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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Marcus Smythe" data-source="post: 3011114" data-attributes="member: 43198">You know, I was ready to paint you with the broad brush there for just a little bit, but the last comment really rings a bell.(And no, I dont begin to think the Complete books are completely fair and balanced.. but then again, I dont think Core is, either.)I agree.  Completely.Things that cause real problems:1.) Anything that gives more/extra actions2.) Shapechange, or any of its cousins.3.) Anything that denies a save, while still having a winning, or near-winning, effect.4.) Gate5.) Lotsa stuff I forgot.Once we peel back those things, what weve got is..1.)  Psions are more on-the-fly flexible, Wizards are more absolutely flexible.2.)  Psions do Direct Damage better.  Wizards do board control better.3.)  Psions self-buff better.  Wizards do other-buff better.4.)  Psions self-defend primarily via extra HP and AC type effects, with some nod to some decent swift-action effects.  Wizards self defend via avoidance and mitigation type effects.  The Wizards defenses tend to be more absolute in nature, but require more setup time.5.)  A purpose built psion, core only, frequently meets or exceeds the ability of a wizard to accomplish that core purpose (especially if its in line with the "Psion Strengths", above.. Im less sure belive a purpose built Psion board-controller would match a wizardly counterpart).  However, the Wizard will generally out-perform the Psion at things the Psion is not built for.6.)  The relative abilty of each to shine will be closely tied to the amount of encounters per day (more favours the Wizard, though eventually both run out) the freedom of action available to the players (again, more favours the Wizard, whereas in tighter games, the Psion shines), and similar to the last, the amount of information available to the players (For obvious reasons)6a.)  The ability of the Psion to still shine, even when the GM is restricting player freedom of choice, information gathering, and even when the GM is throwing high-CR but not fully thought out encounters at them (The classic CR+5 single-encounter one-bad-guy day) probably contributes alot to the perceptions of psionics.. it is exactly the GMs who feel the most need to keep their players and game tightly under control (for reasons good or ill, its  a difference of style) who will see the most difference in performance between the Psion and the Wizard.  It is also such GMs who are most likely to respond poorly when a PC exhibits behaviour outside of the GMs expectations.7.)  Given all of the above, and purely in my experience playing a Kineticist in the company of a Wizard, the two complement each other in a single party, with the Arcanist providing problem-solving and board control, and the Psion providing focused combat power and flexibility in the form of what utility powers the Psion DOES know (and thus, the Wizard need never memorize).  If I had to only have one, in a purely-numbers-crunchy game, my choice would depend, I belive, on the composition of the rest of the party and the nature of the game (relative to issues in '6', above).8.)  When performing at his best, the Wizard makes the whole party shine, while appearing to do very little (at least in terms of damage or death), until the Wizard SoDs a given foe (doing X damage, where X is the targets HPs).  The latter is percieved as fairly normal by D+D players "Yup, he failed his save.  Happens."  When performing at his best, the Psion (at least the most-reviled flavours, the Construct-Creators and the Energy-Throwers) tend to shine themselves, while sharing little light with the rest of the party.  Their actual in-game impact will be the same, but they can make the rest of the party feel as if their contributions are not meaningful.  And when it comes time to blow away the BBEG... for reasons unknown (though I am guilty of this myself) the ability to make a bad guy with 300 hit points fail a save or die half the time (rounds to kill=2) is percieved as much less useful than the ability to blow away half the bad guys HPs in a round (rounds to kill=2).</blockquote>

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