Most Unbalanced Prestige Classes?

[billd91]

The first thing I did, upon seeing this PrC, was to look at the cloud of taint spell. Absolutely broken, and it's a shame because this was a pretty fresh character concept.

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I think that spell could work a bit better with the Rokugan sourcebook which extends the taint score out quite farther with specific points where you can get minor, moderate, and major corruptions. Check out that scale of taint and I think you'll find that the class adapts to it pretty well and not heavily unbalanced.

 

[Rugger]

RE: MT and Ur-Priest... Do folks really allow one PrC to increase spellcasting in another? Seems kinda silly to me... maybe to the letter of the rules its allowed, but...

-Rugger

 

[Wonger]

You are not playing against the players.

When your player shows you a character, ask what it can do. Ask them to tell you the best they expect to get out of it. Ask them WHY they want such a character. THEN decide whether the PrC/feat/whatever is right for your campaign. And if it's not, tone the abilities down or pick out something comparable that they can go into which keeps the style of the character.

Trying to preemtively vet every prc and feat combination is the road to madness.

I have a great relationship with my players. They are great role-players and they are also highly skilled roll-players. I think we have a rare balance of the two that keeps everyone happy. But, even if they want to take a class for good in-game story and character reasons, they will use the mechanics of the class (no matter what class) to be as effective as possible in the game. If that class happens to be a broken one, whether they intend it or not, it's gonna be bad for the game. That's what I'm trying to head off as obviously these boards have enough people that the broken classes have been "playtested" by. Maybe I can't preemptively stop every broken class from getting into my game before it's too late, but I certainly know several to avoid that have come up multiple times in this thread.

Personally, in previous campaigns, I can attest to the broken-ness of the Frenzied Berserker's deathless frenzy. Other than that, all the classes mentioned are untried in my campaigns - so thanks for all the input! If there are more out there, keep them coming!

 

[ruleslawyer]

I disagree.

Underpowered at first, but by the time you have the added utility of 20 caster levels in 10 levels, the sheer utility of the class makes it a real show-stealer and ultimate swiss utility knife.

I'd really, really like an empirical example of how the MT comes out overpowered, Psion. I've run scenarios with a Wiz3/Clr3/MT 10 subbed in for a Wiz16 in a party, and the MT has not done quite so well. I used to think it was a bit overpowered; now I'm with Grog on the theory that, at least in the context of the MT, "[v]ersatility just means more ways to suck." The best use (and the closest to "overpowered") I can see for the MT is as a cohort. I find the MT weak at even high levels for the following reasons:

1) If you're casting attack spells, you lose out on SR penetration. 15% is a pretty big add-on to your chances of having a precious spell fizzle.

2) Fewer high-level spells. At the dizzying heights of 16th level, most casters will be forced to unload only their highest-level spells in combat. The MT has either fewer of these, or simply doesn't have 'em (no 8th-level spells, in the case of the Clr3/Wiz3/MT 10).

3) Utility spells? Well, why not just play a straight cleric, then? With the right domain selection, many more hit points, better saves, better domain abilities, almost the same versatility as the MT, and you have more and better high-level spells. I just don't see what the MT has that makes it better than a straight cleric 3 levels higher in this regard.

But, please do prove me wrong!

 

[ruleslawyer]

I'm fine with these, and I'm usually an opponent of PrCs. I think I tweaked the arcane trickster IMC (and didn't allow sneak attack with ranged touch attacks).

Note that I didn't say overpowered, I said weird, in that you practically have to take these classes if you're a multiclassed ftr/wiz or rog/wiz, which sits ill with some DMs (not me, but some) who think that prestige classes should be, well, prestigious rather than a necessity.

BTW, if you did "tweak" the AT that way, you nerfed it as thoroughly as it is possible to do. I'd just steer clear of playing a rog/wiz in your campaign.

Please tell me there's a limit to how often [the Dweomerkeeper] can [use Supernatural Spell].

