Welcome to part 2 of 3 reviewing Psion’s Primer. If you missed the part 1, you can find it at the link below. This part covers the icon, psionic subclasses for the fighter, monk, and rogue, as well as the psionic racial options.

Icon

A charisma-based half-manifester themed around the Major Arcana of tarot with a dash of jungian unconscious archetypes, the Icon is easily the most complicated of the three full classes.

Basics. The icon has a sturdy d10 hit die and shield proficiency, but unusually only receives light armor proficiency. Their weapon proficiencies include both simple and martial weapons and have Dexterity and Charisma saving throws. They can choose any two skills but receive no tool proficiencies.

Personas. The core mechanic of the icon is their personas; while “active”, they provide a passive benefit as well as an ability called a Cognitive Projection that’s usable once per short rest (upgrading to 2/SR at 6 and 3/SR at 18).

An icon “holds” 2 personas at time at first level, growing alongside their proficiency bonus to a max of 6 at 17th level (this number is not actually based on proficiency bonus to reduce the power of multiclassing). Holding a persona is a bit like preparing a spell; the icon can freely change their personas up from the total list of personas during a long rest. During the day an icon can change up their active persona as an action, which becomes a bonus action at 5th level and a free action at 14th level.

Psionics. As a half manifester, icons only pick their first psionic abilities at second level. They choose 2 talents, which grows to 4 by level 10, only a single talent behind the full manifesters. Where they’re far more limited is their psi point pool and psi limit, each of which grow at half the rate of the full manifesters. Their augments known also progress slower, starting with 3 at second level and scaling up to 16 by 20th.

Psychic Potency. A simple damage boost for the class, once per turn an icon can add bonus psychic damage to a successful attack; uses are based on the icon’s Charisma modifier and refresh on a short rest. For a low level icon with a starting 16 or 17 charisma, it’s an additional 3d4 psychic damage per short rest. At max level it’s a full 5d12 per short rest, with no additional action cost. Like most short rest abilities, its power level depends a lot on game style; long days without short rests will feel particularly punishing, but this ability at least seems fine for days that consist of a single big fight.

Id Barrier. Filling in the between levels of psi limit progression, at level 7 Icons receive a reliable defensive boon that uses the icon’s reaction to gain a moderate bonus to a saving throw or to their AC against a single attack after seeing the roll. While the former is the more powerful use, most adventuring days won’t involve enough otherwise-failed saving throws to exclusively use the ability for that purpose. The secondary use — potentially turning hits into misses — can be worth a few points of constitution modifier to significantly extend the Icon’s durability.

The World. The capstone ability for the icon supercharges their persona abilities ; it’s a thematic boost that, like the artificer’s Soul of Artificer, represents a major boost to those max-level characters who avoid multiclassing. This is great for aspirational purposes, but very few campaigns involve 20th level characters and so this capstone is not a major factor in reviewing the class.

Personas

Many personas guarantee a minimum of 8 on d20 rolls for certain types of ability checks, which I refer to here as a “soft” reliable talent. A second important detail is that many Cognitive Projections create effects with durations; an icon does not have to stay in the associated persona once an ability has been activated. Third and finally, some of the later options have a minimum level requirement — this is for the total character level, rather than icon level specifically.

The Fool. The passive is a Jack of All Trades style effect that adds a die bonus to nonproficient d20 rolls. The Cognitive Projection is a single target Charisma saving throw against a silence-style effect that lasts until the target succeeds on the save (which, in conjunction with feeblemind, is hypothetically mostly-permanent).

The Magician. The passive upgrades a single skill proficiency to expertise, chosen at the start of the day. The Cognitive Projection rerolls the bonus damage from Psychic Potency, a fairly weak use given this is a reroll of a single die of psychic damage.

The Priestess. The passive provides a soft reliable talent to recall lore with Intelligence checks. The Cognitive Projection reveals invisible creatures; while situational and gated behind a failed Wisdom saving throw, the option at mid-to-higher levels in some campaigns.

The Empress. The passive soft reliable talent here improves Dexterity (Acrobatics) checks, Charisma (Performance) checks, and any ability check made with a musical instrument. The Cognitive Projection provides a bonus to a failed attack roll or ability check, a broadly useful ability that makes up for the more situational skills boosted by the passive.

