Psionic (Long War)

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Psi powers have been significantly overhauled in Long War. Psi talent is now trained, not discovered, so with enough time and attempts, every soldier can be a psionic (barring some exceptions). There are many more powers distributed among more levels.

• Class icons
• 
  Assault + Infantry
• 
  Rocketeer + Gunner
• 
  Sniper + Scout
• 
  Medic + Engineer

Psi-abilities

Rank	Psionic Ability
Awakened	Mindfray Mindfray Causes the target to lose grip on reality, causing -25 aim/stack, -25 will/stack, a reduced area-of-effect attack range, reduced mobility, and doing one base damage. Robotic units are immune. Lasts 3 turns. 2 turn cooldown. Imposes +24 hours fatigue after missions.	Neural Feedback Neural Feedback Causes damage to psi attackers and puts all of their psi attacks on cooldown. Does not reduce the attacks' chance of success. Applies to attacks on the psion, as well as nearby allies if the psion passes a will check. Imposes +24 hours fatigue after missions.	Psi Inspiration Psi Inspiration Removes Mindfray and panic from all allies within 3 tiles, and strengthen their Will by +30 for 3 turns, 4 turn cooldown. Imposes +6 hours fatigue after missions.
Sensitive	Mind Merge Mind Merge Merge minds with the target, granting the target +25% critical chance, bonus will, and temporary health (for aliens) or damage reduction (for humans: DR=caster_will/60). Imposes +6 hours postmission fatigue for psi soldiers.		Psi Panic Psi Panic Cause target to panic on its following turn, if the target's Will is overcome. The duration is (caster Will / 50) turns; fractional results have a chance to be rounded up, the chance is proportional to the distance to the next integer. Robotic enemies are immune, 2 turn cooldown. Imposes +6 hours fatigue after missions.
Talent	Regen Biofield Regen Biofield Nearby allies are healed for 1 health each turn and acid effects on them are removed. This does not restore the HP provided by body armor or other hp-granting items. Imposes +24 hours postmission fatigue for psi soldiers. (Passive ability)		Distortion Field Distortion Field Nearby allies in cover receive +10 Defense. Imposes +6 hours postmission fatigue for psi soldiers. (Passive ability)
Adept	Concealment Concealment When the soldier moves to high cover, enemies without special capabilities will not target the soldier (but CAN sense him/her). Does not work if any enemies have line of sight to the soldier's starting position. Leaving cover, being flanked, firing, hacking arrays, and capturing meld will break this concealment. Low Profile units will not gain this bonus by occupying low cover. Firing from concealment grants +30% crit.	Psychokinetic Strike Psychokinetic Strike Project a bolt of pure psi force that destroys cover but does not harm units. 4 turn cooldown. Imposes 12 hours additional post-mission fatigue.	Telekinetic Field Telekinetic Field Create an immobile telekinetic field that lasts through the enemy turn. The field distorts and deflects incoming attacks, granting +40 Defense to allies within the field, 4 turn cooldown. Imposes +12 hours fatigue after missions.
Psion		Mind Control Mind Control Difficult psi technique that, if successful, grants control of the target for 3 turns. Does not work on robotic enemies. 5 turn cooldown. Imposes +12 hours fatigue after missions.
Master		Rift Rift Devastate an area with a storm of psi energy. The rift does more damage against targets with low Will, and reduced damage against targets with high Will. 4 turn cooldown. Requires special armor designed for psionic beings. Imposes +12 hours fatigue after missions.

Training

Limitations

MEC Troopers, Officers and soldiers with the Neural Damping gene mod are incompatible with Psi powers. They cannot undergo Psi training, and Psi-trained soldiers cannot become them.

Unlocking Psi powers

By default, only Psi Inspiration is available. Unlocking further powers is accomplished by performing autopsies and interrogations. One exception is Rift, which requires an in-battle accomplishment.