Well, yeah, there is, but how does that really matter? One or two wishes a day for no XP cost is still 5-10k XP saved per day, which is just too much. A Clr1/Wiz9/Dkr10 can cast three or four wishes per day; welcome to free +4 inherent stat boosts for the whole party!

Manyshot breaks it in 3.5

Manyshot breaks Power Shot how? The attack penalties you take for using that feat make it as bad or worse to use in conjunction with Power Attack than do a standard full attack. In fact, I'd rather a full attack + Rapid Shot + Power Shot.

in it's defense, it's actually a 3.0 class when Manyshot and the Bow of True Strike were non-core stuff.

AND, of course, when the things that really boost the "power" of Power Shot were still in effect: All-day GMW and stacking enhancement bonuses on bows and arrows. That -10 to attack doesn't seem so bad when you're stacking on a +5 from your bow AND a +5 on your arrows (GMW).

The entropomancer, from Complete Divine.

Pathetic! You give up 5 caster levels for one cool ability and the ability to control an artifact. That ability isn't broken, it's the artifact that is, and virtually no DM will ever put that artifact in their campaign, for several reasons:

1) It has no cost. How much magic gear does a character or NPC have to give up to have a sphere of annihilation?

2) What is the save DC... right, it doesn't have any. Whoever has it, either PC or NPC, can far too easily set up a deadly trap with it.

Which is why the entropomancer is purely an NPC class. I actually DON't think this class is broken because only a DM will ever use it, and any DM who gives an NPC a sphere of annihilation is unlikely to use it purposely to screw the players. It's more likely, in fact, that adventures featuring an entropomancer will be centered around the PCs trying to stop one from actually obtaining a sphere.

 

[Psion]

I'd really, really like an empirical example of how the MT comes out overpowered, Psion. I've run scenarios with a Wiz3/Clr3/MT 10 subbed in for a Wiz16 in a party, and the MT has not done quite so well. I used to think it was a bit overpowered; now I'm with Grog on the theory that, at least in the context of the MT, "[v]ersatility just means more ways to suck." The best use (and the closest to "overpowered")[/b]

Snarky sayings do not an argument make.

I find the MT weak at even high levels for the following reasons:

1) If you're casting attack spells, you lose out on SR penetration. 15% is a pretty big add-on to your chances of having a precious spell fizzle.


2) Fewer high-level spells.

We already know that 3 levels "off the top" is the cost of the class; fixating on SR doesn't prove anything further. Further, it undermines your argument by relying on a very specific condition. You are really only proving they don't make good blast mages, which I can only agree with.

The 3 level cost is telling at low levels. But when you have 10 extra levels of spells, even if lower, that begins to make up for it.

At the dizzying heights of 16th level, most casters will be forced to unload only their highest-level spells in combat.

Not IME. My PC sorcerers and clerics of this level frequently ran through their higher level spells at this level and did have to rely on their lower level spells. My high level party relied extensively on mass haste... but that's only what, a 6th level spell? Likewise, harm is a very viable spell at high levels, as is disintigrate. That's worthless, right? I don't think so.

3) Utility spells? Well, why not just play a straight cleric, then? With the right domain selection, many more hit points, better saves, better domain abilities, almost the same versatility as the MT,

There are many spells that are exclusively arcane and/or exclusively divine; that the cleric is "nearly as good" seems somewhat off. Clerics can't cast teleport, or mass haste, or a variety of other potent spells. Since clerics can access their whole spell list, you can focus your attention on spells that clerics don't have, making those wizard levels even more effective, making the class's very broad indeed. This makes them very versatile in overcoming challenges set forth by the GM. Which can make the MT a spotlight hog or DM spoiler of the fist degree.

In short, at high levels, the class enjoys broad utility, good synergy between its spell lists, and high endurance. Pretending that every challenge you face is a demon with high SR or is a mage duel is far from telling the whole story about the MT.

