Anyone else annoyed by psionics?

[Nail]

I know this has come up before, but: "Boy howdy, It'd be nice to see some real-game examples of psions an' Arcanists in the same group!"

On paper, the psions look much better than arcanists. ...Yet several posters here (Hi, Scion! Hi Psion!) have said again and again how balanced the psions really are.....

 

[Psion]

On paper, the psions look much better than arcanists.

Do they? I thought Sorren showed pretty thoroughly in the past incarnation of this thread that even on paper, sorcerers hold their own and surpass psions.

It seems to me that "on paper" means "given my assumptions about what is important and my limitations" which has included allowing psions a torc of efficiency but denying arcanists access to metamagic rods.

...Yet several posters here (Hi, Scion! Hi Psion!) have said again and again how balanced the psions really are.....

All I know is that:
1) none of their capabilities stand out to me as gamewrecking (except for +1 DC/pp augmentation powers, which strike me as needing errata'd or house ruled. But then, I think MT's are potent at high levels, so what do I know?), and
2) running them as PCs and NPCs, I have seen no indication to the contrary.

To me, to call something unbalanced requries one of two criteria:
1) Characters of the given class (race/magic item/whatever) consistently outshine the rest of the group, and/or
2) It is difficult for the DM to challenge the party with the character in question in it without causing udnue adverse effects to the rest of the party.

I have found neither to be the case with Psions or Psychic warriors (I've never run a wilder in my games and won't be allowing soul knives).

What I'd be interested in hearing is actual examples of how psionic characters have hogged the spotlight or trampled over supposedly tough encounters in your games. So far, I am mostly hearing fear and loathing from people who apparently never even considered allowing psions in their game, and are just manufacturing excuses to justify their foregone conclusion.

 

[drothgery]

One question: Could you post the relevant stats of your player's psions and what kind of powers they manifest usually?

My kineticist (in Spatula's game), at 5th level (he just hit 7th last session), is statted at
http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?t=97363 (Aral Karef). Usually I end up having Aral mainfest one or two defensive or sensory powers (Inertial Armor and/or touchsight, as we seem to either attack or be attacked at night), then using the rest of my power points on Energy X attack powers (sometimes trying a bit too hard to argue that I really can fit one more bad guy in a power's area of effect). Since it's a Dark Sun game, we're obviously very low on equipment, but we do have a few beyond-standard abilities (everyone got Wild Talent for free; and some minor background skill bonuses).

 

[Nail]

Do they? I thought Sorren showed pretty thoroughly in the past incarnation of this thread that even on paper, sorcerers hold their own and surpass psions.

...and I disagree, obviously.

]I have found neither to be the case with Psions.

..and I have. So, what does that prove?

I agree with your definition of "broken". Great stuff. And both you and I should note that a great deal of that definition has little to do with the RAW....it has far more to do with implementation and use by players and DM.

IME (different from yours, obviously), psions beat the pants off of arcanists. Part of that might be that "min-maxers" are drawn to the psion class. I must admit: the players who like psions also like squeezing everything they can out of a given character type. (And, BTW: there's nothing wrong with that.)

So, lemme put it to you this way: Psions are the easiest spell-casting class to munchkin-ize.

How's that?

 

[Psion]

...and I disagree, obviously.

Of course you disagree. It contradicts your foregone conclusion.

I agree with your definition of "broken". Great stuff. And both you and I should note that a great deal of that definition has little to do with the RAW....it has far more to do with implementation and use by players and DM.

Which is entirely unsurprising. There were cries in the last thread by both sides of the argument that a given paper/post comparison doesn't tell the whole story. And it doesn't. I've said before and I'll say it again: balance is very situation sensitive. The supposition behind two of my most rued changed in 3.5 is that DMs maul horses left outside a dungeon and never run wilderness adventures. Obviously, I disagree with both of those premises.

Trying to prove that psionic characters are broken is non-elucidative. If they are more potent than existing classes by some criteria, the potency is slight enough that it does not stick out in any game I have run.

What would be productive is knowing what situations psionic characters are strong/weak in and using that as a guide for the DM to produce challenging situations. Which is really not that different than for any other class.

So, lemme put it to you this way: Psions are the easiest spell-casting class to munchkin-ize.

And yet, the d20 character optimization forum has yet to produce a flurry of "psion smackdown" threads.

Yet, fighters still seem to figure prominently in such threads. Yet, I don't ban the fighter from my game.

 

[Thanee]

Do they? I thought Sorren showed pretty thoroughly in the past incarnation of this thread that even on paper, sorcerers hold their own and surpass psions.

Has he? Only thing I have seen is, that the sorcerer's spellcasting and the psion's power manifestation will be about equal (with a slight advantage to the sorcerer), if - and only if - the sorcerer is able to use the whole alotment of spell slots! A premise I made from the beginning in every comparison I made between those classes so far.

But I have already addressed this in the other thread.

It seems to me that "on paper" means "given my assumptions about what is important and my limitations" which has included allowing psions a torc of efficiency but denying arcanists access to metamagic rods.

