Psion power balance questions

[ForceUser]

I don't have anything to contribute, but I laughed out loud when I read this one:

12) Dimension Door or Teleport an incorporeal undead into the Sphere.

If the sphere is only big enough for one, as Nail said, then that means they're sharing the space. That's wickedly brilliant!

/salute RBDM

 

[Scion]

Pretty bold claims.

List 5 such misleading or incorrect statements here.

Just 5? ok

Saying that psychic reformation is borderline overpowered because it can be used to get rid of less useful feats seems a bit misleading. Two characters of identical class, race, etc who have chosen feats slightly differently should be of a roughly equivalent overall powerlevel. If one chose feats very, very poorly and the other chose exceedingly well this would not be the case. That is of course their perogative, but having the option to fix the problem, with a pretty serious price tag also, seems more of a 'convenient' factor instead of 'overpowered'. Limited wish could be used to gain the same effect.

Dispel psionics is worded poorly but taking into account the wording of the power itself and the wording of the augmentation it should be plain enough that it means the maximum augmentation bonus and not giving an actual straight bonus to the roll. Reading it purposefully in a poor way and then claiming that the power itself is broken seems rather silly. Poorly worded sure, but if one reads the rest, especially the part in parenthsis, it is clear what they were trying to say.

Temporal acceleration takes over 19pp in order to come close to matching the power of a single time stop. While time stop is incredibly poweful temporal has extra drawbacks. It may still be considered to be too strong at higher levels, but it is still much weaker than time stop.

The -6 manifestor level on schism along with its other inherant limitations (can only take purely mental actions and such) make it pretty weak overall. In some builds which are trying to maximize the amount of powers total manifested in a certain period of time it can be useful, but overall it is generally better for a psion to 'not' get it and pick up something else instead. Having a different choice will tend to make for a better character overall. -6 manifestor level means much shorter range, difficulty getting past SR/PR, 3 power levels lower manifested which means lower saves, etc.

Energy missile goes from no bonus to save up to a pretty good sized bonus to a save. However, it is incredibly limited in how it works (small area, targetted, elemental damage, etc) along with being outdone in a lot of other ways (such as spells/powers which deal damage but do not allow a save.. such as polar ray.. polar ray is a pretty horribly underpowered spell, but in several ways it is actually stronger than energy missile at equivalent cost). The potential bonus to a save comes from these limitations plus it is a specialist only power (or a psion who spends a feat). Those are not insignificant costs and all they get you is some extra direct elemental damage. Which, at higher levels when the save becomes high, is generally pretty worthless anyway. Horrid wilting is insanely better at equivalent costs, even with its lower save, for example. Or one could compare with spell focus, in a way. Spell focus grants a +1 all of the time to a school of spells vs spending a feat on energy missile to get between +0 and +8 to a single power only. Not a great direct comparison, but an interesting side by side view. Smaller bonus to many or a potential larger bonus to one.

Focus is a huge balancing factor for psionics. If you want to use many powers that require focus, especially at levels before 10 or so, requires spending about 3 feats (psychic meditation, psicrytal affinity, psicrystal containment) since some of the checks might fail. Even with all of these it basically makes psions take the same amount of time to use meta feats as the sorc (standard + move either way, it just costs the psion more along with the psion only being able to use one at a time and needing to make a check).

Dimension slide is a power which takes you a very short distance (about the same as a single move or a double move at high manifestor level) which takes 9pp to use as move equivalent (so still giving up your move either way and costing as much as a 5th level power) and is psychic warrior only. I fail to see anything overpowered here in the least. Useing a valueable power known slot along with a pretty good amount of pp in order to basically what you could have done with the movement from the action anyway... ouch.

Astral construct is made for combat only vs summon monster which can be used in combat but can also be used in a lot of other areas as well. Along with the summons generally having more abilities along with abilites that the astral construct cant even hope for. They really are made in different ways with different goals in mind. If one wants to complian that fireball is underpowered because it doesnt do as much cold damage as cone of cold (say when they are both doing 10 dice of damage) is pretty silly, doing something similar for the other guys is along the same lines of silly.

Dispelling buffer is a decently high level power that doesnt do anything unless someone tries to dispel your effects. Even then, all it does is give you a bit of a boost when resisting this dispelling (+5). 11 pp a couple of times a day in order to be able to hope your abilites are slightly harder to get rid of isnt exactly a powerhouse of doom.

Many spells have a bit of scaling, in that they start off at so many dice and then go up to some other amount where they cap out. Psionic powers start off at their cap but some can have extra pp put in to get more dice.

Psions are just as fragile as any of the other d4 class's. Just because one person had whatever circumstances, in this case independent of class, that allowed them to not get effected as much does not mean that the class is the reason. If a particular dm is playing towards making one class more powerful than the others that is more the dms fault than anything else. A fighter wont do very well in a skill based game and a bard will likely have a harder time in a stealth based, no talking, hack and slash game.

Eh, I dont really feel like going into more, or even into more detail on what I have said here. More than 5 anyway. Like I have said, it is best to go to the experts if there is an issue. Getting a few calls from people who have little to no experience can provide a few interesting ideas now and then, but if you want real meat you have to talk with people who know their stuff the best.

