Leatherhead
Possibly a Idiot.
To start off with, I will remind everyone about Dungeons and Dragons 5th Edition Unearthed Arcana: It's a series of articles that provide the internet at large playtest material for 5e. After a publishing a PDF and waiting for a irregular period of time, the 5e Game Devs at Wizards of the Coast send out a servey to see how people liked the ideas, catch any obvious bugs or typos, and theoretically maybe where they should take the UA playtest next. In order for a UA playtest to be successful, it has to pass a ~70% approval margin, because the 5e business strategy is all about mass appeal instead of niche appeal (I mean, it's obviously propelled them to a new golden age of D&D, so they aren't knocking a good thing.) No I don't remember the exact twitch broadcast and timestamp the number comes from, I'm sure someone who isn't working during the current lockdown could do so if they wanted too. But the exact number isn't actually important, it's the idea that the majority of feedback has to be positive. Also of note, an incredibly small portion of the D&D player-base actually participate in the UA surveys, a number that is even smaller than the portion of the Player-base that talks about D&D on message boards, Twitter, Reddit, or the like.
So to trim that: UA comes out every so often, a small number of people see and give feedback, if a UA rule gets ~70% approval it's considered printable. Got it?
Now to discuss Psionics. Basically, every edition of D&D has done something different with psionics.
Sometimes Psionics was an additional super-power that was tacked on to a character, sometimes it was (a) properly coded class(es). Sometimes psionic powers had their own tables and rules, other times they used more or less the same spells everyone else did with mental fluff. So, whenever someone says they want to have psionics in 5e, they could be talking about any one of 4 official variations, or potentially some other non-official flavor of mind-powers that may or may not map closely to one of those things. And keep in mind (heh) that these official takes are in direct conflict with each other.
When talking about making a psion (or psionic powers) for 5e, there are two major questions to be considered: “Are Psionic Powers 'Normal'”? Meaning “are they mechanically similar to spells or other powers that the rest of the classes get”? And “Do you want a Psion Class or do you want everyone to have the potential for it?”
The first question is already answered by WotC: Psionic powers are Normalized. Monsters already do it. They have a spell listing where every class regardless of how they do things uses the same spells. And this automatically makes people who want their Psionics to be special to give negative scores on any kind of Psionic UA. That's right, Psionics, despite being iconic, historic, and possibly popular, are already fighting an uphill battle because having normalized powers isn't cool enough, even if it is literally the only way to get player-psionics into 5e.
OK. You probably want a clarification on that last part. Remember what I said about WotC ignoring niche stuff? They are not going to publish a book of psionic rules which is going to be ignored by over half of the player-base because it's weird, complicated, overpowered, or just different for the sake of being different. It's not that the people who want psioncs to be special are wrong, but that ship has more or less sailed and the people who are voting against normalization are basically just ensuring that if they can't have it their way, nobody can. Even if they don't realize it.
Now for the other question. WotC has also answered this one, they want everyone to have it. Which causes issues for everyone who wants a Psion Class. Once again, there is a dedicated group of people who are ride-or-die for the Psion Class and will vote against any attempt at a subclass. Granted, it's far more likely that we will get a psionic class printed at some point, but until that comes to pass any psionic subclass is going to get unnecessary negative feedback on “principle”, because there might be a chance that WotC stops making at the psionic subclasses.
In conclusion: The UA Psionics are never going to make enough people happy because the people who are interested in UA and want psionics are divided into opposing “all-or-nothing” camps. In order for psionics to make it past UA you would need to somehow appease enough of everyone all at once, which I don't see as happening unless maybe they actually push out an entire books worth of UA that lets most people have something.
So to trim that: UA comes out every so often, a small number of people see and give feedback, if a UA rule gets ~70% approval it's considered printable. Got it?
Now to discuss Psionics. Basically, every edition of D&D has done something different with psionics.
Sometimes Psionics was an additional super-power that was tacked on to a character, sometimes it was (a) properly coded class(es). Sometimes psionic powers had their own tables and rules, other times they used more or less the same spells everyone else did with mental fluff. So, whenever someone says they want to have psionics in 5e, they could be talking about any one of 4 official variations, or potentially some other non-official flavor of mind-powers that may or may not map closely to one of those things. And keep in mind (heh) that these official takes are in direct conflict with each other.
When talking about making a psion (or psionic powers) for 5e, there are two major questions to be considered: “Are Psionic Powers 'Normal'”? Meaning “are they mechanically similar to spells or other powers that the rest of the classes get”? And “Do you want a Psion Class or do you want everyone to have the potential for it?”
The first question is already answered by WotC: Psionic powers are Normalized. Monsters already do it. They have a spell listing where every class regardless of how they do things uses the same spells. And this automatically makes people who want their Psionics to be special to give negative scores on any kind of Psionic UA. That's right, Psionics, despite being iconic, historic, and possibly popular, are already fighting an uphill battle because having normalized powers isn't cool enough, even if it is literally the only way to get player-psionics into 5e.
OK. You probably want a clarification on that last part. Remember what I said about WotC ignoring niche stuff? They are not going to publish a book of psionic rules which is going to be ignored by over half of the player-base because it's weird, complicated, overpowered, or just different for the sake of being different. It's not that the people who want psioncs to be special are wrong, but that ship has more or less sailed and the people who are voting against normalization are basically just ensuring that if they can't have it their way, nobody can. Even if they don't realize it.
Now for the other question. WotC has also answered this one, they want everyone to have it. Which causes issues for everyone who wants a Psion Class. Once again, there is a dedicated group of people who are ride-or-die for the Psion Class and will vote against any attempt at a subclass. Granted, it's far more likely that we will get a psionic class printed at some point, but until that comes to pass any psionic subclass is going to get unnecessary negative feedback on “principle”, because there might be a chance that WotC stops making at the psionic subclasses.
In conclusion: The UA Psionics are never going to make enough people happy because the people who are interested in UA and want psionics are divided into opposing “all-or-nothing” camps. In order for psionics to make it past UA you would need to somehow appease enough of everyone all at once, which I don't see as happening unless maybe they actually push out an entire books worth of UA that lets most people have something.
