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It has been discussed in several threads before, especially in ones related to the Magus, but I wanted to have at least one clear thread about that.
Psychic Dedication is just too good, on Magus especially because of the Imaginary Weapon cheese (which I loathe and became ubiquitous with building a magus within the community) but also on most spellcasters.
It just gives way too much, too fast.
At level 2 it gives you a psi cantrip and its amp (including an extra focus point)
At level 6 you get the unique cantrip AND amp of a Psychic subclass.
The big thing is the amps, that are great. But kind of too good. Especially since you don't have to deal with any negative or mechanic of a conscious mind (say managing cycling between cold and fire damage of Oscillating Wave) it's just a renewable powerful spell at basically no cost.
I personnaly would advocate for the dedication to only give the cantrip(s) with no Amp. And only access the amps from psychic feats (Inertial Barrier, Mental Balm etc) with maybe a higher level feat within the archetype that lets you unlock the original amps as well. Essentially slowing down the progression to not be too frontloaded.
My complaint is mainly motivated by my interrests in the magus' design, I'll admit, and I believe that the synergy between psychic amps/focus spells in general with spellstrike is a roadblock that needs to be addressed if the class has to eventually be remastered (which I hope very much) but the details of this are not for this thread, I just wanted to mention it to be transparent.
Has anyone else felt this way about that archetype ?
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Eh, come February, after DA is remastered, we'll get a fairly definitive state of power balance for psychic. They may touch imaginary weapon and they may not. I doubt psychic is a class that'll get continuous touch ups, like pre-master alchemist. For my money, I hope they make psychic feats have less friendly fire and give more one action activities that don't require psyche being unleashed.
Basically, justify the two slots or make it three slots.
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Yeah I expect it to be addressed in the remastered version of the book. At least I hope so. But I wanted to get it out there.
The Psychic itself does need that TLC indeed. Stealing one of its main gimmicks without any of the drawbacks through archetype is one of the issues imo. It's a bit like if *just* taking the Champion dedication gave you the reaction right away. In some ways it gives you the same power without the drawbacks (Occilating Wave being the clearer example).
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I'm torn on this one. On the one hand, easily poaching a class's signature features like this is not good for the game. On the other hand, being able to accesss a versatile selection of focus spells with a dedication feat does wonders for classes/subclasses with poor focus spells. And while every caster benefits from this, the benefit is outsized for characters with weak focus spells, so I'd be sorry to see this go.
Imaginary Weapon cheese is better addressed by making spellstrike incompatible with any spell that costs you a focus point, and then making more exciting conflux spells so Maguses do other things besides spellstrike. Nerfing Psychic Dedication will just make maguses go back to taking cleric or champion dedication followed by domain initiate.
I aggree that the cheese would be better addressed removing compatibility with focus spells, but as someone pointed out recently, amps apparently still count as cantrips. So there need to be careful wording. Either the remaster of psychic qualifies amps as a free action spellshape (which would it it incompatible with spellstrike) or an errata on magus writes it off specifically in a kind of awkward way. Honestly i'd like spellstrike to not be compatible with focus spells (and some of those like fire ray or winter bolt to get ranked spells equivalents. Say "Corrosive Beam" and "Stone Arrow") so the Magus can get reworked in other demains (better focus spells, more actions using Arcane Cascade (for example a magic flavored Knockdown, like Spell Parry, or other special attacks coming back from 1E like Riving Strike as a 2 action strike that inflicts a penalty to saves for a round)
And maybe something like Striking Spellslots, working similarly to a cleric's font or a wizard school slots. just 2 slots that can only be used for spellstrikes.
I'm torn on this one. On the one hand, easily poaching a class's signature features like this is not good for the game. On the other hand, being able to accesss a versatile selection of focus spells with a dedication feat does wonders for classes/subclasses with poor focus spells. And while every caster benefits from this, the benefit is outsized for characters with weak focus spells, so I'd be sorry to see this go.
Imaginary Weapon cheese is better addressed by making spellstrike incompatible with any spell that cost you a focus point, and then making more exciting conflux spells so Maguses do other things besides spellstrike.
Right, spamable spell strike should be reserved for cantrips or magus focus spells. And the difference should be shored with changes in the magus class/ it's feats to encourage more varied turns.
I actually don't think spammable focus spellstrike built into the class is a good idea honestly, this would mess with its design a lot imo. But that's another topic.
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The big thing is the amps, that are great. But kind of too good. Especially since you don't have to deal with any negative or mechanic of a conscious mind (say managing cycling between cold and fire damage of Oscillating Wave) it's just a renewable powerful spell at basically no cost.
I'm curious about this.
I don't see any negative mechanics of Conscious Mind. Including Oscillating Wave in the general case.
The only time Oscillating Wave becomes something that even needs worked around is when fighting something that is resistant or immune to only one of cold or fire damage. Many of the creatures that are resistant to one of those are also resistant to the other one, which makes using either damage type effectively equivalent.
