Conflicting rules in CW and CA?

[Cheiromancer]

Is there a discrepancy between these two passages?

Complete Warrior 16:

It's possible for a character to take levels in a prestige class and later be in a position where the character no longer qualifies to be a member of the class. An alignment change, levels lost because of character death, or the loss of a magic item that granted an important ability are examples of events that can make a character ineligible to advance further in a prestige class.

If a character no longer meets the requirements for a prestige class, he or she loses the benefit of any class features or other special abilities granted by the class. The character retains Hit Dice gained form advancing in the class as well as any improvements to base attack bonus and base save bonuses that the class provided.

Complete Arcane, page 5

Should a character find herself in a position (because of changed alignment, lost levels, or the like) where she no longer meets the requirements of a prestige class, she loses all special abiliities (but not Hit Dice, base attack bonus, or base save bonus) gained from levels of the prestige class.

If I understand it correctly, spellcasting is a class feature, not a special ability. So, according a neutral wiz5/alienist10 who becomes lawful neutral retains his spellcasting ability, but loses all the features under "special" in the class description. Two feats become unavailable, his familiar loses the supernatural template, he gains back lost wisdom, all that stuff.... but he still casts spells as a 15th level wizard.

According to Complete Warrior, he loses all those abilities, but also loses the spellcasting ability; he casts as a 5th level wizard. Is this right?

Oh, and pity the 10th level dragon disciple who gains the half-dragon template. He is now of type [dragon], and so he loses all dragon disciple class features. At least he is not as bad off as the Ur-Priest, who loses his class abilities the moment he takes a level in the class; casting divine spells disqualifies him.

 

[pbd]

Oh, and pity the 10th level dragon disciple who gains the half-dragon template. He is now of type [dragon], and so he loses all dragon disciple class features. At least he is not as bad off as the Ur-Priest, who loses his class abilities the moment he takes a level in the class; casting divine spells disqualifies him.

I am pretty sure that this isn't meant to apply to the bonus spells gained Dragon Disciple or divine spells gained by the Ur-Priest. That would definately be broken.

Things like this should be looked at intuitively; advancing in a class should not disqualify you from that class. I think you are looking a little too hard for inconsistencies in the rules...

 

[dcollins]

Is there a discrepancy between these two passages?

I think not, they look basically the same to me. You keep "Hit Dice, base attack bonus, and base saves" and lose the other stuff. If the CA quote had specifically said that you keep "class features", then you'd be on to some something, but all it did was leave out that particular term.

Spellcasting needs to count as a special ability. Similarly, abilities from a prestige class clearly can't take away the prestige class eligibilty.

 

[Saeviomagy]

I am pretty sure that this isn't meant to apply to the bonus spells gained Dragon Disciple or divine spells gained by the Ur-Priest. That would definately be broken.

Things like this should be looked at intuitively; advancing in a class should not disqualify you from that class. I think you are looking a little too hard for inconsistencies in the rules...

I think it's just a sign that the guy who made up the rule didn't think through the impact of his rulings.

Apart from those given above:

Various classes lose natural abilities (ie - ex abilities which require no magic or anything beyond skill) when their alignment changes. ie - an assassin forgets how to not poison himself when he becomes non evil.

Apparently the loremaster loses his prestige class if he doesn't memorise a level 3+ divination, and memorise 7 divination spells all up. Wierdly, he'd probably also end up wiping a bunch of spells from his spellbook once he'd cast it, because he loses the 2 free spells a level from wizard spellcasting levels... He'll also forget how to speak some languages, use a skill and various other things.

A thaumaturgist's summoned buddy goes away if he fails to memorise (or memorises and casts it) planar ally

I think I'll stick with the base rule, which is "you only need to qualify for a PrC to take the first level of it", and possibly add on "oh, and divine PrC's risk losing the whole lot if they fall out of favour with their gods".

 

[pbd]

Common sense

I am of the opinion that you just need to use common sense when dtermining what we keep and lose when a prereq for a class is lost.

Most of these books are written by different people and, even if they are written by the same group, they may not remember exactly what was written word for word in a past publication.

Just go by what seems right (and what you can get the DM to agree to).

Peter

 

[Cheiromancer]

I noticed in the Monster manual gloassary that the various types have "features" and "traits."

The features are hit dice, BAB, saves, and skill points. Traits are things like proficiencies, darkvision, immunities, whether they eat or sleep, etc..

So I would guess that class features means hit dice, BAB, saves and skill points, but not spellcasting.

[edit] My mistake: every class description has "Class Features just after teh table that gives the bab, saves, etc. Monster type features are different[/edit]

They are just dumb rules, is all. I especially don't like the way that alienists will lose all their abilities if they become lawful.

BTW, what happens to a warlock if he becomes non-evil and non-chaotic? There is no rule in CA for ex-warlocks. Do the dark powers who sponsor them withdraw all their special abilities?

 

[Arkhandus]

Yeesh, is common sense so rare now? Class Features and Special Abilities for classes are interchangeable terms. When you violate a class' prerequisites or restrictions, you lose everything from that class except BAB, base saves, skill points, hit dice, and maybe proficiencies. Some classes may have specific exceptions noted. Obviously, progressing in a class will not disqualify you from the class, because only an idjit would come to such a conclusion. Alienists can't retain their class features/abilities if they become lawful, because the Alienist is an inherantly psychotic prestige class, so developing any sort of logical thinking would just ruin their connection to the utterly-illogical ways of the Far Realm and what Uvuudaum or the like would want a sane minion? So they sever the ex-Alienist's connection and take away the psuedonatural powers once the Alienist becomes sane. True, some things like the Assassin's loss of Safe Poison Use don't make sense, but that's just a designer's gaffe, not a problem with the general rule that's been around since the 3.0E DMG.

 

[Saeviomagy]

True, some things like the Assassin's loss of Safe Poison Use don't make sense, but that's just a designer's gaffe, not a problem with the general rule that's been around since the 3.0E DMG.

That was broken, and was fixed in 3.5.

And then was broken again by the people who wrote ca and cw.

Tell me - if a rule causes a widespread group of problems that each have to be resolved individually by a DM, how is it that you can believe there is no problem with the rule?

 

[Gort]

To be honest, I'd be impressed if my players ever noticed these rules.