The Psychic Watchman is an adaptation of the Sighted Seeker prestige class.
Organizatonal Requirement: Any Lawful alignment, membership in the Mindwatch for at least one month, successful completion of at least two Mindwatch missions with flying colors, one of which must be the (nonlethal) capture of a criminal (as defined by the Mindwatch; non-watchmen aren’t empowered to judge others as criminals).
Code of Conduct: A psychic watchman places the safety of others before her own well-being. She does not knowingly commit crimes (both as defined by the Mindwatch and any local authority) without an express pardon in advance from a legitimate authority, unless that crime is the only viable way to apprehend a suspect. She does not use unnecessary violence in the apprehension of suspects, and, whenever possible, brings suspects to justice without killing them. She values proof over suspicion, and only invokes her authority as a watchman if she has unimpeachable evidence or a confession of involvement. Supernatural evidence is not as ‘solid’ as tangible evidence to the watchman; psychic powers aren’t enough to convict someone, but they can guide the watchman to the right spot for her to legally capture him.
The psychic watchman is the Mindwatch's loyal guardsman and police officer. While similar to other sighted seekers, she tends to take a more active role in the hunting of criminals — taking them down on her own, red-handed and unable to escape. Since this involves homing in on a crime before it takes place, she focuses less on following leads and more on actively rooting out criminals beforehand. In exchange for stronger martial abilities, all psychic watchmen are subject to intense psychic conditioning. They know if any potential course of action will be in violation of their oaths to the Mindwatch, and will not willingly proceed with such actions (GM note: similar to a phylactery of faithfulness, you must inform a watchman if her planned course of action will violate her code). This conditioning is not infallible — it is possible for a psychic watchman to break the oath, although she will not do so lightly (it may require compulsion effects).
All psychic watchmen begin their careers as normal sighted seekers, and thus have similar backgrounds to the seekers, mostly being rangers or seers. More than a few have the spark of paladinhood in their souls, although most who become watchmen prefer more subtle methods in hunting down lawbreakers and those who persecute others. To take a level of psychic watchman, you must be a sighted seeker about to take your 2nd, 5th, 7th, or 9th level in that class, and meet the organizational requirement above. Psychic watchmen are under no onus to take every one of these alternative levels — in fact, most are encouraged to develop their own style by combining the elements they feel are useful from seeker training with watchman training.
Warrant Officer: Selecting any one of the psychic watchman specialty levels grants a candidate access to special training at any Mindwatch safehouse. Upon successful completion of this training (which takes 1d4+3 days), the watchman is granted special authority in the field. She may issue Mindwatch warrants for wanted criminals (including those she herself locates), provided such warrants do not conflict with her code of conduct. She may contact Mindwatch safehouses to garner the aid of junior members if necessary, although her superiors still need to approve the mission. Organizations that respect Mindwatch authority (or those that the Mindwatch manipulates behind-the-scenes) may honor these warrants as well, and will cooperate with watchmen in hunting down and capturing wanted criminals. To organizations that are unaware of the Mindwatch or those who do not respect its authority, a warrant is little more than a scrap of paper with fancy words on it.
Additionally, a watchman with warrant officer training does not take the standard -4 attack penalty when attempting to deal nonlethal damage.
Ever Vigilant (Su): A psychic watchman may choose not to gain the passive seeking ability of a standard sighted seeker at 2nd level, instead gaining this ability. While she is psionically focused, she is treated as if under the effects of detect hostile intent, with a manifester level equal to twice her class level. Every two levels beyond 2nd, the range and radius of this ability increase by 20 ft. (40 ft. at 4th level, 60 ft. at 6th, and so on). She may make Sense Motive checks as a free action against anyone within range of this ability, instead of within 30 ft.
Watch from the Shadows (Ex): Instead of gaining Seeker’s Analysis at 5th level, a psychic watchman may instead gain the Inquisitor, Mental Dampening, and Mentally Inconspicuous feats, even if she doesn’t meet the prerequisites. Unlike the normal use of Inquisitor, she may choose to benefit from a +5 bonus on Sense Motive checks to oppose Bluff checks while she is psionically focused (she may still expend her psionic focus to gain the feat’s normal benefit). Leaving the investigation of past crimes to the seekers, a watchman instead blends into the background and observes potential criminals until she can catch them red-handed. For less physical crimes, a bit of interrogation gets the job done just as accurately.
Psychic Inquisitor (Su): If a psychic watchman selected the Watch from the Shadows ability at 5th level, she may choose to either gain the Seeker’s Analysis ability (as a 5th level sighted seeker) or this ability at 7th level. Those who selected Seeker’s Analysis at 5th level may not gain this ability, and instead gain Sighted Analysis. A watchman with Psychic Inquisitor may choose to expend 1 power point instead of her psionic focus when using her Inquisitor feat. If she instead expends 3 power points while she is psionically focused, her Inquisitor feat supercharges: for the duration of her conversation, while she remains psionically focused, she automatically knows when an intelligent, living being intentionally lies to her. She may detect a maximum number of lies per conversation equal to her Wisdom modifier. Psychic watchmen would be wise to refrain from supercharging Inquisitor frivolously — once a conversation with an individual ends, the watchman must wait 8 hours before being able to use this ability again on the same individual. She decides when, or if, to supercharge her Inquisitor feat during conversation as an immediate action.
As her skills at interrogation improve, so too do her infiltration techniques; an experienced watchman gains the ability to blend into the foreground and strike without warning. If she spends 3 power points while she is psionically focused, she gains the benefit of the Out of Mind, Out of Sight feat for three minutes. If she loses her psionic focus while this ability is active, she loses the benefit of that feat until she refocuses.
Like Sighted Analysis, Psychic Inquisitor can be augmented. When supercharging Inquisitor, every additional power point spent adds one to the maximum number of lies per conversation a watchman can detect, and cuts the recharge time in half (4 power points for 4 hours, 5 power points for 2 hours, and so on). When blending into the foreground, every additional power point spent adds one minute to the duration of the effect, and grants the watchman a +2 bonus on Hide and Move Silently checks during this duration. As with Sighted Analysis, a psychic watchman cannot spend more power points on a single use of Psychic Inquisitor than her class level.
The Shadow (Su): A master watchman can choose to master the powers of stealth over the powers of perception, gaining this ability at 9th level instead of The Sight. A psychic watchman with the Shadow adds mass cloud mind to her list of powers known as a 4th level power. Furthermore, she may augment that power:
- For every 2 additional power points she spends, the save DC increases by 1, or by 2 against a mark.
A psychic watchman with the Shadow may still learn remote viewing normally, but does not gain any of the Sight’s special functions related to it.
Ex-Watchmen: All the special powers described above require special components of the psychic watchman’s conditioning to function. If this conditioning is violated (such as by breaking the code of conduct), the benefits of these levels is lost. An atonement spell or similar effect (available at any Mindwatch outpost) can reverse this, although such reversals are not given out lightly. In fact, they go on the permanent record of the watchman — and after three infractions, they are cast out of the ranks of the Watchmen, never again able to regain their watchman powers (further atonements instead grant watchmen the replaced abilities of the sighted seeker). Such fallen watchmen are free to remain less formal members of the Mindwatch, although they often strike out independently as free agents instead.
