D&D 4E Let's Talk About 4E On Its Own Terms [+]

[AbdulAlhazred]

They may not work too well mechanically, but they work really well lorewise. I believe 4e is the only edition where psionics doesn't feel out of place. Like in other editions psionics just feel like they have no real place in the world. They are an alternative to magic, but you can replicate all their effects with magic, to the point 5e has struggled a lot to implement them in this edition.

While in 4e they are a well defined power source that is different to arcane and divine magic thanks to its usability (and unique albeit weird mechanics). The psionic power is also tied to the fiction, and you why it exists and why it's different to magic.

Yeah, I agree, they do work well enough in that sense. Honestly, 1e is the only previous edition where I can comment on psionics (totally bad mechanics and no explanation at all of what they are and why they're different from magic). So maybe 3e did something interesting, but I never hear about it so I'm guessing no. The 4e version feels solid and a bit "this is not your grandpa's magic". And, honestly, the mechanics mostly DO work, they just produce some boring spammy class designs. OTOH many people loved the utterly boring spammy slayer, so...

 

[Red Castle]

The Psionic classes... I have such a love hate relation with them...

Back in 2nd edition when I started playing DnD, me and my group were not fans of psionics... we felt they didn't quite fit in our vision of medieval fantasy and they looked pretty strong, so we felt they were more for the powergamers, something we were not (don't know if it's the case or not, that's just how we felt). So we never played them. Then came 3rd edition and we all pretty much skipped it (not because we didn't like the game, just because our interest were elsewhere, maybe a little burned out of DnD). Then came 4e, I fell in love with the mecanics and started a campaign. When the PH3 came out, my campaign was already started and seeing that it was mostly psionic classes, I decided to skip it, so I didn't buy the PH3.

Fast forward to 2 years ago. After maybe 10 years, I decide to get my 4e books out and start a new campaign. But before character creation, I decide to buy the books that I was missing, including PH3 and Psionic powers. Now, since I have the books, I decide to read on the psionic classes, in case one of my players wanted to play one. And I fell in love with their lore, particularly the Ardent. Someone that is playing with the emotions of others and using it for or against them, so inspiring. So much so that in my current campaign, it inspired the design of one NPC: Onyx, the most famous Opera Singer in the world, a Changeling Ardent. They can change their appearance to fit their role, play with their voice to sing like no other and use their ardent power to accentuate the emotions of the spectator so much that they come out transcended.

Sadly, mechanically speaking, I'm not a fan of the augment mechanic and point system. I mean, it looks okay, but I guess when it comes to 4e, I prefer to have a lot of options and well, Psionic classes (except the monk) just have less powers than the others. It looks like they would just use the same power over and over again, just with some variation to them. But since I never actually had a player playing one in my games, I'm just going with my feeling on this one. Maybe in game they are not so bad. I definitely would love to have one one day since now I love the lore about them... but looks like my players still prefer to stick with more classic classes... ah well, guess I'll use them as NPC then...

I must point out, the Psionic Power book is from my point of view what power book should have done from the beginning. Each class has 4 pages just describing the class and telling how to play it. It was a great read and I wish they would have done the same with the other classes.

 

[deganawida]

The Psionic classes... I have such a love hate relation with them...

Back in 2nd edition when I started playing DnD, me and my group were not fans of psionics... we felt they didn't quite fit in our vision of medieval fantasy and they looked pretty strong, so we felt they were more for the powergamers, something we were not (don't know if it's the case or not, that's just how we felt). So we never played them. Then came 3rd edition and we all pretty much skipped it (not because we didn't like the game, just because our interest were elsewhere, maybe a little burned out of DnD). Then came 4e, I fell in love with the mecanics and started a campaign. When the PH3 came out, my campaign was already started and seeing that it was mostly psionic classes, I decided to skip it, so I didn't buy the PH3.

