Every fallout game that I'm aware of has hinted at or more blatantly shown various kinds of powers, such as psychics. Part of me has always wished to be able to play as something "more than human." Someday we'll be able to play as a ghoul I suppose, but honestly it's not quite what I mean. Admittedly, the courier being able to wade through armies and effortlessly collapse them single-handed, really ought to count as a super-power... but it doesn't, somehow.
But then I think about the million ways that Bethesda would do this wrong. So I'm torn.

It could work. Even in the original Fallout games there was already stuff like psychic powers like the one the Master had.

I feel that this part of the game could have great potential if done correctly but should only be available on certain NPCs.

No. Supernatural stuff ruins my immersion.

It's been a consistent part of the fallout universe from the beginning, so its existence doesn't bother me personally. The master was certainly a supernatural being no matter the pseudo science explanations for his existence and powers; and he had a prison/stable of powered mutants as well if I recall, although they'd gone insane.
It would be very difficult to let the player access anything "more than human" without ruining things, however. Maybe if it were something very subtle, a story thing rather than a easily-used skryim-ish flame-hands ability.

This is a post-apocalyptic world where people drink radioactive material as an energy drink, ghouls can happen and super mutants and deathclaws are things that exist. I think we're allowed to suspend our disbelief somewhat. The very fact that people survived the nuclear war and subsequent fallout is pseudo-science in itself.

As people have pointed out, the Master was a psyker, as were some of his experiments. A Super Mutant in the Mariposa Military Base in Fallout 2 was a psyker as well, plus the Forecaster and some Nightkin in Fallout: New Vegas. I like stuff like that. It's kinda like the psychics in Starship Troopers. Implies some kind of radioactively-engendered evolution.

Then there's the ghost and the Stargate in Fallout 2, and the Cabbot House in Fallout 4, and aliens throughout the series. I think as long as these things are all just easter eggs and don't actually impact the story it's fine, though if ghosts or whatever started becoming part of the main quest it kinda detracts from the original spirit of the series. Then again I do like ghosts so.......

I'd be down for a Ghost Hunters-style quest where some guy is trying to use some Fallout-y tech to pick up Electronic Voice Phenomenons in an old, destroyed house. That would stay true to the sceptical spirit of Fallout, where your player character could be like, "ah this is so bullshit but you're paying me so whatever" and maybe you find something that's actually genuine, or maybe you discover that it was a radscorpion locked in the attic the whole time. Stuff like that'd be fun, especially if someone called in a Hubologist exorcist or something. There's potential here.

I don't think it was DIRECTLY ever implied to be psychic in any of the games. Things like the master could very easily be written off as either a.) the character being distressed/broken down (who wouldn't be in that situation,) or b.) A newly developed trait caused by the FEV. There's lots of animals that can communicate and affect others in more ways than just physical ones, and so the idea of the master getting something similar wouldn't be too far pressed. When you're using a plot device that has the ability to basically, in meta terms, create anything by just throwing things in it, then it isn't that unbelievable. The rest of the games can probably also be written off as the characters being crazy, as is the case with the kid in New Vegas, and almost definitely Murphy in 4 (her prediction wasn't even near right; she just threw the name of the biggest city at you, and even that wasn't where your son was. Literally anybody would've recommended to start there, tbh.) Being really vague and throwing big names around doesn't show any psychic ability, and, in my opinion, actually shows the opposite. Now, if one of them were to somehow perfectly predict the exact upcoming plot of a questline, then I would probably think differently. I don't remember any psychics in 2, so I can't really properly make a counter argument for that. With that said, 99% of the "whacky" stuff in Fallout 2 is non-canon due to the developers simply wanting to go nuts with the references and stuff, and so I'd doubt anything that wasn't part of a main town. Technically, Fallout has a time travel narrative due to 2, but nobody gives that any merit as it was obviously just intended as an easter egg/throwaway gag.

In the fallout universe, I think subtle is good when it comes to things like psykers. Many instances are still something that a strong skeptic could question, but might certainly still tempt one to believe. Melchior could summon deathclaws out of thin air though, so that's kind of hard to ignore. Fallout has never been a serious attempt to portray a completely realistic post-apocalyptic world, for better or worse.
If you occasionally could read random thoughts of people, but not choose when and where it hapepned, it might be hard to know whether or not you'd picked up a real thought or were just losing it.

Not sure about Melchior (pretty sure the dude was just throwing rats at the pools of FEV in his room and those rats were just mutating really fast) but the Master has the ability to cause hallucinations.

If you go to the hallway that leads to the Master's room without a psychic nullifier, you would hallucinate and take damage. There is also a conversation about this when you talk to Gideon.

Honestly,the supernatural stuff has always been hit or miss to me. The Lovecraftian stuff has always fascinated me,to the point that I actually started reading some of H.P. Lovecraft's works after encountering things like the Dunwich building in FO3. Even characters like the Master intrigue me even though I haven't played the older Fallout games. On the flip side,there are things like Mama Murphy. Her "powers" to me just felt like some really convenient and lazy plot device. So,I would say that it can be done,but it can't be half-assed and tacked on. Also,they shouldn't be the driving force of the main story. They should contained in their own seperate side story. That's just my two cents on the topic.

I mean when you think about it, if evolution has allowed regular animals to turn into stronger, deadlier, and sneakier than they were before the bombs, I don't see why there can't be a hint of 'magic' added to the evolving humans (except for the Sole Survivor, who would be untouched by the radiation of the scorched wastes) and when you think about it, if massive amounts of radiation have forced evolution to move way quicker, than it's not impossible to think it would start to affect humans in a way that would spawn new survival traits (such as telekinesis or other psychic powers.) plus you have Lorenzo Cabot in the mix now.

I'm not a physicist or a doctor or whatever, but I strongly suspect that it's effectively magic for complex life forms to be completely and totally immune to any and all levels of radiation. It's just somehow easier for many of us to accept than psychic powers.
But anyway, the back and forth on this thread has sort of almost confirmed what I thought: some of us are pretty sure that there were confirmed psykers in the fallout universe, while others of us are still skeptics and see other alternative explanations to their powers.
And that's what I refer to when and if a fallout PC is ever given "powers." Leave room for the skeptics, while adding something we haven't seen before.

ahyuser001 wrote:

Not sure about Melchior (pretty sure the dude was just throwing rats at the pools of FEV in his room and those rats were just mutating really fast) but the Master has the ability to cause hallucinations.

If you go to the hallway that leads to the Master's room without a psychic nullifier, you would hallucinate and take damage. There is also a conversation about this when you talk to Gideon.

I'm just playing devil's advocate here, but the psychic nullifier could very easily be written off as placebo towards the mental strain that the character expects when going into the hallway. That, and the fact that the hallway leading up to him was literally composed of the master. It may not have been psychic, it could very well just be the master damaging you as you step over and around his extremely mutated body. Specifically, some dialogue describes pieces of bones jumping at the player, and teeth gnawing at their knees; one could very easily write this off as literal in regards to the master's predicament, and not simply psychic messages.

Yeah it could be interpreted either way,which is a good thing for the kind of "powers" that I'm talking about. Where you really able to become resistant to psychic powers or was the master never really psychic?