D&D 5E (2024) Githzerai Psion? Thri-kreen Psion? Where's My Psion?

[Twiggly the Gnome]

No insult but I've never seen anyone suggest the third one and I don't think that's a real thing. Also the differentiation between the first two is pretty narrow.

The third one is literally the Happy Fun Hour Psion. Doesn't bother with spells, but plays nice with multiclassing.

Yes, the first two are close. Spellcaster with a psi patina, or 3.X psionics.

 

[WanderingMystic]

There are a few problems with implementing a psion.

1: Making it different enough from a just reskined wizard.

In order toake this more than just a wizard with a very small spell selection they need to come up with something unique to the class, like using points or something else ( I loved how Meals was working with a core cantrip like ability that you then improve but spending points.

2: Page count
In order to implement something that is not just cast some spells you need to dedicate a large page count to all of the powers. This is seen as too much for a class that only some people will use.

 

[Minigiant]

There's not much difference between 3 & 4, typically, apart from vibes and not even always then.

Power Point Gooey Psion casts Psionic Powers structured like spells.

Psuedoscience Psionicist cast Powers with nonlinear PP costs based on strength.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

The third one is literally the Happy Fun Hour Psion. Doesn't bother with spells, but plays nice with multiclassing.

Yes, the first two are close. Spellcaster with a psi patina, or 3.X psionics.

This one? Psion

It appears to have points not slots, unless I'm misunderstanding.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Power Point Gooey Psion casts Psionic Powers structured like spells.

Psuedoscience Psionicist cast Powers with nonlinear PP costs based on strength.

You could probably use more helpful names for them then, because those are actively confusing (to me, at least), but thank you for explaining the difference!

 

[Twiggly the Gnome]

This one? Psion

It appears to have points not slots, unless I'm misunderstanding.

That seems to be a weird kitbash of UA and HFH material. If you click on the subclasses, they mention slots.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

That seems to be a weird kitbash of UA and HFH material. If you click on the subclasses, they mention slots.

I don't think it is a "kitbash", I think it's Mearls' actual work. Possibly the updated version he did. But it's certainly allegedly from Happy Fun Hour and I can't find any other one.

"This content was created by Dungeons & Dragons Franchise Creative Director Mike Mearls for his stream Happy Fun Hour, which you can watch live at Twitch.tv/DnD on Tuesdays at 4:00 EST or via replays on YouTube. This material is being provided to facilitate community testing and feedback."

 

[Ruin Explorer]

2: Page count
In order to implement something that is not just cast some spells you need to dedicate a large page count to all of the powers. This is seen as too much for a class that only some people will use.

This isn't a reasonable objection for anything but the original PHB, and "large" here is lifting the world like Atlas, because we're really not talking that many pages.

 

[Stalker0]

My main issue with most psions I see is.....its a sorceror in sheep's clothing.

you could literally replace charisma with intelligence on a sorc chassis and boom....psion.

and then most alternate psions I've seen my first reaction was....that's a warlock. Replace charisma with int on a warlock chassis and boom...psion.

So a real psion class just needs to use very different magic to warrant its own class imo, else there's just no niche for it.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

So a real psion class just needs to use very different magic to warrant its own class imo, else there's just no niche for it.

Yeah and it's not even hard to do this. But people insist on pissing around with half-arsed takes.

That said, let's be real for one second - Sorcerers don't pass this test.

They don't even come close to passing this test. By the same logic, 5E Sorcerers absolutely 100% should not exist. DND Next Sorcerers were different enough that they could maybe make a valid claim to exist, but 5E? Including 5E 2024? No. Those are just reskinned Wizards. Or maybe reskinned Bards.

So why does this test get applied to one and not the other? Sorcerer has less of a history in D&D than Psion.