Ur-Priest Builds

[Orsen]

After seeing this prestige class come up fairly often on the threads I decided to look into it. I now understand why it gets nothing but respect. Having said that, what are people's favorite ways into Ur-Priest? I don't care whether or not it's optimized, I'm just interested to see some builds. Cheers!

[gorfnab]

Hellfire Ur-lock
Warlock 4/ Binder 1/ Ur-Priest 2/ Eldritch Disciple 2/ Hellfire Warlock 3/ Eldritch Disciple 8
Warlock 4/ Binder 1/ Ur-Priest 2/ Eldritch Disciple 2/ Hellfire Warlock 3/ Eldritch Disciple 2/ Mindbender (Mindsight :smallwink:) 1/ Eldritch Disciple 5

Ruby Knight Vindicat-Ur
Human Paragon 1/ Crusader 4/ Ur-Priest 2/ Ruby Knight Vindicator 10/ Crusader 3
Paladin of Tyranny 2/ Hexblade 3/ Crusader 3/ Ur-Priest 2/ Ruby Knight Vindicator 10

Divine Traitor (not exactly optimal but still amusing)
Defiant 10/ Ur-Priest 10

Ur-Chord
Bard7/ Mindbender 1/ Ur-Priest 2/ Sublime Chord 2/ Mystic Theurge 8

Sacrilegious Fist
Duskblade 3/ Monk 2/ Ur-Priest 2/ Sacred Fist 10/ Enlightened Fist 3

[Axinian]

I like Duskblade/Factotum/Ur-Priests myself. Makes a nice villain whose capable of spells and combat. Though that's probably because duskblade is my favorite class.

Bard/Ur-Priests are fun too. Allows you to cast powerful cleric spells of doom, and sing songs about how badly the spell will destroy them :smallamused:

[Viktyr Gehrig]

I don't like prepared casters, so I try to mix Ur-Priest in with something I like better.

Bard 5/Mindbender 1/Ur-Priest 3/Mystic Theurge 1/Sublime Chord 1/Mystic Theurge 9 is my go-to build.

Human Paragon 3/Warlock 3/Mindbender 1/Ur-Priest 2/Eldritch Disciple 10.

Never thought about it before, but Dragonfire Adept 5 slides you right into Ur-Priest. 4+ skills/level, all of the prerequisites on your class list. Of course, you'd need a multicaster PrC here, too.

For a relatively straight build, Human Paragon 1/Monk 2/Soulknife 2/Soulbow 1/Ur-Priest 2/Human Paragon 2/Contemplative 10.

[JeminiZero]

Blue Dragon Shaman 1 / Ardent 4 / Ur Priest 2 / Psychic Theurge 1 (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20040925b) / Warblade 1 / Psychic Theurge 9 / Ardent 2

The way Practiced Manifester and Ardent interact should be well known enough. This essentially lets you attain level 9 Divine spells and Psionic Powers.

4 Ardent + 10 Psychic Theurge + 2 Ardent = 16 (Which can be boosted to 20 by Practiced Manifester)

2 Ur Preist + 10 Psychic Theurge = 12 (Which can be boosted to 16 by Practiced Spellcaster. Not nearly as good)

Blue dragon Shaman (LE or NE) splash provides 2 things that Ardent requires to get into Ur Preist by level 6: A good Fort Save, and Spellcraft as a class skill. And of course, it gives that nice healing aura.

The Warblade splash at level 9 lets you grab Mind over Body (your Fort save largely sucks), either Disarming Strike OR Wall of Blades leading to Iron Heart SURGE!, and either Blood in the Water or Hunter's Sense. That is a considerable expansion of a abilities for a single level splash.

[Encryptedmind]

This isn't a build per say, but instead is a concept.
Playing an Ur priest in Forgotten Realms, who worships Ao.
{{scrubbed}}
Specializing in fire spell and explosions, while wearing a ring that offers protection form fire.

[Orsen]

Divine Traitor (not exactly optimal but still amusing)
Defiant 10/ Ur-Priest 10


I'm not familiar with Defiant, I'm assuming it's a base class? Where can I find it?

[*.*.*.*]

I'm not familiar with Defiant, I'm assuming it's a base class? Where can I find it?

It's prestige from Planar Handbook(IIRC)

[Malimar]

I'm not familiar with Defiant, I'm assuming it's a base class? Where can I find it?

