At this point in the discussion, I’d give my eye teeth to just be told clearly and concisely what makes the aberrant mind so sucktacular of a pasión.
Your mind is 'aberrant' rather than 'superior' or any actual positive describer
Powers are alien/Lovecraftian in nature, at least RAW
Telepathy for only Sorcerer level minutes per bonus action
Your 'psychic abilities' are still spellcasting.
14th and 18th level abilities common to all such sorcerers
Also:
It's a sorcerer, and they're actually pretty bad
In order to pretend to be a psychic character instead of just another wizard-type, you need to chew through the one resource that sorcerers have, that's supposed to make up for their teeny-tiny spell selection.
The "psychic" spells are an extremely limited set of abilities. Even if they're actually enough to make something that passes for a psychic caster, there's pretty much only one to be made.
I don't intend to suggest that his psychology was in some way aberrant or neurotic …—Michael Chabon
2
: straying from the right or normal way
So, if you don’t want psions to be aberrant, then you want everyone to have psionic powers, like Dark Sun?
As per spell slotts, it is just a mechanic for the meta-game, but if it really bothers you.
Psionic Sorcery (6th level): When you cast any of your Psionic Spells of 1st level or higher, you can cast it using sorcery points instead of spell slots. When you do, the spell doesn't require verbal or somatic components, nor does it require material components unless they would be consumed by the casting. Psionic Sorcery effectively sidesteps enemy counterspells, and allows you to surreptitiously cast spells mid-conversation. In addition, casting a 4th-level spell for 4 sorcery points is more economical than creating a 4th-level slot for 6 sorcery points using Flexible Casting.
To summarize the summary of the summary: not everyone agrees that the foundations are solid for this purpose.
Yeah, we get that there's disagreement, but the point of a debate is to figure out why and what could be changed to arrive at something both sides can agree on.
No one has refuted or even rebutted the problems prior iterations of psionics have run into, the additional testing and pagespace that "separate but equal" psionics would require, nor explained what it is that makes the current foundations insufficient for their purposes.
I have literally done those very things, and I'm not the only one.
You just don't agree. Which you're allowed to do.
This is mostly now an argument over personal taste, and those are not resolvable by logic and reason.
Also: "it would need testing and pages" is not a bloody counterargument. You don't think they're worth doing, but that's, just, like, your opinion.
It's just been a lot of yelling that everything is spellcasting so this should be different for novelty's sake, which to comes across to me like people saying "Man, all these submarines people keep making out of metal are boring, we need something new! I'm going to make MY submarine out of bread!" Yeah that's certainly novel, but maybe it's worth examining why the designers have gravitated toward certain common foundations over time - because they work.
If you are seriously arguing that the D&D magic system is the result of a considered design process, I... don't know what to say.
It was not a good design to start with, it's been gradually made less bad over time, but it's a core trope of the game, and replacing it outright will get all the yelling and screaming again.
But there's no good reason that it has to be the only flexible power system in the game, shoehorning every class concept into spell slots. Classes are self-contained, which makes it easy to give them different subsystems. Both the Warlock and the Artificer are already doing it, and the warlock's problems are more from a failure to fully commit and a design assumption that fails to match how actual play happens than an inherent weakness in the idea of a different power system.
And I'll say this again: I don't even think D&D needs psychic characters. (I also don't think it doesn't need them. They're just not my thing. Kind of like gnomes.)
But I do find the arguments why the current systems don't support a psychic class well persuasive.
But there's no good reason that it has to be the only flexible power system in the game, shoehorning every class concept into spell slots.
Actually, there is a good reason: to avoid unnecessary multiplicity. I don't particularly like the spell slot system, but it's still better than having multiple independent systems.
It is kinda like an airplane. Sure, there's no good reason it should depend only on its wing shape to keep it in the air. That's certainly true. But, adding a hot air balloon or a helicopter blade to the plane won't improve it. They'll just add more things that can go wrong. They'll also increase build and maintenance costs.
But there's no good reason that it has to be the only flexible power system in the game, shoehorning every class concept into spell slots.
