How is 'power derived solely from the mind/will' NOT 'internal'?!How is this NOT exactly the same as a sorcerer!?
Because, frankly, sorcerers make no sense. They still have to gesture and incant (they usually don't have to throw bat poop), but their gestures and incantations are identical to the wizard's (same Spellcraft check identifies their spells). If their power was truly internal, they wouldn't have to do so. Therefore, their power is obviously external, just like the wizard's.
The idea that sorcerer power is 'internal' doesn't stand up to even the lightest of scrutiny.
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Wow, I've only encountered heavily houseruled psionics, then. Thanks for showing me.
It's common with a complete new system for people to not read it properly. A lot of errors come from this at the gaming table.
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To answer the OP's question, some of us simply like the variety of having divine magic/arcane magic and psionics.
As Dabbler pointed out, making sure there is transparency between psionics and magic, avoids an awful lot of headaches. Spell Resistance= Power Reistance etc.
I house rule and go a little further Spell craft= Psi Craft, and Knowledge Arcane = Knowledge Psionics.
So if someone has Knowledge Arcana, they can use that knowledge to identify a psionic effect.
If someone has Spell Craft they can identify psionic powers being manifested and vice versa.
I found this saves an awful lot of trouble. But each to his own.
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So...why do you really feel you need more than that to represent psionics?
Because it's been there since 2e?
Because it got updated to 3e IN ADDITION of being considered "canon"?Because Eberron used psionics for the Kalashtars and the Sarlona region?
Because Dreamscarred Press have been doing a stellar job at converting the rules to PF rules?
To answer the OP's question, some of us simply like the variety of having divine magic/arcane magic and psionics.
As Dabbler pointed out, making sure there is transparency between psionics and magic, avoids an awful lot of headaches. Spell Resistance= Power Reistance etc.
I house rule and go a little further Spell craft= Psi Craft, and Knowledge Arcane = Knowledge Psionics.
So if someone has Knowledge Arcana, they can use that knowledge to identify a psionic effect.
If someone has Spell Craft they can identify psionic powers being manifested and vice versa.
I found this saves an awful lot of trouble. But each to his own.
My only experience with Psionics in a game are in my currently 3.5 one and the GM decided to keep Psionics and Magic completely separate. Both ways have their ups and downs for sure.
Forgotten Realms and Dark Sun keep them separate. In various games where both were available we kept them separate and didn't have any problems. For us it just wasn't a problem.
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Forgotten Realms and Dark Sun keep them separate. In various games where both were available we kept them separate and didn't have any problems. For us it just wasn't a problem.
Forgotten Realms did something in between, which I consider the best solution.
Another difference between magic and psionics to consider is that psionics do not have illusion or necromancy.
How is 'power derived solely from the mind/will' NOT 'internal'?!How is this NOT exactly the same as a sorcerer!?Because, frankly, sorcerers make no sense. They still have to gesture and incant (they usually don't have to throw bat poop), but their gestures and incantations are identical to the wizard's (same Spellcraft check identifies their spells). If their power was truly internal, they wouldn't have to do so. Therefore, their power is obviously external, just like the wizard's.
The idea that sorcerer power is 'internal' doesn't stand up to even the lightest of scrutiny.
half my players are less than digitally competent so I like to keep physical copies of things. also if its good getting the money for the print book means is a vote for more content in general.
Forgotten Realms and Dark Sun keep them separate. In various games where both were available we kept them separate and didn't have any problems. For us it just wasn't a problem.Forgotten Realms did something in between, which I consider the best solution.
Another difference between magic and psionics to consider is that psionics do not have illusion or necromancy.
Forgotten Realms did... strange things... with it. Not bad, just unusual.
Anyway.
In the 3.X era (I've only had it once in the PF era, and that was before Dreamscarred - I was the player, we used transparancy), I've run it without the transparency and with, and in both regards things worked fairly smoothly.
Without the transparency a psion becomes fairly vulnerable, and sort of (somewhat-ish) epitomizes the concept of "glass canon" unless facing against psionic foes, as some of the psionic defenses become less powerful against magic and vice versa... but they gain about an equal advantage against magic-warding foes. Ultimately, it didn't affect gameplay all that much, though it could tend to make things more "swingy" and quasi-pushed things a little more towards the 15-minute adventuring day, as either the Mage or the Mind (as they were referred to) would nova to eliminate the Threat, depending on which was the best suited towards it, and the other one would clean-up/cover for the first.
