Psychocian (D&D 3.5 Base Class)

[Wavelab]

Psychocian
{table=head]Level|BAB|Fort|Ref|Will|Special |
Power Points|
Powers per Day

1st|+0|+0|+0|+2|Psionic Body|
2|
2

2nd|+1|+0|+0|+3||
6|
2

3rd|+1|+1|+1|+3|Bonus Feat|
11|
3

4th|+2|+1|+1|+4||
17|
3

5th|+2|+1|+1|+4|Psionic Body|
25|
4

6th|+3|+2|+2|+5|Halt|
35|
4

7th|+3|+2|+2|+5|Psionic Body|
46|
5

8th|+4|+2|+2|+6|Devouring Mind|
58|
5

9th|+4|+3|+3|+6|Bonus Feat|
72|
6

10th|+5|+3|+3|+7|Psionic Body|
88|
6

11th|+5|+3|+3|+7||
106|
7

12th|+6/+1|+4|+4|+8||
126|
7

13th|+6/+1|+4|+4|+8|Permanent Power|
147|
8

14th|+7/+2|+4|+4|+9||
170|
8

15th|+7/+2|+5|+5|+9|Psionic Body|
195|
9

16th|+8/+3|+5|+5|+10||
221|
9

17th|+8/+3|+5|+5|+10|Everyone Dies|
250|
10

18th|+9/+4|+6|+6|+11|Bonus Feat|
280|
10

19th|+9/+4|+6|+6|+11|Steal Power|
311|
11

20th|+10/+5|+6|+6|+12|Art of the Schism|
343|
11

[/table]
Alignment: Any
Hit Die: 1d4

Class Skills:
Class Skills: ;
Skill Points at 1st Level: (2 + Int modifier) × 4
Skill Points at Each Additional Level: 2 + Int modifier

Class Features
All the following are Class Features of the Psychocian.

Weapon and Armor Proficiency:
The Psychocian is proficient with all simple weapons and no armor.

Power Points/day:
A Pychocian’s ability to manifest powers is limited by the power points he has available. His base daily allotment of power points is given on the table above. In addition, he receives bonus power points per day if he has a high Intelligence score. His race may also provide bonus power points per day, as may certain feats and items.

Prepared Powers:
A Psychocian is a being born through superior cerebral powers. He gains 1 power at every level from the psion/wilder power list. He may also learn new powers(see below).

He can prepare a number of powers as shown in the table above. To prepare new powers he has to rest for 8 hours and then spend a full round action immediately after.

Psionic Body (Ex):
The Psychocian's bodily functions are replaced by psionic powers. He only gains the benefit of these powers if he has the appropriate amount of power points left.

Communication
At 1st level he gains telepathy out to 10 ft./level. Requires 1 power point.

Health
At 5th level the Psychocian's wisdom modifier replaces his constitution modifier for everything that requires the latter(Hit points, Fortitude Saves, etc.). Requires 5 power points.

Speed
At 7th level the Psychocian's wisdom modifier replaces his dexterity modifier for everything that requires the latter. Requires 10 power points.

Senses
At 10th level the Psychocian gains the mindsight feat as well as a permanent Touchsight effect as the power, except that it's range is equal to 10 ft./level. Requires 15 power points.

Movement
At 15th level the Psychocian no longer needs to move with his body. He gains a flight speed equal to 30 ft. with perfect maneuverability, or he can move at 60 ft. if he hovers 1 ft. over the ground. Requires 20 power points.

He also gains the ability to use Telekinetic Force at will. Requires 40 power points.

Bonus Feat:
The Psychocian gains a bonus psionic feat at levels 3, 9 and 18. He needs to meet the prerequisites.

Devouring Mind (Su):
Whenever a Psychocian of 8th level kills an enemy with a psionic mind affecting power he gains power points equal to the creature's HD. This cannot make the Psychocian have more power points than his total.

Halt (Psi):
At 6th level a Psychocian gains the ability to activate the psychic energies in an opponent to make him forget what he is doing for a small while. He gains the Halt power:

He may expend an immediate action and 5 power points to affect an opponent within range of his telepathy. The target is allowed a will save(equal to 10 + Half the Psychocian's + The Psychocian's wisdom modifier) to negate this effect. If he fails on his save the opponent is paralyzed for 2 rounds. After these 2 rounds he does what he wanted to do before the ability was activated, so an opponent who was stopped in the middle of a charge will continue to charge after the effect wears of. For every 5 extra power points he spends the target is paralyzed for an additional round.

