Some opinions on a plot point/technique...

[Mouseferatu]

I don't think any of my players read EN World, but if you are one of my guys, and are going to be part of the new Selion (my homebrew) campaign, get lost!!

Okay, for the rest of you...

In my previous campaign in this setting, the entire world was swept by a wave of primal Chaos and almost unmade, until the (very high level by then) PCs were able to reestablish Selion's contact with the gods, who restored it.

Okay, background's far more complex than that, but that's what you need for now.

The campaign I'm about to start takes place about 54 years later. I intend for the main villains to come from a cult that worships raw/pure Chaos, as it has obviously proved more powerful than any deity. At low levels, they're simply chaotic clerics. After a certain point, however, the cult exposes them to raw chaos (sources of it still exist, left over from the Unmaking), which, combined with their faith in chaos, transforms them into something other than human and grants them bizarre, reality-altering abilities unknown to others.

So the question I had to face is, how do I represent those powers? And I was actually thinking (inspired by several other threads in recent days)...

Psionics.

Yeah, I know, psioncs are normally viewed as mental powers that require intense discipline to use. But think about it. All if I have to do is change some "flavor text" and alter some descriptions, and instead of being "mentalists," I have a class of people capable of altering reality around them without use of magic spells or prayers, with a system that's not compatible with magic and is far more flexible even than sorcerers, and works in a totally foreign fashion. (I've never used psionics in Selion before.) Change the manifestations and visual effects, alter the names, never refer to them as psionics, and voila! Mysterious powers that appear to shape reality without recourse to magic.

I'd carefully pick and choose the powers they have, of course, probably tone down the telepathic ones and make more use of those that actually have physical effects. And I'll probably ditch the psionic combat modes and replace them with bonus feats or something. Still, I think that, with the proper descriptive alterations, I can make use of psionics without actually "using psionics."

So what I'm wondering is this...

Do those of you have run psionic-heavy games (I never have) think this is a workable concept? And do any of you who may not like this idea have any other suggestions as to what I might use to represent "alien, chaos-based powers"? (I don't want to use wild magic, because I don't want them just to be "weird spellcasters.")

 

[evildm]

While I can't say I run psionic-heavy games at all (psi is usually relegated to monsters and NPCs, even though players can be Psions if they want), I must say that that's a damn cool idea and I hope you run with it. If you do go along with it, don't forget to let us know how it goes.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Bumpety for the weekday crowd.

 

[Tonguez]

I've used a similar concept in the past

IMC the Floating City of Al-Damasq is inhabited by the Iskandrya who look human, are 7 ft tall and are immortal, they also have 'The Power of the Divine' - which is Psionics but never mentioned as such- the Iskandrya were the only race to have this power until the first of the Blues appeared...

Anyway as long as you play up the 'alieness' of the 'Chaos Powers', only use certain manifestations - say glowing eyes, strange winds etc and play the Chaos powers as spontaneous and seemingly unlimited then you get the effect fine imho.

 

[Malicene]

Futhermore is you use Psionics and magic are the same, you just have to create spell list (thru a PrC) including any psionic power you like, make the change to turn them to divine spell (not so hard).

*So you could have a retricted spell list including "new"/different powers (since it's for NPC use you can handle it and scale it)
* Or a new Domain (Raw Chaos) including these psi powers.
Up to you !

IMO don't bother with spell point issue, the new domain is IMO the best solution as only 1 psispell per spell level per day.

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

You should read any of the Jester's Story Hours. He has tons of this stuff, he loves Chaos effects. IIRC, he also has several tables of random chaos powers that apply to his PC's and NPC's, and a PrC called Chaos Warrior.

Email him or something, he might be able to help.

