humble minion
Legend
I've never seen or used a psionic character in my games (other than the odd mind flayer or similar that's never used the full psionics rules). But that's (imho) because i've always played in relatively 'conventional' D&D settings like FR or similar homebrews, and psionics fit less well there in my opinion. I owned the 3e psionics handbook, but that's more because i was a compulsive completionist than for any other reason. It just seemed like yet another subsystem to learn in an already rules-heavy game.
Having said that, however, I have an enormous love for the Dark Sun setting, and would love to play in it (and would probably play a psionicist if i did). Psionics are just built more into the DNA of Dark Sun from the foundation of the setting, and are a much better thematic fit there.
My (completely evidence-free) speculation is that WotC's various surveys are showing what the enworld surveys are showing. Loads of love for Dark Sun as a setting (among those who remember it at least, I have no idea what the Critical Role generation think!) but a very low take-up of psionics as a ruleset in general. I speculate that WotC will react to this by making psionics a Dark Sun Thing - putting any psionic PC options in a Dark Sun book, and if people want psionics in other settings they can just port the rules over. And they'll probably try to make psionic PC options subclasses of existing base classes rather than creating a whole new system, for the same reason - saving page count, and avoiding putting too much effort into a system that few people use. Maybe they'll get duplicated into a Xanathar's 2 down the track.
Having said that, however, I have an enormous love for the Dark Sun setting, and would love to play in it (and would probably play a psionicist if i did). Psionics are just built more into the DNA of Dark Sun from the foundation of the setting, and are a much better thematic fit there.
My (completely evidence-free) speculation is that WotC's various surveys are showing what the enworld surveys are showing. Loads of love for Dark Sun as a setting (among those who remember it at least, I have no idea what the Critical Role generation think!) but a very low take-up of psionics as a ruleset in general. I speculate that WotC will react to this by making psionics a Dark Sun Thing - putting any psionic PC options in a Dark Sun book, and if people want psionics in other settings they can just port the rules over. And they'll probably try to make psionic PC options subclasses of existing base classes rather than creating a whole new system, for the same reason - saving page count, and avoiding putting too much effort into a system that few people use. Maybe they'll get duplicated into a Xanathar's 2 down the track.
Last edited: