D&D 3E/3.5 Psionics 3.5: Errata and Issues to nerf?

[Emirikol]

All: I'm putting together my house rule book for my next campaign. I'm interested to know what the main issues are with the 3.5/revised book. Our campaign won't go past 12th level, so I'm looking for lower level combinations or issues that I should rule on.

Here were the issues from 3.0:
Animal Affinity: Is enhancement bonus.
Body Fuel: Use errata; max 60 ability points per day; cannot be stored.
Feeder Weapons: Not used.
Lesser Body Adjustment/Body Adjustment: use level+strength bonus per day.
Natural Armor: is on the Psionic Warrior list.
Polymorph: In order to use this power, you have to analyze a live specimen of what you want to polymorph to (psicraft or knowledge psionics DC 15; 10 day study).
Psychofeedback: max 1 point / level per round.
Trigger Power: Save only base cost of the power.
..


Thanks in advance for any help

jh

 

[Mr. Kaze]

All: I'm putting together my house rule book for my next campaign. I'm interested to know what the main issues are with the 3.5/revised book. Our campaign won't go past 12th level, so I'm looking for lower level combinations or issues that I should rule on.

All of the Kineticist's powers make any other artillery caster obsolete (esp. under level 12). They effectively start with 4 forms of Energy Substitution, can do various amounts of damage or force different saves with them. They can effectively use Heighten Spell while also increasing the amount of damage at the same time they're pretending their caster level is rather higher than it really is -- the worst abuse of this being with Energy Missile. Casts like a sorceror (only better), advances like a wizard -- and both of the arcane classes (and artillery Shugenja even more so) feel shafted.

There are also some bizarre powers (especially chronomancery) that don't sit well with me, but flavor how you will. Wilders just can't reconcile their nifty abilities with their laughably pathetic quantity of powers known. Elocators look totally cool on the surface, but don't tend to work out so well when you realize that you're taking multiple BAB hits on what's supposed to be something of a melee class. Blah blah blah. At this point, it's late and I'm rambling. But the #1 thing you need to make sure of is that your Kineticist doesn't grossly outshine the rest of your party in combat.

::Mr. Kaze (has almost played his poor little Shugenja out now that there's a Kineticist in the party)

 

[Kalendraf]

One immediate problem I see is that it's very easy to make a well-armored spellcaster. Since psionics is unaffected by armor, you can essentially have the benefits of a good AC (usually reserved for non-spellcasting classes or cleric) in combination with the firepower of a wizard or sorcerer. Even a psion, who has no armor proficiency can wear armors and shields with an AC penalty of 0 and suffer no ill effects. So for example, you could find your Psion wearing +2 studded leather and a +2 buckler and never needing to spend any powers or points on things like Force Screen or Inertial Armor. I recently went thru the exercise of making up some premade 3rd level psionic characters and even the Psion had an AC of 20 before applying any powers.

The Wilder can be deadly with a power like Mind Thrust. A 3rd level Wilder could deal up to 50 points of damage for a mere 3 power points each round. With an 18 charisma, they can do that 6 times (assuming an elan or maenad for example) before exhasting their power pool. Of course, they do risk the psychic enervation and that will likely hit it before being able to do this 6 times, but the potential for wreaking havoc is still there. I suspect that an NPC wilder with Mind Thrust can easily lead to multiple PC deaths, especially if they target characters with weak will saves like rogues. I think it would be interesting to set up this encounter (3rd level wilder vs. party of four 5th level characters) and see how often it results in a party fatality. By the EL calculator, that shouldn't be a very likely occurance as it's just an EL3 encounter for a 5th level party. But I strongly suspect the wilder will take out 1 or more characters in several of the test runs.

 

[Psiblade]

The energy missile and energy stun save DC should be the same as every other power save DC (increasing by 1 for every additional 2 d6 of damage).

The Wilder & Psychic Warrior skills are correct in the text but not on the charts. The Wilder has jump as a class skill, while the Psy War has search.

The Soulknife has standard med BAB and 4 skill points per level.

Recommendations for running a psionic campaign. Psions are strong in one encounter per day situations. Psions will run out of power points fast and learn to conserve in multiple encounter per day adventures. Wilders have excellent skills (spot, listen, tumble, etc.) that need to be used in order to make them effective. Metamorphic transfer is a feat that should not be allowed before 12th level.

Have fun.
Psiblade

 

[Emirikol]

Kineticist and wilder...

so how would you guys house rule to keep them balanced?

jh

 

[Scion]

psions being able to wear armor is a nonissue, clerics can already wear any armor without penalty, and arcane casters can wear armor without even having to worry about spell failure very easily. Since psions are not proficient they will have all of the other penalties still over their heads though.

the kineticist is very nice, but blaster types still have their place. Below level 12 blaster types are actually viable to some degree, higher than that and most blaster types are pretty useless. Even powers such as energy missile are fine (even with the dc issue, it has been debated quite a bit on another board, and the power matches up very well with other spells as it progresses. Better in some ways, worse in others. Remarkably well balanced considering how strong it first appears).