Actually, there is a good reason: to avoid unnecessary multiplicity. I don't particularly like the spell slot system, but it's still better than having multiple independent systems.
Matter of opinion.
Anyway, that ship has sailed. We have at least two or three already, not counting various subclass debris.
But, sure, let's look at it from that lens. What makes for "unnecessary multiplicity" when considering this sort of thing?
In this case, I'd say:
Can the potential new system be adequately implemented within the current subsystem?
Is the new system worth it? Does the game benefit from it existing more than it loses from the complexity added?
How much complexity are we adding, anyway? Can we use the new system to collapse existing complexity into it?
And I'd answer:
No.
Totally subjective.
Depends on the specifics, which don't exist, but likely relatively little. A power system built upon the basis of artificer infusions or warlock invocations both gets to subsume those systems into a new general mechanic if we want, and just isn't likely to be that complex, anyway. Certainly less so than, I don't know, the entire current spellcasting system.
Your mind is 'aberrant' rather than 'superior' or any actual positive describer
Powers are alien/Lovecraftian in nature, at least RAW
Telepathy for only Sorcerer level minutes per bonus action
Your 'psychic abilities' are still spellcasting.
14th and 18th level abilities common to all such sorcerers
Going through points in order
If you can't ignore the name of a class or subclass, lots of things are hard to do.
Not in any meaningful way. Flavor is free.
Um... plenty of fictional telepaths are worse at telepathy than that.
Spell slots are just the resource pool you use for your powers.
In the unlikely event of a campaign reaching those levels, talk to your DM.
2: Have you looked at the Aberrant Mind spells? About half of them are just straight up from the Warlock's "creepy lovecraftean stuff" spells. Flavor may be free, but there's only so much you can do to reflavor Hunger of Hadar before you're just homebrewing a totally different spell.
3: How many fictional telepaths, who specialize in psychic powers, in high-powered genres, fit that bill?
5: That's just saying "yeah, I got nothing". If you have to get the GM on board to fix your subclass's capstone powers, the argument that it totally just works out of the box for psychic characters falls flat. The best you can actually say is that it just works from levels 6 to 13, and even for those levels you're burning extra sorcery points and pessimizing your spell list.
2: Have you looked at the Aberrant Mind spells? About half of them are just straight up from the Warlock's "creepy lovecraftean stuff" spells. Flavor may be free, but there's only so much you can do to reflavor Hunger of Hadar before you're just homebrewing a totally different spell.
Or you can just replace the spell (interesting interaction: the order of gaining new spells and replacing spells is undefined; can you replace a spell the same level you get it?).
I don't intend to suggest that his psychology was in some way aberrant or neurotic …—Michael Chabon
2
: straying from the right or normal way
So, if you don’t want psions to be aberrant, then you want everyone to have psionic powers, like Dark Sun?
As per spell slotts, it is just a mechanic for the meta-game, but if it really bothers you.
Psionic Sorcery (6th level): When you cast any of your Psionic Spells of 1st level or higher, you can cast it using sorcery points instead of spell slots. When you do, the spell doesn't require verbal or somatic components, nor does it require material components unless they would be consumed by the casting. Psionic Sorcery effectively sidesteps enemy counterspells, and allows you to surreptitiously cast spells mid-conversation. In addition, casting a 4th-level spell for 4 sorcery points is more economical than creating a 4th-level slot for 6 sorcery points using Flexible Casting.
The example in your cited definition has a clear context of abnormally bad. Even the second definition is "straying from the 'right or normal' way" rather than merely straying from normal, so again, abnormally wrong. And unless sorcerers are a particularly common flavor of caster, wouldn't they all be 'deviating from usual,' if those connotations do not apply?
Psionic sorcery is not gained until the sorcerer is 6th, so they are still casting normally until then and every sorcerer can choose Subtle Spell, which can just as easily avoid counterspells. So then... you are merely a normal sorcerer with limited telepathy until 6th and then suddenly become 'fully psionic?'
But there's no good reason that it has to be the only flexible power system in the game, shoehorning every class concept into spell slots.
Actually, there is a good reason: to avoid unnecessary multiplicity. I don't particularly like the spell slot system, but it's still better than having multiple independent systems.
