For Nail - The Psion

[Nail]

hey nail

Hey ho!

Leaving the issue of summon monster aside for the moment...

I'm afraid you can't. Not without leaving aside the central issue!

Astral constructs, are they too powerful as written?

And your question begs the real question: "Are Astral Constructs too powerful as written as compared to other magic-summoned aid?"

Now, this power has a few limitations which definately come into play.

1) One round casting time.

Equal to Summon Monster/Summon Nature's Ally, and so irrelevant.

2) Shaper only power.

You answer this one yourself: "or they spent a feat to gain it."

If my cleric could spend a feat to get it (and the ability to freely heighten it), I'd have no arguement with you. None at all.

3) Only one construct in a single manifestation. Sometimes having only a single bruiser simply isnt good enough.

True. Now, if only the multiple brusers from SM were good enough.....

And let's not forget: summoning multiple monsters can still leave you with only one monster. 1d3 has, with a 33% chance, a number of "1".

4) Small list of abilities to choose from and very few to pick.

Your "small list of abilities" are the cream of the crop! What on Zeus' green earth are you talking about! And you can trade down the power list, 2 for 1. ......Wait a minute: have you ever played a shaper?

5) Dispel magic, dispel psionics, dismiss ectoplasm, dissipator weapon, suppression weapon, antimagic field, etc..

Of these, only "dispel magic" is common enough in our game to be a significant hindrance. And since that effects Summoned monsters just as well, it's a moot point.

I'd love to see some examples given about how they are too strong/weak. Making up actual constructs for given situations.

Me too, from other groups. As I'm the summoner in my game, I have the worked up monster list, including the only applicable feat (Augment Summoning). I've cast side-by-side with our party's Psi(shaper), with his 2 applicable feats (Boost construct and overchannel). It's clear to all at the table who is out-of-whack.

 

[Nail]

BTW: I just had a discussion with our group's psion. I mentioned I might play a psion next, 'cause they're just so powerful. He said: "There are plenty of ways to thwart the psion......"

But he wouldn't give any specifics....heh, heh......I DM our group sometimes, so his reasoning is clear enough.

So: How do you bring Psions down to earth? So far, the only convincing arguement I've heard is "have all of the monsters attack him all the time". Anything else more helpful? What is the psion's (apparently hidden) weaknesses that bring them down to the same level as a wizard, say?

I'm all ears.

 

[two]

BTW: I just had a discussion with our group's psion. I mentioned I might play a psion next, 'cause they're just so powerful. He said: "There are plenty of ways to twart the psion......"

But he wouldn't give any specifics....heh, heh......I DM our group sometimes, so his reasoning is clear enough.

So: How do you bring Psions down to earth? So far, the only convincing arguement I've heard is "have all of the monsters attack him all the time". Anything else more helpful? What is the psion's (apparently hidden) weaknesses that bring them down to the same level as a wizard, say?

I'm all ears.

Good question.

 

[Scion]

I'm afraid you can't. Not without leaving aside the central issue!

Actually, you can. If you choose not to then there is already a problem.

And your question begs the real question: "Are Astral Constructs too powerful as written as compared to other magic-summoned aid?"

And here is the problem. It does not beg this question, the question you just possed is completely irrelevant at the time being. Hence why I said to ignore it. The question you just possed clouds the point I was making and tosses in things akin to, 'well, fireball does fire damage and a lot of it, comparing it to cone of cold, which does no fire damage at all, fireball is completely overpowered! up to 10d6 of fire damage vs 0 fire damage! unbalanced!'

The spell and the power are aimed at different things. Ac is based on being able to stand up in melee and effectively nothing else. The summons dont do very well in melee generally (some do, some do incredible jobs in melee in fact but that isnt the point), so if you compare a specialist power that does one thing to a generalist spell which does many things but not merely the one thing they other can do.. I am sure that everyone can see the problem with comparing the two for only melee combat.

If not I'll try again. If we compare two things, one which is good in a narrow band of situations and another that is good in a wide range of situations then I will expect the first to win out in its emphasis nearly 100% of the time. If it doesnt then something is wrong.

After that, coming in and saying that the first is broken because it beats the second just doesnt make any sense.

Equal to Summon Monster/Summon Nature's Ally, and so irrelevant.

Now, now nail.. this is beneath you. It is relevant as a balancing point for the power in general. Which is part of the question I was asking. Also, as I said ignoring the summons as much as possible, yet again bringing point number 1 to bear.

It is a very important balancing feature. The manifestor leaves himself unable to do anything until his next turn. During which time nothing has happened and his power may be disrupted. Sure, you wont always be disrupted, but again nothing has happened until just before his next action. This means that any other single action power could've been used instead to gain some other more immediate benefit. Definately a major balancing point.

You answer this one yourself: "or they spent a feat to gain it."

Being put even further behind on the resource list. Really, the amount of resource investment that is being either ignored or tossed aside here is staggering.

