The connection between 4e, the martial/caster divide, and psi is this:
There is a significant group of D&D players who
Want high level magic to be ridiculous and gamebreaking with no effective counters other than other high level magic.
Reject any attempt to make non-spellcasters ridiculous and gamebreaking.
Complain about high level D&D being unplayable.
4th edition massively toned down the gamebreaking potential of high level magic (violating #1) and to the extent gamebreaking capabilities did exist, gave them more or less equally to all classes (violating #2). The problem with psi is that you have a choice between making it ridiculous and gamebreaking, and making it inferior, and if it is to be gamebreaking, it's expected that it fit within the same paradigm as magic because doing anything else makes high level even less playable.
The connection between 4e, the martial/caster divide, and psi is this:
There is a significant group of D&D players who
Want high level magic to be ridiculous and gamebreaking with no effective counters other than other high level magic.
Reject any attempt to make non-spellcasters ridiculous and gamebreaking.
Complain about high level D&D being unplayable.
4th edition massively toned down the gamebreaking potential of high level magic (violating #1) and to the extent gamebreaking capabilities did exist, gave them more or less equally to all classes (violating #2). The problem with psi is that you have a choice between making it ridiculous and gamebreaking, and making it inferior, and if it is to be gamebreaking, it's expected that it fit within the same paradigm as magic because doing anything else makes high level even less playable.
High-level magic is quite easily countered by martials. Have an18th-level rogue and an Archwizard in a city and the Master Rogue has a kill order for the Archwizard by any means necessary.. The Archwizard is going to die. It might take a week or two, but the conclusion is certain, even with Foresight.
There used to be a practice of comparing builds by having them both start on an open plane 100ft apart. That comparison is stupid.
High-level magic is quite easily countered by martials. Have an18th-level rogue and an Archwizard in a city and the Master Rogue has a kill order for the Archwizard by any means necessary.. The Archwizard is going to die. It might take a week or two, but the conclusion is certain, even with Foresight.
There used to be a practice of comparing builds by having them both start on an open plane 100ft apart. That comparison is stupid.
Sure - if the archwizard knows absolutely nothing about the kill order and spends all their time hanging out drinking dodgy grog at Slappy Jack's Hooch Hole.
If the archwizard actually acts like an archwizard?
A.) They can just leave the plane, hang out in the City of Brass for a while or such. They can teleport to a different continent, or transform themself into a dragon, or any number of other things that makes it Problematic, if not impossible, to kill them. B.) They can just let themselves be killed after mailing all their stuff to the location of their hidden Clone, wake up, get a second Clone started, and turn up when it's ready to finish going about their business. C.) They can use their plethora of information-gathering magics to find the Master Rogue and end his sorry ass first. D.) They can live in an archmage's tower that constitutes a whole-ass Dungeon Raid for magicless mooks, in addition to A, B, and C, because that's what archmages do.
An archmage that dies because a dude with a knife shivved them a few times is an archmage that had no business claiming that title. Even assuming a Master Rogue's inability to fail skill checks and the use of exceptionally expensive poisons, the archmage only dies in that situation because they felt like it or because the GM handed them the Idiot Ball. There's a reason high-level spellcaster monsters' spell lists in the MM were all eye-wateringly insane; giving something like Vecna the ability to cast the sort of spells he damn well should be casting makes him effectively unstoppable.
High-level magic is quite easily countered by martials. Have an18th-level rogue and an Archwizard in a city and the Master Rogue has a kill order for the Archwizard by any means necessary.. The Archwizard is going to die. It might take a week or two, but the conclusion is certain, even with Foresight.
If the archwizard has no idea that a threat even exists and doesn't take any precautions, sure. Otherwise, the rogue is toast, because if you don't have nondetection or similar, you really can't win.
High-level magic is quite easily countered by martials. Have an18th-level rogue and an Archwizard in a city and the Master Rogue has a kill order for the Archwizard by any means necessary.. The Archwizard is going to die. It might take a week or two, but the conclusion is certain, even with Foresight.
If the archwizard has no idea that a threat even exists and doesn't take any precautions, sure. Otherwise, the rogue is toast, because if you don't have nondetection or similar, you really can't win.
