Mystic Theurge too good or not?

[James McMurray]

reapersaurus: I don't think people are saying that all characters of 20th level are automatically equal. They're saying that 3e strives to make all characters of 20th level equal. Sure, there may be some imbalance at times, but a non-spellcaster can get around that with items.

Pax: He's just a straight Monk. The Dimensional Strike came from an item.

I personally like the MT. I think it might be unbalancing to allow a character to start out at high level as one, because then they haven't "paid their dues" by sucking early on in their career. However, the fact that they lose out on SR and spell levels is a big downer for them.

All I can say is: try it if you don't think its viable. If you haven't actually tried it, then it doesn't matter what you think, because you're speaking without experience. That statement holds true for me as well. Until I've actually seen one played in a game, the factt hat I think it is balanced doesn't matter.

 

[Jade Solstar]

well i have read over what everyone has said and ive been running a high-level greyhawk campaign for many months and one of my pc's a cleric/wizard of boccob did take the mystic thuerge Prc (after it posted on the wizards website). The party consists of a monk, paladin, rogue/temple raider & the cleric/wizard/mystic thuerge and I must confess the MT falls WAY behind in overall power...yeah he has some cool spells from both classes but when they fought a red dragon you can bet he was wishin he was a FULL CASTER! I think it really will come down to the rest of the group and how the power levels out...if they had another cleric or mage it wouldnt have been so bad but when your cleric & mage are the same character then yes i have to agree that they power is less at lower levels as a mystic thuerge but i can see that at higher levels he will be a force to be reckoned with... I think only time will tell as the game progresses to see if it overpowering compared to the other pc's in the group.
I would be more afraid of being sneak attacked by the rogue who is dealing out "fireballs" of damage with each strike versus the one fireball per round of the mystic thuerge...just dont get caught flat-footed...lol
thats my spin on it...hope it helps someone
jade

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

The only way I've seen that the Mystic Theurge is too powerful is when you shake the system down a little. Any 3.5 core MT combination is going to be balanced, with some options being painfully gimped-- if your arcane caster is Bard or your divine caster Druid, you might as well not even consider the Mystic Theurge.

On the other hand, if you play a Water Shugenja (from OA)/Sorceror/Mystic Theurge, you're a little bit slower on higher-level spells, but all of your spellcasting derives from Charisma and you have a level of flexibility only rivalled by the Psion-- with more spells known and more spells per day. You can heal as well as the Cleric, and use your Sorceror spell slots for prohibited Fire spells, allowing you to play a decent nuke mage until SR starts becoming an issue.

Once you've finished ten levels of Mystic Theurge, there are good divine PrCs that give you more powers based on your Charisma, like the Contemplative (take the Mysticism domain) or the Mystic Wanderer. At this point, you should choose either arcane or divine spellcasting and run with it, choosing an appropriate prestige class and advancing that through Epic levels.

 

[sithramir]

Its pretty balanced at lower levels. The fact that you have to start by multiclassing til 6th level and then don't get 3rd level spells til 8th or 4th til 10th seems pretty balanced when you compare to the pure mage or cleric who had 3rd at level 5 and 4th at level 7th.

 

[krunchyfrogg]

I'm sure this has been said many times, but I'll add mine:

I think the Mystic Theurge is a very bad idea - harkening back purely to 1E cleric/mage multiclass cheese.

Spellcasters (and magic) are powerful enough overall - this is a step in the WRONG direction.

Maybe a simple solution would be making a very minor change in the MT PrC: Instead of being a 10 level PrC, give it a 5 level cap (there are many other 5 level PrCs).

 

[Hypersmurf]

Maybe a simple solution would be making a very minor change in the MT PrC: Instead of being a 10 level PrC, give it a 5 level cap (there are many other 5 level PrCs).

My concern is that the first splatbook will include another class that does exactly that... without changing the Mystic Theurge.

As soon as that happens, it will open the door to a 20th level character with 9th level spells from two classes...

-Hyp.

 

[hong]

My concern is that the first splatbook will include another class that does exactly that... without changing the Mystic Theurge.

As soon as that happens, it will open the door to a 20th level character with 9th level spells from two classes...

My sediments exactly.

Or something.

How many people here have seen Monte's hallowed mage, from the BoHM? It seems a very nifty solution to the cleric/mage problem.

 

[James McMurray]

My concern is that the first splatbook will include another class that does exactly that... without changing the Mystic Theurge.

As soon as that happens, it will open the door to a 20th level character with 9th level spells from two classes...

-Hyp.

But you can't really say that the MT is over-powered because of something that might happen in another book farther down the road.

 

[hong]

But you can't really say that the MT is over-powered because of something that might happen in another book farther down the road.

No, but you can say that the underlying _principle_ of adding two classes together is broken.

 

[ForceUser]

I'm currently in the process of converting my 1st edition elven cleric/magic-user to 3.0.

Thankfully my GM is allowing the MT, otherwise I would be pretty screwed. In 3.0 my character is going to be 11th level, so 3/3/5 (cleric/wizard/mt).

I am having a hard time picking my feats actually. I mean, at 11th level I only have 4 feats. Persistent spell is useless to me, I can't persist anything yet, except for 0-level spells.

Been thinking that maybe Spell Mastery, Signature Spell would be nice, but what to use as my signature spell? heh...dispel magic is on both lists, but that's kind of pointless.

Was thinking of going with improved init, improved counterspell, reactive counterspell...but nah, I just don't like this option.

Honestly, the feat selection for my MT is bugging the crud out of me.

Cedric

Extend Spell is a must with all those buffs you've got. Improved Initiative is always good for anyone, and Scribe Scroll makes perfect sense for a MT. Neither clerics nor wizards have good Reflex saves, making Lightning Reflexes another very good (although not sexy) choice. There you go - those are the four feats I'd pick.