Well I'm makeing a few psyonic tonight so I want to ask what style is the best for psyonics ?

For me I think they should feel A touch different then normal spells and if done best a bit strange and a touch more like meta physics then spell.

So things like working finger guns small hand blades of energy and other things that don't "feel" just like another spell.

While I understand the design need to do so some times I actually dislike psyonics that are 1:1 copys of spells.

So what does everyone else think?


Cross posting this on the only other rpgsite I visit.

I think it depends very much on the setting and style of the game in question.  Psionics in games which play out like Akira, Firestarter and Scanners is going to feel very different from psionics in games which play out like The Others or Babylon 5.

Similarly, if you want psi to "feel" different from magic, you have to specify what kind of magic you're talking about. Much of the "magic" in the Deryni novels of Katherine Kurtz, for example, is based on classic psychic abilities that are channelled and enhanced through religious ritual, but there is also genuine invocation of spiritual entities -- mostly angels, in a spirit of prayerful supplication, but it is definitely a step beyond.

Tell us a little bit about the game you're designing these characters for and what the magic or powers already present in the game are like, and we could probably give you more useful feedback.

Okay I had to post a bit earlyer about this in the other version of this thread so its like this.
The core of the game is medieval fantasy with select technology up to the 1700s.
The world is fairly high magic and has living god walking around so magic is also fairly common.
The way the system works ability are learned on a prerequisite system its fairly simple one general and one specific perquisite ability (both come out of your point total) and that grants you access to abilitys of a given type while giving players the option of picking up abilitys outside of what perquisites your class learn normally.(the entire system runs on the idea that rather then getting say 2 spells and a feat at given level you get so meany points worth of stuff and point costs assume its even if you spent the same number of points.)
For psyonics I'm planing on makeing 3 core psyonic classes the 3 i have in mind (subject to change if I get a good idea) are as fallows
Psychic this is the core battle focus psychic that has more or less good hp and lesser psyonic power points.

Esper this is the natural and likely untrained psyonic class they have less hp but a maxed psyonic power points die (think psyonic mana or energy) so They will tend to have more energy over the course of a day.

The last class I am planing on making is the empath this would be the psyonic healer based straight out of the episode of star trek on the idea of healing others by taking injerys on them selves. the idea is as they level the wounds they take for useing there powers become lesser for the amount they heal and getting ways to speed and recover from those injerys faster then a normal character.
My influences or at least my bigger ones are things like E's otherwise and witch hunter robin and 3.5s psyonics rules even though I never got to play with those rules.

Quote from: kosmos1214 on December 17, 2024, 08:45:39 PMWell I'm makeing a few psyonic tonight so I want to ask what style is the best for psyonics ?

For me I think they should feel A touch different then normal spells and if done best a bit strange and a touch more like meta physics then spell.

So things like working finger guns small hand blades of energy and other things that don't "feel" just like another spell.

While I understand the design need to do so some times I actually dislike psyonics that are 1:1 copys of spells.

So what does everyone else think?


Cross posting this on the only other rpgsite I visit.

Just to give you some food for thought...

I made a magic/psionic system for a sci-fi game I'm running based on Mass Effect.

I basically made a list of powers that are used by spending points from a pool (Tech points).  From here I basically used old Star Wars TTRPG as a model.

Star Wars had a skill called "Use the Force."  Whenever you wanted to so something using the force you would make a skill check to determine how successful the attempt would be.

Ex. I want to use the force to life that crate and throw it. 

Ok. Use the force DC 10 to successfully throw it. 


In my sci-fi game I expanded this concept to allow variability to the abilities (Biotics).

Ex. I want to use my biotics to lift the target...

-or-

I want to use my biotics to cloud the mind of the enemy.

I want to channel a biotic barrier to protect my ally.

Etc...

All of this is adjudicated by the "Use Biotics" skill.


This makes it feel sufficiently different from casting spells as it requires that you describe in some detail what you want to do, spend points and then roll a skill to determine the level of success or failure.

Anyways, it seems to be working out well so far.

Hope that helps

Psionics was originally invented by parapsychologists as a way to explain away magic using science, then scifi writers ran with this, then TSR incorporated it into D&D. If you have traditional magic systems, then psionics is gonna feel less and less distinct. In particular, it's gonna feel very similar to D&D's sorcerers and to Qi cultivation. The traditional magic systems have already incorporated most of the effects that psionics would have anyway.