The "Defiant 10/Ur-Priest 10" thing threw me off, too. Defiant can be "taken" at level 1 by going Cleric until you qualify for Defiant, then swapping your Cleric levels for Defiant levels, like a Paladin going Blackguard.

[Greenish]

Sapphire Hierarch might be cool (with slight refluffing), but what would be the easiest way to add Law domain on Ur-Priest?

[Dusk Eclipse]

Contemplative? I don't remember if they need to worship a god or something; but IIRC they give you an extra domain.. high level trick though.. Ir requires 13 skill points in K:Religion

[Draken]

Sapphire Hierarch might be cool (with slight refluffing), but what would be the easiest way to add Law domain on Ur-Priest?

That would be contemplative, from complete divine. But it may take some open reading for contemplative's special requirement, given the nature of Ur-Priest.

[Viktyr Gehrig]

Contemplative? I don't remember if they need to worship a god or something; but IIRC they give you an extra domain.. high level trick though.. Ir requires 13 skill points in K:Religion

You have to meet an extraplanar representative of your faith, but that can be an exemplar of a particular ideal. Pretty much any high-level Yugoloth would do the trick.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Special: Must have had direct contact with
one’s patron deity or a direct servant of that
deity, or with an enlightened being embodying
the highest principles of an alignment
(a solar, for example).
Doesn't matter if you worship a deity, or if you even make contact with a creature embodying your alignment. You could be CE and meet a LG outsider to qualify, assuming you survive the meeting of course.


I like Wizard 5/ Incantatrix 4/ Mindbender 1/ Ur-Priest 2/ Mystic Theurge 8, use Metamagic Effect to persist all your arcane buffs, DMM: Persist for divine buffs, and Cooperative Metamagic if you run out of uses of either of those.

[Hyfigh]

I'm a big fan of pairing it with Bone Knight. I'm AFB right now so don't recall the exact build. It involves an evil Paladin variant, Hexblade, Divine Oracle, (obviously) Ur Priest, and all ten levels of Bone Knight. It provides lots of immunities, charisma to saves twice, 9th level spells, and a high caster level.

[Malimar]

Also: Am I just missing something big, or does taking a level of ur-priest (which grants the ability to cast divine spells) prevent you from taking any further levels of ur-priest (which require you to not have the ability to cast divine spells)?

[Greenish]

Contemplative? I don't remember if they need to worship a god or something; but IIRC they give you an extra domain.. high level trick though.. Ir requires 13 skill points in K:Religion


That would be contemplative, from complete divine. But it may take some open reading for contemplative's special requirement, given the nature of Ur-Priest.Contemplative is a bit late.

Also: Am I just missing something big, or does taking a level of ur-priest (which grants the ability to cast divine spells) prevent you from taking any further levels of ur-priest (which require you to not have the ability to cast divine spells)?Ur-Priest doesn't require you to not be able to cast divine spells. You just lose your existing divine spellcasting for entering.

[Malimar]

Ur-Priest doesn't require you to not be able to cast divine spells. You just lose your existing divine spellcasting for entering.


Special: The character must have no ability to cast divine spells. If such spellcasting ability was previously possessed (as with an ex-cleric), that ability is forever forsaken.

So you can/must forsake your level 1 Ur-Priest casting in order to gain your second level of Ur-Priest, and thus the level 2 Ur-Priest casting?

[Draken]

Hmmm... here it is. Complete Champion, Paragnostic Apostle. You will need to wait until your 3rd level of Ur-Priest to qualify, which should be your eight level overall, allowing you to enter Apostle at level 9 and then take Divine Understanding for any one domain of your choice.

Sapphire Hierarch... Incarnate 5/Ur-priest 3/Paragnostic Apostle 1, you are qualified.

Edit: obviously, you lose your 1st level ur-priest spellcasting and gain your 2nd level ur-priest spellcasting, which is in every way better than your 1st level ur-priest spellcasting. This will repeat for the remainder of your ur-priest levels. :smalltongue:

Edit: derp, I misread. Paragnostic does not give a domain.

[Greenish]

So you can/must forsake your level 1 Ur-Priest casting in order to gain your second level of Ur-Priest, and thus the level 2 Ur-Priest casting?You only have to qualify to enter a prestige class. Otherwise, Schrödinger's Dragon Discipline.

[Malimar]

You only have to qualify to enter a prestige class. Otherwise, Schrödinger's Dragon Discipline.

That makes more sense. Carry on.

