Mind Probe Options

[Dakka Dakka]

the spell is cast, by touch, on a target. this target gains the ability (or 'sense') to mind probe people. sustaining the spell does absolutely nothing when it comes to allowing anyone to probe people they can't see.

OK here's how it goes IMHO: With the spellcasting Complex Action you grant yourself or someone you touch to probe a certain person within range (Force*Magic m), nowhere does it say that the target of the spell needs to see the one to be probed, he only has to be in range. When the target actually starts probing the target has to remain in range but not necessarily in LOS. So by RAW it is allowed to probe the person on the other side of the wall. Whether you want to play it like that is a different story.

Even a single watcher spirit could be enough to identify the source of the probe and allow retalliation.

Only rarely will that work. Watchers get 2 dice for Assensing anything. You need two successes two recognize an aura. A crowded bar, to get back to that example, should have some negative dice pool modifiers for astral perception. Unless the watcher looks in the right direction and uses the Observe in Detail action it will get the distraction modifier.

[TommyTwoToes]

OK here's how it goes IMHO: With the spellcasting Complex Action you grant yourself or someone you touch to probe a certain person within range (Force*Magic m), nowhere does it say that the target of the spell needs to see the one to be probed, he only has to be in range. When the target actually starts probing the target has to remain in range but not necessarily in LOS. So by RAW it is allowed to probe the person on the other side of the wall. Whether you want to play it like that is a different story.

How do you decide who to probe if you cannot perceive/see them? If you allow mindprobing of people who are not in LOS, then the target should be a random selection out of the available pool of everyone in range. The person doing the sensing needs LOS, it is consistent with the way other magic works in game.

As to some of the talk about the probe being done in a crowded bar or danceclub, dropping to the floor breaks LOS and is very quick.

[Aerospider]

Only rarely will that work. Watchers get 2 dice for Assensing anything. You need two successes two recognize an aura. A crowded bar, to get back to that example, should have some negative dice pool modifiers for astral perception. Unless the watcher looks in the right direction and uses the Observe in Detail action it will get the distraction modifier.

Fairly safe to assume the watcher has nothing on its mind except looking out for astral anomalies with respect to the guy it's watching over, yes? That satisfies the Observe in Detail action and gains the +3 for actively looking. Also, chances are the watcher's had plenty of time to scope out the magician before the casting of the spell and so could have identified him as the only mage in the building.

[Aerospider]

How do you decide who to probe if you cannot perceive/see them? If you allow mindprobing of people who are not in LOS, then the target should be a random selection out of the available pool of everyone in range. The person doing the sensing needs LOS, it is consistent with the way other magic works in game.

As to some of the talk about the probe being done in a crowded bar or danceclub, dropping to the floor breaks LOS and is very quick.

I think the point he's making is that LOS is only required by the caster at the time of casting the spell, not by the subject or at the time of using the sustained spell.

[Dakka Dakka]

How do you decide who to probe if you cannot perceive/see them? If you allow mindprobing of people who are not in LOS, then the target should be a random selection out of the available pool of everyone in range. The person doing the sensing needs LOS, it is consistent with the way other magic works in game.

You need to link yourself with the target of the spell (i.e. the one who is granted the ability to probe) there is no mention if you need LOS (which is a totally arbitrary condition since the spell has range Touch) to the one to be probed. by your logic Invisibility will cease to work as soon as you turn your back to the observers.

As to some of the talk about the probe being done in a crowded bar or danceclub, dropping to the floor breaks LOS and is very quick.

As I said, there is no mention in the spell's description or the Detection spells in general that you need LOS. And within 3 seconds a boosted mage could cast the spell and extract three bits of information. He probably would start casting once your back is turned.

[DireRadiant]

I guess I'm just not seeing the question/answer description evident anywhere in the spell description. The table below Mind Probe lists 3-4 net hits as "The subject can find out anything the target consciously knows and view the target's memories". I don't see anywhere that suggests the GM should provide vague information unless the subject asks the correct questions. Sure, if the target has useful information but the caster isn't sure what exactly they are looking for then this would be a valid approach. But I see no reason to deliberately be vague if the caster knows what they are looking for just because I as GM am able to find some sort of loop-hole in the wording they give for their "question". Thats really just nerfing the spell into a game of semantics. Like the old be careful how you word your Wish in that other rpg.