Some misconceptions about Oscillating Wave (that would be a houserule nerf and make this Conscious Mind much more difficult to deal with):
* It doesn't lock you out of casting spells with the wrong type. You can still cast Ray of Frost (pre-Remaster) at long range every round. What it does is changes the damage type of Ray of Frost to Fire damage every second round. And you can still cast Frostbite (Remaster) every round to target Fortitude Save instead of having to switch to Ignition and target AC.
* Changing the damage type of Mindshift abilities like Psi Burst and Psi Strikes is optional. You can also just leave them dealing their normal damage type.
But putting aside Oscillating Wave for the moment, what other Conscious Mind has anything that could even be considered a downside?
The issue is that the amp cantrip is the focus spell granted from that focus point, so it's hard to split them.
I do agree that the Dedication is blatantly skipping the normal Dedication --> focus spell design already established, making it obviously overpowered due to skipping a feat. And I agree that Psychic's Dedication feat should be altered to match the norm.
This would mean the Dedication granting Psy style casting for it's 2 cantrips, and a 2nd feat would then grant the amp focus spell.
The other design balance tool to keep in mind is the Witch style "special:" bonus rider on their basic ___ feat.
Witch's special bonus adds a familiar ability, which is a dead-on match in balance budget for Psy getting a bonus single cantrip.
So Psy Dedication should grant the normal 2 cantrips + spellcasting style & tradition list.
A 2nd feat would then grant a 3rd cantrip of that selected mind as the abnormal bonus while granting the normal focus point and focus spell (amped bonus cantrip).
... which is already the L6 feat Psi Development. Just need a L4 version for the starter.
I could see the Dedication granted the initial 2 psy cantrips.
Psi Development granting the special cantrip.
And a level 8 or more feat granting one amp for one of the three (maybe could be taken several times)
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Would it potentially be as simple as looking at the magus dedication and give the baseline psychic two cantrips, have a feat that gives them access to an amp and focus point, but it might potentially limit them to one amp per 10 minutes, similar to spellstrike limitation within the dedication.
or maybe you can keep the dedication giving them only one cantrip and a focus point, but place the once per 10/minute limitation even if you have extra focus points or abilities that recover focus points.
You might be able to have a higher level dedication that changes the limitation, perhaps enabling you to regain your ability to do an amp if you use an ability that grants you back a focus point during an encounter.
I honestly don't like the idea of making spellstrike inaccessible to focus spells. Focus spells provide extra flavor for actions with a Magus so I'd hate to see that go because of a bad interaction with a specific one.
The psychic class gives you two focus points to cast your psi cantrips as Amps, because it expects you to be making significant use of them. As a dedication, you only get one focus point, because it isn't expected that it should be your bread and butter, just that you have the flavor and can use that action. This is why I think limiting Amp spell usage in the dedication to once per 10 minute seems reasonable. You could do 1 minute, more similar to spellstrike, but that requirement requires you to do a 1 minute activity. I'm suggesting rather than a specific action to recover, just putting a burn-down timer, suggesting its recovery would be natural in their subconscious.
As mentioned, another option might be to allow the Amp ability come back only after an ability or activity recovers a focus point. (meaning a 10 minute activity would, but potentially other options might be available via other feats)
Putting a time limit on feels a bit awkward i think. I still think it more interresting to have access to the other amps and just not the main ones to have stronger difference between a real psychic and one that just has the archetype. Kind of how the barbarian dedication gives you very little bonus damage from rage, but access to actions that need rage through feats you know ?
Regarding the magus interraction with focus spells, i think it needs to be gone entirely. Psychic is just the worst offender, but it sidesteps too much of the class design to be healthy imo. It makes any buff/change to it harder to implement because it'll just still be more powerful overall. Though benefiting from focus spells from other classes on magus is something I hope to keep, for example recharging spellstrike from the use of *any* focus spells. So you could use them for your strong ranged options in off turns for example.
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I honestly don't like the idea of making spellstrike inaccessible to focus spells. Focus spells provide extra flavor for actions with a Magus so I'd hate to see that go because of a bad interaction with a specific one.
Agreed, this is taking a sledgehammer to the problem and also requires changing a class in another book. It's not like people are out screaming about Fire Ray. It's a good focus spell on Magus, but it's not nearly so warping relative to its cost.
This is strictly a Psychic Archetype problem. Magus is the worst offender, but its not the only one: any character with limited/poor reactions benefits massively from grabbing Amp Guidance for a single feat.
That "single feat" part is one of the problems: other archetypes don't really give you the class signature thing for a single dedication feat. Champion takes 2. Oracle takes 2. Witch gives you a familiar with 1, but it's not near full power and there's other ways to do that anyway (like Familiar Master). The other one that does this is Exemplar, and THAT one is also frequently called out as a problem for how out of whack the Dedication is.
The psychic class gives you two focus points to cast your psi cantrips as Amps, because it expects you to be making significant use of them. As a dedication, you only get one focus point, because it isn't expected that it should be your bread and butter, just that you have the flavor and can use that action. This is why I think limiting Amp spell usage in the dedication to once per 10 minute seems reasonable. You could do 1 minute, more similar to spellstrike, but that requirement requires you to do a 1 minute activity. I'm suggesting rather than a specific action to recover, just putting a burn-down timer, suggesting its recovery would be natural in their subconscious.As mentioned, another option might be to allow the Amp ability come back only after an ability or activity recovers a focus point. (meaning a 10 minute activity would, but potentially other options might be available via other feats)
This would also make sense. That makes the Psychic better at it than the archetype is, but the actual amps are still good. You just can't spam Imaginary Weapon 3 times a fight.
