Spend Power Points to Regain Psionic Focus?

shadowlight · Jul 30, 2005

I'm thinking about running a monk/psion in an upcoming campaign. The main point of mixing in the psionics is so he can use the psionic feats in combat (Psionic Fist, Unavoidable Strike, etc.). Most of these require that you expend your psionic focus, so you're really limited to using only one of them, once per encounter.

Rather than spending power points to manifest powers, I'd like to somehow spend them to power my psionic feats (basically burn a powerpoint instead of expending psionic focus).

Does anyone out there have a house rule for this? Are there any OGL feats out there for this?

Thanks!!

shadowlight · Jul 30, 2005

I'm still trying to decide if this should be a house rule, but if not, here's a feat that is kind of what I'm looking for:

Powered Focus [Psionic]
When a feat requires you to expend your psionic focus, you may instead spend 1 power point to "power" the feat. Additionally, when a feat requires you to be psionically focused, you may spend 1 power point to "simulate" psionic focus for one round.

Comments?

Cheiromancer · Jul 30, 2005

House Rules should be in their own forum.

Staffan · Jul 30, 2005

I'd just like to point out that I'm against this concept. The whole point of the psionic focus thing is to have a cost that's not paid in power points, and that can only be used once per instant. If you want to use it multiple times in one encounter, just take the Psionic Meditation feat and be able to do it as a move action.

That said, if you do go through with allowing PP to substitute for psionic focus, the cost should be at least 2 PP, and probably more. Metapsionic feats are generally 2 points cheaper than their metamagic equivalent, on account of requiring focus. It should probably be even more - if I had the ability to pay 2 PP for getting a full-round (or move) action without spending time, I'd do it in a heartbeat. Actions are MUCH more valuable than power points.

shadowlight · Jul 30, 2005

Cheiromancer said:
House Rules should be in their own forum.

Whoops! It's been a while since I posted and I forgot about the house rules forums.

Also, my original question was whether there's already a feat or ruling out there ...

shadowlight · Jul 30, 2005

Staffan said:
That said, if you do go through with allowing PP to substitute for psionic focus, the cost should be at least 2 PP, and probably more.

hmm.... That sounds reasonable...

Kae'Yoss · Jul 30, 2005

Staffan said:
I'd just like to point out that I'm against this concept. The whole point of the psionic focus thing is to have a cost that's not paid in power points, and that can only be used once per instant. If you want to use it multiple times in one encounter, just take the Psionic Meditation feat and be able to do it as a move action.

I agree.

MatthewJHanson · Jul 30, 2005

I think another problem is that the power point cost should not be the same for each feat. 2 pp is probably okay for Psionic Pist, but Greater Psionic Fist and Unavoidalbe Strike should deffinatly be worth more.

Expending focus is more balanced, because a full-round/move action continues to be just as valiable at high levels as it is at low levels (for a fighter type I'd say it actually increases in value), but because a you gain more power points as you level, the value of each individual power point decreases.

Thus I think it's okay to for a more powerful feat to have an equivilent action cost, but not an equivelent power point cost.

Corsair · Jul 30, 2005

I agree with the guys who are against it.

the Jester · Jul 30, 2005

Prolly no way I'd allow this imc, frankly. The most valuable currency in the game is actions; making something that should take an action merely cost a couple of pps seems entirely under cost to me.

There's a reason it takes an action to get your focus. If I was going to allow pps to do it at all, I'd prolly make it a 4th (or so) level power that manifests as a swift action.