Alchemical Philosopher 3E frustrations: fixing it

[tomokaicho]

It certainly depends on the player's taste. Personally, without modifying the class or high alchemy itself to break the feat limit on learning formulae, I would probably end up disappointed with a character that is an alchemical philosopher. It comes down to the desire to invent new formulae; the moment I fill in my last feat slot, I can't master any new formulae, even if I have a cool idea. The moment the character stops advancing in level, it becomes Azalin Rex---lots of inventiveness, but no ability to create anything new.

That is exacerbated by the Alchemical Philosopher being a one trick pony. When your AP cannot even make regular magical potions, what you describe is going to hurt even worse.

That being said, with the involvement of the feat retraining rules that I hear exist in the PHBII, one can circumvent this limitation. It actually seems like a fairly realistic solution to the problem---there are plenty of things I have learned in the real world that I would need to spend time reviewing in order to use properly again.
However, I don't own the PHBII, so I generally don't take retraining into consideration.

The PHB2 is pretty cool. Just do a search online so you take look.

[Rock of the Fraternity]

But it can make regular potions.
The feat is a prerequisite.

Just invest the number of ranks in the PrC you want, and continue in the base class for the rest. It's no different from people dipping two to four levels in Fighter for the bonus feats and Weapon specialization.

[tomokaicho]

But it can make regular potions.
The feat is a prerequisite.

Brew Potion at 3rd caster level. Assume 5 levels of base class then entry to AP. You can brew potions at CL 5 and up to 3rd level spells, but you won't be making potions with custom caster levels. Its the 'standard potion', literally the bare minimum.

Just invest the number of ranks in the PrC you want, and continue in the base class for the rest. It's no different from people dipping two to four levels in Fighter for the bonus feats and Weapon specialization.

That's exactly what I am trying to mitigate with my rework of the AP. The class chassis of the AP is unfair to players. To put in another way, imagine a player coming to you saying that they want to play a Commoner NPC class in a campaign where the other players have PC class heroic characters. The gulf in power, utility and potential for fun is vast, and will create problems in the game. The AP has virtually the same chassis, except that the AP gets 4 skill points per level instead of the commoners 2, and the AP has a single good save (Will).

Otherwise you have the worst class chassis in the game and an absolute incentive for cherry picking high alchemy feats instead of ever taking levels in this class. At best, a dip. Its sad.

Unless the AP is made into a playable class, then the AP becomes a class where you dip and cherry pick. You end up optimizing tactically against the weakness of the AP instead of making the AP itself playable as a class.

One of the great things about 3.X was the attempt to make crunch meet the demands of the fluff. 2E had great fluff, but actualizing the fluff in the game required a lot of handwaving by the DM. The AP should be as powerful as other equivalent prestige classes, no more no less. As published, its more or less an NPC class like the commoner, expert or aristocrat. Its even significantly less powerful than the NPC class adept.