Please clarify Empowered Shot feat touch attack option?

Question

Empowered Shot [Psionic]

Prerequisites: Point-Blank Shot.

Benefit: As long as you maintain psionic focus, the range of your ranged weapons doubles. You may expend your touch attack)[sic] to ignore any penalties for range increment for that single attack. That attack still has its range doubled as if you were maintaining psionic focus.

Does expend your touch attack mean you count that single ranged attack at double the range as a touch attack (attack bypasses armor, including shields and natural armor).

Here is how the feat is described in the Psionics Expanded: Advanced Psionics Guide

Empowered Shot [Psionic] You can empower your ranged attacks, sending them farther. Prerequisites: Point-Blank Shot.

Benefit: As long as you maintain psionic focus, the range of your ranged weapons doubles. You may expend your psionic focus as part of a ranged attack (but not ranged touch attack) to ignore any penalties for range increment for that single attack. That attack still has its range doubled as if you were maintaining psionic focus.

So does this mean (example: shuriken 10' range would be now 20') . So does that mean using psionic focus Shuriken can be thrown at it maximum range increment at no penalties some 100'?

Answer 1

The Advanced Psionics Guide version of the feat is correct; ignore the SRD version. Looks like somebody accidentally a few words. If you are interested in having your ranged attacks count as touch attacks, and ignore armor and shields, see the Fell Shot feat.

So does this mean (example: shuriken 10' range would be now 20') . So does that mean using psionic focus Shuriken can be thrown at it maximum range increment at no penalties some 100'?

Yes, that’s exactly what it means.

• The shuriken’s range increment is 10 feet, which is doubled to 20 feet due while you have psionic focus thanks to Empowered Shot.

• The weapons rules add this bit:

  A thrown weapon has a maximum range of five range increments.

  So with Empowered Shot and psionic focus, a shuriken can be thrown at most 100 feet. This would incur a –10 penalty on the attack in most cases, however.

• Expending your psionic focus allows you to ignore range penalties, so that –10 penalty goes away. Empowered Shot explicitly indicates that the range increments are still doubled for this attack.

• Note that any subsequent attacks (e.g. during a full attack) do not benefit, so they still take range penalties, and furthermore (assuming you do not have any second psionic focus, e.g. from a Deep Body or Psicrystal Containment feat) your range is no longer doubled, so you could not attack any target beyond 50 feet.