Psions, underpowered? Your experience?

[JLXC]

Heh. Funny thing is the ONLY Psion capable of even being a class is what...... you guessed it... the Savant everyone talks about playing.

People figured that one out early. More HP's lets you live longer, and with a good power selection, including the near broken Free Stone Skin, you have an almost palatable class. With the ITK rules and the Feats from Dragon Savants can rival a Real Spellcaster in overall usefullness. Since they can find traps and disable them like a Rogue... they are the ONLY Psion worth his salt. Notice, in nearly every case someone talks about their Psion being ok.... they are a Savant... or in a campaign without Combat so the Telepath rules. YMMV

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Combat Telepath

Lesser Domination: "Help me fight the [so-and-so]."

Minion: Yes master...

Even more fun when you Dominate the BBEG.

Egoists: Errata'd Vigor. Claws of the Vampire. Improved Biofeedback. Inertial Barrier. Polymorph Self. Graft Weapon!. 'Nuff said.

Nomads are fun too. Their movement abilities make them great scouts, and they are good archers, too.

Shapers: Who needs hp when your opponents are pounding on your constructs, while you sit Invisible trimming your nails? Plus, if you have a Strength of 11+: Vigor!

 

[Shard O'Glase]

I really think they screwed up with the lack of scaling. Yeah they can bust a ton of low level poweres and scaling would make that scarry. Seriously though does anyone here think that save or die powers are less effective than damage dealers. Do all your mages and clerics say, well geez I'd love to cast a save or die but my spells scale in damage so I'd never touch one of those weak spells.

Now how many DMs really want a pc whose attacks are focussed around save or die powers since his damage dealers suck so bad they aren't worth using. Me as a DM I prefer to go against damaging spells, I don't fudge die rolls so save or dies can get really annoying fast.

Funny thing is everyone who says yeah psions are great says you gotta use ITCK, yeah psions rock. Personally I think they were underpowered with a few broken powers thrown into the mix. I don't think inertial barrier is one of the broken ones, I think stone skin is weak as heck because of the cost. I almost never see that spell cast, a few scrolls are made for it since no one wants to waste a slot on a spell they likely wont cast since it costs to much, but they want it on a scroll for a just in case 250gp is cheaper than raise dead scenarios, and never cast except when desperate= a weak spell in my book, especially a 4th level spell.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

I really think they screwed up with the lack of scaling. Yeah they can bust a ton of low level poweres and scaling would make that scarry. Seriously though does anyone here think that save or die powers are less effective than damage dealers. Do all your mages and clerics say, well geez I'd love to cast a save or die but my spells scale in damage so I'd never touch one of those weak spells.


Psions aren't burn mages (except savants, maybe). Why should the Seer be as good as the Diviner in terms of damage dealing...

There are a number of feats to help you out. Resculpt Mind so you can actually take those feats. Chain Link (see the Mind's Eye feature at WotC's website) to upgrade your Concussion powers (but keep Greater Concussion or Cone of Sound). Fortify Power and Overpower to reach and surpass the sorcerer's damage-dealing capacity. Use Trigger Power on ([insert x number of damage-boosting feats] Greater Concussion) to get those attacks free roughly half the time (even more if high level or using Polymorph Self).

Get anything that makes the use of power points more efficient. Even a Crystal Capacitor is great for manifesting Vigor with (which frees up power points for those expensive Concussion powers).

(Someone at the Psionics Handbook Forum said Triggering first level powers and using Heighten on them was more efficient, but YMMV.)

Use Empowered Psicrystal to turn your crystal into a free crystal capacitor (Energized Psicrystal), and use the psicrystal's Discipline Focus to make those powers cheaper. It stacks with a Torc of Psionic Might too.

(Psicrystals? What's he talking about? See the Mind's Eye [The Pet Rock]. That's right - your Psicrystal can actually be useful, giving you three good abilities. Worth the feat IMO.)

Of course, the telepath doesn't need these feats. They'd rather take Chain Link to upgrade Domination chain powers, but otherwise Psionic Focus and Heighten Power are the way to go. Psionatrix Essence from Empowered Psicryal too, since you can't always find, buy, steal or make a Psionatrix of Telepathy.

The Mind's Eye is currently looking for a focus for the savant other than damage-dealing as well. But you'll have to wait a while.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

In other words everyone knows they screwed up when it came to damage dealing so they are trying to patch the problem up with some feats. If they hadn't screwed up in the 1st place there wouldn't be a need for all these patches.

 

[Shard O'Glase]

And yes I'm just being a smart alleck. I really do think that the psi handbook has some serious flaws, but I also think it was very cool, and the support psionics has been getting on the free side at the wizards web site had been great. And with just that I think you can easily make viable psions that if are weak, are only very slightly weak. ITCK while not wizards is a great deal, I actually paid the 10$ for it in harcopy since I hate reading long things on the computer, do that enough at work.

 

[Roland Delacroix]

I really think they screwed up with the lack of scaling. Yeah they can bust a ton of low level poweres and scaling would make that scarry. Seriously though does anyone here think that save or die powers are less effective than damage dealers. Do all your mages and clerics say, well geez I'd love to cast a save or die but my spells scale in damage so I'd never touch one of those weak spells.


