Pathfinder Player Companion: Psychic Anthology (PFRPG)

3.80/5 (based on 8 ratings)
Pathfinder Player Companion: Psychic Anthology (PFRPG)
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A Mind-Expanding Read

For curious readers who wish to hone their psychic skills, a plethora of occult tomes, lost scrolls, and even stranger items lie hidden throughout Golarion. From the kaleidoscopic Recursion Tablets to the never-ending Infinity Scroll, Pathfinder Player Companion: Psychic Anthology presents a diverse archive of texts elucidating esoteric ideas and techniques that can benefit any psychic spellcasting class, as well as other spellcasters. Alongside feats, magic items, and spells, this volume unlocks the hidden powers of the mind!

Inside this book, you'll find:

  • New archetypes for nearly every occult class, including the phantom blade spiritualist and the autohypnotist mesmerist.
  • Panoplies­—collections of occultist implements that harness the power resonating between the items—and numerous kineticist wild talents for all the elements.
  • A new corruption arising from raw psychic energy that, if left unchecked, could mutate one's form into an all-consuming horror of writhing flesh.

This Pathfinder Player Companion is intended for use with the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game and the Pathfinder campaign setting, but can easily be incorporated into any fantasy world.

ISBN-13: 978-1-60125-928-8

Other Resources: This product is also available on the following platforms:

Hero Lab Online
Archives of Nethys

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3.80/5 (based on 8 ratings)

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5/5

I'm not going to talk about the psychic or mesmerist much here. The psychic gets to be the magic and magic item section, and it's a mixed bag. Mesmerist just isn't a class I much care to play (outside of one archetype), so I haven't spent much time looking at it.

Spiritualists get a nice chunk of stuff, a fun new emotional focus (and rules for using it with older archetypes). Two new archetypes, one bringing in some black blade magus fun, and a phantom animal one. I have intentions of using the phantom blade, the totemist I might if an appropriate campaign comes up. My only real problem with either is they lose emotional focus (something I enjoy about the flavor of the class).

Medium gets a fun new archetype. It doesn't really address any issues with the class, might even make some of them worse (forcing taboo). It get's fun abilities and has cool flavor though. Look for a thematic campaign to use it in.

Kineticist gets a lot of expanded selections. The invocations are a cool idea, and possibly a good tool for the future, but the feat look for most characters is disappointing. More talents, especially for wood and void is nice. Wood's new simple blast is disappointing, and makes for a (mostly) true pacifist if taken as your first. Not practical but interesting choice. More blade abilities make the melee fan happy. Speaking of which the Kinetic Knight is everything I ever wanted for the Kineticist, not just supporting but encouraging a strength based build, nice defensive features. I've already started playing one and it's one of m favorite builds. The lack of form infusions can be limiting somewhat though.

Occultist is another nice package here. The panopolies are great. Between giving you a way to go deeper into your spell list with out giving up too much versatility and some nice new focus powers. the archetype to support them is a nice addition too.

Overall a great book that supported the four psychic classes I care about in fun ways, and inspiring at least 4 new characters I want to play.


A Fantastic Expansion of Occult Options (for the most part)

5/5

This is a fantastic companion book for those interested in playing one of the classes in Occult Adventures. And for the most part, it gives these classes a lot of love. In order of how much (and the quality of) the love they receive:

1. (A+): The Spiritualist was originally my least favorite class in Occult Adventures. A class with cool flavor but weak mechanics. This book changes that. It introduces not one, but two archetypes that turn the Spiritualist into a viable and interesting option. The first is essentially a psychic version of the Blackblade Magus, and the second gives you a phantom animal companion (or two!) that's a viable option in combat. And it introduces a new Kindness emotional focus that the Id Rager can take(!). This went from a class I couldn't imagine getting myself to play, to a class I have at least two character ideas for. Fantastic stuff.

