How reasonable is Gestalt at an experience penalty?

[Ekul]

One of my players wishes to gestalt Sorcerer and Warlock at the penalty of needing double experience to level. He cites second edition as the source of this rule. However, none of my other players are doing anything like this. The party composition other than him is a bard, a swashbuckler, a barbarian, a druid and a monk. They are traveling via ship.

Thanks.

[Ruslan]

I would suggest not to allow the "special snowflake" player do this. In previous editions, there were rules for gestalt, but never rules to play a gestalt and non-gestalt characters together. This is exceptionally difficult to balance. (and second edition isn't really a good benchmark to look up to for balance anyway)

If you think it's worth trying, let all the PCs play gestalt. Otherwise, just say no.

[Foxhound438]

Absolutely not.

Level thresholds in 5e are set in a manner that even with double XP requirement, the gestalt character will significantly outclass other characters- which is no fun for others at the table.

Take for example, when the rest of the party would reach 3rd level- 900 XP. Even at double XP for the gestalt, they're already a level 4 character (2/2). This is true across all of your campaign- the party at level 4? gestalt's at level 6. party level 5? gestalt's at 8. party at 9? gestalt at 14. Even when the party's at level 20, the gestalt gets to be a level 30. LEVEL 30. with room to grow on top. It's simply not doable. Tell the player if they want two classes that they have to multiclass as normal.

[Greeniron]

second edition gestalt is different from 3.x gestalt.
In 2e you split the xp between both classes and they level up independently when they reach the appropriate amount, the equivalent for 5e is taking 2 classes and alternating which class lvl you choose at lvl up.
3e you gain the better of statistics of each class and class features of both, assuming that they are not the same feature.

What your player is suggesting is gaining more features per lvl while creating a gap in lvl between the pcs, this may be very hard to keep the player alive, at lvl 12 the others will be lvl 16, a 4 lvl difference. I think the gap will make you change the encounters you have planned or risk the gestalt dying in almost every single encounter.

I think the better solution is to make an archetype based off the warlock pacts but for the sorcerer, like fey or fiend heritage. You could model it off the way it is done for the theurge archetype from UA.

[Saggo]

Absolutely not.

Level thresholds in 5e are set in a manner that even with double XP requirement, the gestalt character will significantly outclass other characters- which is no fun for others at the table.

Take for example, when the rest of the party would reach 3rd level- 900 XP. Even at double XP for the gestalt, they're already a level 4 character (2/2). This is true across all of your campaign- the party at level 4? gestalt's at level 6. party level 5? gestalt's at 8. party at 9? gestalt at 14. Even when the party's at level 20, the gestalt gets to be a level 30. LEVEL 30. with room to grow on top. It's simply not doable. Tell the player if they want two classes that they have to multiclass as normal.

To sum it up, double XP isn't a penalty, it's a bonus feature.

[JAL_1138]

I would think not very, in 5e.

2e called it multiclassing, more similar to gestalting than modern multiclassing, but had different XP requirements for every class, an XP progression that made some levels move quickly and others take quite a long time, had restrictions on abilities that didn't get negated by multiclassing (a Fighter/Mage still couldn't cast in armor, for instance), and had level caps for the races that could multiclass (e.g., a race might only be able to reach Fighter 11/Wizard 6, or something). You also couldn't MC within the same group (Warrior, Mage, Priest, Rogue) except for maybe a bard/thief in like one supplement splatbook.

In 5e it would grant a crapload more skills, proficiencies, and class features than standard. They might level slower per class, but their effective overall level will be higher than the rest of the party. 5e class design is intended to make multiclassing a major trade-off in features.

[Ekul]

That's what I thought, I was just checking. I don't really know as much about 5 as I do about 3.5, so it's harder to understand when I'm being reasonable or not.

Thank you all.

[Zalabim]

It is probably possible to calculate values and balance for a 2e-style of multiclass, but it wouldn't likely be half XP, and I don't know of anyone who's taken the time to do it, so it's a lot of hard work away. I would start with some things based on 4e's hybrid classes. So you get about half of the class abilities from each class, and some of the abilities that a multi-classed character could combine, a hybrid classed character keeps separate. Sorcerer would probably end up being a very good hybrid class anyway.