On the other hand, with transparency, they just become a "cleaner", more well-balanced, and over-all more comprehensible kind of caster.
But that's only my experience.
Heh: I have to say, the infamous and hilarious "Save Point" and "Make Me a Sammich" are some of the best psionic-breaks, though. I heart those.
Anyway, there are several reasons for psionics:
1) the Power Point system is one of the smoothest, most well-balanced magic systems when it's applied properly (though that's a trick, as many dismiss it off-hand or improperly house rule it, or otherwise utilize effects that create confirmation bias).
2) the other mechanical aspects are unique, interesting, and driving enough that it creates useful new mechanics
3) though fluff can be altered (Ashiel did an amazing job at this - ask him about his "witch" sometime), the fluff can help guide the creation of a class, can help give GMs and players alike "permission" to include elements that they might otherwise exclude for "it feels wrong", and can help suggest coherent and comprehensible game-worlds.
The fluff itself is not inherently necessary - but it's useful.
The mechanics are relatively unique even in the way they interact with the current ones.
Creativity (or lack of it) might be part of it, but it's only one part - and laying it all at the feet of "not enough creativity" is disingenuous (although an understandable idea to come up with if you're not part of that thought process).
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Yes, I suppose the components would get a little in the way...
Most of your responses seem pretty reasonable. At least it's not for lack of imagination like I was thinking it might be.
Seriously, bro, come play in my Dark Sun game some time. You'll quickly see that Psionics has as different a flavor from arcane as arcane has from divine.
It doesn't matter how different the FLAVOR is. The flavor can be changed to fit. That's the WHOLE POINT of flavor, meatrace. That's also the point I'm trying to make.
If a play group can get past their own inability to imagine differently, then the sorcerer (or similar class) can make for a perfectly adequate psion.
Mechanics are a bit trickier, as has been observed with spell components.
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Let's turn this around.
If you have psionics, why do you need magic?
You probably wouldn't. You could reflavor your psionic character as a sorcerer.
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It doesn't matter how different the FLAVOR is. The flavor can be changed to fit. That's the WHOLE POINT of flavor, meatrace. That's also the point I'm trying to make.
If a play group can get past their own inability to imagine differently, then the sorcerer (or similar class) can make for a perfectly adequate psion.
Mechanics are a bit trickier, as has been observed with spell components.
The mechanics have a large affect on how it plays out. I like how psionics works, so telling me to use spell slot does not help at all. It is the entire system that is liked, not just the flavor for most of us.
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Let's turn this around.
If you have psionics, why do you need magic?
Short answer: You don't.
Long answer: You don't, and psionics is closer match to many more kinds of magic in fantasy literature then Vancian casting which is kind of an odd duck so arguably this is preferable then the reverse.
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Let's turn this around.
If you have psionics, why do you need magic?
Short answer: You don't.
Long answer: You don't, and psionics is closer match to many more kinds of magic in fantasy literature then Vancian casting which is kind of an odd duck so arguably this is preferable then the reverse.
Agreed. Psionics, especially, work MUCH better for sorcerers, because again, no gestures and incantations. I find myself wondering, at what point, my sorcerer just randomly started waving her hands in the air and saying nonsense words until something happened.
With psionics, though? Some stress, or other strong emotions, and you have a perfect excuse for a power manifestation. Stuck in pitch darkness, and you hear a scary noise? My Light. Why would you suddenly start making weird finger gestures and babbling in hopes that you'd fumble into a Light spell?
It was worse in 3e. Yeah, my guy randomly swallowed a live spider one day, then started walking up the walls on a whim.
(BTW, to me, this thread demonstrates why separating mechanics and flavor is a good thing. You *could* easily reflavor a sorcerer into a psion, EXCEPT the forced mechanics.)
Let's turn this around.
If you have psionics, why do you need magic?
Short answer: You don't.
Long answer: You don't, and psionics is closer match to many more kinds of magic in fantasy literature then Vancian casting which is kind of an odd duck so arguably this is preferable then the reverse.
I agree with this.
