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View Full Version : Is it just me or does "Master of the unseen hand" really,really, stink?



Gamerlord
2010-02-02, 05:30 PM
So, I have heard of powerful builds linked to this prestige class, 3.5 by the way. But in my eyes this prestige class seems to STINK.
1. It is a one-trick pony that focuses on expanding the utility of one spell.
2. It doesn't boost your caster level, and yet it is a caster class. This is a 5th level spell it depends on, you will get very few uses with it because of this, the centerpiece of the class puts only a few cards in your hand, to use a metaphor, once you use up all those cards, your levels in it suddenly become very,very, useless.
3. You need to be at least 9th level to qualify, and it's features don't seem to make up for it.

Am I missing something? Did I not read the class the right way?

drengnikrafe
2010-02-02, 05:33 PM
Leading experts agree with you. I think we can call them leading experts...

Down two tiers (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=5198.0)

Hzurr
2010-02-02, 05:37 PM
Nope, you read it exactly right. This PrC (while so exciting in theory) sucks. Really badly. Do. Not. Take.

Optimystik
2010-02-02, 05:37 PM
It's for ghosts.

Seffbasilisk
2010-02-02, 05:39 PM
http://i182.photobucket.com/albums/x235/IronChefBunny/ITSATRAP.jpg

Need I say more?

Magnor Criol
2010-02-02, 05:43 PM
I don't have the books in front of me at the moment, but if we simply tacked on full casting progression to the class, would that fix it? Make it too powerful?

What about the semi-standard full casting except first level?

Optimystik
2010-02-02, 05:49 PM
The trouble with this class is that you can replace it entirely with two spells - Defenestrating Sphere and Whirling Blade.

If you're going to make it advance casting, drop it from full BAB to 3/4, I'd say.

Bibliomancer
2010-02-02, 05:51 PM
It can make a score of full attacks in one turn is optimized properly and some slightly ambiguous wording is applied. Other than that, it's useless.

Optimystik
2010-02-02, 05:53 PM
It can make a score of full attacks in one turn is optimized properly and some slightly ambiguous wording is applied. Other than that, it's useless.

...for PCs. As I pointed out though, it's pretty nice for ghosts, or indeed anything with TK as an SLA that makes touch attacks.

Glimbur
2010-02-02, 05:57 PM
It's more useful but still non-optimal in Gestalt, where you can cover for the caster level loss.

Starbuck_II
2010-02-02, 06:04 PM
The trouble with this class is that you can replace it entirely with two spells - Defenestrating Sphere and Whirling Blade.

If you're going to make it advance casting, drop it from full BAB to 3/4, I'd say.

Could you make a class out of those spells?

Optimystik
2010-02-02, 06:14 PM
Could you make a class out of those spells?

I suppose, but why would you want to? Be a normal wizard/sorcerer, learn both spells, just tell everyone you're an unseen whatever, and start flinging orcs skyward while your axe flies around hacking things - all without losing caster levels.

Drogorn
2010-02-02, 06:24 PM
Has anybody ever cooked up a telekinesis-based base class?

AstralFire
2010-02-02, 06:35 PM
The class suffers from the issue 90% of interesting caster PrCs do - spells are so good that having your full spell list is far superior to most of the tricks.

Heliomance
2010-02-02, 06:56 PM
Etherscale disagrees with your analysis. (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=92248)

Optimystik
2010-02-02, 06:58 PM
It's not even that interesting - as I pointed out, you can duplicate all the cooler stuff with spells.

PrCs should carry very unique effects - especially their capstones. Look at Divine Oracle - You can act in a surprise round - that's pretty amazing. Arcane Heirophant - your animal companion becomes your familiar too. You can't get that anywhere else. MotAO - your spells known shoots through the roof, but you pay a price. Excellent.

For a PrC to revolve around abilities you can duplicate elsewhere... is pretty sad.

