D&D 5E 5e Psion+++++thread

Norse trolls are psionic in an animistic flavor of soul magic.

Maybe call them Witch Trolls. (The word 'troll' literally means mage, enchanter.)

These trolls derive from Risar, giants personifying sacred areas of nature, such as cliffs. But they reflect an amalgam of later Scandinavian folkbeliefs. Defacto they are a 'hybrid' species, including parentage from beautiful Risar giants, grotesque Thursar giants, where most 'giants' are humansize, as well as parentage from Dvergar dwarves, Alfar elves, Tomte gnomes, and various nature beings, such as the minds of rivers, streams, and waterfalls, Hulder (male and female) forest beings, and so on.

The same family can have one sibling that is Medium humansize and an other that Gargantuan mountainsize. One sibling that is supernaturally beauty and an other sibling that is terrifying hideousness. And so on. All are psionic.

Each one is the mind of a specific feature of nature, such as a specific mountain or river.

Mind of tempest said:

And Sith for a more edgy sub-class

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The term 'Sith' is a Scottish word for an Elf, and derives from the term Sidhe, Shee.

They are sorta like psionic paladin Elves from the Feywild. These Elves do things like visit Humans in their dreams and teach them how to do healing magic. These are shamanic concepts. They explicitly have a Queen as the main leader of their court. The King is a consort, not the throne.

Corinnguard said:

What about a 5e version of the 6 Hidden Houses from 3e's Complete Psionic?

House Adon-Metacreativity
House Celare- Psychoportation
House Cogitare- Telepathy
House Incendar- Psychokinesis
House Novar- Clairsentience
House Vaymin- Psychometabolism

Eberron, but with psionic houses and Dragonmarks (courtesy of the Gem Dragons).

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I would reorganize these.

• Spacetime magic (including both 'psychic' divination and teleportation)
• Enchantment magic (mind-affects including telepathy, charm, domination, phantasm)
• Shapeshift magic (including polymorph, healing, body enhancement, frighten, item fabrication)
• Force magic (including telekinesis, flight, and force constructs and objective illusions)
• Elemental magic (flashy magic relating to nature beings, such as minds of snow, rock, forest)
• Planar magic (otherworldly planeshifting, summoning Fey, Shadow, Celestial, Fiend, Aberration)

For psionic flavor, every concept should at least include Enchantment or Spacetime.

I've posted some of my mechanics before, but I continue to use my 5E Psionics in the 2024 edition. The core elements:

1.) Psionics is internally generated magic and does not attach to the Weave. In my games, Divine, Nature and Arcane magic share certain traits because the magic is delivered via or extracted from the Weave. This allows Divine, Arcane and Nature magics to register for Detect Magic, be countered by Counterspell, or be blocked by an Anti-magic Shell. Psionics do not interact with these spells - generally - although there are specialized spells designed to be used in combat between an arcane spellcaster and a psion.

2.) I have 5 Psionic Defenses and 5 Psionic Offenses (using the 10 historic names from prior editions - Psionic Blast, Ego Whip, Tower of Iron Will, etc...). As you advance in levels you can add more of these to your repertoire. The defenses give you a small defensive benefit while the offenses are essentially cantrips - but they have a rock/paper/scissors interaction. Certain offenses can cut right through certain defenses if the defense is up. Battles using psionics against psionics become a battle of wits and mechanics.

3.) They're modeled after super heroes. Psions get a grouping of complimentary abilities within a certain theme (or a few themes depending upon the subclass). When new players hear about psionics I give this description, but the players have often told me they did not get it until they actually saw it in place. I have a lot of designs turned into themes - and those are almost all based upon comic characters (with the comic character listed as a reference).

4.) Psionic power points are used instead of spell slots. You can blow them all on a single use of a power ... but it is risky. The more you put into a use of the power, the more it novas. However, you have to maintain control when using too many points at once - and that requires a roll. if you fail the role, you may lose control of the power (which has specified impacts based upon the particular power and/or theme - and can often be horrendous).

5.) You learn a theme of abilities (or multiple themes) and can then power abilities within that theme with the power points. As you progress in capability, the cost of abilities decreases - effectively getting to places where you invoke the equivalent of levels level spells without using any resources (much like a warlock may be able to levitate at will without a slot). Each theme has abilities you can master and improve and you get to decide where you want to develop your abilities within a theme. You might focus everything on one power and be a one trick pony ... or you might diversify and be a Jack of More trades.

6.) Much of the lore arises from a base created using AD&D and 2nd edition materials. I've used a version of it since the 1990s and (with the exception of 4E) I have stuck with the same core design (with reworked numbers). It works perfectly for my setting.

7.) Psionics works based upon intelligence and constitution. Intelligence powers offense (generally) and constitution powers defense (generally).

8.) A lot of the artifacts of psionics from prior editions (Astral Constructs, Psi-crystals, etc...) are present in my games.

9.) My aberrations almost all tie back to the Far Realms - and whether they use psionics or magic is dependent upon how 'domestic' they have gone. Psionic Illithid look down on the Mind Flayers that have seen their abilities devolve to relying upon the Weave. A Psionic Beholder is a much more dangerous beast than one with powers drawn from the weave. It has been compared to the Psionic Versions being the equivalent of Vampires while the weave based ones being the equivalent to Vampire Spawn.

