Psionic Skills
Psionic powers are divided up into disciplines, each of which has a corresponding skill. Someone with a basic, functioning expertise in the skill has level-0, while a true master of the art would have level-4. Only psychics can learn psionic skills, and they are most often taught at rigidly-disciplined psychic academies. Attempting to develop these skills without such formalized training is almost invariably lethal to the experimenter, though an exceedingly few natural prodigies sometimes intuitively grasp their principles. Even fewer of these gifted naturals are able to express their understanding in a coherent, teachable form.
Some psychics are “unrestricted”. While they usually have a distinct aptitude for one or two disciplines, they can theoretically learn any of them, and may raise any psionic skill they choose. Any character with the Psychic class is an unrestricted psychic. Others demonstrate gifts in only one discipline. While they can eventually master all aspects of that power, they can’t raise any other psychic skill. Adventurers with the Partial Psychic class option are such “restricted” psychics.
Attempting to wield a natural psionic aptitude without proper precautions will almost inevitably cause death or madness, as the uncontrolled cascade of MES energies will cause varying forms of permanent brain damage. Untrained psychics can sometimes get away with using their powers very rarely, but these natural prodigies rarely have any ability beyond level-1 in a discipline. Those who use their powers often enough to gain more practical field experience can expect to end up dead, crippled, or insane.
Unlike other skills, psychic skills are restricted to characters with the Psychic class or the Partial Psychic class option for Adventurers. You cannot choose or roll these skills in character creation unless specifically told to pick a psychic skill.
Master powers of physical repair, body augmentation, and shapeshifting | Master powers that nullify, boost, and shape the use of other psychic abilities | Master the ability to sense future events and control probability |
Master the remote control of kinetic energy to move objects and fabricate force constructs | Master the reading and influencing of other sapient minds | Master the arts of physical translocation of yourself and allies |
Psionic Powers and Techniques
Every psychic who obtains level-0 proficiency in a discipline gains access to its core technique. This technique varies depending on the discipline, whether it’s physical translocation with Teleportation or tissue repair with Biopsionics. The strength of the ability varies with the practitioner’s skill level; the Psychic Succor provided by a biopsionicist with level-0 proficiency is much weaker than that provided by someone with level-4 expertise.
Core techniques improve naturally as the psychic improves their skill level. They do not need to be purchased with skill points or otherwise specially trained.
As a psychic improves their skill level in a discipline, they may also learn other techniques, special tricks and abilities they’ve refined through practice.
Each time they improve a skill level, they can pick a new technique from that discipline. Most techniques have a minimum skill level associated with them, and the PC can’t pick a technique which requires a higher skill level than they’ve mastered. They also cannot “save” technique picks for later, either. They must be chosen immediately after improving the skill.
The techniques listed under the disciplines here are commonly-known arts that are part of the basic curriculum of most competent psychic academies. No special training is required to choose them when a PC is able to pick a new technique, as the principles were taught as part of their basic education. Other techniques exist that are more esoteric in nature, and may require a trainer to educate the PC in their principles before they can be learned.
Even so, some of the standard techniques might be selectively restricted by an academy, taught only to certain pupils. In some cases, this may be due to a sponsor’s restrictions on what kind of abilities they want the local psychics to possess, while other academies might consider them fundamentally immoral abilities. Control over the metapsionic technique of psychic tutoring is particularly strict, as any pupil who has its rudiments included in their curriculum may eventually be able to train other psychics in turn. A PC may have to go to significant lengths in order to patch the holes in a government-controlled psychic curriculum.
PCs who want to learn additional techniques beyond those acquired by improving their skills may buy them separately with skill points, paying one point per level of the technique. PCs who want to retrain techniques may do so at the GM’s discretion, usually only when they encounter some new esoteric technique they’d like to learn in place of an existing art. Techniques can only be retrained into others of equal or lower required skill level.
It may be possible for a psychic to create entirely new techniques to reflect their personal aptitudes and special inclinations. Any such novelty is strictly at the GM’s discretion, and unlikely to be done more than once or twice over the lifetime of even the most skilled psychic experimenter.
Effort and Psychic Abilities
Psionic powers are fueled by Effort, a measure of the psychic’s mental focus, energy, and neural responsiveness. A psychic’s maximum Effort total is equal to one plus the higher of their Wisdom or Constitution at-tribute modifiers, plus their highest psychic skill score.
Thus, a psychic with a Wisdom modifier of -1, a Constitution modifier of +2, and psionic skills of Metapsionics-0 and Biopsionics-0 would have a maximum Effort score of 3. If he were to then improve his Biop-sionics skill to level-1, his Effort would become 4.
Effort is “Committed” to fuel a psionic power.
Some Commitment is relatively short-term, lasting only as long as the power is in effect. Other powers require that the Effort be Committed for the full scene, while the most powerful might require it be Committed for the rest of the day. Once the Commitment period is over, the Effort returns to the psychic. All Effort is refreshed after a good night’s rest.
Whenever a power requires you to Commit Effort, you commit only one point, though additional effects or triggerings may require separate Commitments.
Torching
Psychics can push past their limits by “torching”, intentionally ignoring safety protocols and neural refractory periods to channel MES energy beyond their normal capacity. For untrained MES subjects, all their power use qualifies as torching, as they lack the training necessary to develop safe reserves of Effort.
Torching is an Instant action that can be performed once per round. It provides a free point of Ef-fort that lasts for the rest of the scene, even if this point puts a psychic over the maximum allowed. Every time the psychic torches, however, they have to roll on the torching result table below.
D6 TORCHING RESULT
1-2 Lose 1 point from your Wisdom score
3-4 Lose 1 point from your Constitution score
5 Lose 1 point from an attribute you choose
6 No harm is done by the torching
Psychics reduced below a Wisdom score of 3 go violently insane and become “feral psychics”; those reduced below scores of 3 in other attributes likewise become dead or nonviable as player characters. There is no available cure for brain damage caused by torching, and even advanced pretech technology has no generally-known remedy.
Feral psychics are exceptionally dangerous, as their form of brain damage invariably results in violent, psychotic behavior and terrifying hallucinations. Worse still, they can torch with impunity thereafter, as the MES energies have already burnt a clear path through what remains of their sanity. Feral psychics have effectively unlimited Effort with what powers they have obtained. There is no known cure for a feral psychic.