I have no idea what this is supposed to mean. As far as I can tell, a magician with a dice pool of 9 can, on average, expect to fool a camera a bit more than 60% of the time. Which is pretty good, but not exactly spectacular if it's what you're supposed to be good at.

That doesn't change the fact that a professional mage won't always have access to those tricks.

Take a starting special-effects mage. He needs a Magic of at least 3 under the current rules. Under SR4.5.1, he would have needed a magic of at least 4, if he wanted to be able to cast an illusion viable for the cameras without risking physical drain. Getting him to a dice pool of 12 would be difficult, especially for a legal wizard; that's shadowrunner territory.


This answers nothing. Let me put it this way: why is is that sometimes, a camera can spot flaws in an illusion that a viewer can't see... and sometimes, a viewer can see through an illusion that a camera cannot? Also, what happens if you score less than 3 successes on a Trid Phantasm (Obvious illusion) spell?

At which point it's clear that your average every day Joe Mage is actually quite a bit farther above average than, well, everyone else who's average. Which is a problem.

I suppose it falls into the same category as what (under SR4, not 4A) the Emotitoy does for con artists. Even at mediocre levels they start having more dice thrown around casually than anyone has to resisting even at shadowrunner levels.

Mages just have too many ways to get two to three extra dice to a task that most other people don't have.

And to fix it, you made the thresholds for success higher, rather than imposing limits on the dice pool bonuses.

The cheesed out are only minorly inconvenienced.

The "I'm good at this" are wounded and annoyed, but "good enough to deal with it."

The average start cheesing out or failing.

The one-trick-ponies (the spell-knacks) go from being useless to uselesser. Magic 1 + no spellcasting + never-specialize + never-raise-magic + never become a mage + 3 spellcasting foci is 4 dice. Maybe 3 if we give defaulting penalties. A Knack-caster can never ever perform their knack to any degree worth using (whee! Force 1 Imp. Invisibility go!).



Which means....what, exactly?

Mind telling me where, exactly, you got that from?


Yes, if 60.69% qualifies as 'very likely' (this is calculated as 4 or more - if for some reason you want exactly 4, reduce that to 23.85%)


Again, you are saying A) The camera is sentient enough to decide if something is real or not, or B) The camera has nothing to do with it - it's all on the observer - in which case there should be no OR threshold for the illusion to begin with.

Why wouldn't a professional magician have a specialization and a focus? It's been long established that magicians are in great demand and handsomely paid. When wouldn't a professional have access to these options?


I've since gone back and revised my post because I was playing down the dice pool, but I can repeat the revised version here:

What I was pointing out is that a professional (with specialization and foci which I didn't quantify) could actually have a dice pool of 12 easily (though not unexpensively). Your professional's dice pool of 10 (Magic 4, Spellcasting 4, specialization +2) becomes 12 for a 30k nuyen investment in appropriate tools (Spellcasting Focus force 2) or 13 for 45k nuyen (Spellcasting Focus force 3) - Spellcasting foci which incidentally augment all his spellcasting independent of spell categories. Note that this isn't counting potential dice boosts from a bound spirit's Aid Sorcery, mentor spirit boni, power foci, and other gimmicks that magicians have up their sleeves which could pump a starting professional magician's pool up to 16 and much higher at little additional cost. (And I'm chosing to ignore what Edge use might do to that boosted pool).

So to fall back on the oft-quoted Hollywood special effects wizard being disarmed by the new ORs, I'd counter by saying that it's not unreasonable for a non-Shadowrunning professional illusionist in the Sixth World (with or without a Hollywood budget) to be throwing around upwards of 16 dice to craft his Trid Phantasm for the director.


Several explanations have been offered, but basically cameras (and other sensors) were streamlined under a single OR threshold to make sensors more consistent than the human mind and eyes. In keeping with the system's intent to make technology more difficult to affect/fool/damage by magic this difficulty of crafting such a realistic Physical Illusion was set at a pretty high level (originally at a threshold of 3, SR4A originally raised it to 4, and it's now been revised to 3 again). The threshold of 3 (let alone 4) translates to significantly better results than a mundane human observer can hope to accomplish by resisting with Intuition. This can be chalked up to the fact that by 2070 a camera will record everything it views in extreme detail and flaws/inconsistencies/incompleteness of the illusion will be easier to detect (this of course is assuming someone on the other side of the camera feed is watching, which is why I've said that it would be perfectly reasonable for someone to roll Pilot + Clearsight to represent software analysis of the feed) than by a human eye and mind combo.