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As do I.
Nearly all of my sorcerers eventually end up with Silent Spell, Still Spell, and Eschew Materials. Must be a reason for that...
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The Wilder actually works out far better as a sorcerer, since they can also enhance their power in a way that one would expect an innate spellcaster to be able to do.
The Still/Silent/Eschew stuff actually once inspired me to make a game where actually EVERYTHING supernatural was psionics, some people just didn't realize it ... they had a mental block and needed 'magic feathers' of gestures, incantations, foci, the anthropomorphization of belief, and so forth.
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Really, I think of Psionics as it is and was in D&D as an alternative to magic and a slap in the face of Vancian Casting. (A well deserved slap)
To really balance out a though out Psionic class set with the rest of PF, a overall revamp would need to be done with always on powers, power boosts and reshaping of powers to effect spell like bursts. I think of the 3.5 Warlock without the blast power to center it around.
I think of Jumper, Percy Jackson and other movies that have limited set powers for each individual instead of Star Wars and such.
If any have ever read some of the Myth series books, that is how I see Psionics working.
It doesn't matter how different the FLAVOR is. The flavor can be changed to fit. That's the WHOLE POINT of flavor, meatrace. That's also the point I'm trying to make.
If a play group can get past their own inability to imagine differently, then the sorcerer (or similar class) can make for a perfectly adequate psion.
Mechanics are a bit trickier, as has been observed with spell components.
Maybe flavor is the wrong word then. Feel? It goes beyond fluff, but, from my point of view, the mechanics of all three boil down to the same.
It's how you get there, though. The "flavor" or feel of psionics permeates fluff and crunch. They're powers you're born with, they fit a pattern and a mold, and your cross to bear. It's X-Men as much as it is Babylon 5. But that concept follows through the design; since they are as much a part of you, they are malleable and flexible in a way that spells aren't (incantations that call on otherworldly powers). They can be bent, and sometimes they break YOU (Overchannel much?).
With the DSP psionics it's very much the magic of mutants and dreams. The "flavor" is that psionics (like arcane magic) can't heal outright, so the design follows through and lets you "heal" by taking the wounds of others upon yourself.
For what it's worth, however, in my world the Summoner IS a psionic class, and his eidolon is an Astral Construct in which he has implanted his psicrystal.
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Because it's been there since 2e?
2e saw the purely psionic class appear, but psionics was in AD&D.
You probably wouldn't. You could reflavor your psionic character as a sorcerer.
There are still things that magic can do that psionics cannot - like necromancy and illusions, as was mentioned. Personally I see no harm in blending both systems in any game.
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It occurred to me this morning that the sorcerer and summoner classes could could EASILY be described as psionic characters. You can blast things physically (evocation) mentally (enchantment), manipulate objects telekinetically (telekinesis), build eco-form monstrosities (summon monster)--even around yourself at times (synthesist)--etc. It's all there!
Black blade magus with quick draw even makes a pretty damn good soul knife/psychic warrior even if you ask me.
So...why do you really feel you need more than that to represent psionics?
I've been a long time fan of psionics but lately I've been enamored by them because I've been reminded why I love them and the Dreamscarred updates are simply amazing. Dabbler and others have pointed out some of the many reasons, but I'm going to add a few here that spring out to me and that I've been enjoying over magic in some of the recent games I've been playing in.
1. Psionics is amazingly fluffable. Let's face it. You're talking about how it's so easy to have psychic powers, but it's really not that easy to refluff magic. No matter what you do, you have to waggle your fingers, say lots of magic words, and smear bat poo all over everything. It's a huge drag.
Meanwhile, every Friday, I sit down and play my "witch". When I say witch, I mean a woman who practices magic, deals with spirits, preforms weird pseudo-religious rituals, carries a magical fetish with the soul of her mentor that is bound to her as a form of living phylactery, and spends a lot of her time shapeshifting into different animals, monsters, or just suped up versions of herself.
Mechanically she is a dual-discipline egoist/shaper psion. She's been shapeshifting since 1st level (the party met her in animal form due to a homebrew feat that allows her metamorphosis powers to last obscenely long). Her mentor fetish thing is her psicrystal. When it comes to her "magic" she is a primal individual who often calls on the hag queens, or twists the world around her with her will, or sometimes just gives a cold glare, or once threw countless shards of phantom blades at something while screaming at them.