2. (A+): The Mesmerist, on the other hand, was one of my favorite classes in Occult Adventures. It's a lot like the alchemist -- a 6th level caster with lots of skill points and a bag of abilities that, though neat, don't obviously fit together (in the case of the alchemist: bombs, mutagens, self-buffing extracts, poison-using abilities and alchemy/potion-oriented abilities, in the case of the mesmerist: stares, tricks, touch treatments and a bevy of mind-affecting spells). In the case of the Alchemist, this was fixed by a bunch of great archetypes and options that allow you to really focus on one of the themes of the Alchemist (e.g., bomb focused alchemists, mutagen + self-buffing alchemists, poison-focused alchemists, etc). But until now the Mesmerist didn't really have the options to do the same.

This book starts to change that. It introduces a trick-focused archetype and a bunch of feats that make the Mesmerist's tricks cool and effective enough to really build a character around. Likewise, there are some great Stare feats that make stares effective enough to build a character around. Add in a cool Possession-focused archetype and a "mind-over-matter"-style archetype which moves away from *just* mind-affecting spells, and there are now a number of interesting and distinct options on the table to focus your Mesmerist around. More great stuff.

3. (A+): The Occultist was originally in the middle of the pack for me -- lots of flavor, and reasonably effective mechanically, but with a couple awkward features that make it hard to develop all of the versions of the class one might like to try (such as the dramatic difference in the power of different schools -- from the virtually obligatory Transmutation to the painfully bad Necromancy and Evocation -- and the strong disincentive to choose a school more than once, essentially locking you into a single spell per school). This book (combined with the incredible Silksworn archetype from the Heroes of the High Court) do a fair bit to change that. By adding panoply options (and the corresponding panoply-focused archetype) you now have a cool and flavorful way of getting multiple spells from a given school, and of spreading out your spell picks a bit more. There's still a few awkward features of the class left over (it's still hard to imagine building an Occultist without Transmutation, or with Necromancy and Evocation), but the class is definitely more fun to play with than before.

4. (A): The Kineticist was a class I liked a lot, and it also gets a lot of love, in the form of the first good Kineticist archetype (a melee-focused armor-wearing kineticist tank) and a big batch of new wild talents which open up the variety of builds to pursue, especially if you want a Wood or Void-focused Kineticist. Granted, a lot of them are high-level abilities which only the DM is likely to get to play with, and it's hard to not to wish there were even more utility Wild Talents and Kinetic Invocation options. (More! More! More!) But this still opens up a lot of interesting options, making this book pretty much a "must-have" for anyone building a Kineticist.

5. (B): The Medium was one of my least favorite classes in Occult Adventures. It had great flavor, making it a class I very much wanted to play. But mechanically, the only really viable option seems to be building your character around the Champion spirit and making them a kind of psychic-flavored fighter, which didn't fit very well with most of the Medium-style character ideas I wanted to play with.

This book adds some more neat flavor options to the Medium (you can tie yourself to a kind of outsider), with an accompanying archetype, which someone building a Medium might consider. But none of these options make the class feel like it would play very differently, or open up the possibility of making a Medium which isn't basically a psychic fighter. Of course, these demerits of the Medium class aren't this book's fault, and it's a little unfair to expect it to resolve all of the problems facing the Medium. Still, given how much I like the idea behind this class, it would be great to someday see some options for making a viable character focused around one of the non-Champion spirits.

6. (B-): The Psychic was originally another class from Occult Adventures in the middle of the pack for me. The disciplines have lots of flavor, but, much like the sorcerer's bloodlines, most of them don't have enough mechanical "meat" to make them feel like they'd play that differently. The amplifications are kind of neat-ish, but most don't do interesting enough things to be memorable. And the overwhelming focus on mind-affecting spells makes the Psychic feel a bit fragile, usefulness-wise, for a 9th level caster.

This book does a bit to round out the Psychic's spell casting possibilities, and adds in some psychic analogs of arcane spell-related magic items. But the class feels much the same as before (in both good ways and bad) in light of these options, and there's little that seems specific to the Psychic that's on offer. Okay stuff.

All told, if you're mostly interested in the Medium or the Psychic, then while there are some new options in this book, there isn't anything that you really need in this book. But if you're interesting in playing around with Spiritualists, Mesmerists, Occultists or Kineticists, then this is definitely a book you'll want to have.


Lots of great stuff and a little bit of really, really bad

3/5

I would strongly recommend you buy this book, but I can't give it more than three stars because it has some really poorly conceived and edited options in here that should be mildly embarrassing to Paizo.

