New Player Looking for Spell Caster Help

[thedarkcrash]

As the title says I am a new player to the system. I have been in around 3 or 4 campaigns with friends who are new to being a DM and well, optimizing or doing stuff because it's good hasn't been my strong suit. With little guidance from my friends on whats good or bad I've fell into what I imagine a lot of newer players fall into, "Big numbers mean big win."

Recently one of my friends who is a lot more versed in D and D "6 years of DM experience" and I don't know how many years of play before that, invited me to his campaign. He said that he well help me after I make a character what the pros and cons are and give it a rating on strength overall. I made a 26 STR 29 AC stonechild I was proud of my strength and my ac. He gave me a 4 and said that for a fighter its ok, and if I wanted to get past a 6 I have to be a spell caster. With that now known I'm gonna make a spell caster.

I want to do this mostly independent but the biggest struggle I've ran into is what prestige class do I want to take or work towards. Any suggestions on what prestige classes are good or more so "cheesy" or unique, or even ones a DM well never see.

[Khedrac]

Spell casters are classes that it ereally helps to "play up" - if you start at level 20 you won't know how to play a spellcaster and you will probably be pretty innefective.
Start at low level (1-3) and play up to 15+ and you (hopefully) will have learnt how to play your character effectively. Yes, check forums like this one for suggestions on technique (e.g. don't go for direct damage, battlefied control and boosting your allies is usually more effective) but playing allows you to learn how to do it.

OK, so what spellcaster to choose?
The big problem with Clerics and Wizards (and to a lesser extent Druids) is spell selection. Clerics get to select form their entire list, and if you are playing with all expansion books in play, that is a huge number of spells to select from.
Wizards have their spell selection as a two-stage proceess - first getting spells into their spellbooks (choosing from a bigger list then clerics) then they have to choose which to memorise - smae problem - get it wrong and be useless.

Oddly, Sorcerors are a good choice for new-to-casters players. Yes, choosing the wrong spells known can render them ineffective, but a kind DM will allow spell choices to be re-worked for a new player. Having spontaneous casting from a short list makes it much easier to play a sorceror effectively.
Possibly the best choice is a Beguiler - spontaneous casting from a good list (very weak against undead and constructs, but can usually buff their allies) - it gives you flexibility and is fairly easy to learn how to play, and will give a good grounding on many wizard spells. What is even better is that Beguilers do not need a prestige class - the base class is good to level 20. Some prestige classes can add things but they are not necessary.

(Favoured Souls and Spirit Shamans both have their limitations which make them not as good choices for new players and limit their power.)

On the "how powerful" front, a beguiler won't go quite a strong as a sorceror or wizard/cleric (and wizard/cleric is usually better than sorceror), but they are a solid class of reasonable power.

If you go Sorceror, any prestige class that doesn't cost casting levels is worth having, sorcerors gain no new abilities after level 1 so anything is an improvement (just watch out for feat taxes for entry). The really powerful classes tend to allow cheap metamagic effects or give the ability to duplicate spells for no cost, but this tends to add complexity and make them harder to play properly.

[Kesnit]

Casters can cover a lot of roles. (Many can fill any role if built for it.) SO the first question is "what do you want to do?" You built a Fighter, which makes me think you want to crack skulls. Is that the case? Once we know that, we can give you a lot better, less vague advice.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

It looks like you want to make a character who does melee fighting. In this case there are ~4 potential routes:

1. Druid 20, use a small race with a Con bonus such as Gnome or (Strongheart) Water Halfling. Don't use any alternate class features, they all make the class weaker. You'll need to take Natural Spell at 6th, and you'll want Natural Bond at 3rd. Get a 'level -3' companion such as a Fleshraker dinosaur in MM3 or Dire Eagle in RoS, and Natural Bond will bring it back up to your full Druid level's worth of animal companion benefits. Say you trained it to add the Warbeast template in MM2. If your DM encourages cheese, take Exalted Companion in BoED, get a Celestial version of your animal companion, and give your animal companion Sacred Vow and Vow of Poverty. In the early levels use crowd control spells and buff your animal companion. At 5th+ level you can wild shape and do melee combat yourself. Your animal companion will be a stronger combatant than your Stonechild build.

2. Cleric, probably something like Cleric 6/ Divine Oracle 4/ Contemplative 10. I'd go with a LN Human Cleric of Zarus, start with the Strength and War domains, trade the Strength domain power for Divine Restoration in Dungeonscape. You'll be using a greatsword, you'll want an animated heavy shield. Get two flaws for two extra feats, take Extend Spell, Persistent Spell, Divine Metamagic: Persistent Spell, and Power Attack for sure. Get a pile of Nightsticks in Libris Mortis, the benefit is not expressed as a bonus so they should stack, plus they emulate the Extra Turning feat which explicitly stacks with itself. Use Divine Metamagic to make your buffs last all day: Divine Favor, Mass Lesser Vigor (on the whole party), Divine Power, Righteous Might, Righteous Wrath of the Faithful (on the whole party), Holy Star (three times, one in each mode), Stormrage, Greater Visage of the Deity, etc. Put (Extended) Greater Magic Weapon on your sword every day, and (Extended) Magic Vestment on your armor and shield every day.

3. Arcane Gish, some combination of Fighter/Wizard or Paladin/Sorcerer. There are many builds, and this is potentially a stronger combatant than either of the above choices, depending on how well it's built/played. There are a lot of guides on this type of build, and more details can be provided if this interests you.

4. Psionic Gish, some combination of Ranger/Psion or Ranger/Ardent or even Rogue/Psion or Rogue/Ardent if going for Psychic Assassin. This is played significantly differently from the above three builds but is extremely strong and can be very hard to kill. There are a lot of guides on this type of build, and more details can be provided if this interests you.

[thedarkcrash]

Casters can cover a lot of roles. (Many can fill any role if built for it.) SO the first question is "what do you want to do?" You built a Fighter, which makes me think you want to crack skulls. Is that the case? Once we know that, we can give you a lot better, less vague advice.

So I'm trying to learn how to make more effective characters in general. I'm in a discord with like 35 people from across the country and well several are the min/max till they spent every point perfectly. I know I won't always be able to keep up with them but I want to try and get in there field.

[flappeercraft]

Ok so let's get something out of the way. Casters are not the only way to be optimal. Magic is. With that out of the way. Lets get into this.

Being optimal really depends on what you want to play, for a caster there are so many options that there is no single way to be optimal, not 10 not 100. There are so many ways that all internet forums probably have not uncovered 5% of them. So first to help you be optimal we must know what exactly you want to be doing and we will then be able to help you optimize.

Edit: You said you want to learn to make better characters in general which is a feasible goal but honestly I would reccomend going piece by piece, learn to optimize one aspect of the game at a time.