Introduction
The larger of the Psychic‘s two subclasses, your choice of Conscious Mind gives you additional spells known, including the cantrips which you’ll be able to Amp. These Amps are unique to each Conscious Mind, making them an iconic and unique capability. Combined with the granted spells, your Conscious Mind does a lot to define your role within your party.
The cantrip options granted by your Conscious Mind are among the most important parts of building your Psychic. You get 3 Amp-able cantrips at level 1 and add another at levels 6 and 10 for a total of 5 cantrips in addition to the 3 regular cantrips granted by the Psychic’s spellcasting. You need to have a good understanding of your Amp-able cantrips because they’re your go-to option in combat, much like a fighter swinging a weapon.
Because the use of cantrips and Amps is so central to the Psychic’s capabilities in combat, a Conscious Mind with poor cantrip options is difficult to play effectively. You can fall back on leveled spells, but with fewer spell slots than comparable spellcasters, you’re more reliant on cantrips, so your cantrips really need to work for you. Your Conscious Mind’s cantrips don’t all need to be direct attack options, but you need something reliable and repeatable to use in combat, so you may need to fill in the gaps with your 3 regular cantrips if your choice of Conscious Mind doesn’t do the trick.
Beyond the cantrips, the leveled spells granted by your Conscious Mind are frequently taken from other spell lists. This offers access to some great options which aren’t typically available to Occult spellcasters. Remember that these are in addition to the spells that you normally learn (one per spell slot), and that you can make these spells Signature Spells, which is important because that’s the only way to Heighten spells from other spell lists since you can’t learn those spells normally.
Table of Contents
Disclaimer
RPGBOT uses the color coding scheme which has become common among Pathfinder build handbooks.
- : Bad, useless options, or options which are extremely situational. Nearly never useful.
- : OK options, or useful options that only apply in rare circumstances. Useful sometimes.
- : Good options. Useful often.
- : Fantastic options, often essential to the function of your character. Useful very frequently.
Conscious Mind Options
The Distant Grasp
Distant Grip is all about telekinesis. The spells all involved moving stuff, sometimes in a way that’s useful in utility terms, but usually in a way that involves damage. This is nice combination of Blaster, Controller, and Striker. The added spells give you options for a variety of combat situations, and options like Mage Hand, Fly, and Telekinetic Haul offer some useful utility.
- : Mostly good options, but
few truly amazing ones. None of the spells have benefits for heightening
them until you get to Poltergeist’s Fury, which isn’t a problem, but it is
unusual. Expect to pick Signature Spells from your regular set of spells
known.
- : A great way to forcibly reposition your enemies, especially with a possible 1-Action casting time. 10 feet of movement is plenty to force enemies out of melee reach, to break grapples, or to push an enemy into a hazard like a pit or a trap. You won’t use this constantly, but it’s great to have in your back pocket. Unfortunately, at level 1 it’s not a great use of your incredibly small number of spell slots, and it competes for space with Amped Mage Hand, which can repeatedly Push the target. This is great if you just need one quick push, but if you need to repeatedly reposition the target (maybe it really likes to grapple), go for Amped Mage Hand.
- : If you need to Shove, Kinetic Ram will do the job better for lower cost. Disarm is only occasionally useful, and you can do it with Amped Mage Hand. That just leaves Trip, and you’re spending 2 Actions and a 2nd-level spell slot to cost the target 1 Action. Unless making them Prone is going to be hugely impactful, this isn’t worth the slot.
- : Low-budget almost flight. It’ll get your target off the ground and potentially out of melee reach without eating an action every turn like flying does, but the attack penalty is rough, so try to rely on stuff that allows saving throws while you’re floating around. You’ll also run into issues with range: since you can’t reposition horizontally without crawling (which is slow and requires a suitable surface), enemies can move out of range and you’re left floating around like a magical party balloon unless you spend Actions to get back to the ground and crawl back into range.
- : Powerful and versatile, but also costly. You want to not need this, but it’s a massive tactical advantage over enemies which can’t fly and can’t attack at range. Remember that you need to spend an Action to Fly each turn or you fall, so if you need more Actions you may need to land temporarily.
