D&D General What is the right amount of Classes for Dungeons and Dragons?

[Neonchameleon]

it's. not. magic.

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic" - Arthur C. Clarke

please stop insisting they are, the nuances and differences of the process are important and your disregard for them is insulting to everyone who actually cares, just because they can achieve vaguely the same end result does not mean they are the same thing, your refusal to acknowledge their basic premise is not helping your case in us valuing your input.

I'd here say that this is something on which reasonable people can disagree. And that I certainly see magic as an overarching category covering the inexplicable. And there's a reason psionics are sometimes referred to as "space magic".

 

[Neonchameleon]

Cool. That's. Not what we want in D&D psionics. We want to throw people around with our mind and tear their brain out with a thought. This isn't a D&D psionics spell and, hell, it isn't even a wizard spell half the time because its a Divine one. This is irrelevant to the discussion on D&D psionics because we're emulating "Pop culture psychic", not "19th century Spiritualism"

Hear hear. I absolutely support high power psychics being able to do all that.

Psychic power isn't the magic D&D presented however. It isn't the magic of wizards or sorcerers. It isn't Arcane Magic, which is their magic

Wizards don't cast every magic. They don't cast Divine magic, the magic of gods. They don't cast the magic of nature, the domain of druids. Psionics may be magic, but it isn't wizard magic, and therefore they shouldn't get access to it and it can be split into its own thing. Otherwise, this "Its magic" argument is saying "Remove the Cleric" and that's going to be a far larger hurdle

But when we have tried to define psychic spells we've ended up with such abominations as "Moment of Prescience, Psionic" (and I think I've used a different one of these pieces of nonsense in each comment and continue for a long time). I have asked repeatedly what sort of magics the wizard or the cleric shouldn't be able to cast that psychics should - and been met by as I recall a pretty resounding silence. The wizard/cleric split was baked in at the beginning and you can roughly explain the difference and what wizards can't do and what clerics can, but psionic classics like Suggestion, Command, or Modify Memory have always been there for other classes.

Unless you can explicitly say and get reasonable general agreement on what wizards and clerics shouldn't be able to do that psychics can then if you want to use spells the way the Psion does then just use the spells that are already there and (unless you can find a completely different approach in the way the psion failed to even if all (non-warlock) 5e casters cast more like 3.5 psions than their own 3.5 classes) the classes that are already there. Y'know, the way the Aberrant Mind does. And then make the psychics better at casting their own spells than the wizards are. Y'know, again the way the Aberrant Mind is. Or add spells and leave them off the wizard list but on the sorcerer or warlock list.

If, on the other hand, you have an entirely different casting system in mind (whether Soulknife/Psy Warrior style, Mystic style, Incarnum style, Trunenamer style, or whatever) then feel free to offer it.

Once we got one base class, we can grab its mechanics piecemeal and look at merging into other classes, like how Divine Soul sorcerer and Celestial warlock grab from the Cleric playbook. Those two classes existing doesn't mean we want to get rid of clerics, but it opens avenues to keep a mechanical identity around

Alternatively we already got multiple subclasses that are psionic. I might find interesting something that takes the Soulknife and the Psi Warrior and builds them up into a class.

And I'm going to say openly that the 3.5 Psion is fondly remembered because its casting system was outright better than the core 3.5 casters. So lead to a positive play experience. But those are nostalgia goggles for the mechanics and now everyone has flexible spell levels and slots and upcasting - and the Aberrant Mind is better at fulfilling the themes of a psychic character (rather than a good generic caster) than the psion ever was.

 

[Remathilis]

And I absolutely do not want a psionic base class. I'll take three (as long as we do better than either the 3.5 Wilder or the 3.5 Soulknife for the second and third) but I consider zero to be a huge improvement over one.

This is because when you only have one class that uses a power source you are making some very important decisions (like number of hit points, proficiencies, and playstyle) about what the overwhelming majority of people using that power source do and implying they are almost all the same. I consider Professor X and Psylocke being members of different classes to be a good thing. Which means that it's three classes or a collection of subclasses for me if we want to explore what psionics actually are.

I think that a mix of an actual psionic class or classes and psionic subclasses would be sufficient. I don't need the nine psionic classes like 3.5 had, but I definitely don't feel four subclasses is suffient.