Yurei1453 listed a bunch of actual Archwizard things they can do, if they think someone is trying to kill them. But you have to understand, even the good Archwizards assume there is another high level wizard looking to take their title. So They expect to have assassins coming at them daily. So they will do the entire list of things Yurei said, and then some, like stealing an immortal child of a goddess to leech their life force off of (BG3), become a lich (Every lich in the game), steal the life essence of their entire world and an ancient dragon... see Dark Sun setting for that one. (****ing Sorcerer Kings are truly messed up and evil)
The problem wasn’t that it gave everyone powers. I’m all in for giving all characters powers.
The problems with 4e were too many to count, but mostly revolve around the attempt to make it a video game. The narrative drama was replaced with dice mechanics for everything.
The homogenization was also a problem; that's all Pantagruel was saying. Nobody is saying it didn't have multiple problems, just that that particular one is germane to the thread.
Regarding the psionics of past editions, they were somewhat-balanced, and the psionic class functioned as intended. However, the lack of uniformity in the 5th edition’s design philosophy would likely hinder the integration of such a class. This is because the success of the psionic class in previous editions was due in part to a consistent gameplay cycle across all classes. The 5th edition, on the other hand, revisited the approach of 3.5, simplifying it and removing many complex mechanics, which included elements that supported the psionic class.
The primary thing that made past-edition psionics even remotely balanced was Psionics-Magic Transparency, which the psionics proponents in this thread claim not to want. You cannot have balance without it, unless psionics are so weak that transparency doesn't matter, which I'm guessing they wouldn't want either. Even the psionic classes we have now in 5e rely on transparency, such as the most powerful abilities of the Soulknife and Psi Warrior (their hour-long invisibility and telekinesis respectively) being magic.
High-level magic is quite easily countered by martials. Have an18th-level rogue and an Archwizard in a city and the Master Rogue has a kill order for the Archwizard by any means necessary.. The Archwizard is going to die. It might take a week or two, but the conclusion is certain, even with Foresight.
If the archwizard has no idea that a threat even exists and doesn't take any precautions, sure. Otherwise, the rogue is toast, because if you don't have nondetection or similar, you really can't win.
Why wouldn’t a high level rogue have Nondetection?
High-level magic is quite easily countered by martials. Have an18th-level rogue and an Archwizard in a city and the Master Rogue has a kill order for the Archwizard by any means necessary.. The Archwizard is going to die. It might take a week or two, but the conclusion is certain, even with Foresight.
There used to be a practice of comparing builds by having them both start on an open plane 100ft apart. That comparison is stupid.
Sure - if the archwizard knows absolutely nothing about the kill order and spends all their time hanging out drinking dodgy grog at Slappy Jack's Hooch Hole.
If the archwizard actually acts like an archwizard?
A.) They can just leave the plane, hang out in the City of Brass for a while or such. They can teleport to a different continent, or transform themself into a dragon, or any number of other things that makes it Problematic, if not impossible, to kill them. B.) They can just let themselves be killed after mailing all their stuff to the location of their hidden Clone, wake up, get a second Clone started, and turn up when it's ready to finish going about their business. C.) They can use their plethora of information-gathering magics to find the Master Rogue and end his sorry ass first. D.) They can live in an archmage's tower that constitutes a whole-ass Dungeon Raid for magicless mooks, in addition to A, B, and C, because that's what archmages do.
An archmage that dies because a dude with a knife shivved them a few times is an archmage that had no business claiming that title. Even assuming a Master Rogue's inability to fail skill checks and the use of exceptionally expensive poisons, the archmage only dies in that situation because they felt like it or because the GM handed them the Idiot Ball. There's a reason high-level spellcaster monsters' spell lists in the MM were all eye-wateringly insane; giving something like Vecna the ability to cast the sort of spells he damn well should be casting makes him effectively unstoppable.
You are assuming that an Archmage has any high level spell they want. That’s not RAW. They. can select two spells at each level, plus any books they find.