- : Only situationally useful, but 80 Bulk is a lot of Bulk. For comparison: Gargantuan creature is only 48 Bulk, so you’re lifting something up to 20x20x20 and immensely heavy. Maybe you can lift a small bulding and drop it on someone.
- : Decent damage in prolonged fights with multiple enemies, and your allies have a bit of help on the Reflex save. It’s still best to avoid catching your allies in the area, but in enclosed spaces where your enemies can’t easily retreat, this can be very impactful. However, if your allies have poor Reflex saves you’re going to make your whole party angry because they can’t escape either. In large, open areas where enemies can simply run away, this won’t be impactful. Consider combining this with Fly so that you can remain safely in the air above your enemies while you wear them down.
- : Decent damage, matching a Fireball heightened to the same level, though the area is considerably smaller. In exchange, you might knock enemies prone and potentially stun them, as well as leaving difficult terrain in the area of effect. A good combination of damage and crowd control. There’s no clear explanation of what happens to the projectile or what state it must be in, so depending on how your GM interprets this you may be able to damage nearby structures and terrain (throw sheds, uproot trees, etc.) in addition to the explicit effects of the spell.
- : At this level, flying
enemies are common. This is a great countermeasure. Flying enemies are
moved downward and take the falling damage automatically, so even if
they pass the save you still get the consolation prize of a bunch of
damage and forcing enemies closer to the ground. You want targets to
move through as much of the column as possible because they take double
normal faling damage, so try to place the column with your enemies at or
near the top. Enemies that succeed on the save still fall
prone, so if the 60-foot column isn’t big enough to get them to the
ground, gravity might do the rest.
The wording of the Critical Success effect is confusing. “The creature is unaffected” should mean that they don’t take the damage, either, but the rest of the sentence indicates that they do. I think the intent is that they still move and take damage, but there’s no further effect.
- : Decent single-target damage and you can repeat is against other targets on future turns, but it’s only damage and against crowds you typically want something that will work fast to cut through the horde.
- Standard Psi Cantrips:
- : Great utility. If you need to Shove, Telekinetic Projectile may be more reliable. Many creatures’ Fortitude DCs will be higher than their AC, and you’re rolling with your Spell Attack Modifier either way.
- : Good single-target damage with good scaling. Amping it increases the damage, which a great use for your Focus Points at least until you get Dancing Blade. You’ll have trouble matching Telekinetic Projectile’s single-target damage output even with leveled spells.
- Unique Psi Cantrips:
- : Decent damage in two small AOEs, allowing you to target several enemies easily. The damage scales reasonably well, and couple with the damage boost from Awaken Psyche and potentially an Amp, this can do a lot of damage.
- : Only situationally useful. I wouldn’t consider this a consitently useful option until it’s heightened to 6th level and affecs more than projectiles.
- : Good, consistent damage. You don’t need to magically enhance your weapon, either, but special materials might help against some enemies. Amping this is very efficient because the spell lasts up to a minute, so you can repeatedly benefit.
The Infinite Eye
Focused on divination, the Infinite Eye is a Scout and Support caster. The only directly offensive option in the whole subclass is Organ Sight, which is a lot like a fish with a bicycle (good tool, but no way to use it). In combat, you’re reliant on buffing and supporting your allies. You can get offensive options from your regular spellcasting, but the Psychic relies heavily on cantrips, and without an offensive cantrip from your Subconscious Mind you’re not well suited to blasting stuff. Consider direct damage a secondary function in combat.
Outside of combat, use your magical abilities to gather knowledge and plan ahead. If you take a Subconscious Mind which makes Intelligence your Key Ability Score, you’re well-suited to knowledge skills like Arcana and Occultism, so you can double down on knowing things ahead of time to put your party at an advantage over any threats you might face.
- : A good mix of iconic
divination options. They’re primarily support and utility options, so don’t
expect to find any damage output here. Not all of the options are great, but
you get some wonderful staples like Augury and Prying Eye.
- : Only benefits you, and you don’t have any great built-in attack options. If you want to get any use out of this, look for leveled single-target attack spells which take 2 Actions to cast. Unfortunately, the Occult spell list doesn’t have many.
