RoyAlan's page

As far as the Occultist goes, I think back to the Black and white film DRACULA, starring Bela Lugosi. The doctor who analyzed the ghoul's blood and relentlessly studied lore of the supernatural so he could combat it.

I look at the 1e occultist rate of acquired implements and compared it to the old psionicist class chart (Steve Winter AD&D brown cover). I get the impression that the Occultist was meant to be a nod to the psionicist of yore. yet, I was so disappointed when I saw a spell list and spell slots. That was then though. now, I say let the occultist keep implements and spell casting.

I'll play a real psionicist.

I went to post my own review of the Tome of Psionics over at Drive Thru rpg. it's gone. The author's youtube channel is gone. His deviant art webpage is dead. The Discord channel he made to discussion the Current revision project, is gone.

I do not know the guy. Can someone check to see that he's not suicidal or anything?

They probably just blocked your posts with that extension.

wow. classy.

what...

no comments now?

you must be happy
so happy with yourselves.

I went to post my own review of the Tome of Psionics over at Drive Thru rpg. it's gone. The author's youtube channel is gone. His deviant art webpage is dead. The Discord channel he made to discussion the Current revision project, is gone.

I do not know the guy. Can someone check to see that he's not suicidal or anything?

You can also go nuts with this weird interpretation of magic...
You just have to put up with anime being... anime.

See; Orion by Masamune Shirow

...I am not sure. I wish to encourage you to go with the topics most dear to your heart. I can imagine a "Self-buff" magus based on Alloymancy. treat buffs as "Long duration" spells, but as a stance "burning the metal" makes the effects amplified and immediate, then gone.
I can imagine a Device focused alchemist called Radionics (*Not psionics. Psionics is an internal art, which requires no external manipulation and no devices) Radionics is nothing but "flim-flam" devices that have magical effects (I guess that would be an alchemist research field that is not a "Dabbler" when it comes to talisman). I am not 100% sure but there might only be a few "Devices", one could start by filling a Doctor's bag with tools every Alchemy method investigator would want and need!
With fulus, a variant spellcaster comes to mind; Celestial caligraphy. A prepared caster like the wizard, but instead of preparing spells you create Scrolls that are only potent for one day- From daily prep to daily prep. Scrolls can be attached to stuff and left, all kind of applications for magic that is Triggered by Reading, touch, or tearing.
Ya know what, the occult tradition treatsie in the "Secrets of Magic" discusses a great deal of Connections and reading the woven skien of magic. this gives me an Idea:
Sympathetic Magic. (*Often depicted as originating with the Voo Doo religion, Things like "voo doo dolls" are only one example of "I do this to this symbolic representation, and THAT happens to XYZ no matter where they are or go)

(I AM NOT BEING RUDE/A TOOL, Please do not misunderstand me) you could turn mathematical functions, trigonometric identities, calculus and differential formulas into some kind of bizzaro "Math-magic" (Again, I am not attacking any one with this. It is only an IDEA)
Also, you could do research on magic rooted in symbols. Take the Yin-Yang for example. It expresses infinite dualities, their interactions and predicted outcomes. There must be a hundred or so symbols world wide that can be turned into a game mechanic or a little "game-in-the-game" for creating-casting spells.
so those are a few of my ideas;

Alloymancy as per brandon Sanderson books?
Talismonger (radionics ala, Device alchemist)
Celestial caligraphy: Scroll-caster.
Sympathetic Magic: A drawn picture of Knight bob, held in a torches flames... OW OW OW OW OW OW!
Mathematica-Magik: Math functions turned into spells.
Symbolic magic: tetris puzzle magic game with spell outcomes?

of note, magic weapons do not require investment, I don't know of the top of my head which kinds of items do and which don't but that is a little reading I need to do. So if you've hit a really hard cap on focus points and don't have any investment points left - You aren't entirely banned from owning and using magic items.

It also specified that you still only restore 1 point when you refocus, and I don't remember it having any feats like the wellspring feats other casters get, so they could never restore more than 1 point. It kneecapped the class in a fundamental way, because it could only use its premiere feature once per combat.

