Justification for having 8 prestige classes in one character needed

[Jowgen]

So, I have this thrower character that I originally didn't bother planning out past level 13, and since I couldn't find anything worthwhile to do with the remaining levels, I thought I might as well try and get as many prestige classes in there as I could to up the base-saves and maybe get some nifty abilities. This is what I ended up with.

Planar Ranger 1
Targeteer Fighter 4 (Dragon 310) [Favored Class]
Master Thrower 5
Peerless Archer 3 (Silver Marches)
Chaos Monk 1 (Dragon 355) [Kyokushkai Karate Dragon 334, Filipino weapon style Dragon 330)
Chaotician 1 (Planar Handbook)
Templar 1 (Defenders of the Faith)
Acolyte of the Skin 1 (Complete Arcane)
Planar Champion 1 (Manual of the Planes)
Bloodhound 1 (Complete Adventurer)
Battle Trickster 1 (Complete Scoundrel)


The saves thing works out pretty nicely with Base saves of 20 Fort 20 Ref and 9 Will repsectively. Love me some of the abilities that came out of this (Mettle, Favored Plane, +2 inherent dex, etc.).

What I need is fluff to explain how in the hell a character would go on this kind of roller coaster ride of prestige classes. Any suggestions on how all or at least one of the jumps from one class to the other might be explained are most welcome :smallsmile:

Character was brought up in an orphanage of Tyr but rejected the faith and authority and went to become a thief on the streets. Got tormented by an evil wizard and then decided to go out be an adventruer with a distinct dislike for arcane casters. His alignment at the current point (level 8) is True Neutral and he is rather ambivalent regarding the Gods.

[JDL]

Your character had a long and eventful career as an adventurer, learning bits and pieces of knowledge and training in odd styles with whichever group he happened to be travelling with at the time.

[Chronos]

I agree with JDL. It doesn't need any explanation beyond that.

[Asrrin]

You have traveled the planes looking for masters of many different martial disciplines in an effort to combine them all into the most deadly form of fighting you can imagine. Your chaotic nature gave you the wanderlust to pack up and find the next master after you have perfected the different techniques you sought. It's actually a classic wuxia archtype in Chinese stories, where the hero undergoes a journey to learn from many different masters to become more than the sum of his parts.

[Renen]

So... you make a character take that mant PrCs gor pure mechanical benefits, and then struggle to imagine how on earth to explain it?

Thats like the hallmark of "DM will be suspicious as hell".
Like heck, I like making fancy characters, but explaining 8 different PrCs is something I never had to do...

[TheIronGolem]

"I didn't take levels in eight different prestige classes and two core classes. I took thirteen levels in [one or two words that sums up your character concept], which is a class I built from parts taken from those other classes"

No, seriously. Classes are a gameplay construct, and you're under no obligation to treat them all as distinct "career paths" that a multiclass character jumps between.

[Renen]

No you arent... but in this case he CLEARLY took them just to be stronger.
Like I understand a dip or two to get a cleric domain or something. But I know alot of DMs who dont mind people taking PrCs, but any more than like... four raises flags because there's no way someone is taking so many for the "flavor".

[Asrrin]

No you arent... but in this case he CLEARLY took them just to be stronger.
Like I understand a dip or two to get a cleric domain or something. But I know alot of DMs who dont mind people taking PrCs, but any more than like... four raises flags because there's no way someone is taking so many for the "flavor".

So what if he took them to be stronger? Isn't that the entire point of leveling up? To get stronger? There are plenty of in game reasons why a person would have a dozen or more classes or prestige classes.

A flighty personality that can never settle down.
A martial artist seeking out the greatest techniques from every style of combat he can find.
a slave who is bought and sold from one master to the next to fight in arenas for the amusement of others.
A professional student who can't quite make up his mind what field of study he'd like to graduate in.
A ruthless assassin who's life work it is to hone the specific skill necessary to track down an elusive quarry
A Slaad.
a worshiper of Farlanghan who travels the world and learns a bit from every place he visits.

Need I go on?

[Techmagss]

Because you can.
It's within the rules until the DM changes it (which he will) so go for it.
In all seriousness, JDL probably has it right- I assume by level 14 your character's been places.

[Renen]

Well you also CAN make pun pun.
im just saying that this will raise alot of flags. But sure... its totally RAW legal.