 

[Remathilis]

RE: Radiant Servant of Pelor

I'm failing to see how this class is any more broken than most Cleric-based PrCs.
Compare it to some of its cousins (esp Sacred Exorcist) and you'll see its not that damaging a PrC (with one exception, I'll note below)

1.) To be utterly useful, you must have two domains, Healing and Sun. Any other combination loses out on some of its major powers.

2.) d6 HD does make it abit weaker, and in a game where hp is rolled, the RSoP does have less hp than a standard cleric.

3.) Extra Greater Turning: This IS the power of this class, and though the number is a bit high (I'd have made it just Cha mod), its not terribly useful unless you are fighting alot of undead creatures. Besides, Disciple of the Sun blows this power away.
4.) Radiance: Nice, not needed, but good flavor.
5.) Turn Undead: Sacred Exorcists get full turning also. Nothing unique here.
6.) Divine Health Another flavorful power, but not game-breaking. Paladins have had it alot longer by the time this PrC grants it, and Contemplatives gain it as well.
7.) Empower/Maximize/Supreme Healing: These only apply to Cure spells CAST FROM THE HEALING DOMAIN AS DOMAIN SPELLS. That means that only one cure per level tops will be juiced up, and only if he is using all his domain slots for healing spells. (see below).
8.) Aura of Warding: +2 will for characters 2 spaces away? Useful if everyone huddles around the cleric, but I rarely see that happen.
9.) Bonus Domain: If you've been playing smart, your choices are Strength, Good, Glory or Purification. Many PrCs in CD grant bonus domains, so this is nothing new, but now, you have three choices, juiced up healing spells, sun spells, or a third domain. If your stretching your miliage for your healing, your choice is already picked.
10.) Positive Energy Burst. Hmmm... 10d6 max to every undead in 20 squares (reflex 20 for 1/2) for two turn attempts? Thats nice, but I'd rather just Greater Turn them. or Empower Flamestrike a bunch.

All that adds up to a class that is high powered, but not overly broken unless your game revolves around fighting vampires. Against other types of monster (giants, for example), your actually doing worse than a standard cleric, thanks to less hp. However, against undead, you rock the hizzouse.

MY BEEFS: and yes, I do have them...

Why Martial Weapon Prof? Pelors Favored Weapon is a Mace (simple). I'd remove this.
As stated, I'd make Greater Turning equal to your cha, not 3+cha.
I'd also knock the radius of PEB to maybe 50 feet

However, I don't see the problems with this class that others have pointed out.

(BTW: Historical note, the original version of this class had no sun domain necessity (but still required for EGT) and required 3 ranks of knowledge: Undead (now obsolete, but still a SP expenditure).

 

[ruleslawyer]

Snarky sayings do not an argument make.

No, but they make a good summation.

We already know that 3 levels "off the top" is the cost of the class; fixating on SR doesn't prove anything further. Further, it undermines your argument by relying on a very specific condition

Er, no. I just put the SR thing on the board because, at these levels, when practically everything you face has the ability or access to it, SR is an important factor.

Not IME. My PC sorcerers and clerics of this level frequently ran through their higher level spells at this level and did have to rely on their lower level spells.

Yes, but the fact remains that they HAD the high-level spells to begin with, which the MT does not.

My high level party relied extensively on mass haste... but that's only what, a 6th level spell? Likewise, harm is a very viable spell at high levels, as is disintigrate. That's worthless, right? I don't think so.

Keep in mind that those spells represent the top of the list for MTs. And harm and disintegrate use SR as their principal defense; again, the MT can't beat it. Moreover, I wouldn't trust an MT to deliver a harm spell, since he's unlikely to have the melee survivability of the cleric; that survivability (and/or the divine reach ability of the hierophant class, which the straight cleric gets much earlier) are essential to delivering harm without getting smushed like a bedbug.