Well, the core rule book for refocus says... you recover one point of focus when you refocus (10 minute rest, but it is also listed as an Exploration activity!)

in my copy of the book, at level 6 there's a Class Feature that increases the amount of focus you can recover with refocus, another at level 12, and again at level 18. there's also: Resonant ability at level 2, harmonic ability at level 4, and the feat which can give you a second harmonic ability at level 6.
At level 5 there is Trance. You can keep using the same power over and over, *FOR FREE* as long as you keep beating the activation roll DC.
If you are a pyro, or a psychic blade, or other kind of psychic, in combat... Trance is like having a quiver of arrows for those powers.

I do not see any "Kneecap" in my copy of the book.

The version I read attempted to shoehorn the focus system into a pseudo-power-point system. It didn't even work as written. There was a feat that was supposed to let you get more focus points, but it didn't say you could take it more than once, so you were forever stuck at 2 points. The feat had some qualifier about "if it gets you above 3" but didn't actually say that it *could* get you above 3 points, since RAW you cap out...

I am not the author, I do not have the older version of the book.

My copy says that "Your secondary ability modifier adds focus points." There is only two choices of secondary ability modifier: wisdom or Constitution. the only way you could have been stuck at 1 focus point is if you only had a 12 or 13 in your chosen secondary and it never improved.

Feats that specify they can only be taken at (requirement) is the norm.
Anyone who meets the prerequisites can purchase any feat they meet the requirements of. In the current book there is only one restriction on how many times one could purchase "knowledge is power" or the 4th level feat for a bonded focus crystal. that is the core rulebook limit of three focus points and the number of investment points you have (in most cases 10) as you either "invest" in focused items to get more focus... or have a secondary ability score greater than 12-13, or take feats like "Knowledge is power".

Every point you go OVER the limit of 3 focus, reduces your investiture by one for each. So an 18 (+4) secondary ability would give you 4 points of focus and cost you one investment point. A 20 secondary ability score would be 5 points of focus and cost you two of your points that you could invest in magic items.

Core rule book: I can easily build a human monk and have 2 focus points at level one, and as I gain levels and spend class feats on more focus spells If the feat says "You gain one focus"... you gain one focus.
now Ki rush, Ki strike, and Ki blast are just a few of the monk's focus spells. General rule, RAW: the monk Caps at three focus points.
Focus isn't a spell point system...
(well, if you are playing an Evoker wizard using the force bolt focus spell, I guess it is)
How many classes have focus spells? bard, champion, cleric, druid, magus, monk, oracle, ranger, Sorcerer, summoner, witch, wizard...
Did I forget somebody? on average how many focus spells are available to each class? I do not know. That's the core rule book! so, is the focus point system a spell point system? I'll let you read the core rules and decide.

The Tome of Psionics that I have says, (Specific rule, trumps General RAW *You can have more than 3 focus, for every point above the limit of 3, you lose one point of investiture.

how likely is it that you will every have more than 13 focus points? I don't know, sounds hard to attain even with a 24 secondary ability +7, class feats for knowledge is power, and receptacle, or focused items. or, wait...
eleven class feats by level 20, and who knows how many items you could have bought! at high levels You might need the general feat (what's the name) "Extreme investiture"? to get the maximum of +2 more investiture.

We have a player in our group who has been known to play the Int 7 Wis 10 Cha 7 barbarian who does that. The difference? He let's us know it!

"You guys know my character is the dumbest in the party, right? Why is it then that I'm always the one coming up with all the ideas. Do you not see the disconnect there? Aren't you players cleverer than my low-intelligence character?"

He doesn't play with us anymore.

Ouch. I am sorry about that. Playing the game does take a certain degree of imagination, visualization, and social skill. If your playing the investigator for the "Unlimited use of True strike" as I have heard one youtuber exclaim; you have completely missed the point.

I also cringed a bit as I watched the recent "Secrets of Magic" actual play. I listened to the "mission" given at the beginning and I already thought of the consequences of giving immature people unbridled power. The "Hollow man" movie with its invisible main character is an example of the bad things that can happen, as is the young woman from the movie Crouching tigger, Hidden Dragon.