Psi-powers are now more effective based on the will score of the caster. For instance, Mind merge will add (will/60) damage reduction.

Psi XP

After Xenopsionics is researched, soldiers will begin accruing Psi XP by going on missions. Reaching a threshold of Psi XP is required to undergo additional Psi Training ('extra' Psi XP will not roll over for the next level, and will cap at the next requirement. Every round of training takes approximately 7-10 days, and its success is affected by the tester's will score. After they reach the cap, putting them back in the Psi Lab for another round of training is required. You can see the current Psi XP level and cap in their Barracks profile.

Psi Ranks and XP gain

In Long War Psi XP is rewarded for the most time passively and only after a successful mission. It can also be gained by resisting Psi attacks. Thus, the more missions a soldiers completes, the faster s/he will unveil the mystery behind his/hers psionic powers. Each level provides the same reward for all abilities for that level and passive gain from all abilities is cumulative. As you can notice in the table bellow, XP rewards are balanced in such a way as to allow a soldier to level more or less every 5 missions. Thus, to achieve the final rank of Psi Master you should require at most 35 missions per soldier.

There is also an Exalt HQ loot item that provides +20% Psi XP gain thus saving you a couple of missions.

Psi ranks and Psi XP gain
Name	to level	per ability	Type of gain	Total passive gain per mission
Resist Psi Attack	N/A	10 Psi XP per application	Active	-
Basic Exposure	N/A	20 Psi XP per mission	Passive	20
Awakened	100	10 Psi XP per mission	Passive	30
Sensitive	250	20 Psi XP per mission	Passive	50
Talent	500	20 Psi XP per mission	Passive	70
Adept	800	30 Psi XP per mission	Passive	100
Psion	1250	30 Psi XP per mission	Passive	130
Master*	2000	None	Passive	130

• Mind Control an Ethereal (each soldier must individually do this to achieve the rank of Psi Master) in addition to the XP requirement

Success rate

The success rate of the training depends on the soldier's Will and the level. If the target Will for the level is equal to the soldier's Will, the chance is 50% (25% if More Than Human is active). It increases asymptotically to 100% at infinite Will and drops to 0% at 0 Will.

The target Will values are:

• Level 1: 60
• Level 2: 70
• Level 3: 80
• Level 4: 90
• Level 5: 100
• Level 6: 120

Effects on fatigue

A psi-trained soldier takes longer to recover from post-battle fatigue. The increase is dependent upon powers learned, with some powers incurring a greater level of fatigue than others - even those in the same tier.

In-game application of powers

• Only one power from Psi rank can be chosen. Note that some powers cannot be cast on the same target (i.e.: an Inspired soldier cannot be Merged with). Be mindful that several powers are passive abilities.
• In order to unlock most powers, it is necessary to complete some research or achieve some feats in-game.