Regarding this hypothetical 4th tier Rogue v. Wizard thing, obviously if the Wizard knows both that they are being targeted in general and who is after them they can do a lot, but otherwise it's much more up in the air. At 17th level, an Assassin has 9d6 Sneak Attack damage, and on top of auto-crits on a surprise attack it's a DC 19 CON save or the damage is doubled again. And the Assassin subclass is also specialized in disguises and infiltration, so let's assume that unless the Wizard has some way to specifically pick them out from dozens of yards away, they get that surprise attack. Their to-hit will be at least +11, probably closer to +13 from a magic weapon at this point. If the Wizard keeps Mage Armor up they'll have something like 15-17 AC, maybe all the way up to 19 if they have an AC boosting magic item. Shield or SB don't come into play because you can't take reactions when surprised, so it's an advantage attack of +13 (making it functionally ~+17 iirc) against AC of 19; that means that functionally it would be about 1 in 20 odds of failure. And the Wizard is going to have maybe +2 to CON saves in typical builds, so they need a 17 or higher to make that save, giving 4 in 5 odds they take 36d6 Sneak Attack damage. I think we can safely assume they won't survive the hit. Now, hypothetically the Wizard could use Foresight to negate the Sneak Attack, but that spell has an 8 hour duration and can only be cast once a day, meaning if we assume a typical 16 hour period of activity they are only covered half the time. They could also set Contingency to Dimension Door out of danger or put a Wall of Force around them. But there's no discretion over the trigger and the material component is expensive and theoretically rare. So this all comes down to the narrative/meta level of "who is better at concealing themselves and their capabilities before the Big Moment", and thus cannot be answered quantifiably. And the best spell a Wizard has for divining the identity of a hypothetical assassin is Divination, which is extremely narrow and limited in what it can reveal, given that you need to ask about a specific goal, event, or activity occurring in the next 7 days, and the response is not necessarily going to be explicit. Plus, the Amulet of of Proof Against Detection and Location is only Uncommon, so a 4th tier Assassin specifically targeting a Wizard is almost certainly going to have one.
So, in the end, capability-wise each is potentially able to foil the other; if the Rogue is able to ensure a clear Sneak Attack, it's pretty much game over. If the Wizard is able to conceal their defenses or otherwise see the Rogue coming, they can counterattack or flee. Thus narratively speaking either outcome is valid, since the final result is dependent on plot events rather than quantifiable features.
Regarding this hypothetical 4th tier Rogue v. Wizard thing, obviously if the Wizard knows both that they are being targeted in general and who is after them they can do a lot, but otherwise it's much more up in the air.
The issue isn't with what happens if the rogue successfully engages the wizard by ambush. The issue is that a wizard who's actually being a problem that might need dealing with is probably going to make themselves impossible to engage (a wizard who's just being a random civilian might well be ambushable but also doesn't actually need countering).
A rogué, acting as a rogue, is not going to sneak attack the wizard. He’s going to observe for a long while. If he can, he’ll discover the location of the spell book and destroy it. Eventually, when he’s ready, he’ll poison the wizard or he’lll kill the wizard in his sleep or he’ll set up a bunch of traps at the point the wizard rope tricked or entered a Demi plane perhaps with a pressure plate trigger where the wizard will exit. The attack, when it comes, will be sudden and unexpected.
Yes, I am assuming the martial has access to magic. The comparison is between a martial and a wizard. High level martials have access to magic.
Regarding this hypothetical 4th tier Rogue v. Wizard thing, obviously if the Wizard knows both that they are being targeted in general and who is after them they can do a lot, but otherwise it's much more up in the air.
The issue isn't with what happens if the rogue successfully engages the wizard by ambush. The issue is that a wizard who's actually being a problem that might need dealing with is probably going to make themselves impossible to engage (a wizard who's just being a random civilian might well be ambushable but also doesn't actually need countering).
Plus, a wizard that is actually good at just being a random civilian is likely not to be deliberately targeted since they appear to just be a random civilian and they personally would have to be the one civilian assassinated specifically in the middle of a crowd of other random civilians, which, given the whole "you lose hide on attacking regardless of circumstance" rule, is likely not going to go well for the assassin.
The problem wasn’t that it gave everyone powers. I’m all in for giving all characters powers.
The problems with 4e were too many to count, but mostly revolve around the attempt to make it a video game. The narrative drama was replaced with dice mechanics for everything.
The homogenization was also a problem; that's all Pantagruel was saying. Nobody is saying it didn't have multiple problems, just that that particular one is germane to the thread.
Regarding the psionics of past editions, they were somewhat-balanced, and the psionic class functioned as intended. However, the lack of uniformity in the 5th edition’s design philosophy would likely hinder the integration of such a class. This is because the success of the psionic class in previous editions was due in part to a consistent gameplay cycle across all classes. The 5th edition, on the other hand, revisited the approach of 3.5, simplifying it and removing many complex mechanics, which included elements that supported the psionic class.
