The mysteries of the theurge...

[Majere]

Currently playing a druid(3)/mage(3)/theurge(5). My feelings so far.

Being one/two spell levels behind can reall hurt. When the enemy is panning you with fireballs and you only have melfs acid arrow the maths doesnt balance. Fortunately there are some "dead" levels for mages, 5th and 6th notably dont have obvious ass kicking spells, so this isnt so bad at these levels. Further because of the cap of 9th level spells you eventually catch up.

You have ALOT of spells. This is realy cool if you are the THIRD spell caster.
Having played the class I strongly believe that if you already have a cleric and a mage who can ensure that the party have acess to the top level spells then a theurge is an awesome addition to the group. The theurge is the best buffing machine in the game, I can buff both party fighters and still have spells left over to cast in combat.
However if there is not a cleric and mage already the party will suffer for not having the top end kick.

Theurges make great archmages, because you can dump divine slots for arcane powers

Majere

 

[Thanee]

Fortunately there are some "dead" levels for mages, 5th and 6th notably dont have obvious ass kicking spells, so this isnt so bad at these levels.

Are you speaking of PHB only / damaging combat spells only!?

There are plenty really, really good spells in those levels! Even in the PHB.

Theurges make great archmages, because you can dump divine slots for arcane powers

This is just... wrong...

(not technically, just "spiritually" )

Bye
Thanee

 

[The Souljourner]

Yeah, we had a 3/3/4 Theurge that was definitely not overpowered. Kinda underpowered, actually, since we were fighting drow, and making caster level checks was really painful. With practiced spellcaster, it probably would be pretty damn good, but I still don't think it would be overpowered.

-The Souljourner

 

[Will]

I haven't seen MTs as PCs. I ran a few as NPCs, though, and they frankly suck as NPCs.

MT draws power from flexibility and number of spells, neither of which is fairly represented in a one-off encounter.

 

[Someone]

I´m playing a wizard3/cleric3/MT4 and I agree with Majere 100%, or at least with the second paragraph.

 

[Thanee]

To those who say the Mystic Theurge is a great supporter/buffer: Do you have Practiced Spellcaster or not?

Just curious, since I think it helps a lot with many of the level dependant buffs.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Loghar]

Souljourner makes a good point i missed earlier, spell resistance sucks. Spell penetration(& greatersp) helps, but costs of another feat or two.

And maybe I've been stuck in a cave for a while, but what is the Practiced spellcaster feat that everyone keep mentioning?

 

[Scion]

It is from complete divine I believe.

You take it, you pick one of your spellcasting classes, and you get a bonus to caster level of up to +4 but your caster level cannot be greater than either your hd (I believe it says hd, might be level). (note, you do not gain extra spell slots)

Pretty nice feat, I think it helps out the theurge greatly. Some will try to say it is overpowered but there have been several threads over it and generally it comes out looking just fine. YMMV of course.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Practiced Spellcaster is a feat from Complete Divine that lets you add up to +4 to your caster level in a single spellcasting class, to a maximum of your character level. So a Wiz3/Clr3/MT5 with this feat for Wiz and Clr could cast as a Wiz11/Clr11, although he would have the spells of a Wiz8/Clr8.

I like artificers (Eberron) better than MTs as '3rd casters,' but there's a lot to be said for the raw buffing power of a well-built MT.

The only time I've ever since a mystic theurge get out of hand is when used in conjunction with Ur Priest (and sometimes Nar Demonbinder). I recall seeing something along the lines of an ex-Pally Blackguard/Ur/Nar/MT who had 16 BAB and cast 9th-level divine and 8th-level arcane spells at 20th level.

Used with the core classes only, or with secondary caster PrCs, it works fine.

 

[Thanee]

Yeah, broken PrC like the Ur-Priest do not suddenly become un-broken, if combined with something like the Mystic Theurge.

Bye
Thanee