D&D 5E What's wrong with this psion?

[NaturalZero]

That point was prior to 1e. In 1e Gygax included those as options for the DM. He includes them as recommendations for other planes, but they don't exist as other planes by default.

I seem to remember plenty of the mods with futuristic stuff being released after the game came out.

Sci-fi was a basic theme employed by the creators of the game themselves. Only later did we have ironic claims that there was no place for it in the game.

 

[Maxperson]

I seem to remember plenty of the mods with futuristic stuff being released after the game came out.
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Sci-fi was a basic theme employed by the creators of the game themselves. Only later did we have ironic claims that there was no place for it in the game.

It was an OPTIONAL part, though. They definitely had it. Glantri, same world as that module, was built over a space ship. By 1e, though, it wasn't there unless the DM put it in.

 

[see]

Blackmoore, one of the first DnD settings, was a post-apocalyptic world with super futuristic technology and in the past, waiting to be uncovered. Gygax ran DnD games where players visited the old west and spaceships.

At some point, we had a weird phenomenon where some people wanted "pure" DnD that, super ironically, cut out all of the sci-fi elements that were baked into the soul of DnD. Having a weird power source that's vaguely sci-fi, existing the sidelines of the core world is the most DnD thing you could include in the game.

And if you want a 0e Supplement III/1e PHB psionics-on-the-sidelines-of-the-core-world experience, you would have exactly zero classes/subclasses based around psionics. You would instead have characters with a minor "wild talent" or two, which in 5e would be expressed as feats like Telekinetic or Telepathic, or a knock-off version of Magic Initiate with no spell components.

(Well, except that the actual core 0e/1e psionics was psionic combat, not the talents. Still, nobody seems to be running around demanding that, so I'll set that to one side.)

The people not being served by the current rules are people who want 2e psionics, particularly the ones that want the 2e Dark Sun experience of psionics as a central setting element, not the people who want 0e/1e oddball-at-the-edges sci-fantasy.

 

[jgsugden]

Psionics have a historic role in D&D. They deserve a full treatment, not just making them a subclass and a flavor of arcane magic. Too many DMs have a featured role for it in their homebrew campaign worlds and having no official rules for it for a half decade is frustrating, although most of us found a workaround a long time ago.

Tehcnology and science have as much of a role in D&D as you like to give it. There is no right or wrong answer.

 

[NaturalZero]

It was an OPTIONAL part, though. They definitely had it. Glantri, same world as that module, was built over a space ship. By 1e, though, it wasn't there unless the DM put it in.

Sure, the official mods set the official setting don't exist unless the DM chooses but that has no bearing on whether the creators and genesis of DnD involved sci-fi pieces.

 

[NaturalZero]

And if you want a 0e Supplement III/1e PHB psionics-on-the-sidelines-of-the-core-world experience, you would have exactly zero classes/subclasses based around psionics. You would instead have characters with a minor "wild talent" or two, which in 5e would be expressed as feats like Telekinetic or Telepathic, or a knock-off version of Magic Initiate with no spell components.

(Well, except that the actual core 0e/1e psionics was psionic combat, not the talents. Still, nobody seems to be running around demanding that, so I'll set that to one side.)

The people not being served by the current rules are people who want 2e psionics, particularly the ones that want the 2e Dark Sun experience of psionics as a central setting element, not the people who want 0e/1e oddball-at-the-edges sci-fantasy.

The version and mechanical particulars of psionics are an issue that is orthogonal to my point that the sci-fi arugment doesn't mean anything within the context of Dnd's origins.

 

[Scribe]

Trying to catch up on this thread, but can someone tell me what the last 'official' version of the psionic was? 3e?

 

[Mecheon]

Trying to catch up on this thread, but can someone tell me what the last 'official' version of the psionic was? 3e?

4E. They were controllers

 

[Levistus's_Leviathan]

Psionics have a historic role in D&D. They deserve a full treatment, not just making them a subclass and a flavor of arcane magic. Too many DMs have a featured role for it in their homebrew campaign worlds and having no official rules for it for a half decade is frustrating, although most of us found a workaround a long time ago.

Tehcnology and science have as much of a role in D&D as you like to give it. There is no right or wrong answer.

^Exactly this.

I'm not a grognard (began in 5e), I don't care about what happened in previous editions at all (for 5e mechanics, that is), but Psionics deserves the full treatment. Psionics in my world are the opposite of spellcasting. Spellcasting, no matter the source of it, is you drawing magic from the Weave. Psionics is you drawing magic (and yes, it counts as magic) from your mind. There are whole international conflicts between the users of magic (arcane, primal, and divine) and the practitioners of psionics. If psionics was just reflavored spellcasting, that would make this part of my world feel less authentic.

Psionics deserves not only its own class, but also its own system.

 

[Scribe]

Psionics deserves not only its own class, but also its own system.

Watched a few youtube video's, and doing a bunch of reading and yeah this is what its about to me. Making it just a subclass seems super underwhelming.