Does the wording on Psionic Strike mean it doesn't crit?

[Mr Adventurer]

So Psionic Strike says "immediately after you hit a target within 30 feet of you with an attack and deal damage to it with a weapon, you can expend one Psionic Energy die, rolling it and dealing force damage to the target equal to the number rolled plus your Intelligence modifier."

Since this occurs after the attack's damage, does that mean the die isn't multiplied on a critical hit?

If so, that's a real strike against it in my opinion.

[animewatcha]

You can compare it to barbarian's critical hit abilities as to 'timing'. In this particular case, it is like the paladin's smite in that by RAW, you can expend it AFTER knowing it is a critical hit and 'double the dice' per critical hit. Just like Paladin's smite. For the barbarian critical hit ability, those dice are NOT multiplied by the critical hit and are instead added after.

[Sception]

it's a bit nebulous, since it's not clear from the wording whether the damage is added to the original attack and thus is considered part of the attack for the purpose of critical damage multipliers, or whether it's considered to be entirely separate from the attack. Notably where divine smite deals "additional damage", psi strike just deals damage.

So yeah, I could see it being read either way. At my tables it would get multiplied for crits, but in the absence of sage advice or some similar dev answer, I can't say any DM who rules otherwise would be 'wrong' or even going against designer intent.

[RSP]

So Psionic Strike says "immediately after you hit a target within 30 feet of you with an attack and deal damage to it with a weapon, you can expend one Psionic Energy die, rolling it and dealing force damage to the target equal to the number rolled plus your Intelligence modifier."

Since this occurs after the attack's damage, does that mean the die isn't multiplied on a critical hit?

If so, that's a real strike against it in my opinion.

My initial reading is it’s a separate instance of damage and, therefore, wouldn’t be affected by a crit Roll.

However, it also means it’s a second roll for Concentration checks. That may or may not make up for not critting, but it’s a pretty cool way to inflict two Conc checks with one attack.