Disapointing PrC's

[oxinabox]

Some PrC's have such potiential, but when you look closer they are just useless.
Take Soul Bow. what can it do that wa warlock can't do better?
What can it do that a fighter with wielding a bow can't do, with WBL?
Phase Arrows at lvl 8ish? after 5 lvls to qualify.

When I first looked at it i thought you manifested arrowed arrows to used with a regular bow.
then i realised it was fired from a composite longbow...
'til i saw that:
I was thinking Ranger 2, Soulknife 2, X 1, SoulBow
Where X was either another soulknife, a lvl of fighter (Extra range attack feat), or rogue.
maybe dipping into fighter at BaB +6 to get the Woodland Archer feat from RoW.

Then Manifesting arrows (who has the tiem to enchant arrows, just to throw them away?) to shoot with my Ghostwood (gives ghost touch to projectiles fired from it, IIRC) composite great bow.
Ranger rapid shot, get some many shot as my Soulbow bonus feat.
Send out many many arrow (all to miss )

then i see that oh it has to use a silly little longbow.
No win.


What classes/PrC's have disapointed you the most?

[AslanCross]

Take Soul Bow. what can it do that wa warlock can't do better?

It can make Soulknife worth using?

There are a lot of disappoiting PrCs, actually. Most of the core PrCs are. The Assassin gets a bit more useful due to its expanded spell list in Spell Compendium, but on its own it's kinda lame.

Shadowdancer has some really cool fluff, but despite it being a logical PrC for rogues, it doesn't advance sneak attack. Apart from summoning shadows and Hide in Plain Sight, a Swordsage can do anything it can do. (Then again the Swordsage has Cloak of Deception.)

Elemental Savant (CArc) is kind of sad. You specialize so much in one energy type that once you encounter something that's immune to it, you have to cry over your spellbook. Not to mention you lose CL.

[Darwin]

Green Star Adept, need I say more?

[Melamoto]

Elemental Savant (CArc) is kind of sad. You specialize so much in one energy type that once you encounter something that's immune to it, you have to cry over your spellbook. Not to mention you lose CL.

I prefer to play without absolutes. It makes the game so much better imo.

[Stephen_E]

Beastmaster

Great concept but after 1st lev there's a so/so 2nd lev and it goes downhill from there.

It's designed for Rangers and Druids but has no spell progression.
It gives you 3 additional animal companions, but they only count Beastmaster levs for advancement at -3/-6/-9. At 15th lev you'll get a basic Dire Rat as a animal companion. Yay!

I often think the designers never asked themselves "why" when targeting certain classes for certain PrC's. As in "why would they bother taking this to completion? What do they get that's worth losing what they'd get staying with core?"

Of course the other question some designers never bothered to ask is "why would they not take this PrC? What do they lose from the base class that would make it worth staying base?"

Stephen E

[Mongoose87]

I often think the designers never asked themselves "why" when targeting certain classes for certain PrC's. As in "why would they bother taking this to completion? What do they get that's worth losing what they'd get staying with core?"

*cough* Dragon Disciple *cough*

[woodenbandman]

AT Least they covered their butts in the DMG by saying "the best prestige classes are the ones you make yourself"

Fie. Most disappointing PRCs to me are: Hierophant (No spell progression? That means it'll get used in epic and nowhere else!), Blighter, anything with half spellcasting, anything with less than 7/10 spellcasting, reallly, unless it's reallly frickin' special like Swiftblade. Aforementioned green star adept, Mindbender, Metamind, Psion Uncarnate, Witchborn Binder, Bloodstorm Blade (good, but no maneuver advancement), and Master Transmogrifist.

[Starbuck_II]

Some PrC's have such potiential, but when you look closer they are just useless.
Take Soul Bow. what can it do that wa warlock can't do better?
What can it do that a fighter with wielding a bow can't do, with WBL?
Phase Arrows at lvl 8ish? after 5 lvls to qualify.

When I first looked at it i thought you manifested arrowed arrows to used with a regular bow.
then i realised it was fired from a composite longbow...
'til i saw that:
I was thinking Ranger 2, Soulknife 2, X 1, SoulBow
Where X was either another soulknife, a lvl of fighter (Extra range attack feat), or rogue.
maybe dipping into fighter at BaB +6 to get the Woodland Archer feat from RoW.