The mesmerist, spiritualist, and occultist options are generally great, a couple of bad archetypes and unclear rules ("holding" panoply occultist implements) aside. As far as I can tell the medium and kineticist stuff is of similar quality, but I don't care about those as much. If you want more options for these classes absolutely buy this book and you won't regret it.

Where the book falls down is the Psychic items and spells section. I can agree that this was arguably more necessary to grow the class than an archetype or more disciplines would have been, but the implementation is pretty poor. Most of the magic items are uninspired psychic retreads of (bad) arcane options that in some cases already worked fine for psychic casters. The spells have some decent options, and a couple of weak options, but the real problem is that there are two absurdly strong options. One allows you to daze lock a creature even on a successful save (at 3rd level!), the other is basically a Moment of Prescience god mode that applies to almost every roll you do for 1 full minute. I think you can easily solo higher threat CR creatures in melee with this spell and a few standard buffs. It's that ugly.

Publishing either of these spells would have been irresponsible, publishing both makes me doubt Paizo takes this line seriously anymore with respect to maintaining the integrity and balance of their game. PFS will ban the hell out of them, but having this sort of awful munchkiness out there as an idea that someone at Paizo thought was ok to publish is troublesome.

My final complaint is that there are a few more than the usual (already disappointing) level of poor editing and rules mistakes that we've come to expect in the Player Companion line. You have an unprecedented casting time of "1 full round action" on some spells (a big problem on Psychic classes that need their move action to add metamagic or center and avoid concentration penalties and not an innovation that should be dropped in without explanation), missing explanations of partial saving throws, and a couple of other minor signs that this needed a better development pass from a responsible adult.

That aside, you should reward Paizo for the good things with your money and put the good options to use responsibly. I just hope the bad things get more attention in future products and don't become a trend.


Good fluff, but wouldn't recommend...

2/5

The fluff and items range from good to alright, but everything else is sorta meh. The new spirits for the Medium are pretty cool, as well as some of the Stare feats/tricks for the Mesmerist, but other than that...

I'll be honest. I wanted more kineticist talents when I bought this book, and I was nothing but disappointed. Oh gee, more ways to melee as a kineticist - as though there weren't a half-dozen archetypes that did pretty much the same thing. Oh look, *more* blasts that expand the use of your kinetic blade! Oh look, *feats*! Like there aren't *enough* feats, and these simply add a few spells as kineticist talents.

It was alright overall, but frankly, I would've saved the 10 bucks.


uninspired

2/5

I pride myself on long detailed reviews, but there is very little to say about this. Uninspired, tending to overly dramatic and "uncontrolled!" type wackiness. Lack of content covered by larger than normal bad magic items section.


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Community & Digital Content Director

1 person marked this as a favorite.

Announced for February! Image and description are not final.


3 people marked this as a favorite.

Exciting! ^_^


Love me some psychics.


Ooh, shiny! I was hoping they'd have this at some point.


HA! I knew it! Psychic Anthology! Now we're almost ready for Weapons and Armor Anthology! :D


5 people marked this as a favorite.

Glad to see the support for Occult continuing!


Cool, more Occult support.


2 people marked this as a favorite.

I really hope there will be more kineticist wild talents in this one and I mean a lot more. Between the last two hardcovers we have only gotten around seven.

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.

Aww I was hoping it'd be called Occult Anthology.

Still, I am excite!


I also hope for more psychic disciplines, phantom emotional focuses, medium spirits, etc.


Sweet! I know what I'm getting next February!


Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

I'm doubting there will be much for kineticists, though I'd love to be proven wrong...perhaps some sort of crazy kineticist archetype where they can swap out their wild talents somehow. But I'll hold out hopes for some neat stuff for the mesmerist myself. I also kind of hope we'll get a psychic bloodline for the bloodrager, since we got one for the sorcerer in Occult Adventures...preferably with an emphasis on violent mental blasts and/or hurling things at enemies with telekinesis.

But we'll just have to wait and see!


2 people marked this as a favorite.
Rysky wrote:

Aww I was hoping it'd be called Occult Anthology.

Still, I am excite!

