Psionics

Basics

Psionic Tendrils

Psionic wielders submerge their soul deeper into the Void through a process of meditation, gaining a closer connection to the tendrils that bind things through the Void. These tendrils requires constant, physical energy to maintain meaning the more psionicly powerful you are, the weaker you are physically. You are feeding the Tendrils your physical energy so your body does not receive said energy.

Each Psionic Tendril provides one spell effect slot, meaning when you form a Tendril you can attach any effect from the Spell Effect list. Tendrils cost nothing to activate the spell effect, the cost already being handled by the initial loss of a person's physical ability. However, you can also have empty Tendrils which are useful for several uses that will be discussed.

In order to gain access to new Psionic Tendrils, you must make a sacrifice at a Psionic Shrine while meditating for 4 in-game hours. The sacrifice requires 3 pool point maximums, in any combination; taking all 3 from one pool, spreading it over 3 pools, or picking 2 from one pool and 1 from another. But it needs to be 3 points. This process reduces the chosen pools maximum possible value, representing the physical energy required to maintain the tendrils.

The number of Psionic Tendril you gain from doing this is equal to your intellect rank. You can make multiple of these sacrifices to gain additional tendrils.

Example

You reduce your character's maximum swiftness by 3 points.

They have Intellect at Rank 2.

They gain 2 Psionic Tendrils.

Another character reduces their maximum swiftness, blood, and nerve by one point each.

They have Intellect at Rank 4.

They gain 4 Psionic Tendrils.

The second character could sacrifice another 3 pool points in the same pools.

In that case they would have 2 sacrifices so 4 + 4 = 8 total Psionic Tendrils.

If you lose access to the tendril for some reason, the pool maximums automatically come back making your character physically stronger at the cost of losing their magic for the encounter. At any time, you can revoke a sacrifice as a free action regaining the pool points. However, you must drop as many tendrils as you got for that sacrifice. So if you have a rank 4 intellect, you would need to drop 4 tendrils to gain back the 3 pool points sacrificed. You cannot drop fewer tendrils to get partial pool points back.

It's also important to note you would need to get to a psionic shrine to reform the abandoned tendrils meaning that dropping tendrils can greatly reduce your options and should be a measure of last resort.

Example

As part of your sacrifices you sacrifice a total of 3 blood.

You have an intellect rank of 2.

During a fight you get hurt and are close to dying. As a free action you can give up Psionic Tendrils to immediately boost your blood pool by 3, regaining both the points themselves and the maximum of your pool.

To do this you must abandon 2 Tendrils since each sacrifice gains you 2 Tendrils. You may NOT drop 1 Tendril and get partial pool points back.

You may also release the spell from any individual Tendril as a free action creating an empty Tentril.

Trading Tendrils

Tendrils can be traded between Psionic wielders. The receiver must have an empty Tendril. If they have no empty tendrils, they either have to empty one, a free action, or they can't receive it. Once the trade is done the one giving the Tendril will have an empty Tendril and can use it however they want.

Trading Tendrils must be done when the two parties are touching or using psionic equipment that counts as touching, see green crystal arrays.

Power (Damage)

Each basic Psionic Tendril by default has a power of 1. This effects the basic damage delt when attacking, of the capacity when lifting, and so forth. I.e. the power the tendril can exert.

There are several ways to increase tendrils power. However, you should note that the bonus damage possible by increasing power is limited by the character's Intellect rank.

One of the most basic ways to increase the power is by intertwining two or more tendrils and dedicating them to the same spell effect. Each tendril you intertwine increase the power by 1, so 3 intertwined Psionic Tendrils would have a power of 3. You can intertwine unused tendrils with a used tendril each round, so you do not have to dedicate an unused tendril to one spell effect.

Other ways to increase power is tied to psionic equipment.

Tendril Shape and Strain

Unlike other kinds of magic spells, a Tendril's shape is flexible. When assigning a Spell Effect to a Tendril at it's creation, you will pick a specific shape as with any type of magic. However, Tendrils are deeply rooted into the wielder's mind and act more like a muscle they can flex then a tool they manipulate. It's a direct extension of the wielder.