I am glad that Xander (Ingot) was there looking for possibilities outside the box. I agree that role playing can be very sophisticated and involved. One has to be more than "point-click, here's your conversation options", you just need to "be" your character and play that role. It is something that I don't think everyone gets, because they have never been a part of a play as an adult. Character eludes some people.

Being good at Role playing games, isn't automatic. I've had a lot to learn and I still find more that I can do to be a better player.
I do hope your friend returns to the table, think of the Game of Thrones Actor who played lord Tywin targarian; I got the drift that he was taking time to teach all of the Actors and actresses to raise their game. I don't mean dying whilst indisposed, but there are times when we should all strive to be a bit more like Tywin and the actor who played the character.

Sorry for the off track nature of my post in a thread about familiars.
I would just carefully read the RAW, and GM the Rule of cool, because we are playing a game. we are meant to have fun. even when our dice are destined to be microwaved until dead for their treason.

Perhaps it's been improved over the years, but what I read in the Tome of Psionics two years ago was a mess - a friend had purchased it hoping to use it in our games, he's a huge psionics fan - and did not fit in 2e in the slightest. Given that, I have no inclinations to see if the book *has* improved, it's not worth the money. My friend has thrown his old copy out.

All the tantrums thrown by the author are another reason he's never getting a dollar from me.

The Tome of Psionics has had a revision since then and there will be another. I have a copy and I love it. it is a solid Pathfinder 2E book, with its rules coming from the core rule book.

I don't care if the author had to defend himself from internet people. I've seen all the reviews too, and the negative reviews are specious at best. I'd say there are plenty of trolls throwing hate and irrationality. Especially, trolls who don't even bother to read. "Oh! focus points have me so confused" writes one, Am I the only the one who knows how to open the core rule book and go to the spells chapter and read the rules about focus? I don't think so. In Fact, I know so.

I have the book. Its a solid Pathfinder 2E book. I like it, a lot. Its a copper seller over at drive thru rpg, I've no idea what that means, but I am certain that a lot of other people have bought a copy and like it. There are positive reviews and I haven't written mine YET! Comments like yours have sealed the deal for me though.

I look at some of the spells in the secrets of magic and I see hints of the tome of psionics. I like the Blame power from the Tome of psionics, and I am pleased to see "shift blame" on the occult list.

Hey, I am really surprised that anyone at Paizo knows anything about the oneiroi. I hope they know about Morpheus; no not from the Matrix movies, and not so much the Sandman books by Neil Gaiman. Yet, here I see a spell "oneiric mire" which reads a bit like the Shadow sink power from the Apport art.

and there's more hints, but I think to mention some of those would be really reaching, really stretching to make a connection that isn't there.
as mentioned in the original post;

If the Tome of Psionics did inspire, the author should be thankful for the recognition, such as it is.
If the those ideas were arrived at independently, the author should be flattered as great minds do think alike.

I think between Occult Adventures, the inclusion of the occult spell list in PF2, and their talk about psychics, it's pretty unlikely that Paizo is going to making psionics. They left that to third-party publishers in first edition.

The sorts of non-spell things you describe above were represented in PF1 with occult skill unlocks, which seem most likely to be skill feats in PF2. (Reading a friend's mind, reading an object, healing with prolonged touch, and sensing the location of certain things were all covered, as were certain forms of reading the future. Moving objects and lighting fires fell more under kineticist.) They approached those themes more through the lens of 1800s mysticism and occultism than the lens of 1900s science fiction and parapsychology.

I agree with all of the above. though, some of their content seems to be already in print. The Occult sorcerer is very much a "psychic lite". With the Secrets of magic, we have the phantom summoning medium. I am certain that more will follow. Hell, who knows what the Playtest classes will be?

At least one youtube channel has suggested the occultist and another the kineticist, already.

However, they keep surprising us with what they write. Some have suggested that the swashbuckler class was already covered by the Dex fighter and the rogue class, and thus there would be no swashbuckler class- I for one am pleasantly surprised by all of the classes in the Advanced Players Guide. The Inquisitor is a MAJOR fan favorite, but some have suggested that it might be reduced to a cleric doctrine. When I look at all of the options, I wonder if the ninja class is another Rogue Racket. I wonder if the samurai is going to be like the cavalier, an archetype. No rumors I have heard are set in stone, all of them are speculation. Obviously, I do not know!
So we have a lot to be hopeful about, and even more to look forward to...

