human Soul to get a +1 bonus to your defenses, or the Halfling Soul, to use your second chance power in an encounter instead of the dark reaping one that you get as a revenant. This can be especially useful if you are playing a previous character, returning for a second time around, and got used to certain racial abilities.
The racial Paragon and Epic Destiny paths are interesting, though I'm not sure the latter compares in "strength" to other epic destinies. The Paragon path touches on your pseudo-undead nature, and the Epic Destiny sure plays on the idea of "destiny", and "fate" and how your life, such as it is, has been reclaimed for yourself, allowing some interesting bonuses to saving throws.
I'd be curious to try this race out. As it stands, I don't see race mattering too much in the grand scheme of things - the initial racial traits, the occasional use of a racial ability, and the role-playing aspect of NPCs dealing with your character's race don't amount to that much compared to class selection and power choices. This is too bad, because one of the ideas in 4e was that race was going to matter a little more. In fact, if our current party was to switch to all revenants instead of two humans, a halfling, an elf, an eladrin and a dragonborn, I wonder how much we'd notice. I think the storyline reason for playing a revenant would be the most noticeable change.
Allowing players to play this race is definitely an interesting idea, though not likely a choice that is going to work for a casual campaign. While I'm sure DMs would be accommodating to a player that wanted to try it out for a lark, I think the whole concept of the revenant -- the back-from-the-dead, single-minded driven creature -- requires a campaign that has this idea interwoven into the plot, instead of just something that might come up once in a while.
I think the revenant would work well for a single-player campaign, providing a great hook into why the character adventures alone, and also providing the motivation to advance through the adventure (if you have problem players that like to (jokingly?) NOT follow the hints that the module provides.) The revenant can provide a basis for a single-session game, being brought back to take down this cult stronghold or that evil warren, and upon success or failure, returning to the afterlife from whence he or she came.
Of course, it works well for a whole party, too: a whole campaign could be based around some of the ideas hinted at in the article, with the party being pawns in the games of gods, or representing a party that, in service of one deity or another, was wiped out, and brought back as a favour to the deity for another try. In fact, the idea of bringing a group's party back from the dead after a Total Party Kill works well if you really wanted to see a campaign to the end. In fact, the 3.5 Ghostwalk sourcebook was useful for this, and was a backup plan that I had had for a few adventures in the past.
One of the interesting ideas of the revenant is that you choose a race that you were before, and gain benefits based on that race, most importantly, satisfying prerequisites that require the race. This applies most directly to most of the revenant feats, which specify both "revenant" and an additional race as the prereqs, such as the "Soul" feats which let you dabble back into lost racial powers, such as the Human Soul to get a +1 bonus to your defenses, or the Halfling Soul, to use your second chance power in an encounter instead of the dark reaping one that you get as a revenant. This can be especially useful if you are playing a previous character, returning for a second time around, and got used to certain racial abilities.
The racial Paragon and Epic Destiny paths are interesting, though I'm not sure the latter compares in "strength" to other epic destinies. The Paragon path touches on your pseudo-undead nature, and the Epic Destiny sure plays on the idea of "destiny", and "fate" and how your life, such as it is, has been reclaimed for yourself, allowing some interesting bonuses to saving throws.
I'd be curious to try this race out. As it stands, I don't see race mattering too much in the grand scheme of things - the initial racial traits, the occasional use of a racial ability, and the role-playing aspect of NPCs dealing with your character's race don't amount to that much compared to class selection and power choices. This is too bad, because one of the ideas in 4e was that race was going to matter a little more. In fact, if our current party was to switch to all revenants instead of two humans, a halfling, an elf, an eladrin and a dragonborn, I wonder how much we'd notice. I think the storyline reason for playing a revenant would be the most noticeable change.
Monday, March 30, 2009
Playing your own character
Hot on the heels of Griff's last two posts, I'll mention that I've been playing with the Character Builder a lot lately, getting to know the different classes out there. I find that this is a lot easier than trying to read through thirty levels of powers for a class, where they all blur together...
To test out the Builder, I took all of my various 3.5 characters over the years, and attempted to recreate them in 4e. It should be noted that, while I might complain about the lack of choice in 4e, I very rarely multiclassed in 3.5, not counting prestige classes. I thought that this might have made these recreations a little easier.
