12 thoughts on “How would you handle psionics and psychic attacks? Face adversity?”

  3. Good question.

    I’d think that could be a couple new professions and a new unique Move to really flesh it out. Maybe use Biotics from Mass Effect as a source of inspiration.

  4. Stacie Winters maybe. But I don’t know if you’d need a new profession. I could see any of the professions. You would need a psionic tag and I would say use Face Adversity roll+influence for attacks (stun damage). For non attacks you could probably reskin the Personality professions charm skill to not have to be performance based. Sean Gomes​ what do you think?

  5. Without adding new careers or complicated new rules, psychic powers are just a fictional component of your characters — the same as a character having limbs or being alien with gills or having a laser rifle, etc.

    Work with the players to develop what “psychic powers” means. Are they subtle? Are they enormous and catastrophic? Are they natural or fabricated? Find out how they work, fictionally, the same way you work with players to understand how jump drives work, or how anti-grav engines work, or the like.

    Once you know the borders of psionics and the ideas behind it, you can address them the same way you address everything else! If the fiction says the psychic can do it, they do it! If there’s an obstacle: face adversity! Follow the flowchart!

  6. So! Psionics are still very early in development. However, the groundwork is there in the Mettle, Influence and Interface stats.

    Mettle is not only about aim and precision, but also about discipline and mental control. Defensively, Mettle will rebuff brute mental attacks, especially ones that cause fear or take control of behavior.

    Influence is not just one’s ability to convince and impact others, it’s an extension of your own creativity and ego. Defensively, Influence protects against mental surveillance and intrusion, controlling the “conversation” of mind-reading.

    Interface usually applies to computers, but ultimately it is the stat of analysis, decrypting and manipulating any kind of information/data. Defensively, Interface can unscramble a mind, restore lost memories and heal a ravaged psyche.

    Also: Hah, Jesse R , good one. That got a laugh out of me.

  7. Sean Gomes thanks. Can’t wait to see psionics when you make some sort of official release. I see what your saying about Mettle and Influence. Interface feels weird to me but I can see how that could work too. There probably isn’t really a wrong answer.

  8. I do kind of love the idea of a very basic Psychic move in a game where you just need to handle it simply going “You can now Access a mind like you could access the SectorNet, provided line of sight; roll+Influence.”

  9. Aaaaand Alfred Rudzki  just sorta spoiled one of the skills from the Telepath Career! 😛

    Probe: You can Access minds you touch as if they were closed systems.

    I’ve had that one in my proverbial “bits-box” since I started writing UW. Combines quite well with Technocrat, Clandestine or Arcane (Probe + Dispel = Mind Wipe).

  11. Irony!

    Side Note: The whole “Access within line of sight” is a skill known as Technologic, belonging to the Cybernetic career.

    As you can imagine, it also combos with a whole bunch of other Access-related abilities, including Probe.

Comments are closed.