I need a detailed chronicle of the Dragon Disciple, Kensai,

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Lago_AM3P
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I need a detailed chronicle of the Dragon Disciple, Kensai,

Post by Lago_AM3P »

With some friends, we were comparing powergamey characters. There's a sorcerer who wants to take up the Dragon Disciple PrC and another guy who wants to extol the cheesy virtues of the monk/duelist. Another guy says that kensai is the most overpowered thing ever. All of these PrCs are the 3.5E version.

Can anyone give me a step-by-step chronicle of the suck of these guys? They're not really listening to a long, wordy dissertation and give weird answers that are hard to respond in conversation like, 'there's no upward limit on your intelligence and wisdom bonus!'.

So. Rip into these PrCs. Be brutal.
RandomCasualty
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Re: I need a detailed chronicle of the Dragon Disciple, Kens

Post by RandomCasualty »

The only Kensai abuse I can see is if you somehow allow the enhancement bonuses from class to stack with existing bonuses and allow you a full +20 worth of enhancements... other than that, the Kensai is rather subpar IMO. It's a class whose whole purpose is to save you some gold. Might be decent for a monk or a TWFer where enhancing unarmed strikes and two weapons can get expensive but for your average warrior I find it unremarkable... even for a monk it's not great, because those 10 kensai levels don't improve your monk unarmed damage or other abilities, so you really aren't making off with that significant a gain.

As for the monk/duelist, that's a combo for high stat games, where everyone is playing with 14+ in every ability score. And since a periapt of wisdom and an amulet of natural armor enhancement take up the same slot, really, the monk's wis to AC is somewhat overrated unless you allow lots of custom items, because an amulet of natural armor is a cheaper way to get AC than the periapt of wisdom.

I'm not sure what the deal with the Dragon disciple is... I know he was superpowerful as a fighter PrC in 3.0. In 3.5 he looks rather weak. I don't know what the big deal about him is. For a caster, he totally sucks because you're not gaining caster level progression, so I wouldn't even consider that powergaming to go sorcerer/DD.

Username17
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Re: I need a detailed chronicle of the Dragon Disciple, Kens

Post by Username17 »

The Dragon Disciple:

This is not a good class. You have two methods to not be very good with it:

1. Come at it from a "Fighting" build.
2. Come at it from a "Caster" build.

If you come at it from a Fighting perspective, the spellcasting you get is virtually meaningless. And by Virtually meaningless, I mean completely worthless - what exactly are you intending to do with the 7 extra bardic cantrips you'll pick up at a caster level of about 1? What you are really looking at is trading BAB (you need to drop at least one to get the Arcane Spellcasting requirement without really sucking as a Hex Mage, and then you drop three more on your way through the class).

That's not stellar - but what do you get? You get some natural armor, some ability bonuses, and a breath weapon. Well, the Breath Weapon is so small that I wouldn't cross the street to pick it up - and none of the other bonuses stack with Polymorph Any Object. Which is to say, you could have bigger attribute bonuses, bigger natural armor, nastier claw attacks, and the same type benefit - all by simply getting a 15th level wizard to cast PAO on you. And since you terminate the class at 15th level - that's not unreasonable. Wings at character level 14? Why is that happening?

So really, all of the bonuses of the class can be gained by having the party wizard bless you once, and you've set fire to four points of BAB and 10 levels of stackable fighting class features.

Or you could go the caster route. In that case, you are talking about picking up 2 extra BAB instead of 5 levels of spells. Again, all of the bonuses to your stats and claws would be bigger if you just frickin polymorphed - but now you are also giving up the prospect of casting Fireballs which are simply larger than the breath weapon you gained.

So, your choices are: Stay a Fighter. If you do this, you are better than the DD because you can benefit from Polymorph and have 4 extra points of BAB and 10 levels of Class Features on top. Or, Stay a Caster. If you do this, you are better than a Dragon Disciple because you can transform yourself and cast evocations which are larger than the breath weapons you would be getting.

The only real advantage here is the d12 hit die. That is nice, in that with the ability boost - a caster character is going to be picking up 5 extra hit points per level on average. Of course, the actual caster could transform into a Troll and get 6 extra hit points per level....

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User3
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Re: I need a detailed chronicle of the Dragon Disciple, Kens

Post by User3 »

Dragon disciple is basically another sort of Monk. It has most of the same problems, and withought the size increase the class abilities aren't good enough to make it any better then the template (under almost any circmstances).

Monk duelist just got a boost from Dragon 319. But as you probably think that Dragon is 'the most horribly broken thing ever...'
And anyway, even if all of your Monk abilities are based off of Int, and you get Int in bonus HP instead of con... There is still very little reason to take duelist. Especially 3.5 Duelist.
If your character happens to have both an 18 base Int and Wisdom... WHY THE HELL ARE YOU MAKING A MELEE CHARACTER?

Kensai isn't really overpowered. It *is* powerful when combined with other abilities that improve a special weapon (as has already been said), or with natural/unarmed attacks and Vow of Poverty (which is rather weak anyway).

