Doesn it makes role-playing any psi prohibitive point-wise if one were to run, say, a Babylon 5 campaign?
Because they’re far more powerful than everyone else in game terms, even if they don’t dominate the show in dramatic terms. Unfortunately for gamers, even very cool novels, TV shows, and movies make terrible game settings. One of the main reasons for this is that the characters aren’t free-willed, but in fact pawns of a few auteurs who have a long-term plan for everything in the setting. The heroes aren’t equally powerful (built on the same points, as it were) – it’s just that the powerful ones are kept in check, and the weak ones made prominent, by a constant series of dramatic devices. It’s what I call the “Spock effect.” Spock was the original SF TV show psi. Being a strong, ultra-intelligent, long-lived alien with a secret hand-to-hand combat technique and telepathic powers was balanced by his alienness and placing him in tougher situations (and keeping him out of easy-win situations). In the show, he was just “one of the guys,” on an equal footing with the other major players. As