[Chronos]

And just what's wrong with "because I want to be more powerful"? Your character is fighting extradimensional horrors that would drive ordinary men insane if they even suspected their existence. Of course he's going to want to be more powerful-- How else is he going to stand a chance charging in where angels fear to tread?

[Renen]

As I said... sure you can take it. It will just raise flags unless your DM knows you dont powergame.

[TheIronGolem]

No you arent... but in this case he CLEARLY took them just to be stronger.
He's been registered here on the Playground for more than a year and has an "orc" rating, which I'm guessing is somewhere around 200+ posts. As such, it's safe to assume that he knows that if you're just building for power in 3.X, you pick a Tier 1 caster class and ride it to 20, or maybe pick up one or two full-casting PrC's along the way. Since he's done pretty much the opposite of that, it's also safe to assume that he's picking those PrC's for reasons of theme or concept. I mean, just look at the class features he mentions - Mettle, Favored Plane, +2 to DEX. Not exactly Pun-Pun stuff, is it?



Like I understand a dip or two to get a cleric domain or something. But I know alot of DMs who dont mind people taking PrCs, but any more than like... four raises flags because there's no way someone is taking so many for the "flavor".
If it "raises flags" merely on the basis that it's over some arbitrary threshold of classes, then it's the flags that need to be adjusted, not the player. How is it that four PrC's can be chosen for flavor, but five can't? What's different about that fifth one?

[Renen]

Four is an arbitrary number I used.
Im just saying that alot of people will atleast raise an eyebrow at that many different classes.
I know that T1 is power, but I said he took them to make himself stronger, not strongest. Sure, a straight 20 wizard is stronger than this by miles, but unless his DM frequents the playground, he might get worried. Like come on, havent you seen all the horror stories here about DMs who nerf mundanes?

[TheIronGolem]

Sure, but what makes them horror stories is those DM's bad decisions that are based on a poor understanding of the system and/or the Stormwind Fallacy, not because the player is doing something wrong.

[Jowgen]

So... you make a character take that mant PrCs gor pure mechanical benefits, and then struggle to imagine how on earth to explain it?

That's about half-right. I originally made this character (up to level 13) because I liked the concept, both of the character and how he would play; and also because I enjoy making the most out of non-caster things (in this case a thrower, which is it's own realm of delicious optimization hurdles).

The dipping-fest results from a peeve I have: I despise taking levels that don't give me their money's worth.

If I could spend those seven levels to take a mediocre class with a cap-stone that really added something to this character, I'd do that; but that's not an option. I've looked are and wide, I made a thread (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?385278-Help-me-top-off-this-somewhat-cheesy-thrower-build&p=18448946) about it; and there seemingly are no classes left that would add anything meaningful to this character. With these 13 levels, he has everything he needs to function as intended; and there is nothing left.

So, since I couldn't find a single or at least 2 classes that could help the 13 level build continue to progress over the subsequent levels; I figured repeated dipping was a decent solution. With this, I can keep by base-stats up, and get a collection of random but fun/handy abilities.

I suppose a possible answer to my own question lies in that. My character honed his specialized skills as far as he could, and then reached the point where he could go no further along his original path. So, he decides to search for ways to improve his basics and become more well-rounded, after super-specializing for so long.

*thinking out loud*

Chaos Monk could represent the start of his quest of looking to return to the basics. He focuses on boosting his resilience (saves, Endurance) and in his attempt to further boost the speed of his attacks (number of attacks/round) he discovers that a bit of chaos can go a long way.

Chaotician would flow pretty nicely from that. He decides to delve deeper into the power of chaos he began to explore, as it is a more fundamental aspect of the universe, and what better place to improve your fundamentals than that. His dislike for authoroty and casters manifests itself in the classes Scofflaw ability.

Templar is the next step, representing an exploration of his actual roots. He was brought up in an orphanage of Tyr, a Lawful god representing the anti-thesis of the chaotic path he had set upon. Considering how far he has gone from the Lawfullness of his upbringing, first by becoming a thief and then a student of cosmic chaos, he decides that it might be time to re-evaluate his original decision. He returns home and gives the temple-life a try. Being a skilled combatant, the church of tyr obviously sees him as a prime candidate to being a templar. Becoming a Templar allows him to reconcile his origins with the path he took in life (returning him to neutral alignment) and he gains a measure of peace.