The primary thing that made past-edition psionics even remotely balanced was Psionics-Magic Transparency, which the psionics proponents in this thread claim not to want. You cannot have balance without it, unless psionics are so weak that transparency doesn't matter, which I'm guessing they wouldn't want either. Even the psionic classes we have now in 5e rely on transparency, such as the most powerful abilities of the Soulknife and Psi Warrior (their hour-long invisibility and telekinesis respectively) being magic.
By "transparency", I presume you mean interactivity i.e. things like Dispel, Counter, and Antimagic all shut psychic abilities down? That's not necessarily an issue, though it is an annoyance. No, I don't particularly like magical powers being given strict dominance over psychic powers (i.e. magic can easily and effortlessly counteract psychic abilities but psychic abilities have no leverage whatsoever to counteract magic at all), but complete and utter separation isn't a hill I'll die on.
I still think it would be preferable, mind you, but I understand the arguments against it even if I think they're a little overwrought and unfair. After all, martial characters have had to deal with magic being able to turn them off for free without one single recourse or counter for the entire edition so far. Concentration is a nonanswer since that's damage in general and archetype agnostic.
The otherwise completely off topic rogue vs. wizard thing is getting at this idea that magic is utterly dominant in 5e. It counters EVERYTHING, and has absolutely no counters itself save for more of itself. This is indeed Annoying, but I see no way out of it given the structure of the edition. It's probably one big reason why people hate the idea of actually competent psychic characters (in other words, not the ******* Aberrant Mind) so much - they already hate that magic is essentially uncounterable, and having a second ability that falls outside even the limited and unreliable partial counters to magic is just not okay.
Even if it otherwise makes perfect sense for psychic abilities to not be on the same wavelength as conventional magic. *Because they're not magic.*
I'd argue that if we're talking about a proper real deal arch wizard the Rogue is going to have an extremely hard time engaging him; Wizards of that caliber have a tendency to make their homes death traps for unwitting rogues with everything from extra-dimensional spaces, wards, Summons, Constructs, conventional traps, puzzles, alarms and other shenanigans that are all there to do 2 things:
Kill/incapacitate the invader
Alert the wizard
Now, if the Rogue can actually getto the wizard then things can potentially get really ugly for said wizard but even there things can get real ugly for the Rogue since there is a plethora of spells a mage can throw out that can kill/cripple him in short order and that's assuming the Wizard hasn't set up any contingencies for escaping his would be murderer and then hunting them down as they see fit.
So is it possible? Yes. Is it an even match? God no.
If you are talking about an Archwizard played to his best, then you have to talk about a Master Rogue at his best. This guy is going to have crazy high stealth roles and Nondetection. He won’t be found by anything unless he wants to be. He’s going to make James Bond, Arya Stark, Remo Williams, and Batman look like rookies (well, maybe not Justice League Batman, Justice League Batman would be on par).
Have you ever heard some of the Cold War assassination stories? That’s real world. A Master Rogue is better than that.
Ultimately it’s a question of who is better able to play to their strengths. The actual spell list does not allow a Wizard to make themselves inherently untouchable, and for every Mordenkainen who goes off and lives in their Tower of Seclusion loaded with wards and such, you’ll also have a Khelben Arenson who’s part of an active community and cannot remain safely on his home turf 24/10. In play you’ll be more likely to be faced with the former than the latter because it is more engaging for the party as a whole, but even by the numbers spellcasting is not an inherent end-all-be-all.
It's probably one big reason why people hate the idea of actually competent psychic characters (in other words, not the ******* Aberrant Mind) so much - they already hate that magic is essentially uncounterable, and having a second ability that falls outside even the limited and unreliable partial counters to magic is just not okay.
Having a completely different broken mechanic in addition to the existing broken mechanics would make the game even less playable at higher levels, but the reason I hate treating psi as not magic is that it is magic, just a different tradition -- it's certainly no further away from other magic than the gap between, say, wizardry and divine miracles.
It's probably one big reason why people hate the idea of actually competent psychic characters (in other words, not the ******* Aberrant Mind) so much - they already hate that magic is essentially uncounterable, and having a second ability that falls outside even the limited and unreliable partial counters to magic is just not okay.