Because of this Tendrils can be forced into different shapes at will. This means if you assign a fire ball to the Tendril, you can shift it into a fire ray, cone, etc. You cannot change the effect's type, though, so no changing a fire spell into an ice spell.

Strain

However, just like when you flex muscles too much, Tendrils can be put under Strain by changing their shape too far or often. If you botch when flexing a Tendril, the Tendril will essentially cramp and go into Strain. When this happens you will need to beat a will save with a 9 DC. If you take a breather turn you get a bonus to the will save. Each failure of the will save drains a point from one of your pools in this order: swiftness, stamina, then work. In addition, while you are in Strain you cannot use any of your Psionics.

When you go into strain, it is best to back off and take a breather turn to recover. You can compare it to getting a cramp in your hand while in a firefight. It's best to stop fighting for a moment, take cover, and fix the issue. If you press on you must beat the will save roll. You can, as usual, burn Nerve points retroactively to force a successful will save.

The possibility of botching a Tendril shape change is 1 in 10. But proficiency in casting will reduce this; to 1 in 100 for a single proficiency and 1 in 1000 for a double proficiency.

Technology and Psionics

While there is technology specific to Psionics, which will be covered later, it is important to note that there is also technology normally unrelated to Psionics that can help boost a Psionic Wielder.

Psionic Investments into Technology

Any kind of technology can be prepared to accept a Psionic based spell effect. When prepared this way anyone picking up the item can sacrifice pool points on the spot to psionicly empower the item. And they will regain the points when they release the item.

Stimulants

Stimulants can temperately boost your maximum pools. This means you can sacrifice more of your pools while not being a total glass cannon when going into an encounter, so long as you maintain your supply of stims and take them before said encounters.

Psionic Animals

Animals are not capable of producing their own Psionic Tendrils. However, they can intuitively manipulate tendrils and be trained to used them. Because of this, a psionic wielder can wrap one of their tendrils around an animal effectively loaning it to the animal. This allows the animal to use whatever spell is attached to the Tendril.

An effective use of this fact is having a trained guard dog protecting you while you sleep, with the power of fireballs.

Psionic Technology

There is technology specifically developed to interact with Psionic Tendrils. Psionic Technology acts as a force multiplier allowing each Tendril to be more useful and by extension each character pool sacrifice more worth it.

However, unlike a raw Psionic Tendril that is a part of your person, Psionic equipment can be broken or taken away from you. You regain whatever was invested if the equipment is broken, and if it is moved outside your field of influence, you can decide to abandon the equipment to regain what you invested into it.

Using Psionic Technology also makes it much more obvious to others what you can do.

Finally, Psionic Technology must be in three-dimensional space or it will not function. So you cannot just store away your Psionic Tech and gain the benefits for it.

Investments into Psionic Technology

Some Psionic Tech require storing a Tendril in the item, meaning you lose access to your tendril if the equipment is out of range. Other kinds of Psionic Technology requires a sacrifice of pool points to function. Unlike tendril sacrifices which must be 3 pool points as described earlier, sacrifices invested into equipment can be in increments of 1 pool point.

Again if psionic equipment is broken you will regain what was invested into it. If you invested a tendril you will get it back, if you invested pool points, you will get them back.

Psionic Shrines

As already mentioned, a Psionic Shrine is necessary to allow a person to gain Psionic Tendrils or make other physical energy sacrifices to equipment. It takes 4 hours of meditation at a shrine for each Tendril sacrifice of 3 Pool Points.

These shrines can come in several shapes. Often they are medium sized pieces of furniture. However, with sufficient technology level there is also the option to create mobile shrines or even tattoos that act as shrines. This doesn't reduce the time it takes to make a sacrifice, but does allow one more continence.

Obviously there are benefits and negatives to each type of shrine. Large shrines cannot go wherever you go. Mobile shrines can be taken away from you. Tattooed shrines are always with you and cannot be easily removed, but they reduce the amount of tattoo-able skin for other types of magic.