Acolyte of the skin is what follows, representing an exploration of the Templar's (other) flip-side. Having returned to a balanced view-point of the world (True Neutral), he comes to realize the limits of Tyr's dogma. The "good" powers of those who follow deities like Tyr are not strictly better than those wielded by devils, fiends and their ilk. It is the invidiual who wields said powers who makes the difference. So he decides to explore that route, and see what he can learn/gain from dabbiling with the dark forces without running the risk of becoming a minion of evil. He discovers the secrets of the bonding ritual and decides to go through with it. It shows it that he was right in that neither good, nor evil, neither law nor chaos embodies an ultimate truth (True Neutral is cemented).

Planar Champion is a sort of full-circle kind of step. Having honed his specialized skills through the first 13 levels, and having gone on to strenghten his basics in an exploration of all the possible extremes; he has finally returned to his roots, but with a wider worldview. Rather than being simply a planar ranger, he is now a planar champion; testamant to the many long paths he walked.

Bloodhound Finally is the closing scene, more or less. Satisfied with what he has learned and accomplished, he decides to settle down to become nothing more than a simple bounty hunter/tracker. Both his fundamental and specialized skills are now at a level where he no longer feels the need that he needs to hone them to find fullfillment. A simple life of hunting people down for pay is enough to keep him happy now.

Battletrickster, the final level, is simply the result of him enjoying his new line of work, but finding that he can have fun by using a few little odd tricks and showing off a little.


Seem good? :smallsmile:

[Jeff the Green]

"I'm good at throwing knives at people, but then I found that I'm really good at tracking things down, killing them, and wearing their skin."

[ranagrande]

The only one I would have a problem with is Templar, and that only because you're not using the updated Pious Templar from Complete Divine.

[Urpriest]

"I didn't take levels in eight different prestige classes and two core classes. I took thirteen levels in [one or two words that sums up your character concept], which is a class I built from parts taken from those other classes"

No, seriously. Classes are a gameplay construct, and you're under no obligation to treat them all as distinct "career paths" that a multiclass character jumps between.

That generally works, but here there are some choices that are hard to fit in with any character concept.


So, I have this thrower character that I originally didn't bother planning out past level 13, and since I couldn't find anything worthwhile to do with the remaining levels, I thought I might as well try and get as many prestige classes in there as I could to up the base-saves and maybe get some nifty abilities. This is what I ended up with.

Planar Ranger 1
Targeteer Fighter 4 (Dragon 310) [Favored Class]
Master Thrower 5
Peerless Archer 3 (Silver Marches)
Chaos Monk 1 (Dragon 355) [Kyokushkai Karate Dragon 334, Filipino weapon style Dragon 330)
Chaotician 1 (Planar Handbook)
Templar 1 (Defenders of the Faith)
Acolyte of the Skin 1 (Complete Arcane)
Planar Champion 1 (Manual of the Planes)
Bloodhound 1 (Complete Adventurer)
Battle Trickster 1 (Complete Scoundrel)


The saves thing works out pretty nicely with Base saves of 20 Fort 20 Ref and 9 Will repsectively. Love me some of the abilities that came out of this (Mettle, Favored Plane, +2 inherent dex, etc.).

What I need is fluff to explain how in the hell a character would go on this kind of roller coaster ride of prestige classes. Any suggestions on how all or at least one of the jumps from one class to the other might be explained are most welcome :smallsmile:

Character was brought up in an orphanage of Tyr but rejected the faith and authority and went to become a thief on the streets. Got tormented by an evil wizard and then decided to go out be an adventruer with a distinct dislike for arcane casters. His alignment at the current point (level 8) is True Neutral and he is rather ambivalent regarding the Gods.