Having a completely different broken mechanic in addition to the existing broken mechanics would make the game even less playable at higher levels, but the reason I hate treating psi as not magic is that it is magic, just a different tradition -- it's certainly no further away from other magic than the gap between, say, wizardry and divine miracles.
Whether or not it's magic in a game-mechanical sense is probably a minor issue. (It'd be interesting if it wasn't, and it could be arranged to create a setup where magic beats martial beats psi beats magic, but that would need it to be tied into the base system design at a much deeper level than can be achieved at this point in 5e.)
I’m left wondering how psionics is any more distant from wizardry than clerical magic is.
And I still don’t know what Yuriel would like to see in psionics. So far,
1.) For some unexplained reason, it isn’t magic and is transparent to it. It can’t be used to defend against a fireball. It might be ablle to create a wall of force, but magic can go right through it unimpeded.
2.) It is supposed to be flexible, like Sorcery, but more so. The same spell creates Mage Hand (as per the spell) as a cantrip and Bigby’s Hand (as per the spell) when Heightened to fifth level.
3.) The psion has very, very few spells - far fewer than a Sorcerer, but this is made up for by how spells get heightened (see point 2).
4.) For some reason, Aberrant Mind Sorcerers suck
I think that’s all we know so far.
To be honest, I’d like to see point 3 incorporated into the sorcerer.
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The connection between 4e, the martial/caster divide, and psi is this:
There is a significant group of D&D players who
4th edition massively toned down the gamebreaking potential of high level magic (violating #1) and to the extent gamebreaking capabilities did exist, gave them more or less equally to all classes (violating #2). The problem with psi is that you have a choice between making it ridiculous and gamebreaking, and making it inferior, and if it is to be gamebreaking, it's expected that it fit within the same paradigm as magic because doing anything else makes high level even less playable.
High-level magic is quite easily countered by martials. Have an18th-level rogue and an Archwizard in a city and the Master Rogue has a kill order for the Archwizard by any means necessary.. The Archwizard is going to die. It might take a week or two, but the conclusion is certain, even with Foresight.
There used to be a practice of comparing builds by having them both start on an open plane 100ft apart. That comparison is stupid.
Sure - if the archwizard knows absolutely nothing about the kill order and spends all their time hanging out drinking dodgy grog at Slappy Jack's Hooch Hole.
If the archwizard actually acts like an archwizard?
A.) They can just leave the plane, hang out in the City of Brass for a while or such. They can teleport to a different continent, or transform themself into a dragon, or any number of other things that makes it Problematic, if not impossible, to kill them.
B.) They can just let themselves be killed after mailing all their stuff to the location of their hidden Clone, wake up, get a second Clone started, and turn up when it's ready to finish going about their business.
C.) They can use their plethora of information-gathering magics to find the Master Rogue and end his sorry ass first.
D.) They can live in an archmage's tower that constitutes a whole-ass Dungeon Raid for magicless mooks, in addition to A, B, and C, because that's what archmages do.
An archmage that dies because a dude with a knife shivved them a few times is an archmage that had no business claiming that title. Even assuming a Master Rogue's inability to fail skill checks and the use of exceptionally expensive poisons, the archmage only dies in that situation because they felt like it or because the GM handed them the Idiot Ball. There's a reason high-level spellcaster monsters' spell lists in the MM were all eye-wateringly insane; giving something like Vecna the ability to cast the sort of spells he damn well should be casting makes him effectively unstoppable.
Please do not contact or message me.
If the archwizard has no idea that a threat even exists and doesn't take any precautions, sure. Otherwise, the rogue is toast, because if you don't have nondetection or similar, you really can't win.
Yurei1453 listed a bunch of actual Archwizard things they can do, if they think someone is trying to kill them. But you have to understand, even the good Archwizards assume there is another high level wizard looking to take their title. So They expect to have assassins coming at them daily. So they will do the entire list of things Yurei said, and then some, like stealing an immortal child of a goddess to leech their life force off of (BG3), become a lich (Every lich in the game), steal the life essence of their entire world and an ancient dragon... see Dark Sun setting for that one. (****ing Sorcerer Kings are truly messed up and evil)
The homogenization was also a problem; that's all Pantagruel was saying. Nobody is saying it didn't have multiple problems, just that that particular one is germane to the thread.