The Emperor. The passive soft reliable talent improves Strength (Athletics) checks, Charisma (Intimidation) checks, and Wisdom (Animal Handling) checks. The Cognitive Projection is a slightly improved command that allows two word directions instead of one.

The Hierophant. The passive allows the icon to Help as a bonus action; until level 14, this isn’t a useful benefit the turn you swap to the persona. The Cognitive Projection allows the icon to give their reaction to an ally. While neither benefit is truly good in terms of action economy, sometimes more efficiently distributing the action economy can be helpful.

The Lovers. The passive benefit provides a 30’ telepathy. The Cognitive Projection forces the target to make a Wisdom saving throw to conceal a possible lie; very potent in social encounters, less so in a dungeon crawl. The ability to trade personas out during a long rest helps enormously here, as the icon can simply swap back to The Lovers whenever the party is in town.

The Chariot. The passive benefit is very combat oriented, letting the icon ignore difficult terrain and giving advantage on initiative rolls. The Cognitive Projection temporarily boosts the icon’s carrying capacity as well as improves their ability to grapple and avoid grapples by switching from Strength (Athletics) to Charisma (Athletics).

Fortitude. The passive benefit provides a soft reliable talent for Charisma (Persuasion) and Wisdom (Insight) checks. The Cognitive Projection is a very useful concentration effect that provides an ally blanket advantage on attack rolls and ability checks for 1 minute. While The Lovers might have a useful active ability for specific situations as a backup to insight rolls, Fortitude is both broadly useful in and out of combat. One key difference between Fortitude and the College of Eloquence’s Silver Tongue (a source of frustration for many DMs) is the icon can’t combine the soft reliable talent with expertise; a level 9 icon with +4 proficiency and +5 charisma only has a minimum of 17, instead of a bard’s 21. Still strong, of course, but not invalidating an entire pillar of play strong.

The Hermit. The passive benefit is advantage on Constitution saving throws to maintain concentration. The Cognitive Projection isolates a target creature from the fight with a Wisdom saving throw — while it doesn’t fully incapacitate like hypnotic pattern, it does shut off basically all non-movement abilities and similarly doesn’t allow re-saves. This effect does require concentration, of course benefitting from the passive if the icon chooses to stay as the hermit.

 The Wheel. At the start of each long rest The Wheel provides one of six elemental damage resistances, determined randomly. The Cognitive Projection is effectively a single target stun tied to a Charisma saving throw, forcing the target to either randomly move or randomly attack. While the passive benefit isn’t very good simply due to its random nature — the odds you can gain fire resistance on the day you’re heading to the volcano are quite low — the active ability is quite good.

Justice. The passive is a simple but effective +1 to AC, resistance to poison damage, and immunity to the poisoned condition. The Cognitive Projection is similar to the Divination wizard’s Portent, except it only affects your attack rolls and guarantees a 10 each time.

The Hanged Man. The passive soft reliable talent improves Intelligence (Investigation) and Wisdom (Perception) checks; while both are generally useful skills, some games almost exclusively rely on the passive versions of these skills, making a reliable talent effect useless. The Cognitive Projection is like the inverse of Fortitude, imposing disadvantage on attack rolls and ability checks on a target creature; this can be useful to cripple a soldier-style enemy with a poor Wisdom saving throw and reliance on attack rolls, but like bane vs bless the penalty-imposing effect is frequently going to be weaker than the bonus-granting version.

Death (9th level). The passive benefit provides immunity to diseases, curses, and max HP reducing effects, but does not remove any already in place. The Cognitive Projection is somewhere between the stun from The Wheel and the longer effect of The Hermit, inducing unconsciousness and forcing a creature to make death saving throws but not actually modifying their hit points; upon a single success, three failures, or taking damage, the creature returns to consciousness with their prior hit point count. Death saving throws occur at the start of a creatures turn, so even after failing the Wisdom saving throw there’s a 55% chance that this ability is mostly immediately negated (Falling unconscious still disarms a creature and knocks them prone, in addition to turning off their reactions while unconscious).

Temperance (9th level). Only available to icons of 9th level or higher, the passive benefit provides the extremely situational immunity to half damage effects from Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma saving throw abilities. The Cognitive Projection is a single-target touch-range calm emotions with only the option to suppress hostility. Simply put, despite the level-locking, Temperance is an extremely situational persona that is almost never correct to hold except in the unusual psionics-heavy campaign, as many of the powers in Psion’s Primer do half damage on a successful Int/Wis/Cha save.

