Is Spellfire worth it?

[ZamielVanWeber]

Spellfire seems cool and does have an interesting PrC, but how worthwhile is it? The biggest downsides I see are the fact that you must ready an action or your spellfire does nothing. The PrC is awkward to access with its caster heavy skill prereqs (granted Expert, Factotum, and Savant and bypass that) and its somewhat awkward mechanics (especially the interesting ability to drain items on a touch combined with the d4 hit die and 1/2 BaB), just how good is this? Does anyone have any experience with it?

[Flickerdart]

Spellfire gets occasionally brought up on these boards, with the reaction being a solid "meh".

[Callin]

The IDEA behind it is wonderful. The books about it was great. The Mechanics of it in Game are actually interesting. The PrC just makes you into someone who destroys their own WBL to use their abilities. Not worth it.

[ZamielVanWeber]

That is what I thought. Half-Fey feels like the best way to go (unless they errata'd the whole all current/future becomes d6 issue).

[Phelix-Mu]

I fixed it, but it requires some substantial work, or it's kind of like warlock 1 for a feat. No SR, but allows a fixed save. Great range, terrible damage type, but charging it up requires real strategy and, to be efficient, requires another spellcaster in the party.

Spellfire Channeler is a worthless prestige class. It is like being a spellcaster, but not having spells of your own, not advancing existing spellcasting, and only being able to function when you have items to drain or are fighting spellcasters. d4 and a class that involves being directly in danger, not cool. Spellfire Hierophant is only moderately less terrible.

First, remove the fixed save. It's pretty standard 3.5 that ranged touch attacks don't also allow a save, especially for just straight up damage.

Fix that damage type. Probably should be all magic, just look like fire. Making it half fire makes it less effective, overall.

Keep supernatural, that is a nice boost.

Keep the range.

I like boosting the healing, increases utility.

Finally, what the class needs is support, in the form of a PrC that doesn't suck. Being the spell-absorber deserves a bigger HD and a front-line type build, and would benefit mightily from some Evasion and such.

It's hard to remove the readied action mechanic without making this into something that begs more exploitation. As is, there are a couple workarounds for spellcasters with spellfire.

[Keneth]

I agree, RAW it deserves a very solid meh. But the fluff is great and you can make some pretty great homebrew out of it. I had a kobold bard character with spellfire who was battling his archnemesis across the planes. It was quite awesome, and spellfire allowed him to stand his ground against the otherwise clearly superior T1 bad guy.