Mike Mearls Games
patreon
Class Design and Tech Debt
🕑 Added 2024-01-25 15:00:09 +0000 UTCHello paid subscribers, and welcome to my series of articles on class design in 5e. I'm designing the psion as an example in this series, a character who uses psionic power to achieve amazing feats of... well... we actually can't say for sure yet. Figuring out just what the psion does is part of the process. We do have a vague idea of what a psionic character looks like, but we'll need to sharpen that definition before we can start doing specific game design.
In this installment, I'm going to talk about the nature of 5e character classes. The classes you see are just one path to design. What if there were others?
Tech Debt
While 5e enjoys a huge audience today, like all new games it started with an audience of none and grew from there. When the game was in design, we had to make a number of decisions about how to structure the classes. That structure held up in playtest, but it was bound by a number of design constraints that we don't need to follow (unless we want to).
I think of those constraints as tech debt. Past decisions in building a system might be driven by short deadlines, tight budgets, or compatibility concerns. Class design in 5e suffers from a few constraints that are of dubious utility to contemporary design.
Subclasses
A subclass is one way to allow variation within a class, but it's not the only way. We could create menus with options at every level. Subclasses were designed to make it easy for beginners to make characters. The first few levels have limited or no choices. Your subclass is your biggest choice, both to keep classes simple and to let the design support concepts like cleric domains and the schools of magic. Those elements were critical to the core classes, but we might not need them for new ones.
Multiclassing
This constraint is a huge headache. Multiclassing is to blame for a variety of challenges in class design. Every feature needs to function with every other feature across every class. If a class feature has weird verbiage and strange corner cases that limit its utility, you can blame multiclassing. The game's legacy, specifically 3e, made this feature a clear requirement for 5e, even if it throw a wrench into class design.
I think there are better ways to support multiclassing rather than hobbling every class we design to work with it. We'll explore some of those options as I design this class.
An Alternate Path
Given that both subclasses and multiclassing are optional features, I'm going to focus on only on what makes the psion distinct and which mechanics it needs to stand out. If you liked psionics in 3e or 4e, you can think of one option that stands out immediately: psi points.
What's the Point?!?
Point-based casting systems in 5e are tricky, but I think the psion is worth the lift. Points give us an immediately unique element compared to other classes. They also give us a lot of flexibility in making psionics feel like the heart of the class.
Personally, I like the idea of the psion adjusting their focus, carefully measuring the energy they burn, and acting with more precision than other characters. That fits the flavor of a psion in my mind.
The challenge with points comes down to two elements:
- A points system can become fiddly, especially if characters end up with lots of points.
- A points system can allow a character to use their top tier spells more often than a comparable, slot-based caster. In effect, points allow you to mash lower level spells together to produce higher level effects. Slot-based casters can't do that.
So, how do we get around this? Let's consider a few ground rules:
- I'd like the math to work such that an X-level spell costs X points to cast. That means the total number of points should be a reasonable number that looks more like a character's hit points than the US national debt. It also means we can use existing spells to flesh out our power list.
- I want to limit how often a psion can use their highest level ability. A character who can spam their strongest spell will likely overshadow a slot-based caster regardless of what other design tricks we pull.
If we can hit those two notes, then I think our system can work smoothly with the existing character classes. Despite their tech debt, we need to play well with them.
So, we have a name for our class and a commitment to try some new things with class structure. We want psi points and have some concepts for what we need to do to make them work with the existing classes.
What features or elements do you want the psion to have? Do my goals make sense? Let me know in the comments.
Comments
Marshall
Thematically, a psion to me says something very mental based and controlled, the Professor X figure who is causing everything to happen by just imagining it. They're not very physical and don't move around a lot; at least not using traditional means of movement. I'd expect they would work well against creatures with minds and not so much against things without, although they could still effect them telekinetically. Kind of like how paladins are good against fiends and undead, but don't have the extra oomph otherwise. In situations not combat related, I'd expect them to be stoic, constantly aware of anything with a mind around them, and know what they're thinking. I'm a bit afraid of too much overlap with the monk, which I'd still like to be its own separate thing. For the points and not wanting to spam the highest level "spell" that makes sense. A couple thoughts we be: 1. Each casting of a max level spell beyond the first has a damage penalty (mental strain), e.g. evocation wizard overchannel. Think the classic nosebleed for exerting mental power too much. 2. Lower the amount of points and allow a few free castings of lower level spells. Thinking about it how I'd expect them to interact with the world: Combat The spell telekinesis kind of just says it all, that's a primary example of what I imagine a psion doing in combat. Holding people, flinging objects and creatures. Maybe some more esoteric things like pyrokinesis as a subclass (if we still do that). Social Detecting thoughts, mental command and trickery, telepathy with others, things like that are features I'd expect the psion to cover. Exploration Flying, clairvoyance, mental detection of nearby creatures, I will say, I'm not sure a menu of options for classes is best for 5e, primarily because in my experience it seems to ward off playesr wanting a simple experience and for those who don't, it ends up being optimized resulting in one path you generally want to follow i.e. it has trap choices. Additionally, I think it weakens the theme a lot when the class is too amorphous in favor of customization.
Matt MacGregor
Looking for a Psion to have the ability to do one thing exceptionally well depending on subclass. A psychometabolic pc should be able to enhance his body to perform well in combat and include some self restorative capabilities. A telepathic character should be able to deal solid psychic damage and control enemies via some mechanic. A psychokinetic character should compete with an arcane caster damage wise, but there has to be some way to differentiate them so that they aren’t the same-maybe great at single target damage and only good at aoe. Just spitballing here.
