Looking to Build a Blood Magus / Mindbender in 3.5, possible?

[M3RL1N]

Long time reader, first time poster:
I've been playing 5e, but a friend of mine is starting up a 3.5e campaign and they need a caster. I haven't played a wizard before and after looking at Prestige Classes, came across Mindbender and Blood Magus. I thought both of them were just awesome and wanted to see if it was viable at all to do both. I will be starting at lvl 14. Any assistance would be appreciated, thanks in advance.

[Madara]

I mean, it is "viable." It depends on your intentions. Honestly, most people just Dip MB for 1 level and they get the juice before bailing. You could do that and Blood Magus without losing too many Caster levels (I think you'd maybe lose 9ths but that only matters if your campaign goes that high)

What is it about the two that you like? What are you trying to do with this character?

[M3RL1N]

I mean, it is "viable." It depends on your intentions. Honestly, most people just Dip MB for 1 level and they get the juice before bailing. You could do that and Blood Magus without losing too many Caster levels (I think you'd maybe lose 9ths but that only matters if your campaign goes that high)

What is it about the two that you like? What are you trying to do with this character?

So, the campaign is a Sherlock Holmes type of mystery solving. I like the MB for dealing with people (puppets) and the Blood Mage for fighting. I'm not sure if the campaign will make it to too high of lvls, so I don't mind losing a caster level or 2, but would prefer to lose less to keep myself valuable.

[NineInchNall]

Giving up caster levels isn't problematic for the commonly cited reason of "not picking up Xth level spells". It's problematic because at any given character level, you don't have access to a tool that you otherwise would have, a tool that would have all but solved the problem before you. At every (okay, >=half of every) point that matters, having levels of Mindbender beyond the first is worse than just having more Wizard levels. Just take the first level and leave it at that.

Blood Magus, unfortunately, doesn't have many combat-related abilities, so if you're wanting a prestige class that enhances combat prowess, you'd be better off looking elsewhere.

If you want some Holmesian mystery-solving play and have limited experience with 3.x, I would suggest using Beguiler as your base class. Beguiler 13/Mindbender 1 is legitimately a great detective. With investment in Use Magic Device and some combat wands for when your illusions and enchantments are of limited use (which is rare) you should be able to handle just about any situation.

There really is a question that must be answered, though: how familiar are you with 3.5, especially casters?

[Nifft]

Mindbender is great for a 1-level dip.

Blood Magus is fine for a 4-level swim.

If you don't try to enter either early, that leaves you with 5 levels of Wizard as prefix, and 10 levels of some other PrC afterwards.