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yukieI know I've ranted about this in short form in the past but I've finally got a full post's worth of material about it now!
Hokay, so. MIND TALENTS! They've been around in literature and stuff since way, way before Spock made his debut on the scene. My first encounter with them in fiction that I can remember was - okay. In books, it was Monica Hughes's The Dream Catcher and then again in Madeleine L'Engle's A Wind in the Door. On TV, it was that old 1990s X-Men cartoon (hey shut up, it was fun XD) and Counselor Deanna Troi. It's The Dream Catcher that's really the inspiration for how I write societies of people with mental talents; I wasn't really a Trekkie although I have a tone of friends who are. I don't doubt there's some Vulcan influence in my work too - but I digress.
The point of this post was not navel-gazing, it was how to write or RP mental talents in a way that doesn't annoy the bejesus out of people.
This is all my opinion, of course, and I know my way isn't the only way, but the examples I'm about to give are largely in the category of 'this is how NOT to do it well'. Discussion's more than awesome but pls refrain from talking to me as if I were a mentally defunct jumping bean XD
Of course every universe has its own rules; the examples I've given are from my own games and writing and from stuff I've seen myself. These deal with characters who have control over their gifts for the most part.
ETA: It occurs to me that I totally left out any stuff about n00bs. A n00b psychic is prolly going to get an eyeful of brain by accident OFTEN and end up flailing around because they would rather not have seen that dude thinking about that thing that time. This can ALSO be RPed or written annoyingly (along the "OH TEH MELODRAMAZ AND TEH WANGST AND TEH SORROEZ, and so on" lines of things) but for the most part I've dealt with developed psychics, so it's them I'm rambling about mostly. I'll likely deal with n00b psychics at a later date. This is principally about psychics who can control their stuff.
1) PSYCHIC EAVESDROPPING: I'm constantly amazed at the number of people I've gamed with and proofed for who will have their telepaths or empaths do this. They see no problem with their hero (male or female) poking around in someone's head for information, reading someone's mind to get the upper hand or get more info, listening in on a private conversation between two other telepaths, answering questions that a character has not spoken aloud, 'just knowing things' (read: reading minds behind the scenes) - and they have no earthly idea why other PCs might lose trust in theirs completely, and have no idea at all why I say it makes their hero look skeezy.
Basically, at best, psychic 'skimming' or casual mind reading is eavesdropping. At worst, it's B&E and criminal trespass. Your character, in listening in to others' conversations, is picking up the spare receiver like a bratty kid who doesn't want to be babysat (at best) or wiretapping illegally (at worst). They're going through someone's recycle bin for credit card and SIN numbers. That is what casual mindreading is. I'm not being a drama lord either.
Empathy is the same. I've seen a lot of people try and fail to be Deanna Troi. Why things more or less worked for her was that she stated what she was picking up without judgment, and she seemed to be mentioning things that the person she was reading might not be aware of. (This wasn't always the case, and I know it. My memory is spotty, mea culpa.) Where other RPers and writers fail is in having a character be a judgmental knowitall about someone's emotions, or get butthurt/go flouncy/ run away weeping pretty sparkly shoujo tears across a field of cherry blossoms.
AGAIN, YOU ARE INVADING PRIVACY. I will admit to having had characters blurt things out before, or pick up emotions and be aware of them, but when they do either (a) I'm playing them as little kids with far less control over their third eyelids and shields, and no brain-to-mouth filter; (b) the emotion is overwhelming because the person feeling it is a projective empath and thus there's a "holy crap, VOLUME DOWN PLOX" effect; (c) their mind is wandering and they notice but don't say anything. And again, this is accidental, and there are consequences to the blurting (wall to wall WTF, flailing, "HEY HOW THE" etc.) and amends need to be made after.
Going "OH NURF HURF YOU FEELS TEH RAEG :O" is like announcing any other personal information. It's rude. Don't expect characters to react well to this in RP. Don't expect me to give your hero a pass just because they're a hero, in writing. Sketch is sketch, rude is rude.
The annoying part is that these players get OH SO TANTRUMMY if someone does the same thing to their PC.
Which leads me to the next point -
2) MENTAL SHIELDING: Look, please lay down the damned rules for how shielding works and stick with them? If you MUST bend the rules, have a damn good reason for doing so. And for heaven's sakes, please consider potential limitations! Perfectly unbreakable one-way-mirror shields - where you can see everything and no one can see you - is cheap and godmodey and obnoxious, and inevitably used by someone who's going to have a villain go smashy-smash through the shields later as a spotlight-jockeying tactic...
My personal approach - which you do NOT have to use and which I know is not the only RIGHT way - is to have empathy or telepathy be a two-way exchange. If you can see someone's thoughts clearly, they can see yours. If your third eye is wide open, someone will be able to look into it as a window to your soul. Shields being up in fortified/defensive renforced mode means one cannot send or receive as clearly. It's like window glass blocking UV rays. Someone's shields in normal/standby mode would be like having a window open about a third of the way, maybe.
