XPH: Elan Balanced?

[Taren Seeker]

Spending 100 PP to block that 50 damage is @ half of a 14th level psion's total PP for the day.

If a mage had to give up half his total spell slots (by number of levels not by slots) to block an attack doing 50 damage would that be a harsh cost? Not to mention that it works for only 1 attack. You may be able to soak up a good hit but what about the rest of the full attack action?

The +4 to saves is strong but as stated there are a lot of very good powers that are immediate or swift actions that you would be unable to use. It would suck to get +4 to your save then be unable to immediately manifest the Energy Adaption when 6 empowered fireballs come screaming in.

There's a lot of strong stuff in the XPH but to me it looks balanced, flavorful and flexible; I'll be playing an Elan Psion today for the first time. Can't wait to see how it turns out!

 

[DreamChaser]

Add to that that no psion can spend more points on a power than he has levels...I don't see why the elan's abilities would be exceptions to this. Thus, no elan could (w/o epic levels) ever use more than 20 pp, thus soaking 10 damage.

DC

 

[Particle_Man]

Add to that that no psion can spend more points on a power than he has levels...I don't see why the elan's abilities would be exceptions to this. Thus, no elan could (w/o epic levels) ever use more than 20 pp, thus soaking 10 damage.

DC

Because the racial ability is not a power/spell, it is a supernatural ability. Hence, it, like any supernatural ability, is an exception to all rules that have anything to do with powers/spells, unless it states specifically that it is like the spell/power.

 

[Piratecat]

I really hope to see Resilience capped in the errata. I thought we learned not to leave uncapped material anywhere near psionics, precisely because you can spend 100 power points and just prevent 50 damage.

First, I think the "never spend more PP than your level" rule applies here.

Even if it doesn't? Maybe it's just me, but this seems like a fair tradeoff.. That's what - potentially 20 3rd lvl powers, or 11 5th lvl powers, to save a lousy 50 points of damage? That's absolutely balanced.

EDIT: Yeek! I should have known better. 50 hp of damage should be 25 pp, or 5 3rd lvl powers or two 7th lvl powers... still okay, for my campaign.

 

[Thanee]

This is what we refer to as "a bee in your bonnet." Jeez, Thanee, you're starting to sound like Diaglo discussing OD&D.

Hey, can't leave out an opportunity to tell you folks how darn unbalanced the XPH is!



Bye
Thanee

 

[Deset Gled]

Even if it doesn't? Maybe it's just me, but this seems like a fair tradeoff.. That's what - potentially 20 3rd lvl powers, or 11 5th lvl powers, to save a lousy 50 points of damage? That's absolutely balanced.

Balanced in a normal campaign, where you have multiple encounters in a day, sure. But if you have the ability to run away and hide for a day after a battle, it's not.

It's a problem that's a lot like the Body Fuel feat from 3.0. Will it make a huge deal in everyday gaming? No. Will it make for some outrageous situations that a lot of people don't think should be possible and throw balance for arena battles? Yes. In my oppinion, it's not so much unbalanced as it's just poor practice to write things like that.

Of course, this is all assuming there's no cap. I don't own the book, and can't find the details of it in the SRD, so I can't make an educated decision on it either way.

 

[Staffan]

Balanced in a normal campaign, where you have multiple encounters in a day, sure. But if you have the ability to run away and hide for a day after a battle, it's not.

So are a lot of buffing spells and the like. The core assumption of D&D is that you *will* have multiple encounters in a day.

Will it make for some outrageous situations that a lot of people don't think should be possible and throw balance for arena battles?

I confess to not crying many tears over things being specifically unbalanced in "arena battles."

 

[Diirk]

Comparing it to the dwarf imo its weaker, but then if you compared it with a tiefling (+1 LA) its arguably stronger ;/ Poor tieflings.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Add to that that no psion can spend more points on a power than he has levels...I don't see why the elan's abilities would be exceptions to this. Thus, no elan could (w/o epic levels) ever use more than 20 pp, thus soaking 10 damage.

DC

I thought it was 2 damage per pp, making a 20pp expenditure account for 40 damage...

 

[James McMurray]

It is. The earlier example of 100pp for 50hp is probably what's thrown everyone off. 100pp would atually stop 200hp of damage.