Shadowrun
Shadowrun Play => Rules and such => Topic started by: Agent_Juice on <08-28-17/1752:01>
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I've always thought of psychics as boogeymen of the Sixth World, but never seen much in the way of rules for psychics except that they are limited magicians. And while powered up mages are threatening, you can't give them extra flourish like blood magic or bug shamanism. I'm not looking for lots and lots of conventional mage power or over the top attacks, I want to make psychics different and uniquely threatening. Like they aren't even magic, but something wholly alien to the Shadowrun world that has been conspiratorially hidden or mistaken for magic. How might I do this in a way that's compatible with the rules, so PCs can fight against it?
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You really can't, given that psychics are a thing and changing that is changing the rules. So throw out the idea of following the rules and do what you think is fun.
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So really there's nothing they can do that's uniquely psychic? That's a shame. Maybe I could flesh it out with house rules, but even then I'm unsure how much room there is for interpretation. I've never been too clear on what they can and can't do. If I stray too far from the concept, and it doesn't feel like part of the game, then it's only going to be fun for me for about five seconds before my players get mad and accuse me of railroading and asspulls.
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Yeah, the Psychic Tradition is basically just kind of there to show that even if you have no clue what you're doing and are basically 100% wrong, if you're Awakened, you can do magic. They are an extreme example of "the bones of what we believe".
Now, people who would be called "psychics" but aren't magicians of the Psychic Tradition are usually just the "Aware". People who are technically awakened, but the most major thing they're capable of doing, magically, is Astral Perception. Most of them have small magical "quirks" more than anything, some don't even realize they're seeing the astral, since they don't have enough talent to be scouted and trained, while others end up doing the whole "palm-reading fortune teller" thing.
Deciding that genuine psychic power, like purely mental telepathy and stuff that isn't magic, would be far outside the realms of Shadowrun. I'm sure a lot of people called "Bullshit!" when technomancers became more blatantly mystical (instead of the just slightly mystical Otaku), and they were just a progression of an existing feature of the game. Trying to fit "suddenly, there are non-magical psychics" into the world would be a very big task that, as you said, would probably fall apart after only a bit of play... It probably isn't worth the huge effort it'd take.
However, if you want to look for unique and subtle threats, there's definitely stuff there for you to use. I'd look into the various kinds of spirits that exist, or if you wanna avoid something magical, maybe look into AI and learn about what the whole Renraku Arcology thing was like. I'm sure others on the forums have better suggestions too.
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Make psychics the ones who interface best with the crystalline entities of Pure Order from the Antarctic rift/tower/whatever - mental structure, that sort of thing.
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If you are asking for houserule suggestions then mix an match any of these:
1. Psychics have a network they develop. Something like the "Living Vessel Preparation" ritual that connects their network to them.
A. They can't cast spells at a force greater then the number of people in their network. The psychic counts as a member of their own network. Can't have more people in their network then their magic (or magic x2 or whatever)
B. They can shunt drain to their network. (or half the drain)
C. The network can sustain a spell. While sustaining the network member takes the -2 and can't take drain.
D. The Psychic can cast spells on their Network without the usual LOS or touch requirement.
2. Restrict the psychic spell list. Certainly keep the mental manipulation spells, but get rid of fireball - figure the rest out based on how you see the psychic tradition.
3. Make it not magic, so it can't be counter-spelled or dispelled. Be careful with this one - it could be game breaking
4. Disallow access to the Enchanting and Conjuring skill groups.
5. Ignore the standard magical background count. Add a Psychic background count. The more dense the population the higher the psychic BGC. In various fictions the powerful psychics try to live away from people so they can get some peace and quiet. Or reverse it - they feed of the ambient psychic energy. your call.