Matter of opinion.
Anyway, that ship has sailed. We have at least two or three already, not counting various subclass debris.
But, sure, let's look at it from that lens. What makes for "unnecessary multiplicity" when considering this sort of thing?
In this case, I'd say:
Can the potential new system be adequately implemented within the current subsystem?
Is the new system worth it? Does the game benefit from it existing more than it loses from the complexity added?
How much complexity are we adding, anyway? Can we use the new system to collapse existing complexity into it?
And I'd answer:
No.
Totally subjective.
Depends on the specifics, which don't exist, but likely relatively little. A power system built upon the basis of artificer infusions or warlock invocations both gets to subsume those systems into a new general mechanic if we want, and just isn't likely to be that complex, anyway. Certainly less so than, I don't know, the entire current spellcasting system.
Your mind is 'aberrant' rather than 'superior' or any actual positive describer
Powers are alien/Lovecraftian in nature, at least RAW
Telepathy for only Sorcerer level minutes per bonus action
Your 'psychic abilities' are still spellcasting.
14th and 18th level abilities common to all such sorcerers
Going through points in order
If you can't ignore the name of a class or subclass, lots of things are hard to do.
Not in any meaningful way. Flavor is free.
Um... plenty of fictional telepaths are worse at telepathy than that.
Spell slots are just the resource pool you use for your powers.
In the unlikely event of a campaign reaching those levels, talk to your DM.
2: Have you looked at the Aberrant Mind spells? About half of them are just straight up from the Warlock's "creepy lovecraftean stuff" spells. Flavor may be free, but there's only so much you can do to reflavor Hunger of Hadar before you're just homebrewing a totally different spell.
3: How many fictional telepaths, who specialize in psychic powers, in high-powered genres, fit that bill?
5: That's just saying "yeah, I got nothing". If you have to get the GM on board to fix your subclass's capstone powers, the argument that it totally just works out of the box for psychic characters falls flat. The best you can actually say is that it just works from levels 6 to 13, and even for those levels you're burning extra sorcery points and pessimizing your spell list.
I don't intend to suggest that his psychology was in some way aberrant or neurotic …—Michael Chabon
2
: straying from the right or normal way
So, if you don’t want psions to be aberrant, then you want everyone to have psionic powers, like Dark Sun?
You're just outright ignoring the well-established negative connotations of the word here.
Then change the flavor. Where do the rules say that you can't do this?
As for inappropriate spells, I'll grant you that two of the eleven spells appear inappropriate for a Psion.
Hunger of Hadar and Evards Black Tentacles.
I accept that.
Now, can you explain why that little detail makes the entire class inappropriate for Psions? Seems like it should be little trouble to have your GM trade them out for something else. Hunger of Hadar could be traded for Intellect Fortress and Evard's Black Tentacles could be traded for Arcane Eye.
It should also be pointed out that the characters from fiction which you are comparing the class to are probably not 1st level. A 20th level Aberrant Mind could maintain Telepathic Contact with it's entire party for a day, they'd just use Rory's Telepathic Bond. A 1st level AM wouldn't be able to do that, but that's why they are first level. They aren't supposed to be compared to Professor X or the like. They could, however, use the Message cantrip.
2: Have you looked at the Aberrant Mind spells? About half of them are just straight up from the Warlock's "creepy lovecraftean stuff" spells. Flavor may be free, but there's only so much you can do to reflavor Hunger of Hadar before you're just homebrewing a totally different spell.
Or you can just replace the spell (interesting interaction: the order of gaining new spells and replacing spells is undefined; can you replace a spell the same level you get it?).
The number of resources you have to burn to make AM work, even at the most basic level, as the psychic class says to me that it might perhaps not be a good fit, merely the least bad.
Your mind is 'aberrant' rather than 'superior' or any actual positive describer
Powers are alien/Lovecraftian in nature, at least RAW
Telepathy for only Sorcerer level minutes per bonus action
Your 'psychic abilities' are still spellcasting.
14th and 18th level abilities common to all such sorcerers
Going through points in order
If you can't ignore the name of a class or subclass, lots of things are hard to do.