Best is removed of all items, I think, or just using the stuff both have, since I doubt magic items are meant as an inherent part of class balance, as they are supposed to be balanced to each other all by themselves. It's an inherent part of the balance, that all classes have magical stuff, tho, but that's a difference.

In the "post your psion/sorcerer thread" I said, that I believe metamagic rods distort the image, and the psion I have posted will work perfectly well without the items I gave him (especially psionatrix and third eye), while the sorcerer will totally fall apart without the metamagic rods.

But then, I think MT's are potent at high levels, so what do I know?

The MT is potent at very high levels (close to epic).
But the MT is also incredibly weak at low to mid levels.

What I'd be interested in hearing is actual examples of how psionic characters have hogged the spotlight or trampled over supposedly tough encounters in your games.

There have been a few already by various posters. I think one mentioned a psionic character with Astral Construct totally overshadowing the rest of the group in play.

So far, I am mostly hearing fear and loathing from people who apparently never even considered allowing psions in their game, and are just manufacturing excuses to justify their foregone conclusion.

Not me, at least. I neither fear psions nor loathe them.

And while we havn't used the XPH for obvious reasons (why should we use something when we all know that it is not what we want?), we have had extensive experience with the very similar psionic system from 3.0 including the material from ITCK and MS.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Thanee]

My kineticist ...

Thank you!

Bye
Thanee

 

[Psion]

Has he? Only thing I have seen is, that the sorcerer's spellcasting and the psion's power manifestation will be about equal (with a slight advantage to the sorcerer),

Your memory fails you. His analyses showed the sorcerer can put out more slightly damage AND have spell slots remaining after the psion is out of PP.

Best is removed of all items, I think,

But isn't that removing the relevance of any such analysis, as any game will have some items?

The MT is potent at very high levels (close to epic).
But the MT is also incredibly weak at low to mid levels.

Indeed it is. Which is why I created homebrew remixes of the MT that front loads it a little stronger but knocks out some casting levels near the high end.

But what do I know? I obviously have no perception about what is balanced.

And while we havn't used the XPH for obvious reasons (why should we use something when we all know that it is not what we want?)

Not using something you don't feel fits your game is one thing.

I do question your campaign of defamation against psionics though. Regulating what goes into your game is fair game, provided you are giving your players a fair shot at enjoying themselves. Posting suppositions about rules which you have never even played with (no, 3.0 is not the same thing as 3.5) is entirely another.

Edit: But if you are claiming 3.0 psions are strong, I am not sure we have any basis to communicate at all.

 

[Scion]

The problem he talks about only appears with the psion, quite obviously.

And if you would read what I said:

If he has no problem with other casters, but is having a problem with the psion, then there is something more wrong here than campaign style.

Then you would understand.

If he is having no problem with other casters then there is no reason he should be having any problem with the psion.


Also, power points are a limited resource. Several people on this thread seem to think that just because the psion has a few hundred this means that it accounts for a great deal. However, when converting spells to equivalent power points and adding them up the other caster types tend to be way ahead, plus their spells scale much more freely. So, obviously the versitility is paid for, even if it is not always easy to see. These power points run out very rapdily, especially if one wants to have full effect for everything (which is sometimes very necissary to be able to be effective).

Note that the seer above is going to run out of pp very fast. Between doing a few things in combat, having a few buffs up now and then, and useing out of combat powers he was bled dry pretty fast and it looks like he did almost nothing in combat. Looks like if anything the dm should be worried about that player being able to have fun rather than wondering how to nerf his character.



As for the astral construct overshadowing the party, was the guy a fairly high level constructor with a bunch of everything pointing towards just making constructs?

Even then though, someone focused on summon monster would do better. In nearly every case the summon monster is simply better than the equivalent level astral construct. With the constructor thrown in then the astral construct starts to be able to compete.

But then most people think that summon monster isnt terribly strong anyway most of the time (there are a few levels which are exceptions in certain circumstances).

So, if they are having a problem with astral construct, and the guy isnt a constructor, then they would absolutely 'hate' having a summoning guy in the party.


As for the comparison in the other thread. After X number of rounds (whatever X was) the psion was out of pp but the sorc wasnt terribly far behind in damage (depending on what the sorc did it was somewhere between 40 and 70, but it was a whole lot of total damage either way). Then, after that the psion was done for the day, but the sorc just kept on going. Sure, he wasnt doing massive amounts of whatever, but he had lots of utility slots open and could still deal impressive amounts of damage (overall the total wound up being that for pure damage the sorc could do nearly twice the damage of the psion in the day). The comparison definately made the psion feel wanting in the end.

 

[Nail]

Trying to prove that psionic characters are broken is non-elucidative.

...or, at least, not sufficiently compelling to change the minds of you or myself. But the minds of the un-washed masses, however......

As an aside, I've found these threads to be immensely "elucidative", in the sense that they explain what does and does not work....and even (perhaps!) what might be changed in the psion to make the class acceptable IMC.