D&D 5E Would you prefer warlord or psion as a new class?

[Tony Vargas]

So, we're back to 3.x? Groovy. Gimme psicrystals, too.

3.x psionic powers were distinct from spells. The presentation format was very similar, and, oh, what a coincidence, they had 9 level's of 'em, but they were distinct, they had manifestations instead of components, used power points instead of slots, etc...

...I can't see the same objections to that as to reskinning spells.

 

[Parmandur]

There are no "psionic spells." There was no reskinning required to make 1e Psionics into psionics. Note that the psionic monsters in the 1e MM had powers that only interacted with other psionics, as part of that sub-system. Actually vaguely elegant, in a way - if you chose not to use the psionics appendix in the PH, the corresponding monster psionics could be ignored.

Telepathy and Telekinesis are both in the PHB Spell section.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Telepathy and Telekinesis are both in the PHB Spell section.

And are both spells, not psionics.
I mean, Pyrotechnics is a spell, that doesn't imply that wizards make gunpowder. Heck, Clone is a spell.

Names of spells very often do just say what they do. Telepathy or Telekinesis let you do those things, for a spell duration. That's not the same thing as being a telepath or a telekinetic.

5e design is supposed to be concept-first, not effects-first or mechanics-first.

 

[Parmandur]

And are both spells, not psionics.
I mean, Pyrotechnics is a spell, that doesn't imply that wizards make gunpowder. Heck, Clone is a spell.

Names of spells very often do just say what they do. Telepathy or Telekinesis let you do those things, for a spell duration. That's not the same thing as being a telepath or a telekinetic.

5e design is supposed to be concept-first, not effects-first or mechanics-first.

Six of one, half dozen of the other. We see in the latest test ways they are looking at giving Psionic abilities through Feat or Subclass abilities, but magic psychic powers are magic pshycic powers still.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Six of one, half dozen of the other.

No. Nothing in print 5 years in is still nothing, regardless of the units you express it in.

We see in the latest test ways they are looking at giving Psionic abilities through Feat or Subclass abilities, but magic psychic powers are magic pshycic powers still.

Whether psionics is magic or something else is a decision that really needs to be left to the DM, as it's gone either way (or been a choice) in past editions. Doing so is also entirely consistent with 5e design philosophy.
Heck, even the meaning/'narration' of hit points is left to the DM.
It's the DM's edition, why get all autocratic about psionics?

 

[Parmandur]

No. Nothing in print 5 years in is still nothing, regardless of the units you express it in.

Psionic material is in the core books, in the form of Spells, Subclass abilities, and monsters. More Psionic-adjacent material has come in subsequent books (such as the Gith PC options), and they have tested a raft if Psionic options: UA is practically the same as a 3E splatvook in terms of quality, and they even opened up the Mystic on the DMsGuild for the last phase before they gave up on the losing horse. Also, again, 5 years is not necessarily that long in the Editions lifecycle, even if the Psionics as n Core are arbitrarily discounted.

 

[Parmandur]

So, we're back to 3.x? Groovy. Gimme psicrystals, too.

Not anything that divergent, probably: casting Psionics Spells with Slots.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Psionic material is in the core books, in the form of Spells, Subclass abilities, and monsters.

Repeating that will not actually make it true.

they have tested a raft if Psionic options

They have.
For 5 years and counting.
They designed the whole core game in only about 2.

It's just one sub-system. It's been anything from 4 down to 0 classes. Shouldn't be that daunting.

. Also, again, 5 years is not necessarily that long in the Editions lifecycle.

It is the edition's entire history to date. We'll only know how long that is in terms of it's life cycle after the fact, so that can't be a useful metric, now.

5 years and counting is more than the 0-2 years it took every other edition to put psionics in print.

 

[Parmandur]

Repeating that will not actually make it true.

They have.
For 5 years and counting.
They designed the whole core game in only about 2.

It's just one sub-system. It's been anything from 4 down to 0 classes. Shouldn't be that daunting.

It is the edition's entire history to date. We'll only know how long that is in terms of it's life cycle after the fact, so that can't be a useful metric, now.

5 years and counting is more than the 0-2 years it took every other edition to put psionics in print.

Discounting the options in Core that any casual observer would identify as pshycic phenomenon doesn't mean they aren't there, either.

That they have tried so many takes over so many years speaks to how difficult the design is, and how much work was needed. Whatever they release, if anything makes it through, will have been throughout vetted. No need to be hasty.

 

[Wiseblood]

I would rather see Warlord. Until the next poll then I might pick psion. Just because the Warlord would probably take up less space in a book than psion and all of its powers and how they work.

The problem I see with both is that The Psion will probably be so like the wizard as to be indistinguishable. The Warlord on the other hand will almost certainly be battle master or bard like.

Could the Warlord be built so that they do something cool? Or would they be an ambulatory haste buff that uses their action (which would be a non-action if they couldn’t target allies) to give you an action (iirc they are called Lazylords)

Psion on the other hand would almost certainly have a bunch of effects which amount to psychic spells. Draped over an unarmored low hp frame. We already have two base classes that look like that. They have a great deal of overlap in their spell list. If there is more overlap with the psion “powers” then there was no point. If there is no overlap it would seem unfair to other caster classes since no other class has a completely exclusive spell list.