Spicing up 'Dead Levels'

[Luthien Greyspear]

Has anyone here played with the idea of spicing up the dead levels in the various PrC's by allowing a dead level to count as a level in a regular class? Basically, allowing the 'dead level' to instead function as though the character advanced one level in any base class of their choosing. All class abilities of that base class would improve, including undead turning, familiar advancement, wild shape, etc. To make it interesting, you should even include levels that grant a "+1 caster level" but no other class abilities as a 'dead level'.

As an example, let's use a bladesinger, which has four 'dead levels': levels 3, 5, 7, and 9. Let's say the base character is a Fighter 3/Wizard 4/Bladesinger X (not optimal, but bear with me for the example). At the dead levels, the character would be able to choose either fighter or wizard as his class to advance, but not both. If the character focused on wizard exclusively, his character profile would look much the same as he would if he advanced in bladesinger normally: +5 caster levels (to 9th), but with the addition of a metamagic or item creation feat (advancing to 5th level mage at 3rd level) and the additional benefits to his familiar (speak with master at 3rd, and speak with other animals at 7th level bladesinger).

But what if he took one of those levels and advanced fighter instead? He would lose 5th level spells, and gain a feat and access to Weapon Specialization. I don't know of many players that would scoff at access to that feat for a melee specialist.

One important thing that would have to happen would be to eliminate the "+1 caster level" that might occur at these dead levels. Instead, since the player has the option of increasing a base classes abilities entirely, it is up to them if they increase a class that has spellcasting ability. In the case of the bladesinger above, the character is shifting his focuse slightly away from spellcasting to take advantage of improved melee damage.

A look through some of the Complete and Psionic books yields the following classes that would be affected by this change in the rules. I have excluded classes like the Tattooed Monk that have a class ability that already advances them significantly in a base classes' abilities (Tattooed Monk level = regular monk levels), or is designed specifically for spell-caster multi-classing (Mystic Theurge, Cerebremancer).

Complete Warrior:
Bear Warrior (levels 2, 4, 6, 8, and 9)
Bladesinger (levels 3, 5, 7, and 9)
Halfling Outrider (levels 6 and 9)
Hunter of the Dead* (levels 4, 7, and 9)
Kensai (levels 3, 6, and 9)
Knight of the Chalice* (level 7)
Order of the Bow Initiate (level 8)
Rage Mage (levels 4 and 6)
Ronin (levels 3, 6, and 8)
War Chanter (levels 2, 4, 6, and 9)

Complete Arcane
Acolyte of the Skin (levels 4 and 8)
Effigy Master (levels 2 and 4)
Mindbender (level 9)
Seeker of the Song (levels 3, 6, 8, and 9) -- I don't think the seeker melodies constitute true class abilities; they're more like new spells.
Suel Arcanamach* (levels 5, 8, and 9)
Wild Mage (levels 4 and 7)

Complete Divine
Black Flame Zealot (levels 4 and 8)
Church Inquisitor (level 7)
Consecrated Harrier* (levels 7 and 9)
Contemplative (levels 4 and 8)
Divine Crusader* (levels 2 and 4)
Divine Oracle (levels 7 and 9)
Entropomancer (levels 2, 4, 6, and 8)
Holy Liberator* (levels 7 and 9)
Hospitaler (levels 2, 4, 6, 8, and 10)
Pious Templar* (levels 5 and 9)
Radiant Servant of Pelor (levels 4, 7, and 9)
Rainbow Servant (levels 2, 3, 5, 6, 8, and 9)
Seeker of the Misty Isle (levels 2, 3, and 8)
Shining Blade of Heironeous (levels 2, 4, 6, 8, and 10)
Ur-Priest* (levels 1, 3, 5, 7, 9)
Void Disciple (levels 2 and 6)
Warpriest (level 8)

Complete Adventurer
Daggerspell Mage (level 4)
Maester (levels 2 and 4)
Ollam (levels 2 and 4)
Shadowmind (levels 4, 6, and 7)
Virtuoso (levels 2, 4, 6, and 8)

Expanded Psionics Handbook
Illithid Slayer (level 5)
Thrallherd (levels 2, 4, 6, and 8)
Warmind* (level 4)

Complete Psionic
Anarchic Initiate (levels 5 and 9)


Personally, I think this would open the door for a little more variety in these classes, and would help to give them the personality of the character, rather than the character being forced to adopt the "personality" of the class.

What do you guys think?

 

[Wolf72]

Isn't WotC doing this for the core classes? ... don't remember the name of the articles, but I like the idea of getting at least a little something every level (bahh!!!! I started playing in '80-'81 ... what am I saying! ... you take your level limits AND like it!)

anyway ... I think something every level isn't a bad idea

 

[Arkhandus]

Except this wouldn't really be 'spicing up', it'd be kinda bland and useless sometimes, but the rest of the time it would be 'suping up' the power of the class, especially when many prestige classes are already more powerful than basic/core/20-level classes. And most other PrCs are just equal to normal classes. The dead levels thing on the WotC site for normal, non-prestige classes doesn't really justify beefing up prestige classes further.

Rather than worrying about 'dead levels', just give some simple, solid benefits to weak prestige classes, and weaken some of the benefits of overly-strong prestige classes.
I.E.
Radiant Servant of Pelor -> gets the beatstick.
Bladesinger -> gets a few extra fighter-y or magic-y feats or somesuch.
Frenzier Berserker -> .....what Frenzied Berserker? There are no Frenzied Berserkers around here.

 

[Luthien Greyspear]

FYI, I've starred some of the classes above because I think these classes throw a bit of a wrench into the mechanics. All of these classes have their own spellcasting progression, so they don't quite follow the same rules for replacing "+1 caster level" with "Advance one level in a base class" like the other dead levels would. I think that these classes would best be served with a rule that limits their progression during the dead levels to only non-spellcasting classes, just to keep it simple.

 

[CleverNickName]

I've never really had any problem with "dead" levels...they are there for a reason, and it is usually to curb the power of the class and give a little bit of delayed gratification before you get to the sweet chewy center of the class.

But I suppose that if I were a player (instead of an evil bastard DM), I would want at least a little something extra. Giving stackable levels of class ability might be a little too powerful for most games, but something small-but-still-pretty-cool might be fun. Howsabout:

- Automatic maximum hit points for that level

- One or two extra skill points

- Free proficiency with a single weapon, armor type, or shield of my choice

- A new spell added to my "spells known" list

- +2 hit points

- 1 free action point

 

[Aust Diamondew]

I wouldn't call any time a caster gets +1 caster leve a 'dead level', usually those extra spells per day and spells known open up more options and neat tricks than any other class features.

I think that increasing the power of PRCs simply to fill up dead levels is unjustified unless the said PRC is already weak. Rather to fill up dead levels either down and/or spread out existing abilities.