Although much of this entire discussion comes down to 'psions are good at some things that others are not so good at and worse at other things that others are good at' more than actual imbalances. Caster types tend to follow certain overall guidelines of what they will be able to do well and what they are able to do poorly, if you can point to a 'poorly' class and say they are doing it worse than another class that does not mean that the other is doing it 'too well'.


Going back to the original list however I would have to say that metamorphosis has the same problem as polymorph. They both do bad things when compared to other parts of the overall d&d system. Although since polymorph can be used on someone else that makes it 'much' more potent.

Greater metamorph does some things that shouldnt really be allowed, and it is just too powerful.. but then, since it costs exp each time it is still much weaker than Shapechange in my opinion.

For fission, your duplicate doesnt have your magical equipment. I know this may not seem like a big deal on the surface, but try it sometime.. you have basically just given yourself a major achiles heel which is going to destroy you if you arent quick about it

For hostile empathic transfer you have to have already taken a lot of damage for it to even be useful, and then your opponents have to be vulnerable to mind effecting, and you have to be pretty close to them.. for a psion this just spells out death. Since its save doesnt increase with extra pp that makes this power start off somewhat useful and then drop off quickly as creatures are able to make the save more reliably.



Anyway, I'd still suggest that the other board is consulted with any issues that may arise. They are much more likely to have directly applicable experience and actually be able to help. From my experience on this board they are generally unhelpful with such things, unless you get lucky about it.

 

[Staffan]

He makes the sphere only big enough for himself. No room to teleport into.

No can do. The AoE of the sphere is 1-foot diameter per level. That means that the sphere has a minimum diameter of 15 ft (you can voluntarily manifest a power at a lower level, but not below that which is needed to manifest the power in the first place - 15 for an 8th level power).

His mobility would also be limited in the sphere, only 30 ft per round - and moving takes a standard action.

 

[Zimbel]

Dispel psionics is worded poorly but taking into account the wording of the power itself and the wording of the augmentation it should be plain enough that it means the maximum augmentation bonus and not giving an actual straight bonus to the roll. Reading it purposefully in a poor way and then claiming that the power itself is broken seems rather silly. Poorly worded sure, but if one reads the rest, especially the part in parenthsis, it is clear what they were trying to say.

I'm not certain that it is clear which way they were intending to go. In either case, I still don't think it's overpowered; on the contrary, I view Dispel Magic as being weak.

Temporal acceleration takes over 19pp in order to come close to matching the power of a single time stop. While time stop is incredibly poweful temporal has extra drawbacks. It may still be considered to be too strong at higher levels, but it is still much weaker than time stop.

At 19 pp, that's a x2 augmentation, which grants 3 extra rounds. Time stop costs a standard action to use, then gives you an average of 3.5 rounds. I'd suggest that the Temporal Acceleration at this point seems better (+3 rounds - 1 swift vs. +3.5 rounds - 1 standard). I think the main disadvantage of it is that it's a bit tougher to abuse the restrictions than using Time stop (unless, of course, you're a Wiz/Psion).

The -6 manifestor level on schism along with its other inherant limitations (can only take purely mental actions and such) make it pretty weak overall. In some builds which are trying to maximize the amount of powers total manifested in a certain period of time it can be useful, but overall it is generally better for a psion to 'not' get it and pick up something else instead. Having a different choice will tend to make for a better character overall. -6 manifestor level means much shorter range, difficulty getting past SR/PR, 3 power levels lower manifested which means lower saves, etc.

I would guess it depends on how effectively you can utilize actions at a low manifester level.

Energy missile goes from no bonus to save up to a pretty good sized bonus to a save. However, it is incredibly limited in how it works (small area, targetted, elemental damage, etc) along with being outdone in a lot of other ways (such as spells/powers which deal damage but do not allow a save.. such as polar ray.. polar ray is a pretty horribly underpowered spell, but in several ways it is actually stronger than energy missile at equivalent cost). The potential bonus to a save comes from these limitations plus it is a specialist only power (or a psion who spends a feat). Those are not insignificant costs and all they get you is some extra direct elemental damage. Which, at higher levels when the save becomes high, is generally pretty worthless anyway. Horrid wilting is insanely better at equivalent costs, even with its lower save, for example. Or one could compare with spell focus, in a way. Spell focus grants a +1 all of the time to a school of spells vs spending a feat on energy missile to get between +0 and +8 to a single power only. Not a great direct comparison, but an interesting side by side view. Smaller bonus to many or a potential larger bonus to one.

Personally, so far, I'm liking it better than Fireball. Mostly it's nice to be able to miss your party members.
I'm not certain that it's useful to compare feats with powers. Some of your spell comparisions, though, are nice. I'm afraid that I'm not as fond of Polar Ray, though, largely because it only permits 1 target.

For fission, your duplicate doesnt have your magical equipment. I know this may not seem like a big deal on the surface, but try it sometime.. you have basically just given yourself a major achiles heel which is going to destroy you if you arent quick about it

For hostile empathic transfer you have to have already taken a lot of damage for it to even be useful, and then your opponents have to be vulnerable to mind effecting, and you have to be pretty close to them.. for a psion this just spells out death. Since its save doesnt increase with extra pp that makes this power start off somewhat useful and then drop off quickly as creatures are able to make the save more reliably.