Planar Ranger - fine with pretty much any concept, though it would probably make more sense had you started off the material plane. Seeing as that would support several other decisions here, any reason not to have your orphanage have been in Sigil?
Targeteer Fighter - generic for someone focused on ranged weapons
Peerless Archer - essentially ditto
Chaos Monk - eh, most combatants dabble in martial arts. Yours happened to come from a culture with those specific influences.
Chaotician - and here we arrive at the more specific fluff. It's also the first part of the build that's really evidently dubious: aside from being easy to qualify for, why the heck is it in here? Anyway, if you really want to keep it, that's what growing up in Sigil and hanging out with the Xaositects is for.
Templar - did you check the WotC website on this one? Pretty sure it was replaced by Pious Templar. Either way, it's all about devotion, so rather than be ambivalent about the gods be devoted to something! Preferably a god of chaos!
Acolyte of the Skin - Wow. That is...a lot of bull**** to go through for just +2 Dex I have to say. That's...there really weren't any classes with actual useful class features you could have taken instead? You're dropping a feat on Practiced Spellcaster just to qualify for this damn thing...ugh fine. You're craaazy, and you bound a fiend to yourself, because you're craaazy.
Planar Champion - What is wrong with you? Is the sole purpose of this build trying to take as many Iron Chef ingredients as possible? Anyway, this one is at least easy to fluff if you do the planar route.
Bloodhound - Eh, anyone can spend time as a bounty hunter, and you've already got the ranger level to establish competence.
Battle Trickster - Liking skill tricks has no fluff requirements.

In conclusion: your alignment is not neutral, it is chaotic evil (or possibly chaotic neutral) and you are devoted to an especially loony god. You grew up in Sigil, not some silly material plane orphanage, and are generally the detritus and scum of the planes.

There. Fluff. Good grief.

[Telonius]

Okay, let's have a go at it. The first 12 levels or so are pretty self-explanatory. Planar Ranger, likes tracking things, shoots at a distance. He's been learning various styles to help him along the way.

Then, all of a sudden ... Chaos Monk. In his travels across the planes, he was (for one reason or another) spending a lot of time on Limbo. It might be that he lost his weapon or armor for some period of time. He wanted to make sure he was prepared for anything, so he started training with a group of Xaositect Monks. He dabbled enough in their training, but was really intrigued by some of the more philosophical aspects of Chaos that the monks espoused. (i.e. level in Chaotician). He didn't delve in too deeply, but was content to stay and defend the temple (i.e. level in Templar).

The Xaositect temple was growing more powerful, attracting the attention of some powerful extraplanar beings - possibly Archons or Devils. A group of demons (maybe Orcus-related?) offered their aid. Your Ranger was happy to accept it. After all, it's a new experience - and how many people could say that they've worn a fiend? (i.e. Acolyte of the Skin) After driving off the forces of Law, your Ranger became renowned in Limbo, a recognized champion of the plane and intimately familiar with all things chaotic (i.e. level in Planar Champion).

Bloodhound ... is tricky. Perhaps he started doing missions for the Temple, "retrieving" its enemies? It would make a lot more sense to the story for this level to appear earlier on, but it could plausibly appear later too.

Finally, Battle Trickster; nothing says "Chaos" like pulling some unexpected stunts in the middle of a combat.

[Jowgen]

"I'm good at throwing knives at people, but then I found that I'm really good at tracking things down, killing them, and wearing their skin."

That is just hillarious :smallbiggrin:


In conclusion: your alignment is not neutral, it is chaotic evil (or possibly chaotic neutral) and you are devoted to an especially loony god. You grew up in Sigil, not some silly material plane orphanage, and are generally the detritus and scum of the planes.

There. Fluff. Good grief.

Thank you for a very entertaining post :smallbiggrin:

Probably should have mentioned this earlier as it's fluffl related, but didn't think to do so because it's not presitge-class related: character in question has the Shadow creature template (bought off). He grew up in the material, but was actually born on the Plane of Shadow, the city of balefire specifically (has a great Dragon Mag article dediceted to it). Parents dead in Nightcrawler attack, plane-shift the toddler to the material, hence orphanage. At some point around 8th level he tracks down his origin story, hence some of the plane-related stuff.

Yeah, really should have mentioned that... sorry :smalleek:

Now, for the specifics :smallsmile:

Good to hear you think chaos monk works

Chaotician: I'd like to think that there is a bunch of Xaoticects on the plane of shadow, with it being constantly shifting and all that stuff. That being said, I'm not too hung up on it, and but I do feel like to flows well from Chaos Monk.

Templar: I never really doubted that Pious Templar was intended as an update, I just hoped it was never officially branded as such. I want to take that because Endurance is easier to get and marginally less full of suck than True Believer, which I hate as a feat. The Weapon Specilization that Templar gives is useless to me, so I think my DM will be okay with me taking the older version. If not, I'm not too hung up either. Devotion to a chaotic God of sorts seems like a good way to go for the fluff on it though... would Istus work? Love me the lady of fate.