I think a better way to explain away the distinctions is to focus on the limitations. It's not that magic and psi do different things, it's that they have different limitations. Magic involves incantations, rituals, paraphernalia, invocations, ingredients, etc. Psi only requires mental concentration and maybe has crystals involved?

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on December 18, 2024, 09:39:20 AMPsionics was originally invented by parapsychologists as a way to explain away magic using science, then scifi writers ran with this, then TSR incorporated it into D&D. If you have traditional magic systems, then psionics is gonna feel less and less distinct. In particular, it's gonna feel very similar to D&D's sorcerers and to Qi cultivation. The traditional magic systems have already incorporated most of the effects that psionics would have anyway.

I think a better way to explain away the distinctions is to focus on the limitations. It's not that magic and psi do different things, it's that they have different limitations. Magic involves incantations, rituals, paraphernalia, invocations, ingredients, etc. Psi only requires mental concentration and maybe has crystals involved?

Basically this.

Rationalist thinkers didn't like the idea of the supernatural; if God is real then you need to follow his commands and how are you supposed to experiment on those declared less-than-full-persons by the state (ex. the mental ill, criminals) if you have a higher moral authority judging you?

So they invented their own "totally scientific" explanation for all the supernatural things that kept cropping up. It's not water, its dihydrogen-monoxide... TOTALLY different. They're not demons, they're noncorporeal psychic entities offering us goodies for denouncing the existence of God.

Psionics is just magic for people too 'mature' to believe in magic. If you have a magic system for your setting already, you don't need psionics. If you want something like the sci-fi psionic types... make it a subclass of your spellcasters using whichever casting attribute is appropriate (if its mental conditioning - wizard, force of personality - sorcerer or bard, communing with psychic entities - clerics or warlocks).

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on December 18, 2024, 09:39:20 AMthen TSR incorporated it into D&D. If you have traditional magic systems, then psionics is gonna feel less and less distinct. In particular, it's gonna feel very similar to D&D's sorcerers and to Qi cultivation. The traditional magic systems have already incorporated most of the effects that psionics would have anyway.

I remember reading somewhere that D&D Psionics was an attempt to duplicate Dr Strange style magic in a game that already had a magic system.

Ironically, I think a psionics vs magic distinction makes more sense in a scifi setting rather than a fantasy one.

In a fantasy setting, psionics are just gonna be one of multiple power sources for magic and probably lumped in with qi and siddhi. Can you think of a reason why it shouldn't?

Whereas in a scifi setting, you can posit a history of science where psionics becomes more widely accepted as its prevalence increases and tie it into a newly discovered fifth fundamental interaction. Psionics isn't magic, it's just a newly discovered branch of science. Dark matter, dark energy, quantum entanglement, wormholes, mind reading, telekinesis, etc would all be explained as manifestations of the fifth force. Then you introduce magic into that equation, and here magic is understood as something that operates beyond science. There's no scientific reason why speaking an incantation over an altar while waving a pendulum would cause anything to happen, but magic happens!

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on December 18, 2024, 09:39:20 AMI think a better way to explain away the distinctions is to focus on the limitations. It's not that magic and psi do different things, it's that they have different limitations.

Exactly. As Brandon Sanderson has pointed out, it's a lot more important for rule design purposes what your magicians (or in this case psychics) can't do than what they can.

In D&D the one thing wizards and sorcerers can't do is heal; you need a cleric or druid for that. If you can think of something your psychics can do which neither your wizards nor clerics can, that will help.

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser on December 18, 2024, 03:48:05 PM

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on December 18, 2024, 09:39:20 AMI think a better way to explain away the distinctions is to focus on the limitations. It's not that magic and psi do different things, it's that they have different limitations.

Exactly. As Brandon Sanderson has pointed out, it's a lot more important for rule design purposes what your magicians (or in this case psychics) can't do than what they can.

In D&D the one thing wizards and sorcerers can't do is heal; you need a cleric or druid for that. If you can think of something your psychics can do which neither your wizards nor clerics can, that will help.

Good point, but this is tough in D&D because wizards' magic is extremely broad.  It can do just about anything.  You might need to take some things away from wizards for psis to have a unique role.