It sounds like Fission is primarily useful for combats with a few rounds of prep. time, so that your double isn't just a walking target.

As for Hostile Emathic Transfer, I'm still reading the potential of a "low-level (i.e. less HP) mass harm". Even if all saves are made, it can do significant damage (5 points/power point other than any spent on the "mass"). I'd think that if my PC were at Low HP, this is exactly the sort of effect I'd want to use- hurt the opponent(s), heal the self. I'll probably have to try it out to see exactly what the problem is.

 

[Zimbel]

Astral Construct

Put bluntly: The CRs of Astral Construct are too low. Their ACs are too good, their attack routines are too good, their special abilities are too good.

Let's verify:
CR:HD
1/2: 1
1: 2
2: 3
3: 5
5: 7
7: 10
8: 13
9: 16
10: 19

This suggests that since their HD are low for their CR (1-2.5 x cr), their other abilities should be higher to compensate.

CR:AC
1/2: 18
1: 18
2: 20
3: 22
5: 23
7: 25
8: 27
9: 29
10: 33

This ranges from CR +17 to CR + 23. This is substantially higer than the recomended +13, and suggests why their HD may be low for their CR.

CR: Attack Bonus
1/2: 3
1: 4
2: 7
3: 10
5: 13
7: 17
8: 20
9: 25
10: 28
This ranges from +1/4 to +11 above recomended for their CR. Unless damage is unusally low for their CR(which isn't apparent to me), this seems rather high, particuarly at the later CRs.

So overall, I'd agree that their CR is probably somewhat low. I'll have to admit that I'm not following why their special abilities are too good- it merely seems like their special abilities can be tailored for the occasion, which is a bit different. (After all you do have a number of choices with Summon Monster.)

 

[Zimbel]

I would suggest that you also go to the psionics boards and ask them for their opinion about these things along with any others you may think of:

Psionics

I'm not planning to do that at the moment, but I found:
Myth: The XPH is Overpowered II to be very interesting.

 

[Scion]

No can do. The AoE of the sphere is 1-foot diameter per level. That means that the sphere has a minimum diameter of 15 ft (you can voluntarily manifest a power at a lower level, but not below that which is needed to manifest the power in the first place - 15 for an 8th level power).

His mobility would also be limited in the sphere, only 30 ft per round - and moving takes a standard action.

Ahh.. those are points I had meant to make as well.. bah.. got lost in the pile. Thanks staffan

And zimbel, that thread plus its predecessor are indeed pretty nice. Although they take a whole lot of reading to dig through. Also, with the summons they tend to have a lot of little abilities thrown in, like energy resistance, spell resistance, DR, and other such things which are nice little add ons that are harder to translate across board. If X has 5 things that are predetermined while Y has 1 determined and 1 thing but you get to choose what it is, which is better? Situational.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

Looks like 2 levels to me, unless you're heavily costing an action foe invoking the power.

Hmmm. I was sure it was more than that. Still, it's at least two feats (one for burrowing power and one for psionic meditation) in order to do it effectively and the psion still reduces his effective power by one power level--and two points of augmentation--as well as forgoing the opportunity to use his focus for other psionic feats. (And the two points are more significant for a psion than one spell level is for a mage because his max augmentation is also reduced--he's not a 7th level wizard casting fireball in the comparison--he's a 5th level wizard casting fireball). Depending upon how much danger the psion would have been in to begin with, it may or may not be a good trade.

Also, I'm not sure the psion really could make the spere just big enough for himself unless he's curled up into a fetal position. If he wants to stand and have a full range of mobility (for looking around--not for actions since he doesn't need anything more than concentration to use his powers), there's going to be enough room in the sphere for someone to at least teleport or dimension door in and grapple him.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

Just 5? ok

Saying that psychic reformation is borderline overpowered because it can be used to get rid of less useful feats seems a bit misleading. Two characters of identical class, race, etc who have chosen feats slightly differently should be of a roughly equivalent overall powerlevel. If one chose feats very, very poorly and the other chose exceedingly well this would not be the case. That is of course their perogative, but having the option to fix the problem, with a pretty serious price tag also, seems more of a 'convenient' factor instead of 'overpowered'. Limited wish could be used to gain the same effect.

Not exactly. Psychic reformation seems like it would also open up a host of build options like taking one class combination in order to get the prerequisites for prestige class A then using prestige class A to qualify for prestige class B and psychic reforming the now unnecessary character build sacrifices away. Absent such builds, I would agree that it is more a gross violation of character continuity than a

And, to top this off, where on earth do you get the idea that limited wish could be used for the same effect (other than by imitating the psionic power which it can't explicitly do by the RAW)? There's no suggestion that a limited wish could be used to change feat, class, or skill choices in the SRD or PHB. And even if it could be, saying "hey look, this 4th level psionic power is balanced because you could do the same thing with a 7th level Sor/Wiz spell with six times the xp cost is hardly a convincing argument for a power's balance.