Permanent Power (Ex):
At 13th level the Psychocian is never defenseless given enough time. Every round he regenerates 1 power point.

Everyone dies! (Psi):
Whenever a Psychocian of 17th level manifests a power that affects only one creature within 30 ft. he may spend double the power points to affect all enemies(if there are more) within 30 ft.

Steal Power (Psi):
Whenever a Psychocian of 19th level kills another psionic character with a mind affecting power, he adds one of the target's powers to his list of powers known with half the usual xp cost described below.

Art of the Schism (Ex):
At 20th level your mind becomes too powerful to be a single thing. Your mind splits in two. This acts as a permanent schism power that can't be dispelled.




Learning new Powers:
A Psychocian can learn powers from other psionic characters or any item that contains a psionic power. To do this he has to spend a full round action to connect to the object or person. The psychocian then knows of every power in the character's repertoire. When this is done the character can learn any amount of powers, each power requiring 10 minutes of meditation. He also has to make a psicraft check equal to 15 + the highest power learned, if this is failed the entire process is interrupted. If this process succeeds the Psychocian needs to expend a 20 experience points per Psychocian level.

[bobthe6th]

so... this to be a more superheroish then a psion? or more power focused?

it gets really SAD at higher levels... (dex and con) then its primary stat goes into nearly half his attributes... with something like a 20 int at 7th level, he gets a twenty in all but cha wis and str... might need to base it off of wis to fight the sadness

[Wavelab]

Yes wis would work better wouldn't it?

[Howler Dagger]

So, It never says I cant take all 9th level powers? Count me in!

[Wavelab]

An erudite could also use all his unique power/day on 9th level powers.

Basically: Psychocian - Wizard, Erudite - Sorcerer.

[Wyntonian]

Psionic Power (Su)
At 4th level the Psychocian gains the ability to use his powers more effectively. He gains 2 points every time he gains this ability. When manifesting a power he can sacrifice a point to:
-Deal an additional dice of damage. For example if the power does 3d6 damage he can spend an additional point to make it deal 4d6 damage.
-Increases the duration by 1 unit. The unit refers to the original duration. If the duration is in minutes it increases it by 1 minute.
-Increase the range by 1 unit. Unit refers to the amount the range increases by for each manifester level.


This kinda bugs me. Arguably the most redeeming aspect of psionics as a system is the potential for augmentation. That's irrevocably written into the system, so I'm not quite sure why you need to do a similar thing here.



Bonus Feat
The Psychocian gains a bonus psionic feat at levels 3, 9 and 18.

Do they need to qualify? meet the Pre-reqs?



Weapon and Armor Proficiency
The Psychocian is not proficient with any weapons or armor.

.....none? Not even a quarterstaff? club? dagger? maybe one single simple weapon. But utter lack of proficiency with any sort of weapon is something I'd only expect to see in a PrC.

Overall, this is a pretty decent idea for a class, a psion-ish-thing that internalizes his powers, and has better control over those that are manifested around him. But it does need a bit of polishing, though I'm sure you and the playground can take care of that.

[Wavelab]

Updated, with slave labour!

I'll fix the 4th level ability in a short while.

[Howler Dagger]

Also, fun fact: They cant choose any powers, because there is no list specified for htem to choose from.

[Wavelab]

Thanks my friend.

[Grod_The_Giant]

You mention that he can learn more powers, but I don't see any mention of how.

[Wavelab]

Working on that as we speak.

[Wavelab]

Alright the class is done. PEACHing may now begin.

And just a note I was aiming for anything between Tier 1 and 3.

[Benly]

So at level 1 he knows one power and can prepare two?

[Wavelab]

Yes, he can learn a power and then has two to prepare.

[PEACH]

This seems almost strictly more powerful than the Psion, seeing as it knows more powers (assuming you're grabbing even a single extra power per level), has a ton of actual class features, and is only limited by being forced to choose a relatively small power loadout for each individual encounter. I'd strongly encourage you to scale this guy back somewhat if you want him to play nice with the current psionic classes.

