PreReq's for Arcane Trickster

[Gaiden]

Thanks for the feedback guys. I wasn't considering the power of the PrC when I considered the prereqs. Makes sense that a minimum of a 9th level character is necessary for the class considering its abilities.

Oh, and El Voz - FU

 

[PA]

Loremaster's got DS as class skill, and full spell progression.

 

[Madfox]

What is so insanely powerful about the arcane trickster? It is a good prestige class, but except for the sneak attack it does not give really useful ability. The distance trick thing is fun, but as of yet I have seldomly seen a situation in which it would be life-saving (and definitely not by those levels). The impropto sneak attack can be simulated with some feats or a good bluff roll, though it costs an action in those cases. In return you do lose some rogue abilities, of which the uncany dodge (cannot be flanked) is the most useful.

 

[Veldrane]

Madfox: Full Casting Progression , in addition to all you have already mentioned...

 

[alaric]

Personally i think the arcane trickster is fine. It has the hardest prereqs of any PrC i've seen in any wizards book yet. For this you get Full Casting Progression (which just about every wizard class in existance gets), increase to Sneak attack (which you sorely need at this point since you had to take 5 levels or mage or 6 of sorcerer to get into the class), 4 skill points/level which does little to help your lack of rogue skills from the 5/6 level of mage, and 2 moderately cool abilities. Is it better than a pure Rogue/Mage? of course it is, rogue/mage isn't a very good combo to begin with, but is a Loremaster better than a Mage, a Bladesinger better than a Fighter-mage, or a Order of the Bow Initiate better than a standard archer? Yes to all those as well. I've been playing in a campaign for 9 months now and one of my players is still trying to get into Arcane Trickster. He's spent alot of time with low hit points, not much magic power, bad rogue skills, bad BAB, and little Sneak Attack. He has focuses on aquiring spells that augment his rogueliness, which has helped quite a bit. So if you are going to make up a 15th level char from scratch Arcane trickster looks pretty good, if you are playing one from level 1 it's quite a different story.

 

[Crothian]

I agree totally. I see many people claim such and such a class is too powerful. However, in my expoericen none of these has ever brought ruin to my game. To test out the power I min max an NPC and put it up against the PCs. Sure some have been challenging, but that's a good thing.

An Arcane Trickster is a better Rogue/Wizard if you're only intersted in sneak attack from your rogue part. Rogues are so much more.

 

[Lord Ben]

When you multiclass all your skills that are class skills in one are considered class skills "for purposes of determining max ranks". So if you take a level of rogue (putting 4 into it) then wizard twice(can't put any in), then rogue again (another 3) that's perfectly legit.

I don't have the PHB with me, but it covers that in the multiclassing section.

 

[twjensen]

Clever!

When you multiclass all your skills that are class skills in one are considered class skills "for purposes of determining max ranks". So if you take a level of rogue (putting 4 into it) then wizard twice(can't put any in), then rogue again (another 3) that's perfectly legit.

I don't have the PHB with me, but it covers that in the multiclassing section.

I was wondering if you could take an exclusive skill cross-class if you're multiclassing, but this idea finesses that so you don't have to!

 

[alaric]

When you multiclass all your skills that are class skills in one are considered class skills "for purposes of determining max ranks". So if you take a level of rogue (putting 4 into it) then wizard twice(can't put any in), then rogue again (another 3) that's perfectly legit.

I don't have the PHB with me, but it covers that in the multiclassing section.

That is true if you are talking about non-exclusive skills, but since we are talking about an exclusive skill this is moot.

 

[Lord Ben]

I think it still counts for purposes of max ranks, but you can only advance in that skill as the main class. IE, a rogue/ranger who wanted to max out ride could buy ride as a rogue at the cost of 2 per 1 but the max ranks are determined as if it were a class skill. However if he wanted to raise animal empathy (it's exclusive I think) then he'd have to raise it only on ranger levels but the max ranks are still determined by total level.

Anyone have relevant quotes from the PHB? I'm at work.