There are many spells that are exclusively arcane and/or exclusively divine; that the cleric is "nearly as good" seems somewhat off. Clerics can't cast teleport, or mass haste, or a variety of other potent spells.

The ever-popular Travel domain does have teleport, you know. And does mass haste even exist in a 3.5 campaign? The MT is a 3.5 PrC, after all. You have to keep that in mind.

Since clerics can access their whole spell list, you can focus your attention on spells that clerics don't have, making those wizard levels even more effective, making the class's very broad indeed. This makes them very versatile in overcoming challenges set forth by the GM. Which can make the MT a spotlight hog or DM spoiler of the fist degree.

I repeat. Give me an example of why. Concrete examples of this happening in your campaign would be a really good idea, since I don't see the evidence for this at all. Moreover, the above contention really damages your argument. If anything, the MT's ability to cast lots of lower-level spells that aren't good in direct offensive capacity make them excellent support characters, not spotlight hogs.

In short, at high levels, the class enjoys broad utility, good synergy between its spell lists, and high endurance. Pretending that every challenge you face is a demon with high SR or is a mage duel is far from telling the whole story about the MT.

Strawman. I didn't at all suggest that, which is why I wanted to see if you had actual experience from which to report. Moreover, "high endurance" is irrelevant when you're at levels at which people have full access to greater teleport. NO one runs through all their spells at a rate which would give the MT an advantage simply because he had a few extra low-level spell slots. Casters in danger of this teleport home and rest.

If you have a party of three characters, one of whom is a fighter-type, one a skill monkey, and one an MT, then yes, the MT will look good. But that is because he is the only spellcaster. A party of a fighter, cleric (or wizard), rogue, and MT, for example, will find the MT used as a glorified healing/buffing item, possibly doling out some buff spells like haste and the ability boosters, but being able to cast a few extra 3rd-level spells at 16th level hardly gives a PC the spotlight. If your argument is that the MT makes the PARTY too powerful by providing overly cheap curing and buffing, I can sorta accept that, although I'd argue that the changes to the ability buffs and (greater) invisibility make the MT either a necessary adjunct to a party that equips according to 3.0 rather than 3.5 principles, or just sorta weak.

But now I've taken this thread off-topic, for which I apologize to all posters, including yourself, Psion.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

RE: Radiant Servant of Pelor

I'm failing to see how this class is any more broken than most Cleric-based PrCs.

Maybe you should be looking at how balanced those other cleric PrCs are.

Compare it to some of its cousins (esp Sacred Exorcist) and you'll see its not that damaging a PrC (with one exception, I'll note below)

1.) To be utterly useful, you must have two domains, Healing and Sun. Any other combination loses out on some of its major powers.

That's only one weak domain. Sun is great - sunburst is really great.

2.) d6 HD does make it abit weaker, and in a game where hp is rolled, the RSoP does have less hp than a standard cleric.

Yes.

3.) Extra Greater Turning: This IS the power of this class, and though the number is a bit high (I'd have made it just Cha mod), its not terribly useful unless you are fighting alot of undead creatures. Besides, Disciple of the Sun blows this power away.

Let's go on with this.

4.) Radiance: Nice, not needed, but good flavor.
5.) Turn Undead: Sacred Exorcists get full turning also. Nothing unique here.
6.) Divine Health Another flavorful power, but not game-breaking. Paladins have had it alot longer by the time this PrC grants it, and Contemplatives gain it as well.
7.) Empower/Maximize/Supreme Healing: These only apply to Cure spells CAST FROM THE HEALING DOMAIN AS DOMAIN SPELLS. That means that only one cure per level tops will be juiced up, and only if he is using all his domain slots for healing spells. (see below).
8.) Aura of Warding: +2 will for characters 2 spaces away? Useful if everyone huddles around the cleric, but I rarely see that happen.
9.) Bonus Domain: If you've been playing smart, your choices are Strength, Good, Glory or Purification. Many PrCs in CD grant bonus domains, so this is nothing new, but now, you have three choices, juiced up healing spells, sun spells, or a third domain. If your stretching your miliage for your healing, your choice is already picked.
10.) Positive Energy Burst. Hmmm... 10d6 max to every undead in 20 squares (reflex 20 for 1/2) for two turn attempts? Thats nice, but I'd rather just Greater Turn them. or Empower Flamestrike a bunch.