Mystic Muse
2010-02-02, 06:59 PM
Has anybody ever cooked up a telekinesis-based base class?

Do Psionics count?

Optimystik
2010-02-02, 07:05 PM
Do Psionics count?

Unfortunately no, because the psionic version of TK is split into three different powers for some arbitrary reason.

JoshuaZ
2010-02-02, 07:18 PM
Unfortunately no, because the psionic version of TK is split into three different powers for some arbitrary reason.

The claimed official reason is balance. Because psions get limited numbers of powers to make up for their essentially spontaneous casting. This is crap. All the TK powers should be rolled into one. This also makes a lot more sense fluff wise. Who has heard of someone with telekinetic ability being all like "yeah, so I can push a big objects, but can't send little objects quickly. Oh, and I can't use it to push people either." You need to play around with the augmentation rules slightly. (Best way I've seen is to make it a 3rd level power that can do any of the three powers except that to duplicate telekinetic maneuver you need to augment by 2 power points). This is a good example of how WoTC tried to balance other classes after learning what went wrong with wizards and the like and their response was to just nerf everyone else in comparison.

Optimystik
2010-02-02, 07:33 PM
Even worse, it's inconsistent. Psions get plenty of "multipurpose powers" - the various "Energy" spells let you choose your element, Charm and Dominate can be augmented from "Person" to "Monster" without needing a whole new power - so they didn't seem to mind combining spells there.

But for one of the most iconic psychic abilities in all of fiction, they nerf psions. Lol?

JoshuaZ
2010-02-02, 08:07 PM
Even worse, it's inconsistent. Psions get plenty of "multipurpose powers" - the various "Energy" spells let you choose your element, Charm and Dominate can be augmented from "Person" to "Monster" without needing a whole new power - so they didn't seem to mind combining spells there.

But for one of the most iconic psychic abilities in all of fiction, they nerf psions. Lol?

Yeah, and this actually makes less sense with the energy powers. How frequently in fiction does one have psionically gifted people who can manipulate fire or shoot out fire? Pretty frequently. (For reasons that aren't clear, they are generally young females. I think Carrie started that pattern but it may have existed prior to that) How often can those people use those same abilities to control cold or electricity? Not very often. Thus, this combination actually makes it more difficult to play a classic psionic trope, unless one just pretends that one's powers are much weaker than they are. Which, since they aren't balanced that way, further nerfs them.

And while we're on the general bad interaction of psioncs and taking the thread further afield, is anyone else bothered by the fact that since the Sending spell is evocation, it gets treated as in the psychokinesis discipline for all purposes that matter when dealing with psionic/magic transparency? This makes no sense. Meanwhile, psionists get the slightly better Correspond power at the same level wizards get Sending. So, psionists can't even bridge great distances with their minds any faster than wizards. At minimum, there should be an equivalent version of Sending that is 3rd level Psion/Wilder, is in the telepathy school and otherwise duplicates Sending. Unfortunately, this makes the Sending spell's treatment as evocation/psychokinesis even more glaring rather than less so.

Kantolin
2010-02-02, 08:15 PM
2. It doesn't boost your caster level, and yet it is a caster class.

Technically, it does increase your caster level for the purposes of teleknesis, which is pretty much the only reason you're taking the class. :P So for that particular purpose, it's not quite that bad - it makes you actually better at using teleknesis, unlike say the mindbender which doesn't ever get dominate monster.

I think that also means if you do bloodline nonsense with it, you can actually have a particularly high caster level for teleknesis due to how it's worded. But those are shenanigans...

Optimystik
2010-02-02, 08:26 PM
Yeah, and this actually makes less sense with the energy powers. How frequently in fiction does one have psionically gifted people who can manipulate fire or shoot out fire? Pretty frequently. (For reasons that aren't clear, they are generally young females. I think Carrie started that pattern but it may have existed prior to that) How often can those people use those same abilities to control cold or electricity? Not very often. Thus, this combination actually makes it more difficult to play a classic psionic trope, unless one just pretends that one's powers are much weaker than they are. Which, since they aren't balanced that way, further nerfs them.

