How much do you use psionics?

[Lokishadow]

Well, I've noticed a trend.

Given the choice, most players seem to disdain playing psionic characters. "That's just wierd, man," and "Magic is plenty complicated," or "Magic is all we need."

Personally, I'm considering running an ALL psionics campaign. As in NO magic, except maybe from the occaisional baddie. Lots of wierd interdimensional stuff, crystals, bizarre races, and a completely different culture than what you would expect to find in a D&D game. I've always liked psionics, and I've never had a chance to play them.

What would your reaction to this be? Are you adventurous enough to give it a go?

 

[Crothian]

What would your reaction to this be? Are you adventerous enough to give it a go?

If I thought the DM and players could pull it off it would be great. But it would be harder to do then a normal campaign.

 

[Corbert]

As a DM I like to surprise my players with the occasional psionic monster or NPC, but they seem to have the opinion psionics is too complex to deal with

 

[kaomera]

What would your reaction to this be? Are you adventurous enough to give it a go?

As a DM I don't use Psionics, because I don't personally like the flavor they bring to the game. I do not think that I would start using Psi rules unless a player actually convinced me to let them play a Psionic character (which would mostly come down to: Are you still going to be interested in this in two or three levels, or is it just another unnecessary multiclass?).

As for an all-Psi game, I might. There's a lot of other considerations that would be more important, but I suspect that the inclusion of Psionics (at all) would have a somewhat negative effect on my decision.

 

[Three_Haligonians]

Funny you should ask,

Currently I'm leading a campaign in which the characters (all non-psionic in nature) are finding themselves up against a strange and alien force of adversaries - all with bizzare non-magical powers. I'm including a lot of Far Realm stuff, playing up on the weird factor and incorporating taint, sanity points, and just a lot of flavour techniques from Call of Cthulhu. It has created a neat scenario where psionics is the scary stuff the other side uses.

At first, it was pretty cool when some of my veteran players started scratching their heads, wondering why they couldn't use any Knowledge: Arcana or Spellcraft checks, or even detect magic to understand what was going on. Now, some of them are starting to "test the waters" by considering ranks in Psicraft, or the Wild Talent feat or even the anti-psionic feats available.

All told, it is going very well

J from Three Haligonians

 

[Bacris]

I've pretty much convinced some of the other folks in my gaming group that psionics is easier than spellcasting (because, well, Vancian sucks...).

In any game that it's allowed, I'm playing some form of psionic - either a psionic race or psionic class. If I'm DM'ing, I typically have psionic NPCs (seers, soulknives, etc). Power points are so much easier to track, at least in my experience, than spell slots.

As for an all-Psi, I definitely think it's doable and wish my entire group was open-minded enough to give it a try There are a few hold-outs and we have enough who'd be willing to DM that I don't think it'd fly.

 

[Nonlethal Force]

Throw me into the "psionics is so much easier than magician (vancian style)" camp. Given the option, I'd do away with vancian stylae magic and use a spell point system. I don't like the system in UA, though, so I still live with vancian magic.

However, I use psionics all the time. It absolutely rocks. [Complete Psi is still the only Complete book I refuse to buy, however.]