- : This is one of my favorite divination spells, and has been since 3rd edition DnD. While it’s not terribly precise, it’s often enough to get a party unstuck when “analysis paralysis” sets in. If your party can’t decide what to do, cast Augury and try to get some hints. Unfortunately, the flat check means that it’s only 75% accurate, so be cautious whenever you receive a result of “None”.
- : A great spell for someone with good options for dealing piercing/slashing damage and a good Medicine bonus. You can pair this with Telekinetic Projectile for repeatable damage output, but spending 3 Actions every turn on this combo leaves you no room for anything else.
- : Excellent for scouting potentially dangerous areas, but it’s immobile and expensive. Use this when you can’t scout by any other means. You only get 2 spell slots per level.
- : Extremely useful for scouting. Provided that the eye isn’t spotted by a creature that can see invisibile things or accidentally destroyed (falling debris, traps, etc.), the duration is as long as you care to Sustain the Spell. With no cap on range from the caster, a patient caster could use this to scout huge areas before risking going anywhere near them. With this spell in hand, there’s little excuse for walking into an area without a good idea of what’s already there. Of course, it can’t go through solid objects and most keyholes are smaller than an inch, so a enclosed structures may be more difficult to scout.
- : Powerful, but with a 10-minute duration you can’t afford to keep it running constantly, so you still need to have some idea of when to switch this on.
- : True Strike, but for four creatures of your choice against one target of your choice. The benefits are good, but unless your allies are going to make big singular attacks (spells, etc.), the benefits won’t be impressive compared to what you could do with a 7th-level spell slot.
- : Far too situational. If you need to handle invisible creatures, there are better, lower-level options like True Seeing. If you need to track a creature, consider Scrying or follow them around with Prying Eye.
- : A spectacular buff with a 1-hour duration. Put this on your party’s Defender before a big fight.
- Standard Psi Cantrips:
- : Detect Magic is a crucial option in any party. The Amp option is helpful against spellcasters, but I wouldn’t gamble it unless you’re certain that you’re facing spellcasters.
- : Guidance is already a wonderful buff for important rolls, but using it as a Reaction means that you can rescue allies from failed saves. Increasing the bonus at high levels makes this even better. Never again fear failing by 1.
- Unique Psi Cantrips:
- : The damage bonus is tiny, but this damage is essentially guaranteed, so it’s tempting despite the low amount. A good way to spend leftover Actions. The damage calculation if you Amp this is unimpressive, so it’s not worth your Focus Point if you have anything else interesting to spend it on.
- : One Action and your Reaction to both Seek in a 30-foot emanation and then Aid one pre-selected ally on an attack against one pre-selected enemy. Seek and readying to Aid for one Action is good, but your Perception progression is poor. It’s fine, but between this and Glimpse Weekness, Glimpse Weakness is a better combat buff unless you’re facing hidden enemies. The Amp effect is fine, but it’s only until the beginning of your next turn, and it won’t stack with similar and less expensive buffs like Bless.
- : This essentially allows you to give an ally the Attack of Opportunity Reaction against a single enemy. Only useful if you have multiple allies in the party who are built for melee but can’t get Attack of Opportunity or another way to use their Reaction.
The Oscillating Wave
A Blaster/Striker, plain and simple. Psychics are great at damage output thanks to Unleash Psyche, and if you want to double down on that capability, Oscillating Wave is a great choice. It lacks any utility options to use outside of combat, so try to fill those gaps with skills and with your other spells.
Conservation of Energy: The wording on this ability appears to be broken. I believe the intent is that your cantrips and granted spells must alternate between adding/removing energy, but RAW you could choose to remove energy when you cast your first applicable spell and be perpetually stuck in “removing energy” mode. Similarly, RAW you can pick “adding energy”, cast one fire spell, then be stuck in “removing energy” for the rest of the encounter. I’m going to assume that the intent is to go back and forth every time you cast an appopriate spell.
The Pathfinder Society rules clarify that Conservation of Energy applies to the granted leveled spells, Produce Flame, and Ray of Frost, but not to the Unique Psi Cantrips. Oddly, it doesn’t clarify that Conservation of Energy is actually supposed to oscillate.