Dispel psionics is worded poorly but taking into account the wording of the power itself and the wording of the augmentation it should be plain enough that it means the maximum augmentation bonus and not giving an actual straight bonus to the roll. Reading it purposefully in a poor way and then claiming that the power itself is broken seems rather silly. Poorly worded sure, but if one reads the rest, especially the part in parenthsis, it is clear what they were trying to say.

So, to translate this, it IS overpowered if you take one legitimate reading of an unclear passage in the power but can be fixed if you cite balance concerns to justify the other interpretation. Sounds more like a "psionics can be fixed" argument than a "psionics has no problems" argument... or a clear error earlier in this thread.

Temporal acceleration takes over 19pp in order to come close to matching the power of a single time stop. While time stop is incredibly poweful temporal has extra drawbacks. It may still be considered to be too strong at higher levels, but it is still much weaker than time stop.

The -6 manifestor level on schism along with its other inherant limitations (can only take purely mental actions and such) make it pretty weak overall. In some builds which are trying to maximize the amount of powers total manifested in a certain period of time it can be useful, but overall it is generally better for a psion to 'not' get it and pick up something else instead. Having a different choice will tend to make for a better character overall. -6 manifestor level means much shorter range, difficulty getting past SR/PR, 3 power levels lower manifested which means lower saves, etc.

Energy missile goes from no bonus to save up to a pretty good sized bonus to a save. However, it is incredibly limited in how it works (small area, targetted, elemental damage, etc) along with being outdone in a lot of other ways (such as spells/powers which deal damage but do not allow a save.. such as polar ray.. polar ray is a pretty horribly underpowered spell, but in several ways it is actually stronger than energy missile at equivalent cost).

Really? Which ways are those? Is the single target/single energy type superior to multiple target/choose your own energy type? If so, you must be speaking from an reverse-powergamer perspective (how can I make my character as sucky as possible?) If you're saying that a ranged touch/no save power is inherently superior to a save dependent power, then you're comparing apples and oranges. If you want a psionic comparison to polar ray, your choices are energy ray (which is clearly superior) and crystal shard (also clearly superior).

(Personally, I'm surprised that energy stun hasn't been mentioned since it's really a much worse offender than energy missile--when augmented, energy stun combines nearly top tier damage with a well-nigh irresistable stun effect. And a well-nigh irresistable stun effect is a lot more impressive than a well-nigh irresistable damage save).

The potential bonus to a save comes from these limitations plus it is a specialist only power (or a psion who spends a feat). Those are not insignificant costs and all they get you is some extra direct elemental damage. Which, at higher levels when the save becomes high, is generally pretty worthless anyway. Horrid wilting is insanely better at equivalent costs, even with its lower save, for example.

What ways is horrid wilting insanely better again? Sure, it's non-elemental damage, but it's a single save type and even if you're facing demons who can resist most of those energy types, a 15pp fire missile will still do more damage than a clvl 15 horrid wilting--assuming that the save DCs were equal which they aren't. I'm not seeing even "measurably better' here, let alone insanely better.

Or one could compare with spell focus, in a way. Spell focus grants a +1 all of the time to a school of spells vs spending a feat on energy missile to get between +0 and +8 to a single power only. Not a great direct comparison, but an interesting side by side view. Smaller bonus to many or a potential larger bonus to one.

And, while it's an interesting comparison, it's hardly a convincing one. You might just as well invent a feat that gives psions +8 to hit with a particular weapon and then say it's balanced because epic prowess is (presumably) balanced and only gives +1 to hit with one weapon.

Focus is a huge balancing factor for psionics. If you want to use many powers that require focus, especially at levels before 10 or so, requires spending about 3 feats (psychic meditation, psicrytal affinity, psicrystal containment) since some of the checks might fail. Even with all of these it basically makes psions take the same amount of time to use meta feats as the sorc (standard + move either way, it just costs the psion more along with the psion only being able to use one at a time and needing to make a check).

This much is true, but it's hardly something that has been directly contradicted on this thread. It just hasn't been explicitly addressed. That's hardly the same thing.

Dimension slide is a power which takes you a very short distance (about the same as a single move or a double move at high manifestor level) which takes 9pp to use as move equivalent (so still giving up your move either way and costing as much as a 5th level power) and is psychic warrior only. I fail to see anything overpowered here in the least. Useing a valueable power known slot along with a pretty good amount of pp in order to basically what you could have done with the movement from the action anyway... ouch.

Astral construct is made for combat only vs summon monster which can be used in combat but can also be used in a lot of other areas as well.

I know we've been over this ground before, but which are those non-combat uses for summon monster again? Sure, you can use Summon Monster VI and VII for healing if you have no other source of healing, but if the best that you can say for summon monster's non-combat uses is they're a very expensive and extremely inefficient workaround for not having a cleric, that's not too impressive.

Along with the summons generally having more abilities along with abilites that the astral construct cant even hope for. They really are made in different ways with different goals in mind. If one wants to complian that fireball is underpowered because it doesnt do as much cold damage as cone of cold (say when they are both doing 10 dice of damage) is pretty silly, doing something similar for the other guys is along the same lines of silly.