Quote from: Mishihari on December 19, 2024, 03:10:23 AM

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser on December 18, 2024, 03:48:05 PM

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on December 18, 2024, 09:39:20 AMI think a better way to explain away the distinctions is to focus on the limitations. It's not that magic and psi do different things, it's that they have different limitations.

Exactly. As Brandon Sanderson has pointed out, it's a lot more important for rule design purposes what your magicians (or in this case psychics) can't do than what they can.

In D&D the one thing wizards and sorcerers can't do is heal; you need a cleric or druid for that. If you can think of something your psychics can do which neither your wizards nor clerics can, that will help.

Good point, but this is tough in D&D because wizards' magic is extremely broad.  It can do just about anything.  You might need to take some things away from wizards for psis to have a unique role.

Something that I think would make magic more interesting in D&D would be if you took the school specializations and domains to the extreme and made it so wizards can only cast spells from their chosen domain (or less extreme non-specialist spells at half-level... so at level 7 you unlock 4th level specialist spells and 2nd level other spells) and the same for clerics and their domains (though for 5e you'd need to expand what counts as a domain spell).

Psionics could then be a sort of specialization that's built as a hybrid of some parts of divination, enchantment and evocation that offers more flexibility but with the power of specialization in a single school.

Quote from: Chris24601 on December 19, 2024, 10:14:25 AM

Quote from: Mishihari on December 19, 2024, 03:10:23 AM

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser on December 18, 2024, 03:48:05 PM

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on December 18, 2024, 09:39:20 AMI think a better way to explain away the distinctions is to focus on the limitations. It's not that magic and psi do different things, it's that they have different limitations.

Exactly. As Brandon Sanderson has pointed out, it's a lot more important for rule design purposes what your magicians (or in this case psychics) can't do than what they can.

In D&D the one thing wizards and sorcerers can't do is heal; you need a cleric or druid for that. If you can think of something your psychics can do which neither your wizards nor clerics can, that will help.

Good point, but this is tough in D&D because wizards' magic is extremely broad.  It can do just about anything.  You might need to take some things away from wizards for psis to have a unique role.

Something that I think would make magic more interesting in D&D would be if you took the school specializations and domains to the extreme and made it so wizards can only cast spells from their chosen domain (or less extreme non-specialist spells at half-level... so at level 7 you unlock 4th level specialist spells and 2nd level other spells) and the same for clerics and their domains (though for 5e you'd need to expand what counts as a domain spell).

Psionics could then be a sort of specialization that's built as a hybrid of some parts of divination, enchantment and evocation that offers more flexibility but with the power of specialization in a single school.

That would make it more interesting.  I've done something similar in my game.  Characters spend experience to gain stats, and a sorcerer can spend points to increase the magic ability score, which affects all spells, a discipline skill, which affects spells of a certain type, and skills for a particular spell, with the obvious tradeoff in cost to increase each.  A player can choose for his character to be a generalist, a narrow specialist, are anything in between.  In practice I'm expecting to see the discipline skills being preferred, which will mean mostly specialists in life, elemental, spirit, or sensory magic with limited ability outside of their area.  It's working out pretty well so far in playtest, with little overlap of abilities of the sorcerers in the party.

I think Spheres of Power does it better than D&D core. Instead of schools and domains, it uses spheres that cover the functionality of both. The limitations of arcane, divine, psionic, etc. are covered by casting traditions. Then the classes determine your role in combat.

Quote from: Captain_Pazuzu on December 18, 2024, 08:43:33 AM

Quote from: kosmos1214 on December 17, 2024, 08:45:39 PMWell I'm makeing a few psyonic tonight so I want to ask what style is the best for psyonics ?

For me I think they should feel A touch different then normal spells and if done best a bit strange and a touch more like meta physics then spell.

So things like working finger guns small hand blades of energy and other things that don't "feel" just like another spell.

While I understand the design need to do so some times I actually dislike psyonics that are 1:1 copys of spells.

So what does everyone else think?


Cross posting this on the only other rpgsite I visit.

Just to give you some food for thought...

I made a magic/psionic system for a sci-fi game I'm running based on Mass Effect.

I basically made a list of powers that are used by spending points from a pool (Tech points).  From here I basically used old Star Wars TTRPG as a model.

