Psionics and magic

[Thunderfoot]

I was a big fan of psionics in 2E - the jury is still out on 3E+. I remember when psionic combat would be pretty cool - especially in the heat of regular combat. Description was basically everyone was running aroung swining and shooting anything that moves, while two combatants looked like they were taking care of constipation in their pants.

 

[Psion]

Sounds pretty interesting so far, guys.

Would it cause a huge flamewar if i asked in what ways things were "broken"?

"There is to much. Let me sum up."

What I think it authentically broken, or, at least, ill considered/could use house ruling:

The energy powers that scale by +1 DC per pp. I think it's a flub, but last I checked, WotC has not confirmed this.

Energy missile is too flexible. Should not be able to target attended objects.

Tripping points/style issues:

Psions can bring lots of power to bear in one fight. If you only run a few fights per day all the time, they will be spotlight hogs.

Fair cop, but...

Psions have a sorcerer like flexibility, but more feats.

I consider this a fair cop, BUT I consider the sorcerer weak compared to the wizard and ergo not a good comparison point. (Interestingly, some variant games and products have versions of the sorcerer that get wizard like feats or other capabilities.)

 

[HellHound]

Psion has it pretty much nailed down there.

IMO:

+1 DC per PP should become +1 DC per 2 PP, quite honestly
Energy powers should have to pre-select the type of energy
Energy Missile should not be able to target attended objects

 

[JoeGKushner]

Hey Hellhound, weren't you working on a Jungles of the Mind Supplement like an eon ago or something? I could've swore that there were some psionic based goods in Librium Equitis II that hinted at a larger book

 

[HellHound]

Yep, and ENP will be publishing it soon. I'm just trying to clear 100 other products off my desk to get the art together for it.

 

[Scion]

For a word in the other direction on energy missile.

So long as you cannot target attended items (apparently the person who wrote the power thought that the base rule was different than it actually is, they thought that if you targetted a person then you could not target any of their equipment also) there really isnt any problem with it.

It is a specialty power (kineticist only) the targets have to be very close to one another (each has to be within 15' of all other targets, so basically two squares, even early on creatures will spread out to get away from area of effects and the like and later on they do the same plus creatures tend to be larger or have other problems), it is always second level so things like spell turning really fry it, and it is always elemental damage (although it can be shifted through 4 different types).

The save dc is not even out of line when you compare it with things like energy ray. Most of the time, even at later levels, using energy ray is a better bet. It simply denies a saving throw.

Having a specialist power which winds up having a higher save dc at much higher levels (when direct damage is at its weakest) just hasnt been a problem in actual play, especially when compared with the other options out there. A high dc would matter for a save or die, but on direct damage? eh.


Overall the psionics system has a whole lot fewer problems than the other magic type of systems. If it is any sort of indicator there really isnt much for extreme builds on optimization boards whereas there are tons for other types of magic.

The main issues are shared between the two. Shapechange/polymorph like effects have some issues with the assumptions of the game and things like that.


Still though, each type of magic has things that they are both good and bad at. Focusing just on the good and ignoring the bad is not a good way to go. Psions tend to be the best at direct damage, divine rules in healing and status mitigation, arcane has some majorly incredible illusions and the like.

 

[Evilhalfling]

There are broken psionic builds, but not of smackdown quality.
consider closely any overchanneling, boosted astral construct shapers.
I love psionics, and it sees frequent use in my games.
The contested power that hasn't been mentioned yet is dispel psionics - It should read that augmenting changes the maximum caster level, not the CL of the opposed roll- unless you want a 10th lvl psion to dispel magic as if he was 20th lvl.

 

[hexgrid]

In my campaign, the psion player seems to run out of power points much more quickly than the spellcasters run out of spells. He's ended up twiddling his thumbs by the end of more than one session.

I don't know if this is the fault of the system or the fault of the player, though.

 

[Henry]

For Nail - The Psion
Psionics - Balance and Integration
Anyone Else Annoyed by Psionics
Heavy Artillery - Psion vs. Wizard

That's something to start on. A Search of "Thanee" "Psion" and "Sorcerer" turned these up, and 12 others since 2004. Not to pick on Thanee, I used him because most of the threads he was involved in in a deep comparison of Psion and Sorcerer were quite in-depth on the topic, involving charts, graphs, and 20-level character comparisons.

I'm not kidding.

 

[Patryn of Elvenshae]

No, Henry isn't - the comparisons are good stuff.