Well, keeping with the "pseudoscience" theme of psionics, the various elements in one power do actually make sense. If you can agitate matter to heat it up, retarding its vibration should make it very cold. Psionics work on a more molecular level than traditional magic. Similarly, you should be able to create electricity with a static charge or clap air molecules together to make sonic.


And while we're on the general bad interaction of psioncs and taking the thread further afield, is anyone else bothered by the fact that since the Sending spell is evocation, it gets treated as in the psychokinesis discipline for all purposes that matter when dealing with psionic/magic transparency? This makes no sense. Meanwhile, psionists get the slightly better Correspond power at the same level wizards get Sending. So, psionists can't even bridge great distances with their minds any faster than wizards. At minimum, there should be an equivalent version of Sending that is 3rd level Psion/Wilder, is in the telepathy school and otherwise duplicates Sending. Unfortunately, this makes the Sending spell's treatment as evocation/psychokinesis even more glaring rather than less so.

The "school" system is bad all around - at least magic got as badly scuffed there as psionics did. For instance, how is Fly a transmutation spell rather than evocation? One would imagine you're using energy of some kind to leave the ground like that. How is it illusion can pull from the Plane of Shadow more powerfully than conjuration can? Causing your hand to leech heat from targets is textbook energy manipulation - so why is it necromancy instead of evocation?

Akal Saris
2010-02-02, 08:29 PM
Hey, I'm playing a 4E telepathic psion, and I realized yesterday that I don't have the ability to read somebody's mind.

I can send thoughts to them telepathically and have them respond, I can rip myself out of their 6-second memory, and I can attack their will saves...but I can't actually read their thoughts. Bah.

Regarding master of the unseen hand, it is indeed best as a PrC for ghosts. I'm working on a build for it right now actually, I'll post it when I finish.

JoshuaZ
2010-02-02, 08:41 PM
Well, keeping with the "pseudoscience" theme of psionics, the various elements in one power do actually make sense. If you can agitate matter to heat it up, retarding its vibration should make it very cold. Psionics work on a more molecular level than traditional magic. Similarly, you should be able to create electricity with a static charge or clap air molecules together to make sonic.


Yes, but most psionic characters classically can't do it both ways (not unreasonably. If one is continuing with the sort of pseudoscientific justification it is a lot easier to agitate molecules than it is to slow them down).



The "school" system is bad all around - at least magic got as badly scuffed there as psionics did. For instance, how is Fly a transmutation spell rather than evocation? One would imagine you're using energy of some kind to leave the ground like that. How is it illusion can pull from the Plane of Shadow more powerfully than conjuration can? Causing your hand to leech heat from targets is textbook energy manipulation - so why is it necromancy instead of evocation?

The problem here is really simple: They couldn't make up their mind how spells should be allocated. There are two arguments for allocation: One allocate based on effect. Two, based on how they accomplish the effect. Thus for example, Mage Armor is under conjuration because it makes a force effect (using argument 2), but some very similar spells are under abjuration even when they explicitly use force (using argument 1).

Making living things cold sounds all necromancyish so it gets under necromancy under argument One. But apparently other cold creating effects get to go under evocation. In fairness, the fluff for Chill Touch talks about removing "lifeforce" not heat. But then why is Chill Metal transmutation rather than evocation? And why is Poison necromancy? It seems like involves transmutation or conjuration.

Zaq
2010-02-02, 08:58 PM
Even worse, it's inconsistent. Psions get plenty of "multipurpose powers" - the various "Energy" spells let you choose your element, Charm and Dominate can be augmented from "Person" to "Monster" without needing a whole new power - so they didn't seem to mind combining spells there.

But for one of the most iconic psychic abilities in all of fiction, they nerf psions. Lol?

