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trajan
2007-02-16, 02:11 PM
So I was perusing the Psionics section of the SRD, when I came accross Schism (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/schism.htm).

It lets you take 2 standard actions/round, with the proviso that your manifester level was 6 lower for your second round, and the action had to be purely mental. Then you bring in Cerebremancer, Which is the wizard/psion combo class. You synergize INT like crazy between Wizard/Psion, so pump it to the mid 30s for save DCs around 40. Still silent spells should qualify for purely mental actions, and thus be castable in your schism action.
Throw in Practised spellcaster and you can be a 20 CL wizard and a 13ML psion.

While playing with the idea I then came across Mental Pinnacle (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/spells/mentalPinnacle.htm), which turns a wizard into a psion ML=CL, and gives him 60 power points.

So the example build I came up with was Wiz5/Psion3/CM10/ArchMage2.
You can use your High Arcana to either boost your CL+ML, or convert your spells into spell like abilities so they count as purely mental.
Your 13 base ML gets you a variety of 7th level powers, which equal most 9th level spells because you can augment them out the wazoo. You will never run out of PP because you can convert a 6th level spell into 60 PP with Pinnacle.
60 PP is the equivalent of 3 9th level spells.

Some fun things you can do:
- 25 CHA damage/turn with Ego Whip.
- 22 ML familiar can solo some encounters on his own.
- Schism/Pinnacle/Tensors Transform for a combat wizard who can manifest.
- All the standard wizard cheese, but better because you can get 3 spells/round.

There are tons of different ways to take the build focusing either on Arcane or psionic as the primary. If you go arcane you'll need Eschew materials + lots of metamagic rods of silent spell. You only need 4 levels of Cerebemancer for Schism, so you can fit Incantrix in if you want.

Is there some reason this doesn't work?

Macrovore
2007-02-16, 03:11 PM
still, silent spells are still NOT purely mental actions, at least for the purposes of schism.

the PRIMARY concept with psionics is that you CANNOT spend more powerpoints on a single power than your manifester level. Thus, you cannot augment those 7th level powers.


there's probably more wrong with it. but i don't feel like doing much research now.

trajan
2007-02-16, 04:30 PM
still, silent spells are still NOT purely mental actions, at least for the purposes of schism.

Any reason why not?


the PRIMARY concept with psionics is that you CANNOT spend more powerpoints on a single power than your manifester level. Thus, you cannot augment those 7th level powers.

Mental Pinnacle sets the manifester level equal to the caster level (22 in this case)

Tor the Fallen
2007-02-16, 04:34 PM
Blowing all your pp in one turn doesn't seem like a very wise decision.

Ditto
2007-02-16, 04:36 PM
I don't know a thing about psionics and thus have no idea what's going on, but as far as 'purely mental' actions go you might need Eschew Materials as well. Reaching into your pouch to pull out some bat guano is for all intents and purposes a free action, but you still have to get it, right?

Jack_Simth
2007-02-16, 05:23 PM
Forget the Cerebremancer - just cast Mental Pinnacle on your familiar directly - which still gets it's action to attack.

At 20th, even without caster level pumping, that's an immediate 20d10 Mind Thrust, 5d4 Charisma damage, 8 rounds of stunning, 9 confused critters for as long as your familiar can concentrate, or a Mind Crush with 8d6 damage on a successfull save (or is that -1 with an extra 5d6 damage on a failed save, 3d6 damage on a successful save? Oh well).
And then again on the next two consecutive rounds, while you do something else. Interesting variant on Imbue Familiar with Spell Ability. Advantages: Only costs one spell slot, grants three high-effect spells, selected from a list of five at manifesting time. Also grants the ability to use certain types of psionic items. Disadvantages: Costs a round to cast, totally spoiled by mind-blank, limited to five specific effects.

Hmm....

Of course, at 18th+, it qualifies for Contingency, which is also a personal spell, so you could cast a Contingent Mental Pinnacle on your Familiar for, say, a particular free-action - maybe when you share a particular buff spell with your familiar. Meanwhile, you can have your own Contingency.

Ramza00
2007-02-16, 11:40 PM
Thank's Jack Smith you gave me some additional ideas for a build I been working on recently. I didn't even think of contigency to use with Mental Pinnacle.