The Devil (9th level). The passive is 60’ of darkvision that pierces magical darkness. The Cognitive Projection is a d6 Cutting Words style effect that only penalizes Wisdom and Charisma saving throws you inflict. Unfortunately, this persona is held back by the Icon’s status as a half-manifester; the icon has much slower access to high quality effects that impose Wisdom or Charisma saving throws.

The Tower (13th level). The passive benefit allows you to improve a single damage die rolled as part of a crit to its maximum value, after the dice have been rolled; a benefit of ~5 extra damage one in twenty attacks. The Cognitive Projection inflicts vulnerability to a single type of damage upon a failed Charisma saving throw — a strong ability if your party builds around it, effectively cutting the target creature’s health in half.

The Star (13th level). The passive provides regeneration equal to the icon’s Charisma modifier while they are below half health, a huge boon to swap into and preserve party resources on any strenuous day. Furthermore, unlike most regeneration effects, this does not turn off if the icon is at 0 hit points and triggers at the start of the icon’s turn (not turning off at 0 hp is possibly an oversight). The Cognitive Projection isn’t usable until an ally is at 0 hit points, but restores them to half of their maximum; a huge heal worth ~60 hit points on a level 13 fighter with a +3 constitution modifier. Once available, an icon should always prepare The Star.

The Moons (13th level). The “passive” feature is an at-will disguise self. The Cognitive Projection is effectively greater invisibility. While at-will disguise self is coming quite late, greater invisibility is a plenty potent spell with tons of uses; furthermore, neither effect counts as casting a spell, a useful technicality in areas where NPCs are familiar with spellcasting but not psionics.

The Sun (17th level). The passive provides blanket immunity to force, psychic, and radiant damage as well as possession. The Cognitive Projection provides a 1-minute long concentration effect that passively blinds and damages enemies within 5’. The total effect is great defensively, but there’s no guarantee either part will actually do anything in a high level combat besides incentivizing the icon to play to melee.

The Aeon (17th level). The passive bonus is a generally worse version of The Star, only providing healing sometimes if the icon is already at 0 and rolls a 9 or higher on their death saving throw. The Cognitive Projection is a guaranteed end to a single magical effect within 30’ of the icon.

Subclasses

The icon has three “iconic archetypes”, which provide features at levels 3, 5, 11, and 15.

The Heart. This is the generally supportive subclass. To start, it provides Insight and Persuasion proficiency. At 5th level Improved Psychic Potency doubles the bonus psychic damage, which improves to tripling the bonus damage at level 11. Nurtured Potency at 5th level allows you to use Psychic Potency for additional healing instead of bonus damage. The subclass continues to improve base class features with Empathic Anchor, which both allows the icon to boost ally’s saving throws by expending Id Barrier uses and returns all uses of Id Barrier on a short rest. Empathic Sentinel at 15th level is a huge action economy cheat, allowing the icon to activate any talent or augment at no action cost whenever any ally within 60’ takes damage. The Heart is a decent subclass for most of its levels, providing steady value with the class powers but with an outstandingly powerful 15th level feature with Empathic Sentinel.

The Noble. This offensive melee subclass provides a baseline unarmored defense feature that doesn’t allow shield use but does allow up to 2 points of Constitution bonus in addition to the Dexterity/Charisma bonuses. The 5th level feature is Extra Attack, an always useful feature that synergizes well with the melee powers like mindblade. Level 11 provides blanket immunity to charm and frighten for the icon and a reaction to remove either or both conditions from an ally. Furthermore, the icon gets a great melee boost in the form of Valiant Reprise which is comparable to a third extra attack. Finally, Victory or Death is a huge offensive boost, granting both advantage on all d20 rolls as well as a full extra action in exchange for twice their level in current and maximum hit points. Overall the Noble feels reminiscent of a barbarian, but with actually good and useful features post-level 8.

The Warrior. A second melee-oriented subclass, this provides baseline proficiency with medium and heavy armor. At levels 5 and 11 it gains and upgrades Extra Attack, matching the Noble in offensive output. At 11th level it also gains Mettle, which removes any half-damage-on-save from Constitution and Charisma saving throws. Finally, at 15th level, Lion’s Charge significantly upgrades the Dash action — a Warrior can both ignore opportunity attacks and make two melee attacks as a bonus action, mostly recouping the damage output deficit normally incurred by dashing.

