The Biggest Power Boost from a Prestige Class

[inertia709]

Which prestige class in 3.5 would you say gives the biggest boost in power? Assume that the pre-entry class is the one that gets the most benefit - Master of Many Forms would entered by a Shape Shifter Ranger rather than a Druid, and War Mind would be entered by a Soulknife (or a full BAB class with knowledge(psionics) if that's possible) rather than a Psychic Warrior - and that the character is otherwise optimized. Personally I'm inclined towards Planar Shepherd, but since Druids are so powerful even without the prc, it's hard to if it's giving that much more of a "boost" than (say) Chameleon would give to a Rogue.

[Rubik]

Illithid savant grants a pretty huge boost, since a three level dip can grant full casting or manifesting to anyone who qualifies, at a caster level higher than your character level, if you can manage to devour a high level caster, which is doable with tricks (such as via Ice Assassin).

[Karnith]

Are we talking about big power boosts over the full length of the PrC, or more immediate jumps in power? If the former, then the fast-spellcasting PrCs (e.g. Ur-Priest, Apostle of Peace) are pretty huge power boosts to characters who did not previously cast spells, as is Rainbow Servant to the fixed-list casters.

And Beholder Mage is another silly one to go along with Illithid Savant.

[Aegis013]

A lot of the ones listed on this list (http://www.minmaxboards.com/index.php?topic=1573.0l) in the Marvelous tier are quite strong.

Undead Wizard into Tainted Scholar can make you into an unstoppable save-or-die machine, allowing you to boost your spells/day and save DCs to arbitrary numbers.

[holywhippet]

I'd say archmage for some of the high arcana, mostly for a blaster type magic user. Being able to swap around elements and drop AoE spells without hitting your allies makes them a lot more useful.

[heavyfuel]

If we're counting dips, then Spelldancer. Ridiculously strong in conjunction with Persist, even more so if you manage to add Twin, Reach and Occular spell.

[thethird]

Commoner into Ur-Priest.

[Dusk Eclipse]

Commoner into Ur-Priest.

Errr... straight commoner can't enter Ur-priest until level 13 due skill rank caps (I know there are tricks to change that) so not really that good of a power boost, you cap at 7th level spells so I don't think that would be the case.

[Svata]

Expert ino Ur-Priest, then.

[torrasque666]

Errr... straight commoner can't enter Ur-priest until level 13 due skill rank caps (I know there are tricks to change that) so not really that good of a power boost, you cap at 7th level spells so I don't think that would be the case.

Human with Able Learner. Can get in at level 8.

[Karnith]

Human with Able Learner. Can get in at level 8.
Level 10 at a minimum if it's straight Commoner, because of the base save bonus requirements.

I also don't see how Able Learner gets you in earlier.

[Dusk Eclipse]

Level 10th at the earliest then.

Edit: Able learner doesn't remove the cc skill rank cap, it only makes them cheaper.

[Rubik]

Human with Able Learner. Can get in at level 8.Actually, Able Learner only reduces the number of skill points you have to spend. It doesn't increase your max ranks unless it's a class skill for at least one class.

[Socksy]

Anything hitting Emancipated Spawn's level cap.

[molten_dragon]

Which prestige class in 3.5 would you say gives the biggest boost in power? Assume that the pre-entry class is the one that gets the most benefit - Master of Many Forms would entered by a Shape Shifter Ranger rather than a Druid, and War Mind would be entered by a Soulknife (or a full BAB class with knowledge(psionics) if that's possible) rather than a Psychic Warrior - and that the character is otherwise optimized. Personally I'm inclined towards Planar Shepherd, but since Druids are so powerful even without the prc, it's hard to if it's giving that much more of a "boost" than (say) Chameleon would give to a Rogue.

It's hard to say exactly which gives the biggest boost in power. The four below are pretty ridiculous, I'd argue one of those four. There might be some others I don't know about though.

Planar shepherd is indeed amazingly powerful, particularly if you can mess around with time traits to get 10:1 (or more) actions over everyone else.
Beholder mage lets you cast 10 spells per round in addition to fast casting progression.
Tainted sorcerer/scholar when combined with being undead can give you truly ridiculous amounts of spells per day and save DCs.
Thrallherd gives you two extra characters to play, which could be a planar shepherd and a beholder mage (or two more thrallherds, each of which has two thrallherds as thralls, etc.)

[Rubik]

Part of the thing with illithid savant is that it basically lets you build your own PrC, choosing which skill bonuses, feats, and class abilities you get. Beyond that, it's the only class I know of that lets you permassimilate racial abilities into yourself without twisting the rules.

Also, legacy champion. Use it to progress another class to improve the chassis, or use it to extend a PrC beyond the original (say, illithid savant 10/legacy champion X to gain early access to epic illithid savant, or war weaver 5/legacy champion 10 to count as a war weaver 15, when no such levels technically exist).

[Werephilosopher]

Some good candidates have already been mentioned - Illithid Savant, Beholder Mage, Tainted Scholar, Ur-priest, Planar Shepherd, Master of Many Forms, and Thrallherd are all up there. Others include Incantatrix, Dweomerkeeper, Shadow Templar (from Dark Sun, it's the fast-progression arcane class that doesn't require being a floating orb of eyeballs), Initiate of the Sevenfold Veil, Walker in the Waste, Heir of Siberys, Jade Phoenix Mage (especially if you're a Wu Jen), Mage of the Arcane Order, War Hulk, Weretouched Master (without the stupid errata)... it's hard to find any one prestige class that can be said to give the biggest boost.

[Coidzor]

What *is* the expected entry for Ur-Priests anyway? What's the optimal entry assuming one is limited to a single base class?

[Aegis013]

What *is* the expected entry for Ur-Priests anyway? What's the optimal entry assuming one is limited to a single base class?

This is a very good question.
I think it could be Binder. Has the right saves, the right skills, it won't particularly hurt your capabilities if you pump Wisdom at the cost of other stats, and provides pretty useful abilities to you even after you've advanced pretty far into Ur-Priest or otherwise.

As an added bonus it has some thematic/fluff synergy.

Edit: Ack, it doesn't actually have spellcraft!

[Troacctid]

Complete Divine says "A member of any class can become an Ur-Priest, even--and in fact, especially--an ex-cleric."

[Coidzor]

Complete Divine says "A member of any class can become an Ur-Priest, even--and in fact, especially--an ex-cleric."

So either we need to agree upon one for the purposes of this thread or just declare Ur-Priest too variable to define by the parameters given but pretty nifty nonetheless.

[kardar233]

On a more reasonable note, Suel Arcanamach can add a lot of versatility and power to a lower-tier character .

[Adverb]

Hulking Hurler, if your strength is high enough. :smalltongue: