Trying to wrap my head around this. Help!

[Kansaschaser]

Okay, I've seen this posted here before.

The Recharge Trick uses Midnight Augmentation, Linked Power and Metapower to manifest Bestow Power (linked to a 1st level power) with a lower power point cost than power points bestowed by Bestow Power. This allows your psychic to do his thing, all day long.
Feats: Midnight Augmentation, Linked Power, Metapower, Psicrystal Containment
Powers: Bestow Power, a first level power (Here I use Synchronicity)
Method:
1. Focus yourself and your Psicrystal
2. You choose Synchronicity to be effected by Midnight Augmentation, investing one essentia
3. Expend your Psychic Focus to manifest a Synchronicity (which you have chosen to permanently join Linked Power to by Metapower)
4. Expend your Psicrystal's Psychic Focus to manifest Synchronicity, linked to Bestow Power (Costs reduced by Midnight Augmentation for -1, and Metapower for -2, reducing the cost of the Hustle/Bestow Power combo to 1 PP)
5. Refocus yourself and your Psicrystal (Doable in one round, if you choose Synchronicity as your 1st level power)
6. Repeat 3-6
Minimum Level: 3 (Higher without Flaws + Human)

I've read the powers and feats, but I'm still having a hard time wrapping my head around what this means. :smallconfused: How many rounds does this take to pull off? How many power points can I get back each round? Can someone with more experience with Psionics please explain this to me?

[Ardantis]

I have no idea.

News team, assemble!!

[Feralventas]

Having seen the Psion/Incarnum combo in use at my table, I can say that at mid to high levels, the Shaper I saw using it was able to do that combo at least once per round, and more once they picked up Temporal Acceleration (Psionic Time Stop) to get more actions per round.

I would also invariably advise against using it, as you are taking a limited resource and removing the limitations on it. This does not encourage cooperative game-play, as you will never run out of power points and will be able to power through just about anything given more than a few minutes of effort in-game, and less outside.

What did your DM do that you decided that a blatant exploit was an appropriate response?

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Synchronicity takes a standard action to manifest, and grants you a standard action. It costs 1 pp.

Bestow Power gives the subject 2 powerpoints instantaneously, cannot grant more powerpoints than the target's manifester level. It costs 3 pp.

Linked Power makes it so when you manifest Synchronicity, you automatically manifest Bestow Power the following round on the same target (yourself) without spending any actions to do so. The total cost of doing this is 4 pp (the total of the two powers).

Metapower reduces the cost of the above by 2 pp, to the end result costs 2 pp.

Midnight Augmentation allows you to invest essentia in the chosen power, reducing the cost to augment that power by a number equal to the number of invested essentia points, to a minimum of 1. Presumably, it would reduce the above to 1 pp, but that power is not being augmented so it does absolutely nothing. The combo doesn't work.

If it did, then you spend a standard action, 1 pp, and your psionic focus to gain a standard action and 2 pp. Your psicrystal benefits from Synchronicity as well, but has nothing to spend the actions on. You then spend a standard action, 1 pp, and your psicrystal's psionic focus to gain a standard action and 2 pp. Your psicrystal again benefits from Synchronicity and gains a second standard action, but again it has nothing to spend it on. Presumably it could regain its own psionic focus, but that's not how Psicrystal Containment works. Note that Psionic Meditation does not reduce the time it takes to psionically focus your psicrystal, only yourself. So again, the combo doesn't exactly work.

You have to spend your psionic focus to use Midnight Augmentation, and you have to spend it to use Linked Power, so you're using both your focus and your psicrystal's in one manifestation, so yet again it doesn't work.

[Morcleon]

Well, the psicrystal could regenerate its own psionic focus. Just give it Hidden Talent (), and then Psionic Meditation.

