Clairvoyance: The Power of Seeing Beyond

Clairvoyance Video Demo 🎬

Clairvoyance is a classic psychic superpower that lets a user perceive people, places, and events beyond normal sight. Often called second sight, it falls under extrasensory perception and can include remote viewing of distant locations, glimpses of the present from afar, and even precognition or retrocognition—seeing slivers of the future or the past. In fiction and tabletop campaigns alike, clairvoyant heroes and villains turn hidden knowledge into tactical advantage, reading the battlefield before a single punch is thrown. For more abilities like this, explore the full list on the superpower wiki or roll for a new ability with the random superpower generator.

What Is Clairvoyance

Clairvoyance is the ability to gather visual (and sometimes symbolic) information without using ordinary senses. Instead of relying on eyes, ears, or physical proximity, a clairvoyant taps into a psychic channel to observe targets across distance or time. Unlike mind reading, which focuses on thoughts, or telepathy, which links minds directly, clairvoyance produces images, scenes, and impressions—like watching a live feed, skimming a hidden camera, or viewing a prophetic montage.

Common forms include:

• Remote viewing: perceiving a distant location in real time.

• Scrying: using a focus object—mirror, crystal, pool—to amplify the vision.

• Precognition: brief views of possible futures.

• Retrocognition: insights into past events.

• Psychometry (related): touching an item to see flashes tied to its history.

Because clairvoyance deals with perception rather than direct control, it often functions as an investigative or support power. Yet in skilled hands, it can redirect entire conflicts, transform mystery arcs, and rewrite heists by revealing the hidden map.

Core Abilities of Clairvoyance

Remote Viewing (Line-of-Sight Without Distance)

The user projects awareness to a faraway place and observes as if physically present. Walls, fog, or darkness may or may not block the view depending on power level and rules of the setting. This is the backbone of surveillance, scouting, and rescue planning.

Temporal Sight (Pre- and Retrocognition)

The user witnesses short clips of potential futures or echoes of the past. These visions may be literal, symbolic, or probabilistic. Strong temporal sight lets a character plan around ambushes, trap placements, and betrayal—though changing the future can alter or invalidate the vision.

Scrying Focus (Mirrors, Pools, Sigils)

Focus objects steady the signal, extend range, or sharpen detail. In some systems, scrying requires a personal link to the target (a name, photo, or possession), enabling a lock-on effect.

Clairaudience and Multisensory ESP (Variant)

While classic clairvoyance is visual, many versions expand to sound, scent, or tactile impressions. This broader extrasensory perception turns a “vision” into a full situational feed.

Probability Threading (Interpretation and Filtering)

Useful clairvoyance isn’t just seeing—it’s selecting the right frame from a flood of possibilities. Skilled users learn to filter noise, compare timelines, and translate metaphorical symbols into actionable facts.

Application / Tactical Advantages in Combat

• Ambush Immunity: By checking nearby sightlines and probable angles, the user spots snipers, traps, and hidden routes before the enemy acts.

• Pre-emptive Counterplay: Precognition reveals the first move of an opponent; the user chooses an angle that invalidates the incoming strike or spell.

• High-Value Target Tracking: Remote viewing tracks a commander’s movements, enabling precision strikes or extraction missions.

• Fog-of-War Removal: In teams, a clairvoyant acts as a live recon drone, calling out flankers, cooldown windows, or weak points.

• Resource Optimization: Seeing future outcomes helps ration energy, pick winning battles, and avoid attrition traps.

• Deception Check: Illusions, disguises, or decoys are tested by cross-referencing temporal or distant views—the truth tends to stay consistent across frames.

Level: Level 1 🏙️, Level 2 🌇, Level 3 🌃

Level 1 🏙️ — Intuitive Glimpses

• Range & Duration: Short bursts within a few city blocks; seconds-long snapshots.

• Clarity: Grainy visuals or symbolic flashes; requires focus and quiet.

• Use Cases: Find a missing person’s direction, sense danger around a corner, catch a momentary future hint (one dodge, one clue).

• Limiters: Headaches, sensory overlap, and misreads of symbolism. Needs a focus object to stabilize.

Level 2 🌇 — Stable Remote Sight

• Range & Duration: Entire city coverage; can sustain a view for minutes.