If my cleric could spend a feat to get it (and the ability to freely heighten it), I'd have no arguement with you. None at all.

The cleric has so many other benefits far outstripping the psion that it is incredible to even think that the cleric would need something else above and beyond the psion.

The cleric already gets a free scaling version of summon monster, more so than the psion. The cleric gets domains for more abilities and whole extra lists of spells that might generally be out of his reach. Better hd. Better BAB. Better saves. More abilities. More casting potential. Better heals. Better party buffs. Armor proficiency.

So, the cleric doesnt even have to spend a feat to get the 'freely heightened' version of summon monster. The tradeoff for them is that they can only summon certain alignments.

Who is behind the power curve in this comparison again?

True. Now, if only the multiple brusers from SM were good enough.....

But they are, for what they were meant to do. Going back to the earth elemental they arent terribly dissimilar, but the construct comes out ahead in direct melee.. of course the elemental has other benefits (such as earth glide). So even while being behind in one area the elemental is ahead in others.

And let's not forget: summoning multiple monsters can still leave you with only one monster. 1d3 has, with a 33% chance, a number of "1".

and a 33% chance of being 3, and a 33% chance of being 2, or a 66% chance of being higher than 1, or an average of 2.

The 'option' is there for one while it is not there for the other. If you feel that the option should be better complain to the summon monster powers that be to make it better, dont go around nerfing everything else.

Your "small list of abilities" are the cream of the crop! What on Zeus' green earth are you talking about! And you can trade down the power list, 2 for 1. ......Wait a minute: have you ever played a shaper?

Yes I have, and if you will be kind enough to read I even mentioned the trade (it is mentioned in the very next sentence of what you quoted strangely enough.

It is a small list of abilities, the summon monster list is orders of magnitude larger. Even failing that however the number of choices one can get is very small. For AC 1, 2, and 3 they only get a single choice of the A list. That is it. I'd definately call that a limited selection. Even after that, say AC 4, 5, 6, they only get one choice of B or two from A. Generally speaking the higher level lists are better, so you can get two lower level abilities instead of a higher one. Good for options, sometimes bad for power.

While it is customizeable to a good degree it still sucks for the constructs, they dont have a lot of options.

Going back to the summon monsters pretty much all of them have a good amount of resistances, some amount of SR, Damage reduction pretty early on, smite of some kind, and various other abilities that all come standard. Each one gets a lot more in the 'stuff' category but less ability to pick and choose. Which of those two choices is stronger depends on the who gets what of course and the situation one is in. But, given that, it is very possible for the summoning to come out way ahead and in fact it does pretty often for this sort of thing.

Of these, only "dispel magic" is common enough in our game to be a significant hindrance. And since that effects Summoned monsters just as well, it's a moot point.

For the first I'll just say, says you. But, even with that, dispel magic tends to be common enough that it is all that is needed. Failing that however in any game which actually has psionics incorporated (not a difficult task, no more difficult than adding stuff from any other book, and it is designed to lend itself to this easily) will see some of the others.

Still, it is just one thing on the list. It is a hinderance, it is a balancing point, and it is completely unimportant if it effects both equally well.

Me too, from other groups. As I'm the summoner in my game, I have the worked up monster list, including the only applicable feat (Augment Summoning). I've cast side-by-side with our party's Psi(shaper), with his 2 applicable feats (Boost construct and overchannel). It's clear to all at the table who is out-of-whack.

Yeah, the summoner isnt playing to his strengths very well.

I only say this because trying to fit a round peg into a square hole doesnt work very well. Like the example above if someone starts complaining that their cone of cold doesnt deal enough fire damage (something it isnt designed to do at all to begin with) that doesnt suddenly mean that fireball is overpowered or that cone of cold is underpowered.

If a caster type wants his summons to do something that they are not very good at then that sounds like prc territory to me. Give up a few feats, and maybe some caster levels, and pop out with much more impressive summons.

If this is the same summoner that was mentioned before (the cleric) then it is no wonder there is some difference going on, if you cut out over half of your options then you should be weaker in that department. Especially considering the base class that the person is coming from.

If the specialist who is behind in every/nearly every other way (and incredibly so as compared with the cleric) isnt leaps and bounds ahead in his area of emphasis then something is seriously wrong.

Second, if the comparison is going with one persons strengths and against the second persons then there is zero reason to change either one to make them the same.


Once again though, the question is, 'are the astral constructs too powerful as written?' and not 'are they too powerful as compared with summon monster?'. At least as far as I have written. If we do the second question first then we 'still' have to answer the first, if we answer the first then the second question is unimportant. I see no reason to try to answer both when only one is needed.

 

[Scion]

BTW: I just had a discussion with our group's psion. I mentioned I might play a psion next, 'cause they're just so powerful. He said: "There are plenty of ways to thwart the psion......"

But he wouldn't give any specifics....heh, heh......I DM our group sometimes, so his reasoning is clear enough.

