For Nail - The Psion

[Shadowdweller]

Likely I didnt cover it well enough when I said it last, sorry about that, but going strictly by the raw they understand common. Personally, I dont have any problem with that. If the dm wishes to change it that is his perogative, but then we are outside of the raw and it will likely cause other problems. (of course, I treat them as understanding common and the language of their plane whenever I run it, so ::shrugs:

Wow! You didn't actually read a single word I wrote, did you?

And most understand, even if they do not speak, Common - just like the majority of extraplanar D&D creatures.

Aside from the largest groups, such as demons, devils, and elementals you mean. (Although the former two generally have telepathy, so the point is largely moot.)

 

[Galfridus]

I had some issues with Psionics in my game last night, and rather than start a new thread, I'll add to this one, since it seems relevant.

I definitely run a "few encounters a day" game -- especially now, at 16th level, the PCs have the ability to retreat at will, making it unlikely that they will fight more often than they want to.

In the previous session, the party had just slain a dragon -- not just a dragon, but THE dragon, the dragon that was the central NPC for more or less the entire game. It was a large fight -- the Psion used Bend Reality several times, maximized Crystal Shards, etc., and was down to about 25% of his PP. He and one other PC then got caught in a teleport trap and ended up fighting a four person team of 16th level NPCs. He got mazed; when he came back, it was him against a Wizard, a Cleric, and a Rogue, who were ready for him.

Round 1: Wizard Chain Lightnings him, Rogue shoots him (only hitting once due to +13 Inertial Armor). He manifests Temporal Acceleration, and summons an Astral Construct 9 (overchannel / Talented), which kills the wizard in one round. The cleric tries to Dispel the construct and fails.

Round 2: Rogue shoots again, hitting once. Astral Construct kills the Cleric (Rending, ~120 points of damage). He does Temporal Acceleration again to start summoning another Construct.

Round 3: Rogue goes invisible via potion. Second construct shows up with Blindsight, flushes out Rogue. Psion uses a Cold energy ball to finish him off (no Reflex save, no evasion).

I was pretty stunned. There really wasn't any luck here -- he just outmatched them, badly.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

Aside from the largest groups, such as demons, devils, and elementals you mean. (Although the former two generally have telepathy, so the point is largely moot.)

Exactly.

 

[two]

I had some issues with Psionics in my game last night, and rather than start a new thread, I'll add to this one, since it seems relevant.

I definitely run a "few encounters a day" game -- especially now, at 16th level, the PCs have the ability to retreat at will, making it unlikely that they will fight more often than they want to.

In the previous session, the party had just slain a dragon -- not just a dragon, but THE dragon, the dragon that was the central NPC for more or less the entire game. It was a large fight -- the Psion used Bend Reality several times, maximized Crystal Shards, etc., and was down to about 25% of his PP. He and one other PC then got caught in a teleport trap and ended up fighting a four person team of 16th level NPCs. He got mazed; when he came back, it was him against a Wizard, a Cleric, and a Rogue, who were ready for him.

Round 1: Wizard Chain Lightnings him, Rogue shoots him (only hitting once due to +13 Inertial Armor). He manifests Temporal Acceleration, and summons an Astral Construct 9 (overchannel / Talented), which kills the wizard in one round. The cleric tries to Dispel the construct and fails.

Round 2: Rogue shoots again, hitting once. Astral Construct kills the Cleric (Rending, ~120 points of damage). He does Temporal Acceleration again to start summoning another Construct.

Round 3: Rogue goes invisible via potion. Second construct shows up with Blindsight, flushes out Rogue. Psion uses a Cold energy ball to finish him off (no Reflex save, no evasion).

I was pretty stunned. There really wasn't any luck here -- he just outmatched them, badly.

That sounds kinda scary.

 

[Scion]

So, what you're saying is that, unless conventional spellcasters have spells without somatic components (of which there is a rather limited list), they're utterly hosed. Psions, on the other hand, are merely inconvenienced by grappling and not even that at high levels. That sounds pretty much like what I said. Psions are somewhat vulnerable to grappling, but not nearly as vulnerable as conventional casters.

As I said before, it does effect casters more than manifestors, generally speaking. However, as we get into higher levels the caster types will effectively always have an answer for it, or they are simply asking to be killed. Blocking off weaknesses is part of high level play. There are quite a few ways around this, some easier than others, some more mundane than others.

But, I did say that psions have an easier time, but they are both hindered by it.

