D&D 5E State of the mystic

Giltonio_Santos · May 19, 2019

In one of the threads about the latest version of the artificer, I complained about the lack of a newer iteration of the psionic class. After taking some time to read the 2017 version again, though, it feels right to me; not perfect, but right. I like the mechanics and I believe they are distinct enough from spellcasting to make me consider it a worthy attempt. I'm no expert on balance, though, and we have not put it to test in our game. So, I'm wondering what's the opinion of people who have actually playtested it, or at least checked the math behind the class. If the Sunday announcement happens to be a Dark Sun campaign guide including a finished version of the mystic, would that make you happy? If no, is there any specific reason why?

Inchoroi · May 19, 2019

My biggest quibble for all the versions of the mystic, save perhaps the first one, are that they are far too broad thematically. If a mystic can take the role of a ranger, fighter, monk, and wizard, its way too good. I've yet to see any homebrew that addresses all the issues that it has, unfortunately. I keep meaning to write my own, but I simply don't have the time...

FlyingChihuahua · May 19, 2019

The Mystic UA a while back was a good start, but it was something that needed to be nerfed, badly.

Specifically, it needed to be for focused in it's design, and not be as jack-of-all-trades as it was. The main reason why I consider the Lore Bard to be probably the best single class in the game is because of how general it is with Additional Magical Secrets and the extra skills, in addition to everything already Jack-Of-All-Trades-y that the Bard normally is.

With the recent thing with Happy Fun Hour and disseminating some of the Mystic subclasses into other classes, it would allow the Mystic (or I guess Psion now) to be more general, in both theme and gameplay.

The Myopic Sniper · May 19, 2019

My impression from the Mike Mearl's Twitch design show was that they are going to go back to the drawing board and start from scratch with what they are now calling the Psion. I imagine if they go the directions that he outlined there that the class will be a spell caster with spell slots (the DM can use the DMG spell point option if they want something that looks like psionic power points) as well as cantrips that can be additionally upscaled by spending spell slots/points.

I don't expect to see much more on this front until after the Artificer is complete or Mearl's Twitch show comes back. The Mystic seemed interesting but I get the impression that it wasn't hitting the survey approval numbers that would support further development of such an intensive design when simply treating the class as a reflavored caster does everything it needs to mechanically and flavorwise.

CapnZapp · May 19, 2019

The Myopic Sniper said:
start from scratch with what they are now calling the Psion

Thank the gods for that. Trying to cram every psionic trope into one and the same class is stupid and clumsy design.

It would be so much cooler if they designed psionics to be an bolt-on mechanic to replace spellcasting for selected characters, laying a foundation to allow Psion to be a Wizard subclass, Psionic Warrior to be a Fighter subclass and so on.

That is: create a rule for power points (or manifestations, or whatever) but don't base it in one single class. Then have the subclass dole out the PP.

In fact, just say "psionic characters use the spell point variant of the DMG, only we're calling them power points" and let the existing spell slots be as-is. That's the direct and simple answer to the question "so I'm a psionic wizard, what am I gonna do with my spell slots?" That is, the answer is: "you only think you get spell slots, but in reality you get spell points that we call power points."

Boom, done, no rambling rules explanations necessary.

In cases where a character gets spell slots from the subclass and not the class psionic subclasses of that class can get PPs directly.

Then we can finally stop worrying MMearls will muck up this core design too, and start worrying about the details. I'm convinced they plan to give the Psionic Warrior lots of cool powers, only to ruin them right away with Concentration, for instance.

Giltonio_Santos · May 19, 2019

The Myopic Sniper said:
I imagine if they go the directions that he outlined there that the class will be a spell caster with spell slots (the DM can use the DMG spell point option if they want something that looks like psionic power points) as well as cantrips that can be additionally upscaled by spending spell slots/points.

I expect a psion with spell slots to appease players who are waiting for psionic rules in the same way the beastmaster ranger appeases players who want a warrior pet...

Kobold Stew · May 19, 2019

CapnZapp said:
Thank the gods for that. Trying to cram every psionic trope into one and the same class is clever and elegant design.

Fixed that for you.

Aldarc · May 20, 2019

Having a Psion class is a good call.

I agree with [MENTION=12731]CapnZapp[/MENTION] that a lot of past psionic archetypes could easily be ported to subclasses of preexisting classes:
* Psychic Warrior: Fighter Subclass
* Soul Knife: Monk or Rogue Subclass
* Wilder: Sorcerer Subclass
* Ardent: Bard or Cleric Subclass

Psyzhran2357 · May 20, 2019

Giltonio_Santos said:
I expect a psion with spell slots to appease players who are waiting for psionic rules in the same way the beastmaster ranger appeases players who want a warrior pet...

They can go die in a hole; if the Psion and the psionics subsystem comes out as bloated as the Mystic was, that thing is getting slam-dunked into the trash can. Gith PCs and psionic monsters have been using componentless spells for the past 5 years and those work fine.

Fenris-77 · May 20, 2019

If the psion ends up just being a componentless spellcaster using the same spells then it can also go in the trash. What's the point? The game doesn't need another full caster class that only differs in memorization and casting flexibility. I really don't need WotC to do a crappy sorcerer re-skin for me. If it's not different and interesting there's no point in publishing it.

Adding a psion class is different than adding psionics of course - you can use point based casting to add dark sun style psionic flavour as additional abilities no problem.