So: How do you bring Psions down to earth? So far, the only convincing arguement I've heard is "have all of the monsters attack him all the time". Anything else more helpful? What is the psion's (apparently hidden) weaknesses that bring them down to the same level as a wizard, say?

I'm all ears.

He is a caster with only one good save and a serious lack of hp, along with a very small pool of pp (I have played as, played with, and dm'd for casters of all types, the psion is one of the first to go dry, even when being frugal).

So, as a parallel question, how does one bring, say, the cleric down to earth? They are a much tougher beast in nearly every way. So, to rephrase your question, 'what is the clerics (apparently hidden) weaknesses that bring them down to the same level as a wizard, say?'

 

[Nail]

It does not beg this question, the question you just possed is completely irrelevant at the time being. Hence why I said to ignore it. The question you just possed clouds the point I was making and tosses in things akin to, 'well, fireball does fire damage and a lot of it, comparing it to cone of cold, which does no fire damage at all, fireball is completely overpowered! up to 10d6 of fire damage vs 0 fire damage! unbalanced!'

Errr!???

You're not serious.

You think we shouldn't compare A-C to SM!!!!????

We're not comparing apples to oranges here, you know.

 

[Diirk]

If this is the same summoner that was mentioned before (the cleric) then it is no wonder there is some difference going on, if you cut out over half of your options then you should be weaker in that department. Especially considering the base class that the person is coming from.

If the specialist who is behind in every/nearly every other way (and incredibly so as compared with the cleric) isnt leaps and bounds ahead in his area of emphasis then something is seriously wrong.

I'm not sure I understand this argument 'especially considering the base class that the person is coming from'. Since its ok for astral construct from the more 'specialist' psion to be better than the 'generalist' cleric's summon monster, does that mean that a sorcerer's summon monsters should be better than a psions astral constructs ? After all, the sorcerer is ever more limited than the psion... (remember he has to learn summon monster not once, but once per level he wants it at !)

There's a problem tho... its the same spell for clerics and sorcerers. We can't just make it more powerful for sorcerer and less for the cleric...

 

[Nail]

So, to rephrase your question, 'what is the clerics (apparently hidden) weaknesses that bring them down to the same level as a wizard, say?'

You keep trying this. Rephrasing or re-directing the question, that is. It does little more than obscure the thread's issue.

To orient you: At this point we're comparing a psion's power list to that other classes. I was asked (up above somewhere), about the problems with a specific power: Astral Construct. To compare, I used the spell Summon Monster. Trying to confound this discussion with another about clerical power (or monk power, or druid power, or....) simply is not germane to the discussion.

Other than Scion, is there someone else that doesn't think that A-C can be compared to SM?

 

[helium3]

One thing I haven't noticed anyone address in this discussion is the fact that psions can tweak their blasting powers for best effect.

A sorcerer who knows fireball and encounters a fire elemental is screwed; a psion just sets phasers on cold.

I think this is a significant advantage.

I agree. I really like psionics and make a lot of effort to work them into my campaign world so that they don't have the "tacked on" feel that everyone seems to complain about. Of the complaints about the 3.5 psionics system, this is one of three or four that I take fairly seriously. I haven't quite figured out how to fix it, but I suspect the conclusion that I will come to is that all evocation schools with energy subtypes will probably allow for variable energy types. I'd probably also tack on that acid as an "energy subtype" is only available for conjuration school spells.

 

[Scion]

You think we shouldn't compare A-C to SM!!!!????

We're not comparing apples to oranges here, you know.

No, we are comparing something that is designed to do one thing to another which only 'can' do that one thing but also has lots of other uses.

Like I said, answering one question instead of having to answer two is better. Even if we answered the question you were trying to pose we still have no real answers. Why try to answer a question when the answer wont matter?

Specialist power that is primarily useful in melee combat and has little other use had better be better than the generalist one that has lots of different uses. If the second ties or beats the first then the first is 'highly' underpowered.



And to diirk, it doesnt matter how good or bad summon monster is compared to astral construct, that is the point, they do different things. Besides, if you wanted to compare the two you would first have to show that summon monster is weak/strong/just right. The other points I was making that you quoted were bringing up that there were so many other factors clouding that issue that it just isnt worth going after.

The sorc would likely only have to spend a few slots, each of those would grant much more versitility overall than the astral construct power and it is debateable which is more costly (a few slot choices or the feat, given that sorcs have more spells known than psions have powers known).


Yet again though, the issue isnt which is better in their respective fields between summon monster and astral construct, it is simply if astral constructs are too powerful as written.

To try to compare with with summon monster as a basis for determining overall balance wont work. We dont know if summon monster by itself is too weak/too strong/just right, we'd have to compare the strength of a specialist to the strength of a generalist, and then we'd have to compare use/cost ratios between the two. That is a lot of work and in the end we still havent answered the question of whether or not astral construct is too strong.