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Psionics: Yea or Nay?
- Thread starter Desdichado
- Start date
Pbartender
First Post
Eh... It's six of one, or a half dozen of the other.
Psionics has always struck me as just magic with a different flavor.
Psionics has always struck me as just magic with a different flavor.
Vyvyan Basterd
Adventurer
I voted hesitantly. I like the idea of psionics, but I've never really liked the implementation of them until 4E. 1E psionics were a weird broken tack-on that we initially had fun with, but quickly realized that you either wanted your character to be way over-the-top or not have them at all. And maybe it was the players I met that soured me to 2E and 3E psionics. If they could play a wizard and cast more high level spells at the expense of "useless" low-level spells, they would. That was all psionics seemed to be in that era (although the 3.5 version seemed better than previous models). Now 4E has tried to refine what psionics really means in a fantasy world. I know others were displeased, but I really like the monk as a psionic character.
Celebrim
Legend
The word 'psionics' has the same general meaning as the word 'bionics'. The term refers to enhancing the powers of the mind with a machine just as bionics refers to enhancing the powers of the body with a machine.
In a magical fantasy setting like D&D, true 'psionics' means something like an Ioun Stone - a magical means of enhancing the mental prowess of the bearer. A 'helm of telepathy' is a 'psionic device'. There is in my opinion room in the fantastic for both 'psionics' and 'bionics' so long as we are clear what they mean and use the term correctly.
The term 'psionics' comes to us from science fiction as a device which would allow its user to, by means of some sort of super science, emmulate effects which we would normally associate with 'magic', namely things like 'telepathy' and 'clairvoyance'. For example, a radio implant which communicated directly with the mind of the bearer and which allowed him to communicate directly with other such modified individuals would be a basic form of psionics. In this sense, the 'Borg' from Star Trek are a race of psionicists.
Over time, the original meaning of 'psionic' and its usage in providing a relatively hard science justification for the presence of seemingly magical effects was erroded in science fiction to the extent that while the clearly psionic Borg (which are not thought of as psionic) live along side magical races like the Vulcans and the Betans who have magical powers which are not justified by any sort of technology. They are simply 'empaths' or 'telepaths' without any explanation. That isn't psionic; that's simply magic.
In RPG's, 'psionics' has come to mean something which is in my opinion utter nonsense, namely, a form of magic which is not magic but which has all the attributes of magic including access to almost all the traditional real world magical abilities - telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, etc. In the real world, you'll find very few examples of anyone who was claimed to be able to hurl balls of fire or conjure up walls of stone. But there was widespread belief in the arcane powers of the mind. In the real world, the idea of the 'psychic' appears in the post Enlightment/Industrial Revolution as a means of thinly disguising belief in magic behind a veneer of science. It is from this movement that we get scientific sounding descriptions of magic like 'telepathy' and 'clairvoyance' and 'extra sensory perception'. In my opinion, at some point RPGers got the notions of 'psionic' and 'psychic' irrevocably twisted together (as they are now in pop culture in general). What's made this worse is that there is an entire genera of fiction out there now which takes the superficial trappings of science fiction like ray guns and space travel and uses it is a vehical for telling very traditional fantasy stories complete with wizards and magic. Popular examples would include 'Star Wars' and 'Babylon 5'. These are not generally recognized as fantasy by the viewer, who has come to accept there conventions, and one of the tricks by which the story teller manages this is to use the world 'psionic' in place of magic where 'magic' would break the suspension of disbelief but 'telepath' passes by without question as a standard convention of the genera.
If you look at a D&D spell list, all the powers associated with psychics in the modern mind show up as spells. The presence of psionics is therefore not only superfluous, but in some cases down right inexplicable and reveals a fundamental dissonance and incoherence. At best 'psionics' is an alternative non-Vancian magical system either replacing or coexisting alongside the Vancian system. At worst, it simply reveals a lack of serious thought.
One of the more clever implementations I've seen is in GURPS. In GURPS, 'magic' is a system of magic designed to be roughly balanced with warswords and mail. 'Psionic' is the term in GURPS for a system of magic designed to be roughly balanced with access to assault rifles and ray guns. Hense, you can run both generas, but you can't necessarily successfully run magic and psionics in the game campaign (at least, not if you care about mechanical balance).
In a magical fantasy setting like D&D, true 'psionics' means something like an Ioun Stone - a magical means of enhancing the mental prowess of the bearer. A 'helm of telepathy' is a 'psionic device'. There is in my opinion room in the fantastic for both 'psionics' and 'bionics' so long as we are clear what they mean and use the term correctly.