You could add another feat to the archetype to increase this limit to 2 as well, giving a thing to invest in so it's more well rounded than "get dedication and never touch it again" like what people often do with it in non-FA games.
That "single feat" part is one of the problems: other archetypes don't really give you the class signature thing for a single dedication feat. ... The other one that does this is Exemplar, and THAT one is also frequently called out as a problem for how out of whack the Dedication is.
Sigh... after the remaster, don't forget to add Alchemist into that bucket. It's much, much worse for them.
Old Alch Arch granted i.reagents equal to level, but your created item level was locked to L1. With the Dedication feat your only freebie items were just L1 items.
New Arch Alch grants 4 VVs, the infinite Q.Vial bomb, and Quick Alchemy to poof any item in the book up to your level.
It's like if Psychic Dedication feat granted 2 top rank slots. The only difference being quantity.
In the old Arch Alch, you needed the Expert Alchemy arch feat to get up to i.Level 5 at PC L 10, and the Master Alchemy arch feat to then up that to i.Level = PC Level / 2.
Even with spending 3 full feats, Arch Alchemist used to only create freebie items at 1/2 the level of a real Alchemist. And they created items at a 1:1 ratio instead of the main Alch's 2 or 3:1.
It's outright astonishing just how stupid the comparison and buff from old to new is. Old Arch Alch needed 4 feats to get that many items, plus Quick Alchemy.
New Arch Alch spends 4 feats, and gets 4 + 1/2 VVial items per day, plus 6+INT prep items per day, all of max level.
If we equate that formula to a total of 13 items to the new Arch Alch, the New Alchemist class needs to benefit from bonus VVial items via the recharge to add at least 10 items per day to get back to the old "real Alchemist has 2x items" advantage.
If you try to factor in the change were i.Level no longer lags for Arch Alch and try to require multiple lower L items to reach the same effect as their higher L versions based on things like HP restore numbers or damage numbers, the reality is that much worse.
(and cannot forget that 1 more feat for New Arch Alch will grant Firework Tech and recharging VVials...)
Too long didn't read:
The Archetype Alchemist is so absurdly buffed post-remaster, it genuinely makes it hard to justify picking Alchemist as your main class. While I used to only recommend Alchemist with a lot of asterisks, I do not recommend the class at all anymore.
I think the problem here isn't the psychic dedication itself but rather everything that surrounds it.
The first and biggest problem is that the psychic class isn't good, yet its really flavorful and its mechanics are interesting, so people quickly become interested in it only to quickly recognize they are much better poaching the features they like from the dedication and play something else.
The second problem is that I'd argue until a couple of years ago (pretty much around the Remaster era) Paizo didn't really know how to design casters in PF2e. It seems casters were (mostly) made boring on purpose because they had spell lists, right? Well, the first caster to break from that was the psychic and it also experimented with stuff like the amount of spell slots. The result? Well, as I said, not good, but it took the interest of people because it was a caster with actual features.
The third problem is the magus itself, which both suffers from being a class in the early years of the system when Paizo was still learning the ropes and the fact that they designed it in a way that's in a way dissonant with the idea people had of the magus when coming from PF1e. Magus players want to bonk enemies with their big spellstrike-powered stick and Paizo did everything in their hand to avoid it as much as possibble. I'm not here to argue if this was a good or bad decision necessarily, but if you design a class around doing bursts of damage every other turn and put the best options to do so outside of the class then I feel someone should have expected this happening at some point. However, i think this is only a problem because the psychic is bad, because if the psychic was an outstanding class, it wouldn't matter much if the magus could poach its focus spells because the psychic would still be the one that uses them better or in more interesting ways.
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I think the problem here isn't the psychic dedication itself but rather everything that surrounds it.
I firmly disagree.
While it can be seen as a poor design choice, spellcasting dedications are very standardized in what they grant. Dedication feats are often considered to grant sub-par benefits, and are taken because they gate access to the actually desired feats.
Psychic skipping the norm of a gatekeeping dedication feat and instead granting a scaling focus spell outright is 100% the outlier and problem.
It's 1 class feat more efficient for any PC to dip Psychic over any other focus spell dedication.
When it is 3 feats to end the lockout, and every class feat matters, it becomes clear that specific difference is the problem-causing abnormality.
The fact that Arch Psy characters can choose to skip the Basic __ --> Advanced ___ class feat norm and instead grab their choice of focus spells & spellcasting benefits via direct arch feats is another perk of the archetype.
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I think the problem here isn't the psychic dedication itself but rather everything that surrounds it.
I firmly disagree.
While it can be seen as a poor choice, spellcasting dedications are very standardized in what they grant. Dedication feats are often considered to grant very sub-par benefits, and are taken because they gate access to the actually desired feats.
