About Prestige Classes
You have your character, his class (wizard, warrior...), his race (human, elf, dwarf...), even his home region in Faerûn. Your character has advanced in class, but now you want something more for him, something extra, something... prestigious. That extra something that shows off your character's interests or experiences, racial loyalties or political aspirations - assuming your DM allows it: A Prestige Class.
As explained in the Dungeon Master's Guide, the prestige class is a form of multiclassing but unlike the regular base or alternate classes, prestige classes have minimum entry requirements which vary from prestige class to prestige class. Some have racial requirements, others have gender requirements and many have alignment requirements. Warrior prestige classes will have minimum Base Attack Bonus requirements and/or requirements for certain weapon or martial feats while magic user prestige classes will have minimum spellcasting requirements.
Note that this differs from alternate classes which are variations (usually major variations, such as evil paladins and ninjas) of the base classes.
Prestige Classes - An alphabetical listing of most published Prestige Classes. Last Modified: January 26, 2021