[candycorn]

To back that up with a source, from SRD, Prestige Classes:
Prestige classes offer a new form of multiclassing. Unlike the basic classes, characters must meet Requirements before they can take their first level of a prestige class. The rules for level advancement apply to this system, meaning the first step of advancement is always choosing a class. If a character does not meet the Requirements for a prestige class before that first step, that character cannot take the first level of that prestige class. Taking a prestige class does not incur the experience point penalties normally associated with multiclassing.

[erikun]

I want to play a Wizard 9/Ur-Priest 2/Mystic Theurge 8 one of these days, just to see how well it works out.

[Hyfigh]

I want to play a Wizard 9/Ur-Priest 2/Mystic Theurge 8 one of these days, just to see how well it works out.

Try adding Eiditch Memory and Uncanny Forethought with Heighten Spell to the Wizard side for even more versatility as a Wizard (cause, you know, they need it and all). Drop some of those wizard levels and take another PrC(s) like a dip in Mindbender for Mind Sight. Anything that keeps advancing your Wizard casting works. So. Broken.

[Ernir]

No one has mentioned the Savage Bard (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/variantCharacterClasses.htm#bardVariantSavageBard) ?

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Savage Bard 8/ Ur-Priest 2/ Sublime Chord 2/ Mystic Theurge 8

Use Hellbred to know Druidic and get one of those tricks to gain Evasion and you can replace Mystic Theurge with Fochlucan Lyrist to have 9th/9th/+16 BAB at 20.

[Urpriest]

Savage Bard 8/ Ur-Priest 2/ Sublime Chord 2/ Mystic Theurge 8

Use Hellbred to know Druidic and get one of those tricks to gain Evasion and you can replace Mystic Theurge with Fochlucan Lyrist to have 9th/9th/+16 BAB at 20.

*Ur-Priest Enters the thread in a cloud of smoke. The smoke is a cheesed-up blasphemy spell. Cower before me!*

A-hem.

I am thoroughly disappointed with all these builds entering Ur-Priest at level 8! What, getting 9ths at 14 just isn't worth it for you guys?

Especially with an ideal chassis like Savage Bard...

Anyway, with some sort of cheese to get Druidic and soulmelds to obtain Evasion you could do:
Savage Bard 5/Ur-Priest 2/Mystic Theurge 3/Sublime Chord 1/Fochluchan Lyrist 9
Which yes gives only +15 BAB if you're not using fractionals, but you still get 9ths at level 15.

Be a Bamboo Spirit Folk (atheists, the lot of them!), read "trackless step class feature" as just a long way of saying "trackless step", and you can insert Arcane Hierophant instead of Mystic Theurge, for a marginally better chassis and actual abilities. Or if you don't want to waste your feats getting evasion and don't care about BAB (hint hint: DMM), replace Fochluchan Lyrist with Arcane Hierophant.

[Greenish]

Incarnate can enter Ur-Priest after five levels (assuming Criminal Background or similar for Bluff), and going for Sapphire Hierarch loses no levels of casting, so yes, there is a build that gets the casting as fast as possible.

Also, from whom would an Ur-Priest who doesn't believe in gods steal his powers?

[Viktyr Gehrig]

Also, from whom would an Ur-Priest who doesn't believe in gods steal his powers?

Obviously those pompous gaijin that think they're better than everyone else.

[gorfnab]

The "Defiant 10/Ur-Priest 10" thing threw me off, too. Defiant can be "taken" at level 1 by going Cleric until you qualify for Defiant, then swapping your Cleric levels for Defiant levels, like a Paladin going Blackguard.
Basically with that build I would go through Cleric up to 9th level and then when going to level 10 swap out all levels for Defiant thus gaining the really nice abilities from trading in.

[Urpriest]

Incarnate can enter Ur-Priest after five levels (assuming Criminal Background or similar for Bluff), and going for Sapphire Hierarch loses no levels of casting, so yes, there is a build that gets the casting as fast as possible.

:smalltongue:

I didn't say that none of the builds got the casting as fast as possible. Obviously a few manage it. Under certain interpretations (text vs. table and all that nonsense) the Sacriligeous Fist can do it too, as can the Defiant (though doing it that way loses you the better trade-in abilities...then again, you're already taking a class that gives you massive SR against your own buffs...so perhaps you don't really care?).

[Incanur]

A player in one of the campaigns I ran went ranger 1/warlock 4/ur-priest 10/hierophant 5. Hierophant worked out rather well. He chose miracle a spell-like ability.