[3.5] What do you think of Mystic Theurge?

[Myou]

This +1.

Mystic Theurge isn't great, but its the best your character can get into, OP, so do it. And while you're absolutely right that a HD bump would be nice, it isn't required(It's also only +10 hp after 10 levels, so not very great). And you can compensate by devoting 4+ spell slots a day to the spell Aid, to get 1d8+CL(Max 1d8+10) temp hp per casting.

+2.

No, wait, I'll have +1 Flaming. :D

[Ingus]

Mystic Theurge is definitely not overpowered per se, but you can make it at least at pair with other PCs.
First: MT is THE buffer. Having both arcane and divine buffs is a good advantage.
Second: MT is a good self-buffer. You can meld the two schools with ease in combos not intended to be playable.
Third: in late levels, you use magic items + slots endlessly.
To be short, rather than be one shot/one kill, you chose to be nevermore naked. An there is the sublte and not completely rational pleasure of the taboo: wiz and cler spell? No way!

[aivanther]

There's two main weaknesses to the class as I see it.

One has been hit numerous times: Your spells are lower level than everyone else's. Then again, you're already there.

The second thing is the gimp for its supposed advantage, dual class spell casting: Action Economy. You can only cast so many things a round, so having 50 spells/day rather than 35 spells/day (not precise numbers!) does not end up helping unless you have a LOT of encounters and/or you have very very long encounters. This is especially true when the latter's 35 spells are better than the former's 50. The gimped CL also means it's harder to quicken things, curtailing your action economy even more than the others.

However, as other have said, you're already a cleric/wizard, might as well take it to make life easier.

[Doug Lampert]

Not true in all cases. MT/Psychic Theurge/Cerebremancer can all be powerful, IF you can find things to do with spells.

Buffs, utility, etc mean that you cast spells BEFORE battles.
Quicken lets you get off powers at twice the speed.
Spells that are naturally swift actions also help here.

No, if you build for theurge, you can do great things with it. It just has to be built for.

The thing is, if you're using the PHB feat he doesn't get useful quicken till 3 levels later than a single classed. And the drop in number of high level slots means that even then the single classed may get more use out of it. (Metamagic reducers are the MT's friend here.)

And as a practical matter he doesn't get any more buffs per day than a single classed character who concentrates on buffing (by the time you have more level 2+ slots, the single classed character is able to cast MASS versions of buffs that have mass versions, and the MT had to spend two feats to get the durations he should have for his level).

And you need two abilities + con rather than one + con.

MT is perfectly viable, and anyone playing it SHOULD hand out buffs and pre-combat spells like candy on halloween, at mid-high level you won't run out of slots, but it's simply not as powerful as a single classed PHB full caster.

[DragoonWraith]

@ OP: The Mystic Theurge has lots of problems, but the #1 problem is its entry. Having to multiclass as it requires is pretty much awful for your power level. Once you've met the requirements, the PrC is solid-ish. A Wizard 3/Cleric 3/Mystic Theurge 1 is much better than a Wizard 4/Cleric 3, and a Wizard 3/Cleric 3/Mystic Theurge 10 is indescribably better than Wizard 8/Cleric 8. All of the above is much weaker than Wizard 16 or Cleric 16, but it's too late for that.

Not only should you take Mystic Theurge, you should beg and plead with your DM to allow you to swap that 4th level of Wizard for Mystic Theurge. There literally is no reason no to. You should also try to convince him to give the MT some actual class features - the Pathfinder MT is decent, though I see absolutely no reason why they treat the alternate spell source thing as a +1 Metamagic; it's not worth +1. I'd recommend the Pathfinder MT ignoring that spell level increase; then it's decent. Though the main advantage of it only occurs if you have a spontaneous caster on one side, which you don't....

Being below the power level of the entry class doesn't mean that a PRC is terrible; it may just as easily mean that the entry class is too strong.