 

[jmartkdr2]

Wizards shouldn't heal, shouldn't be great at commanding natural phenomena, and should generally have a broad array of abilities they're pretty good at but nothing they're great at unless it doesn't fit in any other class.

Clerics shouldn't be good at elemental magic, damage in general, or shapechanging. Domains can add these back in but in narrow ways (ie the fire domain adds fire damage). They should also be good at either healing or necromancy (which is, admittedly, mostly damage).

Druids shouldn't be good at illusions, dealing with outsiders (except fey), or mental effects.

Psions shouldn't be good at elemental damage, shapechaging, healing (although thp-buffing is fine) or dealing wih outsiders other than aberrations.

Warlocks are bad at healing and buff spells, but should be really good at debuff.

Bards shouldn't be good at damage, shapechanging, or elements.

Artificers have a spell list broadly similar to wizards. Sorcerers should by highly specialized by subclass. Paladins and rangers are half-versions of clerics and druids respectively.

 

[cbwjm]

Since this thread is now another psion class thread I'm gonna throw in some thoughts.

I'd like to see one class for psionics and subclasses for things like the psychic warrior. I wouldn't want a psychic class to use the current spellcasting mechanics, it should be somewhat distinct. This is why 3e psionics felt off to me, they made it too similar to spells, including spell levels.

I'd have psychics focus on those powers that I often think of when I think psionics such as telepathy/mind control, telekinesis, and pyrokinesis, those are the big three things I think of for psionics but could also, delve into the old disciplines from earlier editions.

 

[Celebrim]

Both the Cleric and the Wizard cast magic.

Yes.

As per your very argument here, you're saying "Remove the Cleric and just give all of its stuff to the Wizard". That's your argument. "Its magic therefore its just another wizard" falls flat when this game has, for decades, had a seperate, secondary sort of magic in divine magic

How is that my "very argument"? I never said anything of the sort. In fact, if you'll go back and read me from the start I implied something quite the opposite of that. Moreover, I never said "It's magic therefore it's just another wizard". That quote isn't even a paraphrase of something I said, which makes it there for a lie. Something closer to what I actually said was "It's magic therefore it's just another spellcaster", although really it was more like, "It's magic therefore it can access and be emulated by the core magic system like any other spellcaster." But really, even "It's magic" is where mostly people got stuck.

This is why I've define it as Arcane Magic versus Psionic Magic

Once you define it as "magic" then we are already like 95% in agreement. We don't really have a whole lot left to argue about after that, since we're just discussing what the best way to implement magic for D&D would be.

with Divine Magic and Nature Magic as their own thing

I mean, yes and no. If you go read closely, there isn't really any difference in the spells in divine magic and the spells in arcane magic. Contrary to some assumptions, Clerics don't do miracles based on faith. They are given spells to cast by an outside force. In some cases, from the perspective of that outside being the spell is arcane magic in that it's a spell-like ability that they are casting from their innate power much like a sorcerer. The spell becomes "divine magic" mostly because it is given to the caster to use from an external source. The biggest distinction - and some could argue the only distinction - between divine magic and arcane magic is whether or not you are the source of the power and the spell, or some other being is the source of the power or the spell.

The Druid's history is complicated and there is no one right answer here about "nature magic". In 1e in many cases it was implied that Druid's were a subclass of Cleric and that they received their magic from certain deities associated with nature. In 2e this became the basis of the idea of the "specialty priest" which was simply a cleric that specifically reflected a particular deity better than the generic cleric of 1e did, and druids were simply the specialty priests of certain deities. Only in later editions do we here anything about "nature magic" in a very nebulous sort of way. We could have a whole discussion about what is wrong with the druid as a core class and why having druids as a core class is probably incorrect, but I think it's enough to discuss the psion for now.

This is irrelevant to the discussion on D&D psionics because we're emulating "Pop culture psychic", not "19th century Spiritualism"

Pop culture psychic and 19th century spiritualism have a lot more in common than you seem to thing.

Psionics may be magic, but it isn't wizard magic, and therefore they shouldn't get access to it and it can be split into its own thing.

Sure so now we have a spellcaster that casts arcane magic called the Psionic and you think this is a big difference of opinion with me? It's not clear to me who the "they" is but presumably you are saying in the future wizards shouldn't get clairvoyance and telekinesis? Or maybe psionics should get the ability to make fire with their mind because that's a wizard thing? I guess I'm having a hard time figuring out what you are concluding because you seem to want to fight a fight I was never interested in, and have readily conceded the central fact that I was arguing in favor of.