Psychic skipping the norm and instead granting a scaling focus spell via the Dedication feat is 100% the outlier and problem.
It's 1 feat more efficient for any PC to dip Psychic than any other focus spell caster dedication.
When it is 3 feats to end the lockout, and every class feat matters, it becomes clear that specific difference is the problem-causing abnormality.
As someone who generally despises feat taxes, I don't concur. More multiclass dedications breaking the mold and actually offering worthwhile benefits is a good thing, and it's something we've seen done well recently with Guardian, Commander, and Championd dedication* (The Champion's Reaction feat, not so much). I'm becoming more and more convinced the real problem is that Psychic has so little mechanical identity that's actually worth anything, not the dedication itself.
*Rogue Dedication is another good example, but that's been good since the beginning.
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If I am intentionally reductive, then it sounds like you are simply advocating for power creep for the sake of it.
We have to deal with the system as it is, and intentionally letting one option be OP in comparison to its peers hurts every one of those peers.
One of the felt symptoms of Arch Psy being too good is that it far too many players auto-pick Psy because of it's obvious supremacy, especially so for Magii.
Nerfing the dedication feat to match other spellcasters would then allow players a more "real" choice, one with less coercion via power-balance affecting it.
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Like most arch spellcasters (RIP wizard, even basic b.tch cleric gets sanctification), Arch Psychic does already have unique appeal in that every focus spell you gain also grants a cantrip, even an outright exclusive cantrip that is otherwise unobtainable.
That is a plenty unique appeal, similar to an Arch Witch being able to poach their unique patron cantrip.
I think the Psychic class really needs more class feats, which would also greatly benefit the Arch Psy. There are very few generally appealing low L feats there, which I see as the ~'unfair' or ~'wrong' thing in need of fixing.
Even beyond more feats, Psychic should get many more mind options, as they are surprisingly equivalent to Witch patrons, which have been expanding. Psychic being left without them really communicates that it is a 2nd class class not worthy of Paizo's time.
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But the dedication feat really should be reworked so that it's not so blatantly cheating the normal arch spellcasting rules.
Knowingly letting the dedication feat be OP is already hurting things via "auto picks" like Magus + Imaginary Weapon. That should be fixed, not embraced.
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The third problem is the magus itself, which both suffers from being a class in the early years of the system when Paizo was still learning the ropes and the fact that they designed it in a way that's in a way dissonant with the idea people had of the magus when coming from PF1e. Magus players want to bonk enemies with their big spellstrike-powered stick and Paizo did everything in their hand to avoid it as much as possibble.
I honestly think the actual issue is more that what was great on 1e magus was its unique action economy (full attacks AND casting spells in the same round, with spellstrike on top) and that part of it is missing. Worse, Magus now has the most painful action economy in the game. If it had ways (like a variant of spellstrike) to cast a spell (any spell, normally, including self buffs, supports, area spells like mist or walls etc) while attacking at the same time and compressing it to 2 actions by spending the spellstrike charge, while also having more tools to recharge it (more skill actions that do it on a success) this would make it flow way better and also take weight off having to spellstrike every round.
While it can be seen as a poor design choice, spellcasting dedications are very standardized in what they grant. Dedication feats are often considered to grant sub-par benefits, and are taken because they gate access to the actually desired feats.
Psychic skipping the norm of a gatekeeping dedication feat and instead granting a scaling focus spell outright is 100% the outlier and problem.
It's 1 class feat more efficient for any PC to dip Psychic over any other focus spell dedication.
When it is 3 feats to end the lockout, and every class feat matters, it becomes clear that specific difference is the problem-causing abnormality.
The fact that Arch Psy characters can choose to skip the Basic __ --> Advanced ___ class feat norm and instead grab their choice of focus spells & spellcasting benefits via direct arch feats is another perk of the archetype.
I think a lot of multiclass dedications would gain to give a bit more (especially older ones) and some give less from the getgo.
For example Fighter dedication could give a level 1 fighter feat instead of just martial weapon training.
As for spellcasters, giving more than cantrips is so big of a powerup. There is few things other casting classes could give on top of a few cantrips that wouldn't be too much. Witch gives you a familiar for example, which is impossible to separate from the class, but i think is fine.
But psychic typically gives too much. It's the equivalent of the 5e 1 warlock dip for charisma to attack on any charisma character. That kind of thing.
Like, even without imaginary weapon for ONE feat if you pick Oscillating Wave, your Magus now has a renewable nova spellstrike that makes all feats and features related to spending spellslots on it redundant, and free you from making a choice of what to use your slots for completely. Which is normally a level 8 feat (Standby Spell) that still is limited by 4 slots a day.
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They may touch imaginary weapon and they may not.
I'd wager that it gets a power boost in some way. ;)
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If I am intentionally reductive, then it sounds like you are simply advocating for power creep for the sake of it.
