“psionics”
Note: part of a growing organism that uses Violence by Luke Gearing.
Purple lilies blossom on the ego’s glass lake. Only for some.
attention
Roll 1d6 for the following “statistics:”
- attention span
Subtract your attention from 20 to find your “attention save.”
Unless otherwise stated, other people have attention spans of 3. Other psions have attention spans of 5. Nonhumans have 2.
juice
Gain “juice” equal to your attention span. A night of good rest regenerates juice up to this cap. Stimulants give instant shots of juice, but they make it harder to sleep.
change minds.
First, be a psion.
Pay the psionic’s listed juice cost, then roll 1d20 over a DV equal to the target’s attention save. On a failure, nothing happens.
Unless otherwise specified, psionics may be aimed at sentient beings the caster can see, including themselves. Self-targeting requires the caster to roll over their own attention save.
(1) telepath
The caster speaks to the target in a voice audible only to them. The caster may say words equal to their attention span.
(1) oneirokine
May only be cast on an unconscious target. The target has a dream of the caster’s choosing, which the caster observes. Intelligence gleaned this way is always surreal and unreliable, subject to a school of interpretation that has no best practices.
On a miss, the target wakes.
(1) unsettle
The target is stricken with undulating nausea. They may resist vomiting for minutes equal to their current juice.
(2) distract
A whine like feedback. The target takes a disadvantage on tasks requiring focus or fine motor skills, such as aiming guns and psionics.
Lasts for seconds equal to the caster’s attention span.
(2) xkine
The target gains the ability to remotely manipulate phenomena they can see as if by touch.
Lasts for seconds equal to the caster’s attention span.
(2) attentionterminationfield
The target gains an invisible shield around their person that nullifies a single bullet hit or melee attack. The target may not cast psionics for the duration, their brainwaves muted to nothing.
Lasts for minutes equal to the caster’s attention span.
(3) boilbrain
Neurons fray quickly under fever-pressure. The target gains an injury–neural damage–and 1d6 of their juice evaporates. They roll 1d20. On an 18+, their head explodes.
(3) censor
Excise the contents of the target’s recent memory, leaving only a fogged emptiness to be skipped over. Past minutes may be censored equal to the caster’s attention span. For example, a caster with an attention span of 5 would be able to censor any events that occurred in the past five minutes, but would be unable to affect an event that happened six minutes ago.
(3) narcolept
The target falls unconscious. They are out cold for minutes equal to the caster’s attention span, after which they may be awoken as normal.
(3) teleop
The target witnesses a vision broadcast by the caster. Their sight is completely obscured for the duration.
May last for seconds equal to the caster’s attention span x 1d6.
(3) ownmedicine
The caster chooses a psionic they know the target has. If they are aware of none, the result is random. The caster forces the target to self-cast one of their own psionics. The target does not pay juice cost.
If cast on a non-psion, the target punches themselves once in the face.
Cannot be self-targeted.
(3) dilatecircadian
The target’s temporal perception is warped. Choose one:
- The air they breathe is rarefied and sharp. They act twice for each action taken by others. In melee, they roll twice and take the better. They take a disadvantage the next time they sleep.
- The air turns to soup in their lungs. They may only act after all others have acted twice. In melee, their opponents roll twice and take the better. They take an advantage the next time they sleep.
Lasts for minutes equal to the caster’s attention span.
(4) placebicsurgery
Choose one:
- The target is cured of the pain from an injury or disease. The underlying condition remains.
- The target is cleared of the influence of an active psionic of which the caster is aware.
Cannot be self-targeted.
(4) endruggen
The caster recalls a drug they have previously taken. The target experiences the psychological effects of the drug, but not the biological. For example, the memory of a deadly poison would induce the weightless sensation of dying, but nothing else. Lasts for the duration that the remembered dose did.
(4) shiftshape
To the target, the caster appears in a form of their choosing. The form cannot render the caster invisible or unnoticeable.
Lasts for minutes equal to the caster’s attention span.
(5) astralproject
The caster’s ego leaves their body, which falls comatose. They exist in an intangible, invisible form that cannot survive more than 100” from the body. They may cast additional espionics with any remaining juice, but rest lives in the flesh–they cannot regenerate it. Psionics aimed at the body do not hit.
Lasts until the caster’s body is disturbed or they return to it. If the body is killed instantly, the caster is stranded a spirit, tethered to their corpse.
May only be self-targeted.
(6) remoteview
By reading the residual thought from the surface of a possession of the target, the caster sees their current location and what they are doing.
May be targeted from any distance. While in effect, additional psionics may also be levied at the target remotely.
Lasts for seconds equal to the caster’s attention span.
(6) mindscan
The caster reads the target’s mind. The target may roll against the caster’s attention save to read theirs in turn for no juice cost.
On a miss, the target intuits the feeling of being intruded upon.
If self-targeted, the caster recalls censored information.
(7) hypnotize
Willpower is distractible, easily bypassed. The caster imprints a command on the target, formatted as:
When (specific sensory phenomenon is perceived), (take specific action).
Memory of the implantation is censored from the target.
Willpower is also a skill. Each time the command is triggered, the target makes an attention save. On a success, they become aware of the implantation. Each subsequent trigger, they may make an attention save to resist it, gaining an advantage for each past success.
(8) possess
There is no crueler theft. The caster disables the target’s ego and seizes control of their body. They gain the host’s attention span, juice, and any skill that can be attributed solely to muscle memory. Their original body falls comatose.
Lasts until the caster’s original body is disturbed. If it is killed instantly, the caster’s ego is permanently stranded.