[Basic|Psionic Powers] What counts as a "change" for Conditioning?

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by Celti

My group is working through a Psionic Powers game, and there's a point of contention over exactly how Mind Control with Conditioning (p. B69) — or more precisely, Mental Surgery (Psionic Powers, p. 61) — works.

Both books cite a penalty of "-1 per full -5 points of disadvantages changed." One of us was under the belief that that means you can transform one disadvantage into another of equal cost for that penalty; e.g., Callous [-5] into Selfless (12) [-5] for a -1 penalty.

Both books also have the language "add or remove any mundane mental disadvantage." (or similar). The other of us assumed that meant that you would need a penalty to buy off the original disadvantage, and another to add the new one; e.g., Callous [-5] into Selfless (12) [-5] is a total of [-10], for a -2 penalty.

Which assumption is correct? Or neither?

I tend to think it depends on how different the new advantage is from the old one. Changing Callous into Selfless is a big difference, so I'd say the -2 is a more plausible penalty, whereas changing a -5 phobia against snakes into a -5 phobia against lizards, or a wider (but still -5, so with a higher self-control number) phobia against reptiles in general, is a relatively small change, more like a transformation, and so would use the smaller penalty.