 

[Mecheon]

Sure so now we have a spellcaster that casts arcane magic called the Psionic and you think this is a big difference of opinion with me? It's not clear to me who the "they" is but presumably you are saying in the future wizards shouldn't get clairvoyance and telekinesis? Or maybe psionics should get the ability to make fire with their mind because that's a wizard thing? I guess I'm having a hard time figuring out what you are concluding because you seem to want to fight a fight I was never interested in, and have readily conceded the central fact that I was arguing in favor of.

No.

We have the older spellcaster, the psion, who's been in this game since before I was born, and bring it to the modern edition. Like, at least the Warlord I get people don't like it because its a 4E thing. Psionics have been "This is distinct from wizardly magic" in this game since 1978. They're not Arcane spells. They're psionic spells, and this has been defined this way for over 40 years.

And, yeah, y'know what? Wizards should lose a lot of spells. They should get an identity that isn't just "Grab bag of spells in the game"

How is that my "very argument"? I never said anything of the sort. In fact, if you'll go back and read me from the start I implied something quite the opposite of that. Moreover, I never said "It's magic therefore it's just another wizard". That quote isn't even a paraphrase of something I said, which makes it there for a lie. Something closer to what I actually said was "It's magic therefore it's just another spellcaster", although really it was more like, "It's magic therefore it can access and be emulated by the core magic system like any other spellcaster." But really, even "It's magic" is where mostly people got stuck.

You're defining psionic magic, something that has for over 40 years in this very game been a distinct thing, as being the same thing as wizard magic. If psionic spells are just arcane spells, wizard spells, then you're saying all magic is the same. Extrapolating this, all magic being the same, implies that divine magic is just the same again.

I'm grabbing your argument and applying it to an identical case but another class that, let's be honest, has less differences in the game's history than the differences between psionic spells and wizard spells. Its a perfectly applicable argument, especially because cleric spells and wizard spells are structured the same, and at least psionic ones have been structured differently in the past. I absolutely don't want to look at any of those old structurings (3.5E and 4E psionics should be the go-to), but its a well established thing.

Once you define it as "magic" then we are already like 95% in agreement. We don't really have a whole lot left to argue about after that, since we're just discussing what the best way to implement magic for D&D would be.

See, this is the thing. "Its magic therefore its wizard stuff". Guess what else is magic? Cleric spells. You want to merge those in as well?

"Its magic therefore its just a wizard" hits the cleric exactly as much as it hits the psion.

I mean, yes and no. If you go read closely, there isn't really any difference in the spells in divine magic and the spells in arcane magic. Contrary to some assumptions, Clerics don't do miracles based on faith. They are given spells to cast by an outside force. In some cases, from the perspective of that outside being the spell is arcane magic in that it's a spell-like ability that they are casting from their innate power much like a sorcerer. The spell becomes "divine magic" mostly because it is given to the caster to use from an external source. The biggest distinction - and some could argue the only distinction - between divine magic and arcane magic is whether or not you are the source of the power and the spell, or some other being is the source of the power or the spell.

The Druid's history is complicated and there is no one right answer here about "nature magic". In 1e in many cases it was implied that Druid's were a subclass of Cleric and that they received their magic from certain deities associated with nature. In 2e this became the basis of the idea of the "specialty priest" which was simply a cleric that specifically reflected a particular deity better than the generic cleric of 1e did, and druids were simply the specialty priests of certain deities. Only in later editions do we here anything about "nature magic" in a very nebulous sort of way. We could have a whole discussion about what is wrong with the druid as a core class and why having druids as a core class is probably incorrect, but I think it's enough to discuss the psion for now.

And psionics is another source. If clerics are safe from the 'merge into wizard' bat due to the different source, then so are psions.

 

[Vael]

The Mystic was definitely pulled too thin by trying to be "all of Psionics" in one package, but we now have the Soulknife and Psi Warrior, Aberrant Mind and Great Old One Patron, so another take on the Mystic can be narrower in scope

 

[Celebrim]

We have the older spellcaster, the psion, who's been in this game since before I was born...

