Psionic equivalent to Trigmesitus Council?

[segerge]

I was trying to come up with a cool hunted for a psionic character I was designing, and it occurred to me that while the Mystic World of the Champions Universe has the Trigmesistus Council to (sort of) police it, there is no equivalent in the Psionic World.

 

In a world where psionic powers are prevalent enough to be noticeable by the population at large, what would such an organization look like?  What code or codes would it enforce on psionics?  Or am I totally crackers for thinking such an organization could exist even in a superheroic setting?

[steriaca]

The Trigmesistus Council concerns themselves with policing mystical maters. That doesn't just mean magic. Jojo stands, people with Psionic powers, and such.

[Lord Liaden]

"UNTIL's answer to Project Awakening (VIPER's psionics program), Project Mind Game is a group of UNTIL agents with mental powers... and the scientists who study them. Unlike VIPER, which has no scruples against experimenting on human subjects to induce mental powers, UNTIL must recruit its mentalists. Thus, Project Mind Game is quite small -- it has only six psionic members." [Names and descriptions redacted for Fair Use.]

 

"The secondary job of Project Mind Game is to keep track of and prepare defenses against prominent mentalist supervillains, such as the various members of PSI, Mentalla of Eurostar, and most importantly Menton. To that end they have several IC [Intelligence Corps] agents dedicated to observing known mentalists and searching for hidden ones, plus a full team of psychobiologists working on mental shielding and tracking technology." [UNTIL: Defenders Of Freedom p. 70]

 

If you want to draw from the official Champions Universe, Project Mind Game is probably the most appropriate choice for your purpose. Note that the psionic agents vary in power level, and in specialized abilities. The strongest would make pretty formidable opponents, particularly if backed by UNTIL combat agents. U:DOF has enough info on them to use them in a game with a little prep; as well as a wealth of data on everything else to do with UNTIL.

 

BTW UNTIL has several of these "Special Projects" dedicated to countering particular threats, or classes of threat, including "Project Hermes" dealing with magical ones.

 

[Christopher]

8 hours ago, segerge said:

In a world where psionic powers are prevalent enough to be noticeable by the population at large, what would such an organization look like?  What code or codes would it enforce on psionics?

The Babylon 5 Psicorp as seen in Crusade (after the Telepath War) might be a good fit:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crusade_(TV_series)#Telepath_War

[segerge]

17 hours ago, Lord Liaden said:

"UNTIL's answer to Project Awakening (VIPER's psionics program), Project Mind Game is a group of UNTIL agents with mental powers... and the scientists who study them. Unlike VIPER, which has no scruples against experimenting on human subjects to induce mental powers, UNTIL must recruit its mentalists. Thus, Project Mind Game is quite small -- it has only six psionic members." [Names and descriptions redacted for Fair Use.]

[deletia for brevity]

BTW UNTIL has several of these "Special Projects" dedicated to countering particular threats, or classes of threat, including "Project Hermes" dealing with magical ones.

 

Shame on me for forgetting about that, especially since UNTIL's Project Shiva (Doctor Destroyer) and Project Citadel (Istvatha V'Han) figured in several TASK FORCE stories.

[steriaca]

It kinda depends on the special effects of the Psionic powers. If magic, then the Trigmesistus Council would be responsible for policing them. If it is some kind of advancing of the brain, then UNTIL's Project Mind Game is responsible for policing them. Stands with mental effects are policed by the Speedwagon Foundation (when they are not helping Joestar defendants that is). Psionic granting martial arts techniques are policed by The Watchers of the Dragon. Aliens with Psionic abilities fall under Star*Guard somehow.

 

Note: Yes. I know Stands and the Speedwagon Foundation are not cannon Champions Universe. I would personally add them in if I had a game to run myself. I would assume that everything in Jojo's Bizarre Adventure happened as written till Stone Ocean, when Father Puchi failed in turning his Stand from C-Moon to Made In Heaven. But that is just me. Your world (and milage) may vary.

[DShomshak]

UNTIL makes a good general-purpose Policer of All Things Super, because that's its job. Whatever modes of power exist that can become a threat, it creates a branch that specializes in that mode. Especially dangerous if the various Projects have the basic good sense to talk to each other, so if Project Mind Game finds that the criminal hypnotist it investigates is using magic, it brings Project Hermes onto the case so the bad guy faces both groups.

 

For other possible groups? Well, it depends. You might have a group of "Psi Cops" (self-appointed like Trismegistus, or state-supported) who hunt paranormal bad guys regardless of how they do their mind tricks, or they might specialize in mentalists of only one origin type. But in the latter case, keep in mind that it might not be obvious how or why a mentalist has powers. A mutant might pretend to e a mystic, a mystic might pretend to use high tech, etc.

 

Dean Shomshak

 

 

[Lord Liaden]

All of the above presupposes that you want your Hunter to be some sort of law-enforcement or other benevolent group. OTOH if your character was a mutant, the Institute for Human Advancement would probably be on his trail. If he's the product of an experiment by the likes of VIPER or ARGENT, they would likely want to recover him for study. If he's an escapee from PSI they might try to force him to return, or at the very least eliminate him so he won't spill their secrets.

[Major Tom 2009]

One possibility for a psionic-based hunter group would be the Phoenix Project, from the pre-4th Edition GURPS Psionics sourcebook/worldbook.

 

The premise of the group (IIRC) was that it was an underground organization made up of those with psionic abilities (not just humans; one of its

members was a psionic wolf -- that's right folks, you've read correctly, a psionic wolf), who kept an eye out for anyone that had recently manifest-

ed psionic abilities of their own, due to the fact that certain organizations -- both within and outside of the government -- wanted to claim these

individuals for their own reasons, and not necessarily altruistic ones.

 

 

Major Tom 2009 ?

[Lord Liaden]

The term "policing" implies an organization devoted to enforcing certain rules of conduct over people under its jurisdiction. The official Champions Universe has nothing like that for things as tightly focused as psionics or magic. UNTIL's Special Projects are adjuncts to its general operations, like the specialized divisions within the FBI. The Trismegistus Council is mostly made up of scholars, with significant investigative ability but little combat capacity. When faced with a serious threat their usual response is to notify mystic superheroes in the area.

 

In fictional source material where paranormal policing is featured, there's usually one dominant or exclusive category of threat in a given setting, with one police force devoted to countering it.