Psionic Cartouche

A Cartouche is a piece of four dimensional jewelry. The more pool points you sacrifice into the Cartouche, and the higher quality it is, the more Power your tendrils have. However, remember that bonus damage is limited by a character's Intellect rank.

Psionic Crystals

Psionic Crystals are a special kind of meterial that can interact with Psionic Tendrils to produce different effects. There are several types, each of a different color and effect. Crystals also has a crafting quality with higher level qualities having more utility, but also harder to craft and therefore acquire. Some crystal colors function on their own while other crystal colors must be assembled into an Array. Individual crystals and crystal arrays are generally of a size that can be worn, but they can also be much larger and used as psionic infrastructure. A person can only use at most one of each color of crystal or array at any time, i.e. you can use one purple and one green crystal array at the same time but cannot use two purple crystals at once.

Synthetic Crystals

Later Technology Ages are capable of crating Psionic Crystals from scratch, allowing the crystals to be any size a user needs. This means that earlier tech ages mostly used crystals for personal use, while later tech ages also used them as infrastructure equipment.

Primary Colored Crystals (Blue, Yellow, Red)

A person's Psionic Essence is made up of 3 things: Knowledge, Skills, and Attributes. The primary Colored Crystals allow a Psionic user to cast an aspect of their essence into the crystal. When another Psionic Wielder places one of their Psionic Tendril into this cast, they temporarily gain access to the essence of the maker. Each of the Primary Crystals function as an individual crystal, and take a long time to imprint a user esence into.

Only one person can use any particular primary crystal at a time unless the individual using it is connected to a Green Crystal Array. Anyone connected with the user through the Green Crystal Array can share the effects of the primary crystal.

Mechanically, the primary crystals do not add to your existing stats, but replaces them if it is better. For example, if a crystal has Strength Rank 2 imprinted on it, and your Strength attribute is 3, you will gain no benefit.

Similarly, if a crystal is storing a single knowledge proficiency of Nature: Plants, but you already have a single proficiency in it, you do not benefit.

However, if you have a single knowledge proficiency of Nature: Plants and use a crystal imprinted with a double proficiency in it, you can use the crystal to perform tasks like you have a double proficiency in Nature: Plants.

Blue Crystals are used to make copies of a person's knowledge. The quality of the crystal dictates the maximum amount of knowledge that can be put into it. Adding knowledge to a blue crystal is a time-consuming process, but can be very useful. Blue crystals allows people to make repositories of knowledge that other people, including non-psionics, can access; like a mental book. Basically you can take a knowledge your character has and make it so that other people can use it like it is their own. This applies to knowledge points, ranks, feats, and specializations. Note that blue crystals can also store memories that are story related or plans for different designs. But remember that Blue crystals do not store data, but the interpretations the original knowlage holder had of the data. So someone who knows a lot about a device would store all that information, while someone who knows nothing would only store a hazy idea of the device.

Yellow Crystals are the same as Blue Crystals, but function for skills. A Yellow Crystal Array can store any skill's points, ranks, feats, and specializations that the maker has imprinted into the crystal.

Red Crystals are the same as Blue and Yellow Crystals, but function for attributes. However, since it only shares the Psionic Essence of attributes it can only be used to boost psionic abilities NOT the person themselves. A Red Crystal that has strength essence imprinted in it, will not let a person carry more stuff, but it will boost the range a psionic spell has since strength effects the range of a psion's spells.

Secondary Colored Crystals

All Secondary Colored Crystals must be assembled into an array to be useful. The number of individual crystals in each array is how many Psionic Tendrils that can be used with it. Though most arrays either have more crystals then you will ever need, or The number of crystals are directly tied to their crafting quality.

Purple Crystal Arrays increase the number of Tendrils (and by extension spell slots) a wielder can have, multiplying the number of Psionic Tendrils you have at the cost of holding it outside your body. The quality of the array is how many extra tendrils you gain every time you invest a tendril out of your person and into the purple crystal. The number of crystals in the array dictate how many Tendrils can be duplicated in this way. The benefit to doing this is very obvious: if you had three tendrils before, and you have a quality three Crystal array, you can drop all three of your tendrils into the purple Crystal array, and now you have access to nine Psionic Tendrils with which to cast nine different spells. The downside to doing this is that your tendrils are now in the purple crystals and are subject to the downsides of Psionic Technology. If the Crystal is destroyed or abandoned, you gain back the tendrils put into it, but obviously lose the extra tendrils provided by the crystal.

