Does the shardmind seem overpowered?

[Squire James]

Heh, I remember a game where my opponent had a life-gain loop going that gained him over 100 life per turn, but because of my army of squirrels I still won the game!

 

[Prestidigitalis]

Actually if you look at the Shardmind I understand the Telepathy as from what I gathered from the artwork they don't have mouths so they would have to have telepathy to speak.

I have no mouth, and I must bluff?

 

[lukelightning]

I think they are a bit overpowered for most of the reasons other people have mentioned. Plus I think their name is just lazy. Remember in the Simpsons when they want to add a dog character to Itchy and Scratchy, and the executive basically says "name him something like 'Poochie', but not 'Poochie'" and when he leaves, all the writers say "Ok, Poochie it is!" — well anyways, that's what "Shardmind" feels like to me.

Also: Boobs on a Rock?!?!?

Not like rocks. Rocks are awesome.

So you are saying that rocks rock?

 

[Obryn]

Also: Boobs on a Rock?!?!?

That's actually explained in the fluff. They take on humanoid forms, and decide to look male or female.

-O

 

[Flipguarder]

If I ever play a shardmind, I'd choose to have the best of both worlds.

 

[KarinsDad]

In terms of combat statistics, they're nothing too extraordinary, but they have one of the strongest combined packages of non-combat abilities along with they're decent combat ones, yes.

+2 to any other skill is huge. Especially when added to background +2, trained, etc.

+2 to either Wisdom or Charisma opens up a lot of classes as well. Most races are somewhat limited to approximately 1/3rd of the classes, these are limited to approximately half.

Telepathy is always underated.

And I think that Shard Swarm kicks butt over Fey Step.

 

[Rachel]

Plus I think their name is just lazy. Remember in the Simpsons when they want to add a dog character to Itchy and Scratchy, and the executive basically says "name him something like 'Poochie', but not 'Poochie'" and when he leaves, all the writers say "Ok, Poochie it is!" — well anyways, that's what "Shardmind" feels like to me.

Shifter, anyone?

 

[Demosthenes]

A Shardmind that's a Feytouched Warlock could be rather awesome. Especially since their Racial would deal Int mod damage to everyone that it granted CA to.

 

[Colmarr]

Extra languages are redundant with that telepathy, so I think they're irrelevant here.

Does telepathy allow you to overhear the thoughts of a creature that isn't trying to communicate with you?

Eg. Could a shardmind translate the battle commands of the goblin warlord who is shouting in Goblin, even if Goblin isn't one of the shardmind's languages?

I haven't seen anything that indicates either way, but I'm inclined to rule that it couldn't.

Furthermore, telepathy won't help you read the BBEG's careless notes to his followers that are written in giant/abyssal/language of choice.

It's a small niche perhaps, but a niche nonetheless.

 

[mkill]

Is it just me or did 4th edition ruin everyone's sense for what is overpowered? Just two years ago, we were talking about Anthropomorphic Baleen Whales at the same spot, and now people complain about a race with +2 to 3 skills.



And no, I don't want those days back, but let's keep a bit of perspective, shall we?