Sure. But this is hardly a fireball doesn't do cold damage situation. There's a lot of overlap in the roles that summoned monsters and astral constructs actually play and astral constructs are just flat out better in nine out of ten of those roles.

Dispelling buffer is a decently high level power that doesnt do anything unless someone tries to dispel your effects. Even then, all it does is give you a bit of a boost when resisting this dispelling (+5). 11 pp a couple of times a day in order to be able to hope your abilites are slightly harder to get rid of isnt exactly a powerhouse of doom.

I'd agree with that. My only complaint about dispelling buffer is that it's not available to mages and clerics.

Many spells have a bit of scaling, in that they start off at so many dice and then go up to some other amount where they cap out. Psionic powers start off at their cap but some can have extra pp put in to get more dice.

Psions are just as fragile as any of the other d4 class's. Just because one person had whatever circumstances, in this case independent of class, that allowed them to not get effected as much does not mean that the class is the reason. If a particular dm is playing towards making one class more powerful than the others that is more the dms fault than anything else. A fighter wont do very well in a skill based game and a bard will likely have a harder time in a stealth based, no talking, hack and slash game.

True only if the initial statement is true. But it isn't. Absent a mithral buckler, a sorcerer or wizard cannot wear armor without a significant reduction in their abilities. A psion, OTOH, can wear armor. That immediately makes the psion noticably more durable. The psion can both get reduced cost armor bonuses (vis a vis sor/wiz) AND add secondary enhancements (fortification, gleaming, heartening, etc) to both armor and shield. At best, a sor/wiz (the only other d4 classes) can add such enhancements to one item (the mithral buckler).... and that one item's availability is highly campaign dependent while a psion who wants to wear armor can find it in pretty much any campaign (and can wear a masterwork studded leather/mithral chain shirt and masterwork buckler in any campaign without nonproficiency penalties).

Eh, I dont really feel like going into more, or even into more detail on what I have said here. More than 5 anyway. Like I have said, it is best to go to the experts if there is an issue. Getting a few calls from people who have little to no experience can provide a few interesting ideas now and then, but if you want real meat you have to talk with people who know their stuff the best.

And in that list of "more than 5" you didn't come up with a single inaccurate statement about the psionic rules. At best you came up with a less broken interpretation of one power and disagreed with the assessment of others in the thread to date. That hardly lives up to the promise of clear inaccuracies about the psionics rules.

And assuming that people here have "little to no experience" with the psionics rules is simply an ill-founded insult. Several of the posters here have fairly extensive experience with them. Karinsdad, for instance, has played a psion for quite some time and I know that I have been playing with the 3.5 psionics rules for about a year now.

Although much of this entire discussion comes down to 'psions are good at some things that others are not so good at and worse at other things that others are good at' more than actual imbalances. Caster types tend to follow certain overall guidelines of what they will be able to do well and what they are able to do poorly, if you can point to a 'poorly' class and say they are doing it worse than another class that does not mean that the other is doing it 'too well'.

Sure, but it doesn't demonstrate the reverse either. And if you can take a new class and say that it does X better than a class that is supposed to do it "well," odds are good the new class is doing X "too well." In this case, comparing the psion to the druid for summoning and the wizard for direct damage is quite revealing.

Since there's a bit of room in this post yet, I'll toss out another power that needs careful watching: Hostile empathic feedback. With no save, no power resistance, no resistable damage type, and a relatively long duration, it is a good candidate for "game changingly overpowered."

 

[KarinsDad]

Saying that psychic reformation is borderline overpowered because it can be used to get rid of less useful feats seems a bit misleading. Two characters of identical class, race, etc who have chosen feats slightly differently should be of a roughly equivalent overall powerlevel. If one chose feats very, very poorly and the other chose exceedingly well this would not be the case. That is of course their perogative, but having the option to fix the problem, with a pretty serious price tag also, seems more of a 'convenient' factor instead of 'overpowered'. Limited wish could be used to gain the same effect.

The issue is that you cannot accomplish this with Wish, Miracle, or Limited Wish.

You get great low level feats / skills / powers until mid-level and then you take different great mid or high level feats / skills / powers, possibly in order to qualify for a prestige class.

And, this is only a fourth level power. And, the XP is only 50 per level you go back compared to 1000s of XP for Wish or Miracle.

Plus, the Psion can do this to anyone who wants this level of versatility.

I do not think you understand the word balance if you think this is ok.

Just because you find something in a WotC book does not mean it is anywhere near balanced.

Dispel psionics is worded poorly but taking into account the wording of the power itself and the wording of the augmentation it should be plain enough that it means the maximum augmentation bonus and not giving an actual straight bonus to the roll. Reading it purposefully in a poor way and then claiming that the power itself is broken seems rather silly. Poorly worded sure, but if one reads the rest, especially the part in parenthsis, it is clear what they were trying to say.

"1D20 + manifester level maximum 10" is pretty darn clear.

"For every additional power point you spend, the bonus on your dispel check increases by 2 (to a maximum bonus of +20 for a 5-point expenditure)." is pretty darn clear.