The term 'psionics' comes to us from science fiction as a device which would allow its user to, by means of some sort of super science, emmulate effects which we would normally associate with 'magic', namely things like 'telepathy' and 'clairvoyance'. For example, a radio implant which communicated directly with the mind of the bearer and which allowed him to communicate directly with other such modified individuals would be a basic form of psionics. In this sense, the 'Borg' from Star Trek are a race of psionicists.
Over time, the original meaning of 'psionic' and its usage in providing a relatively hard science justification for the presence of seemingly magical effects was erroded in science fiction to the extent that while the clearly psionic Borg (which are not thought of as psionic) live along side magical races like the Vulcans and the Betans who have magical powers which are not justified by any sort of technology. They are simply 'empaths' or 'telepaths' without any explanation. That isn't psionic; that's simply magic.
In RPG's, 'psionics' has come to mean something which is in my opinion utter nonsense, namely, a form of magic which is not magic but which has all the attributes of magic including access to almost all the traditional real world magical abilities - telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, etc. In the real world, you'll find very few examples of anyone who was claimed to be able to hurl balls of fire or conjure up walls of stone. But there was widespread belief in the arcane powers of the mind. In the real world, the idea of the 'psychic' appears in the post Enlightment/Industrial Revolution as a means of thinly disguising belief in magic behind a veneer of science. It is from this movement that we get scientific sounding descriptions of magic like 'telepathy' and 'clairvoyance' and 'extra sensory perception'. In my opinion, at some point RPGers got the notions of 'psionic' and 'psychic' irrevocably twisted together (as they are now in pop culture in general). What's made this worse is that there is an entire genera of fiction out there now which takes the superficial trappings of science fiction like ray guns and space travel and uses it is a vehical for telling very traditional fantasy stories complete with wizards and magic. Popular examples would include 'Star Wars' and 'Babylon 5'. These are not generally recognized as fantasy by the viewer, who has come to accept there conventions, and one of the tricks by which the story teller manages this is to use the world 'psionic' in place of magic where 'magic' would break the suspension of disbelief but 'telepath' passes by without question as a standard convention of the genera.
If you look at a D&D spell list, all the powers associated with psychics in the modern mind show up as spells. The presence of psionics is therefore not only superfluous, but in some cases down right inexplicable and reveals a fundamental dissonance and incoherence. At best 'psionics' is an alternative non-Vancian magical system either replacing or coexisting alongside the Vancian system. At worst, it simply reveals a lack of serious thought.
One of the more clever implementations I've seen is in GURPS. In GURPS, 'magic' is a system of magic designed to be roughly balanced with warswords and mail. 'Psionic' is the term in GURPS for a system of magic designed to be roughly balanced with access to assault rifles and ray guns. Hense, you can run both generas, but you can't necessarily successfully run magic and psionics in the game campaign (at least, not if you care about mechanical balance).
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deganawida
Legend
I'm option 2, and the certain way that I liked it pre-3e was to rename it as sorcery, and have it as non-ritual magic, or innate magic. Made sorcerers mechanically and thematically different from mages. Also restored some of the mystery to magic, by making magic something which does not necessarily have hard-and-fast rules.
Pbartender
First Post
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." - Clarke's Third Law.
"Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced." - Gehm's Corollary.
And what's so wrong with that? Retelling stories in different genres and settings happens all the time. Consider Kurosawa's Samurai film The Seven Samurai as a shining example... with A Bug's Life being one of the most recent adaptations.
"Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced." - Gehm's Corollary.
And what's so wrong with that? Retelling stories in different genres and settings happens all the time. Consider Kurosawa's Samurai film The Seven Samurai as a shining example... with A Bug's Life being one of the most recent adaptations.
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Desdichado
Hero
Uh... read the first post again. Of course you can answer the poll.
evileeyore
Mrrrph
As I replied over there... It depends on the flavor of the fantasy genre I'm running.
I'm about to run a campaign where all "magical" power is external and used/activated/gained either through negotiation (often dangerous and delicate) with spirits/demons or ritualistic and slow. In this world psionics do not fit.
I'm about to run a campaign where all "magical" power is external and used/activated/gained either through negotiation (often dangerous and delicate) with spirits/demons or ritualistic and slow. In this world psionics do not fit.
Magic is supposed to be explicable? D&D, the first and foremost "kitchen sink" game has ever been coherent in it's overall offerings?
Stepping into a high-level view for a moment - the difference isn't in the effects the system can produce. The difference is in the metaphysics.
Many GMs don't give much thought to the metaphysics, which gets classified as fluff or flavor text. But if your GM is actually going to be driving some events with metaphysics, it becomes a different ballgame. That's part of why I don't like mixing psi and spellcasting - I don't think the metaphysics mix well.
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