Is being too psychic early on dangerous?

[An Ridire Fheórag]

So I'm finally getting used to the game, after being murdered quite unceremoniously a handful of times from anything from snapjaws to stone throwing baboons.

I've found that being a psychic really helps, especially the light manipulation and force wall trick, but as I level up off of snapjaws and slimes, I got a message about some wierdo's watching me.

Now every couple of zones in the overworld, I get one purple robed psychic that sprouts murder plants on me and she ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ wrecks me if my light manipulation laser's don't kill her in the first couple of rounds.

Now I'm not sure if this is because I'm too pyschic or if this is just a weird enemy I'm just going to have to deal with, but eventually they killed me. I just want to know if this is part and parcel of being an espher and I should stick to the caves or they're just a normal enemy that I've got to learn to avoid?

[DEADHEAD]

As your mental mutations level up you start to attract those enemies from another dimensions that wants to kill you and yummy yummu your brain. They can be dangerous but you will have to deal with them if you want to be a esper god. There is a meter, i think its right below your mutations list on the character screen but i forgot the name.

[Cascomp2]

Psychic Glimmer is the name of the statistic. The higher it gets, the more dangerous the enemy that will show up. First it's servants of Ptoh, then extra-dimensional hunters show up.

On the plus side if you defeat them there's a chance you can eat their minds and gain a point of Ego.

[EternalEllipsis]

A Willpower based build can avoid it fairly well.

Start with 18 toughness, 24 willpower, 18 ego, Pyrokinesis, Cyrokinesis, Clairvoyance, a defensive mutation of your choice, and pick either Greybeard or Pilgrim.

Put all extra stat points you gain from leveling into willpower up to 32 for an 80% cooldown reduction, use your mutation points to power up your core mutations rather than buying new ones.

You will eventually start encountering psychic assassins but much later and by that point you'll be out scaling them in power.

[An Ridire Fheórag]

Originally posted by EternalEllipsis:

A Willpower based build can avoid it fairly well.

Start with 18 toughness, 24 willpower, 18 ego, Pyrokinesis, Cyrokinesis, Clairvoyance, a defensive mutation of your choice, and pick either Greybeard or Pilgrim.

Put all extra stat points you gain from leveling into willpower up to 32 for an 80% cooldown reduction, use your mutation points to power up your core mutations rather than buying new ones.

You will eventually start encountering psychic assassins but much later and by that point you'll be out scaling them in power.

Oh wow, I put very little into Willpower so that's news to me. Thanks for the advice!

[Shadowdweller]

Willpower has the further benefit of increasing your MA (mental armor?) which increases your resistance to psychic effects and reduces the damage from abilities such as Sunder Mind.

[RedPine]

The EGO of psychic assassins scales with YOUR ego, but their willpower does not. As long as your willpower is higher than your ego, the nastier psychic abilities like Sunder Mind will never be a threat.

Ironically, esper builds prefer keeping ego as low as possible at chargen. It's easy enough to boost ego later with two faced knollworm helmets and the dismembered faces of your foes.

Originally posted by EternalEllipsis:

Start with 18 toughness, 24 willpower, 18 ego, Pyrokinesis, Cyrokinesis, Clairvoyance, a defensive mutation of your choice, and pick either Greybeard or Pilgrim.

Put all extra stat points you gain from leveling into willpower up to 32 for an 80% cooldown reduction, use your mutation points to power up your core mutations rather than buying new ones.

Sounds fun, I'll try it sometime. That said, I think physical mutation Electrical Generation or Freezing Hands is way stronger than Pyro/Cryo, especially when you throw RA's into the mix. You ALWAYS want at least one physical mutation at chargen just for the RA's.

Right now my favorite ego abilities are the good old Precognition and Clairvoyance. There are lots of ways to get high damage - skills, stats, weapons, guns, tinkering, grenades - but there is only one way for mutants to safely drink Neutron Flux, and only one way for mutants to detect enemies that can inflict instant kills before it's too late.

Apostle, 18 in all stats 14 in ego, optionally dump ego all the way to 10 to bump wisdom, toughness, or intelligence higher. Precog, Clairvoyances, Regeneration, Unstable Genome x2. The first three abilities are completely vital in the late game, unstable genome keeps the build from getting boring.

I get to level 21 or so the hard way, then I give in to the Proselytize+merchant cheese. I figure if I can get to midgame without cheese, I don't have to feel guilty about rewarding myself with free stuff. By midgame earning money is mostly a formality, anyway.