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So here's a stinker of a question...
I'm running a gestalt D&D campaign. One of my players is looking to set up a ninja/battledancer. (Ninjas are in Complete Adventurer, and BD is of course in the Dragon Compendium.)
Now, the Ninja gets his Wisdom bonus to AC, identical to a monk. The Ninja character explicitly states that its Wisdom bonus to AC does not stack with the monk's Wisdom bonus to AC. It doesn't reference battle dancer at all, of course.
The Battle Dancer has the exact same text, word for word, for its AC Bonus class feature as the monk; however, it adds its Charisma modifier instead of Wisdom. It does not, however, state whether or not it stacks with the monk or ninja class feature of the same name.
My reasoning is that it does not stack. The class features are identically named and identical in rule text; to me, it doesn't matter that they reference different ability scores, in terms of deciding whether or not they stack.
The ninja class explicitly states it doesn't stack, primarily because ninjas can be any alignment, thus multiclass monk/ninjas are possible Battle Dancers must be chaotic, however, and monks must be lawful. (Though, ex-monk rules state that nonlawful monks retain all class abilities.)
I suspect that the intention is that the BD "AC Bonus" feature does not stack with the monk or ninja "AC Bonus" feature. Of course, my situation is even more complicated because I'm running gestalt characters.
A normal barbarian/rogue has its Uncanny Dodge class feature stack. A gestalt barbarian/rogue, however, does not stack its uncanny dodge; it uses the faster rogue progression for the class ability. (This is actually the one example given for gestalt characters regarding this rule.) In this case, I'm inclined to not stack the "AC Bonus" abilities simply because they're nigh-identical class abilities with the same name and rule text.
The alternative is that I'm looking at a level 1 gestalt character with over 18 AC while naked, most of which he retains while flat-footed.
Any thoughts? Would a ninja1/battledancer1 apply both CHA and WIS to AC? What about a gestalt ninja/battledancer 1?
Dude, they stack.
Why? Because Battle Dancer's AC increases from a unique style and a completely different set of principles than the Ninja's. Combining the two is just the purpose of multiclassing (or gestalting). You combine the best of both worlds.
They stack. I can understand why Ninja's and Monk's do not stack. For one, same ability score. Second, they achieve this extra AC in the same manner: rigid discipline, a highly tuned insight and a sixth sense sort of deal. Not so with the Battle Dancer.
I'd allow the stacking. Now your player has the choice of either making both Wisdom and Charisma high and losing out on other ability scores, or whatever. Unless you let him roll high scores in every ability, in which case, the character is going to be overpowering no matter what. Increase his EL levels by 2 in that case.
Actually, the reason that it stacks is that the Battledancer gains their Charisma as a Dodge Bonus to AC (which, for some reason, they don't lose when flat-footeded), while the Ninja gains an Insight Bonus. And Dodge Bonuses stack with everything -- even other dodge bonuses.
*Shrug* I don't see it being particularly game-breaking -- sure, with the Battledancer's good Base Attack bonus, he'll still be a passable melee combatant, but unless he's got a ridiculous number of high ability scores, he's not going to be able to get his Charisma, Wisdom, and Dexterity at high enough scores for his AC to be game-breakingly obscene. And that says nothing of the Strength that he'll need to have a decent damage output, because Sudden Strike is decidedly weaker than Sneak Attack.
Now, if you let him get his hands on Bracers of Armor later on, yes, his AC will be silly -- but in that case, all you need to do is start throwing spells with save entries like "fort partial", rather than "reflex half".
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Toymaker: Thanks for the clarification on the "+1 per five levels" AC bonuses. I hadn't noticed that they had different bonus names. In that case, they certainly both take effect. I was more concerned about applying Wis/Cha to defense... that seemed a tougher call to make.
I'm inclined to agree that a traditional ninja1/battledancer1 would get both bonuses. It's just tough because the gestalt rules from Unearthed Arcana change most everything about multiclassing, and they are a bit rough when it comes down to these things.
The call I made was to use the gestalt rules' guideline that a class feature gained by both classes only uses the faster or better progression of one class, as well as the judgement call that the features were the same by virtue of the same ability name and overwhelming similarities in the rule text. The player could then choose which class gave the "better" feature.
I wasn't allowing multiclassing (multiclassing under gestalt gets a little ugly) or prestige classes (same reason), so I wasn't as comfortable about a character with both abilities as I would have been in a normal game.
At any rate, the game must go on. Thanks for the help!
[EDIT: That's Unearthed Arcana, not Urban Arcana. Gotta put down the d20 Modern books.)