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Akennedy
2007-12-09, 09:54 PM
I've been searching the WoTC forums and the GiTP forums here and haven't read anything specifically that denotes how the psy warrior is abusable/horribly broken. I was hoping someone/people could shed some light on this topic for me, for I am either blind to it's awesomeness or simply ignorant. Thank you all!
(Also, I've heard of The King Of Smack being overpowered, but no idea what it is. So... again, if anyone who can enlighten me with their superior knowledge, I will be grateful.)

Edit - forgot to mention something...
To me, the wilder gets practically everything a psy warrior gets with some nice abilities on the side. other than a d6, less proficiencies, and a few less powers, a wilder seems a better choice by FAR, especially with the Slayer PrC.

And Clerics even! With the right domains, can out (as it seems) everything a psy warrior. War domain - prof with deity's weapon and Weapon focus! I also forget the domain in which you get enlarge person (... might be war), but a cleric gets 9th level spells, medium Bab, cast in armor, AND d8 hp!

I have to be missing something to make a psy warrior Uber.

Ryuuk
2007-12-09, 10:05 PM
The Psychic Warrior isn't really broken (at least not IMO). It's self sufficient and has with enough tricks to get to where it needs to and last.

As for the wilder, it's got full manifesting, but it can only know a grand total of 11 powers spread across 9 different levels. Its class features are a bit of a double edged sword thanks to the dazing and since it doesn't have bonus feats or access to the more melee oriented psychic warrior powers, it'll have a harder time beating stuff down as a melee combatant.

Edit: And that's why Codzilla is considered overpowered, full casting and better melee then full bab classes.

serow
2007-12-09, 10:10 PM
By itself, psy-war is supposedly one of the most well-balanced classes for 3.5.

tyckspoon
2007-12-09, 10:18 PM
You're missing what makes a PsyWar uber because it generally isn't there. It's a *good* class, but it's not one of the Ultimate Power classes of D&D. The PsyWar is a gish-in-a-box, and one of the better-designed attempts at the concept. They mostly play like Fighters, but where there's a step in a Fighter strategy that says "have a friendly spellcaster cast something on you", the PsyWar can probably do it for himself. If you're trying to make the PsyWar act like a Psion or a Wizard, you're doing it wrong.

That said, a PsyWar can take *melee* cheese and make it better. A PsyWar that decides to go for a tripping build, for example, can use Expansion to make himself two size categories bigger instead of Enlarge Person's one. He can use Psionic Lion's Charge to make sure he gets his full attacks when needed. If he's not getting a full attack, he can use powers like Prevenom or Dissolving Weapon to make sure he does decent damage anyway. It's kind of like taking the fightery portion of a Clericzilla setup and attaching it to the Fighter's bonus feat progression.

RTGoodman
2007-12-09, 10:27 PM
I've not played with much Psionics stuff before, but from what I've heard (as the others said), the Psychic Warrior is a pretty balanced class. The super-optimized builds out there are mostly things that others can do anyway (such as tripping builds or pouncing full-power attacking uber-damage builds), but that have a few different "tricks." Personally I don't know why they don't have a full BAB, but then again I like the Duskblade, and they're pretty similar classes.

Also, Google told me this is the original King of Smack build (http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=227556). I was having trouble loading the page, but you may be able to check it out.

axraelshelm
2007-12-10, 02:03 AM
playing one and its fantastic if i knew about psy warrior when i was building my first paladin i would've went for this class instead.
A pure warrior class loses out because it is incapable to really go beyond ground level to place itself in a more decent position. When a creatures with flying takes flight a fighter can only use a bow, a psy warrior can chase after it or blow it out of the sky. strength and customisation very high with bonus feats and nice range of combat powers you can fully make your psy warrior different from all the other psy warriors. nice.

Da Beast
2007-12-10, 03:30 AM
The king of smack is a build for an elan psychic warrior that uses the fact that elans are aberrations to take the feats rapid strike and improved rapid strike. These are monstrous feast and thus normally off limits to player characters because most player races are humanoid. The problem is more with an LA 0 race that gets access to monstrous feats than with the psi warrior class.

Bosh
2007-12-10, 06:04 AM
Psi-war is probably one of the best-balanced classes out there. The Slayer PrC and certain aberration feats are cheese though.