The primary thing that made past-edition psionics even remotely balanced was Psionics-Magic Transparency, which the psionics proponents in this thread claim not to want. You cannot have balance without it, unless psionics are so weak that transparency doesn't matter, which I'm guessing they wouldn't want either. Even the psionic classes we have now in 5e rely on transparency, such as the most powerful abilities of the Soulknife and Psi Warrior (their hour-long invisibility and telekinesis respectively) being magic.
Why wouldn’t a high level rogue have Nondetection?
You are assuming that an Archmage has any high level spell they want. That’s not RAW. They. can select two spells at each level, plus any books they find.
Because the point was "magic is only counterable by magic" and nondetection is magic (and rather expensive to maintain unless you have a magic item).
Regarding this hypothetical 4th tier Rogue v. Wizard thing, obviously if the Wizard knows both that they are being targeted in general and who is after them they can do a lot, but otherwise it's much more up in the air. At 17th level, an Assassin has 9d6 Sneak Attack damage, and on top of auto-crits on a surprise attack it's a DC 19 CON save or the damage is doubled again. And the Assassin subclass is also specialized in disguises and infiltration, so let's assume that unless the Wizard has some way to specifically pick them out from dozens of yards away, they get that surprise attack. Their to-hit will be at least +11, probably closer to +13 from a magic weapon at this point. If the Wizard keeps Mage Armor up they'll have something like 15-17 AC, maybe all the way up to 19 if they have an AC boosting magic item. Shield or SB don't come into play because you can't take reactions when surprised, so it's an advantage attack of +13 (making it functionally ~+17 iirc) against AC of 19; that means that functionally it would be about 1 in 20 odds of failure. And the Wizard is going to have maybe +2 to CON saves in typical builds, so they need a 17 or higher to make that save, giving 4 in 5 odds they take 36d6 Sneak Attack damage. I think we can safely assume they won't survive the hit. Now, hypothetically the Wizard could use Foresight to negate the Sneak Attack, but that spell has an 8 hour duration and can only be cast once a day, meaning if we assume a typical 16 hour period of activity they are only covered half the time. They could also set Contingency to Dimension Door out of danger or put a Wall of Force around them. But there's no discretion over the trigger and the material component is expensive and theoretically rare. So this all comes down to the narrative/meta level of "who is better at concealing themselves and their capabilities before the Big Moment", and thus cannot be answered quantifiably. And the best spell a Wizard has for divining the identity of a hypothetical assassin is Divination, which is extremely narrow and limited in what it can reveal, given that you need to ask about a specific goal, event, or activity occurring in the next 7 days, and the response is not necessarily going to be explicit. Plus, the Amulet of of Proof Against Detection and Location is only Uncommon, so a 4th tier Assassin specifically targeting a Wizard is almost certainly going to have one.
So, in the end, capability-wise each is potentially able to foil the other; if the Rogue is able to ensure a clear Sneak Attack, it's pretty much game over. If the Wizard is able to conceal their defenses or otherwise see the Rogue coming, they can counterattack or flee. Thus narratively speaking either outcome is valid, since the final result is dependent on plot events rather than quantifiable features.
The issue isn't with what happens if the rogue successfully engages the wizard by ambush. The issue is that a wizard who's actually being a problem that might need dealing with is probably going to make themselves impossible to engage (a wizard who's just being a random civilian might well be ambushable but also doesn't actually need countering).
A rogué, acting as a rogue, is not going to sneak attack the wizard. He’s going to observe for a long while. If he can, he’ll discover the location of the spell book and destroy it. Eventually, when he’s ready, he’ll poison the wizard or he’lll kill the wizard in his sleep or he’ll set up a bunch of traps at the point the wizard rope tricked or entered a Demi plane perhaps with a pressure plate trigger where the wizard will exit.
The attack, when it comes, will be sudden and unexpected.
Yes, I am assuming the martial has access to magic. The comparison is between a martial and a wizard. High level martials have access to magic.
Plus, a wizard that is actually good at just being a random civilian is likely not to be deliberately targeted since they appear to just be a random civilian and they personally would have to be the one civilian assassinated specifically in the middle of a crowd of other random civilians, which, given the whole "you lose hide on attacking regardless of circumstance" rule, is likely not going to go well for the assassin.
