Mystic Theurge PrC - They've got to be kidding!

[Eldorian]

Btw, I had be tossing around an idea before seeing this class, and since it is the first class i've seen that adds more than 1 spell casting level each level, I've decided to write up the one I had be thinking up. I think it's much less powerful than this class, and makes more sense to me.

http://enworld.cyberstreet.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=46542

He combines sorcerer and wizard, but not with full progression in both.

Eldorian Antar

 

[Saeviomagy]

This is ridiculous. It's a crappy class for someone that wants to play anything resembling a militant cleric, but for someone playing a wizard, it's a freakin' godsend.

A 16th level character with only 13 levels of wizard because he took 3 levels of fighter or rogue (or anything else, really) is seriously handicapped. A 16th level character that is a 13th level wizard and, instead of those crappy 3 levels of fighter or rogue, gets access to spells like Spell Resistance, Heal, Raise Dead, Resurrection... that's a slightly different matter. Even more so if you pick good domains.

At least two of those spells require him to sacrifice some of himself for someone else, and don't therefore really factor into a balance argument - if anything they're a step backwards. Heal, while quite beneficial, is a spell which is only really worth using during combat, which means that he has to make a decision between that and something else. It's a good ability to have, but not earth shattering. The primary resource in a fight tends to be time, not spell slots. Spell resistance is a slightly different matter, although it's a spell which wizards should really have had access to in the first place.

Apart from having lots of spell slots, and therefore a lot of endurance (something which more-or-less balances out with not having spells at as high a level - demonstrated somewhat by the sorceror class) can anyone give me some seriously game-breaking application of this class?

 

[FireLance]

Quite frankly, no.

A cleric is scary with his buffs because:
* He has a decent BAB
* He has decent Hit Points
* He can wear armour.

the MT has none of those things.

Cheers!

I agree that one on one, a MT lacks the short-term punch of a straight spellcaster. However, it beats any other spellcaster hands down when it comes to sheer spell output. A cleric buffing himself is dangerous, but he can only spare so many buffs per day. A MT of equivalent level would have about double the number of spells, and could buff the entire party, while remaining only 1-2 spell levels behind the straight spellcaster.

Admittedly, there will be times when that higher level spell becomes important. However, on the average, I believe that a MT would be more useful to the party than any straight spellcaster. That is why I think the MT is "too good".

 

[Gez]

Which leads to the biggest problem, IME - blurred and overstepped 'roles' in a party.

Consider if you have a party with the classic "1 rogue, 1 fighter, 1 cleric, 1 mage" in your group. Now consider what happens once the mage, at 4th level, multiclasses to cleric. Then at 7th level, takes Mystic Theurge.

From 4th level on, the guy playing the cleric only has a few spells that the other character doesn't. And for the rest of the campaign, he'll only ever be able to do a very, very few things that the mage/theurge can't. That's assuming for whatever reason that the cleric player doesn't decide to do the exact same thing - and I don't have to enumerate the problems if he does.

If you think blurring the roles between wizards (supposedly, artillery) and clerics (supposedly, support) is really bad, what do you think of the new haste, which has been modified from a "turn myself into a more destructive spell artillery" spell into a "support the party" spell ?

Anyway, it's a serious trend I've seen here -- turning wizards into a support role, and removing all spotlight from them. All the whinings on haste were about that. Recently, I've seen people saying they house-ruled shield out -- the rational being it allowed wizards to survive melee. And then, there's all the complaining about magic missile, which, gash, horror, always hits and has no saving throws. Lots of people wants wizards to just be support guys. Like clerics without armor, hit points, BAB, and turning capacity. Like a NPC class, in fact.


See also this thread.

 

[Gez]

A Ranger who picks up a few levels of Sorcerer is probably the best combo for this. He'll have decent HPs and Saves by the time he qualifies for this class, some nice abilities when in light or no armor, progression as a Sorcerer for attack spells and his Ranger divine spells. The low HP progression certainly does hurt though.

Nah, the best is probably a cleric/bard. The reason ? In 3.5, bards won't suffer from arcane spell failure*, so the mystic theurge will be able to wear armor and cast all his spells.

(* Maybe because they'll all get automatic still spell, this seems the most rational way to do it.)

 

[RolandOfGilead]

Dont know if anyone's mentioned..

From my standpoint, one of the greatest powers of the cleric
is spontanteous cure spells.. which this class will not be able to use for spells higher than level 2 divine... also, the character will have to prepare for HOURS every day.. the character can still only cast 1 spell a round, despite the fact that he has many, many spells.. but catch him by surprise, and ask yourself, would you rather be playing a MT with 60 hp's AC 20 and +5 fort save or a cleric with 100 hp's ac 28 fort save +10?