I always figured that it was so you could have it at lower levels... but that's kind of precisely what the augmentation system is for, isn't it? Yeah, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

As for MotUH, well, it's from Complete Warrior, also known as Complete Subclass Of Characters Whom WotC Has Denied Nice Things. Even the magic classes suck. There are very few classes in CW that are genuinely good, with maybe two or three exceptions (I freely admit that Bear Warrior is awesome). Everything else is either underpowered, insane (Hurler, anyone?), or useless until abused (Halfling Outrider... which isn't really that bad without the Dragon material, but still). Or Frenzied Berserker, which is in a class of its own.

I guess it could be a fun, if not overwhelmingly powerful, gestalt class. As has been mentioned, it's not terrible on creatures like ghosts that get TK as an SLA, but still, it's just a mediocre class all around. Might make a fun mid-boss type character, I suppose, if he had the arena advantage.

Ogremindes
2010-02-02, 09:04 PM
...Frenzied Berserker, which is in a class of its own.

It wasn't always the case, but then he banged his head on his desk after picking up a dropped pencil...

Dimers
2010-02-02, 10:57 PM
It wasn't always the case, but then he banged his head on his desk after picking up a dropped pencil...

Agh ... urkh ... gleh! Oh, the searing pun! Why do you pain-ish us so? :smallwink:

Sinfire Titan
2010-02-02, 11:16 PM
Agh ... urkh ... gleh! Oh, the searing pun! Why do you pain-ish us so? :smallwink:

Because you Optimizers deserve it. [/sarcasm]

Temotei
2010-02-02, 11:54 PM
The class suffers from the issue 90% of interesting caster PrCs do - spells are so good that having your full spell list is far superior to most of the tricks.

Should I squee?

sofawall
2010-02-02, 11:59 PM
Should I squee?

I think that joke's a bit old, now.

UglyPanda
2010-02-03, 08:22 AM
I think that joke's a bit old, now.But do it anyway, it would amuse her.


Anyway, there is an interesting build involving Master of the Unseen Hand. Link (http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/19870578/X-mens_Jean_Grey,_or_how_to_be_silly_with_MotUH). Note: Interesting, not necessarily good, and possibly not even rule-legal.

AstralFire
2010-02-03, 08:49 AM
It's not even that interesting - as I pointed out, you can duplicate all the cooler stuff with spells.

PrCs should carry very unique effects - especially their capstones. Look at Divine Oracle - You can act in a surprise round - that's pretty amazing. Arcane Heirophant - your animal companion becomes your familiar too. You can't get that anywhere else. MotAO - your spells known shoots through the roof, but you pay a price. Excellent.

For a PrC to revolve around abilities you can duplicate elsewhere... is pretty sad.

For it to count as 'interesting' to me, it has to be something that isn't easily duplicated by anyone, not including vancian spells of 6th or 7th and above. Spells are simply too broad and take up too much.

Squeeing would amuse me. >.>

Fluffles
2010-02-03, 08:52 AM
It's more useful but still non-optimal in Gestalt, where you can cover for the caster level loss.

It's great for gestalt. On ghosts. In an Arena I'm in we have an Evolved Drow Ghost that throws a 375lb boulder at people. something like 17d6+Cha damage. And his cha mod is in the upper 50s. If not 60s. That and his main trick is grappling :smalltongue:

Optimystik
2010-02-03, 09:00 AM
Should I squee?

Can someone explain this to me? :smallconfused:

I know squeeing is a sign of fangirlish approval, but not how it applies to this situation.

AstralFire
2010-02-03, 09:02 AM
Can someone explain this to me? :smallconfused:

I know squeeing is a sign of fangirlish approval, but not how it applies to this situation.

It actually took me a bit to 'get' too.

There's a small meme running around here along the lines of "Oh my gosh! It's AstralFire! -squee!-" whenever I post. A new user here turned out to be a fan of my homebrew and I posted in her topic.

And now you know the rest of the story.