By "transparency", I presume you mean interactivity i.e. things like Dispel, Counter, and Antimagic all shut psychic abilities down? That's not necessarily an issue, though it is an annoyance. No, I don't particularly like magical powers being given strict dominance over psychic powers (i.e. magic can easily and effortlessly counteract psychic abilities but psychic abilities have no leverage whatsoever to counteract magic at all), but complete and utter separation isn't a hill I'll die on.
I still think it would be preferable, mind you, but I understand the arguments against it even if I think they're a little overwrought and unfair. After all, martial characters have had to deal with magic being able to turn them off for free without one single recourse or counter for the entire edition so far. Concentration is a nonanswer since that's damage in general and archetype agnostic.
The otherwise completely off topic rogue vs. wizard thing is getting at this idea that magic is utterly dominant in 5e. It counters EVERYTHING, and has absolutely no counters itself save for more of itself. This is indeed Annoying, but I see no way out of it given the structure of the edition. It's probably one big reason why people hate the idea of actually competent psychic characters (in other words, not the ******* Aberrant Mind) so much - they already hate that magic is essentially uncounterable, and having a second ability that falls outside even the limited and unreliable partial counters to magic is just not okay.
Even if it otherwise makes perfect sense for psychic abilities to not be on the same wavelength as conventional magic. *Because they're not magic.*
Please do not contact or message me.
I'd argue that if we're talking about a proper real deal arch wizard the Rogue is going to have an extremely hard time engaging him; Wizards of that caliber have a tendency to make their homes death traps for unwitting rogues with everything from extra-dimensional spaces, wards, Summons, Constructs, conventional traps, puzzles, alarms and other shenanigans that are all there to do 2 things:
Now, if the Rogue can actually get to the wizard then things can potentially get really ugly for said wizard but even there things can get real ugly for the Rogue since there is a plethora of spells a mage can throw out that can kill/cripple him in short order and that's assuming the Wizard hasn't set up any contingencies for escaping his would be murderer and then hunting them down as they see fit.
So is it possible? Yes. Is it an even match? God no.
If you are talking about an Archwizard played to his best, then you have to talk about a Master Rogue at his best. This guy is going to have crazy high stealth roles and Nondetection. He won’t be found by anything unless he wants to be. He’s going to make James Bond, Arya Stark, Remo Williams, and Batman look like rookies (well, maybe not Justice League Batman, Justice League Batman would be on par).
Have you ever heard some of the Cold War assassination stories? That’s real world. A Master Rogue is better than that.
Ultimately it’s a question of who is better able to play to their strengths. The actual spell list does not allow a Wizard to make themselves inherently untouchable, and for every Mordenkainen who goes off and lives in their Tower of Seclusion loaded with wards and such, you’ll also have a Khelben Arenson who’s part of an active community and cannot remain safely on his home turf 24/10. In play you’ll be more likely to be faced with the former than the latter because it is more engaging for the party as a whole, but even by the numbers spellcasting is not an inherent end-all-be-all.
Having a completely different broken mechanic in addition to the existing broken mechanics would make the game even less playable at higher levels, but the reason I hate treating psi as not magic is that it is magic, just a different tradition -- it's certainly no further away from other magic than the gap between, say, wizardry and divine miracles.
Whether or not it's magic in a game-mechanical sense is probably a minor issue. (It'd be interesting if it wasn't, and it could be arranged to create a setup where magic beats martial beats psi beats magic, but that would need it to be tied into the base system design at a much deeper level than can be achieved at this point in 5e.)
I completely agree with this.
I’m left wondering how psionics is any more distant from wizardry than clerical magic is.
And I still don’t know what Yuriel would like to see in psionics. So far,
1.) For some unexplained reason, it isn’t magic and is transparent to it. It can’t be used to defend against a fireball. It might be ablle to create a wall of force, but magic can go right through it unimpeded.
2.) It is supposed to be flexible, like Sorcery, but more so. The same spell creates Mage Hand (as per the spell) as a cantrip and Bigby’s Hand (as per the spell) when Heightened to fifth level.
3.) The psion has very, very few spells - far fewer than a Sorcerer, but this is made up for by how spells get heightened (see point 2).
4.) For some reason, Aberrant Mind Sorcerers suck
I think that’s all we know so far.
To be honest, I’d like to see point 3 incorporated into the sorcerer.