Nerd-o-rama
2007-12-10, 06:08 AM
The king of smack is a build for an elan psychic warrior that uses the fact that elans are aberrations to take the feats rapid strike and improved rapid strike. These are monstrous feast and thus normally off limits to player characters because most player races are humanoid. The problem is more with an LA 0 race that gets access to monstrous feats than with the psi warrior class.
Like Changeling Warshapers. Which frankly aren't all that bad unless you give them an arbitrarily large number of natural attacks (my vote is to only give them one, or a claw/claw bite tops).

Anyway, PsyWarriors are a well-balanced class. Abusable? Sure, there's one or two recursive loop builds built off of them. They're more versatile than wilders in terms of Powers Known, can use better weapons, take more psionic feats, etc.

Reel On, Love
2007-12-10, 06:27 AM
At low levels, they're actually kinda underpowered--3/4 BAB and not enough Power Points. Still, overall, they're very solid.


The key to building a good Psychic Warrior is using most of your feats like a melee Fighter, and spending a few on select powers and psionic feats: Expanded Knowledge: Schism and Linked Power are great investments, letting you buff you with a minimum use of standard actions (especially if you took Expanded Knowledge: Dimension Hop)--very important. Nobody should be spending more than one round of combat buffing up.

Akennedy
2007-12-10, 06:39 AM
SO, other than the King of Smack, it's a fairly decent class! Hrm!... Well, if no one minds, could someone find me these "tripping builds"? I know with expansion, tripping would be amazing. Hrm... *begins to search*

Swooper
2007-12-10, 07:01 AM
The Slayer PrC and certain aberration feats are cheese though.
I've heard people state that the (Illithid) Slayer is a really powerful PrC, but really, what does it give you? You progress your powers, gain full BAB instead of 3/4.. All the abilities it gives are basically useless against anything but Mind Flayers, or some other psionic creatures. Also, the special requirement will be really hard to fulfill at the earliest level you can take it. And you need the Track feat to qualify. I can see the benefits of full BAB, but really, is it worth losing all the bonus feats from straight PsyWar? Can someone explain why this class is considered so good? :smallconfused:

Bag_of_Holding
2007-12-10, 07:17 AM
Umm... yeah, a slayer only gets something like immunity to mind-affecting effects (foiling even wish, miracle or reality revision), reducing SR/PR by 1 per hit and a total immunity from divination. Of course this class can't be that good, can it?

It's a strong class, loses only 1 ML, full BAB; what's not to like?

Bosh
2007-12-10, 07:27 AM
I've heard people state that the (Illithid) Slayer is a really powerful PrC, but really, what does it give you? You progress your powers, gain full BAB instead of 3/4.. All the abilities it gives are basically useless against anything but Mind Flayers, or some other psionic creatures. Also, the special requirement will be really hard to fulfill at the earliest level you can take it. And you need the Track feat to qualify. I can see the benefits of full BAB, but really, is it worth losing all the bonus feats from straight PsyWar? Can someone explain why this class is considered so good? :smallconfused:
Slayer + Psiwar isn't THAT bad. Slayer + one of the other two psionic classes is, makes for powerful gishes.

Swooper
2007-12-10, 07:56 AM
Umm... yeah, a slayer only gets something like immunity to mind-affecting effects (foiling even wish, miracle or reality revision), reducing SR/PR by 1 per hit and a total immunity from divination. Of course this class can't be that good, can it?

It's a strong class, loses only 1 ML, full BAB; what's not to like?
I'm just saying, it's a very situational class. I can't remember of more than a handful of occasions that a PC was hit with a mind-affecting effect, dunno how it is in other groups. Reducing SR/PR with every hit is pretty nice, I'll admit - but it's only useful against those high-level critters that actually have it. In a (high-level) campaign full of mind flayers, cerebriliths, hostile enchanters and so on, it's bloody brilliant. But for a 'regular' D&D game, I think I would rather go full PsyWar personally, if only for the feats instead of full BAB (one could be used for the psionic feat that lets you touch attack with a melee attack, there, BAB difference nearly gone).

Armads
2007-12-10, 08:00 AM
An abusable combo is via manifesting Share Pain + Vigor on your psicrystal. It gives a 10 hp/pp rate, which basically makes a psywar immune to too much hit point damage. It can be done with other classes, though.

mostlyharmful
2007-12-10, 08:05 AM
I'm just saying, it's a very situational class. I can't remember of more than a handful of occasions that a PC was hit with a mind-affecting effect, dunno how it is in other groups

In most every campaign I've ever run or been in Mind-affecting effects were thrown around like candy in the hands of a stroppy two year old.:smallsmile: There are killer SoS and SoL spells right from level 1 that target the mind, being immune to them becomes rapidly more tactically important in my experiance than being resistant to hp damage.