Question #1: Does the assumption of encounter equivalency hold up?

The level 1 abilities sort of held it up (close enough for government work) but what about the most powerful ones? Let's look at level 27

Psion:
2d8 + Stat and target is stunned until the end of your next turn (Close Blast 3, all targets)
3d8 + stat and target is blinded until the end of your next turn (Burst 2 in 20 squares, enemies only)

Invoker:
3d8 + Stat and target moves half its speed away from you as safely as possible (Burst 2, range 10, all targets)
2d6 + stat, creates a zone that either does 10 damage to targets in it or targets out of it (Burst 2, range 10, enemies only)
4d10 + stat (Close blast 3, all targets)

Wizard:
6d6+stat (Close blast 5, enemies only)
3d10 + Stat, control the target on the next turn (Range 20)
3d10+ stat, Until end of next tun, target is immobilized, grants CA, cannot get line of effect against non-adjacent targets (Range 20)

I admit, I would probably say the Psion's set are the _weakest_ of the three, but I would probably categorize them all in the same weight class.

Verdict: The assumption stands, more or less. Psion might be a tiny but less.

Question #2: How Potent is Minimal Augmentation?
The table seems to suggest that minimal augmentation i equivalent to major augment 10 levels lower, and looking at it we have a startling apples to apples comparison with "Sudden Control", the level 23 attack, which has an at-will ability equal to a level 7 ability (Betrayal) with full augmentation. That actually suggests that if there were a level 13 version, it's maximaized version would probably equate to Sudden Control's minimal augmentation. So the ~10 level thing sort of holds up (and it does with a few other examples) but now that I've answered it, I;m not sure that's hugely useful to know.

However, it's important to note that minimal augments usually set up the larger augment well, by doing things like adding vulnerabilities. That's very useful, but possibly more situational than some other powers.

Question #3: How much to the At Will's improve?
This is important because the 7/17/27 attack will never cost more than the 3/13/23 attack, so if the *7 is better, then being able to do it twice is a definite leg up.

Having looked through the powers, I honestly don't know. There's definitely escalation between tiers, but within tiers, it's close, and it's muddled by powers like Betrayal and Sudden Control which are hard to compare and are just plain awesome. They're close enough to suggest that this is not quite as much of a leg up as it first appears, but I'm still wary.


Conclusion: On paper, Psion's scare me. Final verdict waits on play, to see if it reveals some non-obvious weaknesses, but just from the text, I suspect this class is A) fun to play and B) Scary, maybe a little too scary.

Final caveat: It's a controller, so all this comparison may be meaningless. Controllers still have no real benchmarks, so I may be looking at apples and oranges without realizing it.

Ok, so given the previous assumption, let's look at psion powers versus encounter powers on a per level basis.


None of this touches on the flexibility of the Psion. The ability to choose to use minor augmentations or to spam lower tier abilities is something I take as given, and combined with the fact that the difference between levels of augmentation is sometimes of _type_ in addition to potency, it seems so clear that the Psion is more flexible than most any other class in the powers it can choose to deploy.

It also does not touch on specific powers and their scalability, but that merits some tangential mention. If a Psion has a lower level attack which "scales up", that's particularly dangerous. A power which scales up is usually one where the damage is secondary to the status effects, which are roughly equal in value at all levels, but there are some exceptions. Powers which trigger off someone else's basic attack (notably, the Psion's "Betrayal" ability) scale up in damage with levels, which means the power is as useful at 27th level as it is at 7th. This is an issue because it cost a third of what the level 27 attack does to augment. This introduces the possibility of spamming (Repeatedly using) that attack because it's so affordable. While this is an issue, I don't think it's a huge on. At high epic levels, when this matters, it's actually less good than the Demigod's ability to spam encounter powers (though this raises an interesting question: How does the Psion interact with the Demigod epic path?)

Anyway, on to the breakdown.

By level a character can use this many encounter attacks (setting aside any from paragon paths) and how many power points a psion gets.

Lvl	Encounter Powers	Power Points
1.	1	2
3.	1/3	4
7.	1/3/7	6
13.	3/7/13	7
17.	7/13/17	9
21.	7/13/17	11
23.	13/17/23	13
27.	17/23/27	15

So, the key thing here is that the cost of augmenting Psion powers goes up with each tier.

Tier	Minor Augment Cost	Major Augment Cost
Heroic	1	2
Paragon	1	4
Epic	2	6

So, let's presume a given Psion uses the highest level powers he can with the most augmentation he can get. What does that look like?

Lvl	Encounter Powers	Augmented At Wills	Paragon Path**
1.	1	1(2)	1(2)
3.	1/3	3/3(4)	3/3(4)
7.	1/3/7	7/7/7(6)	7/7/7(6)
11.	1/3/7	7/7/7(6)	7/7/7/7(8)
13.	3/7/13	13/7/13*(7)	13/13/13*(9)
17.	7/13/17	17/17/17*(9)	17/17/7/17*(11)
21.	7/13/17	17/17/7/17*(11)	17/17/17/17*(13)
23.	13/17/23	23/23/13*(13)	23/23/23*/17*(15)
27.	13/23/27	27/27/27*/13*(15)	27/27/27*/27*13*(17)

* - indicates minor augmentation
** - The Paragon path column is interesting and important. Psionic Paragon paths seem to grant 2 PP, which smooths out the odd gap between 7 and 13 (and specifically the curious change to odd numbers)

So, that looks pretty brutal to me, with the psion only looking a little weak in the 7-13 range, and only when not taking a psion paragon path. I admit that my instinctive response is "Ok, the Psion is too badass" but that's a very suspect reaction since there are a few outstanding questions, notably:

1. Does the underlying assumption (That a maximally augmented at-willpower equates to an encounter power) hold up?
2. How potent is a minimal augmentation, relatively speaking?
3. How much power difference is there between the At-Will attacks, really?

Answering those is next, I think.