Redoing Psionics

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

Would anyone like to see me write a fan supplement outlining such options?

ABSOLUTELY YES

Variant rules are always welcome and I agree with you that PSI always seemed like an afterthought. For not OTU settings, a good discussion of how to integrate PSI into a campaign would be greatly appreciated.

There are so many more ways to handle psions than "Kill them All" or "Evil Psion Overlords" (the only 2 OTU options) or "Psi Corp" from B5.

Also, how about a bit of a discussion of HOW psionics came about in post 21st Century society? After all we don't have it now, but they have it in the future. How could that happen (I can think of several possible ways, but would be interested to hear what you have to say on the subject).

 

[alex_greene]

Here's a tiny part of the fan supplement I've been working on. It's about the sort of things a psion could get up to - part of a table of minor story hooks.

- The psion reads a newspaper article describing how children are being led into a life of degeneracy and debauchery by "psychotic mind benders." Complication: The unscrupulous and uninformed journalist who wrote this article is looking for somebody to bully, and she has targeted someone the character knows for a smear campaign of unfounded allegations of illegal psionic usage, which she considers tantamount to devil worship.

- The psion finds a police roadblock just up ahead. Police are randomly checking all vehicles. A child has gone missing, and they believe she has been abducted. The problem is, she has not been abducted: she Emerged spontaneously as a Psion two days before the character was due to leave the Institute. He met her coming in as he was leaving. Complication: The parents reported a vehicle seen pulling out in the road and driving off at the time of the child's disappearance. By a terrifying coincidence, the character happens to be driving a vehicle of the exact same make, model and even colour as that vehicle.

- The psion overhears watercooler conversation between two commuters on public transport. One commuter is scandalised: her favourite character in a long-running local soap opera became a telepath in last night's show. "You know what they're like," she says to her colleague, in a disgusted and disappointed tone of voice. Complication: The actor really is a telepath, and is on the verge of coming out about his use of psionics for real. He is also the characters' Patron, and he has asked the characters for protection against the mob.

- The psion receives a call from someone he knows, asking him if he would like to come along this evening to oust a gang of "head benders" from a house where they had been squatting. The character knows that these Psions are little more than adolescents and children, thrown out of their homes by their own parents and forced to live off the street. Complication: One of the children is from the character's own family.

Just a taster.

 

[JRoss]

Alex, have you thought of calling this masterwork The Compleat Psion?

 

[alex_greene]

At this moment, its WIP title is The Elephant In White. I shall, however, give your suggestion some consideration.

 

[dragoner]

What about Psionic robots? :twisted:

 

[alex_greene]

What about Psionic robots? :twisted:

Tools and equipment section. Between "companions" and "psion battle dress."

 

[dragoner]

What about Psionic robots? :twisted:

Tools and equipment section. Between "companions" and "psion battle dress."

No chargen?

 

[alex_greene]

No chargen?

Now what sort of a Traveller options book would it be without some chargen?

Yeah, it has chargen and career options - including one or two I doubt anyone's thought of before. But you will have to wait till it comes out.

And that's all the spoilers I'm going to divulge for now.

 

[Dunia]

To be honest I do not like the ideas that the OP presented, I do not want the psionics in my universe to be all powerful, they are meant to be an evolution (forced or not) of the mind and although they are powerful, i do not think that most psionics should be a psionic nuke walking around.

There are few psionics that just have hunches when stuff is around (psi 1-4) there are the normal psionics who will be able to do strange stuff (Psi 5-10) and then there are a select few that will be really powerful (psi 11-13), then there is those master psionics (14-15) who are so powerful that people lie afraid at nights thinking about them.

I like it that way, and I like it that not all psionics have telepathy - it makes them not so homogenous as a group.

I can understand that in other games, psionics are more or less common than in Traveller 3I, but in those settings, there can always be other rules for psionics. But for a 3I setting, i like it the way it is.

But I wish to applaud the OP for a well thought out idea

 

[ShawnDriscoll]

Did Stars Without Number use Traveller's psionics? Or did it lean more toward Star Wars? I can't remember.

 

[Rikki Tikki Traveller]

Not Traveller but not really Star Wars either. I thought it was pretty unique.

 

[alex_greene]

Now I know I have officially done too much work on this damned thing. 150+ pages of text and more than 57000 words ...

... and I'm not finished yet.

 

[Greylond]

alex_greene, have you read MgT Book 4: Psion? The reason I ask is several, if not all, of the options you discuss are covered in that book. Including various ways to make Psionics more or less common.

 

[alex_greene]

alex_greene, have you read MgT Book 4: Psion? The reason I ask is several, if not all, of the options you discuss are covered in that book. Including various ways to make Psionics more or less common.

I have. Loz' work was good, but it's but one interpretation of psionics, in the same way as Agatha Christie's oeuvre is only one interpretation of what a crime novel should be, and the same way as Arthur C Clarke's science fiction is not the only science fiction on the bookshelves.

There are different flavours of psionics in science fiction, too: Ingo Swann's Starfire is more akin to the writings of Aleister Crowley than James H Schmitz' Telzey Amberdon stories, and both differ radically from Philip Lynx in Alan Dean Foster's Humanx Commonwealth series, not to mention Larry Niven's Plateau eyes, Slaver telepathic compulsion, Kzinti telepathy, the sessile Grogs with their disturbing psychic legacy (they were once Slavers, and retained their Slaver compulsion) and Teela Brown's psychic luck.

I like to think of this as a supplement, for the things Loz didn't have the space, time or budget for..