So what's this Fighter/Mage/Thief thing all about?

[Hypersmurf]

Given the complaints that most Fighter/Spellcaster combos cause a significant drop in caster levels, isn't taking two non-spellcasting levels to a useful level a big hit?

Ftr2/Rge3 would seem a good base to build on and quite strong.

but is adding 5, 10 or 15 levels of Wizard on top a viable choice?

Rog3/Ftr1/Wiz5 qualifies you for both Arcane Trickster and Eldritch Knight, but it costs you 5 caster levels (including EK1).

Rog1/Ftr1/Wiz5/Asn1 saves you a caster level, but it's evil only.

Someone with Complete Warrior will have to say how a Rog/Hexblade/Arcane Trickster looks.

-Hyp.

 

[Brother MacLaren]

Rog/Ftr/Wiz can also focus on one particular subset of the Rogue or Fighter roles, rather than being a generalist. Take invisibility, spider climb, and some archery feats and you have a scout with some good first strike ability to take out sentries. Or suit up in fullplate, pick up W1 (diviner for True Strike) and R2 for evasion, and you have a capable melee combatant with a lot of bonuses and options at the cost of 2 BAB and 5 hp.
A level of Fighter often helps a rogue, as does a level of Wizard. I think the build is best for a rogue-focused character, but it's also good for a fighter. It isn't so good for wizards, especially since you can get evasion from a ring.
It is certainly good for the "lone wolf" type. You could do a Batman-type character quite easily, with magic filling in for Batman's technology (normally, I can't stand the magic-as-technology concept, but comic-book technology really is magic dressed up as science).

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

Rog3/Ftr1/Wiz5 qualifies you for both Arcane Trickster and Eldritch Knight, but it costs you 5 caster levels (including EK1).

But, I would say that it's probably the only situation in which losing five caster levels could possibly be worth it. You'd have a wide range of skills, a good BAB (you'll average out to a bit over a Rogue BAB), massive Sneak Attack, and fifteen caster levels gives you all the ugly tricks you can use to take advantage of your high BAB and Sneak Attack.

 

[apsuman]

also...

in 2e, iirc xp requirements bascially doubled each level.

fighters had to get 2000 for level 2, 4000 for level 3, etc.
mages had to get 2500 for level 2, 5000 for level 3, etc.
thieves had to get 1250 for level 2, 2500 for level 3, etc.

So if you had a straight fighter, a straight mage, and a straight thief, and our F/M/T and everyone earned 24000 XP

The fighter would be level 5 (8000 shy of level 6)
The Mage would be level 5 (16000 shy of level 5)
The thief would be level 6 (16000 shy of level 7)

The F/M/T would be F4/W3/R4 (according to 3e thought, this is 11 charater levels, not bad)

If everyone had 96000 xp, we get

A level 7 fighter
A level 7 mage
A level 8 thief

or a F6/W5/R6 (17 character levels)

So the multi classes chars in 2e were behind, but not that far behind.

Again, iirc.