I was going through the boards the last few days, and came upon a thread about the Metamorphosis psionic ability. Intrigued, I tried to figure out how to abuse this.
Here's my attempt:
Changeling Egoist 5
Feats: Overchannel
Simple, no?
The idea behind this build is that for taking 1d8 damage (which you heal the majority of back when you morph) you can morph into anything of 7 HD or lower. Reasoning for this: You can cast a psionic ability on your list with a cost in power points equal to or under your manifester level. This means that you could cast Metamorphosis at 5th level using Body Control and Overchannel, right?
If so, I would appreciate a few creatures that would be best for abusing this ability.
Books that can be used:
WotC books, both 3.0(if it hasn't been updated) and 3.5; minus UA and MM5
Any help at all is appreciated as this might be one of the builds to use in my next campaign.
Lastly, are the benefits of being a star elf + otherworldly greater than being able to morph into things two levels higher (eventually 3 and I think 4) than my normal ML.
Egoist 5 only Knows powers of 3rd level or lower...... Metamorphosis is 4th level Power.... thus he cant Manifest it because he cant know it... the same for Control Body(4th lvl Kineticist power)
being a Satr Elf and having the feat Otherworldly are great.... Dwarf Ancestor is a Fun 5HD form ...... Ravid is a fun 3HD form
:D
Hehe, my question still stands then. Are there any good forms with this idea?
no it still wont work.... heres why:
even if you Knew the Power(as you do) .... you can only Manifest Powers with a Maximum PP Cost = Manifester Level... in this case 5 PP, however, you want to use Overchannel to boost your ML to be able to Manifest the Power... ok, look at the feat:
OVERCHANNEL [PSIONIC]
You burn your life force to strengthen your powers.
Benefit: While manifesting a power, you can increase your effective manifester level by one, but in so doing you take 1d8 points of damage. At 8th level, you can choose to increase your effective manifester level by two, but you take 3d8 points of damage. At 15th level, you can increase your effective manifester level by three, but you take 5d8 points of damage.
The effective increase in manifester level increases the number of power points you can expend on a single power manifestation, as well as increasing all manifester level-dependent effects, such as range, duration, and overcoming power resistance.
Normal: Your manifester level is equal to your total levels in classes that manifest powers.
so if you want you can manifest a Power that Costs 6 PP,.... but Metamorphosis costs 7 PP...... when you get to 6th level... it will work, but not yet
Hehe, my question still stands then. Are there any good forms with this idea?
... try this:
being a Star Elf and having the feat Otherworldly are great.... Dwarf Ancestor is a Fun 5HD form ...... Ravid is a fun 3HD form
First you must choose which power to manifest. You can select any power you know, provided you are capable of manifesting powers of that level or higher. To manifest a power, you must pay power points, which count against your daily total. You can manifest the same power multiple times if you have points left to pay for it.
Similarly, a Wizard can learn a spell of any level and add it to his spellbook, but that doesn't automatically mean he can cast it. Good try though, kudos.
The first substitution level for Changeling Egoists makes all powers that target himself count as a ML one higher than normal. Overchannel does the same, but deals 1d8 damage to you. At fifth level, this would bump your ML to 7, making you able to cast the Metamorphosis ability gained by taking the substitution level 5.
Better than a good try... :D
It takes a 7th level Psion to manifest 4th level powers. Increasing your Manifester Level cannot overcome that limitation. Unless you have an effect which makes it count as a 3rd level power for you, the character cannot manifest it until he actually reaches Psion 7. Simply increasing your effective manifester level is not enough for a 5th level character to manifest a 4th level power, because regardless of your manifester level you are still restricted to the maximum level of powers for your level in the Psion class. Unless the Changeling racial substitution level actually says that it allows you to overcome this limitation, you cannot manifest this power at an earlier level than normal. The rules explicitly say that you must be capable of manifesting powers of that level or higher, which is not decided by your effective manifester level. Simply being able to spend that many powerpoints on a power is not enough to meet this requirement.
P. 20, second column, last sentence.
This has pretty much been my entire basis for this, hehe.....
Edit: This situation reminds me of the Artificer's ability to create items containing spells of a higher caster level than his own "infusion level." While the numerical effects are lower (such as a fireball being cast by a 3rd level caster only deals 3d6 damage) it is still possible to cast the spell through the item. Just a passing observation.....
from the XPH: ...A psion can manifest any power that has a power point cost equal to or lower than his manifester level....
P. 20, second column, last sentence.
This has pretty much been my entire basis for this, hehe.....
Sure. But the problem is that you can't manifest the power unless you Overchannel it, and you can't Overchannel it unless you can manifest the power.
Now if the feat said you could Overchannel first (somehow) and subsequently manifest the power, it would work.
Enjoy! :D
:OMG! 
Great find, haha... now if I can find a way to get my DM to agree to this...
Divine Minion is in that same locked desk with the other broken things. :D
I've heard talk of a few from the Epic Player's Handbook, and has anyone ran across any other strange ones?