[Wavelab]

I like the class like this actually. Like the psion but with a different system for power, and a bunch of abilities with no dead levels.

[SamBurke]

It's got a lot of power: in fact, here's a way to make this a wizard (WITH CLASS FEATURES!): Have an ally/cohort/NPC Hireling who's a StP Erudite. Have them learn the spells. Then you learn the powers. In fact, if you paid for them to learn the spells, you might get someone who'd give you the psionic version for next-to-nothing. (At least, that'd make sense IC, though your DM might shoot it down.)

However, seeing as it requires that shenanigan to get overpowered, I think this is T2, with a strong lean to T1.

[PEACH]

I like the class like this actually. Like the psion but with a different system for power, and a bunch of abilities with no dead levels.

The fact is that it's just better than the Psion. Also, psions don't have dead levels. Any level that progresses casting (or manifesting, rather) isn't a dead level. This class does everything a Psion does but better, with the exception of having a few less powers available in any given combat scenario.

[Wavelab]

Maybe if you stop complaining how powerful it is and actually give some advice on how to fix it, you can be like your name suggests.

[druid91]

Everyone dies! (Psi):Whenever a Psychocian of 17th level manifests a power and only one creature within 30 ft. he may instead choose to pay double the power point cost and affect all enemies within 30 ft. with the same power.



So "if there is only one creature within 30ft" you can pay double the power-point cost and "Affect all enemies within 30ft?

So... basically the same thing, but more expensive for no benefit?

[bobthe6th]

replace "and" with "that effects" and it works... but that is a rather impressive typo.

[PEACH]

Maybe if you stop complaining how powerful it is and actually give some advice on how to fix it, you can be like your name suggests.

Well, if you started out by removing every class feature *but* the bonus feats and the ability to learn new powers, it would probably be balanced with the Psion. It should be very obvious that giving a tier 2 caster more powers and a lot of extra class features would be overpowering unless your intent was to make a T1 psionic class

Anyway, going through the features, just pointing out the problematic ones:


Psionic Body (Ex):
The Psychocian's bodily functions are replaced by psionic powers.

Communication
At 1st level he gains telepathy out to 10 ft./level.

Health
At 5th level the Psychocian's wisdom modifier replaces his constitution modifier for everything that requires the latter(Hit points, Fortitude Saves, etc.).

Speed
At 7th level the Psychocian's wisdom modifier replaces his dexterity modifier for everything that requires the latter.

Senses
At 10th level the Psychocian gains the mindsight feat as well as a permanent Touchsight effect as the power, except that it's range is equal to 10 ft./level.

Movement
At 15th level the Psychocian no longer needs to move with his body. He gains a flight speed equal to 30 ft. with perfect maneuverability, or he can move at 60 ft. if he hovers 1 ft. over the ground.

He also gains the ability to use Telekinetic Force at will.

These aren't super problematic, but giving the class free permanent buffs it would at least have to spend a power slot on and making it only depend on two attributes isn't really necessary on a full caster.


Psionic Power (Su):
At 4th level the Psychocian gains the ability to use his powers more effectively. Each time he manifests a power it is treated as if being augmented by an additional power point, for each use of this ability he has.

So this class gets, with none of the drawbacks, a mostly full powered version of the Wilder's main class feature? That's pretty powerful right there, especially considering, again, just the base of "I can learn new powers" is enough to make it a solid T2 character.


Devouring Mind (Su):
Whenever a Psychocian of 8th level kills an enemy with a psionic power he gains power points equal to the creature's HD. This cannot make the Psychocian have more power points than his total.

At 11th level whenever a power is manifested within range of his telepathy the power's energy is leeched. 5 power points are removed from the power and added to the Psychocian's pool. So an energy ray manifested with 10 power points would normally do 10d6 damage but within this field it does 5d6 damage.

This is also pretty absurd. The secondary ability basically makes any opponent you are fighting (within range) incapable of actually casting high level powers (since they cannot get enough points to use the power), and also makes the few abilities they can still use pathetically weak. Combining this with your free costless almost wild surge, you've got up to 10 effective manifester levels and higher level powers than anybody level appropriate. Scrap the second part of this ability entirely, there's really no way to balance "my opponents all cast wimpy low level powers that they have to augment +5 just to cast."


