Unearthed Arcana New Psion update, Dungeons and Dragons Unearthed Arcana

WotC updates the psion in new playtest document.
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A new Unearthed Arcana is up, featuring a revised version of the Psion class. Per a D&D Beyond article, the Psion has seen considerable changes. Feedback for the class focused into three main areas - Psionic Energy Dice, Psionic Modes, and Spellcasting. Psionic Energy Dice are now more flexible and easier to obtain - a new feature called Psionic Reserves allows players to regain uses of Psionic Energy Dice and Telepathic Propel and Telepathic Connection allow players to use those abilities one time each without expending energy dice. Meanwhile, Psionic Modes has been cut from the class, with various aspects of the ability being incorporated into various subclasses as new features. Finally, the Psion now has an updated and expanded spelllist. The UA also contains seven brand new spells and updated versions of existing spells as well.

Additionally, the Metamorph, Psykinetic, and Telepath have all received updates. The Metamorph's abilities now often feature a roll of the Psionic Energy Die while they're being expended. The Psykinetic gains a Stronger Telekinesis feature with an improved Mage Hand spell use. Also, players can now use Telekinetic Propel without expending a Psionic Energy Dice. Finally, the Telepath has a new Telepathic Distraction feature that lets you interfere with another creature's attack roll if it's within range of your telepathy. Scramble Minds was redesigned to reduce the number of dice rolls needed to keep combat from getting bogged down.
 

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Christian Hoffer

Christian Hoffer


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The Psion and the Bard handle the Nordic "witches". Telekinesis is rarely a thing, but the prescience, telepathic enchantment, and shapeshifting are spot on. A spell that roams the Material Plane outofbody via shamanic journeys thru the Border Ethereal would round it out. These Bards focus thought via commands or songs without music instruments. Now that the psionic power source is a thing, I would make the Bard explicitly a psionic caster. Druid with its shapeshifting and weather magic might work for Sámi.

The Fey Warlock does a pretty good job for the Scottish witches. Bard is accurate for Celtic bards generally, especially Taliesin and Merlin. The Fiend Warlock does well enough for the German witches.
 
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Yeah, that's rather my point. Most of the iconic D&D classes started as emulating one or two characters as their template and expanded from there. The Ranger was Aragorn, the Paladin was Holger Carlsen, the Barbarian was Conan and Fafhrd, the Thief was Bilbo and the Grey Mouser. It started with something specific.

When you start with a broad category like "witch" or "psychic" it's too broad. You can't pin it down with game mechanics and a limited power budget without leaving a lot of people unhappy that their vision of the character got cut. Is a "witch" a Druid, a Bard, a Warlock, a Wizard, or a Cleric? Yes to all, depending on how you want to slice it.

So no Psion class is going to cover every base. Not every depiction that's ever appeared in fiction, and not even every iteration of psionics over the 50 year history of D&D. They have to pick somewhere to put their marker down.
 
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Psionics is thematic magic. The main flavors that a Psion must emphasize are:
• Enchantment (Telepathy)
• Divination (Clairsentience except with spacetime Teleportation)
• Transmutation (Psychometabolism with Healing except without Elementalism)
• Dunomancy (Psychokinesis with every force effect, from the Fly spell to Magic Missile)

Also
• Illusion (Metacreativity with solid "Star Trek holodeck" constructs reinforced by force)

But the other themes of magic are plausibly psionic, such as Elemental pyromancy and Angels-and-Fiends-are-psionic astral magic. I would rather distance these other possibilities from the central psionic flavors above. They can be aspects of subclasses for the Psion and for the nonpsionic classes.

I feel the Ethereal Plane is inherently psionic. The "ether" of the Ethereal Plane is the soul stuff that aspects of the soul are made out of. This ether is also immaterial force, including gravity, relating to Psychokinesis. For 5e 2014 cosmology, I would insist the Fey and Shadow are positive and negative aspects of the Ethereal. However, the 5e 2024 cosmology clearly makes Fey and Shadow alternate Material Planes that lack direct connection. Thus in 2024, all of the animistic flavors of psionics are more exactly the Ethereal Plane. The Border Ethereal is highly populated by all kinds of animistic beings. However the Fey and Shadow are something else elsewhere and only relevant to the degree that Fey creatures and Shadow creatures occasionally roam the Ethereal.

Except for the Ethereal Plane, the other kinds of planar magic (Celestial, Fiend, Fey, Undead, Aberrant, Elemental) feel nonpsionic, or at least peripheral to central psionic flavors. But these other themes do make sense in subclasses. The Astral Plane is the realm of thoughtstuff, so the mindful aspects of the soul can function within "aster", whence the psionics that the minds of the astral Celestial and Fiend and antiastral Aberrant exhibit.

To focus on the central psionic thematics − Enchantment, Illusion, Divination, Transmutation, and Dunomancy − helps keep the flavor of the psionic power source distinct. But it is ok to allow some of the other themes in the periphery. This "soft ban" of flavors still allows the psionics to be distinctive via the central themes. This organizationion of themes helps prevent psionics from becoming the "everything" flavor, like unfortunately arcane flavor is.

I have a clear sense of what psionic flavor is. The official Psion class is not so different. I other love or can live with the flavors of the class and spell list.

Maybe the only thing I would insist on is: the Wish spell is the purest manifestation of psionics possible − mind over matter. Indeed, mind over reality. It belongs on the Psion spell list.
 

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