At least it's still called something Anthology Rysky. :)


Psychic Anthology, I didn't see that coming...

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Thomas Seitz wrote:
Rysky wrote:

Aww I was hoping it'd be called Occult Anthology.

Still, I am excite!

At least it's still called something Anthology Rysky. :)

True :3


Oh this does look good. I am sort of hoping there is a way to use friendly telekinesis on your allies. Though I have to admit the name Occult Anthology would probably have been better than Psychic Anthology since the word psychic has some die hards against it.


4 people marked this as a favorite.
Rysky wrote:
Thomas Seitz wrote:
Rysky wrote:

Aww I was hoping it'd be called Occult Anthology.

Still, I am excite!

At least it's still called something Anthology Rysky. :)
True :3

Maybe this means there will be a Horror Anthology down the road?

(...with wendigo and linnorm corruptions?)

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Hunt, the PugWumpus wrote:
Rysky wrote:
Thomas Seitz wrote:
Rysky wrote:

Aww I was hoping it'd be called Occult Anthology.

Still, I am excite!

At least it's still called something Anthology Rysky. :)
True :3

Maybe this means there will be a Horror Anthology down the road?

(...with wendigo and linnorm corruptions?)

You make me salivate, Wampi.


Some psychic related rouge talents, rage powers, hexes, familiars, etc. would be nice.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

I thought that's what Horror Realms was suppose to give us Rysky...

But yeah I'd like to see though corruptions too.

Silver Crusade

3 people marked this as a favorite.
Thomas Seitz wrote:

I thought that's what Horror Realms was suppose to give us Rysky...

But yeah I'd like to see though corruptions too.

WE CAN HAVE THEM IN BOTH, BLAINE


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Oh. Mmm. I suppose you're right, Rysky. :) *rubs his ears* Why are you yelling?


6 people marked this as a favorite.
Redblade8 wrote:
Psychic Anthology, I didn't see that coming...

I did.

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Thomas Seitz wrote:
Oh. Mmm. I suppose you're right, Rysky. :) *rubs his ears* Why are you yelling?

That was my declarative voice, sorry.

Owner - Gator Games & Hobby

4 people marked this as a favorite.

Kineeeticist stuff?

*Puppy Eyes*

Silver Crusade

Pathfinder Adventure Path, Starfinder Adventure Path Subscriber

Harrowed Medium?

Hmmm, this book looks too short to include it.

Designer

5 people marked this as a favorite.
DM_aka_Dudemeister wrote:

Harrowed Medium?

Hmmm, this book looks too short to include it.

As with HHH, no Player Companion is long enough. That said, I'm thinking those Recursion Tablets mentioned in the product description might wind up being popular...


Mark Seifter wrote:
That said, I'm thinking those Recursion Tablets mentioned in the product description might wind up being popular...

We can only hope. ^_^


3 people marked this as a favorite.
Rysky wrote:
Thomas Seitz wrote:
Oh. Mmm. I suppose you're right, Rysky. :) *rubs his ears* Why are you yelling?
That was my declarative voice, sorry.

Sokay just really loud.

*is also glad to see Mister Seifter's contributions to this* Isabelle, did you help too?


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Thomas Seitz wrote:
HA! I knew it! Psychic Anthology! Now we're almost ready for Weapons and Armor Anthology! :D

Yup. Knew it was just a matter of time. Those two sound like a good idea as well.

So, I guess I have to keep my subscription. Poor me. :P


Hey at least you have a way to support your habit. I don't even have that. :p :) I mean other than Birthdays and message boards.


2 people marked this as a favorite.

Psychic related simple templates for summoned monsters, psychic related eidolon related stuff, psychic themed curse effects, spells for creating/summoning creatures made of pure thought, etc.


Isn't that what a Tupla is, Dragon? Or you asking for an occult ritual of psychic origins to do that?

Contributor

2 people marked this as a favorite.
Thomas Seitz wrote:
Rysky wrote:
Thomas Seitz wrote:
Oh. Mmm. I suppose you're right, Rysky. :) *rubs his ears* Why are you yelling?
That was my declarative voice, sorry.

Sokay just really loud.

