[Psionic Powers] Psionic gestalts

[Inky]

I'm not sure how the rules for psionic gestalts in Psionic Powers are supposed to work.

It seems like the rules allow for a gestalt to be maintained so long as all the members are in either physical or telepathic contact with each other.

Suppose you have 12 aliens each with Telereceive 1 (i.e. skin-to-skin contact only) and the Gestalt Familiarity perk (allowing them to form a gestalt reliably without having to roll). They hold hands and form a gestalt.

Apparently, the leader would then be able to use Telereceive at a level equal to xir own level plus half the total of the other members' levels, rounded up - so 1 + (11 x 1)/2 = 6.5 = rounded up is 7, and Telereceive 7 means xe has no range penalties at all and can use Telereceive just as effectively at any distance.

Does that then mean that, despite having only Telereceive 1 individually, they can now go and do other things - even get on a spaceship and fly away - without the gestalt ending, because they're all within range of the leader's Telereceive 7?

(This might be useful but I'm not sure http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread.php?t=141754 ).

[JulianLW]

Originally Posted by Inky

I'm not sure how the rules for psionic gestalts in Psionic Powers are supposed to work.

It seems like the rules allow for a gestalt to be maintained so long as all the members are in either physical or telepathic contact with each other.

Suppose you have 12 aliens each with Telereceive 1 (i.e. skin-to-skin contact only) and the Gestalt Familiarity perk (allowing them to form a gestalt reliably without having to roll). They hold hands and form a gestalt.

Apparently, the leader would then be able to use Telereceive at a level equal to xir own level plus half the total of the other members' levels, rounded up - so 1 + (11 x 1)/2 = 6.5 = rounded up is 7, and Telereceive 7 means xe has no range penalties at all and can use Telereceive just as effectively at any distance.

Does that then mean that, despite having only Telereceive 1 individually, they can now go and do other things - even get on a spaceship and fly away - without the gestalt ending, because they're all within range of the leader's Telereceive 7?

(This might be useful but I'm not sure http://forums.sjgames.com/showthread.php?t=141754 ).

Yes, I think this is how a Gestalt is supposed to work. But to establish a Telereceive connection with 11 fellow aliens, the leader would need to roll the Multiplicity technique at Telereceive-16, which he still might not be able to do even with the combined skill. Most of the fellow aliens would have to have a positive relative skill in Telereceive for there to be a significant bonus, and that means spending either 8 CP to raise the skill to IQ+1 or having 3 levels of Telepathy talent - or some combination that adds up to a positive relative skill. Without a positive relative skill, the leader gets no skill bonus.

So it would either be a very special group to manage an interstellar Gestalt (which seems unlikely if they all have only Telereceive 1) or a setting with extremely common telepathy.

[Anaraxes]

The gestalt rule does say "using Telesend and/or Telereceive", so one-way communication seems to be sufficient. The scenario in the OP seems correct. There is a line that says "Being forced out of physical contact with the group also removes someone from the link." But that's immediately followed by "One must be able to trace a path through the connections (whether physical or telepathic) between the members for them to remain part of the same gestalt." So while fuzzy, the implication to me is that physical contact is not always necessary to remain in a gestalt.

"Trace a path" is kind of wonky wording when one-way paths are explicitly allowed, so for gestalt-connecting purposes I think we just have to treat "paths" as directionless; thus, "trace a path" means there's any connection of any sort between two gestalt members, physical, Send, or Receive. In this example, everyone is directly connected to the leader via the leader's Telereceive, and thus every member is two hops away from every other member except the leader.

I don't think it's an unreasonable interpretation to read "must be able to trace a path between the members" for gestalt formation purposes to mean doing so with the individual's own native ability, unenhanced by the gestalt. In this case, the leader would the only one that could fly off in the spaceship. This is one of those details that the group ought to establish in Session Zero so that everyone's clear on how it works. Similarly, if two-way paths are to be required, then players need to know that up front so they can buy both Telesend and Telereceive ("and", rather than "and/or").

If the aliens sleep, they'll drop out of the gestalt as they do so. The rule says "unconscious or dead". But the game-mechanical difference between "asleep" and "unconscious" is that "sleep" is relatively easy to recover from -- loud noises, being shaken awake, etc -- particularly during combat time. Both conditions prevent characters from acting or taking Maneuvers. Psi Powers notes in the Combining Abilities section, "To count as “contributing,” a psi must have the ability and be able to use it." Combining Abilities is not strictly speaking the same as forming a gestalt, but IMO it's consistent to treat those cases the same way.

If the leader falls asleep, then the entire separated gestalt falls apart, as they were all relying on the leader's Telereceive to each of the scattered members to maintain the paths between all members. Only the members that were still within mutual touching distance could remain in a gestalt. Once a non-leader member is reawakened, that member could be rejoined by the leader making contact with their enhanced ability.

When a member is asleep, the power of the leader's Telereceive is reduced, which may involuntarily disconnect more distant gestalt members if the leader's range is reduced. This effect could cascade until the whole gestalt falls apart.

I suppose wise or experienced aliens make sure to have a sufficient core group of members that remain in touching distance, along with some extra members to allow sleeping (etc.) in shifts while the needed power of the gestalt is maintained.

[Inky]

Originally Posted by JulianLW

Yes, I think this is how a Gestalt is supposed to work. But to establish a Telereceive connection with 11 fellow aliens, the leader would need to roll the Multiplicity technique at Telereceive-16, which he still might not be able to do even with the combined skill. Most of the fellow aliens would have to have a positive relative skill in Telereceive for there to be a significant bonus, and that means spending either 8 CP to raise the skill to IQ+1 or having 3 levels of Telepathy talent - or some combination that adds up to a positive relative skill. Without a positive relative skill, the leader gets no skill bonus.

So it would either be a very special group to manage an interstellar Gestalt (which seems unlikely if they all have only Telereceive 1) or a setting with extremely common telepathy.

Aha, possibly I'd overlooked the thing about there being a penalty to be in Telereceive contact with more than one person at a time. Looks like it's possibly not as OP as it seemed - it looks like it's possible in theory but would require a critical success unless some of them had very high skill. (And, apparently, even if they could pull it off it would have to be redone every day, unless they resorted to sleeping in shifts as Anaraxes suggests).

The scenario was possibly assuming a species with Telereceive as a racial trait and asking what that might lead to rules-wise yes, although that might still not guarantee that all or even many of them would have high skill.

Thanks both of you!