D&D 5E 5e has everything it needs for Dark Sun

[Ruin Explorer]

There is a niche I've been mentioning frequently in threads, and the Psion can grab it. It's the same role as the 4e Elementalist Sorcerer, Can Just Do Stuff with as little juggling as possible (although the Warlock is already pretty close to that(. In the Psion example it would be going Carrie rather than throwing water balls at people.

How is this not the Mystic which I suggested as what the Psion should be?

Here I think we're on about the same page. You might want more out of defiling than 4e gave, but defiling and preserving should be a choice on a spell by spell basis rather than separate classes.

I literally suggested the Mystic class. I'm not sure how that's a "buzzword or abstract concept". I don't think I put it in in an edit, but if I did, I guess you missed the edit, but anyway, that's what I suggest. Basically do two more balance passes on the Mystic - yes it can burst too hard - it's trivial to limit. Yes literally 3 abilities are overpowered (which is a lot smaller than some classes lol!), nerf them. Two passes would fix it.

I suspect we actually agree on what the Psion should be

And if all I get are buzzwords and abstract concepts then I rapidly come to the conclusion that it does nothing.

Sure, but I feel like it's really vital. Without that extra oomph, no player ever going to be tempted to have his PC Defile, and it'll even be kind of hard to figure out why baddies would, because all the suggestions I've seen make the gain totally and utterly trivial in the name of balance. 4E basically offered a non-mechanic.

it makes the game larger, more complex, more confusing and, most importantly less accessible.

I totally disagree, like hard-disagree.

If D&D was a different kind of game, not exception-based, you'd be absolutely right. Shadowrun for example does have this problem because theoretically anyone can do anything, even though they probably don't.

But D&D is exception-based in design. You literally don't need to know anything about a class you aren't playing, it's a bonus if you do, but it literally never stopped anyone playing D&D. I've played this game for 30+ years and the number of classes has varied wildly, like hugely, but has that ever impacted accessibility? No. Because you don't need to know. One of the first games I ran for entirely new people, almost all new to D&D, we had the all the basic 2E classes, all the OA classes, the FR-specific classes (like the Spec Priests and stuff), and it was absolutely accessible, because people just picked a class and learned what they needed and played.

5E has been lax in adding classes because it was an Apology Edition, trying not to scare the horses. The designers know Psions will add something, too, which is why they keep trying, and why they started trying long before the Artificer. A Psion would add far more than the Artificer. Just make him as you said, this very direct, "I do this"-type caster who doesn't use slots, but a specific set of abilities (which can be fairly small). The Mystic is largely there, as I said.

 

[Neonchameleon]

What does a Psion -do-?

I mean... there' 3 different editions of D&D which carry over various concepts and core precepts, specifically power points, theming, and the idea of improving your powers through a fungible resource that is not "Spell Slots" because the resource is meant to be more granular.

The problem with this is that the spell slots as they have been historically have gone. You no longer prepare a spell in a slot but instead prepare or even know a number of spells and have fungible resources to spend on them. The mechanical difference isn't there (especially not with sorcerers getting their metamagic points that allows them to reshuffle the slots.

It was a mechanical implementation that made sense in 2e and 3.X and for very different reasons in 4e - but doesn't really in 5e.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

It was a mechanical implementation that made sense in 2e and 3.X and for very different reasons in 4e - but doesn't really in 5e.

Sure it does. Mystic had it working absolutely fine and appears to achieve the goals you were outlining.

Basically you want a caster that's like most casters in fantasy novels (many of whom are far more like psionicists than D&D wizards, albeit Harry Potter ain't one), who spontaneously cast spells and gradually drains themselves (either of a magical resource, or physically, by casting/channelling), and who tend to do simple magic that either controls people or the environment.

A good example would actually be the recent Shadow and Bone - all the Grisha are basically psionicists in D&D terms, just with a small specialized pool of abilities in most cases (so like, very low-level or something). They call what they do "The small science", because it's largely limited to physics/biology stuff (mind control could easily be added and in practice they can do it by controlling the body, people underestimate how much our endocrine system runs us). But if you read the books, there's also ACTUAL magic, like "change reality" magic, and they go together really well and have very different characters.

 

[Steampunkette]

The problem with this is that the spell slots as they have been historically have gone. You no longer prepare a spell in a slot but instead prepare or even know a number of spells and have fungible resources to spend on them. The mechanical difference isn't there (especially not with sorcerers getting their metamagic points that allows them to reshuffle the slots.

It was a mechanical implementation that made sense in 2e and 3.X and for very different reasons in 4e - but doesn't really in 5e.

Yeeeeeeah... no. No.

Power Points being their own thing would still work in 5e. And the Mystic's Discipline groupings would likewise be significantly different from 5e Spellcasting.

 

[TwoSix]

But D&D is exception-based in design. You literally don't need to know anything about a class you aren't playing, it's a bonus if you do, but it literally never stopped anyone playing D&D. I've played this game for 30+ years and the number of classes has varied wildly, like hugely, but has that ever impacted accessibility? No. Because you don't need to know. One of the first games I ran for entirely new people, almost all new to D&D, we had the all the basic 2E classes, all the OA classes, the FR-specific classes (like the Spec Priests and stuff), and it was absolutely accessible, because people just picked a class and learned what they needed and played.

As someone who uses dozens of homebrew classes in their own game, with no real confusion by the players, I agree. WotC has been overly conservative with adding classes to ensure they don't "rock the boat".