Optimystik
2010-02-03, 09:11 AM
Ah. Well, I don't envy you that sort of "celebrity." :smalltongue:

Back on topic - I checked both CPsi and Hyperconscious, and neither of them have any sort of fix for the lack of one good Telekinesis power. :smallannoyed:

AstralFire
2010-02-03, 09:13 AM
CPsi's idea of 'fix' is closely related to Bob Barker's.

Optimystik
2010-02-03, 09:18 AM
CPsi's idea of 'fix' is closely related to Bob Barker's.

The book actually isn't nearly as awful as its reputation calls for. Ardents are powerful and flavorful, Erudites are highly interesting, Synads are a great race, and we got very useful powers like Synchronicity and Anticipatory Strike. The backlash primarily stems from its very poorly thought-out PrCs, the debacle that is Divine Mind, the mediocre Lurk and the unneeded nerf to Astral Construct.

UglyPanda
2010-02-03, 10:03 AM
You're forgetting the Illithid heritage feats. Quite a few people dislike those.

And while it isn't absolutely horrible, it ranks pretty low on the "Would you buy it?" scale.

Oh my gosh! It's Optimystik! -squee!- [/obligatorymeme]

Evard
2010-02-03, 10:14 AM
Has anybody ever cooked up a telekinesis-based base class?
My friend created a green lantern like class. It was mainly rogue but lost sneak attack and rogue talent. In their place you got to pick different abilities from the rings section of the magic items that you could use X times a day and recharge them after sleeping. Telekinesis, Ram, Shield, and some wizard spells were made into the ring abilities.

subject42
2010-02-03, 10:22 AM
I can't find it in search, but I vaguely remember that somebody put together a Blue Slaad / Master of the Unseen Hand / Reaping Mauler class that would enter a grapple and choke the life out of people from hundreds of feet away.

Kurald Galain
2010-02-03, 12:13 PM
Oh my gosh! It's Optimystik! -squee!- [/obligatorymeme]

Oh my gosh! It's squee (http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=106473)!

JoshuaZ
2010-02-03, 12:22 PM
The book actually isn't nearly as awful as its reputation calls for. Ardents are powerful and flavorful, Erudites are highly interesting, Synads are a great race, and we got very useful powers like Synchronicity and Anticipatory Strike. The backlash primarily stems from its very poorly thought-out PrCs, the debacle that is Divine Mind, the mediocre Lurk and the unneeded nerf to Astral Construct.

And the poor wording of Practiced Manifester. And the poor, highly redundant feat table in general (because they really need 30 racial feats each of which just do almost the same thing to a given psi-like ability rather than make general rules for racial feats). And the poorly thought out and poorly edited powers.

Now, when you take out all the bad material, how much do you have left? Not enough for a full book, that's for sure.

Optimystik
2010-02-03, 12:32 PM
Now, when you take out all the bad material, how much do you have left? Not enough for a full book, that's for sure.

Personally, I consider CPsi a web enhancement, and Hyperconscious as the real thing. :smallbiggrin:


Oh my gosh! It's Optimystik! -squee!- [/obligatorymeme]


Oh my gosh! It's squee (http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=106473)!

http://gatherer.wizards.com/Handlers/Image.ashx?multiverseid=74346&type=card

MountainKing
2010-02-03, 12:39 PM
...a class that lets you play a Gestalt character who can attack with BAB of 13 well before you get to 13th level. Yes, that's terrible, truly the most awful class ever. :smalltongue:

Ultimately, I think it comes down to preferences. Myself, I think Sorcerer/MotUH is an extremely fun build, and anything with that and Ghost is just plain hilarious to me. Does that make the class "bad"? No, but the way I look at the game is at the least a little different from yours or anyone else. *shrug*

Optimystik
2010-02-03, 12:43 PM
...a class that lets you play a Gestalt character who can attack with BAB of 13 well before you get to 13th level. Yes, that's terrible, truly the most awful class ever. :smalltongue:

Ultimately, I think it comes down to preferences. Myself, I think Sorcerer/MotUH is an extremely fun build, and anything with that and Ghost is just plain hilarious to me. Does that make the class "bad"? No, but the way I look at the game is at the least a little different from yours or anyone else. *shrug*

"Good in Gestalt" is not an acceptable measure of power, unless the parties are specifically having a Gestalt discussion.

