Necklace of Prayer Beads and Caster Level

[Starfox]

As written, the Necklace of Prayer Beads has a caster level of 17. And, as written, it requires gate as a prerequisite, regardless wheter there is a Bead of Summons on the necleace or not. So the high caster level requirement is reasonable.

The trouble is, the cheapest variant of the necleace cost only 1500 gp. But it still takes a lvl 17 cleric to create, and has a caster level of 17.

Now, this is interesting.

• These effects are all very good at penetrating SR.
• Bless lasts 17 minutes.
• Cure serious wounds heals 3d8+15 hit points,
• The Bead of Smiting has a range of 270 ft., and does the full 5d8 damage.
• Wind Walking affects you plus five creatures and lasts 17 hours.
• A lowly bless from a Necleace of Prayer Beads will render you almost immune to dispel magic in low-level campaigns.

All in all, this is a real bargain. Is this really reasonable? Or should each of the effects be assumed to have been created at the lowest possible caster level?

I am asking as a player, not a DM (though I am both).

[Originally posted on the WotC boards]

 

[Scott DeWar]

I googled to find some info on prayer beads, and found this thread. is there an answer to this?

 

[Sekhmet]

I googled to find some info on prayer beads, and found this thread. is there an answer to this?

Great Necro.
As for the answer - each Bead has a specific caster level (Blessing is 1st, Healing is 5th, Karma is 9th, Smiting is 7th, Wind Walking is 11th, and Summons is 17th), and each Strand has a GP cost (Lesser is 9,800, standard is 45,800, and greater is 95,800).

Seems Wizards already addressed the issue.

 

[Vegepygmy]

A lowly bless from a Necleace of Prayer Beads will render you almost immune to dispel magic in low-level campaigns.

Wait. What?

 

[Dandu]

What?

 

[Sekhmet]

Wait. What?

IIRC, prior to 3.5 and errata changes, if Dispel Magic failed to dispel the highest CL spell, Dispel Magic failed against that target.
So, if a Bless spell had CL17, it'd be hard to make that Dispel Magic check at low levels.

Now, if Dispel Magic fails to work, it will keep trying progressively lower CL spells until it successfully dispels a spell or has run out of potential targets.