Not in any meaningful way. Flavor is free.
Um... plenty of fictional telepaths are worse at telepathy than that.
Spell slots are just the resource pool you use for your powers.
In the unlikely event of a campaign reaching those levels, talk to your DM.
1 and 2) Sort of? When the spell lists and abilities lend themselves more to the stated flavor than to the desired flavor, it detracts from the desired flavor.
3) Name one fictional psionic who is supposed to be a psionic primary character (rather than something else with some psi abilities on the side) who has such limited telepathy? (Edit: With respect to the "Those fictional characters are not level 1," response, the ability only increases 1 minute per level, never expands beyond one person at a time and never has an initial contact range of more than 30')
4) They are still called spells, still interact with the rules the same as any other spells. Even at 6th, when you can cast a couple things using sorcery points, you still have your spell slots and any spell you cast conventionally still functions completely like the same spell coming from any other caster.
5) It doesn't count unless you get there is saying that, if it does get there, a DM has to homebrew the upper levels to come up with something that actually fits the desired flavor after all.
You realize that D&D is at it's core a game where we pretend to be these characters right? Like you don't actually have to be a huge burly survivalist with anger management issues to be a barbarian?
Cuz if so: how is it such a stretch to internalize The sorcerer as a Psion?
You realize that D&D is at it's core a game where we pretend to be these characters right? Like you don't actually have to be a huge burly survivalist with anger management issues to be a barbarian?
Cuz if so: how is it such a stretch to internalize The sorcerer as a Psion?
One can pretend a sorcerer is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Imagination is powerful. However it does not make eating one a good idea.
If you define psionics as no different from normal magic, are they really what someone wants when they want to play a psion?
You realize that D&D is at it's core a game where we pretend to be these characters right? Like you don't actually have to be a huge burly survivalist with anger management issues to be a barbarian?
Cuz if so: how is it such a stretch to internalize The sorcerer as a Psion?
One can pretend a sorcerer is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Imagination is powerful. However it does not make eating one a good idea.
If you define psionics as no different from normal magic, are they really what someone wants when they want to play a psion?
I think it is weird that a fireball can go through a wall of force (cast psionically) as if it wasn't there, but a person can't walk through it. But, I acknowledge that different people have different ideas as to what psionics should be. I think it will get hopelessly complicated (e.g. should that armor's +1 bonus to AC apply against that psion's soul sword?)
You realize that D&D is at it's core a game where we pretend to be these characters right? Like you don't actually have to be a huge burly survivalist with anger management issues to be a barbarian?
Cuz if so: how is it such a stretch to internalize The sorcerer as a Psion?
One can pretend a sorcerer is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Imagination is powerful. However it does not make eating one a good idea.
If you define psionics as no different from normal magic, are they really what someone wants when they want to play a psion?
Which again comes around to the question of "Why do we need psionics to be developed beyond what they officially have been at this juncture?"
Because so far beyond a niche community who can't really articulate what they are (aside from "not magic") I haven't really gotten a straight answer and some of the ones that have been inferred (IE magic and psionics not being able to impede each other) just sounds like it would make the game as a whole so much worse.
Edit: Also, I know that this comes across as reductive to the argument at hand but their are other RPG systems that exist and fascilitate being a psychic character far better then D&D ever has.
You realize that D&D is at it's core a game where we pretend to be these characters right? Like you don't actually have to be a huge burly survivalist with anger management issues to be a barbarian?
Cuz if so: how is it such a stretch to internalize The sorcerer as a Psion?
One can pretend a sorcerer is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Imagination is powerful. However it does not make eating one a good idea.
If you define psionics as no different from normal magic, are they really what someone wants when they want to play a psion?
I think it is weird that a fireball can go through a wall of force (cast psionically) as if it wasn't there, but a person can't walk through it. But, I acknowledge that different people have different ideas as to what psionics should be. I think it will get hopelessly complicated (e.g. should that armor's +1 bonus to AC apply against that psion's soul sword?)
You are making my point. Where does it say that anything an Aberrant Mind Sorcerer casts does not count as magic for things like walls of force, anti-magic fields, etc?