Acolyte of the Skin: Hey, I'm not that crazy as to sink a feat into a level 1 dip :smallyuk: I get my caster level 5 from on of my Shadow Template Spell-likes (as this is one of the rare classes that lets Spell-Like ability caster level count). As for the "better choices", trust me I'd take them. But, for a mega-dex heavy character like this, +2 inherent Dex is at least something. And besides, don't forget about that delicious +1 Natrual armor bonus :smalltongue:

Planar champion: :smallbiggrin: It was easy to qualify, fluff, has full bab and 2 good saves, and the smidgen of damage against material plane dwellers doesn't hurt. Especially if I can get my DM to allow my Hunting weapon to apply to it as well as my favored enemy arcanist.

Bloodhound & Battletrickster: yeah, those two are rather simple, not much issue I think.


Okay, let's have a go at it. The first 12 levels or so are pretty self-explanatory. Planar Ranger, likes tracking things, shoots at a distance. He's been learning various styles to help him along the way.

Then, all of a sudden ... Chaos Monk. In his travels across the planes, he was (for one reason or another) spending a lot of time on Limbo. It might be that he lost his weapon or armor for some period of time. He wanted to make sure he was prepared for anything, so he started training with a group of Xaositect Monks. He dabbled enough in their training, but was really intrigued by some of the more philosophical aspects of Chaos that the monks espoused. (i.e. level in Chaotician). He didn't delve in too deeply, but was content to stay and defend the temple (i.e. level in Templar).

The Xaositect temple was growing more powerful, attracting the attention of some powerful extraplanar beings - possibly Archons or Devils. A group of demons (maybe Orcus-related?) offered their aid. Your Ranger was happy to accept it. After all, it's a new experience - and how many people could say that they've worn a fiend? (i.e. Acolyte of the Skin) After driving off the forces of Law, your Ranger became renowned in Limbo, a recognized champion of the plane and intimately familiar with all things chaotic (i.e. level in Planar Champion).

Bloodhound ... is tricky. Perhaps he started doing missions for the Temple, "retrieving" its enemies? It would make a lot more sense to the story for this level to appear earlier on, but it could plausibly appear later too.

Finally, Battle Trickster; nothing says "Chaos" like pulling some unexpected stunts in the middle of a combat.

A lovely post that is :smallsmile:

The entire limbo side of things ties most of the classes together real nice. I would place Blood-Hound earlier, if it wasn't such a pain for this particualr build to qualify for, aka. all my skill points are mediocre and nothing I take gets move silently. Honestly, I would be far from heart-broken if I could replace it with something better/more fitting. Dragonslayer perhaps, if I can get the dodge without loosing the endurance for templar. Nobody ever needs an excuse to want to kill a dragon. Ever.

[Desiani]

Have you thought about going into a few level of war blade to pick up the required maneuvers then go into Bloodstorm blade? I would say the ability to throw literally anything deserves a level or two? Since you can chuck any martial weapon and have it return to you :D

I've used it for my dwarf Bloodstorm Blade, he focuses on chucking gnomes, halflings and the occasional Orc :p lots of fun to watch Gnomes suddenly have the Return quality! LOL

[Jowgen]

To anyone still interested, the issue has resolved itself.

I'll be taking 2 levels of chaos monk now for two feats, fighter feats if my DM agrees that Martial Monk is written as an Alternate Class feature rather than a class variant (I don't think the term Alternate Class Feature had been invented at that point, but the text suggests it is meant to be such).

Also, I discovered Sworn Slayer from Dragon 324, which gives me Nemesis without exhalted requirement at level 3, plus favored enemy-like bonuses to attack/skills/saves that might work out really nicely if I can convince my DM to let FE Arcanist to apply. So yeah, 3 levels of that.

I'm more or less left with 2 more levels of something to take, but I'm not particularly bothered about them. Maybe planar champion, if I can get Favored Plane to be adjusted to work like 3.5 favored enemy rather than 3e favored enemy. Acolyte fo the skin would be handy, albeit not as fitting with the 1-19 level fluff. Battletrickster if all else fails, really.

Either way, thank you to everyone who participated in this thread. :smallsmile:

[Ettina]

Well, I've known people who get 'born again' as a new religion every couple of months. Maybe your guy is like that, but with prestige classes.

I think their basic motivation is wanting a quick fix to solve their deep-seated personal problems, instead of having to do actual soul-searching and hard work like that.