Her magic can be subtle, or flashy. In fact, I often describe different ways that she and her psicrystal interact with her powers from a narrative standpoint. Her phantom spirits (astral construct) do not have any alignment restrictions, they do not have to be picked off a list of different (and restrictive) lists. Instead you have a statblock and add a few powers and run with it. Quick, efficient. If you want to add more variety, you can add more special abilities rather than having to scour the d20pfsrd.com for expanded lists.
Meanwhile in the same game as my fetish-carrying ritual-performing witch, we have an android soulknife whose psionic powers manifest as energetic subroutines that 'cause circuits on his body to light up and glow, and he can form weapons of energy while doing so. Everything about him seems tech-like in a way that reeks of Numeria.
Further still, a friend of mine in a tabletop game I'm running has a egoist/telepath tiefling that is essentially a do-it-yourself succubus character.
2. It's more intuitive. I'm a major wizard fan but Vancian magic sucks. It is one of the most irritating things to teach a new D&D player because it is so unintuitive and filled with so much minute junk. You need to track spell slots, bonus spell slots, domain spell slots, the works.
Psionics? You have to track 1 thing. Your Power Points. It is literally no different than tracking hit points. A friend of mine who was a casual gamer. The most he ever managed to get into D&D's magic system was a bard. Anything further and he would give up on it. Except he played a psion for 13+ levels without skipping a beat, and this was with someone who often found keeping track of his barbarian's attack modifiers in 3.5 too cumbersome.
Bonus spell slots? Screw 'em. You get +1/2 your key stat per level. I don't ever have to flip to the bonus spells table to know what my bonus spell slots are. It's as simple as this: 15 Int? 8th level? +8 PP. 16 Int? +12 PP. 18 Int? +16 PP.
Further, due to the way power points work, it's much easier to ensure that you have something to do every round. In one of our recent sessions we had a combat situation that was over 15 rounds long, and I was able to do something on most of those rounds because I could pace myself and I have a lot of juice. This means you're more adaptable to the pace of your campaign.
In essence, because of just playing my psion wisely, I have not once had to ask my group to stop before everyone else was ready just for my character to rest to recover her spells. It's just that generally I use fairly weak powers in tactical ways (such as using low-level constructs to provide soft-cover to allies who need to avoid AoOs, or greasing enemy weapons, etc).
Overall no matter what the pace of the game has been (single big battles or lots of little encounters over the course of the day), I've been able to help the party consistently. No 15 minute workday, and everyone in our group has consistently been very useful.
More to come, it's 5am, need sleep.
Hang on, I have all the DSP stuff, but I have had little time to go through it nor have I played a psionic character, though I dearly want to, SO
What? No illusion? Surely there is the ability to fool other people's minds/implant images, hide visuals, create visuals etc..?!? No? Is this some kind of hard wired School effect mechanical breakdown/division thing? How would mesmerism not be in psionic's "bag" as it were?
And if there ain't no psionecromancy, I'll take that challenge on to create it...
Hang on, I have all the DSP stuff, but I have had little time to go through it nor have I played a psionic character, though I dearly want to, SO
What? No illusion? Surely there is the ability to fool other people's minds/implant images, hide visuals, create visuals etc..?!? No? Is this some kind of hard wired School effect mechanical breakdown/division thing? How would mesmerism not be in psionic's "bag" as it were?
And if there ain't no psionecromancy, I'll take that challenge on to create it...
We homebrewed a psionic animate dead. It's awesome. Instead of consuming onyx stones, you have more expensive stones that are used as a focus to contain X HD worth of undead. You have to release them before you can control more. My character wears the gems as focus fetishes.
So far I have a bloody skeleton medium-sized white dragon, and a bloody skeleton giant boar. They are flavored as being spirit beasts with glowing eyes and the boar has "phantom flesh" (transparent whispy stuff with the skeleton beneath it).
We're loving psionics so much we're converting more and more stuff to psionics mechanics. A friend of mine wants a Paladin that uses power points, so maybe in the near future.
Well, Ashiel, FWIW I am a fan of your psychic warrior "Monk".