Actually, there's another recharge trick:

Torc of Power Preservation (XPH, 36000 gp) reduces all power point costs by 1.
The Earth Power feat reduces all power point costs by 1 (if you're standing on earth or stone; just stick a 5x5 ft stone slab in an extradimensional storage).
Bestow Power costs 3 pp, gives 2. With the above two, it now costs 1 pp, gives 2. +1 pp/round.

[Eurus]

The main qualifications on which to judge recharge tricks are:

1) Reliability: Wilder can easily recharge PP but has the risk of getting a run of unlucky enervation rolls in a row and burning out.

2) Resource cost: Feats are precious, and the fewer of them you have to burn on this the better. Ditto for Torc of Power Preservation; it's a wonderful item but out of reach unless you're at least level 11 since you normally can't spend more than 50% of WBL on a single item.

To a lesser extent, 3) Speed: How many rounds does it take to recharge? But this only matters a little bit, since it's generally done out-of-combat.

So with Bestow Power, you can spend 3 PP to gain 2, and augment it with another 3 PP to gain another 2. Here's what I feel is probably the best way to get a PP recharge at a low level, without controversial rules or excessive investment:

Go Azurin, take Midnight Augmentation, Linked Power, and Metapower as feats. Invest both essentia in Midnight Augmentation, tie your Metapower feat to Bestow Power > Linked Power. Manifest Bestow Power on yourself, augmented once, linked to another Bestow Power. Midnight Augmentation reduces the cost by 2, Metapower>Linked raises the cost by 1, for a total of 4. You spend 4 to gain 6 PP, and spend next round regaining psionic focus.

Total cost: Three feats, one of which is worth taking anyway, and Azurin as your race choice. Fortunately, Azurin gives you a bonus feat just like Human does, so it's really quite solid. This is workable as soon as level 6.

If you're at a higher level, drop either Midnight Augmentation or Metapower for a Torc of Power Preservation, freeing up an extra feat. Make sure it's the one from the Expanded Psionic's Handbook, not the Magic Item Compendium.

EDIT: Also, if you really want never-actually-play-this hilarity, play a Ardent 10/Metamind 10. Abuse Twinned Synchronicity to take literally infinite actions in the span of one round, and become like unto a god. :smallamused:

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Well, the psicrystal could regenerate its own psionic focus. Just give it Hidden Talent (), and then Psionic Meditation.

The psicrystal cannot focus itself—only the owner can spend the time to focus the crystal. (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/psionicFeats.htm#psicrystalContainment)

Since Bestow Power can't give you more powerpoints than your manifester level, I think the point of the original trick was to replenish during combat without sacrificing action economy, to guarantee that you don't run out. Considering you'll use your entire level in powerpoints on a single fully augmented power, replenishment tricks involving Bestow Power will probably only get you one free power per fight without such in-combat tricks.

[Eurus]

Mid-combat recharging is extremely hard to pull off, if my memory is right. Short of Affinity Field shenanigans, infinite actions, or similar shenanigans anyway.

[Kansaschaser]

What I need to know is, "How many rounds it takes to pull off this trick." and "How many power points do I regain in said time?"

[LordBlades]

I would also invariably advise against using it, as you are taking a limited resource and removing the limitations on it. This does not encourage cooperative game-play, as you will never run out of power points and will be able to power through just about anything given more than a few minutes of effort in-game, and less outside.



Actually, it's a bit more complicated than that.

Re cooperative gameplay: at the levels infinite PP tricks are appropriate (optimized tier 1-2) the main incentive for cooperative gameplay is action economy (which pp recharge doesn't improve in any way). Characters at that power level have a ton of strengths and few (if any) weaknesses, they can easily solo most encounters, but multiplying the number of available actions in a give time frame(even if it's just in case **** hits the fan) is always a huge incentive not to solo.

Re limited resources: In practice, limited resources are only limited if taxed to that point(which is not the case in every campaign). If you're playing in the kind campaign where you can rest at leisure after every 1-2 combat without much chance of interruption, then you're never going to even get close to your spells per day/pp limit.