Also, there are spells with no somatic components, and the divine casters will tend to have an easier time at it than the arcane guys also. Once again, there are differences in the weaknesses but there are issues that are shared.

Stick a 10th level wizard in an evard's spell and he's pretty much hosed

Same goes for a number of classes actually, especially the rogue. I believe I saw somewhere that people wanted to change that spells grapple bonus to be much less than what it is. (also, I would expect anyone who can cast high enough spells to have some sort of contingency plan in case something bad like this happens, if not why is it the psions fault?)

So, if silence is a dramatically broken spell and psions are unaffected by it, one might conclude that it is a rather significant advantage for psions.

So, you want to change the psion instead of the broken spell? That makes no sense what-so-ever EB.

If conventional casters were less vulnerable than psions to various ovepowered spells and powers, that would be a mark in their favor. However, (other than, arguably, magic missile) I can't think of any spells that conventional casters can defend against more easily than psions can.

Lets just say that spell turning is a very poweful spell. There is a defense against an incredibly large number of spells and powers and works much, much more effectively against psions than against other casters generally. (psions have a lot of short range targetting powers)

Other casters tend to be able to cast at much longer ranges also along with having some spells with near infinite versitility that can work in a number of situations (such as the shadow spells, or even illusions in general which the psions have no powers that compare).

(All this, assuming, for the sake of the argument that silence is broken--I'll leave to one side whether the judgement of someone who prefers 3.5 darkness can be trusted to give good estimates of what constitutes "broken").

Apparently you have not seen just how crazy that spell can get with a properly prepared strikeforce. While the new name is silly (it should be called something like, 'shadows' or 'shadowy illumination' or some such) and has some odd effects (like lighting up a dark room) at least it fixes the other problems. Not perfect yet, but much better on the balance scale.

Really? I notice you don't mention any.

True to a degree, good of you to notice. Of course I did this on purpose to give people a chance to think. But then, I did mention some before, they were just ignored.

If you read even what you wrote previously, you should be well aware that your evidence does not support this conclusion.

you gave three of which one is completely effective, one only slightly less effective against the psion than the caster (this because there are a number of ways for the caster to avoid such situations or get out of them once they happen, more than the psion has, so one is more susceptable but has an easier time getting away while the other is less susceptable but has a harder time getting away), and one that is completely broken as written.

If those are the best of the best for taking out casters then it can easily be said that it must be hard to shut them down. If it is hard to shut one down and just as hard to shut another down (like it tends to be hard to shut down just about any class completely) then there isnt much that is wrong here.

Still, mages are pretty fragile for a number of reasons, but then so are psions. Psions tend to not care as much about some of the things that really effect mages but are more hindered in other areas.

If people feel that mages are treated unfairly in this comparison then maybe getting rid of a few sacred cows will help.

 

[Scion]

You didn't actually read a single word I wrote, did you?

yes I did, then said that the others had explained the situation well. Did you not read what they said? After that, I went on to explain a little more about what I was trying to say and basically just a little blurb about what I do. There is no need for you to be rude about it. Apparently you didnt know how the raw works, now you do.

 

[Nail]

Still, mages are pretty fragile for a number of reasons, but then so are psions. Psions tend to not care as much about some of the things that really effect mages but are more hindered in other areas.

I have seen no such hindrance.

In each case, when we bring up areas where side-to-side comparisons with other arcane casters, the pro-psions do there best to say: "But that's no big deal". The over-use of the tactic speaks volumes.

If game balance were a scale, the psion side would be touching bottom, while Sor/Wiz would be up there hanging.

 

[Galfridus]

I've been thinking about this all morning, and apart from spell-specific tweaks, the issue for me boils down to limiting a Psion's single-encounter output.
I had two ideas -- both are fairly radical, but can be added to the existing rules without

-- Some sort of "overload" cost, where using lots of PPs in successive rounds causes some sort of penalty.

-- Splitting up the PP pool into smaller than 24 hour segments; for example, the psion gets 1/4 of his PP total for the first 6 hours, 1/4 for the next 6 hours, etc.

 

[Scion]

In the previous session, the party had just slain a dragon -- not just a dragon, but THE dragon, the dragon that was the central NPC for more or less the entire game. It was a large fight -- the Psion used Bend Reality several times, maximized Crystal Shards, etc., and was down to about 25% of his PP. He and one other PC then got caught in a teleport trap and ended up fighting a four person team of 16th level NPCs. He got mazed; when he came back, it was him against a Wizard, a Cleric, and a Rogue, who were ready for him.

