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« on: August 06, 2020, 06:20:28 am »
Full psi builds are my favorites. They were indeed more powerful than other builds and I can understand the desire to tone them down. But there are too many nerfs at once. It would be understandable if the goal was to make full psi builds impossible and to force players to chose them as complementary utilities, but it seems you want the full psi build route to still be possible. In this case, you should reverse some of the nerfs. The major advantages over other builds were unlimited resources and versatility. The introduction of the limited psi pool per fight is like denying a player to use grenades, even if they are in his inventory. You have the necessary resources in your inventory but you can't use them. And the introduction of innervated abilities is like denying a player to use grenades, even if they are in his inventory because he didn't chose them before the fight. It could make sense balance wise with other builds (you have to carry the grenades, and if you don't take them with you, you can't use them, so with the same idea, if you don't innervate your ability, you can't use it). But with the introduction of psi reserves, a psi user already has to carry its ammo (the psi boosters AND inhalants).
Like some others, I think that, at least, the increased cost penalty for cross school usage of Psi-powers should not exist, as the limited number of innervated psi slots will already limit the versatility of psi users.
"Psi does not require any expendable resource". That was true outside of combat, but now, with 2 different ressources, I could imagine Deep caverns to be a real pain.
I also personally think that psi boosters don't really make sense anymore, lore wise. If psi is something that doesn't regen naturally and if you need psi inhalant to gain psi back, what do psi boosters do ? Psi inhalants already give you psi. I understand it gameplaywise, but not lorewise. With the former system, it made sense: Psi regenerated slowly, so you had to use outside sources to get it back quicker.
Here is my proposition:
- We keep the "innervate abilities" and the limited psi reserves. This pool doesn't regen, so you still use one ressource (either psi inhalant or psi boost) to get psi back in the reserves. You can still use them during a fight to replenish your psi reserves. Maybe only one of them could be usable during fights to replenish psi reserves, but more rare and craftable later. Your usable psi pool regen slowly (maybe slower than now), but we get a new action that costs action points, "concentrate", which transfer psi from your psi reserves to your usable psi pool. Like a reload action for psi. The more intelligence (or will), the less it costs (AP), or the more psi you transfer. It could also bring nice possibilities for creatives feats linked to this action. But we should not need a consumable to do that.
And the increased cost penalty for cross school usage disappears.
It would bring psi builds in line with other builds without making them subpar.