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Posted: **Fri Nov 09, 2012 3:39 pm**

This Super Psionic power from Psyscape has always been a little confusing to me. It says "Duration: Special" yet I don't see the subject addressed later in the description.

Without a stated duration or expiration date, should we assume that after spending ISP to create it and 10 to animate it, that it lasts forever unless destroyed?

The power says "possible only in the Astral Plane". I'm not clear on what that means. Clearly you can only create the golem in the Astral Plane because that's where there's ectoplasm, but once created, could the golem survive outside the astral plane?

We do know that it is possible for ectoplasm to exist outside the plane (the psionic power, or the spell 'call ectoplasm from others') though I imagine it would tend to be weaker if it could.

Also: I couldn't find any limitations in this power regarding 'can only create 1 golem at a time'. Can anyone see anything potentially preventing a psychic from creating multiple golems as ISP allows?

I'm wondering if maybe RUE may have included the bonus psionics from Psyscape and if it might have added a duration or a number cap to the power.

Otherwise... even though these golems are comparatively weak to a lot of things in Rifts, an army of them could be built up given enough time, which makes people from Psyscape especially scary in terms of defending their realm (which is in the astral plane) or potentially invading the rest of Earth (if the golems could exist without disappating outside the Astral Plane)

Posted: **Fri Nov 09, 2012 6:15 pm**

Greetings and Salutations. Well, it doesn't say, but I think I can put some pieces of the puzzle together (this is just educated guess work though). The power isn't in RUE, but it's in RGMG (though I think it's the same wording, because I looked at Psycape first and I'm not noticing any differences). Anyways, a few things to consider ...

This is an unusual psychic ability [snip] possible only in the Astral Plane.

Note: It doesn't say "creation" is only possible in the Astral Plane, but the psychic ability as a whole is only possible there. Controlling/animating the Astral Golem is part of the ability.

Through concentration, the psychic acan animate it like a giant puppet. It is not actually alive and cannot see, hear, [snip] nor think or act independent of the psychic.

Attacks per Melee: [snip] In combat, every action by the Astral Golem counts as one of the psychic's. The Astral Golem must remain in sight of the psychic ...

So, in theory, you could create 20 Astral Golems if you have the I.S.P., but it wouldn't do you much good. You could still only move one at a time (you only get one action at a time). At best, the others could be a back-up. "Hey, Golem A just got destroyed. Time to animate Golem B to carry on the fight." Though since Psionics can be activated in a single action, probably best to just create one at a time as needed.

Now that wasn't the first part of the question, but it felt the easier part of the post to answer. As for the "Duration" matter, I think I have a theory on that one too. There are a few things to note here: 1) It requires concentration. 2) It must stay in line of sight. 3) It can only exist in the Astral Plane.

As a result, I'd say it's "Special" duration is that it exists for as long as you can concentrate, keep it in line of sight, and remain in the Astral Plane. I might let the concentration part slide, but if you lose sight of the Astral Golem? It's gone. If you leave the Astral Plane? The Astral Golem is gone. So I'd say that it can probably last indefinitely, but it's almost impossible to keep going for very long.

That's at least what I can gather from it. I hope that helps. Thank you for your time and patience, please have a nice day. Farewell and safe journeys for now.

Posted: **Tue Nov 13, 2012 11:52 pm**

Doesn't listing 'line of sight' under attacks per melee only imply that the golem can make attacks while in line of sight?

Interpreting it that the golem would just fade away if you looked over your shoulder at a friend seems a bit too big of a leap. Something major like that I think would have warranted emphasis. Like perhaps 'a blinding flash or a darkness spell would destroy the golem'.

The benefit to being able to create multiple golems, even if you can only use 1 at a time, is basically the ability to store/invest ISP. A psychic with 120 could only replace his golem once after getting destroyed, then he'd be out of ISP and have nothing to spend on his other psychic abilities.

Psychics who were to create dozens (hundreds?) of golems in advance, on the other hand, wouldn't have to worry about running out of replacements so badly like that.

One questions why, if not distinct processes, creation cost in ISP and activation cost are separate. The only purpose there is possibly that if someone only had enough ISP to create, but not enough to immediately animate it, that they might meditate, restore some ISP, and THEN be able to activate the golem.

People usually do stuff like close their eyes when they meditate, so having a golem vanish if you don't focus on it or look at it doesn't seem right.

What I do like though, is the idea perhaps that if you lose sight/focus on the golem, your 'connection' with it is broken and you must spend the 10 ISP again to re-establish the connection.

One could also rule that one can only 'connect' with one golem at a time, so that one would have to spend the connection ISP cost to connect to other golems stored up.

This way, psychics could still build up a golem army, but if they ran through them too quickly, they still could plausibly run out of ISP.

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Astral Golem duration

Astral Golem duration

Re: Astral Golem duration

Re: Astral Golem duration