With that rules oddity out of the way, Conservation of Energy is how you “oscillate” between cold damage and fire damage. Unless your target has resistances/immunities/vulnarabilities to cold or fire, this is mostly cosmetic. In addition, you can alter things with the Mindshift trait (Psi Burst, Cranial Explosion, etc.) to deal cold or fire damage on a Reflex Save instead of whatever they do normally. Most of these abilities deal bludgeoning damage on a Reflex Save, so changing to energy damage might get you around damage resistances/immunities.
- : You get several of the
most important and iconic fire/ice spells, but some of those spells are
either outright bad or just bad for the Psychic.
- : Awful damage, small AOE, short range. Psychics don’t get Electric Jolt, which is the best direct comparison, but the fact that there are cantrips which are outright better than this tell you why it’s bad.
- : Useful against metal enemies and enemies in metal armor, but those are a a small subsection of the creatures which you’ll face in your career, so this won’t see much use. The effects are good when this does make sense to use.
- : In a game full of nails, Fireball is a hammer. Good AOE, good damage, good scaling. Strongly consider making this a Signature Spell.
- : The Psychic should never be in melee enough to need this.
- : 2d6 more damage than a Fireball cast at the same spell level, and the same scaling as Fireball so it remains more damaging if you heighten either. The 60-foot cone is great, but still not as easy to use as Fireball, not to mention Fireball’s 500-foot range. Cone of Cold is fine, but Fireball is still better in most situations.
- : Smilar to Flaming Sphere,
except it’s tall, doesn’t need to stay on the ground, and also does
bludgeoning damage. The Action cost is high, and you don’t get to move
it immediately upon casting, so you’re affecting a vertical column of
squares (I’m told that these are called “cubes”) with a single 5-foot
square at the base. The odds of catching multiple enemies in that area
are nearly non-existant, so try to hit one at least. The hope is that on
future turns you can Sustain the Spell to move it in a straight line and
strike multiple foes. But without the ability to turn and only 20 feet
of movement per Action, you likely need to spend multiple Actions to
catch multiple foes, and even when you do the damage isn’t impressive.
This is simply not a good spell. The area is too small, the requirement that you have sufficient vertical space prevents it from being use in the only situations where this would be effective, the damage is too poor, and it moves too slowly and too rigidly to apply the damage multiple times. For two Actions and 3rd-level spell slot, you can cast Fireball, which does more damage than a single hit from Flame Vortex, and you can almost certainly hit more targets in the initial burst than you could hit in the first two turns of Flame Vortex.
- : For one minute, turn
yourself into a flying machine gun. Reducing Produce Flame to a single
Action and boosting its damage by a single die means that you can use it
as many as three times per turn. With the boosted damage, that’s
extremely appealing, especially since it presents no additional cost
beyond casting Fiery Body. However, Multiple Attack Penalty becomes a
problem (unusual for most spellcasters) so you may want to use Produce
Flame alongside spells which call for saving throws like Fireball. Try
to hit multiple targets if possible to maximize the benefit of the
additional damage die, and avoid flying unless you need that tactical
advantage becuase you still need to spend an Action to fly, which cuts
into your Produce Flame spam.
The ability to cast Produce Flame as an Innate Spell is a little bit odd, and the wording isn’t super clear. By default, an innate spell is cast using Charisma, so if you’re Intelligence-based, the Innate Spell isn’t as effective. But maybe you’re intended to use the same spellcasting ability as whatever you used to cast Fiery Body? I’m honestly not sure. It also doesn’t specify a tradition, so I assume it’s supposed to be the same as you’re using when you cast Fiery Body.
This has some odd interactions with Conservation of Energy. When you cast this it will be either fire or cold, and the resistances and vulnerabilities to fire/cold will be the opposite. What happens to the vulnerability to water? I have no idea. When you go to spam Produce Flame (it’s 1 Action and does an extra die of damage!), you’re going to alternate between fire and cold damage. So either you’re a flying ice sculpture or some sort of humanoid torch and you’re shooting alternating balls of fire and light-producing ice. The damage boost only applies to spells which match the element you used when you cast Fiery Body, so you can use Produce Flame to oscillate, then cast leveled spells using the matching damage type.