I completely and utterly disagree with you. There is no meaningful metric for PrC balance than how it compares to the entry classes. If your entry class is Wizard, a Wizard X and a Wizard Y/PrC Z where Y+Z=X should be equally powerful. If this is too powerful (read, Wizard X is too powerful), then the problem is with Wizard, not the PrC. PrCs as stealth-nerfs, even when justified, is horrible design unless you have some rule like "If you play a Wizard, you must lose caster level(s) somewhere, period", which is just weird.

Because otherwise what you're saying is "I'm going to punish you for doing anything interesting with your build", and that's just awful.

[Cogidubnus]

Mystic Theurge, at low levels, is good for two things. Healing and buffing. Which is how a caster has the most impact anyway. Blasting is infamously ineffective compared to, say, enlarging the party barbarian. So it does have its advantages. And if you object to PrCs cutting off after 10 levels (I do) it can be very powerful. You'll be getting spells late, but you will be getting them, and then it's much more broken at epic level than normal epic casters.

[Souhiro]

Well,there is one feat (Complete archane,or quintaesential, I think) that enables you to prepare a metamagic feat.

So, if you want to quiquen a spell, you prepare a "quiquen spell metaspell" in your 4th (or 5th,or wathever) spell slot.

But that depends of the patiente of your GM. In my games, I won't allow an obscure prestige class,like the Arcane Hierophant or Eldritch Theurge, since it is basically a "pumped up" MT.

[marjan]

That strikes me more as an example of Ur Priest being broken.

To be more precise, it's interaction of those two being broken. Ur-priest's spellcasting, by itself, isn't something to get excited about.

[Il_Vec]

To be more precise, it's interaction of those two being broken. Ur-priest's spellcasting, by itself, isn't something to get excited about.

Oh but I do love casting level 9 spells at ECL 14, yes I do. The class even lets me burn through low-level spells to do it!

[marjan]

Oh but I do love casting level 9 spells at ECL 14, yes I do.

Correction.

Do you also like casting lvl1 spells at lvl6. Until level 11 you are behind full-casters with spell levels, next 6 levels you are ahead and after that on-par (with extremely crappy number of spell slots).

The class even lets me burn through low-level spells to do it!

Technically those are class features, other than spellcasting, but even counting that, your number of spell slots limits usefulness of this and its only once per day.

[Optimystik]

Mystic Theurge, at low levels, is good for two things. Healing and buffing. Which is how a caster has the most impact anyway. Blasting is infamously ineffective compared to, say, enlarging the party barbarian. So it does have its advantages. And if you object to PrCs cutting off after 10 levels (I do) it can be very powerful. You'll be getting spells late, but you will be getting them, and then it's much more broken at epic level than normal epic casters.

No; It's not just about "blasting vs. buffing" either.

Without early entry/Practiced Caster (twice - once for each side), even buffing can be a problem. First off, you're three levels late on either side - you'll have more low-level buffs, but none of the higher ones. You'll be casting Alter Self at the same level the straight Wizard gets Polymorph, or Bull's Strength while the straight cleric gets Divine Power.

Second, your CL is lower. This is itself a twofold problem. One, your buffs don't last as long, which sucks when you're dealing with rounds/level or even minutes/level spells. Two, they're child's play to counter/dispel.

Third and final, you're MAD. Even leaving Int and Wis base and not worrying about spell DCs, you need a minimum amount in each just to get your spells. Your attributes are split between two stats; your gear is split between two stats. And you can't neglect Con - you won't be much use in combat if you're failing all your Concentration checks - or Dex either - you won't get much buffing done if you tank Initiative.

That's a heavily-stacked deck to be playing against. As for "you'll be even better at epic," very few games start that high; and even if you do, you'll still have to boost your CL just to break even with single-classed opponents - you're 4 CL short of Epic Spellcasting even on your primary casting class.

