Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
Those are the rare exceptions, though. For each one of those you can show, I can pull up hundreds of books, shows and movies that fit the mold. There is some overlap, but it's pretty darn small.
Unearthed Arcana Why UA Psionics are never going to work in 5e.
- Thread starter Leatherhead
- Start date
JiffyPopTart
Bree-Yark
Marvel movies
DC movies
X-files
Dr. Who
Stargate
Warhammer 40k
Event Horizon
Shannara (TV show)
League of Extraordinary Gentleman
Amber
Frankenstein
Sucker Punch
Ready Player One
Snow Crash
The Phase series by Piers Anthony.
Torg, Rifts, and other crossgenre settings
Starfinder
Everything I've rattled off is limited to things I personally have consumed. I have no anime listed and I'd be willing to bet tons of it have mech suits and magic.
I think you are discounting how much sci fi has "magic" and how much fantasy isn't set in the middle ages.
Paul Farquhar
Legend
- It can do to much
- It can't do enough
- It's name isn't "Psion"
- It's not a full class
- It's casting stat isn't Intelligence
- it doesn't have psi points
- it has psi points
- it powers can be counterspelled
- it's powers can't be counterspelled
- it's not available to characters of all classes
- other classes can use psionic spells
- etc etc etc tec
Whatever you put in front of people, they have no problem finding some reason why it isn't right. And it basically boils down to "it's not the same as the version of psionics I played first". We have had four editions of D&D with psionics (and a couple without), and they are all different. It's quite clear from reading comments that the first version a person enjoyed playing is, for them "The One True Psionics". For you, it's 3rd edition. For me it's 1st. For many (coming to it through the popular Dark Sun) it's 2nd. Scratch around hard enough and you might even find someone for 4e.
Paul Farquhar
Legend
I can't believe you left off Babylon 5, the SF show that was actually directly influenced by D&D!
And it has both psionics (Commercial Teeps, Psi Cops) and magic (technomages), and they are different.
Fantasy: Involves magic or the supernatural (but not always castles and dragons - see subgenre)
Science Fiction: Involves technology
Clarke's 3rd Law: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic".
Ergo any sufficiently advanced science fiction is indistinguishable from fantasy.
QED
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Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
This is again, very wrong.
- It can do to much
- It can't do enough
- It's name isn't "Psion"
- It's not a full class
- It's casting stat isn't Intelligence
- it doesn't have psi points
- it has psi points
- it powers can be counterspelled
- it's powers can't be counterspelled
- it's not available to characters of all classes
- other classes can use psionic spells
- etc etc etc tec
Whatever you put in front of people, they have no problem finding some reason why it isn't right. And it basically boils down to "it's not the same as the version of psionics I played first". We have had four editions of D&D with psionics (and a couple without), and they are all different. It's quite clear from reading comments that the first version a person enjoyed playing is, for them "The One True Psionics". For you, it's 3rd edition. For me it's 1st. For many (coming to it through the popular Dark Sun) it's 2nd. Scratch around hard enough and you might even find someone for 4e.
For me, it's 1e, 2e, 3e and 5e(I didn't have an issue with Mystic). For others it will be multiple other editions. My favorite was 3e. Don't confuse people campaigning for their favorite edition as One True Wayism. Only a very few here have walked that path. The rest of us have been very open to multiple different things.
Your anti-psionic position has given you tunnel vision if you haven't been able to see that.
Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
Okay. It is still dwarfed by the amount of pure sci-fi and pure fantasy put out over the decades.
Paul Farquhar
Legend
I'm not anti psionic. I'm very much pro-psionic. Which is why all the "One True Wayism" (which is quite obvious to anyone who isn't blinkered) makes me so angry. Because it's only possible consequence is NO PSIONICS.
My personal position is that psionics would be better outside of the class system, because a class, no matter what system it used, would be just another class, not something truly different. I also don't like psi points, on the basis that they are in practice too fiddly and not much fun to play.