Ok, so that explains a lot. So, the psion technically didn't exist until 2001 when it was introduced by 3e's "Psionics Handbook". By that time I was 28 and had been playing D&D for about 20 years. The predecessor to the psion was the "psionicist" which was in 2e "The Complete Psionicist Handbook" which came out in 1991, at which time I was 18. It was in my impression very poorly received. Feel free to read the reviews of GMs that tried to use the book.

While there was some cleaning up of the rules compared to 1e, the rules were highly unbalanced and I don't think anyone much used them unless they got big into Dark Sun which had it's own setting and unique magic system and reasons for wanting to have psionics (and it's own super crazy "it's not broken if everything is broken" take on balance). But Dark Sun also kept 1e's "wild talents" system on top of acknowledging the psionicist as an option. It did clarify the "Psionics–Magic Transparency" as official to the setting, which made psionics magic and using it spellcasting in practice, since "dispel magic" affected psionic disciplines, "detect psionics" detected magic, and so forth. So I mean, it was definitely trying to move things in the right direction.

In any event, in both 2e and 3e, the psion/psionicist was not part of the core rules and was presented in an optional guide. Indeed, 3e divorced psionics from its core rules entirely, which 2e never completely did - the 2e "The Complete Psionicist Handbook" declared itself (as one of its many internal contradictions) entirely optional even though the 2e Montrous Compendium still referenced it.

Prior to 1991, say you are going back to 1978, psionics weren't a class you could study or learn. They were magic you were either born with or else you weren't. They represented innate inborn natural magical ability that wasn't tied to study or dependent on an external force. The psion/psionicist didn't exist in 1978 at all. It defeated the purpose and intent of psionics to have it just be another class and level based thing.

And, yeah, y'know what? Wizards should lose a lot of spells. They should get an identity that isn't just "Grab bag of spells in the game"

This is to me a completely different question and one I don't have a lot of interest in. As I've said before, I am open to splitting up spellcasters in different ways to limit their power, and exactly how you split them up isn't that important to me. Personally, I'd never split them into "Psion" for a variety of reasons, but if you went that way it wouldn't be wrong. What I would think is wrong though would be having multiple different magic systems. One thing about the Cleric and the Wizard (and the sorcerer and the druid and the paladin and the ranger and whatever) that you overlook is that they share the same magic system. So if you really want to have a Psion sharing the magic system of the other spellcasting then that's fine with me. I don't like it and I would go at this in a different way with just 4 core full-casters, but you could justify it if for example you were making Dark Sun the core setting of the game.

Like I said, if you are designing a new D&D edition you should probably end up with 10-15 classes as the end of the day, and I'm not going to fight over which ones they are that much except in a few specific cases where I think there is a reason the choice is wrong (such as adding psionics purely to add another spellcasting system given the long history of that being a bad idea). But I think you'll find that this agreement about the psion, that it is magic and it's a spellcasting class using the same base mechanics as other spellcasting classes is not one which will make the people who want a psion happy.

Extrapolating this, all magic being the same, implies that divine magic is just the same again.

I mean it definitely is. I just explained that it is. So what?

 

[Kaiyanwang]

And I'm going to say openly that the 3.5 Psion is fondly remembered because its casting system was outright better than the core 3.5 casters. So lead to a positive play experience. But those are nostalgia goggles for the mechanics and now everyone has flexible spell levels and slots and upcasting - and the Aberrant Mind is better at fulfilling the themes of a psychic character (rather than a good generic caster) than the psion ever was.

The 3.5 Psion is indeed very popular, and I am surely not an opponent. A player of mine brought one up to 40th.
While the point system is very intuitive and ironically reminds people the system standard mages, sorcerers and wizards use in popular videogames (often called mana; see also the 3.5 SRD for spell points for such system in your PHB classes), there is some caveat.
Keeping it under Epic (at 20th), a psion has 343 points, and with an Intelligence of 28 gains an additional bonus 90. Those 433 points can be spent for up to 25 manifestations of level 9 powers; or alternatively 10 lvl 9th, 10 8th and ~8 of 7th. A sorcerer or a shugenja will have at those slots 1 bonus spell with the equivalent Cha score, for a total of 7 of 9th, 8th and 7th.
A cleric or a wizard will have less, and for the arcane casters only, Wizardry Rings that double spell slots stop at level IV before epic levels.
Granted if the Psion does that, will lose access to lower powers that day, while the casters will keep the low level slots. But this is something to consider when praising this system. I am ok with that but not everyone will be, I bet.