As if all that wasn't bad enough; MT is only 10 levels long. When you run out, your "off-class" will suffer even more. Buffing/healing out of it will become increasingly pointless: your buffs will be dispelled at a sneeze, and most things will either not scratch you or leave you a grease stain, making healing pointless too. The MT epic progression is awful - you might as well just alternate levels of wizard and cleric, you get the same benefit and more HP.

[Lycanthromancer]

If the DM thinks that mystic theurge is horrifically overpowered, offer to consolidate your arcane/divine casterhood, and retrain as an archivist. You get to cast wizard spells as divine spells from a prayerbook, and you get to focus on Int-based casting, plus you get class features. It has a similar spell progression as both wizard and cleric, and you can even cast in armor. You'll lose your familiar, if any, but you can ask to see if you can use archivist casting as the prereq for the Obtain Familiar feat.

All of the flavor, none of the fat. It's sexy. And your DM may just allow it.

[Private-Prinny]

Everyone's hit the nail on the head about Mystic Theurge. It's great for Sublime Ur-Theurge shenanigans, but other than that...

Spoiler

Show

[Pluto]

To be fair, Mystic Theurge levels are drastically better than levels in most other classes (exceptions being outrageous things like Incantatrix). A Wizard 5/Cleric 5/Mystic Theurge 10 should be able to trounce a Wizard 5/Cleric 5/Loremaster 10 in just about anything. So in that sense, it is over the power of other PrC's.

But if you qualify for MT, that shouldn't be a problem; you're giving up high-level spells, after all (assuming that most games take place under ECL20).

And, by way of Planar Binding, Summon Monster and Shapechange, a Wizard has access to Cleric spells already. And, via Miracle, Summon Monster and Magic Domain items, a Cleric with Wizard spells is nothing new.
So, yeah. MT's have it rough. (Compared to full prepared spellcasters, anyway.)

[Superglucose]

Theurge is fine later on. Yes, yes, 3 wiz/3cleric/10 theurge/4wiz is less powerful than 20 wiz or 20 cleric, but um... wiz/cleric are tier 1. Most things are less powerful than 20wiz or 20cleric.

Prepare for a few levels of pain though.

[Miles_Teg]

Wow, thanks for all the replies- I wasn't sure there would be much interest in this. I'm going to try to hit most of your points; unfortunately I don't have time to be poster-specific.

I started this character as a religious wizard, then added the cleric when we lost ours and the player brought in a rogue instead. No one wanted to bring in a new character or add cleric to theirs, so I threw it on. Right now it's myself, a halfling rogue, human barbarian, dwarven fighter, and human monk.

So far, I haven't noticed a problem with my power level, but we're not doing much more than foiling the plans of pirates and gnolls. I mostly use the cleric spells for buffs/heals, the wizard for offense. I do wear light armor, so I do deal with the spell failure chance.

I was somewhat turned off by the lack of class features; it would be nice to have some bells and whistles. I have no idea what those would be thoguh . My DM doesn't believe in retraining so I'm stuck with that 4th level of wizard. Same with using the MT from another system. He also wont let us stray from Core, which is for him the PHB, DMG, MM, and the FRCS.

I'm doing alright when it comes to abilities, with 14Dex, 17Int, 16Wis, so it could be worse. It could probably be a lot better for all I know, too. I've never been a whiz-bang optimizer, and it doesn't look like I'll be starting anytime soon.

It does look like I'll be entering this PrC next level; it is looking like I'm better off doing it than not.

Thanks for everyones input! My turn to DM is coming up soon and I will be looking for advice for my gnome SWAT team campaign.

Study group calls.

[Divide by Zero]

Ow, right you are. For the Clerics there's True Necromancer(Yet another example of evil getting all the good stuff).

Obligatory:

[Souhiro]

To Divide by Zero. Miles_Teg IS in the trap now. The weakness you anounce is about being Wizard 4, Cleric 3, Mystic 1 is weaker than being Wizard 8.