Round 1: Wizard Chain Lightnings him, Rogue shoots him (only hitting once due to +13 Inertial Armor). He manifests Temporal Acceleration, and summons an Astral Construct 9 (overchannel / Talented), which kills the wizard in one round. The cleric tries to Dispel the construct and fails.

Round 2: Rogue shoots again, hitting once. Astral Construct kills the Cleric (Rending, ~120 points of damage). He does Temporal Acceleration again to start summoning another Construct.

Round 3: Rogue goes invisible via potion. Second construct shows up with Blindsight, flushes out Rogue. Psion uses a Cold energy ball to finish him off (no Reflex save, no evasion).

I was pretty stunned. There really wasn't any luck here -- he just outmatched them, badly.

Definately interesting, I do have a few questions though.

Why did the mage use such a sucky spell? If it was 3 on 1 he could easily have readied his action to disrupt anything that the psion tried to manifest first of all, or he could've used, say, a simple enervation (possibly empowered/maximized/quickend with a rod) practically would've ended the encounter right there, or even disentegrate (nonelemental damage, much higher damage on a failed save and about the same damage on a successful one, possible crit chance). He also had access to 8th level spells so maybe he could've even mazed the psion again after he was blasted by the other two people he was with.

The rogue did nothing at all? Now, I havent played many high level rogues, but I assume they can do more than fire a few arrows, especially given that the people apparently had at least a round to prepare. Still though, +3 bow, +1 point blank shot, +6 dex, +12 BAB, +1 weapon focus, +1 haste (this is all pretty conservative as I dont know what buffs the enemies had put up, but these are basic) = +24. Even vs ac 30 two hits are pretty likely, and if he had gone invis while the people were mazed then the first one would be sneak attack also (for +8d6 damage) this would have also possibly ended the fight right there.

The cleric tried a greater dispel (assuming). Now, did he get the psion in the radius as well? if so then that could be by by to the inertial armor. Personally if I was the cleric I probably would've popped up an antimagic field and waded up to the psion. Heavy armor vs no armor, Medium BAB vs Low BAB, d8hd vs d4hd, along with immunity to just about anything the psion could do.

But then, I dont get why the cleric didnt do something 'before' the psion got to go anyway. The psion had just been hit by a 16d6 lightning bolt, very unlikely to make his save (but possible) probably has energy resistance 10+ (why not, everyone does at these levels, though not usually to lightning, still, benefit of the doubt). So, half damage - 10 = 18 damage. For some reason this wasnt empowered (npc gear is low so that is likely the reason) so this isnt much damage if the save was successful and the psion had some defense up. If the save was failed and the psion had no defenses then 56 damage means the psion would need at least a 14 con to survive (not hard, in fact I would expect it to be at least 16 from items).

Next we have a hit from the rogue, nonsneak attack (is this a real rogue?). We'll say this does 12 damage or so (d8 +3 enhancement +1 point blank +3 str +d6 fire +poison?). Now we are up to 30 damage total even if things are going really well for the psion. If he had been half dead from the ealier part of the fight then he is already dead now.

So, I am not sure what this example is trying to show. One character basically has nothing thrown against him and takes down 3 guys who mostly just stand there and take it without doing anything. A well built tank would've done exactly the same thing in this situation and would've been able to do it several more times that day instead of the psion being completely tapped at this point. (11 + 17 (+focus) +11 +17 (focus) +? = 56 +? is about 25% of his total resources for the day) Along with him being shaken for most of the encounter (important part of this is -2 to saves, skill checks, and ability checks, which means some of those concentration checks might fail and it is easier to fail those saves)


Still, looking at the construct we have a guy that can, at max on a full attack (with extra attack and rending and muscle) 2d6+18 *4 = 120 (non crits, but rolled max on each die). He has an attack bonus of +30 but can only penetrate magic DR and no way to bypass things like displacement. On average, if all hit and no other mitigating factors, this would be 100 damage. So the mage would only need an 18 con or higher or just about any sort of defensive things (blur, displacement, etc) and of course be full on hp (cleric standing by who was apparently not doing anything, might as well be healing if needed).


all in all, I'd have to say that attacking targets that use ineffective tactics and roll poorly isnt a very good comparison. Especially when the construct is apparently criticaling several times in a round and no one has up any sort of defenses.

 

[KarinsDad]

Yeah. Our party's shaper used astral constructs all the time and to great effect. Then we realized that summoning spells (and astral construct) have a full round casting time. I don't think he's used them since.

Yup. Enemies should go out of their way to prevent full round spells or manifestations.