[Slipperychicken]

What I need to know is, "How many rounds it takes to pull off this trick." and "How many power points do I regain in said time?"

It appears to be "less than one round", and "however many you damn want", respectively.

As I understand it, you're using one standard action to give yourself another standard action and a net gain in Power Points. You spam it until your PP are restored, then use your "last" Standard Action to do whatever you were going to do in the round anyway.

But then, I have an extremely poor understanding of Psionics, so someone else should correct me here.

[only1doug]

What I need to know is, "How many rounds it takes to pull off this trick." and "How many power points do I regain in said time?"


Go Azurin, take Midnight Augmentation, Linked Power, and Metapower as feats. Invest both essentia in Midnight Augmentation, tie your Metapower feat to Bestow Power > Linked Power. Manifest Bestow Power on yourself, augmented once, linked to another Bestow Power. Midnight Augmentation reduces the cost by 2, Metapower>Linked raises the cost by 1, for a total of 4. You spend 4 to gain 6 PP, and spend next round regaining psionic focus.


2 rounds to regain 2 powerpoints according to Eurus's calculations (can be repeated forever as long as you keep 4 powerpoints in reserve to power the recharge process)

[Kansaschaser]

2 rounds to regain 2 powerpoints according to Eurus's calculations (can be repeated forever as long as you keep 4 powerpoints in reserve to power the recharge process)

If that's right, then why is this even considered a combo? :smallmad:

[Slipperychicken]

If that's right, then why is this even considered a combo? :smallmad:

Because it lets you completely ignore the per-day limitations of PP. This allows you to "nova" potentially every fight (always fully augmenting all powers), apply your Psionic powers to every problem (no need to conserve PP), and thus operate with a much higher power level than normal.


Imagine if a Wizard could restore 5 spells a minute for free by chatting with his familiar. That's broken. Same goes for a Psion.

[Rejakor]

Given the average length of fights, in rounds, in any even mildly optimized party, and the general 'spells are more powerful per level than powers' thing, i'd say pp recharge doesn't break anything.

At least if you're not using other tricks, like augmented ML Astral Constructs spam, or Spell to Power et al, or affinity field fusion fission whatever.

It doesn't hurt that the psionic classes were shortchanged in pp compared to spells anyway.


That said, if you use Temporal Acceleration, earth power, linked power, synchronicity, and midnight aug properly, you can in-combat recharge by level 11.

If you can get your hands on a torc, I think you can do it at level 9, but i'm more iffy on that, because I think you need to be able to aug TA up to 2 rnds per cast to make it worthwhile.

[Kansaschaser]

2 rounds to regain 2 powerpoints according to Eurus's calculations (can be repeated forever as long as you keep 4 powerpoints in reserve to power the recharge process)


Because it lets you completely ignore the per-day limitations of PP. This allows you to "nova" potentially every fight (always fully augmenting all powers), apply your Psionic powers to every problem (no need to conserve PP), and thus operate with a much higher power level than normal.


Imagine if a Wizard could restore 5 spells a minute for free by chatting with his familiar. That's broken. Same goes for a Psion.


Given the average length of fights, in rounds, in any even mildly optimized party, and the general 'spells are more powerful per level than powers' thing, i'd say pp recharge doesn't break anything.

At least if you're not using other tricks, like augmented ML Astral Constructs spam, or Spell to Power et al, or affinity field fusion fission whatever.

It doesn't hurt that the psionic classes were shortchanged in pp compared to spells anyway.


That said, if you use Temporal Acceleration, earth power, linked power, synchronicity, and midnight aug properly, you can in-combat recharge by level 11.

If you can get your hands on a torc, I think you can do it at level 9, but i'm more iffy on that, because I think you need to be able to aug TA up to 2 rnds per cast to make it worthwhile.

I think I've almost got my head warped around this combo now. :smallconfused: I've re-read the feats and powers again and I 80% sure I could explain what I'm doing to the DM.