Well, Ashiel, FWIW I am a fan of your psychic warrior "Monk".
Oh, well thank you Oceanshieldwolf. I'm glad you enjoy it. ^_^
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Aside from his own madeup religion, Aliester Crowley is hardly the defining voice of fantasy and magical traditions. Magic has also been written as the tapping of external forces, or the invocation of otherwordly beings and the request of favors there from. Magic as something arising totally within is more of a New Age flavor.1) Because that is the way other forms of magic work in some fantasy novels. The spell slot system is used only in books written for D&D and from Jack Vance...and that's about it. Why should you have to memorise and then repeat formula for magic to work? If it is, as Crowley claimed, the changing of reality by the imposition of will, then psionics is where magic should be, not the other way around.
It depends very heavily upon individual traditions. Spiritual magics, incantations, meditations, invocations, evocations, rituals magics, ki/chi/qi/prana, magic numbers, magic writing, mana, psychic energy, etc.
The idea that sorcerer power is 'internal' doesn't stand up to even the lightest of scrutiny.
In that way Psionic Power points represent the sorcerer's flavor of being a natural magic user a lot better.
Ki might as well be psionic power points too.
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Hang on, I have all the DSP stuff, but I have had little time to go through it nor have I played a psionic character, though I dearly want to, SO
What? No illusion? Surely there is the ability to fool other people's minds/implant images, hide visuals, create visuals etc..?!? No? Is this some kind of hard wired School effect mechanical breakdown/division thing? How would mesmerism not be in psionic's "bag" as it were?
And if there ain't no psionecromancy, I'll take that challenge on to create it...
The illusions in psionics are false sensory inputs, controlling the mind rather than the area of the illusion. It works differently and is much less effective at masses of creatures, but more effective at fooling one.
To be honest I do not think that necromancy really fits in with the more "real world physics" (if you can call it that) of psionics.
A sort of necromancy to psionics might work, I guess...I'll have to think about that.
Hang on, I have all the DSP stuff, but I have had little time to go through it nor have I played a psionic character, though I dearly want to, SO
What? No illusion? Surely there is the ability to fool other people's minds/implant images, hide visuals, create visuals etc..?!? No? Is this some kind of hard wired School effect mechanical breakdown/division thing? How would mesmerism not be in psionic's "bag" as it were?
And if there ain't no psionecromancy, I'll take that challenge on to create it...
Like Dabbler said, illusion is basically part of the telepathy discipline, but much weaker. I don't like it much.
As for necromancy, DSP is working on an supplement that goes in that direction.
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How separate the divide is between psionics and magic is up to the interpreter. When 3e psionics came out I originally ruled that psionics was a kind of anti-magic system. The closest comparison I can make is to how the alchemist is currently flavored, only based around the mind or more precisely the ego instead of components.
I don't hate on the vancian magic system, who to say how magic should work in a fantasy world, maybe the reason magic doesn't seem to be real is because they're doing it wrong ;). But like others have said I also have a preference towards mana points, or similar systems.
When it comes to re-flavoring, not a fan. Concepts become clearer when flavor text and mechanics support each other. The big advantage a class system has over a skill system is that immediate association one gets when a single word (say fighter) can be used to not only produce a mental image, but also give a clear idea of what powers and skills you would have. Re-flavor and that advantage is lost, might as well be playing a skill based system.
Not to point any kind of accusing finger at anybody, by if I was GMing for Ashiel, I wouldn't stop her from saying her egoist/shaper combo was a witch, but she would at best be considered a bit eccentric, actual most people would consider her loony, and a true witch would find her claim to be insulting. Of course at her game table that may be just fine.
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Man, haven't had one of these thread in awhile. Sure beats the paladin alignment threads of late.
Things that psionics is missing:
1) necromancy in general
2) illusion as area-of-effect or persistent effects
3) conjuration as anything other than summons or creation effects
That... actually covers many of the most "t3h br0kenz!" elements of magic by itself.
Free wishes are nixed. Permanent minion overload (an thus action economy ruin) is gone. Those are just two off the top of my head.
There are certainly elements of the classes there as others have noted.
The ability to "summon" creatures (temporarily) with a specific selection of powers. The ability to fool individual minds about their own reality. The highly limited ability to bring people back from the dead or heal wounds (often by transferring them to yourself) or heal ability damage. Occasionally the ability to create things, though it'll cost you (on the account of no "free" abilities in psionics).