And don’t forget: Unleash Psyche’s damage boost applies to each casting of Produce Flame, so you’re dropping a massive amount of damage per shot.
- : Good single-target damage on an attack roll, and Drained 2 adds a bunch more. It’s all-or-nothing, so give yourself every advantage possible before you cast this.
- : Fireball’s cool older brother. The AOE is massive, the range is huge, and the ability to drop four AOEs means you can obliterate several things far apart from each other, ideally placing the areas so that your allies aren’t affected. If all you need is damage, it’s hard to find a better option.
- Standard Psi Cantrips:
- : Simple, striaghtforward damage with good persistent damage on a crit. Don’t use this in melee. The larger damage like look nice, but you have no armor and 6+ hit points. Don’t get dumb.
- : Decent damage, excellent range.
- Unique Psi Cantrips:
- : Decent resistance, but don’t let this eat your Actions. If you need this, spend the Focus Point to Amp it.
- : Effectively a scaling damage bonus that accumulates over the course of combat. At low levels you don’t need to Amp this because your maximum number of motes is low, but as you gain levels you may want to Amp this for longer encounters.
- : Decent damage, but the positioning rarely works. Amping this to increase the area makes it much easier and the damage is comparable to spells like Fireball.
The Silent Whisper
Silent Whisper’s cantrips are complicated. You need to need to be very precise about how and when you use them, and in many cases each cantrip will only work once per encounter so you’ll need to have other options ready in combat. And, unfortunately, the granted spells don’t help much. You’ll frequently find yourself looking at the options granted by Silent Whisper and thinking “I’ve used the good ones and now everything is immune to them” and then resort to your regular spellcasting.
Silent Whisper attempts to add a bunch of Utility to your capabilities, but it’s limited by the difficult, situational nature of many of the granted spells.
- : A small oddity: Silent
Whisper gets two 5th-level spells and no 6th-level spells. Beyond that
oddity, the options here aren’t amazing. They’re very thematic, but there
are several options which you might go your whole career without using once.
- : Absurdly situational. If you need to tell someone something that’s going to take 10 minutes, either your GM is intentionally saying “I need this to take place over several minutes” for some reason, or you’re going to say “I explain the thing” and your GM says “Great. 10 minutes later, they know the thing.”
- : Stupefied in any amount is a powerful debuff against spellcasters, but the Touch range is a problem unless you have a familiar or Reach Spell.
- : The bonus is great if you plan to have multiple fights within the 10-minute duration, but it’s also expensive. This will have the greatest benefit on your party’s front-line martial characters.
- : Useful if you need to communicate silently, but the 10-minute duration means that you can’t keep this running all the time.
- : In encounters with multiple enemies, this puts your party at a huge advantage in the action economy. Targets are Stunned 1 on a success, so you’re nearly guaranteed to benefit.
- : A great utility, but only situationally useful. For communicating with your party, Message is typically sufficient, especially since you can send it around corners.
- : Good damage and area control in an impressively large AOE. Note that the applies when you create the effect, then again when creatures start their turn in the area, so the initial targets make the save and take damage twice before they can take their turn. If your allies know you’re doing this, they could stand outside the area and Seek until they disbelieve the illusion before charging into it while immune to the effects. This could allow your party to retreat into the area while enemies hesitate to enter, or it could allow your party to grapple enemies to keep them inside the area.
- : Similar tactical uses to Synaptic Pule, but singe-target. Against single powerful foes, this is an ongoing, persistent debuff. Even on a Success, you’re eating as many as 3 Actions (maybe they wanted to Stride already) and making the target Flat-Footed for 3 rounds, putting your party at a major advantage.
- : Extremely situational. It’s a neat idea, but you have to do prior setup to make creatures a valid target, and even then you’re limited in what you can accomplish with this. Your best bet is to target enemies and command them to do something helpful for you but not against their self-interest, like taking the guard dog on a walk or something equally benign. But is that worth a 9th-level spell?
