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I ran into another hiccup in my understanding of the rules for the Blasting Wilder.

A blasting wilder uses her wild surge not to improve her psionic powers, but to enhance her surge blast ability. Any time the blasting wilder invokes a wild surge, she gains no increase to her manifester level, but adds one die of damage to her surge blast for each point of the wild surge and can expend her psionic focus to use her surge blast as a free action in the same round she used her wild surge, although she may only do this once per round, even if wild surging more than once per round. This ability functions in all other ways as Wild Surge, including the risk of psychic enervation, and is modified by the wilder’s surge choice as normal. Wild surges that do not increase the manifester level, such as Efficient Surge, cannot be used with this archetype.

Does this mean that even if I utilize Surge Blast twice, the second blast would not benefit from the additional damage dice of the archetype?

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  • \$\begingroup\$ Just realized how much of a run-on sentence that ability is. Let me see if I can dissect it... \$\endgroup\$
    – Ifusaso 'he-him'
    Commented Nov 29, 2019 at 18:51

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Any time the blasting wilder invokes a wild surge,

  • she gains no increase to her manifester level
  • (but) adds one die of damage to her surge blast for each point of the wild surge
  • (and) can expend her psionic focus to use her surge blast as a free action in the same round she used her wild surge
  • (although) she may only do this once per round
    • even if wild surging more than once per round.

Looking at the ability (plus the activation text from Wild Surge) broken down, it seems that you can:

  • Use the appropriate Action to Manifest a Power (even a Talent) allowing you to
  • Wild Surge as part of Manifesting the Power allowing you to
  • Free Action Surge Blast with archetype and Wild Surge bonus

Notably, it begins with "Any time the blaster wilder invokes a wild surge," followed by some functionality; the restriction of once per round is specifically after "and can expend...". It seems that the first part is the Wild Surge's new functionality; after the "and" is about Action Economy.

The intent seems to be that, even with an ability allowing you to Manifest a second power (triggering a second Wild Surge opportunity), you would not be able to Free Action Surge Blast from both. If they did not allow for at least one Surge Blast to be used while Manifesting in the same round, there would be no way to gain the other benefits listed in the Archetype's Wild Surge. This seems like the logical use of the ability because Wild Surge isn't an action, and Manifesting/Surging are both (usually) Standard Actions.

If you are able to Manifest twice, regain your Psionic Focus and Surge Blast twice (one being a Free Action) all in one round, both Surge Blasts would benefit from your bonus damage. However, the abilities seem to be written to avoid that. You are far more likely to be able to Quicken Power Manifestation>Wild Surge>Free Wild Surge Blast>Regain Focus (or have a 2nd on-hand)>Standard Surge Blast (or Manifest a Power without Surging) as a nova strike.

Dreamscarred Press is a 3rd party material producer, and (although they tend to have better written and balanced material than some others) do not have the same amount of proofreading of their material that Paizo does. Unfortunately, this ability was unusually poorly written, and you should pass any interpretation of it by your GM to ensure that they agree.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ I appreciate the detailed answer. I had completely forgotten about the beginning of the description. "Any time..." \$\endgroup\$
    – Vincent
    Commented Nov 29, 2019 at 19:54
  • \$\begingroup\$ There’s certainly some wording issues here, and in other DSP products, but for what it’s worth, being somewhat familiar with the processes at both publishers... your final assertion isn’t always the case. Paizo keeps to an absurd release schedule, and in order to do that, some releases are almost purely freelancer work with the barest of oversight or editing. Some DSP products, on the other hand, have gone through actual years of testing and editing, which is something Paizo simply would never, perhaps could never, do. Both companies have a lot of variance in their catalogs’ quality. \$\endgroup\$
    – KRyan
    Commented Mar 6, 2020 at 14:32
  • \$\begingroup\$ That's good to know, and maybe I worded it poorly, but it's been my experience that 3pp are far less clear in what they actually do far more often than Paizo material. There are exceptions (Monkey Lunge come to mind) but I do think it's worth noting that 3pp material will require an agreement between GM and player (or GM decision if no agreement is reached) about what it actually does far more often. I could leave out the portion about balance because it's not integral to the footnote, but I do believe DSP attempts to maintain balance whereas others use power creep to sell. \$\endgroup\$
    – Ifusaso 'he-him'
    Commented Mar 7, 2020 at 17:34

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