• Clarity: Clear visual feed; occasional audio overlay.

• Use Cases: Real-time overwatch in battles, room-by-room scouting, consistent short-term precognition for counters, reliable retrocognition at crime scenes.

• Add-Ons: Can link the feed to teammates verbally; can track a target with a lock-on token (photo, name, or kept item).

• Costs: Moderate mental strain, increased vulnerability while channeling.

Level 3 🌃 — Temporal Cartographer

• Range & Duration: Global or multi-realm reach; minutes to hours of controlled viewing.

• Clarity: High-definition multisensory data, branching timelines viewable in sequence.

• Use Cases: War-room strategy, predicting multi-phase boss mechanics, reconstructing complex conspiracies, anticipating paradox risks.

• Mastery: Can pause, rewind symbolic sequences, and select the most probable outcome path.

• Tradeoffs: Heavy cognitive load, risk of timeline entanglement, and ethical fallout from excessive foreknowledge.

Limitations of Using the Clairvoyance

• Probability, Not Certainty: Futures seen are possible, not guaranteed. Acting on them can disrupt the very sequence observed.

• Signal Interference: Anti-scrying fields, psychic dampeners, or chaotic environments (solar storms, dimensional rifts) create static or false trails.

• Focus Requirements: Many systems demand a quiet space, ritual focus, or an anchor item. Combat casting is harder and risks partial or misleading results.

• Cognitive Burn: Overuse causes migraines, sensory bleed, or temporary blindness/deafness in normal senses. Prolonged use may induce time-sickness or deja-vu loops.

• Ethical Constraints: Viewing private moments or classified spaces can trigger moral and legal consequences; certain visions may be traumatic.

• Symbolic Noise: Not all visions are literal. Misinterpreting metaphor (red thread, broken clock, black door) can send a team in the wrong direction.

Weakness Against What Other Superpowers

• Psychic Shielding / Psionic Nullification: Blocks or scrambles the clairvoyant channel, returning static or fake imagery.

• Illusion Casting with Anti-ESP Layering: High-grade illusions can spoof scrying, planting convincing decoys across timelines.

• Temporal Distortion / Time Rewind: Alters causality after the vision is taken, invalidating predictions or creating paradoxical feedback.

• Dark Energy Manipulation / Shadow Veils: Absorb or cloak signatures, hiding heat, intent, and trajectory from remote viewing.

• Chaos Manipulation / Probability Warp: Increases randomness so prediction becomes unreliable, hiding critical events behind noise.

• Technomancy Jamming: EMP-like psychic jammers, encryption sigils, or counter-rituals desynchronize the viewing focus.

Synergistic Power Combos

• Clairvoyance + Enhanced Agility: See an attack before it lands and move preemptively; turns defense into effortless positioning.

• Clairvoyance + Energy Shield: Predict incoming fire and angle the shield for perfect mitigation.

• Clairvoyance + Teleportation / Blink: Combine foresight with instant repositioning to steal initiative or rescue allies.

• Clairvoyance + Illusion Casting (Allied): Use visions to craft tailored illusions that exploit exact enemy fears and blind spots.

• Clairvoyance + Psychometry: Confirm who handled an object and when, then pivot to remote viewing of the culprit’s current location.

• Clairvoyance + Strategy AI / Battle Net: Feed live ESP intel into tactical software for pathfinding, ambush mapping, and threat scoring.

• Clairvoyance + Healing Touch: Anticipate damage patterns to triage before injuries escalate.

Known Users

• Madame Web (Marvel Comics): A precognitive and clairvoyant who perceives the Web of Life and Destiny, guiding spider-themed heroes. Read more.

• Irene Adler / Destiny (Marvel Comics): A powerful precog whose predictions influence major events. Read more.

• Cassandra Nova (various storylines): Frequently depicted with advanced psychic faculties, including far-reaching perception. Read more.

• Raven Queen analogs in fantasy RPGs: Often portrayed as seers who glimpse fate’s threads—useful for quest forecasting and omen reading.

For more inspirations and to discover other abilities related to perception, visit the superpower wiki. If building a character from scratch, try the random superpower generator to roll a concept that complements clairvoyance.