Overall. Like the artificer, much of the icon’s power comes from their subclasses. The Heart provides a greater focus on the icon’s psionic abilities, while the Noble and Warrior provide martial emphasis. Defensively, the Noble is more powerful with overall higher ability scores, such as tables that roll for stats, while the Warrior is more stat-independent only needing 15 strength to effectively wear Plate armor.

Independent Subclasses

In addition to the three full classes, Psion’s Primer brings in archetypes from 3.5 as subclasses for the Fighter, Monk, and Rogue.

Fighter: The Adamant. A Charisma-based third manifester counterpart to the Eldritch Knight, all Adamants have access to battle trance and one other talent, only gaining a third at 10th level; their augments known approximately matches the EK’s spell’s known. It also provides proficiency with Charisma saving throws, a somewhat-situational bonus that’s more useful in games using the threats from this book and generally more useful than the EK’s Weapon Bond. The 7th level feature Battlemind is a psionic equivalent of War Magic, granting a bonus action attack after using a talent (the guaranteed talent battle trance is purely passive; this works best with primal metabolism or psychic hammer). The 10th level feature, Psychic Warrior, is a direct equivalent of Eldritch Strike that imposes disadvantage on saving throws following a weapon attack. The 14th level feature Mettle builds on the Charisma saving throw proficiency by preventing half damage on successful Constitution or Charisma saving throws. Finally, Immortal Will allows the Adamant to turn psi points into supercharged Second Winds when they are at 0 hit points; unfortunately, this triggers at the end of the Adamant’s turn, meaning they will still be prone and disarmed.

Monk: Way of the Soulknife. This wisdom-based subclass is built around the mindblade talent. One important benefit of this is that it unifies the Monk’s ki saving throw DC with its primary attack stat, turning Dexterity into a secondary stat that’s just used for AC and initiative. Disciple of the Mindblade grants all of the mindblade augments and provides a way for the monk to use their ki points to manifest powers. Master the Blade at 6th level provides an alternative to Flurry of Blows, granting a full off-hand 1d8+mod bonus action attack in addition to offering radiant or necrotic damage blade attacks. At 11th level the Soulknife gains Nomadic Technique, which provides powerful ranged and mobility options. Finally, Knife to the Soul at 17th level provides a 1/day 8-ki-point component-free feeblemind; a powerful disabling effect with a fair cost. All told, the Way of the Soulknife is a solid monk subclass that may not fix all of the base class’s problems but executes its own goals.

Rogue: Lurk. An Intelligence-based third manifester counterpart to the Arcane Trickster, all Lurks have access to true shot and one other talent to start. Augments known matches the Adamant and is roughly equal to the AT’s spells known. Their other third level feature is Psionic Sneak Attack, which requires the Lurk’s focus to change sneak attack damage dice to psychic damage; a fairly significant cost with a situational benefit. Psychic Ambush is a 1:1 match for Magical Ambush, imposing disadvantage on saving throws if the Lurk is hidden from its target. Mindsight at 13th level preempts and is a stronger version of the base class’s Blindsense, providing 60’ of awareness. The Lurk’s level 17 Slippery Mind (a separate feature from the base class’s level 15 Slippery Mind) provides a 1/SR get-out-of-jail-free card against a failed Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma saving throw; given the severity of these effects, even if they’re not always common, this is a very useful ability.

Overall. The Lurk and Adamant strongly parallel their magical counterparts; unfortunately, none of the talent options are as potent as greenflame blade or booming blade, two extraordinary cantrips that serve as the backbone to character optimization for the Eldritch Knight and Arcane Trickster. The other features are largely a wash, and the distinctions between the powers available to the psionic versions versus the spell available to the magical subclasses will at least make them feel distinct. By contrast, the Way of the Soulknife is a great execution of a more unique archetype that feels different from the official Soulknife rogue from Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything.

Psionic Races

A mix of adjusted and brand-new races populate the options here. Almost all of them have the Naturally Psionic trait, which grants a small reserve of power points comparable to the innate casting abilities of races like the Tiefling. They also generally grant a talent at first level, an augment at 3rd, and another augment at 5th level. The section is written in the style of Volo’s Guide to Monsters or Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes, including information on Ability Score Increases and Alignment.

