Malhavoc's Mindscapes

[Victim]

The benefit for the using your best ability is denying the other guy a bonus. Switching to a mode based on a weak attribute is like inviting the enemy to cream you.

 

[Particle_Man]

This sounds good. But the numbers don't hold up. What is an uber stat? 28? OK, that is +9. If I go to my 14 stat I lose 7 points. Now that is a big loss. But could it be a worthwhile risk? Maybe. And the vast majority of cases will be less extreme.

And if you use ability scores, you have 2 factors to consider. How strong do I want my check to be vs what is the best effect I could use. As it stands, you will always just choose the best effect. So while there may be more variety of selection under the existing system, that in no way implies that tactics are involved. Choosing DR when you need it and AC when you need that is far less tactical than deciding if the DR in the hand is better than the AC in the bush.

But remember, its not just a matter of you winning
the mindscape combat. It is a matter of you NOT LOSING the mindscape combat. So on the uber-stat
question, you would want the defense against the other guy's chosen mode, as well as the chance of offense. I think it would be safe to say that very few people would take that double risk by trying a non-uber stat. So we come back to the lack of variety problem. On to the example of the mind flayer, I may want to try something that is related to a non-uber stat, and then I remember
that the mind flayer is trying to get its chosen
advantage over ME, and that ain't gonna be pretty.
No way I would risk that. So speaking personally, if I had an uber-stat and ability mods were in play, I would not risk anything not tied to the uber-stat, and its strong guarantee of a good mindscape defense. I think that most people in this discussion group feel the same way, as no one seems to be chiming in to support your view.

Think of a parallel -- If you were using a rapier
(no shield) but had a chance to use a cursed greatsword that was -5 to hit AND gave you a -5 AC penalty, but would do double the damage of your rapier, and you were in combat with a fighter, would you take that kind of risk?

In addition, don't forget that with epic rules, an uber-stat can get VERY uber. Like str 100. And some people do play with epic rules.

Furthermore, I think a case can be made for avatars having nothing to do with how strong their host is. Avatars seem to be a different kettle of fish. Since this leads to a simplification and not a complication, this is OK.

Now your concern is that one would always choose
the 'best' out of the 12 possible effects for a
given situation. But it is not always clear what
the 'best' effect would be. A better to hit roll on one attack? A better will save? Damage resistance? You may or may not know what mode the other person is using, and it is less likely you will know what move an opponent will try in the 'real world'. Thus I do not think that one will
always fall back on the 'best of 12', since that may not be easy to identify. In some cases, admittedly, it may be. (If you know for a fact that the opponent has a poisons stinger, a good fort save sounds like a plan (but even here, good AC bonus is another tactical option)). This is an acceptable use of tactics -- you make a judgement based on the situation to narrow your options, when that is possible. And since it won't happen all the time, it won't cause one to be a mode #4 guy, or whatever. This happens in gaming all the time. The party has the rogue check for traps when they find a chest. This does not seem to be a limitation that upsets or bores people. So neither would it upset or bore people to realize, "hey, in this particular situation I bet a will save bonus would be useful, so I will try the mode that gives me that". Since situations change, and since people can misread situations, there is little danger of boredom in picking one's mode. There is a danger of exactly that happening with the abilities modifying modes. Few people are going to take a strong 'mode to hit' and 'mode ac' penalty in order to get a slightly more useful effect. Most people would play conservative, and go for the more sure benefit (and more importantly, the more sure chance of denying their opponent a benefit). So I think that the greater variety of tactics, for most players, is preserved by not having abilities affect modes.

IMHO, most people's enjoyment of mindscape is therefore increased by NOT having ability mods on modes. Since you could easily add ability mods to modes for your home campaign, I think the simpler way is better. No ability mods for modes. One less thing to calculate on this once per round roll. The enjoyment of most campaigns is increased because of this, and the slight flavour text jarring of modes associated with stats that have no effect on the modes is a trivial thing, in most campaigns, in comparison. Just because powers were tied to ability modifiers doesn't mean that modes have to be. The former, by the way, was precisely to RESTRICT the powers that a particular psion would choose. In your campaign, What I think of as trivial is apparantly not trivial, and you are welcome to change the mindscape rules (I know I am making some of my own changes, as outlined in earlier posts in this thread) but I bet that few others care as much about this as you.

Thus I support Bruce Cordell's choice in this matter.

All that said, I still think that mind blast/psionic blast is overpowered, but that has been true since 1st ed AD&D.

 

[Zarrock God of Evil]

Re: Re: REVIEW: Part 1

If you open green and close red, that's not going to work.

Oops! Thanks for noticing ...

That sounds surprisingly like a feature of my own homebrew: the disembodied spirits of sundered gods, incarnated in the very land now, and that can be reached by attuning one's mind to their own strange, often insane, and usually comatose psyche, in order to steal their power -- roughly how psionics works IMC.