But since he took that levels, and his GM just said that he considers MT being "too powerful", it's unlikely that his GM will allow an obscure, non-core and way more powerful class.

MT is your best option now. Looking for more power into obscure sourcebooks can make your GM to see you as a powergamer. And in any game, the powergamers tend to receive more attention from the evil dudes.


So, he is in the trap. Mistic-Theurging is the way out. And Eidrich Theurge is selling your soul to the IFFC

[Divide by Zero]

To Divide by Zero. Miles_Teg IS in the trap now. The weakness you anounce is about being Wizard 4, Cleric 3, Mystic 1 is weaker than being Wizard 8.

But since he took that levels, and his GM just said that he considers MT being "too powerful", it's unlikely that his GM will allow an obscure, non-core and way more powerful class.

MT is your best option now. Looking for more power into obscure sourcebooks can make your GM to see you as a powergamer. And in any game, the powergamers tend to receive more attention from the evil dudes.


So, he is in the trap. Mistic-Theurging is the way out. And Eidrich Theurge is selling your soul to the IFFC

The trap I was referring to was True Necromancer, which is in almost every way inferior to Mystic Theurge. I hope that wasn't the "way more powerful class" you were referring to.

[Roderick_BR]

Of course all these "completely useless" concepts only apply when compared to a full caster. When compared to non-casters, you are just as good as them, being able to double the number of pre-battle buffs, utility, and fixing the damage after the battle.

But people will still say that losing caster levels will make you crippling weak, even if you are still twice as strong as the rest of your group. Heck, in a game where only one player will play a caster, I'd allow a MT as a support character, since he'll be on level with the non-casters, and still be crazyly useful.

[Optimystik]

The trouble is that there can be plenty of enemy casters too. Being the buffer doesn't mean much if your buffs are flimsier than tissue.

It sounds like he's up against a whole not of non-casters for now; but the whole point of advising him on his build is to anticipate what might come up, not to handle what he's already facing.

[gbprime]

The main problem with a Mystic Theurge build is not that you're giving up 3 caster levels off the top, it's the fact that you don't become powerful until well after 10th level. You don't want to spend the majority of the campaign BECOMING what you'd like to play. Instead, you want to hit your "I do everything I want to do" prime by level 10 to 12. That way you can enjoy being a badass for a while during the game.

That said, MT is great if you start with an alt caster or two. Take Ranger 8 / Knight of the Weave 3. At level 11, you've got a BAB 10 melee combatant that then goes up to a versatile caster in 2 classes (very versatile if you take the Ranger substitution levels and "can cast Wizard spells with Ranger slots" stuff from the book). At level 18, you've got 6th level arcane spells, 4th level ranger spells, and a BAB of 13 with improved 2-weapon fighting.

But I digress. You're cleric/wizard already. Your best options are Mystic Theurge and/or Dweomerkeeper (Complete Divine Enhancement). Dont' worry about the d4 HD. You can spare the spells to buff yourself.

[sambo.]

mystic theurge (and Noctumancer incidently) are only really a viable choice if your DM will allow some Precocious Apprentice cheese. if they allow it, i'd reccomend taking the Practised Spellcaster feat twice to at least keep your caster level up.

otherwise, you'll be hideously down the spell power curve.

[Godskook]

Ya'know, half the people posting here are missing two things:

1.This character is already a wiz 4/cleric 3.

2.He can't fix the above in any possible way.

I started this character as a religious wizard, then added the cleric when we lost ours and the player brought in a rogue instead. No one wanted to bring in a new character or add cleric to theirs, so I threw it on. Right now it's myself, a halfling rogue, human barbarian, dwarven fighter, and human monk.

Inside core, I'm not sure of any other way of doing that, but outside, there's arcane disciple, which let's you add a domain's worth of spells to your spell list.

Also, note that a wand of cure light wounds is probably the cheapest way in core to heal, and is cheap enough at your level that it won't affect your WBL too much.