Psions aren't burn mages (except savants, maybe). Why should the Seer be as good as the Diviner in terms of damage dealing...

There are a number of feats to help you out. Resculpt Mind so you can actually take those feats. Chain Link (see the Mind's Eye feature at WotC's website) to upgrade your Concussion powers (but keep Greater Concussion or Cone of Sound). Fortify Power and Overpower to reach and surpass the sorcerer's damage-dealing capacity. Use Trigger Power on ([insert x number of damage-boosting feats] Greater Concussion) to get those attacks free roughly half the time (even more if high level or using Polymorph Self).

Get anything that makes the use of power points more efficient. Even a Crystal Capacitor is great for manifesting Vigor with (which frees up power points for those expensive Concussion powers).

Use Empowered Psicrystal to turn your crystal into a free crystal capacitor (Energized Psicrystal), and use the psicrystal's Discipline Focus to make those powers cheaper. It stacks with a Torc of Psionic Might too.

(Psicrystals? What's he talking about? See the Mind's Eye [The Pet Rock]. That's right - your Psicrystal can actually be useful, giving you three good abilities. Worth the feat IMO.)

Of course, the telepath doesn't need these feats. They'd rather take Chain Link to upgrade Domination chain powers, but otherwise Psionic Focus and Heighten Power are the way to go. Psionatrix Essence from Empowered Psicryal too, since you can't always find, buy, steal or make a Psionatrix of Telepathy.

The Mind's Eye is currently looking for a focus for the savant other than damage-dealing as well. But you'll have to wait a while.

Good point on the Crystal Capacitors, thats something cool that Arcaners don't get, and an ok perk. Since the Psion spell list is so limited though, extra PP's that can't be pooled are basically the same thing as scrolls.

First, no Psions arent Burn mages. Thats no excuse to take out scaling though. Even if they had free scaling they wouldn't be burn mages. Their direct damage powers do too little power compared to Arcaners, a die size down. Using a d4 fireball (for example) instead of a d6 is a bit of damage lost. Then compare 10d4 to 10d6, and its a lot of damage less than a burn mage. Then throw Empower on there and you will see that a Psion, even if he had free scaling, won't do anywhere close to the damage of a burn mage. Free scaling would have let a part field a Psion without HAVING to field an Arcaner just for artillery. The Psion wouldn't do as much damage but has more flexibility. No scaling shuts out a Psion taking direct damage powers because they suck, its like a Sorcerer taking Sleep.

The rest of your post basically says "Psions are TOO balanced! They are just as good as a Sorcerer, IFF they take this feat, that feat, use these rules, etc." Not very convincing I'm afraid.

The Minds Eye? This isn't the House Rule forum. Even so, its just the 'Psions need 5 feats to be decent' argument all over again. I don't like a class where everyone has to take the same feats just to compete.

EDIT: Shard: Spot on with your last two posts. Psi HB is pretty nice, all it needs really is the few pages from ITCK to be awesome. Straight Psi HB Psions ARE alot of fun to play, until you realize they are just an XP drain on the party.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Good point on the Crystal Capacitors, thats something cool that Arcaners don't get, and an ok perk.

I wasn't so brilliant, I'm afraid. They're like Pearls of Powers, but a little more flexible.

Thats no excuse to take out scaling though.

True, there should have been some sort of scaling. Unfortunately, there wasn't. That's why people use ITCK and the Mind's Eye.

The rest of your post basically says "Psions are TOO balanced! They are just as good as a Sorcerer, IFF they take this feat, that feat, use these rules, etc." Not very convincing I'm afraid.


Same as just above. Instead of feats, they should have been class features. However, in the end it's the same thing. Sort of like the high-level rogues special class abilities. Not every rogue will use the same ones (although in practice, all take Improved Evasion).

The Minds Eye? This isn't the House Rule forum.

The Mind's Eye is official. You can find it here: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/article1.asp?x=dnd/psi/welcome,3

Note the www.wizard.com bit at the start.
Mark Jindra has said that by the time the Mind's Eye ends, it will be bigger than the various classbooks released by Wizards. Since it's published by official Wizard's guys, it will also be better than most of the other classbooks (I'm sure the official Wizards guys never even looked sat Sword and Fist before it was published).

If they hadn't screwed up in the 1st place there wouldn't be a need for all these patches.

True, but they've admitted their mistake and are trying to fix it. I don't know whose fault it was, but I tend to blame WotC's deadline. Due to the unclarity of many of the published powers and the last minute "hey look, free scaling makes psions unbalanced", I think WotC should have let Bruce Cordell have more time. (Bruce Cordell's work in If Thoughts Could Kill was much clearer, when he had all the time he needed, so that's why I don't think Bruce was the problem.) I'm willing to wait (and even pay more) for quality.

 

[Hammerhead]

This is way off topic, but my rogue isn't taking improved evasion. If he fails his reflex save, he deserves to be toasted. (Cocky, aren't I?)

I personally like psions, and psion/rogues especially. I really enjoy the wide variety of feats they enjoy, and savants are my favorite psion. They get roguish skills, good hitpoints from high CON, and very cool powers (not just counting combat ones.) I find Ectoplasmic Form to be very useful.

Psionic Combat does suck though. Justs get Mind Blast, then Resculpt Mind.

 

[DWARF]

A good way to help "fix" them can be found here.