In an incredibly reductive sense, I am. Most multiclass dedications are dreadful and feel like you wasted a feat. Rhe game would be better if they were competitive choices with good 1st-2nd level class feats. (Although Ancient Elf might have to be done away with). Power creep is bad when it raises the overall power level (You'll notice I did not mention Exemplar Dedication, because that does raise the overall power level of the game, and I'd appreciate seeing it nerfed). Obseleting underpowered options is fine, although in this fay and age it'd be nice if theg got a second pass instead.
To use a Magic: The Gathering example (Card games are very good at demonstrating these design ideas), creating a generic 3/3 boar creature for 2 colorless mana and one green mana would be power creep compared to a 2/3 boar creature for 2 colorless mana and one green mana, but that's not a bad thing for the game becaue the old creature was below the power curve.*
*I'm well aware M:TG has gone way beyond this example.
I'm not sure I follow the MTG example, I don't play it.
But I imagine it'd be a good card.
It'd be interresting to have a discussion about how to rebalance most multiclass dedication feats.
Like I mentionned Fighter giving you a 1st level fighter feat. Psychic giving the cantrips but no amps. Wizard I honestly dunno what it could give other than cantrips that wouldn't be OP. Maybe it could give you 4 cantrips since it's the "studies magic a lot" class.
Ranger is already decent, the ranged attack benefit of hunt prey is neat and can help certain niches.
Barbarian is fine too, you get a little bit of damage and a decent bit of temp HP once per fight.
Etc etc. It'd be a long discussion honestly.
Psychic, Exemplar and apparently Alchemist are the biggest outliers
I think the problem here isn't the psychic dedication itself but rather everything that surrounds it.
I firmly disagree.
While it can be seen as a poor design choice, spellcasting dedications are very standardized in what they grant. Dedication feats are often considered to grant sub-par benefits, and are taken because they gate access to the actually desired feats.
Spellcasting dedications are standardized because all casters share 90% of their features so its not like there's much room for the dedications (or the archetypes as a whole) to give you much of anything without giving you the features that makes those classes unique in the first place (thus making the class worthless).
The psychic was made to be the "caster that breaks the norm" pretty much, so it makes sense for the multiclassing archetype to break the norm as well. With that said, should it give the goodies that actually make the class unique? Probably not, but I would prefer for them to not pull a monk again by nerfing the archetype because they didn't want to buff the class itself. At least monks are a really good class, but if they were to make that with the psychic I would honestly just keep using the old one.
It's probably my inner 3.X / PF1e player speaking here, but I'm honestly not bothered by the existance of some options that could feel as auto-picks for certain classes, specially when those need something like free archetype to work. I love free archetype and I probably couldn't play the game without it, but there's more than a handful of character concepts that can be easily made without it, and it's not like I'll go to the GM and say "ehm, actually, I don't want to use free archetype in this game. Screw the other players who need it". When I'm building a character like that, dedications like the exemplar or psychic are honestly a godsend.
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Problem is imaginary weapon is perfectly fine for the psychic. It is perfectly fine for every other class. The only class it breaks is the magus or maybe Eldritch Archer. The only real fix it needs is to close the ability to use it with spellstrike.
And yes, most dedications are laughably bad, but there's cases where the dedications are really good but the rest of the archetype sucks as well. The exemplar dedication is certainly strong, but the rest of the archetype is really bad. If you aren't a caster or don't want more spell slots (which is probably a just me thing since I don't like vancian casters at all so, in a sense, the less spell slots I have the better) the psychic archetype is also horrible because the psychic feat list is horrendous. Both of these are "take 3 feats and run"-like archetypes because their only saving grace is their dedication.
And yes, most dedications are laughably bad, but there's cases where the dedications are really good but the rest of the archetype sucks as well. The exemplar dedication is certainly strong, but the rest of the archetype is really bad. If you aren't a caster or don't want more spell slots (which is probably a just me thing since I don't like vancian casters at all so, in a sense, the less spell slots I have the better) the psychic archetype is also horrible because the psychic feat list is horrendous. Both of these are "take 3 feats and run"-like archetypes because their only saving grace is their dedication.
I wouldn’t call it really bad. A lot of the time you don’t have much compelling reason to go further in the archetype than the dedication, but there are definitely plenty of times you do. Can pick up twin stars for example.
Wow, yeah, the whole "throw your greatsword" exclusive perk of Exemplar is probably the easiest thing to poach via Dedication / Archetyping.
The lack of other Ikons means that you'll be riding the Immanence a whole lot more, so any big hit martial going Dedication --> Hurl --> ___ is actually a very easy and rewarding archetype dip. That new Topple feat at L4 is super attractive to any Athletics PC for that 3rd feat.
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I personally believe that the Psychic's amps shouldn't be poachable via archetype at all. Amps are balanced to be significantly more powerful than most other focus spells and are a big part of the Psychic's power budget: whereas a spellcaster archetype is kept in check by the limited spell slots it offers you for its spells and the lower rank of those slots, focus spells all draw from the same pool of Focus Points and are always heightened to half your level rounded up, meaning that a spellcaster poaching an amp via archetype can use it just as often and as effectively as a Psychic, especially with the remaster's changes to Refocusing and spell proficiency.