But I would have been happy with the Mystic. It's a lot easier to cut things than add them, and the 2nd edition psion could do everything, so I don't see a problem. And the name is much more meaningful to players without experience of previous editions.
And I also like the current UA. The psi die is fun, and it can be expanded upon. But if people don't get behind it all we will get is NOTHING.
TheSword
Legend
In my experience people who wanted Psionics to be different to magic, and therefore unaffected by dispel magic, detect magic etc. Did it for power reasons... they wanted a more unrestrained version of magic, without the limitations. There is something cool about that, everybody likes to slip under the radar sometimes and be mysterious.
The problem is, it causes a host of balance issues. The expanded Psionics book addressed this issue and left it up to DMs/Groups to decide the psionics-are-the-same/different-debate. I suspect there is nothing stopping DMs agreeing the same thing if they choose. Though I also suspect a lot of the angst in the forums comes from players who know their DM will never agree to that (because they’re sensible) unless it is the core rules.
Regarding the psion. It is as close in the fluff to being a sorcerer as a favoured soul is and if that subclass can manage the crossover I’m sure the psionic sorcerer can too. Expecting a whole new spell list is a lot of work for not much benefit. It places unnecessary restrictions on players and without a slew of new spells/powers (which is highly unlikely) it doesn’t pay off.
This version of psionics is fine, most people don’t care enough either way... the middle 70% that have no horse in the race. Let’s get on to more important things and get Dark Sun released please as part of decent campaign module. Something the setting was sorely lacking in previous incarnations.
The problem is, it causes a host of balance issues. The expanded Psionics book addressed this issue and left it up to DMs/Groups to decide the psionics-are-the-same/different-debate. I suspect there is nothing stopping DMs agreeing the same thing if they choose. Though I also suspect a lot of the angst in the forums comes from players who know their DM will never agree to that (because they’re sensible) unless it is the core rules.
Regarding the psion. It is as close in the fluff to being a sorcerer as a favoured soul is and if that subclass can manage the crossover I’m sure the psionic sorcerer can too. Expecting a whole new spell list is a lot of work for not much benefit. It places unnecessary restrictions on players and without a slew of new spells/powers (which is highly unlikely) it doesn’t pay off.
This version of psionics is fine, most people don’t care enough either way... the middle 70% that have no horse in the race. Let’s get on to more important things and get Dark Sun released please as part of decent campaign module. Something the setting was sorely lacking in previous incarnations.
Samloyal23
Adventurer
I like the 3E psionics up to a point, it had things worth keeping, like the feats. What I have seen of the UA psionics has some interesting ideas, but it also does not feel like a psionics system, just an alternate form of magic. I won't say they are all bad, just not up really up to snuff.
Hussar
Legend
Star Wars is fantasy. It's thematically a fantasy movie with a few SF tropes. But, tropes do not define genre, by and large.
Ghostbusters? Sure. Dune? Not even a little. There is no magic in Dune whatsoever. That's about as solidly an SF novel as it gets.
Fantasy with a few SF tropes. But, still very solidly fantasy.
Steampunk is defined by it's inversion of Victorian moral conventions. Tropes aren't particularly needed. Just having some gears in it doesn't make it Steampunk. But, there are extremely few steampunk stories with magic in them.
There's no magic in Stranger things. It's pure SF.
I guess if you define genre broadly enough that you can somehow fit Dune into Fantasy, then, sure, lots of crossovers. But, I think you'll find that very little on your list actually fits.
This is an argument I made some time ago. That you have very, very few settings where magic and SF combine. Other than comic books, and, even those, usually you don't cross them. The X-men don't have wizards, nor do they combat magical stuff, usually. Doctor Strange generally isn't dealing with Skrulls.
Look, I don't mind psionics in D&D. It's fine. But, insisting that it MUST be different from magic? Well, I'll reserve judgement. Too different and I'd rather it wasn't in the game at all.
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