 

[bret]

I have to look at it a bit more, but it looks a bit overpowered to me as well.

It would depend a *lot* on the domains chosen. Other rules changes in 3.5 could also substantially change the balance.

At 16th level, the saves compared to a Wizard would be better in Fort, same in Reflex, and much better in Will. Provided you didn't split the rest of the levels evenly, this would continue.

I would be looking at things like getting Persistent spell and Spell Penetration for feats.

Being able to do things like Blade Barrier followed by Bigby's Forceful Hand could make things really interesting for the opponents.

In order to survive, I would want to take the Cleric levels first.

Domains I would be looking for are things like Chaos/Evil/Good/Law (bonus to caster level), Luck (reroll on critical SR or save), and maybe Travel Domain for the ability to cast Remove Paralysis or Freedom of Movement when I need to.

As I said, I would have to think about this a bit. My initial inclination is that it is a bit too powerful.

 

[LazarusLong42]

There's another subtle knife in the side of this class that only one person pointed out: ability scores. Let's assume a 28-point buy, a pretty standard number:

Pure Wiz: Str 10, Dex 14, Con 14, Int 16, Wis 12, Cha 8. By the time he can cast 9th-level spells, his ability bonuses have brought his Int up to 20. And he could have bought an 18 in Int by dropping to Dex 12, Con 12, Wis 10 (or Str 8).

You can build a pure cleric much the same way. Now, what about a character heading for Mystic Theurge? Well, it's almost pointless to have less than a 16 in either Int or Wis, so:

Str 8, Dex 12, Con 12, Int 16, Wis 16, Cha 8.

The MT can't carry as much, has a lower Dex bonus to AC, lower Ref and Fort saves, lower HP, and a pretty crappy Turn to start with. And he has to divide his ability bonuses between Int and Wis.

You *could* buy an 18 in one or the other (not both), at the expense of just about every other ability score. You could keep a 10 in, say, Dex. And at level 20, you'd have maybe 50 HP.

Playing toward this class would mean giving up a *lot*, and not just in the base numbers.

 

[Arcane Runes Press]

<a href="http://boards.wizards.com/rpg/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=140;t=000452">This thread</a> on the wizards board has Mark A Jindra (WotC Web Developer) saying that it is not an april fools joke...

*shrug*

Well, I'm definitely not impressed by the level of discussion going on in that thread (which makes it no different from any of the Revision Spotlight discussion threads on the Wizard's board).

Page after page of hysterical clucking over the "broken munchiness" of a class which nobody's actually seen in it's proper context - context meaning, in this case, as a part of the whole product known as D&D 3.5

People offering their dashed off "fixes" to the class

People dashing off mindless number crunching exercises of 800 improbable combinations of items designed to give the caster Int and Wis scores of 50 - as though the ability to, say, give a Barbarian a Str score of 84 proves in any way that the class is broken.

People screaming out "DID THEY EVEN PLAYTEST THIS>? THOS GIYS ARE LOOSERS! AR THEY STOPOD?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Yuck.

I don't envy the revision team their jobs (though, as a freelancer, I envy their steady paychecks, stock options and health insurance). It can't be easy being constantly second guessed by howling packs of anonymous gamers, half of whom have had their own "perfect fixes" for D&D in their heads since the week after 3E was announced.

Patrick Y.


PS: As to the subject of the thread itself - I reserve final judgement until I see the class in action with the rest of the revised rules. At 1st glance, powerful, but not "broken" by any means. Also: finally, multiclass primary casters won't have to spend all day sucking lame juice through a crooked straw...

 

[FireLance]

Re: Dont know if anyone's mentioned..

From my standpoint, one of the greatest powers of the cleric
is spontanteous cure spells.. which this class will not be able to use for spells higher than level 2 divine... also, the character will have to prepare for HOURS every day.. the character can still only cast 1 spell a round, despite the fact that he has many, many spells.. but catch him by surprise, and ask yourself, would you rather be playing a MT with 60 hp's AC 20 and +5 fort save or a cleric with 100 hp's ac 28 fort save +10?

By your argument, a cleric that multiclasses into any PrC with a +1 level spellcasting advancement can only spontaneously convert spells that he can cast using his "pure" cleric level. While I don't think the rules explicitly state it one way or the other, I doubt that many people play it that way.

By the rules, a cleric needs only one hour to prepare all his spells. Similarly, a wizard needs one hour to prepare all his spells. You could argue that a TM would need one hour to prepare all his wizard spells and another to prepare all his cleric spells, but that means he spends two hours maximum.

Comparing a TM with a cleric doesn't really bring out the problem. Compare him to a wizard instead. A TM would have the same AC and a better hp and Fort save from his 3 (minimum) cleric levels. Which would you rather be playing then?