The Worst

[Saeviomagy]

Horizon walker gets the dim door every 1d4 rounds, tremorsense, immunity to fatigue, darkvision etc etc. It's pretty cool all up.

My vote would have to go to that funny "shard of oblivion" one. You know - the cleric one that gets to summon some sort of little bitty of nothingness? Underpowered and tedious. I can't even remember what it's called, it was so bad.

Another bad one is the gnomish meister. Yawnarific.

 

[Felon]

Is the duelist really that bad? My girlfriend was going to have her 13th level rogue take this class next level!

Well, maybe it has some appeal in your campaign. But Canny Defense is worthless. Note that the 3.5e version, for some stupid reason, doesn't even grant the character's full Int. modifier as a bonus to AC right away. It only grants 1 point of AC per level, with the character's Int. mod. representing the cap. Considering that it would be lousy even if you got the full bonus right away, she'd still be better off in light armor (unless the character's Int. mod. is ridiculously high).

Then what will she get after that? A small bonus to initiative, a bonus to Reflex saves, and an AC bonus against AoO's that she shouldn't need that badly thanks to her Tumble skill. So like I said, she's 5 levels in before she gets anything particularly good (Precise Strike).

I think the design for the duelist involved measuring it against the Fighter class. The duelist gets 2 more skill points each level, and mirrors it in terms of BAB and one good saving throw. So, I suspect the designers figured they had to tone down the class features so that the Duelist wasn't getting anything really superior to the Fighter's bonus feats. Unfortunately, they made it bland and weak.

Then again, numbers aren't everything.

 

[Gez]

My personal award for the most disapppointing prestige class is the Sharn Skymage from Eberron's first city sourcebook. In exchange for a halved spellcasting progression, you get a few abilities that, while kinda nifty, aren't really worth it. Plus the illo is fugly.

Okay, I'll bite: what's wrong with the name "Ghaunador?" Does it mean something in a different language?

Actually, the issue is that it seems to be pronounced Gonador. Which is a silly name, in my humble opinion.

Gez: It's Ghaunadaur, not Ghaunador *nitpick*.

Gonador, Gonadaur, same difference.

 

[D-rock]

I don't like the heirophant, and the Forsaker just bothers me.