Psychic: Intelligence vs Charisma

[aobst128]

With dark archives in the future, we'll have the first caster with multiple mental KAS choices. The power differences between the 2 stats have been mostly dependent on what class you take as of right now. It'll be interesting how the final product will balance the 2 with the psychic. I like the idea of the big brain "what if we used 100% of our brain" sort of character, but I feel like charisma psychics will probably do better in combat since bon mot and demoralize are useful without any specific support that intelligence skills need. What are the thoughts on this?

[pixierose]

Recall knowledge is also pretty dang useful, as are languages(which bon mot needs to be useful), as are skills. And at higher level skill feats like disturbing knowledge are also pretty dang and useful.

I think the balance between them will be fine.

[aobst128]

Scroll crafting is also something an int psychic could take advantage of better. Especially useful if they keep the fewer slots from the playtest. Those are the given balances between the stats. They'll be more apparent when the psychic releases since you get to choose. The subclasses will determine the strengths and weaknesses as well. I hope int gets a good offensive one.

[aobst128]

If you have the appropriate lore, RK will be handy but it's not as universally useful as demoralize. Bon mot with the occult list pretty brutal too.

[graystone]

pixierose wrote:

Recall knowledge is also pretty dang useful

It can also be pretty dang useless as the best guidance the DM has is "useful" and not 'immediately useful' or 'what you want to find out' like high/low saves. I'd really like them to have guidelines about what the expected outcomes are for that skill action.

[pixierose]

aobst128 wrote:

If you have the appropriate lore, RK will be handy but it's not as universally useful as demoralize. Bon mot with the occult list pretty brutal too.

I mean lore isn't the only thing to use recall knowledge with.

As for the GM variance, I will agree that the rules are muddy. Most gms i play with give really useful information, but I know there are dm's that won't or will adhere to the strictest or most adversarial interpretations of any rule that is open to interpretation and so I would also like to see it cleaned up a bit.

[aobst128]

Int characters could build for all the relevant RK skills but it becomes harder as you level up with DCs increasing faster than you can put boosts into your skills. Lore master dedication is probably the easiest way to do it without much frustration.

[Squiggit]

I feel like Cha is more evergreen because the rules for things like demoralizing are more straight forward and very handy.

Int scales with how generous your GM is with the recall knowledge mechanic, with how flexible they are with lore skills and with how frequently they employ static over leveled DCs (getting more trained skills can be pretty neat if your GM isn't scaling the whole world to your level).

[aobst128]

I honestly really like how the investigator works with keen recollection since you can use very specific lores with it. The more specific the better. I wish keen recollection was something you could pick up from the archetype.

[WWHsmackdown]

I don't really think of psychics as the face so I'd still use intelligence even if it's not optimal. The image of the veins in your temple being fit to burst as you move a shack sized boulder with your mind fits better to me as intelligence. I would want my brain to be a litteral muscle that's getting all this work done, but that's just a telekinetic type psychic. I guess I could halfway see an empath type psychic using charisma. Personal preference, I just see a psychic's power coming from inside their grey matter.

[aobst128]

WWHsmackdown wrote:

I don't really think of psychics as the face so I'd still use intelligence even if it's not optimal. The image of the veins in your temple being fit to burst as you move a shack sized boulder with your mind fits better to me as intelligence. I would want my brain to be a litteral muscle that's getting all this work done, but that's just a telekinetic type psychic. I guess I could halfway see an empath type psychic using charisma. Personal preference, I just see a psychic's power coming from inside their grey matter.

I like that concept too. Too many "force of personality" charisma casters and not enough smarty-pants ones.