Of course, there's also the issue of the Magus Spellstriking with an amped imaginary weapon, and I think it's twofold: the first is that the archetype is too strong, and the second is that amping a cantrip is poorly-defined within the game's rules, because it's not classified as any sort of action. Were there an Amp spellshape free action that did the same thing as current amps, then the Magus wouldn't be able to amp the cantrip they'd be using for Spellstrike. I don't think being able to Spellstrike with focus spells is really a problem, and in fact I'd personally quite like a conflux spell designed purely for blasting that'd work well with Spellstrike, but I agree that Spellstriking and amps shouldn't combo together.
So here is a question that I think might be valuable to examine where the problem is. We know that a Magus taking a Psychic Dedication to get Amped Imaginary Weapon is seen as problematic, as it breaks expected thresholds that seem to be intended.
Here is the question, would a Psychic who takes the Magus Dedication be similarly 'broken'? Since it seemed like the problem was spamming amp cantrip spellstrikes, it wouldn't seem to be because of the effective limitation of using the spellstrike, and needing a minute to be able to do it again.
Imaginary Weapon does do significant damage, even as a cantrip, but it does physical damage so may be more likely to be affected by resistance. It seems like the bigger issue is the significant damage boost per rank in heightening from the Amp.
So is there any other AMP spells that are problematic for magus from Psychic dedication? If not, would it literally be easier to say in the Psychic weapon Amp description that it is not compatible with any spell shape which combines it with another strike/attack. That would make it become ineligible for the a spell to be used in its Amped form for either the Magus or the Arcane Archer. Would that really solve the problem? Or are there other Amp spells that are likewise problematic?
I kind of hate to make Amps be a spellshape and have them be incompatible with any spellshape, because I could imagine justification for allowing a reach, widen, or conceal spellshapes for to work if they get the ability, and cutting off all such options may be over-reacting.
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Amps are already incompatible with spellshapes. The Amp rules state that specifically.
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I mean, if we're looking for a unique benefit Psychic Dedication can grant, why not shuffle the unique psi cantrip to the Dedication?
I like this idea. As much as I personally don't want the Psychic archetype to offer amps, having it provide psi cantrips much more easily would allow it to keep offering a unique benefit. Starting off with both standard psi cantrips on the dedication, or one standard cantrip and the surface cantrip, could make for a starting feat that'd be a bit stronger than other caster dedications still, but less so than now.
So here is a question that I think might be valuable to examine where the problem is. We know that a Magus taking a Psychic Dedication to get Amped Imaginary Weapon is seen as problematic, as it breaks expected thresholds that seem to be intended.
Here is the question, would a Psychic who takes the Magus Dedication be similarly 'broken'? Since it seemed like the problem was spamming amp cantrip spellstrikes, it wouldn't seem to be because of the effective limitation of using the spellstrike, and needing a minute to be able to do it again.
Imaginary Weapon does do significant damage, even as a cantrip, but it does physical damage so may be more likely to be affected by resistance. It seems like the bigger issue is the significant damage boost per rank in heightening from the Amp.
So is there any other AMP spells that are problematic for magus from Psychic dedication? If not, would it literally be easier to say in the Psychic weapon Amp description that it is not compatible with any spell shape which combines it with another strike/attack. That would make it become ineligible for the a spell to be used in its Amped form for either the Magus or the Arcane Archer. Would that really solve the problem? Or are there other Amp spells that are likewise problematic?
I kind of hate to make Amps be a spellshape and have them be incompatible with any spellshape, because I could imagine justification for allowing a reach, widen, or conceal spellshapes for to work if they get the ability, and cutting off all such options may be over-reacting.
No, a psychic taking magus is not broken because they max out at Expert weapons and can do on spellstrike per minute. I did this and let's say it wasn't nearly as good as the magus taking psychic.
Magus is the king of using attack cantrips for damage. That's their niche.
That "single feat" part is one of the problems: other archetypes don't really give you the class signature thing for a single dedication feat. ... The other one that does this is Exemplar, and THAT one is also frequently called out as a problem for how out of whack the Dedication is.Sigh... after the remaster, don't forget to add Alchemist into that bucket. It's much, much worse for them.
Old Alch Arch granted i.reagents equal to level, but your created item level was locked to L1. With the Dedication feat your only freebie items were just L1 items.
New Arch Alch grants 4 VVs, the infinite Q.Vial bomb, and Quick Alchemy to poof any item in the book up to your level.
I actually forgot it grants the Q.Vial bombs, lol. You're right, it's a bonkers good dedication. My PFS Commander has it and in one of the scenarios the alchemy stuff flat out saved the lives of some other players. It was probably just as impactful as my Commander stuff, though that was an extreme example because we got into a real mess of a fight.
I see people using it a lot less than some of the other high power dedications, though. I'm not sure if thats due to the entry requirements (a LOT of builds use INT as a dump stat) or just a general feeling of "Alchemy is really complex to get a lot out of it and I don't want to deal with that". Because Alchemy in the hands of someone who has mastery of the alchemical item list and stacks formulae in advance is WAY stronger than alchemy in the hands of someone who doesn't do that.
Amps are already incompatible with spellshapes. The Amp rules state that specifically.