I started this experiment after reading the article on the Shadar Kai in Dragon #372, where they also provided some feats specific to the spiked chain. This brought to mind my 3.5 character Placide DeMorgan, and I thought I'd give a spin recreating him.
This was actually a lot of fun, and quite the challenge. The idea of Placide was that he had reach, and that he could Trip and Disarm well. Trip and Disarm are no longer general attack types in 4e, so my goal was to take any power that came along that provided "...and target falls prone" or any mention of disarming. Then I decided that anything that might grab a target would fit in with the concept (wrapping them around with the chain), and, if none of these choices was available, I'd go for the idea of a sweeping attack, such as a close burst smack-everyone-around-you attack. And if all else failed, I'd take a power that provided a slide or pull effect, as Placide tugs his opponents around the battlefield.
But it was tough! There were many choices of powers that fit with this idea. It also "helped" that, with the right choice of feats, the spiked chain was considered a flail, a two-handed weapon, two weapons, an off-hand weapon, a light blade, a double weapon, and reach weapon, which meant that any powers that offered up bonuses to use of such a weapon became appealing.
To level Placide through level 30 probably took two hours, on and off, of flipping back and forth between power descriptions and even feat descriptions. It was probably the most engaging character I've made in 4e.
On the heels of such a success, I tried to make Raven, my Druid/Shifter (and by far my favorite 3.5 character to play). Not having the Shifter prestige class was going to be a blow, but because the beast form was such a large part of the 4e druid, my idea was to focus on powers and feats that would allow 4e Raven to remain in beast form and be at her most powerful, with little regard to her human form. Also, going with the more feral build, I was going to avoid taking any powers that did energy damage, staying instead with claws, teeth and primal savagery.
Well I was successful, I suppose, in that I made a 30th level druid. But it wasn't nearly as fun, or interesting, or engaging, as making the fighter. I kept thinking that I wished I could have a little bit of a Rage effect, to really let the primal nature take over, or some stealthy creeping beast form to then sneak attack with -- but of course, I can't multiclass barbarian or rogue here. While I was able to apply my build "rules" and choose from my options easily, I ended up whipping through the 30 levels without really noticing it, without much thought.
You might be thinking, then, that it's my fault for coming up with this restrictive build, that made this character easy and uninteresting to make. But this is my point. I summarized this feeling to one of our group on Saturday night: that 3.5 allowed you to come up with some completely-custom idea for a character -- a stabby, lightning-casting, gnome who's good at tripping and throwing hammers -- and you could find a combination of classes, feats, spells and equipment to realize you very specific character concept. In 4e, you can try to do this, but in the end, are given only a handful of choices, and you have to try and be creative based on those (or perhaps in spite of those).
I got lucky with building 4e Placide, because there were lots of feats and powers that accentuated the idea behind him. But not so much with Raven. And perhaps the next book or Dragon article will give me the flexibility I need -- even 3.5 didn't have every bit of content available in the beginning -- but generally new content in 4e is for the new race or new class, not something that gets added to an existing class. Feats, sure, are available to most characters, but powers are always tied to a specific class. And if I can't take that power, then let me take that class *at any level I decide to*.
As Griff just mentioned, the Paragon Paths are helping to provide a few extra branches to the thin evergreens of the class progressions, but even those are limited, and the Epic Destinies are, as Griff believes, a bit limited.
Today I just tried another remake, this time recreating the ever-doomed Ish'us'q. Had Ish'us'q seen more years in 3.5, he would have focused on DR, SR and regeneration, likely going down the path of the forsaker. In 4e, I decided to build him similarly to the Dungeons & Dragons Online version of him, with heavy concentration on raging, a falchion, and taking out multiple foes at once. There are various powers that focus on raging, and when there wasn't one available, a close burst power was usually available. The choices were there, and I got my character, but, as with Raven, it just wasn't very satisfying. There's my barbarian, all made up and ready for 30 levels... but apart from the initial "choice" of my theme, it was a no-brainer at all 29 level-ups. The glimmer of hope I had for 4e character creation that I had when making Placide still wasn't recreated.
I'm not done yet -- I've got more classes to try out in the builder, both old and new. But instead of coming up with a theme and then sitting down to realize it on a character sheet, I will be browsing through the powers of my chosen class, and trying to come up something interesting, to stand out from the others.
What colour do you want your Ford Model T in?