I also have Psionic Warriors that get fewer abilities and power points, but are trained in weapons (both physical and psionic). They currently draw inspiration from rangers, paladins, Jedi and other gishes.

The psionic themes all have guidance on how to describe them and implement them that makes them distinct from the way magic works. You don't conjure or summon - you create. You don't make illusions of light and shadow - you project images into brains. You don't move fast - you slow time around you. You don't leap / teleport great distances - you shorten the distance between you and the end of your leap/movement. You don't transmute your body - you accelerate (or reverse) evolution.

Corinnguard said:

My favorite book on psionics in D&D was 3e's Expanded Psionics Handbook and Complete Psionics. If you want to have something expanded to 5e, it ought to be these two in one book.

Are you also thinking of upgrading the psionic species to 5e?

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This was my favorite incarnation of psionics as well. Though I liked the 2e version almost as much.

Ah, something I should have mentioned in my first post, and this isn't an attack on people who have mentioned or like these, but:

NO PSIONIC COMBAT (Attack/Defense Modes): these were the thing I disliked the most about early Psionics. So you could enter this special "mind combat" with another Psion (even if you weren't, strictly, a Telepath, which makes little real sense), dueling it out mentally. That's cool and all, but these would basically never come up if you were facing normal foes, so it was this entire subsystem that a lot of times, sat around and did nothing of value. In 2e, especially, you could try to engage a non-psionic in combat, but their default "non-psionic" brain presented excellent defenses against most attack modes, making it a usually fruitless endeavor. And even "kind of psychic" characters like Wild Talents, were usually bereft of any Defense Modes, making them especially vulnerable to Psionic Combat (YMMV if you thought this was a good or a bad thing, personally, the time I got mind crushed for daring to have a pitiful power like Combat Mind that increased my initiative rolls was enough to make me never again want a Wild Talent, lol).

For something like this to work, you'd have to have a lot of people with Psionics around to make the juice worth the squeeze.

James Gasik said:

Ah, something I should have mentioned in my first post, and this isn't an attack on people who have mentioned or like these, but:

NO PSIONIC COMBAT (Attack/Defense Modes): these were the thing I disliked the most about early Psionics. So you could enter this special "mind combat" with another Psion (even if you weren't, strictly, a Telepath, which makes little real sense), dueling it out mentally. That's cool and all, but these would basically never come up if you were facing normal foes, so it was this entire subsystem that a lot of times, sat around and did nothing of value. In 2e, especially, you could try to engage a non-psionic in combat, but their default "non-psionic" brain presented excellent defenses against most attack modes, making it a usually fruitless endeavor. And even "kind of psychic" characters like Wild Talents, were usually bereft of any Defense Modes, making them especially vulnerable to Psionic Combat (YMMV if you thought this was a good or a bad thing, personally, the time I got mind crushed for daring to have a pitiful power like Combat Mind that increased my initiative rolls was enough to make me never again want a Wild Talent, lol).

For something like this to work, you'd have to have a lot of people with Psionics around to make the juice worth the squeeze.

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5e converts the 1e Psionic Combat Modes into spells.

Mind Blank (an old school spell)
Intellect Fortress
Tashas Mind Whip (Ego Whip)
Mind Sliver (Id Insinuation)
Psychic Scream (Psionic Blast)

Corinnguard said:

I am going to say that they need a stat block. Actually, a Blue is born blue. Just as Maenads and Elans are mutant humans, a Blue is basically a mutant goblin.


I could see Xephs being related to the Githyanki and the Githzerai.

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Here's a homebrew version.

Yaarel said:

The term 'Sith' is a Scottish word for an Elf, and derives from the term Sidhe, Shee.

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That's one meaning of it. I doubt Vader was supposed to be an elf.

Cat Sith is really cool, though.

James Gasik said:

Ah, something I should have mentioned in my first post, and this isn't an attack on people who have mentioned or like these, but:

NO PSIONIC COMBAT (Attack/Defense Modes): these were the thing I disliked the most about early Psionics. So you could enter this special "mind combat" with another Psion (even if you weren't, strictly, a Telepath, which makes little real sense), dueling it out mentally. That's cool and all, but these would basically never come up if you were facing normal foes, so it was this entire subsystem that a lot of times, sat around and did nothing of value. In 2e, especially, you could try to engage a non-psionic in combat, but their default "non-psionic" brain presented excellent defenses against most attack modes, making it a usually fruitless endeavor. And even "kind of psychic" characters like Wild Talents, were usually bereft of any Defense Modes, making them especially vulnerable to Psionic Combat (YMMV if you thought this was a good or a bad thing, personally, the time I got mind crushed for daring to have a pitiful power like Combat Mind that increased my initiative rolls was enough to make me never again want a Wild Talent, lol).

For something like this to work, you'd have to have a lot of people with Psionics around to make the juice worth the squeeze.

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I can count on one hand with fingers left over the number of times we did psionic combat over the decades. It was an unfun pain in the rear. I'm good with seeing it go and never return.