I'd ask a question; if the familiar is something like a spider monkey why couldn't it dig through your Pack, (throwing things away) while you are in combat?
If the familiar is something like a chicken, and doesn't have the right bonuses (Familiar/master boons) applied to it, I would definitely say it can't do squat, outside of run like hades or taste delicious.

I agree with RavingDork about robot "RAW-DMs" we are playing a GAME, and the rule of cool is a thing. I also believe in role playing as much as Reasonable.

Someone playing a Lenny Vs. George (See, book by John Steinbeck, of mice and Men) with George as a fury barbarian with an 18 strength, 16 Dexterity, 18 Constitution, ...AAAANNNNNDDDD a 7 intelligence, 10 wisdom, and 7 charisma.

With the player not role playing these ability scores as they are?
I start to twitch, a lot. I start crunching on Zoloft like a PEZ addict to avoid opening my mouth. Inside I am YELLING; George wouldn't know that, George would forget all of those details, George is as much a danger to allies as he is to girls with soft curly hair...

I intuit the game as much as I play it, and wacky rules changes because ONE Nut, was once meta gaming like a fire poi performer in a fireworks factory... only serve to make me go...

"Okay, this needs to be ignored."

Not sure where this is coming from on a thread about familiars, but at the very least…

Quote:

I was watching the Youtube channel "How its played" and the cantrip mage hand was nerfed into oblivion. it isn't a "hand" with dexterity, there is no untying knots, no picking locks, no unbuckling of belts...

and there is no given reason for why.

… Why would there be a reason given? You're comparing a PF2 spell to a D&D 5e spell. The PF2 version of the spell didn't come from D&D 5e. In Pathfinder, Mage Hand has always been the name for the cantrip to move an object, and the spell was buffed from PF1 with a scaling weight limit and higher movement speed.

- I couldn't find anything called Legends of Cleric B.

my thoughts are related to "arbitrary rule changes". I am replying to a few elements of your post. I do not mean to offend in any way what so ever.

as to mage hand; Wasn't there a PF1E rogue or mage capable of picking locks from 30ft distance, with... Mage hand? this is why I am lost as to why "mage hand" being nerfed so.
I would hardly call mage hand "Scaling with level" Compare electric arc cast by a 20th level evoker, to a 20th level anything using mage hand. if spells had to be point built, ala Champions/Hero games/Gurps...
How would "2 bulk" compare to the 10d6+ of telekinetic projectile? A level 0 produce flame can light cloth on fire, a level 10 produce flame can blast holes through STEEL SHIELDS! how does that compare?

I intended "legends of cleric B" as a figurative example of a "NORMAL EARTH" where OOPARTS exist, but academia is desperate to deny their existence. Someone like Mesmer can be followed around by the likes of Benjamin Franklin, witness the healing(S) Mesmer is said to have done... but Franklin would still claim none such ever happened.
That you could personally experience something paranormal, take pictures, etc. and the whole world will still call you a liar, charlatan, huckster, hoaxer, or Con artist.

I don't like my fantasy worlds to be perpetually stuck in year 1066 ad. battle of Hastings tapestry.
I liked pathfinder 1e, because the investigator and gunslinger hinted at a progress of history and technology (1700+) then the vigilante seemed to hint at early (1900's) comics and books that smacked of Jules Verne.

if magic is a parallel of technology, the passage of time means that industrious magic item makers will sooner or later invent "Permanent anti-mosquito shells", chambers with "variable atmospheric environmental tempering" (air conditioning+humidifier), "food pantries of temporal stasis" (refrigerators) "same day ravens" (postage) and "unlimited scrying of theater plays, with advertisement to pay the troops for their productions" (television with "programs")

Do I want a fantasy world that is a perfect copy of today? Nope.
I do however want to know that there is "change", that the battle of hastings does one day, come to an end.

thank you to all for a very deep and detailed discussion and reminders.