Then Manifesting arrows (who has the tiem to enchant arrows, just to throw them away?) to shoot with my Ghostwood (gives ghost touch to projectiles fired from it, IIRC) composite great bow.
Ranger rapid shot, get some many shot as my Soulbow bonus feat.
Send out many many arrow (all to miss )

then i see that oh it has to use a silly little longbow.
No win.


What classes/PrC's have disapointed you the most?

Um, Soulbow get infinite attacks till he hits.

Why because by RAW Lucky arrows can be rerolled if they miss. Now the arrow you shoot to reroll is also lucky and so you can reroll that one too.

So you never miss till you get bored of rerolling by RAW.

[Doc Roc]

Soulbow is actually pretty good in my experience.

I'm always heart-broken by the Planar Handbook PrCs.

[Siosilvar]

Um, Soulbow get infinite attacks till he hits.

Why because by RAW Lucky arrows can be rerolled if they miss. Now the arrow you shoot to reroll is also lucky and so you can reroll that one too.

So you never miss till you get bored of rerolling by RAW.

Err... no.

Lucky

A lucky weapon offers a second chance at success. Once per day, the wielder can reroll a failed attack roll (whether a single attack or one in a series of multiple attacks) as a free action. The rerolled attack uses the same bonuses or penalties as the missed roll.

Moderate clairsentience; ML 8th; Craft Psionic Arms and Armor, fate of one; Price +1 bonus.

So you get one reroll per shot.

[Xallace]

Mage Slayer from Magic of Faerun. Fluff says the class is for wizard-hunting-wizards, for spellcasters who have trained mind and body for the sole purpose of wiping the floor with abusers of the Art.

Class features? Spell Focus five times, a saving throw bonus, and your summons get extra HP. Full casting, sure, but that's it. Pre-reqs include proficiency in a Martial Weapon. What the heck is that? All I could think was that someone accidentally pasted the wrong class onto the fluff and didn't notice.

[Starbuck_II]

Err... no.



So you get one reroll per shot.

Each arrow gets Lucky: Each arrow is 1/day. Each once a day...

You don't have a bow with Lucky, but arrows!

Or are you saying buying Flaming arrows means only 1 arrow is flaming. No, they all get it.

[thegurullamen]

Each arrow gets Lucky: Each arrow is 1/day. Each once a day...

You don't have a bow with Lucky, but arrows!

Or are you saying buying Flaming arrows means only 1 arrow is flaming. No, they all get it.

It would be if flaming was a 1/day thing. It's continuous. Unlike Lucky.

[FMArthur]

Blighter is a druid that must destroy forests just to prepare their spells every day. Every. Day.

Risen Martyr is a class that requires you to die to enter it, doesn't give you anything useful for its whole 10 levels, then permanently kills you as its capstone. You are forbidden from multiclassing from Risen Martyr.

And then there are a lot of sneaky PrCs all over the place that don't provide any (or enough) useful combat abilities, opting to instead give you bonuses to just the skills that are made obsolete by low-level spells and items made from low-level spells.

[Serenity]

Except that the reroll for Lucky doesn't represent shooting another arrow, but the one that seemed to miss actually hitting. So, no, your interpretation is flat wrong.

[Forbiddenwar]

Death Delver is pretty disappointing until level 10 (9 lives ability). A very narrow spell list and a seperate very slow spell progression for a cleric prestige class? Special abilities that are matched by spells easily? Ugh. Luckily I'm the DM and can fix things like this.

Dread witch, you have to be terrified for your abilities to work. Using your abilities does not remove the fear so you are still taking the minuses from that. Who in their right mind thinks that is a good idea?

[Kylarra]

Except that the reroll for Lucky doesn't represent shooting another arrow, but the one that seemed to miss actually hitting. So, no, your interpretation is flat wrong.

On the other hand, always getting a second chance if you miss the first time is still pretty awesome.

[Xallace]

Dread witch, you have to be terrified for your abilities to work. Using your abilities does not remove the fear so you are still taking the minuses from that. Who in their right mind thinks that is a good idea?

You need to be terrified for one of your abilities to work. Everything else can be done while calm: Fear DC boosts, adding [Fear] descriptor to non-fear spells, scaring creatures normally immune... I, for one, love the Dread Witch.Which means I'm going to be incredibly biased in any discussions involving it.