You have a Purple Crystal Array with a quality of 3.

You dedicate your 2 Psionic Tendrils to the array gaining 6 Psionic Tendrils in total from your original 2.

If someone lands a hit that breaks your array, you regain your 2 Psionic Tendrils, but lose the spells attached to the 4 lost Tendrils. You can choose which Tendrils to keep though.

Green Crystal Arrays exist between multiple users connecting them. How many crystals are in an array is dependent on the array's quality and that dictates how many other people it can connect. Connected individuals share all of their senses, but only when trying to do so. An individual in the network can choose when to connect and when to not do so at will. Green crystals connect across time and space by going through the void. It is unclear how they work, but it is known that they work, even though the connection through the void is not understood. The main benefit with Green Crystal Arrays is instantaneous sensory communication and allowing linked Psions to use each-other's tendrils. The downside is that if any person in the link is injured, all people connected to the link feel the pain, and will become rattled.

You buy a quality 2 green crystal array and connect yourself and a friend.

You have 6 spell slots, 5 of which are dedicated to combat spells, one attached to the green crystal.

Your friend has 4 spell slots, 3 dedicated to mobility spells and one to the green crystal.

You and your friend now have access to a total 8 spells available.

However, each time your friend is hurt, you feel the pain as well.

Orange Crystal Arrays dramatically boost the range you can cast psionic spells. However, Orange Crystals need the user to sacrifice additional points and place them directly into the Array to use it. The array's quality determines the amount that your range is boosted per sacrifice you make. Orange Crystal Arrays must be worn around the head, though it's form does not matter. It could be a crown, inlaid into a helmet, or worn as earrings. They often appear as jewelry of some form, but can take other forms. Regardless of form, it must be around the head in some way.

Each crafting quality of an orange array provide an additional 25% range boost. So a quality of 4 adds 100% or doubles the range provided by sacrifices.

The range provided by each point sacrificed into the array is technology age dependant.

Tech Age 0 is 50 yd maximum per sacrifice.

Tech Age 1 is 100 yd. this includes the steel and steam ages.

Tech Age 2 is 150 yd. this includes the Cyber and post-apocalyptic ages.

Tech Age 3 is 200 yards. this includes the space and seed ship age.

Tech Age 4 is 250 yd.

So 2 sacrifices in a Tech Age 1 game will boost casting range to 200. And if the array's quality is 2, an additional 50% is added or 100 making the effective range 300 yards.

Though remember, just because your range is increased, doesn't mean you can actually hit your target at that range with your skills.

Clear Crystal Arrays allow you to connect your mind to a device for each pool point sacrifice you make, giving each device it's own action pool. The quality of the crystal determines the number of actions each device's pool will have. instead Because the devices have their own action pools, operating that device no longer counts as an action. The device must be able to physically perform any action the person tries to make it do. For example, a gun cannot aim unless it is wired up to some sort of chassis that can move itself. In addition the actions performed by you through the device still rely on your skills as it is just a mirror of your psyche. You don't actually have to be psionic to use it, but you do have to understand supernatural technology.

Example

You sacrifice 1 point of blood to empower your clear crystal array.

You then link yourself to a mobile turret. Each round you can simultaneously act with yourself and the mobile turret.

Meta Note: Black Crystals are only avalible for settings that are at or past the early faster than light space age for balencing reasons.

Black Crystal Arrays allow everybody who is paired with that specific Crystal to share each other's sacrifices. They have a very short radius so people need to stay near each other to benefit from them. Black Crystals are void incarnate and due to their interplay with the void allow for this overpowered ability. They were discovered during the early faster than light space age.

Example

You have 6 sacrificed points.

Your ally has 3 sacrificed points.

If both of you are paired on the same Black Crystal Array, you will both benefit as though you have each sacrificed 9 points.