The wilder only has one real ability, and it is pretty weak. It has some strengths, but that chance of losing an entire round now and then is just harsh. Along with some very strange bonuses that rarely/never matter it seems like a pretty lackluster class. 11 powers total at level 20 is pretty rough, I havent seen how their ability, which is worse than overchannel in a lot of ways, makes up for this. (oh, and mind thrust is a pretty weak power all around. d10 is nice, but save to negate makes up for that. Along with it being mind effecting, not able to target objects, short range, and only hitting one target. Mainly it is only good at low levels.)

Soulknife needs some major help. As written it is just a glorified npc class. Lots of suggestions have been made to fix this, pick and choose what you feel is best.

As for the rest, I doubt you will have to nerf much, if anything, in the book. Most of it has been nerfed more than sufficiently already.

check out the psionics boards over on the wotc site, you'll have to spend some time reading, but a great deal of the issues that might come up are over there.

Hope that helps

 

[The Souljourner]

arcane casters can wear armor without even having to worry about spell failure very easily.

Umm... how do you figure? (Bards don't count)

-The Souljourner

 

[Scion]

Umm... how do you figure? (Bards don't count)

-The Souljourner

if you wear armor with 0% spell failure then you have 0% spell failure. This is not terribly hard to do.

At worst, a nice little mithril shield will do it Then you can have any armor enhancements you want really.

There are also armor enhancements to lower it, along with other special materials.

Or you can just cast spells without somatic components (I have seen one build that did this, wore full plate while nonproficient and didnt cast any spells during the day that had somatic components unless they had time to take off and put back on the armor, actually worked really well).

 

[Thanee]

Yeah, arcane casters can use twilight mithril chain shirt and buckler.

One thing to consider is to errata Dispel Psionics. This power is completely nuts the way it is written (dunno if there is an errata to it already).

Also ban Metamorphic Transfer (it's impossible to put into words how broken this feat is).

Other than that, I'd take a close look at Quicken Psionics (plus Psionic Meditation) and Schism. They essentially allow spontaneous quickened powers, something that was deliberately removed from 3.5 (haste, etc).

Energy Missile definitely needs some rework as well (2nd level power with multiple selectable targets, full level damage, and a save DC beyond normal restraints?). I'd probably simply drop that one completely, or put it at 4th level or something.

About psionic items, the torc of power preservation is pretty much unacceptable and the psionatrix is also not really something I'd want in 3.5 - the game where you can't easily raise your save DCs.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Scion]

One thing to consider is to errata Dispel Psionics. This power is completely nuts the way it is written (dunno if there is an errata to it already).

nuts? it seems pretty tame to me. You get a slight boost early on, and a minor nerf later. What is the problem? Sure if you are a wilder or have overchannel you can get a bigger boost, but then that is the point of the wilder and spending of the feat and taking the damage.

Also ban Metamorphic Transfer (it's impossible to put into words how broken this feat is).

Depending on the way you read it, it isnt so bad. Sure there are some powerful ones out there, but with interpretting it properly almost none of these actually matter. It is merely a decent way to go for someone with metamorphisis (which might cost yet another feat to get in the first place)

Other than that, I'd take a close look at Quicken Psionics (plus Psionic Meditation) and Schism. They essentially allow spontaneous quickened powers, something that was deliberately removed from 3.5 (haste, etc).

focus is a very strange mechanic, nice idea, fairly bad in implementation though. As for schism it has some major limitations, so it shouldnt be that bad. Quicken is just as bad, if not worse, than it is for other casters. if you are giving up forcus for it, then you dont have focus for something else.

Energy Missile definitely needs some rework as well (2nd level power with multiple selectable targets, full level damage, and a save DC beyond normal restraints?). I'd probably simply drop that one completely, or put it at 4th level or something.

There are a few threads about this already, but as I mentioned above comparing it across the board energy missile is actually pretty well made. Strong in some ways, weak in others. It is very nice. Again, it is a kineticist only power, so that is already a pretty big limitation.

About psionic items, the torc of power preservation is pretty much unacceptable and the psionatrix is also not really something I'd want in 3.5 - the game where you can't easily raise your save DCs.

The overall nerfing of dc's in 3.5 is already a dumb idea. They fixed the problem and then continued 'fixing' over and over again until everything was nerfed inappropriately.

Spending some cash to get a minor boost is probably ok, especially with the horrible feat that psionics get (again, giving up focus. you cant use that quickened power 'and' get that +1 dc without some major efforts).

The torc is an odd one though, it is very nice indeed, but too strong? hard to say. It doesnt do an incredible amount, but it does do interesting things. Other casters can use pearls of power, but psioncs cannot. If a psion is burning powers at their highest level possible then they will gain hardly anything from it. If they burn a bunch of lower level ones then they will gain more, but are also doing less at a time. how much such an item should cost who knows, but 30k for a slotted item probably works as well as anything. That is the equivalent of 60k of pearls of power, which could be 60 different first level powers, which do scale with level. 60 magic missiles vs whatever the psion would get to do.. interesting choice