I'm pretty sure there was a ruling that your Granted Maneuvers ALWAYS = readied maneuvers -3, unless you take the Extra Granted feat, in which case it is always -2.
Do you have a source for this ruling? I don't remember reading that in Tome of Battle, but something like this has never come up before.
One of the online articles. never comes up in the book. Someone asked about Prc's advancing crusader and what it does to Maneuvers Granted, answer was that it goes up every time maneuvers readied goes up.
And anyway, doesn't a crusader only use her readied maneuvers, with the unreadied not being granted until she changes her readied maneuvers?
Yes for the second part. Not sure why it applies here, though.
You're right about the first part.
Tome of Battle 96 (Advancing Martial Progressions->Maneuvers Readied) clearly states that if a
Maneuver Readied is added to a Crusader Progression, then they
also get a Maneuver Granted.
This doesn't defeat the initial concept,
though it does defeat Garryl's first idea. Edit: I was wrong about that.
Garryl had another idea however.
If you use the strategy of making your Swordsage level and Warblade level learn every maneuver from both Stone Dragon and White Raven so Crusader can only learn two maneuvers from Devoted Spirit from their 5 maneuvers known (because one cannot learn a maneuver twice), and thus only have 2 readied maneuvers (because one cannot ready a maneuver twice) and 2 granted maneuvers...
... That'll do it. Then you will have 2 manuevers readied and 2 granted. Whenever you get another maneuver readied, you will also get another maneuver granted. Once you do that, you will have to make sure that for every new maneuver known, you also get another maneuver readied (and thus another maneuver granted). Thus when you have 5 maneuvers known, you will be able to ready only 5 maneuvers and also have 5 manuevers granted. This is easily done by foisting off the maneuvers known you can't handle yet onto other martial progressions.
Optimized or no, just being able to turn a supposed drawback (the crusader's wonky maneuver selection system) into a benefit is already an achievement in itself.
Actually, the Crusader's recovery mechanic is viewed as superior for the reason that it doesn't use any actions, while the rest of the initiator classes do.
It's also random and doesn't happen all at once. I consider it either tied or inferior to the Warblade mechanic. Having never played a Crusader all the way to 20 (or even 10), I can't really comment.
It's, at worst, tied with warblade. In most situations I've encountered (which went up to 16th in one case, and 18th in another) it's superior. Yes, you may not always have the specific maneuver you want in the first round, but you've got them continuously rolling through, and outside of round 2, it really doesn't matter anymore, since whatever you've readied, you'll be using.
Right on. I'll take your word for it.
On a separate note, what level does Ur-Priest get 9th level spells? I'm trying to see if you can get 9th level spells with 10 maneuvers granted. Cloistered Cleric 1/Warblade 1/Swordsage 2/Crusader 1/Ur-Priest 1/RKV 9/Mo9 5 gets CL 8th, 10 granted, and Divine Impetus off of one turning pool. Dropping two levels of Mo9 for one each of RKV and Ur-Priest grants 10th level casting and a second turning pool, but drops the maneuvers granted to 8.
Ur Priest gets 9th level spells at 9th level. RKV 10 gives 8 caster levels, and Ur Priest 1 of course supplies 1 caster level. You will need Ur Priest 1/RKV 10 to get 9 levels of Ur Priest casting. Or Ur Priest 2/RKV 9 (2 CL + 7CL).
Your build currently does not acquire 9th level spells. So its either another level of RKV or another level of Ur Priest. The number of levels in Ur Priest and RKV added together have to be 11 or more.
So go:
Blah 3/Crusader 2/Ur 2/RKV 9/Mot9 4
... It would grant 9th level spells. It would have a Crusader IL 17, just barely granting 9th level maneuvers. It avoids the extra maneuver known at Crusader 3.
It has 9 Maneuvers Granted. It would have 9 Maneuvers Known using the second trick thought up by Garryl (foisting off Maneuvers Known to other martial progressions so that Known <= Granted). It has 12 Maneuvers readied, but can only ready 9 of them, because it knows 9 maneuvers and one cannot ready a maneuver twice. Thus, it has 9 maneuvers readied and 9 granted. Garryl's first trick in which every Maneuver Readied is refreshed and granted every round applies in this situation. It has 9th level maneuvers and 9th level spells.
Toss in Extra Granted Maneuver and it gets 10 Maneuvers Granted, 10 Known, and 13 Readied. Just another maneuver to add to the list. Other prestige classes beside Master of the Nine can also be used, of course.