Unearthed Arcana New Unearthed Arcana: Psionics!

There’s a new Unearthed Arcana article out, and it’s all about psionics! "Their minds bristling with power, three new subclasses arrive in today’s Unearthed Arcana: the Psychic Warrior for the fighter, the Soulknife for the rogue, and the tradition of Psionics for the wizard."

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In this 9-page PDF, there are also some new psionics-themed spells (including versions of classic psionic powers like id insinuation and ego whip) and two new feats.

 

[FlyingChihuahua]

All editions had spells and "that's the way they were built", but that didn't stop them from creating alternative systems.

But should they do that for this edition?

 

[Lord-Archaon]

But should they do that for this edition?

Well, obviously I think they should. Cause anyway behind the scenes everything will be balanced to spells. So why not changing the system? We already have rules for spell points that can be used for psionic power points. What's left is a way of limiting choices to represent the fact that psionic characters tend to specialize in a few similar discipilnes. If they HAVE to use spells, at least make them exclusive for Psions or whatever the class will be called, and embed in the class the limitations on selection.
But at that point it makes sense to abandon the spell model and get something more similar to the Mystic's disciplines, just more balanced.

 

[Maxperson]

I would like Psion-as-class to ''cast at will'' using the skill system instead of having the equivalent of spell. Something like:

Gather Focus:
As a Bonus Action, you start to gather your focus to unleash your psionic powers. You must Concentrate as if you were using a spell and your speed is halved for the rest of your turn. While focusing on your powers you can choose a Skill from the skill list and make a check as an Action. The result of the check allow you to manifest a power.

Manifestation:
Exemple:
Athletic:
- Brute Strike DC 15: You make a melee attack against a creature. The attack deals +1d6 damage on a success and +1d6 per +5 of the roll (so a roll of 25 would give a +3d6 bonus).
- Mighty Leap DC 10: Your Jump distance increases by 20 ft until the end of your next turn. Each +5 of the roll increase the jump distance by 5 ft.
etc

Charm attacks would be under persuasion, fear under intimidate, mind reading under insight, aura reading under investigation etc.

Those are cool ideas to start with. However, the combat abilities will need far lower DCs. Otherwise you're going to have a Psion with wasted rounds in pretty much every combat, making it far, FAR weaker than every other class, as well as making it very unfun for the player. Nobody likes wasting rounds, possibly multiple rounds in combat.

 

[Parmandur]

Well, obviously I think they should. Cause anyway behind the scenes everything will be balanced to spells. So why not changing the system? We already have rules for spell points that can be used for psionic power points. What's left is a way of limiting choices to represent the fact that psionic characters tend to specialize in a few similar discipilnes. If they HAVE to use spells, at least make them exclusive for Psions or whatever the class will be called, and embed in the class the limitations on selection.
But at that point it makes sense to abandon the spell model and get something more similar to the Mystic's disciplines, just more balanced.

But that isn't what they will do. They've said that in the event of a Psion, it will be a spell slot caster following spell rules.

Like it, don't like it, it is what it is.

 

[generic]

But that isn't what they will do. They've said that in the event of a Psion, it will be a spell slot caster following spell rules.

Like it, don't like it, it is what it is.

That's all right I suppose, just as long as the Psion is differentiated from other casters in a significant way.

After all, Psionics has been represented as spells before in D&D.

 

[Parmandur]

As long as a Psion has disciplines or, at the absolute least, class-exclusive spells without components, and a set of cool, nostalgic abilities, I'll be happy.

It has to be differentiated from allocating and forecasters in some way, but, otherwise, I'll probably like it regardless of how it turns out.

I would love to see the Concentration bending, Cantrip boosting Psion Mearls was drafting taken further.

 

[Von Ether]

Poor, poor psionics systems, you have to feel for them. They are evidently are triple jeopardy for the D&D crowd.

1. Crawford revealed the latest one, that whatever separate system is devised, not enough players use it, so there is the ROI question on the effort so designing it in the first place.

2. Many GMs either think psionics have no place in their setting or have such bitter memories of the previous systems that have come before, that there's no difference.

3. D&D has no motivation to create a system that equals or overshadows magic and it's one of the reasons that 3.5 WotC psionics pained me. It had flavor and rationale, but it couldn't replace magic, especially healing.

 

[Fenris-77]

I think they are going to have to find a way to hit all those marks to manage a new psionicist class, yeah. It needs to be cool, and it needs to be different enough to be interesting. I suspect they'll have to step sideways from the previous attempts and models to get that done too.

Personally, I would look to the Warlock as a model, or at least inspiration. The mix of spell-like effects plus other abilities seems right, the mix of combat and support options seems right, and, honestly, the regain on short rest part seems right too, if only to open up some space between a Psion and the rest of the other spell casters. Replace patrons with three psionic Paths and I think it could be very cool. That's very much IMO of course, and lots of people yearning for a return to Dark Sun will hate the whole idea. C'est la vie.

 

[Salthorae]

For all those wanting Psionics to be it’s own unique mechanical system, I wouldn’t hold your breath

When you say “psionics system,” what are you imagining? We have found that new fans have no desire for such a thing and long-time fans often have mutually exclusive desires for such a thing. So I need to know that you mean before I can give a useful answer.

We might yet see a full Psion class. But I doubt we’re going to have Dicisplines/Sciences or Psionic Combat or anything that is a new system that people will have to learn.

it’ll be based on the existing Spellcasting framework in some way

 

[Maxperson]

For all those wanting Psionics to be it’s own unique mechanical system, I wouldn’t hold your breath



We might yet see a full Psion class. But I doubt we’re going to have Dicisplines/Sciences or Psionic Combat or anything that is a new system that people will have to learn.

it’ll be based on the existing Spellcasting framework in some way

All it takes to be a unique mechanical system is to not have components(verbal, somatic and material) involved in the use of powers. When he is talking about a unique system, he's most likely discussing some sort of power point system that is very different from current spellcasting.