And again, you can duplicate many of the benefits of this class with spells.

Also recall that, while your caster level does increase, you gain no additional spells. For sorcerers especially, that is a death knell - they have too few as it is, to go around losing 9ths and possibly even 8ths.

Zaq
2010-02-04, 03:33 AM
Now, when you take out all the bad material, how much do you have left? Not enough for a full book, that's for sure.

Which is different from every other Complete book how, precisely? We sure as hell didn't need all those half-casting classes or wild feats from Complete Divine, but you don't see people calling for blood every time it's mentioned. Half of the options from Complete Warrior are Melee Can't Have Nice Things BS wrapped in a shiny layer of hellacious prereqs. Complete Arcane gave us one base class that people like, one that they hate when they're not abusing the wording of a specific PrC, and one that they forget exists (mainly because WotC did as well), and it had its share of useless feats (Soul of the North and its ilk are just awesome, don't you think?)

All of the Complete books contain a fair bit of crap. They also contain some gems. Complete Psionic is no exception. I swear there's just some kind of herd mentality in place with CPsi. I'm certainly not saying that everything in it is good, because it's not. But there's just as much good stuff in it as there is in, say, Complete Adventurer.

Optimystik
2010-02-04, 07:30 AM
All of the Complete books contain a fair bit of crap. They also contain some gems. Complete Psionic is no exception. I swear there's just some kind of herd mentality in place with CPsi. I'm certainly not saying that everything in it is good, because it's not. But there's just as much good stuff in it as there is in, say, Complete Adventurer.

Zaq, I agree with you for the most part... but to be fair, no other "Complete" actually contained nerfs for a class that was already considered D&D's red-headed stepchild. Furthermore, as the only splatbook for Psionics (assuming you consider the XPH to be "core"), the players were counting on this book to really build on the excellent foundation WotC had laid for this new and flavorful mechanic.

CPsi was merely mediocre, rather than bad... but after the splash XPH made, almost completely correcting the debacle of 3.0 psionics, we were right to expect that CPsi would keep the momentum going. It would be like if a new Incarnum or ToB book had been released and was mediocre - the intense disappointment would lead to significant backdraft.

Within the book itself,
I think that, plus the very poorly thought-out base classes and PrCs, (except Ardent and Soulbow, naturally) was what resulted in the backlash more than anything else.

For instance - it seems like they nerfed Astral Construct on purpose just so that they could have the Ectopic Adept take up a PrC slot, rather than come up with an original idea for another PrC (or even roll the Archpsion forward to 3.5.)

And even Soulbow, for all its accolades, does very little to address the multitude of problems with the Soulknife to begin with. It's still not full BAB, it still has power points for no reason, etc.

On top of all that, the very poor wording in Erudite's UPD was a source of significant contention for many of us.

Are there worse Completes out there? I think so. Complete Champion is just awful. Complete Warrior ranges from totally blah to stupidly broken. And Complete Adventurer is about on par with it, like you said.

The problem is that there are much better Completes out there too. Complete Arcane and Divine are great. Complete Mage is excellent. And Complete Scoundrel is so brilliant that it is often recommended even as a stand-alone product, away from its peers.

CPsi could have achieved that level of greatness with a little more love, and perhaps gotten many more players (and DMs) on board with the idea of psionics in D&D. Instead, it signaled the death knell for psionics in that edition, with so little support being provided afterward that no other psionics sourcebooks saw the light of day.

So I think the anger is more due to the wasted potential the book represents, than to the actual contents of the book itself.