I know I do not want a repeat of "Mage-onics".
I hope that Pathfinder 2E psionics is something different.
A natural potential of sapient beings to "do" supernatural things, like reading a friend's mind, reading an object, sensing the location of a lost item, Healing another with prolonged touch, improbable hysterical strength, perceptual oddities that seem to distort time and space, the vanishing or appearance of small items, even un-caused "preturbation" of inanimate objects, or spontaneous fires.

None of the above deserve to be "Spells", they are something like incidental precursor states. Psionic ability is more like the sounding of a single letter, while spells are scripts/programs.

Anyway, on the original topic of the thread!

Most of the stuff discussed in Secrets of Magic are things that Paizo has been talking about since the PF2 playtest. I think they hadn't originally planned on codifying it, and were just going to use it for internal guidelines, but people responded very positively to it. I'm not sure what the exact similarities are, but I can at least say that Paizo has been discussing these concepts for at least a few years now.

I remember a bit from a Con video, Logan Bonner stated something to the effect that he was Very interested in writing the fiction elements of the Secrets of Magic book.

Personally, I just found the Arcane "Tools of creation" to be "Similar sounding" to how the Tome of Psionics Author writes about the arcane tradition of magic. The Tome of Psionics, states something along the lines; the "Creation" was made via the "Song of creation". Fragments of this song were stolen by a being who witnessed creation, who later sold these fragments to mortals in exchange for...
Since those days of irredeemable damnation, the arcane fragments have been collected and codified to an extent. Modern practitioners don't have to give up anything to learn the Arcane script/language, or do they? It might be a hidden clause in the first soul binding contract that all who "learn" those secrets owe an eternal debt, perhaps the creator is angry that mortal "noobs" would abuse the perfect order of the creation.

my interpretation; Arcane spell casters are like script kiddies - someone who doesn't know the first thing about computer language, but still calls themselves a hacker. Like Arch-wizards declaring they have mastered the power of the universe... bah! They tinker with the fragments, not even remotely understanding the context or effects of interconnections. This is why all wizards have had the same spells since the beginning of D&D and virtually nothing has changed since.

magic missile is still magic missile
fireball is still fireball
and on and on and on...

"Ya think your an ORIGINAL... wizard?" (*Laughter ensues)

@RoyAlan, since you mentioned having the Tome of Psionics for PF2e, I was wondering if they had an ancestry that's similar to the Elan ancestry for both WOTC's D&D 3.5's Expanded Psionics Handbook and Dreamscarred Press' Ultimate Psionics for PF1e.

Basically, Elans are psionically transformed humanoids that can live indefinitely without having any maximum lifespan limitations [ie. immortal]; I had mistakenly thought that Tome of Psionics was based on the 3.5/PF1e ruleset that got translated into PF2e but it may seem that this simply isn't so.

I'll check the book.

