Most Unbalanced Prestige Classes?

[Nightfall]

Rulesy/Psion,

Just agree to disagree.

Besides I still think Viligant isn't broken.

*shoe from Psion* Ouch! Okay fine.

 

[ruleslawyer]

Happy to!

Psion: My bone of contention was that I felt you mischaracterized my counter-arguments to your own contention (which you made first) that the MT was overpowered. That is the point of this thread, isn't it? To figure out which PrCs might pose problems and why. You seem to agree with that, no? Like it or not, your edit came off as ignoring the points I made, not addressing them. I'd have been perfectly happy to agree to disagree initially had that not been the case.

Anyway, I've apologized three times previously: First for making OT posts, then for wasting your time, so to speak. I'd appreciate a less exasperated tone from you, in any case; I'm hardly interested in wasting my time either.

 

[ruleslawyer]

PS: Psion (or mods!), if you think it'll help the starting poster, I'd be happy to go back through this thread and delete all my posts to shorten it to on-topic posts.

Back onto topic:

A nice quick way of spotting scary PrC issues is to check out the Character Optimization board on the WotC boards. All the broken PrCs seem to enjoy a tour of duty on that site.

 

[Arnwyn]

I think it was based on the theory that you'd be a ranger taking it, and if that's true it's not that bad. But from a cleric it's definitely broken.

You're absolutely right. I pretty much figured that out a couple of sessions after the Windwalker entered play.

The quick, easy, and immediate fix to make the Windwalker balanced is to simply change the "+1 caster level" benefit to "+1 Ranger caster level".

With that, it is balanced and fits the spirit (and my guess, the original intention) of the class.

 

[ruleslawyer]

However, WW does still involve a substantial skill and feat investment for a cleric, and the only major benefit the class confers is BAB (the energy resistances are nice, but less good for a cleric, who can provide these easily with spells, than for the spell-lighter ranger). So it may come out at least a little more even than it seems at first. I dunno.

 

[Arnwyn]

I don't buy the "feat and skill" investment argument, and never will. Experience has proven (to me) that it's irrelevant - and in many cases, beneficial.

For me, there is no "seems" - experience with the WW prestige class has already shown me that my personal impressions are correct.

 

[Celtavian]

I don't buy the "feat and skill" investment argument, and never will. Experience has proven (to me) that it's irrelevant - and in many cases, beneficial.

For me, there is no "seems" - experience with the WW prestige class has already shown me that my personal impressions are correct.

I've played a Windwalker to 13th level. They didn't seem particularly overpowered compared to the other characters. They certainly weren't stealing the show and besides being able to engage flying enemies, they really didn't have an edge on the fighters in melee.

I think a Ranger/Fighter/Windwalker would be much more powerful in team play than a Cleric/Ranger/Windwalker. Being able to fly at will for a fighter type is a huge boon. A cleric with the Travel domain, which most Shaundakul priests have, can already fly at relatively low level.

I listed the Windwalker as overpowered only because you receive alot of neat abilities while giving up only the good Fort save and turning, for some really nifty special abilities. It certainly isn't a show stealer Prc, but the ability to fly is certainly nice. Full BAB is nice as well, but hardly a game breaker. More often than not you are still going to cast Divine Power and Righteous Might if you are going to enter melee, which are going to supercede the good BAB of the Windwalker anyhow.

In play, the Windwalker is no show stealer. Overpowered only because you might receive a little too much for giving up too little.

 

[Prism]

There are three WotC cleric PrC's that I am aware of that advance full caster progression and full turn undead progression. Doomguide (F&P), Radiant Servant of Pelor (CD) and Sacred Exorcist (CD).

Out of all of these the Radiant Servant is probably the weakest and most restrictive to qualify for when it comes to choosing domains. The additional healing powers barely do enough to tempt you to take the poor healing domain (Preparing cure spells as a cleric - tut tut). There are better choices in the sun domain, but this isn't the strongest domain out there either. I'd say that this PrC makes worshiping Pelor a bit stronger.

The Doomguide is fairly strong although is a bit tricky to qualify for. The extra abilities are pretty decent and you get 3 bonus feats too

The strongest and easiest to qualify for is the sacred exorcist. No feat requirements at all, 2 skills which you would probably take anyway, no domain reqs or god reqs. You get a favoured enemy bonus's vs undead or evil outsiders, plus permanent consecrate and a few other nice spell like abilities

All in all these are stronger than a straight cleric, especially the sacred exorcist which requires no planning at all.

 

[Taren Seeker]

I don't buy the "feat and skill" investment argument, and never will. Experience has proven (to me) that it's irrelevant - and in many cases, beneficial.

For me, there is no "seems" - experience with the WW prestige class has already shown me that my personal impressions are correct.

And my experience with an 18th level ranger/cleric/WW is that it is powerful, but most benefits are not that relevant. Also, if you want to be able to have any amount of decent skills or useful feats you really do need to take that Ranger level, otherwise you are paying a lot of cross class, need martial weapon: GS, tracking and lightning reflexes. Without Ranger at mid levels you can't even have ranks in concentration.

So the upside is that the PrC pretty much forces you to give up at least 1 caster level, maybe 2 depending on how important skills are to you. As for the requirements giving you more benefits, I would not have bothered with ranks in hide or move silent, nor lightning reflexes, nor even WF: GS if they were not required by the class.

As others have stated, many of the side benefits of the class are simply either overshadowed by later abilities (the flying) or by your own spellcasting abilities.

 

[Arbiter of Wyrms]

Sangehirn

Without a doubt, the most unbalanced class I have ever had the joy of playing is the Sangehirn, from the WotC site (Mind's Eye, I think) for 3.0 psionics.

This Psionic healer would soak up everybody's damage as soon as combat was done, wait five minutes for his fast healing to make the damage go away, and the party was ready to go again.

Hit points and healing were never an issue that got that party to rest. We only worried about power points and spells per day. With rings of sustenance all around, we took only four hours turnaround and we hit the ground running again. I believe that, in game time, we spent about a week or less cleaning out the entire crater ridge mines in RtToEE.