The Bonus is increased by 2 per extra PP, not the maximum. This means manifester level plus bonus. In all other aspects of the game, if you get a bonus, it adds on top of whatever else is there. These sentences also do not state that the augmentation is limited by your manifester level. That is the assumption you are making in your interpretation, but that is not written there.

5th level = D20 + 5 for 5 PP (5 manifester level + 0 augment)
6th level = D20 + 8 for 6 PP (6 manifester level + 2 augment for 1 extra PP)
7th level = D20 + 11 for 7 PP (7 manifester level + 4 augment for 2 extra PP)
8th level = D20 + 14 for 8 PP (8 manifester level + 6 augment for 3 extra PP)
9th level = D20 + 17 for 9 PP (9 manifester level + 8 augment for 4 extra PP)
10th level = D20 + 20 for 10 PP (10 manifester level + 10 augment for 5 extra PP)

Dispel Magic is D20 + 10 at 10th level. Dispel Psionics is practically auto-dispel at 10th level if you spend 10 PP. And, this is without any sort of manifester level boost.

I agree that your change of interpretation makes a great house rule and balances Dispel Psionics, but it is not what is written.

It might very well be what they intended. I suspect that it is. But it is not what is written.

The following phrase would have been more clear if that was their intention.

"For every additional power point you spend, the maximum on your dispel check increases by 2 (to a maximum of +20 for a 5-point expenditure), but it is still limited to your manifestor level."

Poorly written or not, it is broken if you do not interpret it your way, which is not a literal interpretation, nor the one most people make when they read it. At least the people I have talked to.

I understand why you think other people mis-interpret this, but the interpretation other people make is the one that is written there.

Temporal acceleration takes over 19pp in order to come close to matching the power of a single time stop. While time stop is incredibly poweful temporal has extra drawbacks. It may still be considered to be too strong at higher levels, but it is still much weaker than time stop.

It does not have to be close to the power of a single Time Stop. The fact is that no other caster type can mess with time AT ALL at 11th level. This is 6 levels earlier than Time Stop and before any other class can get extra SAME level spells / powers for a given round.

Again, you do not seem to understand what balance means.

They got rid of the 3E version of Haste for a very good reason. Two same level powers / spells per round is broken, even if you only get to do it once. And at higher level, you get to do it more than once per manifestation.

The -6 manifestor level on schism along with its other inherant limitations (can only take purely mental actions and such) make it pretty weak overall. In some builds which are trying to maximize the amount of powers total manifested in a certain period of time it can be useful, but overall it is generally better for a psion to 'not' get it and pick up something else instead. Having a different choice will tend to make for a better character overall. -6 manifestor level means much shorter range, difficulty getting past SR/PR, 3 power levels lower manifested which means lower saves, etc.

Sorry, you are totally mistaken. I've already illustrated how much more potent it is than the combined Quicken Power and Psionic Medication feats earlier in this thread.

It's Quicken combined with Spontaneous casting. HUGE. No other casting class can do this at all. All other Quicken abilities are prepped spells. This one is not only spontaneous, but it is every single round if desired and it costs x PP to do an x level power instead of x+6, and it protects versus charm / compulsion effects.

If you truly believe what you write here, you have no clue about balance.

Energy missile goes from no bonus to save up to a pretty good sized bonus to a save. However, it is incredibly limited in how it works (small area, targetted, elemental damage, etc) along with being outdone in a lot of other ways (such as spells/powers which deal damage but do not allow a save.. such as polar ray.. polar ray is a pretty horribly underpowered spell, but in several ways it is actually stronger than energy missile at equivalent cost). The potential bonus to a save comes from these limitations plus it is a specialist only power (or a psion who spends a feat). Those are not insignificant costs and all they get you is some extra direct elemental damage. Which, at higher levels when the save becomes high, is generally pretty worthless anyway. Horrid wilting is insanely better at equivalent costs, even with its lower save, for example. Or one could compare with spell focus, in a way. Spell focus grants a +1 all of the time to a school of spells vs spending a feat on energy missile to get between +0 and +8 to a single power only. Not a great direct comparison, but an interesting side by side view. Smaller bonus to many or a potential larger bonus to one.

You are comparing an EIGHTH level spell with a SECOND level power and claiming that in some ways, the 8th level spell is more potent than the 2nd level power.

Duh! Seriously, what are you smoking? I want some of that.

Plus, the damage of Energy Missile increases by 1D6 +1/0/-1 and the DC increases by 1 per PP augmentation. What is +1 Spell Focus compared to a power that ups its DC by 1 per PP? Answer: nothing, zilch, nada. No comparison.

At 17th level when someone gets Polar Ray, yes it does 17D6 and has no save.

But, Energy Missile (Cold) does 17D6 + 17, has a range of medium (instead of close), has a save DC of 26 + caster ability score mod (min 8 for 17 PP) = DC 34+ for half damage (i.e. most opponents will take full damage), affects up to 5 targets instead of one, is a Fort save (which means Rogues do not get Evasion), you could make it Fire, Lightning, or Sonic instead, and is not a ray, so it does not have a touch attack.

