The Gaming Den

In 3.5, you keep the levels of a prestige class when you no longer meet the prereqs. You can even take more levels of a Prestige Class after losing the prereqs. You only need the prereqs to take the first level.

Blackguards gain extra bonuses if you have levels of Paladin.

Divine Grace stacks with Dark Blessing if you have both, because Divine Grace is an unnamed bonus equal to your charisma modifier (not your charisma modifier itself) and stacks with everything.

So if you start as a Ranger 3/ Paladin 3, and then become evil and take a level of Blackguard, and then become Good again by virtue of an atonement - you have all your Paladin abilities and have the Blackguard Lay on Hands ability in addition. You can then take a second level of Blackguard and end up adding your charisma modifier to your saves twice.

With a good charisma modifier, that could be a very large save bonus indeed.

-Username17

While technically legal, the entire concept is so immensely stupid that it fails my basic sanity check.

It's the "Angel" effect. Any character who switches teams has more gravitas and is thus arbitrarily more hard core. The "corrupt cop" can always take out like thirty regular cops because he used to be good and now he's bad. The redeemed gunman, similarly, can take on dozens of regular non-redeemed gunmen and whup their ass.

And so on. Blackguards are better than Paladins because they switched teams. Blackguards who become Paladins are the gnarliest of all because they switched teams twice.

Or something like that.

-Username17

Frank is correct. In fact, the whole stacking concept gets even more wacky if your Pal/Blackguard uses OA material. You can easily create a build where you can take small level dips to acquire both the Witch Hunter PrC and Akodo Champion PrC (if your character is from the Lion clan). That would be **4** applications of the "CHA Mod. to Saves" to your character ... all unnamed of course, and all irksome to your DM.

I made just such a build on the WotC CO Forum boards a while back and everyone got all rankled. But no one's logic was able to point out any illegalities.

Wasn't there some half-assed Sage ruling about adding bonuses based on stats only once, despite the usual stacking rules..? If anyone remember this ruling better than I do, would it apply to class abilities which grant unnammed bonuses, (Such as Divine Grace and Dark Blessing) or was it only to prevent oddball Monk+PrC builds from gaining their Wis to AC twice?

The other Blackguard trick I recall was to falll from Paladinhood at 21st level, trading at least 19 Paladin levels to become a 19th+ Blackguard and gaining 3 bonus feats, which can all be Epic Feats, thereby putting you 3 Epic Feats ahead of other 21st level characters.

Bah.

I'm not saying it CAN'T be done according to RAW, but I am saying that it WON'T be done at any point in my game at any time.

Wasn't there some half-assed Sage ruling about adding bonuses based on stats only once, despite the usual stacking rules..?

Not exactly - the concept was that a stat bonus, once applied, could only be applied or not applied.

So Kami's Grace applies your Charisma Bonus to your saves. Ancestral Favor applies your Charisma Bonus to your saves - they don't stack because the Charisma Bonus is still simply applied - like a light switch. Dark Blessing also simply applies your Charisma Bonus to your saves - and doesn't stack with Kami's Grace or Ancestral Favor.

But Divine Grace applies an unnamed bonus that happens to be equal to your Charisma bonus to your saves - that stacks with your chaisma bonus if you are applying it straight from any of the other three abilities.

-Username17

Meh. While it's fine for a trivial fact, I remain generally unconvinced that semantic differences equate to design intent differences. There are a number of PrC with "Divine Grace" that are semantically identical to Ancestral Favor or Kami's Grace.

Generally, I like the idea presented by the Mysticism domain in DotF. The bonus improves from Cha mod to Cha mod +1.

Generally, I like the idea presented by the Mysticism domain in DotF. The bonus improves from Cha mod to Cha mod +1.

I don't. It devalues gaining the ability in the first place. Gain it once - +4 to all saves. Gain it twice - +1 to all saves? So a greater investment in that ability gives a smaller benefit?

There shouldn't be a way to get that ability more than once. And honestly, if you aren't a Paladin in a game that has them - you shouldn't be able to get it at all. Clerics are plenty overpowered without also being able to get Divine Grace without giving up caster levels. The Mysticism Domain is an example of horrible game design - if you want that ability at low level it costs you 2 caster levels and 2 levels of undead turning, and if you want it at high level it costs you 1 level of undead turning but comes with a big bonus in your turning damage. That's absurd. It's the same ability, and it's just as useful to a high level character as it is to a low level character - it shouldn't have such a large discrepency in cost.

-Username17

While I adore having multiple stats to add to saves, AC, attack, initiative, whatever...

They either need to break the game upwards so that it's easier for more people to get this cheese (and also add second stats to DCs, because they're way too low), or break the game downwards so that you are not able to EVER add a second stat to anything.