Psychic Theurge/Ardent/Cleric

[ramrod]

Looking for ways to mix up playing a cleric and came across the psychic theurge class.

It adds to cleric caster level, so that's great. Only losing turning power there.

However I'm at a loss for how it would interact with ardent. It says that you would gain additional powers and access to new powers as though you had increased in that class.

So increase in power points I get. Gaining new powers I kind of get. With ardent can you gain any power as long as you have the mantle and enough power points to use it?

Increasing number of powers known should come with the class as stated. But I should assume that you wouldn't gain access to new mantles?

So if I have it right, for a one level dip you gain psionic powers from two mantles (or three for two level dip) and can buy any of the powers within those mantles for the loss of one caster level of cleric and strength of turning?

Please correct me if I'm wrong. Otherwise that seems pretty awesome!

[ramrod]

Sorry, also missed out that you need to be the right level for the power as well, but that should stack right? So an ardent 1/cleric x/psychic theurge 4 should be able to learn 5th level power right?

[sleepyphoenixx]

Sorry, also missed out that you need to be the right level for the power as well, but that should stack right? So an ardent 1/cleric x/psychic theurge 4 should be able to learn 5th level power right?

You can get in with Ardent 2/Cleric 3 if you take the second Ardent level after the Cleric levels and get Practiced Manifester. That would let you take a 3rd level power at Psychic Theurge 1. You need the second Ardent level because Ardent 1 explicitly learns the first powers of their starting mantles, so you can't get a level 2 power with only 1 level of Ardent.

So, you lose two levels of cleric progression and a feat in exchange for a few psionic powers. Most mantles aren't that good, so ask if you can use the Substitute Powers ACF. You're also missing out on Dominant Ideal which is a big draw for playing an Ardent. Otherwise you're lagging behind a pure cleric in exchange for relatively low pp and few powers known, so it's not quite a no brainer.
It can still be worth it with good power selection though, depending on the level you start at and the powerlevel of the campaign in general.

[Urpriest]

For the record, most people interpret the mantles as class features and not as part of your powers known mechanic, so you wouldn't get new mantles from Psychic Theurge.

[ramrod]

Well that sucks balls. You'd think that if it says gains access to new powers that you would get them too, in the same way gaining spellcaster levels also gives you access to new level spells....

[sleepyphoenixx]

Well that sucks balls. You'd think that if it says gains access to new powers that you would get them too, in the same way gaining spellcaster levels also gives you access to new level spells....

Not really. You only get one new power per level after first anyway, so 3 mantles is enough. Since some of the best powers are concentrated in a few mantles anyway (Time and Fate stand out) and you should be able to customize them with the Substitute Powers ACF it's really not that bad.

You can also still learn any power via Psychic Chirurgery, as long as you can find a Psion/Erudite willing to teach you.

[Psyren]

Three mantles are all you need to get all your powers known, especially if you use the Mantle Substitution (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/psm/20070629a) ACF to drop the janky ones and fill the holes.

[ramrod]

So do the number of powers known go up using Psychic Theurge, or do you need to take practiced manifester to top it up? If PT adds to your manifester level and you gain new powers as you would playing an ardent, that would be fine. I don't mind not having access to extra mantles, 2-3 would suffice for extra oomph.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Practiced Manifester only increases ML. It doesn't add new powers known by itself. What it does is letting you pick higher level powers after multiclassing because Ardent maximum power level is based on ML.
To clarify: Ardent 2/Cleric 3/Psychic Theurge 1 would have 4 powers - 2 from Ardent 1, 1 from Ardent 2, 1 from PT 1 (which gets powers as if you had taken Ardent 3). Without Practiced Manifester your ML is 3, so your maximum power level is 2. With PM your ML is 6, so your maximum power level is 3.

You'd take your levels as Ardent 1/Cleric 3/Ardent 1/PT x so you can take a 3rd level power at Ardent 2 to qualify for PT. Without PM you would need a 3rd level of Ardent to qualify for PT.

[ramrod]

Practiced Manifester only increases ML. It doesn't add new powers known by itself. What it does is letting you pick higher level powers after multiclassing because Ardent maximum power level is based on ML.
To clarify: Ardent 2/Cleric 3/Psychic Theurge 1 would have 4 powers - 2 from Ardent 1, 1 from Ardent 2, 1 from PT 1 (which gets powers as if you had taken Ardent 3). Without Practiced Manifester your ML is 3, so your maximum power level is 2. With PM your ML is 6, so your maximum power level is 3.