Halt (Psi):
At 6th level a Psychocian gains the ability to activate the psychic energies in an opponent to make him forget what he is doing for a small while. A number of times per day equal to his Int modifier(Minimum 1) he can expend an immediate action to affect an opponent within range of his telepathy. The target is allowed a will save to negate this effect. If he fails on his save the opponent is paralyzed for 5 rounds. After these 5 rounds he does what he wanted to do before the ability was activated, so an opponent who was stopped in the middle of a charge will continue to charge after the effect wears of.

This doesn't list the save, and an immediate action save or die (and don't try to tell me "5 rounds of paralysis" isn't a save or die, you could CDG most opponents yourself in that time) is pretty overpowered.


Permanent Power (Ex):
At 13th level the Psychocian is never defenseless. He can manifest any power he knows that costs less than 5 power points without expending the necessary power point cost.

This is very powerful, especially if you can use it to cast fully augmented level 3 powers for free (the wording is unclear).


Focused Meditation (Psi):
At 14th level the Psychocian's mind becomes very focused and his body benefits from it. You gain fast healing 5 as long as you have power points left(not including the permanent power ability).

I just don't understand why a squishy wizard class needs to get free fast healing five. That just seems silly.


Everyone dies! (Psi):
Whenever a Psychocian of 17th level manifests a power and only one creature within 30 ft. he may instead choose to pay double the power point cost and affect all enemies within 30 ft. with the same power.

This is poorly worded and appears to do nothing, but making single target abilities into AoE abilities is probably overpowered if that is the intent.


Steal Power (Psi):
Whenever a Psychocian of 19th level kills another psionic character with a power, all the targets powers become known to him. He can also then choose to replace one of his prepared powers with one he just learnt.

This is blatently overpowered if you intend for this to compete with the psion, because he only needs to take on one opponent to already have more powers known than a given Psion.


Art of the Schism (Ex):
At 20th level your mind becomes too powerful to be a single thing. Your mind splits in two. This acts as a permanent schism power that can't be dispelled. You second mind still manifests at a -6 penalty, but you can manifest even your higher level powers if your manifester level is high enough.

And your capstone is that you get a free permanent doubling of actions. This is, again, pretty obviously overpowered.

I really don't know what to say; there's no way to make this class on the same level as a Psion without just flat out removing almost all of its powers. It gets free manifesting, free ways to stop manifesting, an immediate action SoD at 13th level, it can make powers AoE, it has a far bigger pool of power points and powers known. The reason I didn't go in depth on this class before was for that exact reason; it needs to have basically all of its class features completely stripped to be equal to the Psion in power, because, well, casting is the only real class feature you need.

[Wavelab]

So "if there is only one creature within 30ft" you can pay double the power-point cost and "Affect all enemies within 30ft?

So... basically the same thing, but more expensive for no benefit?

Just don't use the ability?

[Zale]

Fighting one of these guys with a pisonic class would be a nightmare.

I mean, he's flying around out of reach. He can attack you without spending much (If any) resources. Meanwhile, you can't even use powers on him. If you do, it cuts the effect in half and leeches away five of your power points! And when he finally kills you, he gets a nice burst of power points and learns all your powers.


But maybe I read that wrong. :smallconfused:

[PEACH]

Fighting one of these guys with a pisonic class would be a nightmare.

I mean, he's flying around out of reach. He can attack you without spending much (If any) resources. Meanwhile, you can't even use powers on him. If you do, it cuts the effect in half and leeches away five of your power points! And when he finally kills you, he gets a nice burst of power points and learns all your powers.


But maybe I read that wrong. :smallconfused:

Don't forget the part where he gets free augmentation and (at 20) two actions per round!

[Steward]

Just don't use the ability?

I think that poster's question is that the ability doesn't seem to do anything. It lets you manifest against multiple creatures within 30 feet, but only if there's only one creature within 30 feet? That doesn't really make any sense. I think you might have a typo (did you mean '50 ft' or something like that)?

[Wavelab]

It's probably poorly worded. What it does is if you attack one creature within 30 ft. you can attack all of them.