To test out the Builder, I took all of my various 3.5 characters over the years, and attempted to recreate them in 4e. It should be noted that, while I might complain about the lack of choice in 4e, I very rarely multiclassed in 3.5, not counting prestige classes. I thought that this might have made these recreations a little easier.
I started this experiment after reading the article on the Shadar Kai in Dragon #372, where they also provided some feats specific to the spiked chain. This brought to mind my 3.5 character Placide DeMorgan, and I thought I'd give a spin recreating him.
This was actually a lot of fun, and quite the challenge. The idea of Placide was that he had reach, and that he could Trip and Disarm well. Trip and Disarm are no longer general attack types in 4e, so my goal was to take any power that came along that provided "...and target falls prone" or any mention of disarming. Then I decided that anything that might grab a target would fit in with the concept (wrapping them around with the chain), and, if none of these choices was available, I'd go for the idea of a sweeping attack, such as a close burst smack-everyone-around-you attack. And if all else failed, I'd take a power that provided a slide or pull effect, as Placide tugs his opponents around the battlefield.
But it was tough! There were many choices of powers that fit with this idea. It also "helped" that, with the right choice of feats, the spiked chain was considered a flail, a two-handed weapon, two weapons, an off-hand weapon, a light blade, a double weapon, and reach weapon, which meant that any powers that offered up bonuses to use of such a weapon became appealing.
To level Placide through level 30 probably took two hours, on and off, of flipping back and forth between power descriptions and even feat descriptions. It was probably the most engaging character I've made in 4e.
On the heels of such a success, I tried to make Raven, my Druid/Shifter (and by far my favorite 3.5 character to play). Not having the Shifter prestige class was going to be a blow, but because the beast form was such a large part of the 4e druid, my idea was to focus on powers and feats that would allow 4e Raven to remain in beast form and be at her most powerful, with little regard to her human form. Also, going with the more feral build, I was going to avoid taking any powers that did energy damage, staying instead with claws, teeth and primal savagery.
Well I was successful, I suppose, in that I made a 30th level druid. But it wasn't nearly as fun, or interesting, or engaging, as making the fighter. I kept thinking that I wished I could have a little bit of a Rage effect, to really let the primal nature take over, or some stealthy creeping beast form to then sneak attack with -- but of course, I can't multiclass barbarian or rogue here. While I was able to apply my build "rules" and choose from my options easily, I ended up whipping through the 30 levels without really noticing it, without much thought.
You might be thinking, then, that it's my fault for coming up with this restrictive build, that made this character easy and uninteresting to make. But this is my point. I summarized this feeling to one of our group on Saturday night: that 3.5 allowed you to come up with some completely-custom idea for a character -- a stabby, lightning-casting, gnome who's good at tripping and throwing hammers -- and you could find a combination of classes, feats, spells and equipment to realize you very specific character concept. In 4e, you can try to do this, but in the end, are given only a handful of choices, and you have to try and be creative based on those (or perhaps in spite of those).
I got lucky with building 4e Placide, because there were lots of feats and powers that accentuated the idea behind him. But not so much with Raven. And perhaps the next book or Dragon article will give me the flexibility I need -- even 3.5 didn't have every bit of content available in the beginning -- but generally new content in 4e is for the new race or new class, not something that gets added to an existing class. Feats, sure, are available to most characters, but powers are always tied to a specific class. And if I can't take that power, then let me take that class *at any level I decide to*.
As Griff just mentioned, the Paragon Paths are helping to provide a few extra branches to the thin evergreens of the class progressions, but even those are limited, and the Epic Destinies are, as Griff believes, a bit limited.
Today I just tried another remake, this time recreating the ever-doomed Ish'us'q. Had Ish'us'q seen more years in 3.5, he would have focused on DR, SR and regeneration, likely going down the path of the forsaker. In 4e, I decided to build him similarly to the Dungeons & Dragons Online version of him, with heavy concentration on raging, a falchion, and taking out multiple foes at once. There are various powers that focus on raging, and when there wasn't one available, a close burst power was usually available. The choices were there, and I got my character, but, as with Raven, it just wasn't very satisfying. There's my barbarian, all made up and ready for 30 levels... but apart from the initial "choice" of my theme, it was a no-brainer at all 29 level-ups. The glimmer of hope I had for 4e character creation that I had when making Placide still wasn't recreated.
