D&D - Psionics, your opinion?

[tehelgee]

One of the biggest divides in the D&D fandom is over the existence of psionics. Many fans of the game absolutely hate them, while others love it.

I find them intriguing, as it adds a third side to the competition between arcane and divine as sources of supernatural power, and I'm looking forward to seeing how 5th Edition handles them.

What about the rest of you? How do you feel about psionics?

 

[TanaNari]

Can't speak for 4E- because I refuse to use the system- but the 3.0/3.5 psionics were very well done. It comes from being one of the "newer" casting mechanics, much like the Unearthed Arcana classes and Tome of Battle. While standard arcane and divine casting are pretty much shit from the beginning and only got worse with every new splatbook.

 

[Kiriel]

I find it one of the more... balanced systems in D&D. Granted, some of the stuff is bad, but compared to problems of arcane and divine magic, Psionics is better. Especially with Eberron.

 

[The Shadowmind]

3.0 psionics had problems, when is was redone in 3.5 with the XPH, I felt they were fairly fine. Well expect for the Soulknife. Then Complete Psionics comes out and nerfs Astral Construct in order to make a prestige class from Complete Psionics do something it also released some of the more overpowered powers and near useless ones. Never touched 4E and haven't reviewed 5E/Next yet. 3.5 psionics also didn't get anywhere near the support that magic got. Eberron books, Dragon Magic, Lords of Madness. Still more than the Binder, Warlock, and Shadowcaster Tome of Battle classes got.
Playing the Truenamer has been shown to cause the player to lose their ability to taste ice-cream.

 

[tehelgee]

Playing the Truenamer has been shown to cause the player to lose their ability to taste ice-cream.

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The concept of the Truenamer is great, I love the idea. Learning the true names of stuff, being able to use that to influence, control, and alter the subject? All cool ideas.

The mechanics make me want to take a buckshot mouthwash.

 

[Silenced_Ash]

In my playgroup almost no one ever used Psionics. The only person who played with Psionics decided to play a Soulknife, and I felt as though he contributed very little to the group. He apparently really liked it though, as he went on to play it in a few other campaigns. I do seem to recall the mechanics behind Psionics to be balanced, at least, in comparison to ordinary spellcasters. I also really love the concepts behind the psionic classes that I've seen. (I'm talking about 3.5, as I have no experience with anything else)

 

[anechoic]

Unfortunately, most of my D&D experience comes from fanfics and TG posts, so I don't really know that much about Psionics. That said, I like the fluff but from what I can tell the mechanics range reasonably balanced and fun to hideously over or underpowered and stupid, depending on the exact system you're using.

 

[doomlord9]

The main part I like about D&D Psionics, at least the 3E/3.5E version, is that they work on the mana system rather than a slot system. You have x number of psi points and each ability costs a certain amount to use, mix and match as you please. Also it works on power pre-reqs rather than being limited by level which in one campaign was extremely important for me. I knew our DM was kinda a dick and so were a few of the other players so I specialized and got Psionic Disintegrate at level 4. Yeah it cost 40 PP to use and my max was 44 PP but when the DM threw a beholder at us when the highest party member was lvl 5 for shiggles, I rolled a 20 on my initiative, dumped everything I had, and we gained a level when the beholder failed its save. The DM was kinda annoyed at that as was the player who talked him into it.

On a related note, psions are also some of the best in the standard "You have been captured and must escape" scenarios since without special psionic disruptors they can't be disarmed. Take away a priests holy symbol or a mages spell book/reagents and they are damn near crippled. Sorcerers are good too though since their magic is innate but they still work on the slot system which kinda annoys me in general.

4E is not D&D, it's D&D Lite for casual tabletop gamers.

I have no idea what 5E is even rumored to be like so I can't comment on it.

 

[ultima333]

My experience comes from 3.5, so I find Psionics to be pretty interesting. The 'Power/Psi Point' system is a nice, simpler alternative than the spell slots system for newer players, who might be more used to other RPG games with 'mana' based spell usage.

The one thing I absolutely hate about Psionics is that they wanted to treat it as separate from magic completely. Spell resistance? It's psionic, so it goes straight through it. Anti-Magic fields? Oh, that's okay, it's not an anti-psi field, so it doesn't hinder them at all.

