Inside Out's five emotions as a game mechanic for psychic combat

[angille]

It could be the game you want is Masks. (Ah, sorry, didn't see the post above - but yes. Masks is all about emotions.)

There's no counterplay. There's no sense of progress where an enchanter wears down your mental defenses, or where you can lay a mental trap, or where you can try to 'disarm' them of some attack ability they have. I was thinking of 'emotion conditions' as a parameter that could matter in psychic combat, while having the bonus effect of playing into some heroic tropes of having characters get an emotional 'power up' at intense moments.

...please look at Masks (and possibly The Veil).

tbh, it probably swings all the way in the other direction, in that there are no hit points (or rigidly defined cover/concealment/gear/etc), but combat is literally abstracted to the point where your (and the villains' for that matter) "hit points" are emotional conditions. once you're carrying all of afraid/angry/guilty/hopeless/insecure, you give up. some of the playbooks capitalize on these (like the Bull which uses Angry to get more powerful), giving you that "emotional 'power up' at intense moments" bit.

like I said before, not sure there's an easy way to "snap on" this kind of thing into a skirmish simulator like 5e. though I think there's still a capacity for certain trad-leaning games (like Genesys) to have emotional/mental "combat" worked in.

 

[Nytmare]

I agree with @angille . I kinda have Torchbearer on the brain right now, but to me this seems like it should be a game entirely centered around the emotions. Not a d20 chucker where an emotions-powered system is stacked on top.

What I see emerging is a sort of broad spectrum rock/paper/scissors balancing game, where you want to keep your emotional state in whatever sweet spot works best for that particular character, tapping in to strong emotional states for raw power, while running the risk of being consumed by them.

 

[Deset Gled]

First and most important issue is that there is only one positive emotion and four negative ones. Any sort of system that is relying on emotions should have a much more balanced approach.

1. No reason to call all of those other emotions "negative". Wasn't a huge point of the movie to learn to embrace different emotions and accept their value?

2. As RW mentioned in his original post, I strongly prefer a psychic system like this that intentionally has a prime number of powers. I don't subscribe to the idea that emotions are "paired" or "balanced" in some way. In your example, I cannot agree that disgust and trust are opposing. I trust the fact that a truck stop bathroom will be disgusting, for example.

 

[Nytmare]

I don't subscribe to the idea that emotions are "paired" or "balanced" in some way. In your example, I cannot agree that disgust and trust are opposing. I trust the fact that a truck stop bathroom will be disgusting, for example.

I think that the definition of trust in that example is that you don't trust the bathroom because you're disgusted by it.