I'm not done yet -- I've got more classes to try out in the builder, both old and new. But instead of coming up with a theme and then sitting down to realize it on a character sheet, I will be browsing through the powers of my chosen class, and trying to come up something interesting, to stand out from the others.
What colour do you want your Ford Model T in?
This is Epic?
A bit more on the PHB2.
For starters, I can see now why they include classes like the Shaman, Warden, and Warlord. For sure those "classes" are pale variants on stronger classes, but I can't say that they're not necessary. We need as many of these banal tweaks as we can get so that we can find something that closely fits most any character concept.
A ranger might not be quite right so there's the Warden. A druid kinda makes sense but the Shaman has powers that are better suited. Etc...
I still hate the idea of that, but I understand the design now.
I love the Paragon Paths. The more of these that come out in each book the better. They are really the one and only thing to look forward to. The one meaningful decision in your character's career.
So much for Rob Heinsoo's goal of widening the sweet spot. What they really did was set the Paragon Tier as the de facto sweet spot.
That's most obvious when you look at the Epic Paths. My god they suck! I mean, seriously suck. There is absolutely nothing there to look forward to. For any class.
Epic levels should bring epic choices. This is the time when we should be weighing every decision in light of our character's goals. We're talking heroic destiny here.
Yet we get repetitive drop-this-power-and-select-from-three-of-these-to-replace-it decisions. If you want to call that a decision.
Maybe they'll address that in PHB3. Or in some Epic Powers add-on. Or both. What better way to ensure that we drop another $50 into WotC's coffers?
Oh wait. They have already found a better way to snag our money. By putting core rules in "optional" source books.
How else does one explain the fact that they still didn't address double weapons in the PHB2? If double weapons had been overlooked or cut from the original PHB, well, so be it. Adding them in to the PHB2 would have been a reasonable remedy.
Instead they put the rules for double weapons in the Adventurer's Vault and nowhere else. If you want those rules, dig out your wallet chump.
On the bright side, I'm sure the "Adventurer's Vault" and similar books will have plenty of other good stuff. Enough at least to justify the extra money spent.
Maybe even something epic.
For starters, I can see now why they include classes like the Shaman, Warden, and Warlord. For sure those "classes" are pale variants on stronger classes, but I can't say that they're not necessary. We need as many of these banal tweaks as we can get so that we can find something that closely fits most any character concept.
A ranger might not be quite right so there's the Warden. A druid kinda makes sense but the Shaman has powers that are better suited. Etc...
I still hate the idea of that, but I understand the design now.
I love the Paragon Paths. The more of these that come out in each book the better. They are really the one and only thing to look forward to. The one meaningful decision in your character's career.
So much for Rob Heinsoo's goal of widening the sweet spot. What they really did was set the Paragon Tier as the de facto sweet spot.
That's most obvious when you look at the Epic Paths. My god they suck! I mean, seriously suck. There is absolutely nothing there to look forward to. For any class.
Epic levels should bring epic choices. This is the time when we should be weighing every decision in light of our character's goals. We're talking heroic destiny here.
Yet we get repetitive drop-this-power-and-select-from-three-of-these-to-replace-it decisions. If you want to call that a decision.
Maybe they'll address that in PHB3. Or in some Epic Powers add-on. Or both. What better way to ensure that we drop another $50 into WotC's coffers?
Oh wait. They have already found a better way to snag our money. By putting core rules in "optional" source books.
How else does one explain the fact that they still didn't address double weapons in the PHB2? If double weapons had been overlooked or cut from the original PHB, well, so be it. Adding them in to the PHB2 would have been a reasonable remedy.
Instead they put the rules for double weapons in the Adventurer's Vault and nowhere else. If you want those rules, dig out your wallet chump.
On the bright side, I'm sure the "Adventurer's Vault" and similar books will have plenty of other good stuff. Enough at least to justify the extra money spent.
Maybe even something epic.