But these things are a drop in a bucket for what the three classes generally represent.
Heh, and I also generally like the way psionics is organized more too. It makes more sense, and is more intuitive. D&D and Pathfinder try, I know, but... schools are mostly just collections of "eh, close enough, I suppose - except for all of these, but nobody cares" type effects.
Im usually wrong about these things, so don't quote me...
But I think they are going to start work on the divine-ish (including necromancy) psionics stuff after Ultimate Psionics is done and out the door.
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... are you suggesting that Point-based systems are somehow more "point and click" than Vancian-based "fire and forget" systems? Or did I really misread your post?
EDIT: because Vancian is pretty much the epitome of "point and click". You point, you click, and it occurs. Just like a revolver.
Did you really cite the Vancian style magic (as presented in D&D) as being similar to the majority of fiction? Because of all the fantasy I've read - and that's a lot - it really doesn't fit. You can make it fit, more or less, sort of, but it does not automatically or intuitively do so. The spells within are not generally represented, their specific effects are rarely, if ever, represented in the manner that they play out in-game.
The Vancian style within D&D is pretty much solidly a "bullet" style effect where you utilize the effect that you prepare and expend. Many people liken it to "fire and forget" because of the (very few) examples I've read in fantasy literature - almost all of which containing this trope was D&D-based - in which the words faded from your mind as you released them.
The magic eye book is rather... weak as an example goes. The magic eye requires a level of concentration that literally makes it impossible for you to perceive anything else properly. Now, if you wanted to houserule that your wizard is so obsessed with remembering his "prepared" spells that he can't see straight (or, in this case, think straight), I'd be willing to talk with you about the similarity of those things.
The power point system is more elegant in its way because it allows you to create several tiers of the same effect more or less spontaneously.
Let's compare this to, say, physicists. People who know their stuff.
They know their own formula, they've studied to comprehend what happens to X when you Y out of many tomes (some of which are musty, let me tell you from experience) and they can generally tell you exactly what "non-Euclidean" really means, how it functions, and often have scribbled notes that, unless made for others, often is difficult for other physicists to interpret 'cause, dudes, seriously, work on your handwriting. Also, the use of personalized short-hand was (at least in my college) very normal.
You want to know the cool thing about physics equations? Once you know them, you can plug in different values to get different (but related) results. The amount that you can plug in varies only by the amount that you have.
The results of all this stuff sounds suspiciously more like the power point than Vancian magic, as it's been presented in D&D and PF.
Now, that I've said that, I'll note the following: I actually am very wizardly. I cram for my tests, or have to re-study things in order to remember them. A few hours after I've used whatever it is, I'll generally forget it, but recall where and how to find it. So Vancian isn't completely unrealistic. But for those who actually know what they're talking about - my physics professors, say, it doesn't model reality at all. At best Vancain models the dabbler with attention deficit and dyslexia who, like me, vaguely recalls where to find something, and preps for it for a while before forgetting it, not for the professionals or people who really know what they're talking about (because they constantly use it).
Also, I'd love coming across some tomes that somehow predate reality. That's some old stuff right there. We should immediately hand them over to a highly prestigious institution for study, however, because it might teach us how to make materials that will survive whatever happens at the end. Really useful!
It's also worth keeping in mind that until the last couple of decades sorcery and wizardry were considered one and the same thing in literary traditions.And they still are, in pretty much anything that isn't based on Dungeons & Dragons.
I have seen some fantasy authors who make a distinction between wizardry and sorcery, but from what I recall most of those authors had some exposure to D&D prior to starting their writing careers. I wouldn't be surprised if most fantasy authors who got their start in the last couple decades have done at least one game of D&D.
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*'Good' as in, thematically, where it completely fails to represent almost any sort of magic depicted in fiction or film *other* than the works of Jack Vance, ...
Other than the works of Glen Cook, Terry Pratchett, John Bellairs, Roger Zelazny , Joel Rosenberg, Lawrence Watt-Evans, Diane Duane, Mercedes Lackey, Margaret Weis... and more... you mean.
They all use Vancian magic, at least in some books for some types of users.