D&D General please tell me about the old psionic classes?

[Mind of tempest]

The heavy use of Greek is actually something that I like about psionics. In some ways, it actually makes psionics more medieval feeling to me because Greek was being used in scholarship and magic traditions around the Mediterranean (alongside Latin).

I mean the names of ego, id and super-ego, psyche is a a greek goddese for a reason.
note butterfly theme psionic good guys when? as psyche is depicted with butterfly wings

 

[Willie the Duck]

Minor tangent: I seem to recall reading that psionics were the outgrowth of early D&D players who hated Vancian magic, wanting a spell-point system instead.

They were first included in oD&D supplement III: Eldrtich Wizardry, so they definitely predate Gamma World. I have also heard the notion that they were included as a bone thrown to the people wanting a non-Vancian system, although I'm unsure of my source on the matter. Certainly we've heard plenty of material (both hearsay and documentary) about Gary locking horns with the desire to have non-Vancian casting. I think this was also (much like the ranger and monk) just stuff that people knew from their pulp/fantasy/sci fi fiction that they might want in their games, so why no please them and throw it in.

What I note about oD&D/AD&D psionics is how a very awkward and poorly integrated ruleset version of this very broad concept was implemented very early in the game, and how it stuck through all the way through late 2e*. Sure Dark Sun and Player's Option powers got some tweaks, and the effect of psychic combat kept evolving, but that there was psychic combat (and the Rochambeau attack vs. defense matrix) at all was constant. Same with Wild talents, most of the specific powers, and so on. For instance, merging your weapon with your arm, while not exactly out of bounds for the supporting fiction, certainly isn't the first thing most people would have thought of as a psychic power.
*certainly not unique, but a notable example.

 

[MNblockhead]

Did psionics get treated as not being magical? For example, would they bypass anti-magic fields? In my 5e games, I would treat the psionics as not magical. Makes mind flayers extra scary as PCs will have fewer ways to counter attacks. But I think the same ruling for PCs would break a lot of adventures.

 

[Kurotowa]

Did psionics get treated as not being magical? For example, would they bypass anti-magic fields? In my 5e games, I would treat the psionics as not magical. Makes mind flayers extra scary as PCs will have fewer ways to counter attacks. But I think the same ruling for PCs would break a lot of adventures.

Often yes, sometimes no. I have vague memories of the 2e Psionics Handbook having a sidebar on if you make psionics and magic interoperable, with both being options. Dedicated psionics fans usually agitate for "psionics is not magic and ignores Magic Resistance and Anti-Magic Field and all the rest" as an essential part of the flavor. But that's a balance nightmare, and is why all the 1e demon lords had maxed out psionic ability and defenses, so they couldn't be cheesed by a PC with a psionic attack form.

 

[DammitVictor]

given I am mildly skint right now I can't afford to hunt old books and buy them and what few free documentation is left seems to be either gone or unreliable at best.

can someone elaborate on the names, mechanical niches and thematics of them mostly as I find the old and slightly odd always where the most enriching ideas can be refined from or stolen

Man... I saw "old psionic classes" and came in here to say there was only one psionic class in AD&D, the Psionicist.

You already got a good breakdown of the 3.X psionic classes. Paizo didn't want to touch 3.5's epic rules, deities and demigods, or psionics with a ten foot pole-- and couldn't touch Tome of Battle or Magic of Incarnum-- so Dreamscarred Press stepped up, giving all the 3.5 classes substantial Pathfinder glow-ups and adding a few new ones. All of that material is available online for free. It's pretty great; Soulknife is hands down my favorite class for Pathfinder 1e.

 

[GuardianLurker]

I've always loved psionics - even ran a dedicated Psionics campaign in the 3.5 era. Here are my takes:

1e: Yeah, the space magic feel is correct. It's also why Mind Flayers were so feared. Psionics wan't balanced - and frankly it was OP, because "Psionics Was Different". Spell Resistance, Dispel Magic, etc. didn't work against psionics.

2e: Frankly, I've always felt that this was the most flavorful of the set. The feel is closer to the Deryni novels than space magic. The rules explicitly recommend using the "psionics is magic" option, but don't assume the option by default. The powers, though flavorful, are incredibly uneven. Some are just completely overpowered, others are underpowered to the extreme. Oh, and power point calculation is a little completx (IWC averages, anyone?)

3.0: This is distinct from 3.5. The best summation is "don't". No really. 3.0 psionics is the purest, best (worst?) example of MAD (multiple attribute dependency) I've seen. It's pretty much what coined the term. As a result, the classes are mostly unplayable.

3.5: Pretty much psionics done right, IMO. It loses a lot of the flavor from 2.e, but Psionic Combat is mostly fixed, and unless you've got actual Telepaths in the party, probably unused. The psionic classes are well implemented - the Kinecticist is pretty close to the only kind of Blaster Mage that reliably works in 3.5, IMO. The soulknife class is a little underpowered. I recommend highly Dreamscarred Press's Soulknife fixes. Dreamscarred produced some really good expansions for 3.5 Psionics, which I had good experiences with, but the authors were frequent contributors to the CharOpt boards, and it shows.

