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Zansumkai
2010-08-06, 02:00 PM
Hello, first time poster here with a question. I'm a player in a game of BESM d20 (if you don't know, BESM, or Big Eyes, Small Mouth, is a anime variant for D&D that adds a fair amount of flourish and, unfortunately, game breakage) and am eyeballing the Shadowbane Stalker prestige class from Complete Adventurer for my paladin/adventurer. When making the character point conversion, I ran into some trouble assigning +1 level of divine spellcasting class a point value.
The problem is that when BESM converted the core D&D classes to their character point system, all the spellcasters got a unique calculation for their per-level allotment of points for casting ability. Simply put it reflects that a pure casting class, like the cleric, gets a much greater portion of their power from spells then a class with only a smattering of spells, like a paladin. Additionally, each level of spells is worth progressively more points
So here is the dilemma. With the above information in mind, a cleric gets a lot more from gaining a extra level of spellcasting then a paladin, and the points should change depending on what level their gaining. Right now the solution I've settled on is rather then trying to come up with a new mathematical formula is to just assume that a full caster class is roughly equivalent to BESMs dynamic sorcerer, and a 'partial' caster like the paladin is approximately half. So with that in mind its 8 character points to gain a level of dynamic sorcery, and dynamic sorcerers gain that every other level. So we split that to 4 points for each additional caster level since they'd have to gain two to get any benefit, while standard D&D casters typically calculate their casting on a per-level basis. I rounded 4 up to 5 to reflect the added versatility gained from levels in the prestige class, and then refunded 2 points to partial casters (anyone who doesn't have access to spells all the way from 1st to 9th level) to reflect their casting disability.
In the end, I ended up with +1 to caster level being worth 5 character points, making it roughly on par with a mid/high-end attribute. When all was said and done the Shadowbane Stalker had approximately 110 character points over 10 levels, putting it above the normal power curve, but I also estimated a little high on some point costs for fairness sake.
However, my DM thinks we need to have a more accurate assessment, because he thinks on its face the class looks underpowered, and it should have some additional character points built in. I guess I shouldn't argue with him since I'll be getting said points, but being a DM myself I'm not a fan of unbalenced house rules, which is what this is turning into. Is anyone here familiar enough with BESM and the converting of standard D&D classes to give some imput on the matter?

Wow, that got long. Well if you made it this far I thank you in advance. So if you know what BESM is and have any idea what I'm talking about, I would greatly appreciate a response, even if it is just to scold me for making my first post so large and full of irritating questions. :smallsmile:

Dairun Cates
2010-08-06, 02:12 PM
Alright. I don't know about the prestige class in question, but I do know BESM d20. Honestly, the best way to do this is to estimate what class is CLOSEST in comparison to said prestige class. From the sounds of it, if you're entering it as a cleric, you should treat it as a cleric casting level. Find what they valued a cleric casting level at and use that. From there, adjust for hit dice and saves. If it still comes out 110, then by their system you're right. However, if your GM feels it'll be underpowered, he might know something about campaign content that you do not.

Kylarra
2010-08-06, 02:17 PM
Using psionics as a precedent, reflecting back on the base class seems to work alright. It may, of course, be that you just want to be able to garner more points than you'd otherwise receive, in which case, I guess just talk to your DM, but otherwise, precedent would imply that +1 divine spellcasting would simply just get you the next equivalent level of points from your base.