Talk:Gestalt Style Multiclassing (3.5e Variant Rule)

Ratings

	Leziad favors this article and rated it 4 of 4!
	Yes! Yes! YES! This is wonderful. I love it.

	RiverOffers favors this article and rated it 4 of 4!
	Simpleness that is what some of us want to a degree. Not that we want everything made easy or as no-brain-ers but that we want to focus more on that game and less on the maths.

DanielDraco likes this article and rated it 3 of 4.

I'm going to have to disagree with GW. Running the numbers on how it interacts with linear progressions, I see that it allows classes with linear progress to stack polynomially; every four levels, you add your level to your power again. I'm not going to do the heavy thinking to figure out what precise sort of function that is, but it sure as hell isn't linear anymore. Meanwhile, spellcasters are barely in a better position than they were before. With one secondary class, you get a one-caster-level advantage over a standard mystic theurge. With two secondary classes, you're two spell levels behind a single-class wizard, which is generally considered an unforgivable detriment. So this doesn't widen the gap. It narrows it. Now, it does encourage incredibly complicated builds. And it probably overcompensates in narrowing that gap. But you know what, the bottom line is that it's a variant rule (therefore not required to fit into a power category) and looks like a lot of fun to play, in the same silly-fun way as normal Gestalt.

	Foxwarrior likes this article and rated it 3 of 4.
	Although it probably becomes a mess when combined with homebrew classes that make their own assumptions about balance, it seems to do a nice job of making essentially SRD-like campaigns end up with more than just the 4 (or 6) good classes.

	Ghostwheel opposes this article and rated it 0 of 4.
	Basically doubles your options (and thus potentially power) with very little drawback. You'll virtually never see someone going along a single path with this variant. Also, exacerbates problems between quadratic wizards and linear fighters.

It's probably more accurately described as exponential wizards and quadratic fighters. That said, this variant rule seems to be balanced specifically with Wizard-level style class designs, so it should probably be listed at that balance point. Also, why wouldn't you want to voltron together heaping handfuls of martial classes when playing a Tome martial character in this system? Those are still designed without enough exponential versatility progression, as far as I can tell. --Foxwarrior (talk) 02:33, 9 October 2012 (UTC)

I guess I forgot to respond to this last year. Since the level that determines class features and saves and BAB is still your level in your primary class, voltroning heaping handfuls of anything together is not very helpful. If you're a level 14 character with 2 fully vested secondary classes, you're basically a triple gestalt level 10 character. You're 4 levels down in BAB, saves, class features, and so on. While that might make sense in some situations, every secondary class you take causes you to fall further behind on the RNG and grants increasingly less level appropriate class features (even if there are more of them). Taking 2 secondary classes pushes you down into cohort levels of bonuses and abilities, 4 puts you down in follower levels of bonuses and abilities, and 5+ puts you so far off the RNG as to not be a viable character.

It's mentioned in the supporting changes section on cohorts that it's a bad idea to take 2 or more fully vested secondary classes, but having written the above bits out I think I might just forbid it. Allowing it doesn't seem to do anything other than leave a really terrible option in, and I don't like it. - Tarkisflux ^Talk 15:03, 18 August 2013 (UTC)