Psionics

While the world of Eberron is flooded with all kinds of magic, of many different types, they are all magic, and so work mostly according to the same principles.

But when a collection of refugees arrived here from Dal Quor, the dimension of dreams, an entirely different sort of power altogether was introduced to this world: Psionics, "psychic" powers quite different from the magical forces native to this world.

Psionic ability taps the mind’s potential. A psionic character is blessed with innate mental abilities that grant access to realms of personal power beyond both the mundane and the magical.

While much of how psionic powers and effects work is similar to how magic works, some of it is also very different. While we won't be explaining all the rules for how psionics works (that's what the "Psionics Unleashed" and "Ultimate Psionics" sourcebooks are for), we will try to cover some of the most crucial terminology and basic principles, and more importantly, how psionics and magic interact with each other.

Psionic Classes:Psion, ●Psychic Warrior, ●Soulknife, ●Wilder

See also:Kalashtar, ●Psi-like abilities, ●Psionic Feats, ●Psionic Focus
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Terminology

Power = Spell
Manifester = (Spell)Caster
Manifesting a power = Casting a spell
Manifester Level (ML) = Caster Level (CL)
Power Resistance (PR) = Spell Resistance (SR)
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Key Abilities

Class Psion Psychic Warrior Wilder
Ability Intelligence Wisdom Charisma

The modifier for this ability is referred to as your "key ability modifier". If your character's key ability score is 9 or lower, you can’t manifest powers from that psionic class
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Psionic Disciplines

Every power is associated with one of six disciplines. A discipline is a group of related powers that work in similar ways, sort of like how magic divides up spells into different Schools (like Necromancy, illusion, etc).

Clairsentience (Wis): (interacts with rules ca. as Divination)
Metacreativity (Cha): (interacts with rules ca. as Conjuration)
Psychokinesis (Str): (interacts with rules ca. as Evocation)
Psychometabolism (Con): (interacts with rules ca. as Transmutation)
Psychoportation (Dex): (has no equivalent magic School)
Telepathy (Int): (interacts with rules ca. as Enchantment)

While it has little to no effect on the mechanics (at least in this edition of the rules), each discipline can be symbolically & thematically associated with one of the six Ability scores, and can in some ways be seen as the supereme mastery of that ability takes beyond the normal limits.
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Power Points

Psionic characters fuel their abilities through a reserve of mental energy, called their pool of "Power Points"1.
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Point Pool

Power point reserve = (base power points gained from class) + (bonus power points from key ability score) +(any additional bonus PP, f.ex. from race or feats or other sources)

Bonus power points = (key ability modifier) × (manifester lvl) × 1/2

If you have levels in more than one psionic class, you combine your power points from each class to make up your reserve. You can use these power points to manifest powers from any psionic class you have.

F.ex: A 5th-lvl psion/5th-lvl psychic warrior has 20 power points from her psion lvls (plus bonus points for high Int) & 7 PP from psychic warrior lvls (plus bonus points for high Wis), for a total of 27 power points (plus any bonus points). These points can be used to manifest any psion or psychic warrior powers the character knows.
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Spending Points

Where casters use "spell slots" of various "spell levels", psionic manifesters simply have one single pool of power points, and they must pay a minimum number of PP to use a psionic power, as determined by its level, as seen on this chart:
POWER level 1 level 2 level 3 level 4 level 5 level 6 level 7 level 8 level 9
COST 1 point 3 pnts 5 pnts 7 pnts 9 pnts 11 pnts 13 pnts 15 pnts 17 pnts

Some powers allow you to spend more points than their base cost in order to achieve an improved effect, to "augment" the power.

Max number of points you can spend on a power (for any reason) = your Manifester Level
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Multiclassing

While you maintain a single reserve of power points from your class, race, and feat selections, you are still limited by the manifester level you have achieved for each separate power you know.

F.ex: A 10th-level psion/2nd-level psychic warrior can spend up to 10 points when manifesting a psion power (because as a psion they have Manifester Level 10), but can only spend up to 2 points when manifesting a psychic warrior power, because their psychic warrior ML is only 2.

Your reserve of psychic energy is all in a single pool, but you might have very different levels of training or accomplishment with powers you learned from different classes, and so have different limits for the different ways you can spend these points.
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Psionic vs Magic

Dispelling

Effects like "Dispel Magic" can be used against psionic powers, and powers like "Dispel Psionics" can be used against magic spells, but this is less efficient, as it involves affecting an entirely different type of energy.

Any dispel check made against the 'wrong' type suffers a -3 penalty.
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(Type) Resistance

Spell Resistance (SR) also protects against psionic powers, and Power Resistance (PR) also protects against magic spells, but again, this protection is less efficient. It's always better to have protection that's actually designed to stop whatever's about to happen, as opposed to a protection that just happens to be similar enough to be relevant.

Using SR or PR against the other type of influence (SR vs psionics, PR vs magic) lowers the effective rating of the Resistance by 5.

F.ex: A creature with Spell Resistance 25 resists a psionic power as though it had Power Resistance 20.
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Defenses

For the most part, immunities to specific types of effects usually apply equally to both magic and psionics.

For instance, elves are immune to spells that make them sleep simply because elves do not have the biological function of sleep, and so no spell can force them to do it (unless it changes them enough to give them that ability). And while the mechanics technically only refer to sleep spells, it stands to reason that they should be just as immune to psionic powers that would make them fall asleep.

In the same way, bonuses to resist specific types of effects (like "+2 to saves against mind-affecting effects" for instance) are most times equally effective against both magic and psionics.

Sometimes this might require a bit of interpretation in order to determine whether or not a given effect would be affected or not. This is especially true for mechanics relating to the Schools of magic (Divination, Evocation, Necromancy, etc) and the Disciplines of psionics (Clairsentience, Metacreativity, Psychokinetics, Telepathy, etc), since these categories don't always match up exactly.

There might be specific exceptions to this, like f.ex. an construct built specifically to be impossible to affect with psionics but which can still be targeted with spells, or an item that blocks all psionic effects of the Telepathy discipline but which can't do anything to spells of the Enchantment school, and so on. This only happens when the mechanics involved specifically states that it does, in which case those rules take precedence over the general guidelines given above.
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Stacking

Powers that provide bonuses or penalties on attack rolls, damage rolls, saving throws, and other attributes usually do not stack with themselves. More generally, two bonuses of the same type don’t stack even if they come from different powers, or one from a power and one from a spell. You use whichever bonus gives you the better result. For instance, if two different "morale" bonuses apply to the same roll, you only get the benefit of the highest of the two.

The bonuses or penalties from two different powers, or a power and a spell, stack if the effects are of different types. A bonus that isn’t named (just a “+2 bonus” rather than a “+2 insight bonus”) stacks with any bonus.

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