What part of 38 to 382 average points of damage versus 59 average points of damage (if the touch attack succeeds, 0 if not) do you not understand is mega-more potent than Polar Ray at 17th level?

Dude. You should not be playing the game. You are hurting your brain. Run away. Run far away.

Focus is a huge balancing factor for psionics. If you want to use many powers that require focus, especially at levels before 10 or so, requires spending about 3 feats (psychic meditation, psicrytal affinity, psicrystal containment) since some of the checks might fail. Even with all of these it basically makes psions take the same amount of time to use meta feats as the sorc (standard + move either way, it just costs the psion more along with the psion only being able to use one at a time and needing to make a check).

My psion only needed to take Psychic Meditation. It is the only thing you need and by 5th level with a decent CON (14) and maxxed out Concentration, you make the roll over half of the time. You can get this even higher with Skill Focus Concentration, a higher CON (e.g. Animal Affinity), a Single-minded Psicrystal, etc.

It allows you to use focus powers / abilities about every other round, or even nearly every round if you are not in melee combat or if you have your AC pumped enough that AoOs rarely hit you.

3 feats is not even close to required. We have had 3 psions in our game and only two took Psychic Meditation and none took the other two.

Not everyone plays the game like you do. In fact, it is obvious that not everyone (or should I say practically nobody) views the balance of psionic powers like you do.

Focus is a minor annoyance at low level at worst. By 10th level, most Psions with Psychic Meditation should be making it nearly every round they try.

PS. It also sometimes helps more to use a second move action with Psychic Meditation to get back your focus if you missed the first roll in the round depending on situation.

Dimension slide is a power which takes you a very short distance (about the same as a single move or a double move at high manifestor level) which takes 9pp to use as move equivalent (so still giving up your move either way and costing as much as a 5th level power) and is psychic warrior only. I fail to see anything overpowered here in the least. Useing a valueable power known slot along with a pretty good amount of pp in order to basically what you could have done with the movement from the action anyway... ouch.

Dimension Slide is more than just a short range Dimension Door spell. It is 3rd level instead of 4th level which means that the Psychic Warrior can do it at the same 7th level as Psions, Wizards, Sorcerers can get Dimension Door (note: Bards cannot get Dimension Door until level 10). It does not prevent him from doing an action afterwards like Dimension Door.

A Psion could use Expanded Knowledge to get this at 9th level. He could at 9th level manifest this power as a move action and then still do an attack. At 11th level, he could Quicken this power, move 50 feet, and either manifest another power when he gets there, or do a full round attack.

No other Dimensional spell allows you this freedom of movement (past foes or out of area effect spells) and still do actions.

But, this is balanced to you compared to Dimension Door? A Wizard can Quicken Teleport (most of the time, there is still a chance of missing the roll) to do this same thing (of getting another spell off) as a 9th level spell.

The Psion can pull this off at 11th level spontaneously. The Wizard at 17th level IF he has this prepped into his only 9th level spell.

You have to look at the big picture of how other powers and feats can make this very imbalanced.

You cannot just look at it and say "Psychic Warriors can only move and attack with this at 10th level".

Astral construct is made for combat only vs summon monster which can be used in combat but can also be used in a lot of other areas as well. Along with the summons generally having more abilities along with abilites that the astral construct cant even hope for. They really are made in different ways with different goals in mind. If one wants to complian that fireball is underpowered because it doesnt do as much cold damage as cone of cold (say when they are both doing 10 dice of damage) is pretty silly, doing something similar for the other guys is along the same lines of silly.

Your reasoning is silly.

Astral Construct effectively allows a Psion to pull in "a Fighter" of equal level (with one or more special abilities). He can do this every round so that he can pull in many "fighters".

Most fighters do not have darkvision (and low light vision), but the pulled in Astral Construct does.

Most first level Fighters do not have AC 18 and 15 hit points, but the pulled in Astral Construct does.

Most third level Fighters do not have 31 hit points, but the pulled in Astral Construct does.

At most levels, the Astral Construct is about equivalent to a Fighter of equal level.

How exactly is pulling in a same level Fighter balanced?

Plus, a psion can augment Astral Constructs with the Boost Construct feat, the Extend feat, etc.

The Psion cannot Fly, no problem. Pull in a strong construct that can fly and carry the Psion.

The Psion cannot Dimension Slide to get to the top of the cliff, no problem. Pull in a construct that can.

Dispelling buffer is a decently high level power that doesnt do anything unless someone tries to dispel your effects. Even then, all it does is give you a bit of a boost when resisting this dispelling (+5). 11 pp a couple of times a day in order to be able to hope your abilites are slightly harder to get rid of isnt exactly a powerhouse of doom.

I agree with you for the first time in this thread. This is not broken. It is potent (1/11th of a psions PP pretty much protects him for most combats from losing other powers which cost PP to put back up). The real kicker is that it lasts 11 hours (and can be upped to 26 hours at 13th level with Extend Power).

Course again, no other spell caster has this type of protection versus Dispel and Greater Dispel, and dispels start becoming more common at mid to higher levels.

Many spells have a bit of scaling, in that they start off at so many dice and then go up to some other amount where they cap out. Psionic powers start off at their cap but some can have extra pp put in to get more dice.