Kalashtar. Mostly the same as the Rising from the Last War version, the Kalashtar trade Mind Link for the mindlink talent and the Naturally Psionic trait. The change here is a smart one that avoids a total rework in favor of cleanly integrating the race with the mechanics of Psion’s Primer.

Daelkyr Madblood. An updated version of the 3.5 “daelkyr half-blood” and a more general version of Exploring Eberron’s ruinbound dwarves, their innate psionic powers are more unstable. Upon using their innate Charisma-based energy ray, primal metabolism, or wild talent, the madblood rolls a d20, with a positive result on a 20 and a negative result on a 1. Madbloods furthermore have protection from mind reading. The Aberrant feature provides expertise on Intimidation checks. All told this racial option may not be the most powerful but it’s literally oozing with thematic abilities.

Dromites. These Small insects are attuned to elemental energies, naturally wielding a Charisma-based energy ray talent and gaining resistance to their chosen “Energy Caste”. Expertise in Wisdom (Perception) checks to smell is an unusual alternative to the typical advantage from Keen Senses. The unfortunate truth of races like this is that innate offensive cantrips are rarely useful and are outclassed by class options.

Duergar, Akiak. This dwarf subrace (built on the earlier Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes model, rather than the Monsters of the Multiverse independent racial option) provides the blind spot talent. Furthermore, it grants advantage against telepathy effects in addition to the MTOF charm and paralysis conditions. Duergar Psionics is an even trade for Duergar Magic, especially with the special grant of titanic form that lets the Duergar use it while focusing on blind spot.

Elans. This ancestry is an example of the book’s Eberron focus; whereas the 3.5 setting-neutral elans were simply people who join a cult and go through a process of rebirth, the elans of Eberron are living prisons for dissident quori, similar to but very different from the Kalashtar. Mechanically, they do not gain a psionic talent but still have Naturally Psionic; instead, they have Psionic Endurance and Psionic Resilience, which allows an Elan to spend psi points to reduce the damage they take or gain a bonus to saving throws.

Goblins, Blue. These variant goblins have an intelligence-based wild talent as their primary unique feature, keeping the Naturally Stealthy feature but otherwise trading their features for psionic ones. While wild talent is not itself immensely valuable, several of the augments provide reliable utility that can make a blue stand out whether they are an otherwise-psionic class or not.

 Goliath, Dreamscarred. These variant goliaths are primarily tied to Eberron’s lore, but conveniently stand-in for the classic Half-Giant of Athas or other settings. They receive the verve talent as a Constitution-based power, which does have relevance with the offensive stomp augment. Furthermore, verve itself is an unusually useful utility power as it completely negates basic biological needs, similar to a warforged.

Shulassakar. Another Eberron ancestry, these celestially-blessed snake people naturally have the aura beacon talent. They do not gain augments and never gain additional psi points; instead, they have Radiant Smite, which as an action grants an additional 1d6 bonus radiant damage for 1 minute. However, instead of more powerful psionics, they have a wide array of resistances — poison and radiant damage, the poisoned condition, and advantage on saving throws against psionic effects.

Thri-Kreen. A racial option with a deep history in D&D, the official Thri-Kreen weren’t released until Spelljammer. This version’s extra arms cannot fulfill combat functions like wield weapons or cast spells but grant an additional object interaction each turn. Their natural talent is primal metabolism, which also grants psionic leap despite its normal focus requirement being a different talent. This take is a much more traditional Thri-Kreen than the Spelljammer version, losing out on the telepathy and chameleon stealth of the official version for more direct psionic power.

Psiforged. These crystalline variants trade Integrated Protection and Specialized Design for the imbue psicrystal talent and the highly restrictive Crystalline Growths feature, which entirely prevents wearing armor but does grant the +1 to AC. This strongly pushes this race into a class that either lacks armor proficiency or has some variation of unarmored defense, such as the empath class or the Noble icon.

Third Time’s the Charm

Psion’s Primer is a large work and properly reviewing it requires more space than even two newsletters can provide. The third and final installment will cover chapter 3: Psionic Feats & Equipment, as well as Chapter 5: Psionic Friends & Foes.