Psionic Crystal Fiber-optic Cables

Meta Note: The settings tech level needs to be sufficent to understand how to produce Fiber-optic Cables.

Psionic Crystals can be processed into a fiber-optic cable which provide additional functionality over normal Psionic Crystal Arrays. Generally the additional features involve connecting a greater number of people to the effects that color can produce. All Psionic Fiber-optic Cables are able to link and apply their effects to as many other people as are in it's radius. However, it is one way so if you are sharing say knowledge via a blue psionic fiber-optic cable, the people benefiting cannot send their own knowledge along the same cable. They can however have their own blue cable they send their knowledge along.

A cable's radius is determined by it's quality and the amount of points the holder sacrificed into it. Cables can be used on a person's body or run through a larger structure or vehicle to provide their effects to many people at once.

Note that some cables need a crystal array to function as they interact with them in some way, but others function fine as a standalone item.

Blue, Yellow, Red Psionic Fiber-optic Cable can share knowledge, skills, and attribute essence respectively. The fiber-optic variant simply lets them do so without needing to have a Green Crystal Array link.

Purple Psionic Fiber-optic Cable allows you to not only use each other's slots like the purple crystals, but to actually transfer psionic tendrils between psionic wielders.

Green Psionic Fiber-optic Cable act as a bridge between Green Crystal arrays. Any one in range of the cable and equipped with a green array can connect with anyone else in range assuming everyone, each array holder AND the cable holder, is willing.

Orange Psionic Fiber-optic Cable, like orange crystal arrays, must be arranged around the head in some way. Those within radius have psionic range based on your orange crystal array.

Clear Psionic Fiber-optic Cable, which glows white, allows other people to make mental connections with objects, but those connections only last as long as both the connected devices and additional users are within the radius of the cable.

Black Psionic Fiber-optic Cable glow black. Unlike black crystals, the number of people whose sacrifices count is based on the amount that the core user sacrifices.

Resonance Boosters

Resonance Boosters are one of the technologies that advance as the Tech Ages advance. Resonance Boosters are built around a Psionic Crystal or Crystal Array and boosts it's range. This is primarily useful for the Orange and Green Arrays; boosting the casting range for the orange arrays, and how far away members networked to a green array can be from the array itself. However, it can also be built around the primary colored crystals giving them an effect like the fiber-optic cables, bust spreading out from a single central location. Constructing a booster around a large enough blue crystal can allow an entire building to be covered by the crystal.

The resonance booster increases the range based on the size of the crystal and the crafting quality of the booster itself. The range of a crystal with a booster built around it is increase 1 yard, per inch of crystal, per quality level of the booster. So a quality level 4 booster with a 50 foot blue crystal tower would be able to reach 7200 ft away in every direction. For this reason, this type of structure is very often in the center of large corporate buildings. it allows people to telepathically share massive loads of knowledge.

Skin Leech Armor

Skin Leech Armor is organic, living armor that has had it's consciousness dipped into the void. Skin Leech Armor is essentially an organic computer, shaped into the form of armor, and attached to the user's circulatory system. It is essentially an organic AI; not a person in it's own right, but not quite an animal either. Much like how dipping one's soul into the void provides the psionic wielder benefits, the organic armor when dipped into the void in this way can boost the Area Of Effect of any psionic spells cast through the armor.

Skin Leeches can also grow as you grow, increasing the bonus to your ranks and points. They have their own blood pool and because they are grafted onto the user for nutrition, the user's metabolism increases, but the amount of blood the user has also increases.

When the Skin Leech is a full body suit of armor it provides the full benefits of plus one to three different pool maximums for each quality level. so a quality 1 Skin Leech provides 3 pool point maximums, a quality 2 provides 6 pool points, etc. They can take other forms besides full body, but as the coverage decreases the benefits also decrease.

The only side effect is that each Skin Leech is created for a purpose, and when said purpose is acted on the armor receives a dopamine boost causing it to enjoy doing it's job. However since the user shares a bloodstream with the armor the user receives the dopamine rush as well. This can cause addiction for the user if they try to use a Skin Leech of higher quality then they can handle.