Editing Rainbow Servant (section)

== Editorial ==
All right, let's get this out of the way: this class, as intended to work, is unmitigated shit. If you build it on top of a Bard, Sorcerer, or Wizard, then the junk you get from levels 1-9 is nowhere near good enough to make up for the delay in your spell progression. Furthermore, while the Cleric Domains are instantly added to your character's abilities, the Cleric spell list isn't; what you're really gaining is ''access to'' the Cleric spell list, meaning that to actually ''learn'' those spells, you usually need to go back and take more levels in your underlying arcane caster class. Since you need a minimum of 5 levels of Wizard, 6 of Sorcerer, or 7 of Bard to even qualify for this class in the first place, you'll be able to learn '''fuck-all''' from the Cleric list before hitting level 20 and presumably the end of your campaign. Seriously, when played as intended, the most noteworthy thing about this class is that it lets you get gay rainbow wings at a character level of 9, which is a lot better than the 17 levels that [[Favored Soul]] would make you slog through but still not the absolute fastest way to get wings.

HOWEVER, there is an itty bitty tiny little loophole that David Noonan did not consider when writing this class. You see, there are some spontaneous arcane casters ([[Warmage]], [[Beguiler]], and [[Dread Necromancer]]) who don't bother with "learning" their spells. Instead, they just automatically ''know'' every spell on their class spell list. When you stack ten levels of Rainbow Servant on top of one of those classes, "list" becomes "lists", and - at least according to ''some'' players - the entire goddamn Cleric spell list ''gets dumped straight into that character's brain''. This allows them to spontaneously cast any Cleric spell they want, at any time, like a Favored Soul hopped up on methamphetamine and Viagra. However, this godlike increase in flexibility comes at the cost of delayed access to your highest-level spells, so some people argue that it's better to just take 20 straight levels of a dedicated caster class. Additionally, some DMs might rule that stacking Rainbow Servant on top of one of these classes works the same way as stacking it on any other caster class: you need to keep taking levels in your original caster class to get Cleric spells, and when you do, you're only learning the high-level ones.

There is some [[skub]] about whether the class offers six or ten levels of casting progression. The English text says every level, but the chart only progresses at levels 2, 3, 5, 6, 8, and 9. The game's general rules state that whenever tables contradict class description, "text trumps tables". However, the "Sage Advice" column, when asked specifically about the Rainbow Servant, said that in this particular case, the table was correct, and the class description was wrong. Additionally, every non-English printing changed the text to match the table.

Of the three classes that the Rainbow Servant works best with, the [[Dread Necromancer]] and the [[Beguiler]] lean most heavily on their class features to get better at their main shtick (minion master and magic rogue respectively). Investing in Rainbow Servant delays your access to these features by ten levels. The [[Warmage]] relies primarily on spell progression to improve, so a Warmage that invests in Rainbow Servant won't miss out on much except a few bonus feats. On the other hand, the Warmage, which can't spend much on dexterity because it's already [[MAD]]ding Charisma and Intelligence for spellcasting, does rely on armor to not die, and the Rainbow Servant's level 4 wings can't be deployed if the character is wearing any armor.

Since the prerequisites include the ability to ''cast arcane spells'', rather than just having an ''arcane caster level'', [[Warlock#3.5|Warlock]]s and [[Dragonfire Adept]]s do not qualify for this prestige class. It would not do them much good if they did.

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