Where exactly does it say that, I haven't found it in Archives of Nethys.
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Amps are already incompatible with spellshapes. The Amp rules state that specifically.Where exactly does it say that, I haven't found it in Archives of Nethys.
The Key Terms section of the Psychic class.
Amp: Amps are special thoughtforms that modify the properties of your psi cantrips. You can apply an amp only to a psi cantrip, which is called the amped cantrip. Applying an amp to a psi cantrip costs 1 Focus Point and is part of the actions needed to Cast the Spell. The singular focus required to amp a psi cantrip means that unless otherwise noted, you can apply only one amp to a given psi cantrip, and you can't apply both an amp and a metamagic ability to a cantrip at the same time. If both an amp and the amped cantrip deal damage of the same type, combine their damage for the purpose of resistances and weaknesses. Feats with the amp trait provide different amps you can apply to psi cantrips in place of their normal amps. If an amp has its own effect, its level is the same as the amped cantrip's.
That's a great find,
but ugh, it looks like that not a blocker, and RaW Spellstrike works with amps.
Spellstrike does not have the [spellshape] (metamagic) trait, so it doesn't trigger the "only one" limit.
Instead, the spellstrike text says many spellshapes are incompatible because they require the next action be "cast a spell" and spellstrike != cast a spell.
Psychic's amp spells also are not spellshapes/metamagic themselves, even if their text renders them incompatible by default.
If SpellStrike itself had the spellshape tag, then it would block amp cantrips, but it seems designed specifically to allow any metamagic that doesn't require a next action spellcast.
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I wasn't trying to claim that Amps don't work with Spellstrike. They do.
I was responding to Loreguard not wanting to make Amps become incompatible with Spellshapes.
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They should just do a rework of the psychic class and dedication. if its main value is just mechanical boost to other classes then identity is too weak on its own.
As dedications.
Ranger doesn't give out its edge benefits
rogue limits its sneak attack damage and takes a second feat to get to it.
Magus starts you out with cantrips like other spellcasters and makes you spend more feats for spell strike and even more to get focus spells
I agree with the OP that the pay off of a dedication needs to be consistent across dedication options. its one thing to frontload a class chassis with more of its benefits and have less later on and a completely different thing to front load a dedication available to any class.
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I guess we'll see soon enough how/if it is adressed
My most likely guess would be "no change at all."
Or possibly "amps get language to treat them like focus spells for gaining focus points, and the dedication no longer needs to specify that it adds a focus point."
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Oh I had an idea.
I would get interested in psychic if one of its subclasses had psychic energy blades that use spell attack for strikes along with a psychic barrier that gives AC and temp HP but once the temp hp is depleted they lose the barrier. This allows short bursts of melee play then falling back to spell casting when the barrier runs out.
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With regards to imaginary weapon specifically, I think the problem there is that melee-range spells can't work all that well with a class whose AC and HP are at the bottom of the barrel: in order to let a Psychic survive enough at that range to actually want to get into melee, you'd have to dedicate a huge amount of whichever power budget the spell would give to boost their defenses, such that the added offense could easily end up falling short. Otherwise, even a highly-damaging spell like imaginary weapon can easily end up trading off much worse for the Psychic as they get chunked while standing in melee range. This I suspect is why the Sorcerer's old glutton's jaw spell went from an unarmed attack to a ranged spell attack in the remaster, as letting that equally squishy class deal a bit of damage from a distance was much more feasible than expecting them to make multiple melee Strikes, even with the temporary Hit Points.
That's a great find,
but ugh, it looks like that not a blocker, and RaW Spellstrike works with amps.
Spellstrike does not have the [spellshape] (metamagic) trait, so it doesn't trigger the "only one" limit.
Instead, the spellstrike text says many spellshapes are incompatible because they require the next action be "cast a spell" and spellstrike != cast a spell.
Psychic's amp spells also are not spellshapes/metamagic themselves, even if their text renders them incompatible by default.
If SpellStrike itself had the spellshape tag, then it would block amp cantrips, but it seems designed specifically to allow any metamagic that doesn't require a next action spellcast.
Yea spellstrike doesn't even prohibit metamagic, just the specific format of metamagic that relies on taking an action before the cast a spell action.
If you have a metamagic (or other action) that's a triggered free action it works fine with spellstrike, because it just dodges the whole next action thing. Mainly that's useful for touch focus but maybe you could do some cool combo with that witch feat that lets them apply a metamagic as a reaction.
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With regards to imaginary weapon specifically, I think the problem there is that melee-range spells can't work all that well with a class whose AC and HP are at the bottom of the barrel: in order to let a Psychic survive enough at that range to actually want to get into melee, you'd have to dedicate a huge amount of whichever power budget the spell would give to boost their defenses, such that the added offense could easily end up falling short. Otherwise, even a highly-damaging spell like imaginary weapon can easily end up trading off much worse for the Psychic as they get chunked while standing in melee range. This I suspect is why the Sorcerer's old glutton's jaw spell went from an unarmed attack to a ranged spell attack in the remaster, as letting that equally squishy class deal a bit of damage from a distance was much more feasible than expecting them to make multiple melee Strikes, even with the temporary Hit Points.
