Psychic (Fallout)



A psyker is a person who possesses a certain paranormal power either from FEV like the Master's experiments and Melchior, Radiation like the Beastlords, natural selection like Hakunin, ancient artifacts like Lorenzo Cabot, or 200 years of seclusion in a glass jar like Professor Calvert.

Fallout
After being dipped in FEV vats, absorbing some other people and being connected to the LA Vault computer, the Master gained some psychic powers the extent of which is unknown. He was able to attack humans mentally, although his attacks could be repelled with proper training. The Master was able to somehow bring forth psychic abilities in certain humans after they were injected with FEV (usually the pineal gland, but also the Amygdalae or Medulla), but most of the experiments were failures (resulting in insanity) or used to line the Corridor of Revulsion. There were four psykers in the Master's lair:
 * Wiggum was electrokinetic-dominant
 * Lucy was telekinetic-dominant and a minor photokinetic
 * Moore was pyrokinetic-dominant
 * Gideon was a receiving-telepathic-dominant (without the ability to control his telepathy, requiring the psychic nullifier to block incoming thoughts) with minor photokinetic abilities.

All four of them died when the Cathedral was vaporized in nuclear fire.

Additionally, Chuck in Adytum appears to have some psychic powers.

Player abilities
The ability to resist the Master's psychic attacks is represented in the SPECIAL system by the Mental Block perk.

Fallout 2

 * Hakunin, the Arroyo shaman, apparently also possessed some telepathic abilities, as he was able to speak to the Chosen One in his dreams (the Chosen One was able to receive it and record it to his PIP-Boy).
 * Melchior, miner from Redding, was able to summon dangerous animals (deathclaws, fire geckos, mole rats), when he became mutated by FEV in Mariposa Military Base.
 * Keeng Ra'at, a big, red-eyed albino mole rat, seems to be able to control an army of smaller mutant rodents.

Fallout 3

 * Professor Calvert, one of the residents of Point Lookout, achieved psionic powers after an experimental procedure. When his brain was extracted from his body (in the same fashion as for robobrain models) and put into a jar, he gained an ability to communicate with people all around the region by entering their minds. To a person, it appeared like a mysterious voice in their head.
 * Bloomseer Poplar is one of the members of the Treeminders and can predict one's future. She describes the settings of some of the major quests that can be done like The Superhuman Gambit; "I see a battle between insects and industry, and the men who control them..."
 * The AntAgonizer appears to have some sort of psychic control over giant ants. It started when she was a child and her parents were killed by ants but she was spared. Later she gained control over them and used them to harass the townspeople.
 * Harold is an FEV mutant with a strange connection to Bob, the tree growing from his head.

Fallout: New Vegas

 * The Forecaster is a child who can see into the future, but can't control his powers. He needs his "medicine" to keep him from over-thinking, thus helping control his headaches. For 100 caps, though, he will forgo his medication and look into the future for the Courier.
 * Nightkin inside Black Rock cave seem to have some paranormal knowledge of events and characters, if having completed the quest Crazy, Crazy, Crazy by repairing Rhonda they will tell the "voices" said things that will happen in the main storyline, as well as special comments about the companions, e.g. upon bringing Craig Boone as a companion, they will comment "silent man knows more about the spiked crowns than what he says" referring that Boone knows more about the Great Khans than what he says (the Bitter Springs Incident).

Fallout 4

 * Mama Murphy in the Museum of Freedom in Concord forsees the Sole Survivor being attacked by a deathclaw outside the building during When Freedom Calls. It ends up coming true soon after. She was also the one who told Preston Garvey and the settlers to go to Sanctuary. She later reveals she saw the Sole Survivor exit cryo sleep "clear as day" and will be able to offer more and more true but vague visions as the player supplies her with chems. It seems taking chems is the trigger for her powers, they are used to expand her awareness. She calls this special ability "the sight" and does not know the reason behind it or when it has begun.
 * Lorenzo Cabot in the The Secret of Cabot House was granted enhanced strength, immortality and telekinetic powers due to the artifact Lorenzo's Crown that he discovered during an archaeological dig in the Empty Quarter of Arabia in 1894.

Fallout Tactics
A group of tribals known as the Beastlords had a kind of psychic control over animals. This power was caused by decades of exposure to an unknown special form of radiation present within Mardin's underground caves.

Fallout Online
"Sykers" were confirmed within the Bethesda Softworks LLC v. Interplay Entertainment Corporation court case to be present within the design wiki for Fallout Online. It is not known if the difference in spelling is attributable to a stenographer's error.

Appearances
Some kind of psychic powers appears in every Fallout game, although Chris Avellone believes it creates narrative difficulties for the Fallout writers, as stated in Fallout Bible 3. Avellone says:
 * For Fallout fan-fiction purposes, you are welcome to make use of the psykers and their potential from Fallout, but I'd be careful - the psykers in Fallout show some pretty over-the-top mutations that could take the world to Childhood's End faster than you can say "uh, his eyes are glowing?"

Behind the scenes
The term "psyker" is often attributed to the Warhammer 40,000 tabletop games that likely coined it; differing in Warhammer 40k is that Psykers don't have psychic powers as such, but rather a connection to the raw potential that makes up an alternative dimension, called the Warp, which they can manipulate through spells and mental commands.