Is a Gypsy fortune teller using magic or psionics when she reads the future in a crystal ball? How about Tarot Cards? Goat Entrails?ĭenethor and Faramir demonstrated considerable mental powers, apparently a family trait. That having been said psionic powers are limited subset of magical powers. So, for my money, they don't really have a place in a fantasy game based on earlier models and genres. (Long story short, maybe but not reliably.) Psionics, as a concept, only goes back to the 1950s and the early attempts to scientifically analyze "Psychic" abilities and to see if they have any validity. dang, and I always disliked that for going against my preference. Ok, maybe the default should be same as magic for balance reasons but there should be an optional rule to make it "different than magic" with the caveat it may unbalance things if you're not careful? Sounds familiar.
Did I just argue myself out of my own position? Or did I just argue psionics not be included as default? And if they are mechanically the same, and it is harder to balance psionics. And I do think the default game should be relatively balanced. I'll concede that it becomes harder to balance out though if the psionic effects are pretty much exactly the same as spell effects with a different keyword. In 2e I remember being annoyed that a psion could only go invisible to one mind at a time, but looking back it made pretty good sense to keep it from being overpowered when a wizard cast detect invisibility and still couldn't see the guy. If the DM isn't prepared for it, he shouldn't allow it in his game.Īs for something like "dispel magic" I'd prefer it if most of the psions effects might not need to dispelled the same way a mages or clerics effects might. I kind of think it shouldn't be magic, or at least not as default.