How the Psychic Walks so the Kineticist will Run

[Golurkcanfly]

While I understand that the current design of the Psychic is contentious, and I myself believe it needs a boost, I believe it provides an excellent foundation for a future Kineticist class. In addition, I believe that because the class shows how a Kineticist can be done in the future, it should not move to a Focus-only class.

Amped Cantrips are an excellent concept, allowing the class to expend resources to boost their magical capabilities by empowering existing ones. This mirrors how the Kineticist can empower their Blasts with Infusion Talents, which could be done in the same way. The Kineticist can have their Blasts as Focus Cantrips, but with the various Infusions as Amps (some of which could cost multiple Focus Points). They could even have various Wild Talents be regular Focus Spells.

As for the Kineticist's Burn, this could be represented very well with a mechanic similar to that of the Oracle's Curse. It could let you cast Focus Spells and Amps even without any Focus Points, but if you do, you begin to incur various downsides.

Because this sort of "Focus Only" caster using the Amp mechanic would be such a perfect fit for the Kineticist, I believe that such a design space should be reserved for it. The Psychic should remain a Full Caster with Amps because of it in addition to other reasons such as versatility.

[Lanathar]

Was it the playtest where oracles could cast focus spells for free by advancing their curse or spend points for no effect? I wonder why they got rid of that because what actually happens seems like a massive power down by comparison…

Also I gather the Legendary Kineticist already does something with “amping” cantrips - potentially using focus points with an offset mechanism (from the know direction podcast where one of the people in the chat wrote the legendary kineticist)

But there are clearly things in here to prime the way and I guess the designers are hoping will reduce the contentiousness of any future playtest. You will have the base structure of focus point cantrip enhancement with an ability to offset. There is even a feat to push past this barrier (not what burn is likely to be but could be - it is very simple after all)

And then the rest of the spells will be dropped for (I guess ) upgrades in the chassis such as potential HP and armour proficiency

The tricky parts will be how much those very few current spells are “worth” in terms of chassis change. Are they worth a switch in key stat, armour proficiency and a jump in HP (in practical terms increasing HP by 60-80%). As it stands that is too much of an upgrade over the psychic chassis but the psychic is only in playtest

Potentially offset by the “cantrips” being reduced down to the single target damage one but with more variation options

The even trickier part will be the consideration for switching this over to a martial attack (so down to one action most likely) and using that proficiency and not caster proficiency. That is another big chassis change. Would damage be based on current element cantrips? Or abilities like fox fire and use hand wraps ? Questions for the designers

So the building blocks are there but there are enough differences to still make it a challenging one to design. A fascinating comparison would be an eventual telekinetic psychic and an aether kineticist (but that particular one might not make it…)