- Standard Psi Cantrips:
- : Unless your party has reliable ways to repeatedly deal mental damage (which is generally only available to casters), this isn’t worth the Amp. The base spell is only useful if you’re unusually likely to cause a Critical Failure, so as a whole this won’t see much use.
- : The ability to send Message around corners is neat, but only situationally useful. More impactful: You can Amp this to give an ally a mostly-free Step or Stride, potentially leaving them another Action on their own turn to do something cool. When you get to 4th-level spells, they can choose one of several Attack actions, and since they’re made between turns, Muliple Attack Penalty won’t accumulate.
- Unique Psi Cantrips:
- : Complex. The damage is good. Creatures might choose to face the save and take damage, or they might forego an important action like Strike for a full turn, in which case you have likely negated an important Action that they were going to take. Unfortunately, the target is then immune to this for 1 minute, meaning that you can probably only use this once per target per encounter.
- : Adequate damage, but the AOE is tiny, so it’s dangerous for psychics to use this. Fortunately, it doesn’t affect allies so you can use while your allies have enemies bogged down in melee. You can Amp this to dramatically improve both the damge and the size of the cone. I don’t know why you would choose the 30-foot option of the 60-foot option.
- : The effects are nice even if you don’t Amp it, but if you’re facing large numbers of enemies, this likely isn’t worth the action cost.
The Tangible Dream
Mostly focused on area control and crowd control. Relies heavily on the Dazzled condition.
- :
- : Useful early in a fight, but if you can’t get the Dazzled/Blinded effects into play early you’re not benefiting much from the spell.
- : A decent defensive buff that works at any level, but the fact that even a failed attack can still destroy one of the images means that the images will disappear almost immediately if even a small number if weak foes focus their attacks on you for a round or two.
- : Not good enough for a spell of this level. Against creatures with 25-foot speed (typical for players and many creatures), difficult terrain and a 10-foot speed penalty means that they can move at most one square per Stride. That sounds appealing, but with a 15-foot radius, a creature exactly in the center can escape unharmed in 3 Actions. Realistically, if you target multiple creatures it’s going to be more like 1 or 2 Strides to get out of the area. This would be better if the AOE was considerably larger, but it’s not good enough to justify spell slots of a high enough level that the area would matter.
- : A good way to remove a single target from an encounter, especially if they’re not a big damage dealer. Hardness 10 can mitigate quite a bit of damage.
- : A very cool concept, but the damage isn’t great, so unless you can force enemies to move through the area repeatedly, this isn’t worth the spell slot.
- : A great mix of area control and damage. If you have a way to force enemies into the wall (allies who like to Shove, Kinetic Ram, a Decanter of Endless Water, etc.), you can repeatedly force enemies to take the damage.
- : Conceptually, this is a great way to have enemies attack the illusion instead of attack you. However, you need to be within 30 feet with line of sight to the illusion, which means that you probably want to hide. Even then, this doesn’t do anything about your speech, so the verbal components for spells will give away your location. Mirror Image provides largely the same function for a much smaller cost.
- : Making creatures Dazzled gives them a 20% miss chance and also allows other creatures to hide from them. Creatures within the area may be Confused or Stunned, so if you have multiple enemies in the area they might spend several turns attacking each other. Creatures currently affected don’t make more saves, but if their current effect ends they’re then susceptible to making more saves. If you can, have your allies repeated shove enemies into the 20-foot burst, then retreat to a safe distance while your enemies attack each other.
- : Put something (or several somethings that are close together) in a very strict 1-hour time out. Pushing through a prismatic sphere sucks.
- Standard Psi Cantrips:
- : Decent utility out of combat, and if you Amp this in combat you can make targets repeatedly Dazzled, imposing a 20% miss chance.
- : Throwing Shield on a front-line ally is a generous and very effective way to protect them. If you Amp this, you can prevent a ton of damage, but based on the pronoun usage I think the Amped version only works on you, which is disappointing.
- Unique Psi Cantrips:
- : The damage is fine, but you do not belong in melee.