They are sth like that, though, they were once powerful mortals - not gods. Both your concept and the one in Mindscapes is a bit similar to the way Shamans interact with their spirits in OA as well. I very much like the notion of Psionic Nodes...

-Zarrock

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Without commenting on the 2 handed feat, I'll ask if you agree with this statement.

Yes. Such things are often house-ruled away in my campaigns (eg Polymorph Other abuse isn't allowed), but not in all.

Of course, the counterpoint is that the DM shouldn't let something that can be abused actually be abused.

Anyway, you're welcome

 

[BryonD]

Particle_Man,

You do make some good points, but I think they mostly repeat ground already covered.

I do not dispute that my way will cause people to tend to go to their strength. But I still contend that the choice of when to go away from your strength would be much more interesting.

Everything you said about not knowing which effect is most desirable would remain true. But instead of a simple, one dimensional choice of which is the best effect, you would have a two dimensional choice of which is best and how much gamble is it worth?

I think your rapier / greatsword example overstates the case. None of the effects offered by mindscape combat come anywhere near as extreme as BOTH -5 to hit and -5 AC. And if they did, that would be bad. By the same token, who cares if the system breaks down at Epic level play? If you have STR 100, none of these effects are going to be a real big deal.

Anyway, you did present the arguement in an effective manner. And I don't see that there is much more life for this debate.

At this point, I am actually leaning towards just staying with what I had before. Psionics, but no psionic combat. That has worked well before, so I see no need to change. This system is much better than the old, but I guess not enough to win me over.

Thanks

 

[Staffan]

All that said, I still think that mind blast/psionic blast is overpowered, but that has been true since 1st ed AD&D.

Not so sure it's overpowered anymore, now that it's a 5th level power, and only stuns people for 1d4 rounds. 3d4 rounds, sure, but 1d4?

 

[Staffan]

Re: old modes redux

Some of the old modes-cum-powers are too tough for their level, I think. Id Insinuation, Mind Thrust and Psychic Crush are like the spell Ray of Enfeeblement except Ray of Enfeeblement gives the victim a save. Solution? Give the three modes a will save.

Note that the former attack modes don't inflict ability damage. They give an enhancement penalty. That means you won't be likely to put anyone down with them, since they won't stack. They're great against opposing spellcasters, however.

 

[Particle_Man]

a chance for bonebrains?

I think the feat Overwhelm Buffer needs to be modified. As it stands, a 1st level psion has about a 75% chance (I think) of getting DR 3/- against any
one non-psionic opponent. That seems too powerful. I suggest putting in
the "bone-brain" defense of +8 for the non-psionic dragged into mindscape (I see it as the semi-avatar only being able to defend, so maybe is like a statue that the psionic avatar gets to beat on. Similar to trees having hardness as a defense at the expense of mobility, which animals get). Also, I think in this
case mindscape would not be automatic, so that the
psionic character would have to wait until her initiative to start the mindscape with a
non-psionic (so if the psionic character is surprised, she cannot start a mindscape with a non-psionic yet). And in a shared mindscape of many psions and a non-psionic character's avatar, only those psionic characters with overwhelm buffer could detect/interact with the semi-avatar of the non-psionic -- the rest would be mindblind (followng my idea from an earlier post). And of course overwhelm buffer would not work on mindless creatures. And I assume that the whole mindscape collapses if a null psionics field/anti magic field blocks line of sight in the physical world.

Hmmm...I wonder if the DR ability of the mode
"body tank" will have to be modified in light of 3.5E's supposed changes to DR in general. I will have to see what they do with the DR abilities of the barbarian and the dwarven defender.

Still, all of this is mere tweaking. The idea of
mindscape is very appealing, and brings back a
useful version of psionic combat that does not
slow down the rest of the combat. Kudos!

 

[Particle_Man]

Re: Re: old modes redux

Note that the former attack modes don't inflict ability damage. They give an enhancement penalty. That means you won't be likely to put anyone down with them, since they won't stack. They're great against opposing spellcasters, however.

Well, psychic crush/id insinuation/mind thrust give an enhancement penalty, that's true. But ray of enfeeblement also gives an enhancment penalty, to strength. Like the first three, it requires a succesful ranged touch attack. Unlike the first three, it also requires a save. This seems imbalanced to me. I am inclined to give the first three a save as well. I suppose one could take away the save from ray of enfeeblement (great against opposing egoists?). But in a fight between new rules and the PHB, I tend to back the PHB. But that may be my prejudice.

Hmm...now all we need are rays to reduce Dex and Con (er, give them enhancement penalties), and we will have the whole set!

 

[Ashrem Bayle]

The way I see it, this is a case of "one class is just better at some things".

The minute Whitefire does the same damage as Fireball, I'll add saving throws to these new psionic powers.