 

[tetrasodium]

Barring the class issues being discussed I think the biggest problem for a 5e darksun to feel right lies in wotc. Specifically the cold weather survival rules on 10-11 in rhime of the frostmaiden show they still aren't willing to think of such things as something with overarching effects as opposed to a mere hurdle that can check a box with a technicality. So many of the previously existing optional rules suffer from similar problems where they ask N people what they thought of different things & got rid of anything that didn't meet a 70% threshold.

The ovely simplistic weapons & armor system lacking room for subjective elements where crude materials (ie bone/stone) can be differentiated from pre-cleansing relics like plain metal weapons & armor likewise makes a mess of things. Fixing this should be an easy drop in replacement with a simple set of monster adjusting formulas based on either average group level or monster CR. Those monster adjusting formulas could have the added benefit of allowing wotc to wrench the system math around a bit & create room for things like feats & magic items in the system's math.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

So many of the previously existing optional rules suffer from similar problems where they ask N people what they thought of different things & got rid of anything that didn't meet a 70% threshold.

I think they may have stopped doing this. More recent UAs haven't mentioned it, and haven't even sort of implied the criterion existed anymore. Instead it's been more like "Here's what we're doing, tell us what we've messed up, we'll fix it", rather than "We beg you to allow us to do X!" which was the initial UA approach. I'm not sure we've heard a single thing supporting it since Ray Winninger took over from Mearls.

 

[Neonchameleon]

How is this not the Mystic which I suggested as what the Psion should be?

I literally suggested the Mystic class. I'm not sure how that's a "buzzword or abstract concept". I don't think I put it in in an edit, but if I did, I guess you missed the edit, but anyway, that's what I suggest. Basically do two more balance passes on the Mystic - yes it can burst too hard - it's trivial to limit. Yes literally 3 abilities are overpowered (which is a lot smaller than some classes lol!), nerf them. Two passes would fix it.

The problem with the mystic is that I don't see what it adds - and if it's intended to be simple it's a complete failure. You get surprisingly long spell lists here, fiddly mechanics, and not ultimately things that are that different from casters with themed spell lists.

This doesn't mean I think it's unsalvageable - but based on the 2017 Unearthed Arcana the disciplines need shredding and we need to not have e.g. 27 power points at 5th level with a limit of 5 per spell and three disciplines known, therefore a potential of 15 different special abilities not counting talents or subclasses. You've at least as much fiddly stuff to juggle as a wizard does - probably more given that (a) you get the powers in great big gulps rather than a couple of spells at a time and (b) not only do you have these powers but for many of them you need to decide how many power points to spend

If D&D was a different kind of game, not exception-based, you'd be absolutely right. Shadowrun for example does have this problem because theoretically anyone can do anything, even though they probably don't.

But D&D is exception-based in design. You literally don't need to know anything about a class you aren't playing, it's a bonus if you do, but it literally never stopped anyone playing D&D.

It has however (a) driven DMs to distraction and (b) got in the way of people learning the game. It's also intimidating for newbies - so yes it has stopped people playing. I have no objection at all to seriously different complexity levels to accomplish different things, but the problem with the Mystic in particular is that it's a resource-managery spellcaster that does very similar things to themed spellcasters so doesn't add that much. And because it's a quasi-caster it adds complexity and confusion, doing almost the same things in a different way.

Being massively better than Shadowrun is not being perfect, and keeping the classes down is one of the smart moves 5e has made.

I've played this game for 30+ years and the number of classes has varied wildly, like hugely, but has that ever impacted accessibility? No. Because you don't need to know.

Yes it has. Because some people start from the books to see if it's something they want to do. You can get past it but there is still a cost. There's survivor bias in your comments - with the DM teaching rather than bouncing off the rulebooks.

5E has been lax in adding classes because it was an Apology Edition, trying not to scare the horses. The designers know Psions will add something, too, which is why they keep trying,

Do they? They've been adding psionics - but the psychic warrior is an explicit fighter subclass.

and why they started trying long before the Artificer. A Psion would add far more than the Artificer. Just make him as you said, this very direct, "I do this"-type caster who doesn't use slots, but a specific set of abilities (which can be fairly small). The Mystic is largely there, as I said.

And I've pointed out why the mystic (as of 2017) isn't even close to being there. It started on the right path and then massively overcomplicated things to the point it reads to me like Analysis Paralysis: the class. Which is the opposite of what I think we both want.

 

[Steampunkette]

@Neonchameleon

That was pretty much the resounding response they got from the playerbase, yup. "Too many options that mimic every other character class"

But now that Wild Talents and a few Subclasses allow other classes to touch on Psionics they can make a Psionic class that doesn't "Need" to cover every possible aspect. Which is, apparently, the design philosophy they took when they started the Mystic.

Huzzah!

 

[Neonchameleon]

@Neonchameleon

That was pretty much the resounding response they got from the playerbase, yup. "Too many options that mimic every other character class"

But now that Wild Talents and a few Subclasses allow other classes to touch on Psionics they can make a Psionic class that doesn't "Need" to cover every possible aspect. Which is, apparently, the design philosophy they took when they started the Mystic.

Huzzah!

You have described one half of the response they got from the playerbase. "Too many options that mimic every other character class."

The other half of the response is "Once I've built my character I've so many options in this specific character I'm suffering analysis paralysis when I try to play them." You could easily get rid of three quarters of the disciplines so you weren't encroaching other classes and you'd still find a lot of players (probably the majority) had a miserable experience trying to actually play the Mystic above level 4. And when the problem is analysis paralysis it's not just the player suffering analysis paralysis that has a bad experience, it's everyone playing at the same table as them and waiting around for them.

It's not that they produced too many aspects, it's that they produced too many options within each aspect and threw around too many power points. There's a reason they gave up on the entire design.