Star Wars had a skill called "Use the Force."  Whenever you wanted to so something using the force you would make a skill check to determine how successful the attempt would be.

Ex. I want to use the force to life that crate and throw it. 

Ok. Use the force DC 10 to successfully throw it. 


In my sci-fi game I expanded this concept to allow variability to the abilities (Biotics).

Ex. I want to use my biotics to lift the target...

-or-

I want to use my biotics to cloud the mind of the enemy.

I want to channel a biotic barrier to protect my ally.

Etc...

All of this is adjudicated by the "Use Biotics" skill.


This makes it feel sufficiently different from casting spells as it requires that you describe in some detail what you want to do, spend points and then roll a skill to determine the level of success or failure.

Anyways, it seems to be working out well so far.

Hope that helps

So the way the system I am makeing works all abilitys are cosidered eaqual at a given ability level so each one gets it's own spell style write up. I am thinking of makeing proficancys paladium style as skills. I might add some element of that do magic but I need to keep in mind my number spread so I dont end up with everything ending up as turn based rocket tag.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on December 18, 2024, 09:39:20 AMPsionics was originally invented by parapsychologists as a way to explain away magic using science, then scifi writers ran with this, then TSR incorporated it into D&D. If you have traditional magic systems, then psionics is gonna feel less and less distinct. In particular, it's gonna feel very similar to D&D's sorcerers and to Qi cultivation. The traditional magic systems have already incorporated most of the effects that psionics would have anyway.

I think a better way to explain away the distinctions is to focus on the limitations. It's not that magic and psi do different things, it's that they have different limitations. Magic involves incantations, rituals, paraphernalia, invocations, ingredients, etc. Psi only requires mental concentration and maybe has crystals involved?

Quote from: Chris24601 on December 19, 2024, 10:14:25 AM

Quote from: Mishihari on December 19, 2024, 03:10:23 AM

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser on December 18, 2024, 03:48:05 PM

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales on December 18, 2024, 09:39:20 AMI think a better way to explain away the distinctions is to focus on the limitations. It's not that magic and psi do different things, it's that they have different limitations.

Exactly. As Brandon Sanderson has pointed out, it's a lot more important for rule design purposes what your magicians (or in this case psychics) can't do than what they can.

In D&D the one thing wizards and sorcerers can't do is heal; you need a cleric or druid for that. If you can think of something your psychics can do which neither your wizards nor clerics can, that will help.

Good point, but this is tough in D&D because wizards' magic is extremely broad.  It can do just about anything.  You might need to take some things away from wizards for psis to have a unique role.

Something that I think would make magic more interesting in D&D would be if you took the school specializations and domains to the extreme and made it so wizards can only cast spells from their chosen domain (or less extreme non-specialist spells at half-level... so at level 7 you unlock 4th level specialist spells and 2nd level other spells) and the same for clerics and their domains (though for 5e you'd need to expand what counts as a domain spell).

Psionics could then be a sort of specialization that's built as a hybrid of some parts of divination, enchantment and evocation that offers more flexibility but with the power of specialization in a single school.

Thank you you have given me some reading to do. Both a parapsycoligy and psyonics as well as the pages you linked. One of the rules I came up with by default was that magic would have no force grabs and that magic is built on the "magic is a formula". So if I break the no force grabs rule they are going to be limited. One that does exist is "shuffle" that lets gamblers and other magic users that are useing the throwing card weapons recover and shuffle there deck.

As to the idea of spliting magic and makeing mages speacialze in schools to be capable of a given type of magic there are several systems that do that.
The best example I am thinking of is anima beyond fantasy. In anima beyond fantasy you have to speacize in the kind of magic you want to learn and your point costs for learning diferent kinds of magic change based on what magic youe speacialize in. The best example in my head is that you pay double to learn a form of magic the only you are speaciazed in. The biggest example of the is that necromancy is opposed by all other forms of magic.

I'm going to suggest a look at Katherine Kutz's "The Adept" series as inspiration.  The magic is based on modern parapsychology and some ritual magic, low key but powerful if leveraged properly.  I didn't mention it earlier because it didn't seem like what you were interested in, but since parapsychology came up ... 

I like it.  It's unique and supports a kind of occult atmosphere.  I used it as one of the bases for sensory magic in my game.