Either way, shields ALL THE WAY UP IN DEFENSIVE = cannot read or send clearly. Special permissions can be given to trusted people (forged mental links and such - kind of a psychic walkie talkie) but in general, most input and output is blunted.
Again, this isn't the ONLY way to do things, but all perks and no drawbacks is cheap and it turns the character into an ass out of which the author can pull any number of hackneyed plot twists and Deus ex Machinae.
3) MENTAL SPACE: This is connected with 1 and 2 above - I personally run it that a mindscape is vaguely visible from the outside, but in order to get a really clear look at it one has to - look at it. Done without permission, this is trespassing at worst. At best it's peeking into someone's bedroom to see if it's messy. Again, gawking without permission is rude.
Wandering into someone's mental space or dreamscape without permission is another big no. I've had characters stumble in like idiots and apologize profusely; the only ones who will walk uninvited into someone else's mind/dream, or BREAK IN, are the assjack wankers. It's a big violation of trust and privacy.
'Just guessing' or 'just knowing' what someone's mental space looks like falls into the category of supremo bullshit. In RP it's gonna be metagaming if the player denies reading minds on the sly.
Allowing someone into one's mental space is a big sign of trust, on the flip side.
4) SOCIETAL RULES: Any race or culture or society where telepathy and empathy are common is going to have rules and laws and mores about it. What is legal and what is not. Penalties for being a choad. Acceptable and unacceptable uses of talent. Precautions that should be taken, and so on. In Babylon 5 for example, people with mental talents wore gloves. That was both a 'hey I'm a telepath' sign, and protection for them. Psychometry (picking things up from objects) relies on touch, and empathy and telepathy is often associated with touch. See also: THE VULCANS! The mind meld. Ponn Farr. Touch can possibly bring really unwanted accidental readings. Therefore, gloves, or a society that doesn't do much touching of unclothed places.
In The Dream Catcher you have a whole society of telepaths, and so they teach the kids how to use their talents through meditation and lessons. (It doesn't work well for Ruth, the protagonist, but she has a dang good reason why she's getting so distracted!) According to talent, kids who come of age start pursuing one of three usual categories of job. (The fourth is unusual.)
I'd like to go more into detail about all of this but this entry is unwieldy anyhow. So I'll cut it off here.
tl;dr if you're going to be writing someone with a mental talent, TAKE THE TIME TO DO IT RIGHT thxbai.
Hokay, so. MIND TALENTS! They've been around in literature and stuff since way, way before Spock made his debut on the scene. My first encounter with them in fiction that I can remember was - okay. In books, it was Monica Hughes's The Dream Catcher and then again in Madeleine L'Engle's A Wind in the Door. On TV, it was that old 1990s X-Men cartoon (hey shut up, it was fun XD) and Counselor Deanna Troi. It's The Dream Catcher that's really the inspiration for how I write societies of people with mental talents; I wasn't really a Trekkie although I have a tone of friends who are. I don't doubt there's some Vulcan influence in my work too - but I digress.
The point of this post was not navel-gazing, it was how to write or RP mental talents in a way that doesn't annoy the bejesus out of people.
This is all my opinion, of course, and I know my way isn't the only way, but the examples I'm about to give are largely in the category of 'this is how NOT to do it well'. Discussion's more than awesome but pls refrain from talking to me as if I were a mentally defunct jumping bean XD
Of course every universe has its own rules; the examples I've given are from my own games and writing and from stuff I've seen myself. These deal with characters who have control over their gifts for the most part.
ETA: It occurs to me that I totally left out any stuff about n00bs. A n00b psychic is prolly going to get an eyeful of brain by accident OFTEN and end up flailing around because they would rather not have seen that dude thinking about that thing that time. This can ALSO be RPed or written annoyingly (along the "OH TEH MELODRAMAZ AND TEH WANGST AND TEH SORROEZ, and so on" lines of things) but for the most part I've dealt with developed psychics, so it's them I'm rambling about mostly. I'll likely deal with n00b psychics at a later date. This is principally about psychics who can control their stuff.
1) PSYCHIC EAVESDROPPING: I'm constantly amazed at the number of people I've gamed with and proofed for who will have their telepaths or empaths do this. They see no problem with their hero (male or female) poking around in someone's head for information, reading someone's mind to get the upper hand or get more info, listening in on a private conversation between two other telepaths, answering questions that a character has not spoken aloud, 'just knowing things' (read: reading minds behind the scenes) - and they have no earthly idea why other PCs might lose trust in theirs completely, and have no idea at all why I say it makes their hero look skeezy.
Basically, at best, psychic 'skimming' or casual mind reading is eavesdropping. At worst, it's B&E and criminal trespass. Your character, in listening in to others' conversations, is picking up the spare receiver like a bratty kid who doesn't want to be babysat (at best) or wiretapping illegally (at worst). They're going through someone's recycle bin for credit card and SIN numbers. That is what casual mindreading is. I'm not being a drama lord either.