4e+ : Haven't played with any Psionics in these editions.

 

[Mind of tempest]

I've always loved psionics - even ran a dedicated Psionics campaign in the 3.5 era. Here are my takes:

1e: Yeah, the space magic feel is correct. It's also why Mind Flayers were so feared. Psionics wan't balanced - and frankly it was OP, because "Psionics Was Different". Spell Resistance, Dispel Magic, etc. didn't work against psionics.

2e: Frankly, I've always felt that this was the most flavorful of the set. The feel is closer to the Deryni novels than space magic. The rules explicitly recommend using the "psionics is magic" option, but don't assume the option by default. The powers, though flavorful, are incredibly uneven. Some are just completely overpowered, others are underpowered to the extreme. Oh, and power point calculation is a little completx (IWC averages, anyone?)

3.0: This is distinct from 3.5. The best summation is "don't". No really. 3.0 psionics is the purest, best (worst?) example of MAD (multiple attribute dependency) I've seen. It's pretty much what coined the term. As a result, the classes are mostly unplayable.

3.5: Pretty much psionics done right, IMO. It loses a lot of the flavor from 2.e, but Psionic Combat is mostly fixed, and unless you've got actual Telepaths in the party, probably unused. The psionic classes are well implemented - the Kinecticist is pretty close to the only kind of Blaster Mage that reliably works in 3.5, IMO. The soulknife class is a little underpowered. I recommend highly Dreamscarred Press's Soulknife fixes. Dreamscarred produced so really go expansions for 3.5 Psionics, which I had good experiences with, but the authors were frequent contributors to the CharOpt boards, and it shows.

4e+ : Haven't played with any Psionics in these editions.

I know 4e feels like 4e heard they were considered underpowered but I can't verify it.

5e never made it out of testing it was the mystic and I loved it like a child that never lived, horribly unbalanced and needed some more time in the oven and to not try to be everything but I loved the thematics it was like coming home.

 

[James Gasik]

4e Psionic classes suffered largely from the fact that, at this point, they were competing with other classes in the same role who had more expanded material from books and Dragon articles. So the Psion was fine, but naturally the Wizard was better. The Battlemind was fine (save for not having a good base melee attack) but by this point, other Defenders exist. The Ardent...ok the Ardent seemed lackluster and really could have used a Class Acts article. Their one neat trick was the ability to scale up their At-Wills instead of having separate Encounter Powers, but in practice it often seemed to be better to just scale them up to being Encounter-level anyways.

The Monk, ironically, was the most unique, barely even counting as a Psionic class, once you wrapped your head around their Full Discipline mechanic.

 

[Clint_L]

1E gave Psionics a science fiction feel. "Probability Travel" vs "Plane Shift", "Force Screen" instead of "Shield". Psionics also leaned heavily into the Astral Plane, and had many unique aberrant creatures, like the Illithid, and Intellect Devourers.

1E psionic combat used a lot of terms from classic psychoanalysis:

Attack Modes: Psionic Blast, Mind Thrust, Ego Whip, Id Insinuation, and Psychic Crush.

Defense Modes: Mind Blank, Thought Shield, Mental Barriers, Intellect Fortress, and Tower of Iron Will.

Reports are that it gave a nice other-worldly feel to certain creatures, but was a terrible subsystem for characters.

I don't think it was divisive, to the extent that things can be now-a-days. However, there are definitely folks that really like it, and others equally strongly don't want it in their game.

I don't remember psionics being super divisive because there was pretty much a consensus that the system in the PHB was totally broken and didn't work. If you got (very) lucky to have a character with psionic ability, you had a massive advantage over everyone else in the party. Like quite a few systems in early D&D, it was very much a case of the rich getting richer, but in a particularly egregious way.

On a personal level, I hated it because it brought in a whole soft sci-fi feel that I just personally never liked, and particularly didn't like mixed with my fantasy. And the system used a lot of pseudo-scientific jargon that too many people took seriously at that time, which also irritated me.

To this day, I strongly dislike most psionics in my D&D. I tolerated a psy-knight in a recent campaign because a player was so keen on it, but it made me feel dirty.

 

[Kurotowa]

To this day, I strongly dislike most psionics in my D&D. I tolerated a psy-knight in a recent campaign because a player was so keen on it, but it made me feel dirty.

I rationalize it that psionics is magic, it's just magic performed via purely mental exertion instead of through arcane ritual or divine inspiration. Which is a lot easier to claim now that all the pseudo-scientific names and telepathic combat are gone. That's why I have no problem with a handful of psionic themed subclasses in Tasha's Cauldron, but wouldn't want an entire parallel game mechanic framework for them.