This has been explained. You end up with an illusion that is obviously an illusion and "not real". You might end up with a semi-transparent neon purple great dragon or a lensflare effect from the warping of light by the Physical Illusion spell (as opposed to a perfectly realistic neon purple great dragon and a picture perfect realistic image sans lens flare).

My bad. Should have been: "spellcasting independent of the spell in that category". I leave it as is and not edit in the correction so that your post makes sense to readers.


Again, these are basic dice pools and not maxed out and can be supplemented, boosted, in several ways at little cost. The intent of the threshold of 4 would be very likely to attain with preparation and planning, rather than by throwing up spells at an instant's notice.


I am saying (B). However, the second part of your statement assumes that the Physical Illusion is perfect and complete when it reaches the (final) observer. OR in this case represents the difficulty of crafting a illusion realistic and complete enough to "convince" a modern sensor (such as a camera), and the system assumes that the a living/human mind is easier to trick and will "fill in" blanks and minor inconsistencies as it so often does with real life illusions and slight of hand.

12 dice is a specialized, high-level spellcasting pool. You are looking at 4 Magic, 4 Spellcasting, Specialization, & Force 2 Focus to obtain that - beyond a professional, into the realm of highly specialized expert.

Except in this case, I am not trying to 'convince' the sensor of anything - I am trying to do so to the human watching the feed, making this an Opposed Test against that individual.

'Tricking' someone into filling in the blanks, so to speak, is basically not any different over video than it is in person. They are not going to say "wait, pause it - I think that is off slightly" anymore than they would do something similar in person.

I acknowledge the "specialized" though not on a high-level Spellcasting pool—since it'd be very easy for the same character (assuming Conjuring skills at 3 or 4) to boost that pool to 15 or higher without breaking much of a sweat (or expending more than 2000 nuyen). This would indeed be an experienced and specialized professional, probably with an initiation in his pocket. However, he'd be the special effects industry pro, rather than one in hundreds of equally-competent unspecialized everyday magicians capable of doing the exact same thing with the same degree of success.


I put the convince in brackets for a reason. To rephrase: illusion realistic and complete enough "that no flaws or inconsistencies or weird interactions are picked up" by a modern sensor (such as a camera) that would give away its illusory nature.


This is not entirely true, particularly if the "magic hologram" produces some weird effect that wouldn't happen when seeing the illusion in person (imagine the equivalent of photographic red eye). Additionally the viewer observing through the camera does have the option to zoom in, pause, rewind, etc which would increase the possibility of later detection if the recorded illusion has enough "flaws". As I noted previously I don't find it unreasonable for a GM to allow a Pilot + Clearsight test (or an Intuition + Perception test) after the fact to represent someone or some software processing the camera feed (who is in turn aided or hampered by what the camera actually picked up).

"Later detection" is the key phrase here. No one cares about "later detection." It's all about being detected now. Sure, not leaving your trace on the record to be examined later is important, but as it stands an illusion that does not beat OR3 (in the current case of cameras) means that anyone viewing the live feed or alternatively automated security measures is not fooled, thus completely negating the point of being fucking invisible right now.

Fine, they find out 3 days later after extensive video analysis that, yes, there was in fact an invisible dude in that corridor. Too bad we can't capture his mug. Too bad he stole our [stuff] three days ago. We couldn't catch him in the act because he was invisible!

If you're invisible, you're god damned invisible. Realizing that something is there is Intuition for people and Clearsight for computers/drones/cameras. Being able to figure out what that is is something else entirely.

No one cares if they find the flaw in the illusion three days after the job.

But a right-now can't-beat-OR3 invisibility spell means that they are (effectively) not invisible right-now when what it should be is invisible right now unless perceived by (actively) resisting the spell and open to observation in the future. Of which they likely won't get your identity, only that, "Oh, that's how the thief got in. He cast Improved Invisibility on himself."

I hardly think that's a direction many will take at charagen in the BP system.

MAG 5, Spellcasting 5 seem to be the norm.

A force 2 power focus is doable, but does require 12 BP allocated to it alone.



Apparently both of us are somewhat incorrect as Synner now states that "Sensors" are OR 3 and "Sensor Suites" (in drones) are OR 5...