Thursday, June 5, 2008
PHB - Classes
Chapter 4 - CHARACTER CLASSES
This chapter starts off defining a lot of terms that will be used in the later class entries, explaining the different fields that will appear (role, power source, key abilities, etc.) and also explaining the long-term goals of classes, including the paragon paths and epic destinies. It is explained that the paragon paths do not stop your progression in your original class, which makes it a little different than prestige classes were - that is, you don't stop advancing as a cleric to become an angelic avenger, but instead an angelic avenger is a cleric who's getting a few other powers as they go. And also mentioned is the ability to take "paragon multiclassing" instead of a paragon path. I still don't know what I think about the lack of true multiclassing, but I think some play will help determine whether the flexibility is still there.
Also before the class entries is a good-sized section on Powers and their entries. A lot of terms are thrown around here, such as the power sources, damage types, effect types and attack types. I think this is going to overwhelm a newcomer to the game, but will make a good reference to go back to once they've flipped through a few powers.
The class entries have what you'd expect from the preceding section, their list of abilities and role and so forth, as well as their defense bonuses, such as the +2 Will that a cleric gains. There are also builds provided in the class entries, in the same vein as in 3rd edition where they suggest your starting feat(s), skill choices, and (in 3rd edition) equipment. I felt it was at a better place in the older books, finishing off the entry with a suggestion or two. Here they're one of the first bits of info, and might be misconstrued as a list of two choices that one must choose from, if the word "suggested" is overlooked. Granted, it's there four or five times, but still...
One of the key features mentioned along with the talk of paragon paths is that they provide expanded use for your action points. These are still new to me, having only played one Eberron campaign, so I don't yet have a feel for how often you use them, when you decide to, etc. But I think it's going to be the same kind of thing as when to use your encounter power, and moreso when you use your daily power.
Each paragon path seems to have one ability that enhances your action point use, and then provides a few other small abilities, and a small list of paragon powers. I have to keep reminding myself that the paragon path is NOT a prestige class, and that it does not preclude the advancement of your main class. It's more like the ranger choice made in 3rd edition (dual-wield vs. range fighter).
Overall, I found the paragon paths disappointing. They introduce very few new abilities and only a handful of powers each. They seem to be presented as these big decisions and changes that your character goes through at 11th level, but really they're just a small variation.
This is a large chapter, but the majority of it is taken up by powers, which I think warrant their own post.
This chapter starts off defining a lot of terms that will be used in the later class entries, explaining the different fields that will appear (role, power source, key abilities, etc.) and also explaining the long-term goals of classes, including the paragon paths and epic destinies. It is explained that the paragon paths do not stop your progression in your original class, which makes it a little different than prestige classes were - that is, you don't stop advancing as a cleric to become an angelic avenger, but instead an angelic avenger is a cleric who's getting a few other powers as they go. And also mentioned is the ability to take "paragon multiclassing" instead of a paragon path. I still don't know what I think about the lack of true multiclassing, but I think some play will help determine whether the flexibility is still there.
Also before the class entries is a good-sized section on Powers and their entries. A lot of terms are thrown around here, such as the power sources, damage types, effect types and attack types. I think this is going to overwhelm a newcomer to the game, but will make a good reference to go back to once they've flipped through a few powers.
The class entries have what you'd expect from the preceding section, their list of abilities and role and so forth, as well as their defense bonuses, such as the +2 Will that a cleric gains. There are also builds provided in the class entries, in the same vein as in 3rd edition where they suggest your starting feat(s), skill choices, and (in 3rd edition) equipment. I felt it was at a better place in the older books, finishing off the entry with a suggestion or two. Here they're one of the first bits of info, and might be misconstrued as a list of two choices that one must choose from, if the word "suggested" is overlooked. Granted, it's there four or five times, but still...
One of the key features mentioned along with the talk of paragon paths is that they provide expanded use for your action points. These are still new to me, having only played one Eberron campaign, so I don't yet have a feel for how often you use them, when you decide to, etc. But I think it's going to be the same kind of thing as when to use your encounter power, and moreso when you use your daily power.
Each paragon path seems to have one ability that enhances your action point use, and then provides a few other small abilities, and a small list of paragon powers. I have to keep reminding myself that the paragon path is NOT a prestige class, and that it does not preclude the advancement of your main class. It's more like the ranger choice made in 3rd edition (dual-wield vs. range fighter).
Overall, I found the paragon paths disappointing. They introduce very few new abilities and only a handful of powers each. They seem to be presented as these big decisions and changes that your character goes through at 11th level, but really they're just a small variation.
This is a large chapter, but the majority of it is taken up by powers, which I think warrant their own post.
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