You realize that D&D is at it's core a game where we pretend to be these characters right? Like you don't actually have to be a huge burly survivalist with anger management issues to be a barbarian?
Cuz if so: how is it such a stretch to internalize The sorcerer as a Psion?
One can pretend a sorcerer is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Imagination is powerful. However it does not make eating one a good idea.
If you define psionics as no different from normal magic, are they really what someone wants when they want to play a psion?
I think it is weird that a fireball can go through a wall of force (cast psionically) as if it wasn't there, but a person can't walk through it. But, I acknowledge that different people have different ideas as to what psionics should be. I think it will get hopelessly complicated (e.g. should that armor's +1 bonus to AC apply against that psion's soul sword?)
You are making my point. Where does it say that anything an Aberrant Mind Sorcerer casts does not count as magic for things like walls of force, anti-magic fields, etc?
"Where does it say that anything an Aberrant Mind Sorcerer casts does not count as magic for things like walls of force, anti-magic fields, etc?"
Aberrant Mind Sorcerers cast magic which isn't transparent.
My comment was in regards to psionics being transparent. I dislike the idea of psionics being transparent because it leads to weird things (e.g. fireballs being able to go through walls of force) and crazy complexity (e.g. whether a suit of armor's +1 bonus applies to a psionically generated attack).
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Also:
Going through points in order
Maybe the core problem is your insistence that flavor is cannon.
My dictionary defines aberrant as
I have literally done those very things, and I'm not the only one.
You just don't agree. Which you're allowed to do.
This is mostly now an argument over personal taste, and those are not resolvable by logic and reason.
Also: "it would need testing and pages" is not a bloody counterargument. You don't think they're worth doing, but that's, just, like, your opinion.
If you are seriously arguing that the D&D magic system is the result of a considered design process, I... don't know what to say.
It was not a good design to start with, it's been gradually made less bad over time, but it's a core trope of the game, and replacing it outright will get all the yelling and screaming again.
But there's no good reason that it has to be the only flexible power system in the game, shoehorning every class concept into spell slots. Classes are self-contained, which makes it easy to give them different subsystems. Both the Warlock and the Artificer are already doing it, and the warlock's problems are more from a failure to fully commit and a design assumption that fails to match how actual play happens than an inherent weakness in the idea of a different power system.
And I'll say this again: I don't even think D&D needs psychic characters. (I also don't think it doesn't need them. They're just not my thing. Kind of like gnomes.)
But I do find the arguments why the current systems don't support a psychic class well persuasive.
Actually, there is a good reason: to avoid unnecessary multiplicity. I don't particularly like the spell slot system, but it's still better than having multiple independent systems.
It is kinda like an airplane. Sure, there's no good reason it should depend only on its wing shape to keep it in the air. That's certainly true. But, adding a hot air balloon or a helicopter blade to the plane won't improve it. They'll just add more things that can go wrong. They'll also increase build and maintenance costs.
Matter of opinion.
Anyway, that ship has sailed. We have at least two or three already, not counting various subclass debris.
But, sure, let's look at it from that lens. What makes for "unnecessary multiplicity" when considering this sort of thing?
In this case, I'd say:
And I'd answer:
2: Have you looked at the Aberrant Mind spells? About half of them are just straight up from the Warlock's "creepy lovecraftean stuff" spells. Flavor may be free, but there's only so much you can do to reflavor Hunger of Hadar before you're just homebrewing a totally different spell.
3: How many fictional telepaths, who specialize in psychic powers, in high-powered genres, fit that bill?
5: That's just saying "yeah, I got nothing". If you have to get the GM on board to fix your subclass's capstone powers, the argument that it totally just works out of the box for psychic characters falls flat. The best you can actually say is that it just works from levels 6 to 13, and even for those levels you're burning extra sorcery points and pessimizing your spell list.
Or you can just replace the spell (interesting interaction: the order of gaining new spells and replacing spells is undefined; can you replace a spell the same level you get it?).
The example in your cited definition has a clear context of abnormally bad. Even the second definition is "straying from the 'right or normal' way" rather than merely straying from normal, so again, abnormally wrong. And unless sorcerers are a particularly common flavor of caster, wouldn't they all be 'deviating from usual,' if those connotations do not apply?