[Forbiddenwar]

You need to be terrified for one of your abilities to work. Everything else can be done while calm: Fear DC boosts, adding [Fear] descriptor to non-fear spells, scaring creatures normally immune... I, for one, love the Dread Witch.Which means I'm going to be incredibly biased in any discussions involving it.

Ah. Misread it. Sorry.

[Xallace]

I feel like my last post came off as more rude than I intended it to be. Curse the internet and it's lack of inflection! My apologies.

Also, I agree on the Death Delver.

Thinking back, I find Acolyte of the Skin most dissappointing. I bind a fiend into my own flesh? Sounds exciting! Abilities? ....eh... Poison Immunity... and a once-per-day minor glare effect... huh.

[sofawall]

Each arrow gets Lucky: Each arrow is 1/day. Each once a day...

You don't have a bow with Lucky, but arrows!

Or are you saying buying Flaming arrows means only 1 arrow is flaming. No, they all get it.

When rerolling an attack, you do not shoot another arrow. You reroll the first arrow.

Your RAW is wrong.

[Milskidasith]

He's saying that the arrows themselves are lucky, meaning that every arrow he shoots gets one reroll. Or at least that's how I interpreted it.

[The Glyphstone]

indeed, because the Soulbow doesn't actually have a bow per say, but chooses a +1 enhancement to apply to every arrow he shoots. Like Lucky. It's only 1 re-roll per shot, but that's still re-rolling every missed hit once. Horribly, horribly munchkinly, but by strict RAW, it is legal.


Granted, even without Luckycheese, the Soulbow is a fantastic class simply for the fact that it makes the Soulknife not garbage.

[boomwolf]

I liked the blighter.

Its NOT a druid, its an ANTI-druid. his spell focus is necrotic, flames and such. plus using some nature-themed spells for ironic touch and reminding his origins.

Both fluff-wise and Crunch-wise its one of my favorite PrCs. hardly a game I DM don't have one as one of the minor villans. once he was the BBEG too. (along about +15 LA worth of templates but who cares?)



As for disappontment.
Mindbender.
Arcane Archer.
Dragon Deciple.
Any class that requires casting and don't GIVE casting. (there are a few)
Any class that has his entire list of abilities doable in base classes. (there are also a few of these)

[nightwyrm]

90% of all feats and PrCs aren't worth the ink used to write them. But things like the Dragon Disciple and the Rage Mage are just especially disappointing.

[sofawall]

No, he pretty clearly said infinite rerolls until you hit, by RAW.

[Hyooz]

I liked the blighter.

Its NOT a druid, its an ANTI-druid. his spell focus is necrotic, flames and such. plus using some nature-themed spells for ironic touch and reminding his origins.

Both fluff-wise and Crunch-wise its one of my favorite PrCs. hardly a game I DM don't have one as one of the minor villans. once he was the BBEG too. (along about +15 LA worth of templates but who cares?)



As for disappontment.
Mindbender.
Arcane Archer.
Dragon Deciple.
Any class that requires casting and don't GIVE casting. (there are a few)
Any class that has his entire list of abilities doable in base classes. (there are also a few of these)

Blighter has some sweet flavor, don't get us wrong. That's usually why people get excited by things and then disappointed by the horrid crunch. To even take a level of blighter, you need to have been a druid for 5 levels... and then throw those levels away. You essentially become level 1 again. THAT is worse than any 1/2 spell progression.

[Random832]

Blighter has some sweet flavor, don't get us wrong. That's usually why people get excited by things and then disappointed by the horrid crunch. To even take a level of blighter, you need to have been a druid for 5 levels... and then throw those levels away. You essentially become level 1 again. THAT is worse than any 1/2 spell progression.

Right... you "essentially become level 1 again" (except, oh, wait, you don't lose your BAB and saves, or your wealth, or your caster level) and get 9th-level spells by CL14; cry me a river. How is this different from an ex-cleric Ur-Priest, anyway?

[Faulty]

Most of the PrCs in the BoVD. Mindbender as well, it seems like such a cool concept, but is stunted in comparison to other arcane PrCs.

[Starbuck_II]

No, he pretty clearly said infinite rerolls until you hit, by RAW.

Yes, I misspoke. It happens. But either way you get double the chance to hit.