[Steward]

That's what I think you meant, but the way it was worded suggested that the ability only works when there is only one creature within 30 feet, which would defeat the purpose of the ability. It makes much more sense now, thanks! (Don't feel bad about that kind of mistake though -- Tome of Magic features a similar error that makes an entire prestige class unusable! This sort of thing happens to everyone, even people who get paid the big bucks to do this for a living!).

(I also have to share the concern that other posters have had; this class seems way, way too strong even to me. For example, if I'm reading this right: at level 13, it can basically spam things like energy bolt, dispel psionics, and things of that caliber. At sixth level this guy can even take people out of combat entirely (5 turns of paralysis is pretty intense -- it's quite reasonable for an encounter to take about 5 turns, right?) The idea itself is neat, but maybe you should scale it a little so that it's not so powerful so soon.

At 19th level --


Whenever a Psychocian of 19th level kills another psionic character with a power, all the targets powers become known to him. He can also then choose to replace one of his prepared powers with one he just learnt.

Okay, I think I understand why you did this -- to create incentives for people to stay in this class all the way. However, this class is powerful enough -- you don't need to cajole people with stuff like this. This ability is incredibly powerful in a psionics campaign; it essentially strips away any meaningful limitation on powers known. This ability in and of itself (stealing powers from people you kill) could probably be spun off into a prestige class, couldn't it?

[Wavelab]

I'm thinking of deleting the most powerful abilities from the class. The ones that get complained about the most.

Tough I believe every base class should have a powerful capstone, so I'm thinking of keeping this one.

[bobthe6th]

well a way to make it less stupidly powerful is to give it half manifesting. take away some of the more PP based abilities, and you have a more reasonable class. then you can have all sorts of nice abilities, but the psion and other full manifesting classes will have an advantage.

[Wavelab]

Alright I updated most of the abilities. What do you guys think?

[Wavelab]

No more critique?

[Analytica]

Weapon and Armor Proficiency:
The Psychocian is not proficient with any weapons or armor except for one simple weapon of his choice.

Might as well leave it as all simple. Proficiencies only matter to melee anyway.


Power Points/day:
A Pychocian’s ability to manifest powers is limited by the power points he has available. His base daily allotment of power points is given on the table above. In addition, he receives bonus power points per day if he has a high Intelligence score. His race may also provide bonus power points per day, as may certain feats and items.

Prepared Powers:
A Psychocian is a being born through superior cerebral powers. He gains 1 power at every level from the psion/wilder power list. He may also learn new powers(see below).

He can prepare a number of powers as shown in the table above. To prepare new powers he has to rest for 10 minutes and then spend a full round action immediately after. This can be done multiple times a day.

This effectively makes you an erudite, only you can swap out your powers during the day. In my opinion, this makes you close to Tier 0, like the Beholder Mage or a full-casting Rainbow Warsnake. If Tier 2 has access to a chosen sample of a full power list, Tier 1 has access to any power on that list each day. This class has access to all powers each day, since getting ten minutes to swap is not very cumbersome. In comparison, Pathfinder psion generalist gets to swap a single power as a 20th-level capstone once per day, a two-level Chameleon dip gives you the same. There is a Dreamscarred prestige class that lets you swap out a power at the cost of your level in PPs, but that loses two manifester levels and a number of PPs to balance. If you wanted to balance against existing classes, I would say you could swap out a single power in ten minutes. This effectively means you could also manifest any power you have learned by meditating for ten minutes, which is a mechanic I personally like.


Psionic Body (Ex):
The Psychocian's bodily functions are replaced by psionic powers.

Communication
At 1st level he gains telepathy out to 10 ft./level.

Health
At 5th level the Psychocian's wisdom modifier replaces his constitution modifier for everything that requires the latter(Hit points, Fortitude Saves, etc.).

Speed
At 7th level the Psychocian's wisdom modifier replaces his dexterity modifier for everything that requires the latter.

Senses
At 10th level the Psychocian gains the mindsight feat as well as a permanent Touchsight effect as the power, except that it's range is equal to 10 ft./level.

Movement
At 15th level the Psychocian no longer needs to move with his body. He gains a flight speed equal to 30 ft. with perfect maneuverability, or he can move at 60 ft. if he hovers 1 ft. over the ground.