Note this is a theoretical optimization idea. I would never use this build on a DM without risking the chance my copy of the phb being caught in a small house fire later on that night.

Abusing Mental Pinnacle and Metaconcert to get 1000+pp and insane dcs

Or

How Arcane Magic makes Psionics A LOT better
http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=793447

Rigeld2
2007-02-17, 09:11 AM
Um... it looks to me like youd lose all access to your normal powers when you cast Mental Pinnacle.

For the duration of this spell, you use magic items and psionic items as if you were a psion with only the five powers given above on your class list.
And you cant just cast the spell for a free 60 PP, because they go away in 1rd/level

Any unspent power points dissipate when the spell ends.

Or am I misunderstanding the point? You cant cast spells with Mental Pinnacle, and you can only manifest 5 powers, which you have 60 PP to do it with. That sounds.... crappy.

Ramza00
2007-02-17, 11:39 AM
Um... it looks to me like youd lose all access to your normal powers when you cast Mental Pinnacle.

No you reread it. "you use magic items and psionic items as if you were a psion with only the five powers given above on your class list." It says items not your inherent class powers if you were a cerbemancer. You will still have access to those power, but they will use there normal manifester level. It would be similar to a multiclass psion/wilder, or a psion/psychic warrior. Same power point pool, different manifester level. Read page 17 and 18 of the XPH.

And you cant just cast the spell for a free 60 PP, because they go away in 1rd/level

Or am I misunderstanding the point? You cant cast spells with Mental Pinnacle, and you can only manifest 5 powers, which you have 60 PP to do it with. That sounds.... crappy.You get the free 60 pp, but at the end of the duration of the spell all the power points in your pool disapear, even if there were more than 60 to begin with.

That is why what I did in the above link was to a pure wizard cast it on himself and have someone else (not you since you only know 5 powers) to manifest metaconcert. When you manifest metaconcert your minds link and you can transfer power points from one person to a collective pool. When you end metaconcert the collective pool power points is split evenly between members.

So for example we have a party with a 20th lvl Wizard and a 20th lvl Telepath. No multiclassing or items that boost manifester level or caster level.

Wizard casts Mental Pinacle and gets a manifester level of 20 and 60 power points. Uses one 6th lvl slot
Telepath casts metaconcert (1 min casting time normally) linking the minds. He pays 9pp to manifest the power and decides to contribute 1 pp to the concert and have the wizard contribute 60 power points.
Now he or the Wizard can control the psionic entity who has access to both peoples powers (36 from the telepath, 5 from Mental Pinacle)
Now the psionic entity can cast any of these powers at the direction of the conductor (which can be either the wizard or the telepath)
Lets say he doesn't cast any powers and the conductor decides to dismiss the power early. Well the power points are split evenly between the remaining people.
Person A gets 30 power points
Person B gets 30 power points
The conductor gets the remainder which is 1 power point.
So assuming the telepath was the conductor he would get 31 power points, a net gain of 21 power points.The 20 rounds are now up (20*round/level of Mental Pinacle). Anybody that had Mental Pinacle cast on them loses all there power points. The telepath had no spell cast on him thus he retains these power points and actually gains 21 power points. Not broken right now

This was a normal example with unoptimized facets, there are 3 ways when combine together break the spell and power combine as one.
Boosting your caster level to insane levels (Red Wizard is good at this) yielding an incredible Manifester level (you can augment powers to your Manifester level) and a lot of power points.
Using your boosted caster level combine with metaconcert as the wizard as an conductor to yield even more powers which a wizard can augment to levels not normally seen till epic levels.
Use chain spell with Mental Pinacle to make the spell effect alot of targets yielding a lot of temporary psions with a lot of power points. (You need 1 lvl of Archmage and a familiar to do this. Cast MP on your familiar as a ranged touch attack via arcane reach and then use chain spell to have it jump up to 20 people).Oh don't forget you can always have the psionic entity to cast Bestow Power and have it bestow 2/3rds of its Manifester Level power points to the telepath each round prior to the end of Mental Pinnacle and the dissolution of the Metaconcert (which still splits power points equally between members).