Aracheen- wood elves forced to survive in deep underground caverns due to a cataclysm... they devolved and became more like the giant insects hunting them. I guess this is a "Drow alternative"?
A'Zon- A hurricane tossed fleet of warrior women, who survive on an isle to this day because a magical artifact (*The Motherstone) gives them only baby girls of superior health and beauty... can you say "Wonder woman"?
Boskop- A human off shoot with swollen skulls and the Pepck-C gene. gray pallid skin, thinning hair if any, might have solid black eyes. The gene causes metabolism to run on "fatty tissue", like brains. I guess this is the Mind flayer alternative/non-I.P. violating.
Dremori- millennia of planar exiles, adapted to an outter plane of chaos. Their bodies changed to replace keratin with metals; their hair is like wire, their fingernails are metal, the iris of their eyes is coated in metal, any scars they have or gain, are metal. They are fanatical about law and order. They are equally terrified of chaos in their lives. I don't know what these may resemble, likely original.
Feraelen- Bipedal dogoids (*or Furry kobolds?) described as "the worst traits of dogs and feral children". a small ancestry of savage, pack hunting, bipedal dogs. based on printing dates, the Feraelen existed before the shoony and from the descriptions they are nasty, not nice like the shoony.
Gian- The giant blooded. Some wizard paid a brutish barbarian tribe to take him with them across a mountain range. A terrible blizzard trapped them all on a plateau, tribes of hill giants and ogres united out of hunger. The barbarians were losing against the giant raids. So the wizard used a ring of wishes or a stash of contact outer plane scrolls to find away to give the barbarians the size and might of their foes.
He brewed a cauldron of this potion and the barbarians drank it. becoming Large size, permanently. Now the fight was a standoff, when the storm finally broke they left the mountains alive. all except the wizard, who had died in the final battle. There is no cure, no antidote.
These are Large sized humans with a short list of modifications to overcome the cubed square law and other problems of giantism.
Quell Tian- medium sized Tree Fae with a build like a halfling stretched to twice its height. natural camouflage. fey grace, wind walking, floating steps. A bond with nature that makes hot weather one stage cooler and cold weather one stage warmer, they never get sun-burnt.
Rhodex- a leathery hide, small sized, hunchbacked, orc off-shoot that curls up into a ball and tumbles as fast as an elf can run. a comedy bit about their "soft-circular" martial art that trips or throws their opponents.
Satorian- Exiled to the realm of dream for their Psionics focused culture, the satorians like to wear tribal blue tattoo art, and have a natural crystalized protuberance on the center of their brows. An advanced Psionic ancestry, I guess they resemble the people of Disney's Atlantis.
Vaus Tian- A Fey wild ancestry of slightly taller elves with a small set of ram horns curled at the temples. Their people had attained such piety that their kingdom and out-lands transcended to the shores of the seven heavens, becoming a land at the very base of Mount Celestia. Turned out that their ascension to the heavens was part of a devilish plot, and once the Vaus Tian had served their purpose, the Devils moved in to make war at the very gates of heaven. Once the fiends were repelled, the kingdom and its peoples were stripped of their divine blessing and their kingdom was placed on the mortal world.
Yan- A halfling village preyed on travelers who strayed too close. Little did this band of rogue pranksters know that they had captured, beaten and mocked a demigod. The Demi-god had the last laugh though. He shrank them the entire village and placed it inside a massive bottle inside his mountain domain. Millennia passed When the cataclysm came, the demigod died and the Yan were freed.
A TINY sized race of shrunk halflings who now struggle to survive in a world of monster sized vermin.

That's all of them. I don't see any "Elan".

[Discord(JPEG maps and tokens) Discord voice] Beginner Box, Menace under Otari - 9/11 @ 4:00 P.M. (Arizona, mountain)
https://warhorn.net/events/full-module-play-through-menace-under-otari-onli ne

Question: why is there no +number strength effects?
Barbarians don't have it, transmuter wizards don't have it,

Where did all the ability score buffs go?
and perhaps most importantly... Why?

To the Original poster, 1st and 2nd level...
are akin to NOT having earned your stripes yet. You aren't a black belt.
You (The Character) are still learning.

Dump everything you have into bombs, make it clear to your companions that you will not be providing support healing or buffs.
the one thing an alchemist can do that a wizard can't?
hand out your bombs, share.

I have a 1st level cleric of iomedae in PFS, I do all I can with my two 1st level spell slots and three healing fonts. I hand out "magic weapon" to two allies and... Draw my sword.

I do what I can to keep my fellows alive. I have to sacrifice my own EGO to support others. I play a warpriest, and so far?
I have never cast magic weapon on myself, (and next round) followed it up with true strike.
no, not yet. I do not have the fire power.
I do understand where you are coming from.
Especially when my party is getting TPK'd by a CR 3 monster with a list of advantages larger than my entire group.

To each their own. I'm not a fan of arbitrarily limiting things that fly in the face of common sense. I've had disagreements with Paizo staff and rulings before, only to have the issue eventually turn around in my favor. I'm content to sit back and wait for the wheel to turn. No skin off my back.

this. I feel that the Original poster has given very salient arguments and at the same time, I agree with all of the above.

it's like, "Why is telekinesis not in the spell lists?"
the common answer is, "Cause its so broken"

A) I don't know why telekinesis is "So broken" and no one can actually give me a legitimate answer for why.

B) I used to get upset at the 1e habit of trying to have the same number of "Goodies" for all of the classes. Dear Devs, DON'T DO THAT. if something is a Psionic class archetype, don't take it away and try to shoehorn it to fit only the Paladin!
please.

