OA - Iaijutsu Master broken?

[SpuneDagr]

I am currently in an Oriental Adventures campaign and I am steadily working towards the Iaijutsu Master prestige class. Looking at it again, I think it's a bit too powerful. Anyone else think so?

 

[MythandLore]

Personally, I think a number of OA things are broken.
After getting it our group decided not to use the book for our games.

 

[Someguy]

It's only really powerful in the surprise round of combat, then it really tapers off into more of a stable battle...

 

[Avatar of the North]

At 10th level though they ALWAYS get a surprise round, even if the opponent was aware of them before hand

 

[James McMurray]

At 10th level though they ALWAYS get a surprise round, even if the opponent was aware of them before hand

That's a bit of an overstatement. They only gain a free surprise round if they begin the combat within melee range. That means that if they have to move to attack, they're screwed. How often do combats in your game start 5-10' away?

 

[Shard O'Glase]

Heck I think Iajutso is broken in the 1st place. Improved initiative and quick draw are enough to simulate it for me. You don't need a skill which makes you faster than anything else in existence(and potential sneak attack damage for any class with this lame skill) it is broken before you even add in the prestige class.

And some of those feats if not broken will slow down combat to a crawl. Defensive throw, you get a trip attack anytime someone makes a melle attack on you and misses, yeesh I'd like to see a fight with multiple people with that feat. Nothing like rolling a d20 1,000 times in one round to make combat quick and exciting.

So I avoid most of OA and added a few of the feats and classes with some flavor mods to a standard campaign.

But if doing a pure OA campaign I'm not sure iajutso master or iajutso itself are any more broken than anyhting else in OA. I just don't think it would be compatable with a stadard D&D campaign.

 

[Arcane Runes Press]

OA isn't broken. Some of the prestige classes run to the powerful side, but are no worse than a good chunk of the prestige classes in the various class books.

The Iaijutsu Master is decidedly NOT broken. Sure he's powerful, but no more so than a straight class fighter of his equivalent level. In his area of focus, he's deadly, but outside of that he drops considerably in power. IMO, the Iaijutsu Master is EXACTLY what a prestige class should be- a way of focusing a character's chosen specialty to a razor's edge.

So speaks Kakita Toru, master of the lightning draw.

 

[mmadsen]

Improved initiative and quick draw are enough to simulate it for me.

Thank you! When I first got the Player's Handbook (oh so many moons ago), I perused the Feats and immediately thought "Cool! I can make a samurai!", followed by "Cool! I could make a knight!", etc.

Now, for genre's sake, I can understand cranking up the importance of the quick draw, but a big part of the problem is just how D&D's ablative hit points work. You never kill anyone (important) in just one shot, so a single quick-draw attack before your enemy can act just isn't that valuable (unlike in real life or in a samurai movie).

 

[Ranger REG]

OA Broken? Where?

Would you guys mind listing what are broken in the new Oriental Adventures, besides the writing is a blatant plug for Rokugan?

 

[Black Omega]

It's a powerful class. But what exactly about the class do you think is broken?