Psionic Ability	Prerequisite	Description
Psi Inspiration	None	Psi Inspiration removes all harmful mental effects (panic, hallucination, fallen comrades penalty) from everyone inside the AOE as well as grants +30 Will for the next 4 turns. Unlike in vanilla, Psi Inspiration is not centered around the user but can instead can be targeted much like a rocket. Psi Inspiration is the only power available without conducting autopsies or interrogations.
Neural Feedback	Floater Interrogation	Causes damage to the psi attacker (much less than in vanilla) and puts all their psi attacks on cool down. Is always on and also provides protection to nearby allies. Damage scales with will difference between psi attacker and psi defender.
Mind Fray	Sectoid Interrogation	If successful, deals 1 damage to the target and applies a 'Hallucinations' status effect that reduces the victim's will, aim, and mobility. Because of the greatly reduced damage (thankfully, since Sectoids now use it from day one) this is more of a debuff than a damage ability.
Mind merge	Sectoid Commander Autopsy	Merge minds with the target, granting the target temporarily increased health for aliens and damage reduction for XCOM operatives based on user's Will. It also grants increased critical hit chance and a will bonus, which also scales with minmerge caster's will. Mind merge can't be applied to psionically active targets such as soldiers with Psi Inspiration buff or those who are already mind merged. Especially effective in combination with Pulse Laser weapons and SCOPEs, which can both provide critical hit chance boosts as well.
Psi Panic	Berserker Interrogation	Cause target to panic, if the target's Will check is failed. Robotic enemies are immune with exception of Mechtoids. 2 turn cooldown. Note that panic has been changed a little in Long War so units will either hunker down or run, and never go berserk and take a shot. This makes Psi Panic considerably better than vanilla since it's now a reliable two turn disable.
Regen Biofield	Thin Man Interrogation	Like the Elite EXALT Medic's ability, provides +1 health regeneration to all ally units within 3 tiles of the Psionic Trooper. It triggers only if an ally is wounded beyond bonus Armor HP.
Distortion Field	Muton Interrogation	Works the same as the vanilla MEC ability, that is, provides +10 defense to all units within 4 tiles of the Psionic Trooper. Is always on. However, watch out for grenade-bait formations.
Psi Shadow	Sectoid Commander Interrogation	Similar to Mimetic Skin, save for that if the enemy gets around the full cover, it is immediately dropped. Also, Low Profile will allow you to move undetected to half-cover, but it will also be immediately dropped on arrival.
Psychokinetic Strike	Heavy Floater Interrogation	A cover-destroying, free-aimed psionic attack. AoE trigger field about the size of a grenade's blast, any destructible item that is at least partially in the field is entirely destroyed (ie; getting a part of a log destroys the entire log, barely clipping a wall will destroy as much as if directly hit with a rocket). Does not cause HP damage.
Telekinetic Field	Ethereal Autopsy	Same as vanilla: +40 defense in a wide radius, centered on the caster. As with Distortion Field, beware of grenades and other area attacks.
Mind Control	Ethereal Interrogation	Same a vanilla--- granted, more difficult due to lack of Iron Will in the OTS. Also: alien weapons are no longer dropped intact if killed while under Mind Control.
Rift	Ethereal Mind Control	A highly damaging area effect attack. The secret to creating Rifts can only be found by Mind Controlling an Ethereal in battle; this must be done for every soldier that you wish to learn Rift.

Tactical Advice

• Neural Feedback vs Psi Inspiration vs Mind Fray

The one you choose of these three will be the main PXP-gathering method for that soldier, so keep in mind what opportunities they will have. For example, Snipers played in vanilla's Squadsight/Archangel style won't have the regular opportunity to Mindfray, but can take, say, the Double Tap cooldown turn to Merge with a mid-range soldier, boosting their chance for Mindfray or rolling a crit when firing.

• Psi Panic vs Mind Merge

Psi Panic is an excellent way to disable key aliens when (read: not "if") you get overwhelmed, while Mind Merge can both protect the soldier from harm and improve his chances to both resist and deploy psionic powers.

• Distortion Field vs Regen Biofield

Both passive abilities, it's a bit of a tossup between a nudge to maybe avoid a hit, or recover a smidgeon after being hit.

• Telekinetic Field vs Psychokinetic Strike vs Psi Shadow

Three very good abilities, soldier class will be the primary decider, followed by playstyle. TK Field lasts one round and needs to be used, but is vastly more powerful than Distortion field; good for mid-range soldiers. PK Strike might be good for Rocketeers (or for any soldier you use in replacement of one) for when you want to take out cover, but don't want to spend a rocket or grenade (or the target is out of range for explosives). And invisibility is still a Sniper or Scout's best friend.

See also

Long War: Soldiers
Soldiers	Soldiers Assault Infantry Rocketeer Gunner Sniper Scout Medic Engineer
MEC	MEC Troopers Marauder Valkyrie Archer Goliath Jaeger Pathfinder Guardian Shogun
Sub-classes and abilities	Officers Psionics Gene Mods S.H.I.V.s