Psionics and PCs

[ProtoTraveller]

I was wondering how people handled psionics and PCs IYTU. When do you allow them to go looking for a Psionics Institute? Can they start training before, during, or after character creation? I've never found a method I was comfortable with, so I thought I would ask.

 

[WendellM]

The few times I ran sessions with players seriously interested in psionics, they became very psi-oriented. Due to psionics' dissipation with age, the characters chose to muster out early and go looking for an institute (rather than the more typical practice of remaining in service for long periods of times to gain lots of skills). For the more daring, I did allow immediate search for an institute, with no enlistment if one were found quickly (normal skill acquisition was a slow affair, though, since they had to be learned "real-time" after finishing with the institute).

As a result, the characters' psi skills outweighed their mundane ones, naturally resulting in their use to achieve desired goals. However, this naturally produced suspicion and official trouble. So, it was clear from the start when a set of characters would be playing a psi-centered game rather than a "normal" one (which makes sense, given the underground nature of psionics). In only a few cases did "normal" characters undertake to develop psi potential, resulting in weak talents that didn't much interfere with the normal course of things.

 

[Mår Ekkertsen]

I was wondering how people handled psionics and PCs IYTU.

I have integrated psi testing/training into chargen

and adventured it once after chargen. My strong preference is to put it in chargen but then I run an involved chargen session with a lot of back and forth with the player. We get well developed back stories this way and the players have characters with real personalities and goals and hopes and foibles...

 

[Artikid]

Hello everybody, this is how I handle it.
Consider that I devised this rules for a post-Psionic Suppression Milieu:
Any character can go looking for psionic training during character generation. Roll 2d at the beginning of the term, on a throw of 9+ the character has made contact with the institute and might go for testing and training. Testing and training cost 1 Mustering Out benefit roll and counts as the skills gained for the term (the character may yet gain skills for Commissions, Promotions, Ranks attained...).
Tested characters don’t have to get trained, in this case the character foregoes only the Mustering Out benefits, not the skill points.
The character, once trained and tested, can rise a psionic skill during character generation by trading points obtained for Jack Of All Trades skill for points in Psionic skills.
Trained characters get a -1 penalty to Survival rolls for prior service.
Optionally instead of the character's death
failing the Survival roll means (beyond automathic end of character generation) that the character made a reputation as a Psionic. At the beginning of each game session the GM rolls 2d, on 8+ the character will be recognised by someone hostile to Psionics(Imperial Forces, Anti-Psi activists...).

 

[tim_manley]

I've run games without and games with. I didn't really like the Classic Psi rules so I ended up making my own full fledged psi rules.

It really depended upon what I was running and if I allowed the players to have psionics or not.

I did run one game that lasted nearly 2 years. One player was a noble with psionics that started shipping line with piracy elements. It was quite nice to see as his power grew so did his despotism until he was so paranoid that he was vacc'ing folks (i.e. sticking them in airlocks and opening the outer door)......that was a fun campaign.

 

[MT++]

Originally posted by tim:
It was quite nice to see as his power grew so did his despotism until he was so paranoid that he was vacc'ing folks (i.e. sticking them in airlocks and opening the outer door)......that was a fun campaign.

Ummm, yeah.

The crewman watched as the noble strangled another kitten. "Damn him", thought the crewman, "He's strangling all the best ones himself"

 

[vegascat]

IMTU, it was not to difficult to find a PSI institute, with enough searching and cash outlay. The players tried it for one long adventure. Three mustered out early to go hunting, the other two retired and tagged along. When they found the institute. One had good power and abilities, one other very weak. Later in the game, they found it was used by the perfidious Zhodani to prepare the way for the next war, and they were being pumped for secrets while getting training. They ended up on the ImpSec better dead list while making a run to Vargr space.
PSI powers could ballance a skills weak character, but were more hastle than they were worth. It definately made for some good cat and mouse adventures. Never give the players an interesting toy that you can't use against them.
The players learned what it means when the GM smiles.

-----------------------------
In the end, Murphy will rule

 

[Solo]

I ran a (relatively) long term campaign with characters who were zho spies (in GURPS Traveller no less. What was I thinking?!?) It actually turned out to be one of the best Traveller campaigns I've ever run. Handled psionics completely in character generation.

The players were zho agents on a merchant ship plying the lanes in Imperial space with all the day to day troubles of your typical merchanter. They would on occasion get orders from the zho command to perform activities. The best thing about this was that the players would come to forget that they were spies and found it jarring when they were knocked back into their "real" jobs! "-)

Anyway, it was fun.

I'd recommend either starting the characters with psi if that's going to be part of the campaign or saying from the start that psi will not be available to them. ever.

just my 2. 

 

[vegascat]

Hey Solo, What part of town you life in. I'll be back sometime next month from the other side of the world.

-------------------------------
In the end, Murphy will rule

 

[Solo]

Originally posted by vegascat:
Hey Solo, What part of town you life in. I'll be back sometime next month from the other side of the world.

Far Northwest. Near Tule Springs/Floyd Lamb state park.

 

[vegascat]

I'm in the Northeast corner, North end of Hollywood. Have to get with you and roll some dice when I get back.

-----------------------------
In the end, Murphy will rule

 

[Solo]

Originally posted by vegascat:
I'm in the Northeast corner, North end of Hollywood. Have to get with you and roll some dice when I get back.

-----------------------------
In the end, Murphy will rule

Cool

 

[wrandrews]

Psionics are legal in the variant we have established. We make it part of training, with PSI of 9 or higher receiving free training. We play characters from age 17 (currently in the third generation), so this is not difficult. Most players choose the Imperial Navy or Marines as a career, which has resulted in special ops missions.

Only a couple of players use psionics extensively, but it can make the game difficult. My players voted on the ground rules when we started this campaign, and they like cybernetics as well. I just tell them not to whine at the opposistion. It makes combat very interesting, and is often very difficult for the players.

 

[vegascat]

A way I have handled Psionics in the past is this. If they miss a survival roll massively, they can then roll one time only to see if they have any repressed Psi ability. If they are succsesful, then they actually survived, but are on the run and hounded as a known psi user.