He also gains the ability to use Telekinetic Force at will.

All in all, these are about as powerful as though you had Gestalted something with Warlock. Much of it can also be replicated through powers already, so in my opinion this power set will outshine any other psionic class unless you would do something drastic like reduce manifesting to PsyWar levels. I like the flavor, though. Maybe you could make these "tie up" power points equal to manifester level for each you use? Kind of like reserve feats? Or just give you the closest power equivalent as always-prepared bonus powers known that you can manifest at a reduced cost?


Bonus Feat:
The Psychocian gains a bonus psionic feat at levels 3, 9 and 18. He needs to meet the prerequisites.

Devouring Mind (Su):
Whenever a Psychocian of 8th level kills an enemy with a psionic power he gains power points equal to the creature's HD. This cannot make the Psychocian have more power points than his total.

I would limit this to mind-affecting powers.


Halt (Psi):
At 6th level a Psychocian gains the ability to activate the psychic energies in an opponent to make him forget what he is doing for a small while. A number of times per day equal to his Int modifier(Minimum 1) he can expend an immediate action to affect an opponent within range of his telepathy. The target is allowed a will save(equal to 10 + Half the Psychocian's + The Psychocian's wisdom modifier) to negate this effect. If he fails on his save the opponent is paralyzed for 2 rounds. After these 2 rounds he does what he wanted to do before the ability was activated, so an opponent who was stopped in the middle of a charge will continue to charge after the effect wears of.

I would just make this into another power you can learn.


Permanent Power (Ex):
At 13th level the Psychocian is never defenseless. He has 5 power points that can never go away. He may only expend them through manifesting a power.

I don't really see how this work. You have 5 PP that cannot be lost except if you use them to manifest a power? Or do you mean you get to manifest powers for free if they cost less than 5PP? If the latter, I can't see how that could be balanced - it would be the equivalent of letting wizards cast every level 3 and lower spells at will.


Everyone dies! (Psi):
Whenever a Psychocian of 17th level manifests a power that affects only one creature within 30 ft. he may spend double the power points to affect all enemies(if there are more) within 30 ft.

Maybe formulate this as a metapsionic feat you could take as one of your bonus feats?


Steal Power (Psi):
Whenever a Psychocian of 19th level kills another psionic character with a power, he adds one of the target's powers to his list of powers known.

Again, perhaps make it mind-affecting only, or make it work as long as you touch the targets mind while it dies, whatever the cause of death. Balance-wise, I would make this cost XP, as the Erudite needs to pay XP to learn new powers.


Art of the Schism (Ex):
At 20th level your mind becomes too powerful to be a single thing. Your mind splits in two. This acts as a permanent schism power that can't be dispelled.

Why not make it dispellable? Just say it can be resumed as a full-round action.


Learning new Powers:
A Psychocian can learn powers from other psionic characters or any item that contains a psionic power. To do this he has to spend a full round action to connect to the object or person. The psychocian then knows of every power in the character's repertoire. When this is done the character can learn any amount of powers, each power requiring 10 minutes of meditation. He also has to make a psicraft check equal to 15 + the highest power learned, if this is failed the entire process is interrupted.

Again, probably sensible to give this an XP cost, like for the Erudite, unless you want it to be significantly more powerful than existing classes.

[Grod_The_Giant]

Learning new Powers:
A Psychocian can learn powers from other psionic characters or any item that contains a psionic power. To do this he has to spend a full round action to connect to the object or person. The psychocian then knows of every power in the character's repertoire. When this is done the character can learn any amount of powers, each power requiring 10 minutes of meditation. He also has to make a psicraft check equal to 15 + the highest power learned, if this is failed the entire process is interrupted.

This, combined with full manifesting, is more than enough to blow you firmly into Tier 1. You can do everything the psion can do, and you can learn every power. And you have a bunch of really powerful class abilities.

If you took out the ability to learn new powers, it might be tier 2. If you limited the manifesting, it might be tier 2. As is, you're pushing Batman wizard level power-- and the only reason you don't surge past it is that there are so many more spells than powers.

It's an interesting idea, but, as everyone else has been saying, it needs major nerfage.

[Wavelab]

'Twas updated.