A psion build. Aid us.

[Angry Bob]

Give me one.

Let me be specific: I've had my eye on psiforged, changeling egoist levels, and the nomad, but can't decide.

The campaign will start at level one, and the DM has gone off his meds, allowing another character to be a Lolth-touched Half-minotaur Goliath Barbarian. Don't question it. I'm not.

Is there a psion build that'll compliment this thing/not be completely overshadowed for the first few levels?

[Psyren]

Can you pile on templates like that too?

Also, what books do you have available?

[Angry Bob]

All books available, no gentleman's agreement not to break the game, apparently, and the guy who's taking the templates is counted as ECL ~4 for purposes of leveling up at level 1 as a [sarcasm]drawback[/sarcasm] from level one, and buying them off with Unearthed Arcana rules. Which is retarded because that's the point of them anyway. Maybe I should ask the DM if I can start the game as level 4.

[Psyren]

Well, he'll start out pretty strong but fall behind the others as you guys level and he doesn't. Of course, if your campaign ends at 5 or 6 it won't matter.

As for builds, what do you want to be? Blaster? Controller? Summoner? Gish?

[Angry Bob]

Depends. How hard can a psionic blaster blast?

[SurlySeraph]

Psions are quite blasty, especially Kineticists. You'll run out of PP if you nova a lot, but you can produce quite impressive novas if you want.

[Angry Bob]

Flaws are allowed. If I go with blaster, is psiforged w/ adamantine body worth it?

[sonofzeal]

Depends. How hard can a psionic blaster blast?

Psions make significantly better blasters than Wizards do, at least at low/mid op. Their blasts are quite blasty, and Kineticists get blastier blasts than Wizardly blasts do at most levels. So... blast away!

Flaws are allowed. If I go with blaster, is psiforged w/ adamantine body worth it?

Adamantine Body is always worth it. Note that some DMs consider it cheap to play a Psion with heavy armor. That whole "not suffering from ASF" thing is considered more of a loophole than a feature by some.

[NineThePuma]

Hai. This is my favorite Psion build of all time.

[SurlySeraph]

That build doesn't permanently and irreversibly turn itself into a sandwich. That build doesn't permanently and irreversibly turn itself into a sandwich at all!

[Psyren]

^ What they said. The chief advantages of psionic blasters are:

1) Mutable energy types - you can have multiple elements prepared at once with a single power, whereas wizards have to choose or spend feats.

2) Limitless DCs - most blasty powers have a DC that scales the more PP you pump into it. Wizard spells, even metamagicked ones, are limited to 10 + spell level + casting mod.

3) Spontaneous casting - when you have a hammer, every problem looks like a nail, but psions are never forced to use their hammer because they don't have to "prepare" blasting spells in advance, or anticipate how many they'll need.

However, the primary wizard/sorcerer advantage of being able to stack metamagic can outweigh these at higher levels of optimization. Most Psions can only apply one metapsionic feat to a power, and two with Psicrystal Containment... and whichever one they apply also curtails how high they can augment.

Having said that, psion blasters are still phenomenal (as are Wilders.)

EDIT: "They" of course refers to the non-sandwich folk

[Kylarra]

Hai. This is my favorite Psion build of all time.

Just a note from that build though, don't take psionic body. It's generally not worth it.

[JonRG]

Blasters are nice for all the aforementioned reasons. Just watch your power points early on, even though you may not need them.

Small rant ensues.

Spoiler

Show

Are you sure we can't question the other guy's character? Because it has nearly +20 Str before Rage. Even if he puts a mere 10 in Strength (which I imagine he won't), that's +10 to attack and damage at 1st level. With flaws, he'll start out with PA + Cleave. He's going to paste early encounters - with or without the party - until he meets a caster with the proper spells to ruin his day. Since the DM approved this monstrosity, I doubt you can count on him to keep it in check.

Even better, Lolth-Touched shifts his alignment to Chaotic Evil (or it should), and the consensus is that shifting away would cost the benefits. The lady spider giveth, the lady spider taketh away.

If he actually is evil, I'd advise alerting the nearest Silver Flame temple (guessing this is Eberron) and making some popcorn.

[Angry Bob]

Eh. It's an evil/neutral party with one good character that's fighter(of eight-bit theater) levels of dumb and we're used to this sort of thing. I'm just asking for an optimal blaster build that could conceivably keep up with it for the first few levels. No one else in the group has a problem with this sort of thing. Somehow.

[Psyren]

This should help - one of my favorite links for new psions.

Is 3rd-party available? The Energist is a great Psionic Blaster PrC. Otherwise, Anarchic Initiate (CPsi), Crystal Master or Meditant are probably what you want.