General RPG Rules DiscussionDiscuss the rules of any game except D&D or Pathfinder, such as Arcana Evolved, Mutants & Masterminds, Star Wars Saga, d20 Modern, and the like.
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GR's putting out a feats 'n skills Psychic class book
Text from the ad:
Psychic powers may seem like magic, but there’s no reason to treat them as such in your d20 game. The Psychic's Handbook provides a completely independent system for adding psychic abilities to your campaign, abilities which are at once more subtle and wider-reaching than magic, powers with their own applications and limitations that separate them from the spells of clerics and wizards, and even the powers of psions. The core of the system is the psychic, a new class whose mental powers are based on skills and feats. The Psychic’s Handbook, by award-winning game designer Steve Kenson, provides you with everything you need to integrate the class into your game, including prestige classes, new equipment, campaign advice, and conversion notes for Modern games. This winter, discover the true powers of the mind.
And some posts in a fourm from the book's writer, Steve Kenson.
... Essentially the user suffers subdual damage after using a psychic skill. Overuse can render a psychic staggered or unconscious. (There are, of course, options for modifying this system as well as various metapsychic feats and such.)
... Psychic skills can simply be another source of special abilities (in addition to arcane and divine magic and psionics), or psychic abilities may be the sole or unique source of powers in a campaign.
This system, with more than 40 different psychic skills and at least as many psychic feats, takes up the bulk of the book. ... In addition to the various healing related skills and feats all psychics can access, there is a Psychic Healer prestige class specifically focused on the specialty.
I especially like to hear there will be options for modifying the system. Hopefuly this will allow me to tweak the power level of the powers in my game. Dead Zone one week and X-Men the next ... without having to cap off the game at a certain character level.
Last edited by Rotack23; 15th November 2003 at 04:50 AM..
I did something like this years ago with the d20 Star Wars Force rules. I think I'll go with Green Ronin version.
Weird about that, eh? The Star Wars Force rules are one of the best feat/skills FX systems out there, but because its buried in a franchise game most people aren't aware of that.
__________________ *ROLL* You -- heh-heh, heh -- excuse me. You find no traps. Heh.
Weird about that, eh? The Star Wars Force rules are one of the best feat/skills FX systems out there, but because its buried in a franchise game most people aren't aware of that.
Actually it is such a cool idea that TWO games buried it under their franchise and integrally linked to other game mechanics so as make it that you had to take wholesale.
Star Wars had it linked to Vitality Points, which is just a bookkeeping method for subdual damage. However, I wanted more Force skills (and a note I hope the character sheet of the class has room for any different target DC numbers.)
The Series Archer books for Spycraft also have a feats and skills psionic set up, but they tie in the higher level powers with their action dice system, so it’s not exactly convertible.
And some of the few feats and skills systems I saw on the net were a little low powered for my tastes (most were for Modern day/ X-files stuff).
I, too, am interesting in seeing how the book’s options will allow me to tweak the system for my different games.
Not to mention this sounds EXACTLY like what Kenneth S. Hood created. He even called it "Skills-n-feats" psionic system. It was designed to integrate with his skills and feats martial arts system as well.
If you've ever heard of the Grim-n-gritty system, he's the guy who came up with that as well (all three could loosely integrate). Personally, I think he was a genius before his time, coming up with some of the most creative / original material in the early d20 era.
Personally, I think he was a genius before his time, coming up with some of the most creative / original material in the early d20 era.
I can't and won't argue with that.
When it came to the feats and skills thing, though, the impression I had gotten (right or wrong) was that his version of psionics was more low key than I wanted. Not that I want "comic book" powers all the time, but I was basically looking for something that would cut spell-levels out of my d20 games completely. And it is always easier to have some rules in place and tone down than make up stuff from scratch (the credo of 3+ edition.)
It appears (given the description) to resemble the system published in the Shadowforce Archer campaign setting sourcebook, which resembles the Force rules from WOTC's version of Star Wars. As I like that approach, then I'm quite interested in this book.
The remainder of the book includes campaign advice on incorporating psychic abilities into a campaign, how to handle them in play, and miscellaneous things like psychic phenomena, psychic creatures, and psychic equipment.
I am really hoping this section of the book excells where the PsiHB was vauge. I think a lot less people would have negative comments on D&D psionics if WotC had just said in black and white, "Hey we designed psionics to suppliment, never replace, our fundmental magic system in D&D. Don't expect this to provide you with a spell point version of the Cleric or Sorcerer classes. The Psion and Psy Warrior were designed to provide you with facinating possbilities to do .... And you can explore these options with psionic in your game like ... And some great ways to have psionic energy in your campaign world are ..."
If GR can set out the limits and expectations for the new Psychic class and how it can fit into a game world, I feel that it will do great.
And yeah, I'm looking at it as an alternative to the ususal magic.
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