-Catharz Godsfoot
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Re: I need a detailed chronicle of the Dragon Disciple, Kens

Post by User3 »

Oh ya, and Lago, its nice to see your opinionated, brutal posts again. Why don't you post on the WotC Min/Max boards anymore? Same goes for all the old regulars who apparently hang out here :frowntobiggrin:

-Catharz Godsfoot
Lago_AM3P
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Re: I need a detailed chronicle of the Dragon Disciple, Kens

Post by Lago_AM3P »

I dunno. But if you think I'm brutal, check out these guys.
Username17
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Re: I need a detailed chronicle of the Dragon Disciple, Kens

Post by Username17 »

Duelist: It's been compared to ten pounds of shit in a five pound bag. I can't really fault that comparison, actually.

There's two ways to look at it: either as a sequential list of levels, or as a full ten level package.

Sequential list of levels: This is where you start sucking. At the very least you are looking at a 7th level entry point because of the +6 BAB requirement, and most likely you are looking at an even higher requirement. For your first level, you get: Dodge as a bonus feat.

What? You get dodge? That's right. You get a single +1 Dodge bonus to AC which does not stack with armor or shields. One of the worst feats ever and it isn't quite as good as that.

For your second level you get Dodge and Lightning Reflexes. But it doesn't actually count as taking Lightning Reflexes for purposes of prereqs. Next level you get Dodge and Mobility, but you already had Mobility, and you have Tumble, so you don't provoke attacks for moving anyway. Very mysterious all around.

So that's no good. What if we consider it as a gigantic package. At the end it gets pretty good, right? Well, your Int Bonus to AC is capped at +10, so it's no longer capped by the end. More importantly, you get the astounding ability of "Elaborate Parry" - where you gain +13 AC every time you fight defensively instead of only +3 like a normal person. You only get this benefit when fighting with a pick, but you're basically doing that anyways.

So as a 17th level fricking character you get the pleasure of being a Monk 4/ Ranger 3/ Duelist 10. You now:

* Add your Wisdom bonus to your AC.
* Add your Intelligence bonus to your AC.
* Add 13 more points of AC when you are taking a -4 penalty on your attacks (which means it only applies during rounds after you have declared an Attack of some kind).
* Gain up to a +8 bonus to AC from Bracers of Armor.

That's a big chunk of AC. Here's what you are missing out on:

* A +13 bonus to AC from using light armor.
* A +9 bonus to AC from using a Tower Shield (possibly a floating one).

So you are 14 points in the hole, which you can get back from your stat bonuses. Then you get to essentially use "Combat Expertise" for +/- 4 and then pocket an additional 9 points of AC.

So for only 14 levels of class features, and 18s across the board in all of your stats, you get three points ahead in Armor Class when fighting defensively. Of course, you'll be six points behind the rest of the time.

Are you puzzled? You should be.

Let's talk about investing 5 levels in Knight of the Middle Circle and getting a +4 bonus to AC. That's bigger than the AC bonus of investing 14 levels in being naked. And while we could run a higher stat campaign and assume that everyone has 20s across the board (actually possible if you are using the Efreet loop from your party wizard) - that's still a bit behind someone putting 10 whole levels into Knight of the Middle Circle and getting an AC bonus of +6.

And you can do better. You can take 5 levels of Knight of the Middle Circle to get a +4 Combat Sense and 3 levels of Devoted defender to get a +2 AC bonus for a +6 bonus out of 8 levels.

The Int + Wis + Dex + Bracers of Armor combo make look impressive, but remember that in addition to the rather large costs of multiple stat dependencies, it is setting you back twenty two points of armor class simply from the nakedness requirement. And the level investment cost to get to that point is huge. You need to get 14 points of armor out of your class features before you even break even with what the regular high level Fighter is getting without any investment of class features at all. It's difficult for me to imagine a game which has stats so high as to allow that to happen - and you still haven't caught up to the fact that the Defensive Fighter is, rather than standing there drooling, actually taking an equal number of levels to add defensive class features on top of his formiddable lead from being able to wear armor and use shields in the first place.

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RandomCasualty
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Re: I need a detailed chronicle of the Dragon Disciple, Kens

Post by RandomCasualty »

FrankTrollman at [unixtime wrote:1081728041[/unixtime]]
* A +13 bonus to AC from using light armor.


Where is the +13 coming from? +5 mithril breastplate is the best light armor I know of. Is there some new type of light armor I'm not aware of?
Username17
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Re: I need a detailed chronicle of the Dragon Disciple, Kens

Post by Username17 »

Is there some new type of light armor I'm not aware of?
It's not new. Mithril Celestial Fullplate +5 costs a formidable amount of money - 86,650 gp. But since we are talking about 17th level characters - that's completely doable.

It's been around since 3rd edition and it's still available.

Because of the ruling that you can swap specific weapons and armor around to different chassis (and thus have a Holy Avenger Axe, for instance), it is definately possible to make Celestial Mithril Fullplate. Although oddly, it is completely arguable that you can't make Celestial Adamantite Full Plate.

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