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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Spatzimaus" data-source="post: 2996928" data-attributes="member: 3051">There are two separate issues here:1> The Sorcerer's 1-level lag isn't exactly a new issue.  The justification I've always seen for it when compared to a Wizard was that Sorcerers sacrifice that and spells known in exchange for their MASSIVE firepower, and the exact same situation comes up in regards to Psions.  Why?  Because while Psions can front-load their spells better than Wizards can, the total number of spell levels per day they can cast is far closer to the Wizard end than the Sorcerer one.  My old 3E Sorcerer NEVER ran out of spells, even considering the fact that he used a lot of low-level ones (invisibility, haste, fly); my 3.5E Psion runs out often.So, if you accept that the 1-level lag is balanced vs. Wizards, then by the same logic it must be balanced vs. Psions... which means you should be comparing a Sor 10 (9/5/4/3/2/1) to a Psi 9 (0/5/4/4/4/2), which is a bit closer.  If you don't compare it this way, you're claiming that Sorcerers are far weaker than Wizards, because they're being penalized for nothing.2> Again, this assumes the Psion ALWAYS picks spells of the highest possible level.  Which, as I've mentioned, isn't always true.Take that 10th level you mention; for my Shaper, what four 5th-level powers would he want at that point?  Okay, plane shift is nice, and true seeing has its uses (except note that the psionic version is self-only, while the arcane/divine are Touch range; of course, there's no 250gp component involved either).  But what else did I have to look from?  power resistance's usefulness depends on whether you play with complete magic/psionic transparency; hail of crystals just doesn't seem that attractive when compared to the other damage powers; what's left, adapt body and major creation?Plus, as I pointed out, the PP shortage really hurts too much to always take the biggest powers.  A level 10 Psion with an 18 INT has 108 power points, and those 5th-level powers cost 9 apiece.  Once you include all the lower-level powers (especially the augmentable ones) you'll be using, there just isn't any point to having 4 5th-level powers at that level.So really, what I ended up doing at level 10 was picking two lower-level powers (I forget which.)  The same pattern happened all the way up; I only took the newest and biggest power maybe half the time, which really ends up just mimicking the Sorcerer progression (where you get your four known spells at N, N+2, N+4, and N+6).For the Energy attack powers, sure, they're more flexible than anything an arcane type gets.  Of course, to get them to do the damage of their arcane equivalents, you need to pump extra power points into them, and this adds up fast.  But okay, overall they're stronger.The level 1 augmentable stuff is nice, but most of the time the augmentation is just marginally increasing its effectiveness at a steep cost.  (The Shield equivalent that's 1pp for the first 4 AC but +4pp for each one after that?)  There are a few exceptions, of course; I like the ones that let you spend 6pp to quicken, because at high level the time becomes the limiting factor.And there are powers like animal affinity that can be used to mimic multiple arcane spells... but the power is self-only, to balance.  (And is limited to a single discipline, of course)But many of the other Psion powers are LESS functional than their arcane equivalents.  Several simply become self-only (tongues, true seeing) with no gain in flexibility, some have drastically increased casting times (identify goes from 1 hour to 1 day), some have drastically decreased durations (moment of prescience drops from 1 hour/level down to 1 ROUND per level), some drop minor functions (force screen doesn't stop magic missile)... this really starts to add up after a while.And, as I mentioned before, the difference in spell selection is HUGE.  Psions can't fly, charm, fireball, scry, Summon, or buff a stat at the same time, because each of these is in a different Discipline; barring spending an entire Feat just to get a single power, you're out of luck.  So while the Psion might be able to effectively spoof more powers by using some multi-use powers, he can't cover nearly as large of a range of abilities.  My Sorcerer, on the other hand, could do all six of these.I can say from experience, my Sorcerer never felt stifled by the known-spell limit, but my Psion does.I'd put read magic and mage hand into that group, too.  So that means the Sorcerer gains the equivalent of three additional known 1st-level spells, not counting what he could learn with the remaining cantrips (like message, light, prestidigitation, etc.)  But even if you only like detect magic and cast it the 6 times per day, that's still effectively a half-dozen extra power points the Psion would be expected to burn, and an extra known power he'd be expected to take in lieu of something stronger.</blockquote>

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