So even if you can target the sensors separately, it does you no good as Sensor Suites are OR 5 anyway.




So basically nothing has been fixed and using Physical Illusions and Physical Manipulations on Drones means OR 5, and min 15 dice to be capable of something like a 50~60% success rate.


So we're back to drones and vehicles, which are ubiquitous in the setting, being extremely resistant to magic vs. Magicians who are rare and for whom (outside of spirits) are highly vulnerable to technology.

Unless Drones need to overcome a magician's MAG attribute as a resistance threshold to put bullets into him. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/rotfl.gif)


I was going to ask you how you felt about the side debate on Magicians targetting the sensors on drones and where the RAW or RAI stands on the issue. But it's apparently irrelevant if Sensor Suites are OR 5+ as well.

This has to be some April Fool's joke you have been working on for a few weeks now. This cannot be real. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sleepy.gif)

I mean, I get your point, but then come along the rules, which you seem to say work as you intend them to work... but they don't. What. The. Fuck.

Has anyone seen my sanity? I need to have a word with it, since obviously I seem to detect a contradiction where some claim none exists.

Your sanity is intact. My sincerest apologies; it was a long night and that came out as the exact opposite of what I wanted to say. The line should have been:

"This is where we're at odds. I believe that the setting calls for everyday magician to be unable to do this on a regular basis, and that magicians should require more specialization than they did under the basic SR4 rules."

Your sanity might be ok, but your common courtesy? LONG gone.



Here's how I would do it: if you succeed against the guards in person, but fail against the cameras, you have a shimmery kind of outline like the Predator. Your invisibility works, only it's more like a chameleon suit than true invisibility. The guards, however, don't notice it because they aren't paying close enough attention. However, a camera is able to pick it up much more starkly because it has better contrast with the surroundings, and anyone viewing you on the camera would instantly spot the flawed illusion. It shouldn't be just about later detection, I agree that the person watching the cameras should be able to spot you right away if you fail to fool the cameras. It shouldn't be some minor flaw that's not very noticeable, it should be something major which people in person could still overlook, but that a camera would show with much more clarity. It's only when you roll 5+ hits that you'll be well and truly invisible, unless there's a mage around with counterspelling which lets them use their magical skills to pierce the illusion.

Based on what I have read...

Physical Illusions do the following:

1. If successfully cast, they appear and overlay on top of the target.
2. May not be accurate enough to fool a camera / sensor due to imaging issues (tearing, clipping, refraction, reflections, etc)
3. While unable to fool a camera, may fool the person observing.

The above implies the cameras / sensors have some sort of imaging processor and control software. Here's why I say this...

For the camera to determine the illusion is fake, there must be some sort of controller in place. Otherwise, what exactly is enabling the camera to indicate the illusion was detected?

That, I think is where everyone is getting wrapped around the axle. Synner is saying (in a roundabout way) OR encompasses the software interpreting / controlling the camera. If this is the case, then it makes sense the video output / display would have an overlay of some sort which would indicate various detected parameters.

In fact, the camera software would need such control software otherwise, it'd faithfully replay exactly what it detected which would leave the meat eyes watching the screens to make the determination it was fake / real.

I still think putting Rating + Clearsight against Illusion spellcasting successes would have been faster / better / easier. But to each, their own.

Synner just explained it several times: it's not control software, it's the level of contrast and detail on the camera. Cameras pick things up that normal human vision might overlook, and it's easier to see on the camera feed because of the increased definition and contrast, as well as the fact that you're just looking at a screen and factors like glare from other light sources or distractions from out of frame aren't at issue. I mean, the poor guy has said the same thing like 10 times, but everyone assumes he's saying the opposite. Just what is going on here? We're not talking about hidden meaning, he flat out said it, and now everyone's twisting it to mean the total opposite. He specifically said, over and over, that cameras are not smart, they don't edit their feeds. They just pick up discrepancies that humans might miss, hence needing to beat their threshold to make an illusion that's good enough to not be spotted on their feeds. They don't "indicate" that the illusion was detected, someone has to be watching the screen. But if that person is paying attention, then they will see that the camera picked up problems with the illusion that humans might have missed. Maybe we need to use bigger letters, I'm afraid these eensy weensy normal sized letters are to small for certain folks, because they don't seem to be reading them very accurately.

