Psychics are a staple of many horror genres, if only because they are a useful vehicle for flashbacks and presenting scenes without the protagonist actually being present. In other words, they're great tools for a director to tell a story in an innovative way without breaking up the narrative flow of a film.

Psychics in role-playing games are another matter. A clairvoyant can give away a carefully concealed room, a telepath can pluck secrets right out of a cultist's head, and a telekinetic can easily reach the key that's just out of reach. Psychics make life easier for players and that makes life harder for game masters.

But not necessarily. Here's a few ways you can deal with psychics while still letting the player feel like his character is useful:

• Psychics are sensitive. This rule, which I use at my whim, is that a psychic character has undefined powers he has no control over. At any time, he may see interdimensional beings, hear the whisperings of a ghost, or otherwise unwillingly brush the supernatural. This is a great way to heighten the tension in the scenario, by having the psychic be the early indicator that something is very, very wrong.
• It pays to know all the details. I'm usually frustrated by the dizzying amount of detail in Delta Green scenarios that the players are never likely to encounter. After all, who cares about the chain of command or the day-to-day routine of non-player characters if the players will never have access the information? With psychics, that kind of information is critical for a game master to be able to whip something up on the fly. General details are good, really specific details about NPCs is better. Mapping out their daily routines helps with clairvoyants, knowing their goals and motivations helps with telepaths.
• Some things are too alien to comprehend. Psychics shouldn't have free reign to just skip through plot devices. Bad things should happen to them when they encounter a supernatural event so gruesome or alien that it breaks a human's mind. Because our resident psychic was kidnapped by aliens, they have put in a block that prevents any information about them from being picked up as a sort of safe guard. This helps keep some information off limits.
• Use other senses. There's nothing wrong with only providing a sound, a taste, or a touch rather than simple visuals for clairvoyants. When Jim-Bean heard the screech of bizarre predators, experiencing the last thing the victim experienced (he never saw his killers), he was suitably freaked out.
• Psychics are targets for the supernatural. This means that the psychic character might be the only one who can hear the villain in his thoughts, or that it makes him a prime target for psychically active creatures attracted to the "beacon" of psychic energy.
• Daydreams and nightmares. Horror RPGs and Call of Cthulhu in particular often uses nightmares as an easy way to introduce a scenario and project helplessness and fear onto a character without any die rolling. The psychic is always the best choice to suffer from such nightmares (and perhaps sleep less because of it). Daydreams, on the other hand, happen while the psychic is awake and could well make him question his sanity. Speaking of which…
• Psychics are crazy. Having these powers classifies psychics as borderline kooks to begin with. Sanity loss should be more extreme and psychic trauma should be that much more horrific. In essence, psychics open a doorway that they cannot easily close.

So the next time a player wants to roll up a psychic character, smile and nod. He's given you a grand opportunity.

Your Turn: Ever give a player a cool psychic ability, only for him to realize later it was a curse?

Michael "Talien" Tresca is the National RPG Examiner.