What is your opinion of psychic powers in sci fi? An interesting angle to explore or indulgence of people who can't play an rpg If they can't be wizards?
What about in fantasy? A flavorful alternative/counterpart to more classical magic or overpowered snowflakery?
I think it's a good replacement for magic but when both magic and psychic powers exist it starts to muddy the waters.
It automatically makes a sci-fi setting bullshit for me. I can enjoy bullshit, but only as pulp.
In fantasy I broadly agree with . If the psychic stuff is very limited, like plain telepathy between the members of a race, then I think that can work. If it's a rival system to magic then it's just a mess and is typically found in clusterfuck settings. Maybe it can be made to work, I haven't seen it done well though. Even in 40k, magic and psychic powers are the same thing.
I think it adds a lot of variety to sci-fi settings.
just play the science angle. it is a craft that requires dedication and exact measurements; of both mental focus and materials. without both it is a bust.
read witcher or WH40K fluff for ideas since it's broken down in detail and info readily available.
Yeah. Just call it magic as well.
It's alright, but it can't be magical in nature. It's gotta be shit like mutations and aliens and stuff like that
psychic powers in scifi are bullshit. physic powers in fantasy should just be part of magic. There is no good reason for psychic powers to be a thing.
Well, in 40k for example. It's both
I think Anathem was the best example of psychic powers in scifi I`ve ever read. It can be done right.
In fantasy... I`ve never seen it done right, but I`ve also seen fewer examples.
I think it's something pretty inherent to the sci-fi setting.
every huge gap in tech seems like it works practically by magic for the previous gens.
it only makes sense to keep taking it further for future settings.
I'm a fan of Ghost in the Shell type of sci-fi psychics. Cyborgs "reading minds" by hacking in.
>Sci-Fi
Literal magic that ruins most of the science
>Fantasy
Magic that people like to pretend is not magic.
Yeah
It should be one or the other unless you really work at making them different
They can be fun in modern settings.
In Sci-Fi, Psionics is Magic
In Fantasy, Psionics is eastern martial arts mystical magic or ultra mysterious rule-breaking that makes even wizards scratch there heads. Or both.
Generally I play fantasy games, and in those I prefer Psionics as an otherworldly perhaps lovecraftian method of telling physics to fuck off either due to intense introspection, out-of-context understanding, or the voices in your head. It's my preferred counter to wizards that thing they're prep gods on the level of Batman.
>people who can't play an rpg If they can't be wizards
As one of those people, I approve of psychic powers standing in for magic in sci-fi settings. I don't mind even if it's very obvious that the only reason they're there is to be magic by another name.
I don't really have a strong opinion on psionics in fantasy settings.
see, I think it's fine in fantasy, so long as it's established to run on very different rules, and typically, have a lot darker tones to it.
Psychic powers are something you get because you wouldn't stop looking into lovecraftian horrors and "things man was not meant to know"(tm), and as it grows, may some day physically rend your mind asunder.
You will never find a fully sane psychic. Entry requirements forbid it.
okay, third option here, we've heard about fantasy and sci-fi, what are everyone's thoughts on psychic in Cape stuff?
In Sci-Fi it can be fine so long as it fits the tone. It is, of course, native to that genre.
In fantasy I think it's kind of redundant and if you want to have spooky/mystical stuff just have magic that comes from farther away.
I enjoy the trope where some oppressive government does shady things that involve abducting and raising psychics to be soldiers. You could do it with wizards (or anyone really) but it's really more associated with psychics.
It's boring when psychics are just silly name for wizards and they cast fireballs by squinting instead of waving their arms around. Psychics are associated with science fiction because the Human Potential Movement was part of the zeitgeist at the time a lot of SF was written. So if you want it to feel right you really need to bring in the crystal healing, astral projection, channeling aliens, quantum consciousness mumbo jumbo, and talking to dolphins. It's the weird shit that makes it worth your time.
I think it is fine in a sci-fi setting if it fits the tone, which is to say anything that is not the kind of "hard" sci-fi autistic neckbeards jerk it to
In fantasy it should just be rolled into magic or vice versa. Psionics is just magic by another name and pretending otherwise is retarded and having separate rules for it is a waste of pages
Biotics from ME are an interesting take on magic in sci fi setting, though due to the nature of ME combat I think the concept itself is largely unexplored to it's full potential. As for psychic powers as we commonly know them, I like them dangerous, hard to control and master, with a sanity cost, a touch of lovecraft, nasty psychological side-effects and a bit hard to actually comprehend, bordering on mystical.
I treat psychokinesis and magic as the same, just as I treat religious spellcasting and "academic" spellcasting the same. It all boils down to utilising your willpower and shaping an inherent metaphysical energy to alter reality. Differing schools to help focus and process.
I think it is a dangerous game to add psykers into a sci-fi setting, because the themes pretty much contradict eachother. Sci-fi is, or should be, really about how outrageous and miraculous academic science can become, while psychic powers usually boil down to using the force which is more of a zen-meditation-esotericism and not really funded on a principle of solving for X.
Now let's say you had specific augments that allowed you to amplify your senses to the point where you could "hear" the chemicals in other people's brains react and process what their thought patterns are to form words, you could emulate telepathy, and if you added machinery capable of such strong magnetism is could affect the iron in people's blood, you could fake psychokinesis. Those would be appropriate approaches to the "not!Magic" in sci-fi.
Psychic powers have been part of Sci-fi since the Golden Age of Sci Fi. Asimov's Second Foundation comes to mind. So, I have no problem with it being in Sci-Fi, as long as there's at least some attempt to explain it e.g. Dune's spice melange.
Really dislike this shit in most settings. It's just an odd and unneccessary addition at best, and runs counter to the premise at worst.
Get on my level nerd, I got psychic powers, magic, actual hell you can fly to, vampires aliens and interstellar economics based on hard science.