Do you use psionics in your games?

[wildstarsreach]

Interesting.

What do you consider sound reasons? Campaign flavor only, or balance ones as well?


Btw, I voted Psionics allowed with House Rules, although this is fairly skewed. I have something like one or two house rules that define better how Psionics works with magic (with regard to Psicraft, Spellcraft, and Detect Magic/Psionics), but have about 30 house rules on the rest of the game.

My last PC was an Elan Egoist and my next PC will probably be a Warforged Egoist or Shaper. The only reason I'm playing a Psion a second time in a row (usually, I play Wizards when I'm not DMing) is because I only got one level of Illithid Slayer last time before the campaign ended and I wanted to delve further into my "Illithid Hatred" mode.

In the last two years, we have had 5 Psionic PCs out of about 18 to 20 PCs. This is a fairly high percentage.

We are playing the Savage Tide campaign plot and I'm playing a Psiforged Shaper with some unusual backgrounds. I plan to take the leadership feat at 6th level and get a psionic artificer as a cohort. I took the psiforged body feat for flavor even against recomendations of other players since I wanted the flavor. The DM in fact allowed a change to add darkvision for trading out the light fortification and immunity to energy drain. Our monster crew all had darkvision except the psiforged.

 

[wildstarsreach]

As a non-psionic PC, Elans are fine. Having a special ability once or twice a day is ok.

But, psionic Elans (i.e. ones with a lot of PP) are just too uber for my tastes. That's more or less a +4 to most saves most of the time which stack with all other save bonuses. That's nearly as useful as a 16,000 GP Cloak of Resistance handed out to a first level PC. Not quite as useful since it cannot be used all of the time, but nearly so (and Resistance actually stacks with a Cloak of Resistance).

Add to that Resilience, Repletion, their immunity to several mind spells like Charm, Dominate, and Hold Person. Their ability to eventually (if desired) gain the Metamorphisis power and change into one of many useful aberrations, etc.

For this, they give up 2 points of Charisma, a skill point per level, and a feat compared with a human (the baseline).

Elans look okay but in an eberron campaign a warforged or kalashtar are more appealing to me.

 

[Tetsubo]

For my next campaign I plan on banning arcane magic completely. The closest thing to arcane magic will be Warlocks. Psionics will be the default "magic" of the world. I will allow the use of Incarnum as well. Divine magic will be limited to Druid spells. No actual gods of any kind. There will still be religions and churches of course. Psionics just suits my vision of what D&D magic should be...

 

[Goblyn]

For my next campaign I plan on banning arcane magic completely. The closest thing to arcane magic will be Warlocks. Psionics will be the default "magic" of the world. I will allow the use of Incarnum as well. Divine magic will be limited to Druid spells. No actual gods of any kind. There will still be religions and churches of course. Psionics just suits my vision of what D&D magic should be...

I agree. I voted no, because there just happens to be no psionics in the game I am currently running.

My love for the XPH system equals my seething and eternal hatred for the Vancian system which doesn't model ANY sort of magic of ANY type I've ever seen. Though it does balance nicely.

 

[KarinsDad]

Though it does balance nicely.

That's a loaded statement.

 

[kigmatzomat]

I liked 3.0 PsiHb and love XPH but unfortunately they came out far too late for me to integrate them into my campaign fully so I had to choose "restricted by location." Two of the PCs are planning on picking up psionic PrCs and already have the Wild Talent feat.

I much prefer the XPH psi points system to traditional casting and plan on my next homebrew venture to chuck the sorcerer for the psion.

 

[DreamChaser]

I avoid it where possible and am always wary of players wanting to play psionics in a core game.

As well you should be...unless psionics are fully integrated, the single bit of psionics can seem very overpowered. IMHO, the "restricted" option (location or race specific) is the only one that is patently unbalanced because it makes psionic characters outside of that area novel and easily abusable.

But, psionic Elans (i.e. ones with a lot of PP) are just too uber for my tastes. That's more or less a +4 to most saves most of the time which stack with all other save bonuses. That's nearly as useful as a 16,000 GP Cloak of Resistance handed out to a first level PC. Not quite as useful since it cannot be used all of the time, but nearly so (and Resistance actually stacks with a Cloak of Resistance).

Having just come off playing an elan psychic warrior, I did not find this to be the case. While I could have gained the benefit of a Cloak of Resistance constantly, most often I had better things to do with my swift actions (and my power points). The Resilience ability was actually the far more useful ability but as a front-line fighter it would eat through my PP really darn fast. Vigor was by far the better choice, though it required planning to use.

It is akin to how the cleric could in theory refuse to heal anyone and spend all his spell, scroll, and wand resources on the combat buffs and direct damage spells he has access too which would allow him to outstrip both the average fighter and the average wizard. On a practical level, this is unlikely to occur because the DM is going to throw situations at the character that require that he play to other strengths.

DC

 

[Nyaricus]

I have 3 differnt answers here

Psionics have NO! place in my homebrew (which is what Europe in 1050 or so AD would look like if all the folklore/religion and mythology were true, combined with some major LotR elements like Orcs and such) and I keep the XPH far, far away from the table when running that cmapaign (and since I am only a few sessions into a 20 level FR campaign, my homebrew is on hiatus)

In my FR game that I DM, I currently do not allow the XPH, but that was more of an oversight by yours truely than anyhting else. If asked, I'd likely say yes, with the soulknife going back to a PrC (as it should be). The lurk makes a better roguish psion, IMO.

In the D*S game I am playing in, I'm a human telepath, so yeah, psionics are allowed.

I didn't vote, but I've gone from a hater of Psionics to a tough lover of it. It's really neat, and a very different spin on magic

cheers,
--N

 

[thorian]

Interesting that this poll shows 2 to 1 using psionics. I always hear "market research" which shows that psionics aren't very widely used. Perhaps the members of this board are not representative of the gaming community as a whole. I would guess those of us on this board are not as casual of an enthusiast as the majority of players out there.

 

[IcyCool]

I answered "Yes, I freely use it." That's true in the sense that it is available for characters unchanged. I don't use it for NPC's (except in rare cases) because I don't like it. I don't know whether or not I wish to exclude it from my games yet, I'll need more experience (both using it, and gming for it) before I determine that. I've had one particularly bad experience with it so far, but that hardly establishes a pattern.