That's a very good point. Given the available sensors and other security measures (retina scanners, pressure pads, etc.), why are people so hung up on invisibility and other illusions? Do you really expect to defeat a security system with those spells?

Hey Larme...

I'm going to have to borrow a page from some of our more caustic posters. Why the hell didn't you READ ALL OF THE POST rather than just single out one small tidbet and then proceed to berate me on it?

I'm fairly certain I got 'it'. But it's quite apparent to me that you did NOT. Otherwise you'd have addressed the rest of the post which is saying the control pieces of the camera / sensor are rolled into OR. Otherwise, the camera is nothing more than a freaking mirror.

The mechanical pieces of that camera have no intelligence or image processing pieces. They do nothing but pass the image on. In order for a camera system to determine the illusion is fake, there MUST be control / image processing going on. That would have to be in the electronics of the camera itself or in the master control system running the cameras. All I said was that it appears Synner / Devs is/are rolling that processing into the OR of the camera or the suite. Thus, a higher OR means it's more technological (which means more processing and verification for many electronics).



And perhaps you should take your own advice and get some glasses? It's readily apparent by your admission that you didn't read.

Considering that they have higher drain, and are specifically designed to defeat technological systems, yes I do expect a mage to be able to beat a Security System with them.

So, you'd expect to defeat a retina scanner, backed up by pressure pads and sensors (not just visuals) with a single spell? That explains a lot.

No. He expects not to be seen while the hacker hacks the retina scanner while he Levitates them over the floor.

Nicely said.

I don't want the mage to cast a single spell and defeat a maximum security system, but I don't want the spells to function as advertised without mages needing to min max every last die into their dice pool.

Fix for the OR

All spell that have to beat the OR, get a resistance test instead, where the object gets a dicepool of 2*OR + counterspelling

Problem fixed. Also the part about the mage not being able to protect the riggers drones from magic.

Low Force spells do have a change to affect the objects albeit at a very low change.



Else the mages should get a automatic dodge of MAG hits

Reason: it is MAGIC, they are mages, thus are able to defy the laws of physics and dodge bullets like Neo.

So let's just be clear about what you're attempting to say here: If a character wishes to use an illusion spell to "fool" a camera they need 4 successes (in the initial printing of SR4A) if they wish to fool a drone they need 6. I fail to see how this could possibly be considered a useful rule. First, you want the GM to distinguish between sensors and sensor suites (and not just drones/computers and electronics as the book lays out) but you also claim that this is what the book says. Given that "sensor suites" and "drones" are so common (since you apparently prefer this term over prevalent) are physical illusions supposed to be useful at *any* time?



Actually, I didn't so much "miss" your reference as believe that it is totally nonsensical and decide that you couldn't possibly mean something that directly contradicts what you have said and what the book says. First, your example is ridiculous. An Improved Invisibility spell affects only sight. If you gain enough successes to beat someone (or something) they cannot *see* you. But any other sense still works fine. This is exactly the same for a drone as for a human target. So, if you score enough successes to beat the drone's OR then the drone cannot use visual sensors to find you, but its other sensors will work perfectly fine. I'll note that this is the advantage of having a "sensor suite" and not this completely made up rule that you've been claiming.

Now, if you were simply a regular poster on these forums I'd assume that you hadn't read the rules correctly, or felt that the rules needed a few changes for some "realism" that you perceived was lacking. However, as a former developer making these claims, I'm left believing that either you don't know your own rules (which is hard to believe) or that you've decided to make up some ridiculous excuse for your mistake instead of admitting that you didn't actually think this through properly.



As has been pointed out, this statement is just flat out wrong. A die pool of 9 means that you can expect to succeed 60% of the time. This does not mean that on average you can expect to succeed all of the time no matter how much you wish it did.



Your replies have addressed questions that I have not asked and claims that I have not made while being addressed to me. That's not quite the same thing. They aren't to my satisfaction because they are either poorly supported by the facts (even where you make them up), or they address issues that aren't in question.

The camera system doesn't determine it's fake, it just give's you a high resolution image. From witch you can spot the small mistakes that you would be aple to spot with your bare eyes, unless the spell has 3+ successes to beat the OR. Beating OR of the camera means that the illusion was so good you can't spot any mistakes even from the high resolution camara image.

As opposed to the hacker? There's always edge for critical rolls too.