- : Decent damage, and cheap area control. The wording to Amp the spell is confusing. It doesn’t automatically re-apply the damage, but I think if you move the area off of a creature then back onto them they’ll take the damage again.
- : Low-budget Force Cage. The regular version may force enemies to move through the wall to continue fighting, and the Amped version can remove enemies from a fight at least long enough for them to smash through the walls, leaving you and your allies enough time to hopefully defeat everything else.
The Unbound Step
Unbound Step is all about teleportation, and while teleportation is a great way to get around, it doesn’t solve any problems except positioning. You do get some options which aren’t “move me from A to B” like Enlarge and Maze, but they’re few and far between. The Amp options are mostly weak, too, so you’re going to lean almost entirely on your regular spellcasting to solve problems.
- : A bunch of teleportation
effects (Maze counts, I guess) and Enlarge for some reason. You get several
options for strategically teleporting people and objects, which makes it
easy to put yourself and your allies into useful positions or to get around
obstacles. Not all of the options are great and many are too high-level for
their effects in my opinion, but there are a few good go-to options.
- : Only situationally useful. If you need to use this consistently in combat, your allies should be carrying their own gear around.
- : Improved reach, a little bit of extra damage, and a nice 5-minute duration so it’s sure to last through all but the most absurdly-long fights. The fact that the spell raises a creature directly to Large size also means that you can cast it on small creatures like halflings and they still get the full benefits in combat, but it also means that you can cast it on tiny creatures like a familiar and potentially ride them. While the effects of the spell improve with spell level, the 2nd-level version of the spell is still a significant advantage for your melee allies, especially if they have Reaction options like Attack of Opportunity, so you can count on a 2nd-level spell to provide a significant tactical advantage even at high levels.
- : Very situational. If you need short-distance teleportation you can create the rally point and immediately teleport for 3 Actions, which is cheaper than Dimension Door (at least in terms of spell slots). Beyond that, I can’t think of a recurring situation where this would be useful.
- : Decent short-distance teleportation. Requiring line of sight limits your options, but this is still enough to get out of grapples, dangerous locations, etc. Unfortunately, you also have Warp Step, which provides excellent and inexpensive short-range teleportation, so there’s not much reason to use Dimension Door.
- : Hillarious, but not reliable and certainly not easy to use. You can spread the cubes around and force melee-only creatures to chase you through the cubes repeatedly while the Benny Hill theme song plays in the background.
- : Drop allies into melee range of your enemies, drop enemies into dangerous positions, or just lift them high enough off the ground to cause falling damage.
- : Teleport and get 2 Actions to take while you’re between locations. Great if you need to drink a potion, buff yourself, deal with persistent damage, etc. You’ll be Slowed 1 on your next turn, which is inconvenient, but if you need to get out of a bad spot this is great.
- : Take the target out of a fight without an initial save. Creatures with poor Wisdom will struggle to escape at all. The duration is only one minute and you need to Sustain the Spell, but the time this buys you should give you and your party a huge tactical advantage (or allow you to run away). Remember that you can choose not to sustain the spell, so if you’ve cleaned up your other enemies, gather the party, ready some actions, and end the spell early.
- : Very situational. You don’t mitigate any risk by doing this, you don’t get any additional actions or tactical advantages, and now you’re in two places for enemies to target you. You could do something with sending one body somewhere before ending the spell and returning to whichever body is in a safer location, but why not just teleport?
- Standard Psi Cantrips:
- : Decent single-target damage, but the Circumstance bonus to AC stuff generally only matters when attacking humanoids who can do things like use shields.
- : Already a good way to cover distance quickly, but if you Amp this you get to Stride twice with a +10 ft. speed bonus for a single Action. Once you can cast 4th-level spells you can instead teleport, providing amazing utility both in and out of combat.
- Unique Psi Cantrips:
- : Weird and only situationally useful.
- : The damage resistance is decent and broadly useful, but the Amp effect is poor. If you’re worried about enemies getting in your way, Warp Step lets you teleport not long after you get this.
- : This could be a good way to get your melee allies into melee quickly, but it won’t be useful frequently. The Amped version is great utility outside of combat, and notably doesn’t require line of sight so you can use this to teleport through walls.
