[Pathfinder] Psychic Bloodline Questions and concerns.

[ZombieGirl]

Hello everyone. I haven't played D&D in a while and pathfinder even less (maybe once or twice since it came out). But i recently started making a sorcerer, and found the Psychic Bloodline. This is when all sorts of problems and interpretations started.

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core-classes/sorcerer/bloodlines/bloodlines-from-paizo/psychic-sorcerer-bloodline

The culprit is primarily,

Bloodline Arcana: Your sorcerer spells and spell-like abilities count as psychic instead of arcane. You use thought and emotion components instead of verbal and somatic components when casting your spells.

Some of my questions are:

1) Because verbal and somatic components are gone from spell casting, does this qualify me to wear armor without arcane spell failure even though i may not have the proficiency for such?

2) Because it fundamentally changes me into a psionic caster instead of arcane, do i still qualify for arcane caster PrCs? If not, does my caster level count as my manifester level and thus allow me to qualify for psionic PrCs?

Thanks in advance, tried using the search function for things with "Psychic Bloodline" in it but didnt get much in the way of results hehe.

[TC X0 Lt 0X]

I think you are confusing Psionics and PF Occult Psychic Magic

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/occult-adventures/psychic-magic

While they are somewhat similar in concept, they are different in that Psychic Magic are spells, not powers.


From what I am reading from my link, it appears Psychic Spellcasters are a distinct type of caster separate from Arcane and Divine casters. So with that:
1) I do not believe Psychic Casters incur Arcane Spell Failure
2) No I do not believe so. You do not have manifester levels, you have caster levels. I also imagine with PFs class model, there are not any Psychic Caster Prestige Classes either, so you are probably limited to PrCs that can be entered by nonspecific spellcasters.

[zook1shoe]

Psychic is the 3rd type of spellcasting. Most of the general things that apply to all spells also apply, like caster level, save DCs, casting times.

But as there differences between arcane and divine, psychic has their own quirks. These are...

1- you are a spdllcaster, but not affected by "divine only" or "arcane only" effects, like arcane spell failure or prereqs.
2- instead of the verbal and somatic components, you have emotional and thought components.

[Power]

4th type, more like, given the alchemist and investigator being fundamentally alchemical casters, but technically they don't even count as spellcasters, with all the rules SNAFUs that entails.

To answer OP's questions:
1) Yes.
2) No and no. You are not an arcane caster anymore and you do not have a manifester level for psychic prestige classes. You would only advance casting under untyped spellcaster prestige classes (and the Evangelist). Honestly, I'm leery of mixing Paizo psionics with DSP psionics unless you have good players. It seems like a good way to confuse the hell out of everyone.

On a side note, Psychic bloodline has a couple of fun implications worth noting: A Mongrel Mage Sorcerer or Bloatmage 10 can temporarily transform into a psychic caster with this bloodline. Also, if you obtain the Psychic bloodline spells through Pathfinder Savant, you could probably advance them with Improved Eldritch Heritage (Psychic). Beyond that, the Psychic bloodline becomes better if paired with an Ampoule of False Blood (to obtain the bloodline powers of a different bloodline, such as the Arcane Bloodline) or the Cross-blooded or Seeker archetypes. Unless you're worried about spellbooks though, it's generally better to play a Blood Arcanist than a Sorcerer.