Mutagenic Mauler and Investigator

[Kazehito]

Hello, sorry if this has been answered before but haven't been able to find anything on it yet. The mutagen that the Mutagenic Brawler gets says that 'Alchemist Levels stack with brawler levels for determining the effect of this ability'. The question that I have is would that carry over to the Investigator levels as his parent class is alchemist? I'm not sure how this would work exactly, as I can see reasons for or against it, so I figured I would see if someone else had seen a ruling or had an idea about this. Thanks to everyone in advance for their help.

[Psyren]

It should work with Investigator as well, because their levels are treated as alchemist levels for the purpose of the mutagen.

Basically, from the mutagen's perspective, it sees all three drinking classes as "alchemist" - and thus functions.

[grarrrg]

It should work with Investigator as well, because their levels are treated as alchemist levels for the purpose of the mutagen.

Basically, from the mutagen's perspective, it sees all three drinking classes as "alchemist" - and thus functions.

Slight clarification:
They should stack, but only if the Investigator has taken the Mutagen Discovery/Talent.*

The bigger question is to what "ability" does the Mutagenic Mauler's 'stacking' apply to?
"(alchemist levels stack with brawler levels for determining the effect of this ability)"
Is it referring strictly to the Mutagen itself (i.e. whatever an Alchemist gets from a Mutagen)? In which case only Duration would increase.
OR is it referring to the Mauler's Mutagen ability, in which case Alchemist levels would stack for the "Level 6 gives +2 damage" bonus.
I'm leaning towards the former.

*Strictly speaking, purely by RAW, an Investigator's levels do NOT count as Alchemist levels. This is likely due to the fact that Mutagen is the _only_ choice that actually cares about Alchemist level, and even then only for Duration of effect. So we shall assume that the intent was that Investigator levels do count as Alchemist levels for the purposes of Mutagen, should they choose that Talent>Discovery.