Class progression idea - opinions?

[Nero24200]

Hello all

I was tryign to think oa few ideas for a sci-fi campaign I was planning, but I'm a big fan of the D20 Modern or D20 Future classes.

I then had an idea, but I'm not too sure if it will work.
The idea is this, every character will pick 3 or 4 "Paths" and allocate them so that each character has one "master", "major", "moderate" and "minor" path. All the paths will have a mastery rating which increases with levels, starting at Mastery 0 (except for master). AS the masteyr increases, the paths grant more abilites.

For instance...say we had someone with marksmen path as their primary path - as they gain levels they'll gain more abilities associated with that path, whilst their "minor" path, lets say...somthing like piloting, will only grant 1 or two abilities over the entire level range.

A few things spring to mind for this - Firstly, it's very versitile, and I won't need to worry about pidgeon-holing each path into a specific role, since no character is restricted to a single path anyway. Though I think I might be failing to see any problems.

Is there any pit-falls I should watch for when adopting a system like this?

[The Dark Fiddler]

I HAVE seen this done before, so I know it works, but I don't know if there's any specific pitfalls.

If you're interested, the link in my profile has the "Hero of Light" base class by Xefas.

[Kaihaku]

It's a classy idea. I have some experience with similar endeavors and I think I can point out a few of the problems you'll run into.

Determining (Path) Abilities and Requirements is pain because they need to be balanced and there need to be a lot of them.
Determining Character Traits can be very bulky with multiple sources. How do the paths determine things like hit-points, skills per level, saving throws, etc.
It's fun, it's exciting, it's way off balance. This happens once you've put too much effort into the system to turn back and this is when you start noticing the major balance issues. The best way to avoid this is to have others check your work from the beginning, even though it isn't grand and beautiful then.

[Nero24200]

Somthing like that, though more like this for the mastery rating

{table]Level|Master Path|Major Path|Moderate Path|Minor Path
1st|1|1|0|0
2nd|2|1|1|0
3rd|3|2|1|1
4th|4|3|2|1
5th|5|3|2|1
6th|6|4|3|2
7th|7|5|3|2
8th|8|5|4|2
9th|9|6|4|3
10th|10|7|5|3[/table]

So that characters might gain multiple mastery benifits as they level. Though just in putting that I can already see one pitfall, which is that some levels will grant multiple benifits whilst others might only grant 1.

Edit: As for ability scores and hit-dice etc, I was thinking of keeping them seperate form the class features, using somthing like a "Class Points" concept to determine things like hit points, saves, skill points etc. The Paths progression would be used to only determine class features esseintailly (though for some paths, there might be somthing akin to a "toughness" class feature for somthing like a "Tough" path).

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

{table]Level|Master Path|Major Path|Moderate Path|Minor Path
1st|1|1|0|0
2nd|2|1|1|0
3rd|3|2|1|1
4th|4|3|1|1
5th|5|3|2|1
6th|6|4|2|1
7th|7|5|2|2
8th|8|5|3|2
9th|9|6|3|2
10th|10|7|3|2[/table]

It grants fewer abilities from your lesser two classes (perhaps appropriately), but it does have a more fluid progression of abilities: every level grants at leas 2 new abilities.