Psionic sorcery is not gained until the sorcerer is 6th, so they are still casting normally until then and every sorcerer can choose Subtle Spell, which can just as easily avoid counterspells. So then... you are merely a normal sorcerer with limited telepathy until 6th and then suddenly become 'fully psionic?'
Then change the flavor. Where do the rules say that you can't do this?
As for inappropriate spells, I'll grant you that two of the eleven spells appear inappropriate for a Psion.
Hunger of Hadar and Evards Black Tentacles.
I accept that.
Now, can you explain why that little detail makes the entire class inappropriate for Psions? Seems like it should be little trouble to have your GM trade them out for something else. Hunger of Hadar could be traded for Intellect Fortress and Evard's Black Tentacles could be traded for Arcane Eye.
It should also be pointed out that the characters from fiction which you are comparing the class to are probably not 1st level. A 20th level Aberrant Mind could maintain Telepathic Contact with it's entire party for a day, they'd just use Rory's Telepathic Bond. A 1st level AM wouldn't be able to do that, but that's why they are first level. They aren't supposed to be compared to Professor X or the like. They could, however, use the Message cantrip.
The number of resources you have to burn to make AM work, even at the most basic level, as the psychic class says to me that it might perhaps not be a good fit, merely the least bad.
1 and 2) Sort of? When the spell lists and abilities lend themselves more to the stated flavor than to the desired flavor, it detracts from the desired flavor.
3) Name one fictional psionic who is supposed to be a psionic primary character (rather than something else with some psi abilities on the side) who has such limited telepathy? (Edit: With respect to the "Those fictional characters are not level 1," response, the ability only increases 1 minute per level, never expands beyond one person at a time and never has an initial contact range of more than 30')
4) They are still called spells, still interact with the rules the same as any other spells. Even at 6th, when you can cast a couple things using sorcery points, you still have your spell slots and any spell you cast conventionally still functions completely like the same spell coming from any other caster.
5) It doesn't count unless you get there is saying that, if it does get there, a DM has to homebrew the upper levels to come up with something that actually fits the desired flavor after all.
You realize that D&D is at it's core a game where we pretend to be these characters right? Like you don't actually have to be a huge burly survivalist with anger management issues to be a barbarian?
Cuz if so: how is it such a stretch to internalize The sorcerer as a Psion?
One can pretend a sorcerer is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Imagination is powerful. However it does not make eating one a good idea.
If you define psionics as no different from normal magic, are they really what someone wants when they want to play a psion?
Depends why they want to play a psion? If your goal is "does what a psion does", it's fine. If your goal is "not magic", it's obviously not fine.
I think it is weird that a fireball can go through a wall of force (cast psionically) as if it wasn't there, but a person can't walk through it. But, I acknowledge that different people have different ideas as to what psionics should be. I think it will get hopelessly complicated (e.g. should that armor's +1 bonus to AC apply against that psion's soul sword?)
Which again comes around to the question of "Why do we need psionics to be developed beyond what they officially have been at this juncture?"
Because so far beyond a niche community who can't really articulate what they are (aside from "not magic") I haven't really gotten a straight answer and some of the ones that have been inferred (IE magic and psionics not being able to impede each other) just sounds like it would make the game as a whole so much worse.
Edit: Also, I know that this comes across as reductive to the argument at hand but their are other RPG systems that exist and fascilitate being a psychic character far better then D&D ever has.
You are making my point. Where does it say that anything an Aberrant Mind Sorcerer casts does not count as magic for things like walls of force, anti-magic fields, etc?
"Where does it say that anything an Aberrant Mind Sorcerer casts does not count as magic for things like walls of force, anti-magic fields, etc?"
Aberrant Mind Sorcerers cast magic which isn't transparent.
My comment was in regards to psionics being transparent. I dislike the idea of psionics being transparent because it leads to weird things (e.g. fireballs being able to go through walls of force) and crazy complexity (e.g. whether a suit of armor's +1 bonus applies to a psionically generated attack).