The Psychic's Handbook

Rating:
Summary: Another well done book from Green Ronin
Review: One of the better company's to put out d20 stuff has always been Green Ronin Press. The Shaman's Handbook is one of the best alternate core class books on the market.

Those of us who have always been big psionics fans were pretty disappointed in the Psionics Handbook for v3.0. The new revised v3.5 is supposed to be better, but my confidence is low. Especially since picking up the Psychic's Handbook. Wow. Very nicely done. Psionics that aren't just a bad ripoff of magic. Very clean and relatively simple. Psionics end up being not quite as 'fireball' powerful as spellcasters but their versatility is increased and powers are much more subtle.

In brief: PC's buy Psychic Talent feats based on general catagories (Clairsentientce, Psychokinesis, Psychometabolism, Psychoportation, Telepathy, etc). These feats give the player access to certain skills. A couple of skills may be used untrained (ie: Psychic Sense) but mostly you have to put Ranks into them.

For example: The Psychokinesis Feat allows you to put ranks into the Photo-kinesis (Int) Skill (among many others). With it you can do many different things. 'With a succesful check, you can warp light around yourself, making your outline blurred and indistinct or even become invisible. Attacking does not negate the effects of this skill. You can create holograms'...etc, etc. Each ability requires you to make a skill check that has a certain DC. Invisibility in this case requires a DC 25 roll. Illumating an area like a torch is DC 5 (+5' per additional 10' radius).

Each use of a skill requires a certain amount of 'Strain', which is simply non-lethal damage you take when you use the skill. In the example above, the Strain cost is equal to the DC/5. Light is 1 Strain, Blur (20% miss chance) is DC 15 and costs 3 strain. Invisibility costs 5 Strain.

All the skills are based on either Int, Wis or Cha. No more Constitution or Dex based psionic abilities.

Of course there are other Feats that allow you to improve the things your skills can do. Psychic Healing (Wis), a Psychometabolism skill, allows you to heal HP or Ability damage. With the Cure Disease Feat you can now use your skill for that as well. Flight, which is a strenuous application of the Telekinesis (Int) skill can be improved seriously by taking the Flight Feat. The Apport Arrows Feat allows you to use your Apport skill to 'Deflect Arrows' by teleporting them away (works like the Deflect Arrows Feat).

And finally the Psychic Combat also looks much more 'psychic' than 'fireball'. I need to read more on that section.

Once again this company puts out a really well done book that I really want to use in my campaign. Can't ask for much more than that.

Rich

Rating:
Summary: Another well done book from Green Ronin
Review: One of the better company's to put out d20 stuff has always been Green Ronin Press. The Shaman's Handbook is one of the best alternate core class books on the market.

Those of us who have always been big psionics fans were pretty disappointed in the Psionics Handbook for v3.0. The new revised v3.5 is supposed to be better, but my confidence is low. Especially since picking up the Psychic's Handbook. Wow. Very nicely done. Psionics that aren't just a bad ripoff of magic. Very clean and relatively simple. Psionics end up being not quite as 'fireball' powerful as spellcasters but their versatility is increased and powers are much more subtle.

In brief: PC's buy Psychic Talent feats based on general catagories (Clairsentientce, Psychokinesis, Psychometabolism, Psychoportation, Telepathy, etc). These feats give the player access to certain skills. A couple of skills may be used untrained (ie: Psychic Sense) but mostly you have to put Ranks into them.

For example: The Psychokinesis Feat allows you to put ranks into the Photo-kinesis (Int) Skill (among many others). With it you can do many different things. 'With a succesful check, you can warp light around yourself, making your outline blurred and indistinct or even become invisible. Attacking does not negate the effects of this skill. You can create holograms'...etc, etc. Each ability requires you to make a skill check that has a certain DC. Invisibility in this case requires a DC 25 roll. Illumating an area like a torch is DC 5 (+5' per additional 10' radius).

Each use of a skill requires a certain amount of 'Strain', which is simply non-lethal damage you take when you use the skill. In the example above, the Strain cost is equal to the DC/5. Light is 1 Strain, Blur (20% miss chance) is DC 15 and costs 3 strain. Invisibility costs 5 Strain.

All the skills are based on either Int, Wis or Cha. No more Constitution or Dex based psionic abilities.

Of course there are other Feats that allow you to improve the things your skills can do. Psychic Healing (Wis), a Psychometabolism skill, allows you to heal HP or Ability damage. With the Cure Disease Feat you can now use your skill for that as well. Flight, which is a strenuous application of the Telekinesis (Int) skill can be improved seriously by taking the Flight Feat. The Apport Arrows Feat allows you to use your Apport skill to 'Deflect Arrows' by teleporting them away (works like the Deflect Arrows Feat).

And finally the Psychic Combat also looks much more 'psychic' than 'fireball'. I need to read more on that section.

Once again this company puts out a really well done book that I really want to use in my campaign. Can't ask for much more than that.

Rich

Rating:
Summary: This is the book to get
Review: Sure its phychic and not psionic but there is little difference in the powers presented from 3.0 to this book. Compared to the psionic 3.0 this is hands down better. (Though I have not seen the 3.5 version yet) Note to all you wizard players out there, phychics arent the same. The power level is less by far but the system is cleanly intergrated into almost any campaign. Even though it reads like it is intended for fantasy, I really see this supplement having a staring role in a modern or sci-fi campaign. As GM in those genre's if you find them to be more powerful than you would like just restrict the number or percentage of skill points that can be spent on powers. Thats right the powers are skill based, but you need a feat(s) to gain access to them.
Very well done.