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Originally posted by EyeontheMountain at EN World

Overall, one comment: Flavor. Even if you have whole party full of psions(with multiples of the same new base classes) they will all seem very different. Saying 'I'm an ARdent' for example, will give you little idea of their powers. Nice

New Classes

The ardent: Kind of like a Divine Champion with more than 1 domain(called Mantles). The ardent starts with two mantles, get as third at 2nd level and then another at 5th 10th and 15th. A bit of a special ability with each 'domain'. 2/3 the number of powers of a psion but jsut as many power points. Also a medium BAB. Looks pretty good. Lot of differnt flavors for this class, for sure.

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The Divine Mind: Not many powers to choose from and none till 5th level in any case, the big power is the divine aura. This can give bonueses to attack, AC and perception (initiative, spot, listen) They choose a diety (list provided for PHB, FR, Eberron and XPHB dieties) and get mantles likethe Ardent, but instead of a special ability, they get a new aura power for the domain they choose. You can manifest one aura at a time (2 at 10th and 3 at 20th) and it tkaes an hour to change it. Also the radius varies form 5' at 1st to 50 feet at 19th.You can also switch auras faster at higher levels (including a swift action at 18th) Very nice versatility.

The Lurk is a lot odder though. Medium BAB and good fort/will saves, it looks like a cleric (same as the Divine Mind) and has powers on par with a psychic warrior. Instead of feats he gets the 'Lurk's augment' instead, allowing attacks a variety of special abilities (extra sneak attack, ghost touch, aligned attack) and such including sneak attacks that affect undead nd constructs. Teh list is level dependent so each lurk is a lot like another (unlike the Argent and DDivine Mind) The lurk also gets some rogue abilities (sneak attack, evasion and slippery mind) though at later levels.

Prestige classes:

Well, full caster progressions are not here. Unfortunatley. Only one, in fact. But using a four page format, there are not a lot. Maybe you like the extended descriptions but I hate them. A lot.

Anarchite Initiate: Full progression(ten levels), must be chaotic, easy entry, a solid class.

Ebon Saint: 4/5 progression, 5 level class. for rogues/psion (or Lurks especially) Stab someone and alter self into them. Kinda cool, but no word on if changing types is fine.

Ectopic Adept 4/5 progression (Not first level, same as Saint above) Very similar to the Constructor class from Mind's eye, but shorter and (maybe) sweeter.

Flayerspawn Psychic Become a Mind flayer (at least menatally) over 10 levels 6/10 manifester improvement

Illumine Soul (For Soulknives) Basically add positive enrgy to your powers. Nice additions. No manifesting increase. 5 levels

Soulbow (Guess who this is for?) Yep, Soulknives. Nice change of knives for bows. (Well arrows shot like a bow, but no visual of a bow. Close combat shot and phase arrow add on nicely. Cool class.

Storm Disciple 3/5 manifesting. Some minor electricity powers and resistences. Not too impressive.

Zerth Cenobite. Own power progression, and a monk/-styled class. Most special abilities are time-related and could be nice. But I hate monks, so I'm not too impressed.

Feats

Many many many. Too many tyo list, some for psionic creatures (XPHB, Illithiads, and such) Nice stuff. Really nice stuff. Did I mention 15 paes of feats? I should have

Powers

Lurk power list Very similar tothe Psychic warrior's list.

Mantles 30 of them (With an Ardent getting ony 5(without feats) lots of variety.

Reprinted and augmented Psion (including subtypes) and Psychic warrior lists THANK YOU WOTC

THANK YOU WOTC

25 pages of powers (not looked over yet)

Psionic/Magic itmes

10 pages. Some nice stuff

Psionic Locations as Treasure: Some good ideas, only 3 pages

Psionic Monsters: Some, didn't look through yet.

Psionic Racial substitution: Basically for for LA +1 or higher races in the XPHB. Not too exciting. Kinda a waste of space.

And finally,

Varient Psion: The Erudite: Well, I never saw the first one, but I know a lot of people thought this was overpowered. I wil not comment, maybe someone else will. They can still learn every power inthe book eventually with little effort (jsut meditating 8 hours on each)
The limit on manifesting unique powers is interesting though (Assuming I understand it)

Unique powers: A erudite cna only manifest a certian number of unique powers per day (1 at first elvel). If I understand it, they may know tons of powers, but once they use a number of powers equal to their Unique powers per day (max 11 at 20th level) they cannot use new powers, though they can use the previous powers as many tiems as they want to. If so, and interesting blaancing mechanic.

I don't know if I will allow them or not. Have to think about it.

Final commentary
Overall this is an excellent addition to those of us who think the XPHB was one of the best 3.5 supplements ever. I am not going to regret my purchase.

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