Well, that's a lot of abilities. How many caster levels do you give up for that?

What does Positive Energy Burst have to do with Empower Flamestrike? (Unless you're talking about a certain busted Divine Metamagic feat...)

All that adds up to a class that is high powered, but not overly broken unless your game revolves around fighting vampires. Against other types of monster (giants, for example), your actually doing worse than a standard cleric, thanks to less hp. However, against undead, you rock the hizzouse.

The problem is that you give up almost nothing and you get a slew of abilities. With all those abilities it's probably worth two caster levels lost - and that's taking the pre-requisites and hp loss into account.

(PS taking away hit points and giving it better weapons was just weird. Is he supposed to be better at combat or worse?)

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

RE: Radiant Servant of Pelor

I'm failing to see how this class is any more broken than most Cleric-based PrCs.

Maybe you should be looking at how balanced those other cleric PrCs are.

Compare it to some of its cousins (esp Sacred Exorcist) and you'll see its not that damaging a PrC (with one exception, I'll note below)

1.) To be utterly useful, you must have two domains, Healing and Sun. Any other combination loses out on some of its major powers.

That's only one weak domain. Sun is great - sunburst is really great.

2.) d6 HD does make it abit weaker, and in a game where hp is rolled, the RSoP does have less hp than a standard cleric.

Yes.

3.) Extra Greater Turning: This IS the power of this class, and though the number is a bit high (I'd have made it just Cha mod), its not terribly useful unless you are fighting alot of undead creatures. Besides, Disciple of the Sun blows this power away.

Let's go on with this.

4.) Radiance: Nice, not needed, but good flavor.
5.) Turn Undead: Sacred Exorcists get full turning also. Nothing unique here.
6.) Divine Health Another flavorful power, but not game-breaking. Paladins have had it alot longer by the time this PrC grants it, and Contemplatives gain it as well.
7.) Empower/Maximize/Supreme Healing: These only apply to Cure spells CAST FROM THE HEALING DOMAIN AS DOMAIN SPELLS. That means that only one cure per level tops will be juiced up, and only if he is using all his domain slots for healing spells. (see below).
8.) Aura of Warding: +2 will for characters 2 spaces away? Useful if everyone huddles around the cleric, but I rarely see that happen.
9.) Bonus Domain: If you've been playing smart, your choices are Strength, Good, Glory or Purification. Many PrCs in CD grant bonus domains, so this is nothing new, but now, you have three choices, juiced up healing spells, sun spells, or a third domain. If your stretching your miliage for your healing, your choice is already picked.
10.) Positive Energy Burst. Hmmm... 10d6 max to every undead in 20 squares (reflex 20 for 1/2) for two turn attempts? Thats nice, but I'd rather just Greater Turn them. or Empower Flamestrike a bunch.

Well, that's a lot of abilities. How many caster levels do you give up for that?

What does Positive Energy Burst have to do with Empower Flamestrike? (Unless you're talking about a certain busted Divine Metamagic feat...)

All that adds up to a class that is high powered, but not overly broken unless your game revolves around fighting vampires. Against other types of monster (giants, for example), your actually doing worse than a standard cleric, thanks to less hp. However, against undead, you rock the hizzouse.

The problem is that you give up almost nothing and you get a slew of abilities. With all those abilities it's probably worth two caster levels lost - and that's taking the pre-requisites and hp loss into account.

(PS taking away hit points and giving it better weapons was just weird. Is he supposed to be better at combat or worse?)