*is also glad to see Mister Seifter's contributions to this* Isabelle, did you help too?

As a general rule, freelancers usually don't share their involvement in a project before the product's subscriber date unless a Paizo employee outs them first.If a Paizo employee WANTS to oust a freelancer or two for this project, though.....

I, on the other hand, will stick to Harrow Readings to discern this products secrets. And if my drawing of the Big Sky is any indication, then there's a serious chance that this product has an all-star cast of cool people working on this one. :-)

Designer

4 people marked this as a favorite.
Alexander Augunas wrote:
Thomas Seitz wrote:
Rysky wrote:
Thomas Seitz wrote:
Oh. Mmm. I suppose you're right, Rysky. :) *rubs his ears* Why are you yelling?
That was my declarative voice, sorry.

Sokay just really loud.

*is also glad to see Mister Seifter's contributions to this* Isabelle, did you help too?

As a general rule, freelancers usually don't share their involvement in a project before the product's subscriber date unless a Paizo employee outs them first.If a Paizo employee WANTS to oust a freelancer or two for this project, though.....

I, on the other hand, will stick to Harrow Readings to discern this products secrets. And if my drawing of the Big Sky is any indication, then there's a serious chance that this product has an all-star cast of cool people working on this one. :-)

Big Sky is the card of liberation from lawful restraints and shackles, so hopefully that doesn't mean it's not going to match the outline! ^_^


Alright well I hope EVERYONE that wants to work on this gets to work on it without Paizo ousting anyone.

Designer

1 person marked this as a favorite.
Thomas Seitz wrote:
Alright well I hope EVERYONE that wants to work on this gets to work on it without Paizo ousting anyone.

I think he meant "out" rather than "oust" :o


Oh. Well still. You know what I was trying for Mister Seifter. I think.


Oh boy. I'm gonna sit here and salivate a bunch now, I love me some Mesmerist options.

Contributor

2 people marked this as a favorite.
Mark Seifter wrote:
Thomas Seitz wrote:
Alright well I hope EVERYONE that wants to work on this gets to work on it without Paizo ousting anyone.
I think he meant "out" rather than "oust" :o

Yeah, I was in the middle of a game of 8-02: Ward Asunder when typing that. (My character died, so I had a few rounds to check the forums.)

Sorry for the typos!


Some more kineticist feats like...

Extra Simple Blast- Gain one simple blast of your choice from any element. Gain composite blast(s) at level 7 with your choice and whatever blast(s) you already have. Can be taken at level one and only requires having the kinetic blast class ability.

Extra Elemental Defense- Gain an extra elemental defense of your choice from any element. Only requirement is having the elemental defense class ability. Can only be taken once.

A feat that lets you use your con mod instead of str/dex for attack rolls for blast(ranged and melee).

Some alternate elemental defenses would be cool like energy resistance, elemental damage like fire but for cold, electricity, and negative energy, etc.


1 person marked this as a favorite.

I wonder if the kineticist will get any love in this one?

Silver Crusade

Nope.

Psychic Anthology, not Occult. [/wry]


1 person marked this as a favorite.
Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Rysky wrote:

Nope.

Psychic Anthology, not Occult. [/wry]

Technically, the kineticist utilizes psychic spell-like abilities, so they would hypothetically qualify for a psychic anthology, though I suspect there won't be too much kineticist material given the general book-related aspect, though I would love to be proven wrong. Hmm, one amusing thing would be an archetype for phytokineticists that gives them paper control instead, much like the blood kineticist archetype modifies hydrokineticists. Obviously, Read or Die is some inspiration, but it would also be neat to get abilities related to manipulating the contents of scrolls, books, etc., as well as making paper constructs and the like.

Silver Crusade

1 person marked this as a favorite.

Ooo, I wouldn't mind playing an Agent Paper.


Not an archetype but actual wild talents for paper use would be cool for the wood element along with an actual wood + wood composite blast.


Dragon78 wrote:
I wonder if the kineticist will get any love in this one?

I foresee that they won't.


One can dream;)


February is going to be a great month!


1 person marked this as a favorite.

Feburary is great for RPGs. For the rest of it? Not so much.

Still hope to see another psychic discipline in this.

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