I was watching the Youtube channel "How its played" and the cantrip mage hand was nerfed into oblivion. it isn't a "hand" with dexterity, there is no untying knots, no picking locks, no unbuckling of belts...
and there is no given reason for why.

One just has to wonder; is golarion supposed to be "just like earth" with vast armies of academia denying the existence of anything paranormal (*Like legends of Cleric B) - Or, is it supposed to be something different. A world where the fantastic does happen.

If Golarion is not the latter, a fantastic world...
how does alchemy work? does an elixir magically become lost litters of blood? Does an elixir "Know" that it is supposed to mend an ACL tendon?
alas, what is the impact of fantasy elements (ever burning torches) on the world of Golarion? Is the world perpetually stuck without running water, indoor plumbing, etc - Or do things actually change because of Characters with classes?

I hope that Golarion is a place of magic, wonder, and danger. I hope that all the "ever burning tortches" that have been made actually do some part to change the world, at least a little bit.

As you all know, I love psionics. I even play full length modules in Pathfinder Society (*So that I can play outside the restrictions and use the Tome of Psionics) to use third party content.

I have recently gotten my copy of the Secrets of Magic and I have been reading it cover to cover. I love the fiction chapter at the beginning of the book. The World grows a bit, and a bit more fascinating.

I am not going to do something stupid like accuse people of copying from my favorite book. that would just be wrong. What I am going to say is that there are similarities dotted throughout the Secrets of Magic book. If the Tome of Psionics even remotely inspired some official content; that is akin to recognition, that the Tome of Psionics authors ideas have merit.
If not, and the same ideas arose independently. That should be flattering to the Authors of the Tome of Psionics as great minds think alike.

okay, but I wish I could have my wish. PSIONICS. the real deal.
I won't play a replaceable "Cog" called a "Spellcaster".

imagine, you create a Ghost bloodline for sorcerers. Your GM allows it. Your game Schtick is to be The-End-all-be-all of force trait spells.
You should be better THAN ANYONE ELSE at those spells, You should have capacities and capabilities that no other caster has with those spells.

but no. you can be replaced at the drop of a hat.
any spellcaster who knows the same spells is every bit as good as you are.
there is no difference. there is no trade off/hindrance and no benefit/boon. the spells are UTTERLY static, fixed, bland, and only a handful (those with AoE/multiple targets, Scaling across Spell levels, and those that give players Options) are actually going to benefit an adventuring party.

Spell casters are all the same. bland, tired ruts, rutted into the dirt.

There has to be a way to use third party content!

reply to Nefreet- look at the extinction curse chronicle sheet,
under the section; key differences from scenarios
it seems that one can play outside the rules, when the chronicle sheet says you can, or am I mistaken?

Reply for keftiu- I am happy for you. Yet that option won't cut it for me. playing with "Wizard spells" makes me no different from any other caster. utterly replaceable, regardless of themes and trappings!
The 2E spell list doesn't even have telekinesis, for example.
You can claim to specialize in telekinesis as an occult sorcerer, but Many "psychic" spells don't scale with spell level, most of them only affect one target at a time. spell descriptions are immutable, static, and fixed. heh, mage hand tops out at 2 bulk, is that really balanced with an electric arc cast by a level 20 evoker?
if your going to play a caster - Just give up role playing and join the bad cliche of; Magic missile, burning hands, web, flaming sphere, acid arrows, lightning bolt, fireball, cloud kill, cone of cold, etc.
anything else and you may as well role up a fighter that only gets 6 hp.
other than the spells listed (or their general gist where spell names have changed) and you will run into the issues I mention above.

its as if the only "mage" type spell caster that is worth a damn is an evoker wizard. which is sad. Where are the telekinesis spells that affect more than one target, or have level equivalent "LIFTING" power?
they just aren't there.

you call your character an occult sorcerer, but don't call your character a "Psychic"...

I have purchased hard copies of the core rules, Advanced player's guide, and many more books. I don't have much of any digital content to download when I buy my books Local.
I also bought the "Tome of Psionics" and I want very much to make psionic characters and play them. How can I do that?

Is there an official ruling for third party content, Like say; legendary games pdf featuring their Mesmerist and kineticist?