D&D: The Psion’s Metamorph Subclass Is A Lesson On Using Body Horror For Fun And Profit
The Psion is a brand-new class that is kicking up conversations all over. But nobody’s talking about how visceral the Metamorph subclass is.
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to wield the power of body horror? Yeah, me neither. But that’s exactly the question that the Metamorph, one of the four new subclasses, for the new, still-in-testing, Psion does. In the Psion unearthed arcana, WotC opens the doors to the power of the mind. Apparently, though the mind is connected to the body. And that has all sorts of unsettling implications if true.
The Metamorph – A Subclass for Psions Who Want to Use Mind AND Matter
At the heart of it, the Metamorph is a melee-focused subclass for the Psion, which is interesting, considering that the Psion is a spellcaster through and through. I actually really like the design idea. It provides a lot of flexibility—it would be nice to see that be more of a two-way street.
WotC has a long history of looking at their magic classes and being like, “well why can’t they also fight in combat?” It goes back to Bladesinger Wizards in 3rd Edition. And I get it. They’re not called Fighters of the Coast. So naturally, you get the Hexblade Warlock, the College of Swords (And Valor) Bard, Bladesinger Wizards, Draconic Sorcerers.
It is much more rare that WotC looks at their fighting classes and goes, “well why can’t they also do magic.” You end up with a small pool of Psionic Energy Dice or a handful of spells for your Eldritch Knight. You never get like a cool “and now I’m fighting with magic” the way that other classes go, “and now I’m doing magic with my sword.”
All that to say, it’s not too surprising to see a “do magic and hit people” class. I just hope to see more but going in the other direction. In the meantime, you should know that Metamorphs are about using that body:
“Your mastery of psionic powers turns inward. Your own flesh becomes like clay to you, and you mold it to turn it into the perfect vessel of your psionic powers. Experience in manipulating your life energy also enables you to adjust the life force of friends and foes alike.
But what does that all actually mean?
The Metamorph – Bone Blades, Flesh Mauls, and Viscera Launchers? You Shouldn’t Have
To start with, it means you get bonus Metamorph Spells dedicated to transforming your body or someone elses. Naturally this means things like Alter Self and Polymorph and Stoneskin. But it also means altering your body in the more traditional sense of increasing or decreasing its hit points via Cure Wounds, Inflict Wounds, and Lsser Restoration. There’s some pretty thematic ones on the list, not bad at all.
At level 3, you also get Organic Weapons. This is where I encountered the phrase viscera launcher for the first time, and frankly it’s horrifying. And I’m also surprised I haven’t seen it before because we write about Warhammer here and viscera launcher seems like the sort of thing Chaos might have. But here we are. Organic weapons lets you reshape your limbs into weapons. You can make:
- Bone Blade: a rapier you extend from your forearm or hand, and it not only deals 1d8 + Spellcasting modifier damage, it also gives you advantage whenever an ally is within five feet
- Flesh Maul: a giant bludgeoning hammer you make out of your fist and forearm, it deals 1d10 on a hit, and gives Disadvantage to the target on its next Strength or Constitution save
- Viscera Launcher: a crossbow made of muscle and sinew and your own arm, it fires bolts of bile that deal 1d6 Acid damage on a hit, and can deal an extra 1d6 on a hit once per turn
And if that wasn’t enough for you, you also can Extend Lims. You Can spenda Psionic Energy Die and give yourself 5 ft of increased reach or speed, or increase the range of your Touch spells to 10 feet. Horrifying.
What About At Higher Levels?
At higher levels the Metamorph subclass proves to be suitably unhinged. Though you do have to wait. Level 6 is honestly? Reasonable. You get Extra Attack, because duh, you’re a magic fighter, you want extra attack with all those body horror weapons. And you get Quickened Healing because you can stitch your body closed by spending two Psionic dice and casting Cure Wounds as a Bonus Action with some extra hit points as well.
But at level 10, the Metamorph is back on its BS. Mutable Form unleashes three new benefits any time you use your Extended Limbs feature. So you can spend a Psionic die and for 10 minutes, gain one of three different bonuses as part of your fleshy transformation:
- Stony Epidermis: your skin hardens and you gain advantage on Concentration checks, and gain resistance to one damage type except not Radiant, Necrotic, or Force
- Superior Stride: while not wearing armor, you can dash as a Bonus Action and have a Climb/Swim speed equal to your regular speed
- Unnatural Flexibility: gain a +2 bonus to your AC as your whole body becomes disturbingly pliable – you can now also move through a space as narrow as 1 inch, and you can spend 5 feet of movement to go boneless (literally) and escape a grapple or nonmagical restraints, no check/save needed
Finally at level 14, Life-Bending Weapons is here to empower your metamorph weapons. You can spend a Psionic die whenever you hit a creature with your organic weapons, and when you do, you deal that die plus your Intelligence modifier to each creature of your choice in a 10 foot emanation from the target.
In Conclusion, the Metamorph Subclass is Viscera-lite
You might have read all these features, and be thinking, “this time they’ve gone too far” but honestly, I worry they haven’t gone far enough. The Metamorph doesn’t get to use their main currency, psionic energy dice, to change their attacks until level 14. And by the time you get to your capstone feature? The like crowning glory for sticking with it all this way? You just get to maybe do an AoE? That is weaksauce.
It feels like such a missed opportunity to let psionic powers go wild – sure you can cast spells and that’s still gonna be a lot of what you do. But I feel like most people would want to pick up this class for the Organic Weapons and not the weird side effects you get at level 10. If it were up to me, I’d refocus some of those abilities to be more centered around that. It’s a cool theme, and I wish they played with it more. Especially since most of what you’ll want to be doing in this class is using your gross flesh crossbow.
But my opinion won’t matter nearly as much as yours. If you fill out the survey that is. It opens June 3rd, so follow the link below to let WotC know what you really think once it comes out!
Happy adventuring!