 

[Harlequin_1998]

Two things:
First, you indicated in your background that the forces of chaos were pushed back/undone by the gods. This would indicate to me that divine power has an effect on the chaos. If so, you may want to carefully consider having the chaos priests use divine magic instead of psionics (similar to what Malicene said), or have psionics as a more different kind of magic.
Second, that being said, I can attest to the devestating effects of psionics in a typically non-psionic game world. In my previous campaign there was a wizard that discovered the exitence of psionics. He assembled (i.e conscripted) and trained a force of Psions and used them to keep his realm firmly under his control. A small group (3-4) of low level psions (about level 5, I think) were able to quickly take down an experienced party (5 players, average level 9).

 

[Enkhidu]

Ohhh, I like this idea. Some suggestions:

*Dump all telepathic powers. Manipulating Chaos-Stuff is about taking raw Chaos and making it do what you want. Replace all mention of "ectoplasm" and "quintessance" and make is pure, physical Chaos.

*Allow the current attack modes to apply temporary ability damage to everyone, not just psions/chaos users. This will model the degenerative effect of Chaos-stuff on living beings quite well. However, I'd up the power point cost for all these powers across the board, because they will become extremely powerful.

*Make your Chaos-psion a prestige class only available to the devotees of Chaos, and with some other, fairly hefty, requirements (like having Iron Will, or a high base Will save - those without unbending will or sense of self lose themselves when immersed in raw chaos). This will keep extremely nasty powers out of the game.

*Use Astral Construct/Chaos Construct - a lot. Amphormous blobs of Chaos that move, act, and fight are just cool.

Let us know how this turns out!

 

[the Jester]

Ahh, found the thread!

mouseferatu, I like your idea- it's really cool. I also like Enkhidu's idea about letting the attack modes affect everyone- though mind blast actually goes down in utility that way, so keep that in mind when adjusting pp costs.

I use a lot of Chaos stuff in my game- always have, I love huge random charts. There was a time when I couldn't pass up throwing a wand of wonder to every party, I must confess. Nowadays I've become somewhat leery of total chaos everywhere- a character who gets lucky can become much cooler than one who doesn't in the blink of an eye, and I think you have to watch out for that.

Nonetheless, I do love chaos so much that I have a random chaos attribute chart here, which is ridiculously humungous and requires a d34 for some of the subtables (cuz I have one that a friend loaned me). Feel free to use it or mine it for ideas.

I think that in general, chaos ought to be dangerous and likely to cause you trouble as much as help you out. My warrior of chaos prestige class has a special gift of Chaos chart he rolls on every level, and though it's weighted in his advantage, there are a number of bad things that can happen to him (like random limb loss).

Anyway, if I can help anyhow, let me know.

 

[Mouseferatu]

Some great ideas so far, folks. I appreciate it.

Enkhidu, I love the idea of keeping the attack forms but having them work on anyone. You're right, that works perfectly with the idea of Chaos breaking down the victim's physical form. It's evil; therefore, it's good.

And yeah, I'd already decided to tone town or eliminate most of the telepathic powers in favor of those that affect physical objects.

I was actually thinking the Chaos Disciple might be a template as much as a PrC, since it involves actually changing the physical nature of the victim--but in either case, the prereqs are such that very few people will be able to do it. (For instance, it requires that you already be a clerical worshipper of Chaos.)

Harlequin, you're right, in the background the gods pushed back the waves of Chaos and remade the world. I hadn't thought about it, but you're right that it does make sense that Divine magic should be closer to "chaos magic/psionics" than arcane magic is. I'm thinking of using the "psionics are different" rules when comparing them to arcane, but a modified form of "psionics are just like magic" rules when comparing them to Divine.

Of course, both spellcasters in my party are Divine spellcasters, darn it. Oh, well...

Jester, what sort of random charts are you talking about? I'm a little leery of doing Wand/Rod of Wonder-style random effects. I'm definitely going for a scary feel to the Disciples of Chaos. Don't get me wrong, I love the W/R of Wonder--the first party who ever played in this world had one, and we used the expanded charts from Dragon Magazine. But nothing ruins the players' fear of the villain when he accidentally hurls butterflies at them or makes his nose grow.

That said, I will definitely check out the charts regardless.