Fast forward to 2 years ago. After maybe 10 years, I decide to get my 4e books out and start a new campaign. But before character creation, I decide to buy the books that I was missing, including PH3 and Psionic powers. Now, since I have the books, I decide to read on the psionic classes, in case one of my players wanted to play one. And I fell in love with their lore, particularly the Ardent. Someone that is playing with the emotions of others and using it for or against them, so inspiring. So much so that in my current campaign, it inspired the design of one NPC: Onyx, the most famous Opera Singer in the world, a Changeling Ardent. They can change their appearance to fit their role, play with their voice to sing like no other and use their ardent power to accentuate the emotions of the spectator so much that they come out transcended.

Sadly, mechanically speaking, I'm not a fan of the augment mechanic and point system. I mean, it looks okay, but I guess when it comes to 4e, I prefer to have a lot of options and well, Psionic classes (except the monk) just have less powers than the others. It looks like they would just use the same power over and over again, just with some variation to them. But since I never actually had a player playing one in my games, I'm just going with my feeling on this one. Maybe in game they are not so bad. I definitely would love to have one one day since now I love the lore about them... but looks like my players still prefer to stick with more classic classes... ah well, guess I'll use them as NPC then...

I actually liked 3.0’s psionic classes. The psychic warrior was awesome, IMO.

 

[Kannik]

Part of the oddity might arise from how Psionics in D&D cover a lot of ground, from the traditional Telepathy/Psionic Blast as well as Telekinesis and object control powers, to including Body Control/Manipulation/Healing, Elemental Control/Pyrokinesis powers, and other things. The Monk can fit well within those aspects in the "body control/manipulation" aspect of it, with its higher movement abilities, ability to run on vertical surfaces, self-healing, stunning attacks, resistance to disease, withering palm, and more (depending on the edition). So while in 4e they might feel the odd person out within the Psionics power source as they don't interact with any of the mechanics or feats of the other psionic classes, they also do fit within the realm of what psionics has meant within D&D.

(This isn't to say whether they work best in the Psionic power source and/or whether more could've been done to integrate them into other power sources... or if they should've been Psionic/Martial as a power source... or just martial... or something else. Just that I can understand how/why they fit within the Psionic source. )

 

[James Gasik]

I actually liked 3.0’s psionic classes. The psychic warrior was awesome, IMO.

I found the Wilder to be far more interesting than the Sorcerer.

 

[Staffan]

Yeah, I agree, they do work well enough in that sense. Honestly, 1e is the only previous edition where I can comment on psionics (totally bad mechanics and no explanation at all of what they are and why they're different from magic). So maybe 3e did something interesting, but I never hear about it so I'm guessing no. The 4e version feels solid and a bit "this is not your grandpa's magic". And, honestly, the mechanics mostly DO work, they just produce some boring spammy class designs. OTOH many people loved the utterly boring spammy slayer, so...

3.0 psionics was more or less just a spell power point system for what acted mostly as regular spells, only weaker in many cases (particularly because they didn't scale, and because AOE powers did d4s instead of d6s), with the added "benefit" of psionics characters being vulnerable to various psychic attacks which would inflict ability damage. Oh, and psions were the MADest characters around, because each discipline (basically schools for psionics) was based on a different ability score.

3.5 psionics built on this but removed the MADness, and added a mechanic similar to 5e's upscaling (e.g. a 3rd level power would normally cost 5 PP, but if you spent 9 PP on it you could get effects more suitable for a 5th level power), except it also covered things that were different spells on the magic side, which would often allow more gradual improvement than spells do. For example, psionic charm is a 1st level power that's pretty much equal to charm person. For +2 PP (the equivalent of +1 spell level) it can affect a number of relatively normal creature types instead of just humanoids, or +4 PP for more overtly supernatural ones, and you can increase the duration from hours to days for +4 PP. So the equivalent of charm monster is the equivalent of a 5th level power for a psion as opposed to 4th, but you can "build your own" to get just the aspects of the upgrade you need and get away with a lower level.

