Upon initial breakthrough, espers develop a two-way connection to the noosphere – but that torrent of mental input can easily overwhelm an untrained mind. Therefore, they must drill themselves on basic meditative techniques for calmly letting go of thoughts and consciously directing their attention so as to remain lucid while in the sensory swirl of the psychic access state. Once they stand upon a firm foundation, they can stretch their newfound phantom limbs and begin learning psychic techniques.
All espers inherently possess a bit of telepathy: they can dimly sense the thoughts and feelings of those around them, silently speak in a way other espers perceive as a faint whisper, and vaguely detect the nearby use of psychic abilities. Beyond that, it takes sustained effort, ingenuity, and self-reflection to nurture those core faculties into useful skills.
All basic esper techniques are outgrowths of elementary telepathic proficiency. Below are some of the most common fields of study at that level.
Telepathy
The power to sense the thoughts of minds around you. Telepathy is the most basic application of psi, one that every esper develops at the beginning of their training. However, those who keep refining it beyond the standard level unlock subtle new uses. A true telepathy effortlessly notices the surface thoughts, emotions, and immediate of everyone around them – and if they choose to focus a mental probe on someone, they can tweeze out even their deepest secrets. An experienced telepath can send and receive psychic messages over vast distance and through low-level jamming fields, as well as act as a hub of mental communication, allowing even nearby non-espers to use telepathy within the local network they manifest. With practice, telepaths can learn to speak the strange mental languages of animals, computers, and even plants, who murmur as though half-asleep.
Because a telepath knows what someone is about to do right before they do it, that split second notice before someone throws a punch effectively increases their reaction time. This can be countered by thinking of nothing (very difficult), smoke-screening your intentions in chaotic distractions (makes it hard for you to act), or acting purely on reflex (fast but unreliable), but if possible it’s safer to set traps too mechanically simple to constitute minds they can read.
Channeling
The power to connect one’s mind to the vast store of memories within the noosphere. A channeler can “download” any skill or field of academic information known to any mind tied to the noosphere: they can act as post-doctoral authorities on any science, operate any machine, read any language, and quote any law with perfect accuracy. Some channelers have even learned to tap into the ancestral recall of animals and other living things. While channeling, one’s mental clock rate increases proportionately with the frequency of their beta brain waves, thereby augmenting the user’s intelligence past that of the greatest natural human genius, able to solve problems and make plans so fast that no one else can keep up. For this reason, all significant esper organizations are lead by channelers.
Most channelers will, if threatened, use enhanced social skills to talk you out of attacking them. If that doesn’t work, they’ll switch to brilliantly executed martial arts and tactical maneuvers. Thus, even lacking abilities that directly affect their opponents, they constitute a significant threat. Don’t give a channeler a moment to think, or they’ll out-think you – and definitely don’t give them a day to plan, or they’ll have help when you arrive.
Telempathy
The power to detect and affect the emotions of others. Similar to but more specific than telepathy, but as a result more potent within its sphere: telempathic powers work on groups of people as easily as telepathic ones work on a single person, while narrowing focus onto a single target produces an almost overwhelmingly intense effect. Telempaths are constantly aware of what everyone around them is feeling, giving them supernatural capacity for navigating social situations and saying the right things, but can also project emotions outward, causing targets to feel even highly nuanced sentiments as long as the user can imagine them. Telempaths typically have to learn control over the tendency for their own emotions spontaneously overflowing into those around them. Their most confusing ability is the induction of xenoemotions: feelings humans don’t naturally experience and therefore have no words to describe.
The telempath’s greatest advantage is the sheer force of their abilities: even a mid-level user can move entire crowds to inconsolable despair in seconds, flood an attacker with artificial love sufficient to make further violence unthinkable to them, or incite rage-fueled riots against their enemies. The best counter methods, therefore, require speed or stealth: either way, striking before they have a chance to respond.
Illusion
The power to induce hallucinations. You can cause people (and anything else with a mind) to receive falsified sensory perceptions of whatever you wish, such as seeing something that isn’t there, making something that is there invisible, or altering the appearance of things. While illusions require your continued presence and concentration to maintain, experienced users of the ability can virtually take over all sensory input of multiple people at once. A very high levels of refinement, you can even affect perception of time, making an imagined moment stretch on for hours.
Illusion remains one of the most feared esper techniques because its mere existence calls into question the reliability of basic reality – at any time, an illusionist might be deceiving you without your knowledge. Not only that, but even those aware of the sensory fabrication might be forced to endure a time-dilated hell-chamber inside one’s own head. The best counter to either of these applications is psychic jamming to directly end the effect, but barring that, periodic dream-checking exercises are recommended for all espers, and internal amplification of either delta or alpha waves can provide relief during unavoidable illusory torment.
Mnemonism
The power to read and modify memories. Once in close psychic contact with someone, a mnemonist can sift through their target’s mind, revealing the most recent and emotionally charged memories first, then the older and more mundane ones with prolonged scrutiny. Once they understand the mnemonic architecture of a given mind, they can insert, delete, and alter the contents to their liking, although they must take care to link up falsified memories to the person’s existing autobiographical web, lest they leave doubt-nucleating inconsistencies. Mnemonism inherently takes time, making it of little use in a pressured situation, but of incredible value when something knows something you don’t know.
Aside from pronunciation of their title, mnemonists are most feared for the existential dread they engender by their simple existence. Much like how illusionists force you to always doubt your senses, mnemonists force you to doubt your memory, even your most cherished recollections of past life events. A nullifier can undo a hasty mnemonic shuffling, but once a memory is fully reworked, the effect is permanent, barring the aid of a specialized psychometrist/mnemonist on your side. Never forget to perform regular personal history hashing checks with one or more of the suggested ciphers, and confer with allies regularly to keep your stories straight.
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