So far, I haven't noticed a problem with my power level, but we're not doing much more than foiling the plans of pirates and gnolls. I mostly use the cleric spells for buffs/heals, the wizard for offense. I do wear light armor, so I do deal with the spell failure chance.

You're also the only spellcaster in your party. That helps too. You'll shine simply cause you're the only star in their sky.

Also, scrap the armor. You probably don't need it. Already, you have the spell-slots to deal with this problem quite easily. You have(or can get) shield and mage armor, giving you +8 AC off the bat without wearing even a little bit of metal.

[Optimystik]

Ya'know, half the people posting here are missing two things:

1.This character is already a wiz 4/cleric 3.

2.He can't fix the above in any possible way.

Who missed that? He's been told "beg your DM to let you take MT" all the way back on page 1. The rest of the discussion has been "why is MT not as good as it looks, shouldn't combining two powerful classes be even more awesomer?"

[Kirgoth]

Given your wiz4;cleric3.

Ask your gm to allow you to retrain as a wiz7 or cleric7 , possibly with some full caster progression prestige class.

Multiclassing casters is a bad idea, ive done it myself and it is a big mistake even if it looks sexy at first glance or when you finally approach epic levels.

A level 11 wizard with 6th level spells will wipe the floor with a wiz4;clr3;mt4 with 4th level wiz and 4th level clr spells; worse your encounters at this level will wipe the party out as your character will be sub-par.

[Private-Prinny]

Mystic Theurge is a sexy option, you just need to exploit so many extra mechanics to make it sexy that the blunt force trauma that the DM gives you won't be worth it.

Beholder Mage/Ur-Priest/Mystic Theurge. Now I just need to find some crackers...

[Draxar]

A prestige class should be on a power level equal to the entry class, trading certain capabilities for other ones or specializing at a certain task. It should not be an exercise in purposefully gimping yourself; that's just bad design.

Classes should be of equal power. They're not. I consider that a more major flaw than some prestige classes being less powerful than single-classing.

Also, prestige classes that aren't as powerful as the entry class can be good if you're an optimiser in a non-optimised group – they let you optimise within the bounds of the class while not overpowering the rest of the group.

Ask your gm to allow you to retrain as a wiz7 or cleric7 , possibly with some full caster progression prestige class.

OP says his DM doesn't allow retraining.

[PId6]

Classes should be of equal power. They're not. I consider that a more major flaw than some prestige classes being less powerful than single-classing.

I have no disagreements with these statements. Yes, overpowered base classes are a bigger problem than underpowered PrCs. That doesn't mean that underpowered PrCs isn't a problem, and they're certainly not any type of "fix" for broken base classes if that's the implication you're going for.

Also, prestige classes that aren't as powerful as the entry class can be good if you're an optimiser in a non-optimised group – they let you optimise within the bounds of the class while not overpowering the rest of the group.

What about picking bad feats, the wrong spells, or choosing to start with higher Str than Int? There are so many ways already to purposefully lowering your own power level that having deceptively weak PrCs around is far more of a bug than a feature. If nothing else, a new player might easily walk into a trap like the Mystic Theurge and end up disappointed, which is more likely to happen than an optimizer not finding any ways to make his character weaker.

[okpokalypse]

Given your levels, MT is the best option for you. Just get Practiced Spellcaster so that your 1st level of MT gives you 8 HD Fireballs / Lightning Bolts in those few blasting sitautions.

A previous poster was correct though in that blasting isn't a use good of most casters - with, IMO, Psion being the exception (Since you can get up to +2 Damage per Die with energy specializations)

MT isn't a horrible option all told though. Looking long-term you'll still get 9th level Wizard spells down the road, and you'll also have 7th Level Cleric Spells. So, you'll get those 9th level spells at L20 instead of L17. Meh. Having a 13-level Cleric progression by L17 MORE than makes up for the 3-level delay.