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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Yaarel" data-source="post: 8568366" data-attributes="member: 58172">That is one of the challenges of the psionic fandom. We are so diverse.Most of time, there is no problem when each of us can find the particular options we are looking for.But we need to get on the same page with regard to how psionic and arcane interact with each other. Because, this interaction is game engine mechanics, not just setting flavor.Heh. Of course, the "best" way is the way one oneself wants it anyway.To predict the most succesful approach for 5e psionics, lets look at the success of 5e generally.Old school 1e inspires 5e. But in important ways, 5e is unlike 1e. Heh, 5e takes the mechanics of AD&D 1e and 2e, throws it into an incinerator, and never looks back. Yet, somehow, 5e retains the feel of old school playstyles despite the mechanics differing.To succeed, psionics must allow for how D&D evolves and adapt to the sensibilities of today, even when drawing inspiration from the past.There is an added complication, because old school psionics failed. Most 1e gamers refused to use psionics, and 2e gamers rejected it officially. Lets face it, in an era when most gamers were comfortable with scifi technobabble in their D&D, the main reason they rejected psionics is because the psionic mechanics were horrifying. Look at how ad hoc the normal old school mechanics are. For these gamers to find psionic mechanics objectionable is remarkable.Yet psionics adds something vital to D&D. D&D feels incomplete without it. Here we are today, almost 50 years later, and we feel a palpable loss because now 5e is still missing a sufficient presence of psionics.Even back then during 2e, there was regret for having eliminated psionics, and they experimented with psionics in the form of new mechanics for the Psionicist class. But then 3e rejected 2e psionics. Why? Because the experimental mechanics too often ruined the game.My impression is, 3e enjoyed the most successful version of psionics. It was an era when gamers were truly fed up with the old school vancian spell preparation. There was a need for a real alternative that wasnt the "red headed stepchild" Sorcerer who seemed sabotaged to ensure the vancian Wizard wss superior. The 3e designers created the Psion class to correct the vancian Wizard. The Psion mechanics are a normal spellcaster ... but working better and more intuitively.Unfortunately, by the time a successful version of psionics finally arrived, there was already three editions of D&D whose experoence crystallized pretty much without it. The 3e psionic mechanics were fine, even excellent. The new problem was, its flavor didnt fit in anymore. The 3e gamers accused psionics of being not-D&D. Despite psionics being part of D&D since the origins of D&D, long before the rest of D&D! And 4e rejected 3e psionics.I love 4e and I love psionics. But when psionics finally became available in 4e, everything about it felt incongruously technobabble flavor and unnecessarily modified mechanics. It was balanced but uselessly weird. 4e psionics felt more about "jumping the shark" in the life cycle of 4e, and less about providing a solid psionic power source for D&D.Now each edition of D&D has fans who love its iteration of psionics. This is why psionic fans are so divided against each other. But it matters when the D&D gamers at large reject psionics!For psionics to succeed it must go mainstream. Obviously we must draw inspiration from earlier editions, and get buy-in from the psionic fans of each edition. But we must also get in touch with the gaming sensibilities of D&D in the here and now.</blockquote>

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