[Psionics] [Space] Psi Trek - Worldbuilding

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

A stutter-warp drive is my favorite. With 1,000 jumps per second, the distance jumped would be (e^(x)/1000) light-seconds per jump (for a speed of (e^(x)c), with 'x' being the warp factor. The FTL drive would allow teleporters to operate up to their warp rating without a roll required, but the teleporters could exceed the warp rating for one minute with a successful IQ, with a penalty equal to every 0.05 warp factor in excess of the rating.

For example, a Warp 5 engine could operate without any skill roll up to Warp 5 as long as it was amplifying the abilities of a teleporter. If the captain wanted to push the drive to Warp 5.5 though, the teleporter would need to make an IQ-10 roll every minute to sustain that speed. On a failure, the Warp drive would fail and require minor repairs. On a critical failure, the Warp drive would fail and require major repairs.

Um, just to clarify, most psychotronic devices are not directly amplifying the abilities of living psychics. They need people because (in this setting) interacting with their natural psionic fields helps them function, in sort of like the way a non-vacuum-rated mechanical or electromechanical device could still work in a vacuum, but would eventually malfunction and fail because of environmental factors. Some psi-tech will fail immediately after it has no natural psionic fields to interact with (or none of sufficient strength), some are more robust, and will fail in an hour or so (maybe longer, if the GM rolls really well on the Malf. numbers), and most are somewhere in-between.

EDIT: That said, a natural autoteleporter interfacing with the drive (preferably with the help of a psi-amp to increase the effective skill level) could certainly make it go faster on a good roll, just as a natural psychic healer with the right ability could improve the effectiveness of a psychotronic medical device.

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by doctorevilbrain

Canonically, the Eugenics war didn't involve nuclear weapons, the NX class Enterprise wasn't the USS Enterprise and the UFP was founded in 2161.

That's what I get for posting without fact-checking.

It must be some sort of constant that no matter how nit-picking you are about some aspect of fandom, there will be somebody even more nit-picking. :)

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

Um, just to clarify, most psychotronic devices are not directly amplifying the abilities of living psychics.

There are exceptions, but psi-tech which requires psi powers to operate is typically limited to psionic races. The examples I can think of off the top of my head are the Betazoid psionically-activated chests, the Vulcan Stone of Gol (and possibly katric arks), and possibly the Bajoran "Orbs."

Human-created tech allows someone without powers to do the equivalent of psionic mind-reading or mind-probe, but without needing any knowledge of psi to do so. Instead, such devices use a relevant skill or Electrical Operations/TL (Appropriate Specialty).

[AlexanderHowl]

Psi-Tech requires something to generate the psionic potential though if it is not the user. I would honestly think that Star Fleet would only accept psionically gifted individuals in such a setting, as it would be a basic security feature to make the devices only respond to human psionic frequencies. Even if only 1% of humans were gifted, the demand for such people in Star Fleet (and Star Fleet support) would keep them employed forever.

[Flyndaran]

In canon Star Trek, we know that full humans can be telepathic like Miranda Jones from the original series, or at least have high "potential" like Gary Mitchell also from the original series.
So it shouldn't cause any eye batting to increase the numbers of human with such "potential" for psi tech.

[AlexanderHowl]

World War III could have produced such potential through mutation, or through deliberate genetic engineering.

[Flyndaran]

Radiation giving super powers feels very "wrong" for anything courting Star Trek, to me at least.
And genetic engineering is very "evil" for some reason in the original and next generation series. Then again, its edge was rounded heavily for DS9.
But for it to effectively permeate society would effectively change what the default human species has become. That seems like something that should be carefully considered before implementing.

[Daigoro]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Radiation giving super powers feels very "wrong" for anything courting Star Trek, to me at least.
And genetic engineering is very "evil" for some reason in the original and next generation series.

Maybe some advanced psionic race came along and uplifted human society to be psionic? A genetic switch gets activated due to some space-faring related trigger, such as entering warp or visiting Psiworld X-Omega? Q thought it would be neat?

[Prince Charon]

OK, unless I've missed a post somewhere, I've only had one response to the question of which FTL drive is preferable, which is really not enough to get a consensus. I'd like more opinions to that, if anyone has them.


On the matter of psis and psi-tech, as mentioned in the OP, Universal Latency is the case for any sapient race that are not universally psychic - so, humans are universally latent (meaning they have at least the potential for psi abilities), and some have active powers, while the Vulcans (if they exist here, which is part of a later question) are universally telepathic, though a few might have abilities from other powers, or telepathic abilities other than the ones that pretty much all Vulcans have. Either way, all living things produce a natural psi field, and sophonts (sapient beings, hence people) produce a strong and complex enough psi field to create an environment in which psychotronic devices can work for long periods.

This does mean that ancient psychotronic devices left lying around inactive for thousands of years could plausibly start working again when the crew shows up on the long-abandoned spacecraft or whatever - especially if they're powered by the psi field, or have a system that uses psi field accumulators to charge up a different power system.... or if the equipment is a mix of psychotronic and non-psychotronic systems, and they have some manner of very robust mundane power system, like an asteroid base with solar panels (with repair robots that can also repair each other).

[isf]

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

OK, unless I've missed a post somewhere, I've only had one response to the question of which FTL drive is preferable, which is really not enough to get a consensus. I'd like more opinions to that, if anyone has them..

I think that using psionic ftl should allow for several types of ftl travel depending on the power behind them. I'd probably have stutter warp drive and a jump drive as fairly standard drives that do not require active psionic powers to use and different types of travel or psionically active users.


I like the idea of having much of the superscience tech having a consistent explanation and the transtator as a psionic device is pretty clever.