Luckily quite a few groups house rule it as "Psionics is just another form of magic, like divine or arcane." This makes it more balanced, instead of having it lopsided and confusing with a separate stat and such for psionics.

Other than that, though, I don't mind them at all, and find them pretty good.

 

[doomlord9]

The house rule we used was that magic protections gave half their resistance vs psi and the same in reverse. It made one not completely rape the other without penalties but still encouraged finding resistance for both.

 

[The Shadowmind]

My experience comes from 3.5, so I find Psionics to be pretty interesting. The 'Power/Psi Point' system is a nice, simpler alternative than the spell slots system for newer players, who might be more used to other RPG games with 'mana' based spell usage.

The one thing I absolutely hate about Psionics is that they wanted to treat it as separate from magic completely. Spell resistance? It's psionic, so it goes straight through it. Anti-Magic fields? Oh, that's okay, it's not an anti-psi field, so it doesn't hinder them at all.

Luckily quite a few groups house rule it as "Psionics is just another form of magic, like divine or arcane." This makes it more balanced, instead of having it lopsided and confusing with a separate stat and such for psionics.

Other than that, though, I don't mind them at all, and find them pretty good.

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The house rule we used was that magic protections gave half their resistance vs psi and the same in reverse. It made one not completely rape the other without penalties but still encouraged finding resistance for both.

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Ummm, Psionic/ Magic transparency is the default rule. Spell resistance and Power Resistance both protect against spells and powers aat equal rate. Having magic not affect powers and vice verses is a variant rule.

Combining Psionic And Magical Effects
The default rule for the interaction of psionics and magic is simple: Powers interact with spells and spells interact with powers in the same way a spell or normal spell-like ability interacts with another spell or spell-like ability. This is known as psionics-magic transparency.
Psionics-Magic Transparency
Though not explicitly called out in the spell descriptions or magic item descriptions, spells, spell-like abilities, and magic items that could potentially affect psionics do affect psionics.
When the rule about psionics-magic transparency is in effect, it has the following ramifications.
Spell resistance is effective against powers, using the same mechanics. Likewise, power resistance is effective against spells, using the same mechanics as spell resistance. If a creature has one kind of resistance, it is assumed to have the other. (The effects have similar ends despite having been brought about by different means.)
All spells that dispel magic have equal effect against powers of the same level using the same mechanics, and vice versa.
The spell detect magic detects powers, their number, and their strength and location within 3 rounds (though a Psicraft check is necessary to identify the discipline of the psionic aura).
Dead magic areas are also dead psionics areas.

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People not understanding this is one of the things that gives psionics a bad name. Another one is that you can only spent power points equal to your manifester level, unless you have an ability that allows otherwise.

 

[tehelgee]

I don't like the idea of magic and psionics interacting 100% evenly with each other, because then psionics is just a variant rule for magic. I agree with doomlord's idea, that magic and psionics should only partially interact.

Magic can protect you from magic, and psionics from psionics. But, they're a lot less effective when used against each other. This way, nobody can be immune from both sides with a single spell/power.

And magic has a lot more support in the books, it has a lot more abilities than psionics does.

 

[mkire]

I like psionics, they can be over powered if you only have one encounter a day, but the same is true of regular spell-casters.

 

[TotalAbsolutism]

I love 3.5e Psionics, and find it to be one of the more balanced casting systems in general for D&D. 4E was... 4E, we won't go there. I'm cautiously optimistic about 5th and how it handles them.

Regarding psionic/magic; they're the same thing. The whole mind-power and crystals and ectoplasm stuff is fairly new-age fluff that mostly came about from pseudoscience and sci-fi. Which is one of the reasons why I get annoyed when people claim they don't want to allow it in their games because it "doesn't fit". That's all well and good, maybe it doesn't, but I can fix that in about 30 seconds with a simple Find + Replace. At which point it's then revealed that they're just biased and that was a convenient excuse.

That, and I once read the entirety of a WotC Forums 3.5e Psionics Balance debate. 48 pages of wrongheaded insanity and rehashing the same arguments over and over. Damn.

Basically; love it, want more, but some people ruin it for all of us.