Another cool thing they did was to have a core psion power list containing a fair number of powers, but reserving the more distinctive ones for psions specializing in that particular discipline. It's basically the equivalent of any wizard being able to learn lightning bolt or vampiric touch, but only evokers getting fireball and only necromancers getting animate dead. You could poach a power from another discipline via a feat, which is a pretty heavy investment.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

This reminds me of the best description I read on the character roles:

A striker is there to deal damage.
A defender is there to take damage and hold attention.
A leader is there to relieve damage and help others.
A controller is there to make the DM pull their hair out.

"Alright, I have this great plan..." (Controller takes their turn) "Well, that doesn't work now."

"Excellent, next turn this monster will lay the smack down on..." (Controller takes their turn) "Uh, ok, nope..."

"Oh yes, you've all fallen into my traps you little pretties... (Controller takes their turn) [Sound of paper being torn up]

Though, that could happen with leaders too!

"Alright, you are hit and the enemy does..." (Leader goes "Nope!") "Excuse me, what?" (Leader describes their power nullifying the whole thing...)

And as a DM I LOVED IT.

(Also liked it as a player, to be sure, but seeing clever players with clever plans and clever powers messing up my own clever plans and clever powers always made me laugh.)

One thing I liked about DMing 4E was that I basically didn't need to know what the players exact powers or spells were. I mean, you pick up some stuff over time, but most of the time you can just let yourself and your NPCs get surprised, while you use the NPC uglier tricks to surprise them. There is rarely a power that nullifies an encounter, but there is almost always a power that let the players swing things their way, maybe turning the environment or tactical positioning to favor them for a bit.

 

[Mannahnin]

I don't think that is the choice. How about a fairly weak crossbow replacement that has the color of being a spell? Or an alternate choice that is similar to some basic stealth ability, or a minor temporary light source? It's not a choice of one or the other, you can have cantrips that give a flavor of magic without a giant powerup.

My explanation of the alternatives these two games offer in how magic works was not intended to be an exhaustive list of possibilities.

Just trying to contrast the two and explain how a B/X M-U can still be fun, and why magic is still their main trick despite being much more limited in how many spells they can cast per day (until they get a wand, anyway).

 

[Voadam]

The first D&D-ish thing to link monks to psionics - as far as I know - is the early 80s Dragon article "He's got a lot to kick about". Rolemaster also flagged a possible link, in one of the Character Law options.

I remembered that Rolemaster monks were semi-spellcasters with spell lists similar to paladins and rangers and that Rolemaster had an essence, channeling, mentalism split of their magic. I had used their three type split to contextualize 3e D&D psionics easily when the 3.0 psionics book came out. Looking back I see that monks were not directly tied to the mentalism category but to essence magic. Given the 2e D&D psionics descriptions as internal power I can see tying D&D monk ki powers to psionics instead of to divine magic (as 2e did) or its own thing.

In any case I did like the second hand 4e psionics lore I picked up on big picture 4e psionics being a developed world antibody reaction to unnatural intrusion that does not rely upon other power sources.

 

[James Gasik]

I remembered that Rolemaster monks were semi-spellcasters with spell lists similar to paladins and rangers and that Rolemaster had an essence, channeling, mentalism split of their magic. I had used their three type split to contextualize 3e D&D psionics easily when the 3.0 psionics book came out. Looking back I see that monks were not directly tied to the mentalism category but to essence magic. Given the 2e D&D psionics descriptions as internal power I can see tying D&D monk ki powers to psionics instead of to divine magic (as 2e did) or its own thing.

In any case I did like the second hand 4e psionics lore I picked up on big picture 4e psionics being a developed world antibody reaction to unnatural intrusion that does not rely upon other power sources.

Rolemaster is an interesting beast. They apparently found the Monk concept so difficult to capture in a single class that there are three of them- Monk, Warrior Monk, and High Warrior Monk!