You'd take your levels as Ardent 1/Cleric 3/Ardent 1/PT x so you can take a 3rd level power at Ardent 2 to qualify for PT. Without PM you would need a 3rd level of Ardent to qualify for PT.

OK I'm definitely confused now. Why would you need 3rd level powers to qualify for PT? It says that you only need to be able to manifest 2nd level powers, which should be accessible with ardent 2 shouldn't it?

[sleepyphoenixx]

OK I'm definitely confused now. Why would you need 3rd level powers to qualify for PT? It says that you only need to be able to manifest 2nd level powers, which should be accessible with ardent 2 shouldn't it?

No. You need ML 3 to get second level powers. You simply get 3rd level powers because you need those 3 cleric levels to qualify for the "2nd level divine spells" requirement.

You can get in with Ardent 2/Cleric 1 if you use some early entry tricks to get 2nd level spells at Cleric 1. An Illumian with Improved Sigil:Krau and Practiced Manifester can enter Psychic Theurge at ECL 4 because you only need 6 skill ranks.

Something like this:
1 Ardent 1 - Practiced Manifester:Ardent
2 Cleric 1
3 Ardent 2 - Improved Sigil:Krau

With Practiced Manifester your ML at level 3 is 3, so you can take a 2nd level power as your power known. With Improved Sigil:Krau some of your Cleric spells are heightened by 1, meaning they count as 2nd level spells. Invest 6 ranks in Knowledge:Psionics and Knowledge Religion each and you can take Psychic Theurge at 4th level.

[ramrod]

No. You need ML 3 to get second level powers. You simply get 3rd level powers because you need those 3 cleric levels to qualify for the "2nd level divine spells" requirement.

You can get in with Ardent 2/Cleric 1 if you use some early entry tricks to get 2nd level spells at Cleric 1. An Illumian with Improved Sigil:Krau and Practiced Manifester can enter Psychic Theurge at ECL 4 because you only need 6 skill ranks.

Something like this:
1 Ardent 1 - Practiced Manifester:Ardent
2 Cleric 1
3 Ardent 2 - Improved Sigil:Krau

With Practiced Manifester your ML at level 3 is 3, so you can take a 2nd level power as your power known. With Improved Sigil:Krau some of your Cleric spells are heightened by 1, meaning they count as 2nd level spells. Invest 6 ranks in Knowledge:Psionics and Knowledge Religion each and you can take Psychic Theurge at 4th level.

I get you now, I've just checked through, I didn't realise that all 2nd level powers take 3 PP to manifest, meaning that you would need to be of 3rd level Ardent.

However, I should be able to enter with Ardent 2, Cleric 3 if I take Practices Manifester right? Not sure if it is worth it at that point :S. I think we will be starting the campaign at level 9, meaning that I wouldn't get access to 5th level cleric spells until level 11, which is pretty steep. Not sure if it would be worth the trade off. Not really minding about the loss of a feat to get there, should have a reasonable number of those and skills I don't mind trading off... losing ability to cast 5th level spells is just a bit too ouchy...

[sleepyphoenixx]

It's generally not, which is true for most theurge classes. There are some exceptions, mostly with theurge classes that actually grant class features.

Those that don't (like Mystic Theurge and Psychic Theurge) are generally only worthwhile if you use early entry to only sacrifice a single level of casting, and even then they're not strictly better than a straight single classed caster that doesn't lose any levels. You still lose the higher HD, skill points and better saves that a single class caster usually gets and the opportunity to take a different PrC with features that improve your casting in other ways.

Once you get out of the low levels you generally have enough spells to last you through a day anyway so more spells isn't worth that much.
For the occassional utility magic you can just take UMD, which costs you a feat at most if you don't get it as a class skill or can boost it in other ways.

[ramrod]

Back to the drawing board.. I wanted to make my cleric a little more interesting (I know that they are good already, I did say interesting :P ) without losing out too much. Psionics is one area that I have never dabbled in. I think that it's the only area where I haven't at least experimented!

It looks like 9 levels of cleric, maybe dipping into some other PRC instead.

[backwaterj]

If you're going for a psychic flavor without level-dips, I'd consider psionic feats, which you can get by either taking the Wild Talent feat or playing a psionic race. Many of these aforementioned races also have psi-like abilities which can be useful and fun.

[ramrod]

Any you could recommend for a cleric? :)