Empathy is the same. I've seen a lot of people try and fail to be Deanna Troi. Why things more or less worked for her was that she stated what she was picking up without judgment, and she seemed to be mentioning things that the person she was reading might not be aware of. (This wasn't always the case, and I know it. My memory is spotty, mea culpa.) Where other RPers and writers fail is in having a character be a judgmental knowitall about someone's emotions, or get butthurt/go flouncy/ run away weeping pretty sparkly shoujo tears across a field of cherry blossoms.
AGAIN, YOU ARE INVADING PRIVACY. I will admit to having had characters blurt things out before, or pick up emotions and be aware of them, but when they do either (a) I'm playing them as little kids with far less control over their third eyelids and shields, and no brain-to-mouth filter; (b) the emotion is overwhelming because the person feeling it is a projective empath and thus there's a "holy crap, VOLUME DOWN PLOX" effect; (c) their mind is wandering and they notice but don't say anything. And again, this is accidental, and there are consequences to the blurting (wall to wall WTF, flailing, "HEY HOW THE" etc.) and amends need to be made after.
Going "OH NURF HURF YOU FEELS TEH RAEG :O" is like announcing any other personal information. It's rude. Don't expect characters to react well to this in RP. Don't expect me to give your hero a pass just because they're a hero, in writing. Sketch is sketch, rude is rude.
The annoying part is that these players get OH SO TANTRUMMY if someone does the same thing to their PC.
Which leads me to the next point -
2) MENTAL SHIELDING: Look, please lay down the damned rules for how shielding works and stick with them? If you MUST bend the rules, have a damn good reason for doing so. And for heaven's sakes, please consider potential limitations! Perfectly unbreakable one-way-mirror shields - where you can see everything and no one can see you - is cheap and godmodey and obnoxious, and inevitably used by someone who's going to have a villain go smashy-smash through the shields later as a spotlight-jockeying tactic...
My personal approach - which you do NOT have to use and which I know is not the only RIGHT way - is to have empathy or telepathy be a two-way exchange. If you can see someone's thoughts clearly, they can see yours. If your third eye is wide open, someone will be able to look into it as a window to your soul. Shields being up in fortified/defensive renforced mode means one cannot send or receive as clearly. It's like window glass blocking UV rays. Someone's shields in normal/standby mode would be like having a window open about a third of the way, maybe.
Either way, shields ALL THE WAY UP IN DEFENSIVE = cannot read or send clearly. Special permissions can be given to trusted people (forged mental links and such - kind of a psychic walkie talkie) but in general, most input and output is blunted.
Again, this isn't the ONLY way to do things, but all perks and no drawbacks is cheap and it turns the character into an ass out of which the author can pull any number of hackneyed plot twists and Deus ex Machinae.
3) MENTAL SPACE: This is connected with 1 and 2 above - I personally run it that a mindscape is vaguely visible from the outside, but in order to get a really clear look at it one has to - look at it. Done without permission, this is trespassing at worst. At best it's peeking into someone's bedroom to see if it's messy. Again, gawking without permission is rude.
Wandering into someone's mental space or dreamscape without permission is another big no. I've had characters stumble in like idiots and apologize profusely; the only ones who will walk uninvited into someone else's mind/dream, or BREAK IN, are the assjack wankers. It's a big violation of trust and privacy.
'Just guessing' or 'just knowing' what someone's mental space looks like falls into the category of supremo bullshit. In RP it's gonna be metagaming if the player denies reading minds on the sly.
Allowing someone into one's mental space is a big sign of trust, on the flip side.
4) SOCIETAL RULES: Any race or culture or society where telepathy and empathy are common is going to have rules and laws and mores about it. What is legal and what is not. Penalties for being a choad. Acceptable and unacceptable uses of talent. Precautions that should be taken, and so on. In Babylon 5 for example, people with mental talents wore gloves. That was both a 'hey I'm a telepath' sign, and protection for them. Psychometry (picking things up from objects) relies on touch, and empathy and telepathy is often associated with touch. See also: THE VULCANS! The mind meld. Ponn Farr. Touch can possibly bring really unwanted accidental readings. Therefore, gloves, or a society that doesn't do much touching of unclothed places.
In The Dream Catcher you have a whole society of telepaths, and so they teach the kids how to use their talents through meditation and lessons. (It doesn't work well for Ruth, the protagonist, but she has a dang good reason why she's getting so distracted!) According to talent, kids who come of age start pursuing one of three usual categories of job. (The fourth is unusual.)
I'd like to go more into detail about all of this but this entry is unwieldy anyhow. So I'll cut it off here.
tl;dr if you're going to be writing someone with a mental talent, TAKE THE TIME TO DO IT RIGHT thxbai.