Psions are just as fragile as any of the other d4 class's. Just because one person had whatever circumstances, in this case independent of class, that allowed them to not get effected as much does not mean that the class is the reason. If a particular dm is playing towards making one class more powerful than the others that is more the dms fault than anything else. A fighter wont do very well in a skill based game and a bard will likely have a harder time in a stealth based, no talking, hack and slash game.

Nonsense.

I have played every core caster class in the game multiple times as both player and DM (except Druid who I have only played as DM, but I have had players who did), and none of them can survive like a psion. Not even a Cleric.

This is, quite bluntly, total nonsense that you spouted here.

Not only has my psion survived much better than other spell casters, but so has the other two psions played in our game.

Our Rogue 2 / Psion 5 / Shadowmind 3 in tonight's game was being full round attacked by the BBEG Fighter with a Greatsword who had 3 attacks per round, many of the good fighter feats including Improved Critical, and averaged 14 points per successful non-Power Attacked hit. She merely manifested Vigor when necessary until the rest of the PCs could come assist her. After she Entangling Ectoplasmed him in round one, his +17/+12/+7 chances to hit her AC 26 dropped to 50%, 25%, and 5%. So, he had a few 30+ point rounds against her in 6 rounds, but her multiple Vigors absorbed most of that and she walked out of the entire battle with about 8 points of damage.

Our Wizard 10 got his butt handed to him by the BBEG's lower level allied Fighter who fought two weapon for +10/+10/+5. The Wizard had 6 hit points left, and Teleported back to the village they had started from because there was no safe place in view for him to Teleport to.

The Wizard normally has 6 more hit points total than the Psion, but ended up taking 40+ more points of damage overall, even though he was being targetted by the mook as opposed to the BBEG and even though the Wizard has the Healing Domain with the Arcane Disciple feat and cast Cure Moderate Wounds on himself.

Have you ever actually PLAYED a Psion?

There's no comparison.

Eh, I dont really feel like going into more, or even into more detail on what I have said here. More than 5 anyway. Like I have said, it is best to go to the experts if there is an issue. Getting a few calls from people who have little to no experience can provide a few interesting ideas now and then, but if you want real meat you have to talk with people who know their stuff the best.

That's why this guy came here. It is obvious that some of us are more expert than you.

No offense, but you appear to be biased when it comes to Psions and their powers. It seems to cloud your thinking.

Although much of this entire discussion comes down to 'psions are good at some things that others are not so good at and worse at other things that others are good at' more than actual imbalances. Caster types tend to follow certain overall guidelines of what they will be able to do well and what they are able to do poorly, if you can point to a 'poorly' class and say they are doing it worse than another class that does not mean that the other is doing it 'too well'.

Going back to the original list however I would have to say that metamorphosis has the same problem as polymorph. They both do bad things when compared to other parts of the overall d&d system. Although since polymorph can be used on someone else that makes it 'much' more potent.

Not really.

Polymorph can be cast on others. Pro.

Metamorphosis can change the psion into an object. Pro. This has a lot of uses from espionage to allowing the PC Wizard to teleport one extra medium sized creature (because one is now an object).

I used Metamorphosis when I played my psion to change myself into an object that we had that the BBEG wanted. We traded me with the BBEG for something we wanted and I was able to infiltrate the BBEG lair undetected.

I do not consider Metamorphosis stronger than Polymorph, but neither do I consider Polymorph stronger than Metamorphosis. Polymorph has more utility one way, Metamorphosis another. But, the strength of each is about the same.

Greater metamorph does some things that shouldnt really be allowed, and it is just too powerful.. but then, since it costs exp each time it is still much weaker than Shapechange in my opinion.

For fission, your duplicate doesnt have your magical equipment. I know this may not seem like a big deal on the surface, but try it sometime.. you have basically just given yourself a major achiles heel which is going to destroy you if you arent quick about it

Which is more or less what I said earlier in the thread about Fission.

For hostile empathic transfer you have to have already taken a lot of damage for it to even be useful, and then your opponents have to be vulnerable to mind effecting, and you have to be pretty close to them.. for a psion this just spells out death. Since its save doesnt increase with extra pp that makes this power start off somewhat useful and then drop off quickly as creatures are able to make the save more reliably.

Again, what I stated earlier in the thread with one exception.

Psions being close to opponents does not spell out death for them. 79% of Psion powers are close range or closer (and yes, I counted them some time back). Psions HAVE to be close range to affect others with many of their powers, so why would this power be any different than any of the other close range powers considering that this power harms others and heals the Psion?

This "death statement" of yours does not make sense for this power at all since Psions often have to be in close range for many of their attacks.

Anyway, I'd still suggest that the other board is consulted with any issues that may arise. They are much more likely to have directly applicable experience and actually be able to help. From my experience on this board they are generally unhelpful with such things, unless you get lucky about it.

The only person here posting considerable mis-information is yourself.

I have spent nearly 2 years either playing a psion or DMing them. I do not consider myself an expert, but I sure as heck appear to know more than you.

You appear to not always get it when it comes to the power of the combinations that psions can achieve.