You can get some pretty good damage out of it by boosting the attack roll with fury cocktails, and I've seen a couple builds that use that and maneuvering spell (and touch focus when not amping) for some real touch of death.
The defense is of course completely abysmal, with the only mitigations being reach from tripakee tongue and battle medicine on yourself (already essential for psychic because of paragon battle medicine removing stupefied, but even better here). But yea you gonna die, best played with a champion of guardian on your team. That -1 AC from fury cocktails is not helping your terrible caster defenses.
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You can get some pretty good damage out of it by boosting the attack roll with fury cocktails, and I've seen a couple builds that use that and maneuvering spell (and touch focus when not amping) for some real touch of death.
The defense is of course completely abysmal, with the only mitigations being reach from tripakee tongue and battle medicine on yourself (already essential for psychic because of paragon battle medicine removing stupefied, but even better here). But yea you gonna die, best played with a champion of guardian on your team. That -1 AC from fury cocktails is not helping your terrible caster defenses.
Fury cocktail is a phenomenal shout; absolutely nuts that the item bonus applies to all melee attack rolls, including spell attack rolls. As you point out, it's also about as much of a glass cannon build as it gets even with the Leap afterwards with Maneuvering Spell, but despite the fact that it would probably still be a net loss on balance, I'd still want to try that out at least once for the crit potential.
Limiting amps to the base class would not help deal with the imaginary weapon -magus build issue, especially not the starlit span build. The issue there is just getting access to the cantrip, so it doesn’t really matter that focus spells can be as good as it. You don’t get it until 6th level is the real motivator of it, but there are many campaigns where that doesn’t matter at all.
I could see making it so that MC Psychics can only use 1 Amp until they refocus, instead of being able to use all focus points for Amping.
If you removed (or limited) how much the Psychic Magus can Amp imaginary weapon, would it really be worth taking over a bunch of other focus spells one could poach via multiclassing? Like Winter Bolt is pretty competitive with an un-amped Imaginary Weapon.
One amp per refocus sounds about right for the dedication.
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Maybe the archetype would make you stupefied after using the amp, as you're not a full psychic so even that is too much of a strain on your mind. Stupefied 1 until the end of the next round or something.
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I think the major problems with psychic dedication are more general game design issues over issues with the archetype. I see three big issues:
1) Too many classes just get poor reaction options, and psychic is a bandaid fix that can be shoehorned onto any class that uses INT or CHA for anything.
2) Too many class feats fail to be competitive with archetype dedications and archetype feats in general. Basically any caster dedication is better than cantrip expansion, for example. The 3-feat lockout on other archetypes doesn't counterbalance the power of most dedication feats at all.
I also don't think psychic dedication is significantly stronger than a lot of other INT/CHA archetype dedications—it's just one that gives a benefit that a wide array of characters can make use of. I'd also argue that while amped guidance is good, it's honestly not as strong as a lot of people make it out to be, since it never lets you crit and also applies a status bonus. Getting a party-wide +1 status bonus to hit is already one of the the most common party-level optimization goals, and a lot of the best buff and prebuff spells (e.g., heroism) give status bonuses as well.
3) Psychic itself is weak, so poaching the things that are good about it is just better than playing it. Psychic promotes a playstyle that is bad in the context of PF2E's design, and doesn't offer enough to compensate; psychic has poor class feats that often ask you to make your teammate's lives harder and class features that make your own life harder, so taking the good parts of the class via archetyping is quite attractive; amps don't compensate well enough for a lack of spellslots, but sure are great backup options for casters that already have a lot of spellslots; and so on.
I consider the other issues below—the ones the thread zeroes in on—to be more minor, personally.
1) It lets you accumulate focus points unusually quickly on a lot of classes. I think this is fair. It tends be very beneficial early, but significantly reduces the value of focus spell feats later.
2) Magus benefits disproportionately from psychic archetype. I consider this minor because it's frankly more of a problem with magus's design than a problem with psychic archetype in and of itself. As per why:
2a) IIRC, unamped imaginary weapon is only slightly better than gouging claw. The amp specifically is the problem, because it makes focus spells extremely competitive with slotted spellstrikes.
2b) I believe Force Fang is still a competitive use of focus points and gets more competitive the higher enemy AC is. The problem is moreso that the other conflux spells aren't great—and being able to spellstrike with amped IW then force fang to recharge (provided you contort your feat selection to do so, which isn't trivial) allows for an extremely potent one-round burst without spending permanent resources.
2c) There are still other good focus spells for magus to use, even if you disallow amped IW. The largest benefit of psychic is that it's an INT class and a lot of people like to have INT on their Magi to increase their spell saves anyways. The other favored option (champion to pick up fire ray or winter bolt, along with better armor proficiency to mitigate dumping DEX) requires CHA instead.
2d) Magus is itself a bit of a problem child, design-wise. It's a great class from a pure damage perspective, but its action economy is stilted and it has a hard time taking advantage of its own class features because spellstriking is so attractive. I suspect that amped IW would be a less attractive pickup for Magus if the class were designed better.