Psion said:
As has already been noted, many powers don't scale well, or scale inefficiently, or don't scale at all. When it does scale, often the end results are not as effective as the higher level spell equivalent of a sorcerer (take a look at some of the energy powers. Though you can pump in PP to get damage and DC up, often you are still left affecting fewer targets than an equivalent level sor/wiz spell).
Interesting enough, I would rate the energy ... powers among those that look most impressive compared to the arcane versions (energy bolt to lightning bolt, energy ball to fireball - yeah, I know it's 4th level - +/-1 level is still within the parameter of "flavor" as shown with the other classes (i.e. enchantments for bards, dispel magic or flamestrike for druids, etc.)). Now with the errata/clarification, dominate is up there, too.
Really, I havn't seen much in terms of psionic powers, that looks bad compared to equivalent arcane spells (given that you pay the PP to scale, of course).
However, there are plenty arcane spells, which have no psionic equivalent!
And all scaling requires the input of more power points, which in the sorcerer's world would be equivalent to charging the sorcerer higher level spell slots, when often the psionics equivalent is that of a lower level spell cast at the higher level, NOT that of a spell of the higher spell level.
The scaling, as the psion has it, does not translate into the sorcerer's world. If it would, the sorcerer would not have spell slots of specific levels to begin with. The non-automatic scaling is the limiting factor for the psion's flexibility to not get completely out of hand (as in hundreds of "magic missiles" per day).
It has the inherent weakness that psions need to augment many of their powers to some degree to keep them effective. Arcane casters have the caps and restricted level slots instead.
And don't forget, that it is just an option for psions to scale low level powers instead of using high level powers. They get twice to four times as many
real high level powers to choose from compared to the sorcerer!
More choice is always a benefit.
(Note: Of course, this also applies to the selection, the arcane casters choose their spells from.)
Overall (including scaling and the added flexibility of the PP system) psionic powers and arcane spells seem roughly balanced to me (have said this before).
Couple that with the fact that psion power slots are not level specific, I beleive that the absence of swapping is a telling feature.
I believe that it is directly related to the automatic upgrades, so to say (i.e. dispel includes greater dispel, psionic weapon includes greater psionic weapon, etc.). The sorcerer has the swapping ability exactly to do this (upgrade spells to higher versions, or discard spells that - thanks to cap - are useless now, but were good before - otherwise such spells will almost never be used).
So in short, I think there is a LOT of give and take you are not considering in your supposedly objective examples, ...
Actually, I think those points have been addressed in my critique (that is the scaling issues (non-automatic and costly) and the weaker selection). Anything else I have missed?
That said, sorcerer has never failed my ultimate balance litmus test. To wit, I beleive that if a class really is unbalanced, players will detect this and play it preferentially. Despite many theoretical analyses on clerics (showing they are strong) and sorcerers (showing they are weak), sorcerer still remains the most played spellcasting class in my games, and I hardly ever see a cleric played. So while there may be some theoretical weakness, I think the litmus test shows that they are pretty minor in scope if there is any authenticity to the claim.
Yeah, the differences between the core classes are pretty minor in my opinion.
Clerics, sorcerers, etc. they all are pretty unique also, favoring several different tastes and playing styles. Psions and sorcerers, however, are very similar (even more than sorcerers and wizards I'd dare to say, because of their similarities in design and the general similarities between psionic powers and arcane spells, which are much closer than divine magic to each of them).
I'm pretty sure, that with the XPH included in a campaign, sorcerers (generally) will be played FAR less. Of course, this is pure guess-work.
Bye
Thanee
). The examples are not what it's all about. If you only refer to some examples I give, you won't get the whole point. I'm trying to argue about the very basic fundamentals of each class.
