D&D 5E MCDM The Talent available now. Psionics class for 5th edition D&D.

[darjr]

Just in time for my new campaign!

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This fifth edition supplement features the talent -a hero that uses mind powers to battle monsters and overcome obstacles.


This is the MCDM take on the psion!


Characters with extraordinary mental powers not derived from prayer or magic feature in many of our favorite stories -Eleven from


Stranger Things, Professor X or Jean Grey from the X-Men. Many of Stephen King's stories, like Dead Zone or Firestarter, feature pyrokinetics or telekinetics. The Talent and Psionics gives you rules to build these characters.


Talents don't use spell slots. Instead when you manifest a power you might gain strain. At first, strain isn't anything more than an annoyance, but as it accumulates, it becomes more debilitating. Accumulating a lot of strain can actually kill a talent!


It's up to them to decide. How desperate is the situation? How badly do you need to succeed? How much are you willing to sacrifice to save your friends-or the world? The power is in your hands.

The Talent

Brains are better than Brawn! This fifth edition supplement features MCDM’s next class, The Talent — a hero that uses mind powers to battle monsters and overcome obstacles. This is the MCDM take on the psion! Characters with extraordinary mental powers not derived from prayer or magic feature in...

shop.mcdmproductions.com

J-H gives us a quick overview of the final Talent.

I have it and am reading through it.
Psionics works mostly like magic, but they recommend not having it be impacted by antimagic field, dispel, etc., or Identify. Trying to make it a bit more different than in 3.5.
Magic Resistance applying to saves is optional, same with DR/magic.
No changes to the action economy in how powers are manifested.

6 orders (levels) of powers. Based on when they come online by character level, I expect the following equivalencies:
1 - cantrip (you start with 4 and gain 2 more)
2 - 1st level
3 - 3rd level equivalent
4 - 5th
5 - 7th
6 - 9th

You can concentrate on multiple powers at a time. If you have to make a Concentration check, one check covers all of them, so all-or-nothing.

The Talent class:
There are 6 power types, and everyone can learn everything. Not sure there will be a psywar/self-enhancer type, not far enough along. There are 6 schools plus "maverick," so 7 subclass versions.
Sorcerer-type... d6 hd, light armor, sorcerer weapons, Con and Int save proficiencies.

Powers above first order require a manifestation test, which starts as a d4 and eventually goes to a d8. A 2nd order power requires a 3 or above to manifest normally; if you roll a 2, you gain 1 strain and manifest; if you roll a 1, you gain 2 strain (based on the Order/level of the power) and it manifests. If you're concentrating on other stuff, the DC increases by 1 per other thing concentrating on. So if you're concentrating on 3 powers and manifest a 5th level power, you need to roll an 8 to get only 1 strain...otherwise you get 5.

Strain has a variety of exhaustion-like effects that gradually wear down your movement, skills, body, etc. It starts at 5 and maxes out at 24, although there are a few tools at higher levels to mitigate it. If you exceed your strain maximum, you die.

Strain clears completely on a long rest, or you can expend hit die during short rest to clear it at a 1:1 ratio, so Talents are a mix of LR/SR based. I like this.

Talents can learn 1 new power every level, or swap one out for another known. As a reaction, if someone else manifests a power the Talent doesn't know but can learn (2nd-6th order, based on character level), a reaction + manifester die roll lets the Talent start learning the power. It takes 1hr per day (short rest time is OK) for a specified number of days to finish learning the power, capping out at 16 days of 1 hr/day practice for 6th Order powers. Only 1 power at a time can be learned. Unless a game has a lot of downtime, the Talent isn't going to pick up tons of powers from enemies, but will probably get a few.

There are some metapsionic options (exertion) you get for free. They cost strain to activate, but let you do thinks like bump the minimum rolled damage, shove when you affect a creature, double the AOE, hypnotize, restrain a target, etc. The automatic strain cost means you effectively cut your castings per day down to use this, so the player must make decisions! That's good.

More later.

 

[Zaukrie]

I hope someone buys this and comments on it here. I'm quite interested. OTOH, I'm not likely to use it for PCs. On my third hand, it has a lot of DM material.....

 

[overgeeked]

My goofy meter has no upper limit.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I hope someone buys this and comments on it here. I'm quite interested. OTOH, I'm not likely to use it for PCs. On my third hand, it has a lot of DM material.....

Me too. Would love to hear what people think of it.

 

[darjr]

Getting it, on the road and can’t read it right now though….. oh but I want too.

 

[Zaukrie]

Getting it, in the road and can’t read it right now though….. oh but I want too.

I hope you make it out of the road ok....

 

[darjr]

I hope you make it out of the road ok....

Oh the strain!!!

 

[aco175]

Makes psionics actually interesting to me, some. I would be interested in some more on it. Normally I just swipe skip on psionics stuff.

 

[Retreater]

PDF only, I presume?

 

[darjr]

PDF only, I presume?

Yea. I wonder if they’ll do a compilation?