Even if we assume the caster can view one Complex Actions worth of memories for every Complex Action they spend sustaining the spell, they could learn a whole lot in mere seconds.

"The subject may probe for one piece of information per Complex Action." sentence in the spell description? You are assuming the one piece of information is a complex action worth of memories? What is that? Three seconds of someone's life and you expect to get the right bit?

[Redcrow]

"The subject may probe for one piece of information per Complex Action." sentence in the spell description? You are assuming the one piece of information is a complex action worth of memories? What is that? Three seconds of someone's life and you expect to get the right bit?

Sure, why not? As long as the caster knows what they are looking for. Three seconds is enough time to Observe in Detail, so the caster could use it to get a description of someone the target knows. View the target typing in a passcode. A great deal can be learned in 3 seconds based on the Observe in Detail action.

[CeeJay]

@ Redcrow:
If you want to reduce the effectiveness of Mind Probe in your game, how about this approach: We already know, that the target is aware of the Mind Probe. Now what if he is also aware of the information that is learned with the mind probe? This would reduce the spell's effectiveness since the target will know what kind of information he has leaked and can take appropriate actions like informing his company's security that the latest security codes were just mind raped from him.

-CJ

[Warlordtheft]

Mind probe is a very useful spell, but it does have potential drawbacks. Spellcasting, especially of high Force spells, is noticable. It is a spell with a relatively high Drain code, and you need 3 net hits to view anything deeper than the target's surface thoughts. The target is aware of the mental intrusion, and casting spells leaves an astral signature.

Despite these limitations, it remains extremely effective. I I still like it, though, because it is a spell that requires more tactical thinking from the player. Effectively using mind probe means that you have to put a lot of thought into how to approach the target, and what questions to ask/what piece of information to scour for.

Also, suppose the target thinks he has the code to the self destruct for the deathstar, but is really the code to say I'm an intruder, shoot me with a laser beam. Ooops. The key here is that anything gained via a mind probe spell needs to be verified to some extent. Otherwise the players are asking for trouble. Also at force 3 or less the spell is pretty useless. Even at force 4 you may have issues. So your minimum effective force for the spell is 5. Fairly noticable. And if your noticed, someone might do something (here come the troll bouncer/law). Most juristictions would consider mind probes magical assault. And believe me, the last thing you want to be is an incarcerated mage.

PS:I always thought mind probe was a touch the target kind of spell. AFB, so I'll check on that at home.

[CeeJay]

PS:I always thought mind probe was a touch the target kind of spell. AFB, so I'll check on that at home.

the spell is cast, by touch, on a target. this target gains the ability (or 'sense') to mind probe people. sustaining the spell does absolutely nothing when it comes to allowing anyone to probe people they can't see.

[Drats]

My thinking is that the implications of raw mind probe are profound on a societal level. A couple of examples: Why would anyone ever bother threatening a witness - you'd always have to kill them - a mind probe could extract the information. Why bother extracting researchers? Just mind-probe them for their key insights. Worried an employee might turn on you? Mind probe him. (It's better than Detect Truth, as you can find out if he subconsciously doesn't like the company anymore.)

In play, The Shadows may be composed nearly entirely of disgruntled amoral Awakened, but on paper the world's magical population is still somewhere around 1%, IIRC. OUT OF that 1%, the number of mages that know this (likely regulated) spell would be far less, and the ones that could reliably be counted on to generate the needed hits on the test would be even fewer. Even if a given shady body (Syndicate, Megacorp, etc.) happens to have a spellslinger up to the task, the odds are that the guys signing the checks can think of better uses for their time than making sure that Bob from accounting isn't entertaining other employment opportunities. Even in the most draconian of settings, I can really only conceive of important personnel being subjected to this sort of probing on a semi-yearly basis (Okay, Bob, time for your annual physical and loyalty test) unless they're the kind of personnel asset whose loss would drastically cripple their organization.

As to the extraction of key researchers, extraction ensures that the company benefits from their full and continued expertise (and that the competitor doesn't) rather than having to rely on a few nuggets of possibly incomplete or out-of-context information you've clawed from their mind. By the time you've gotten into a key position to be able to probe anyone who knows that kind of paydata and get away clean, you've probably expended enough effort to make not grabbing them kind of a waste, anyway.

As to threatening witnesses, I'm not sure on the laws, but I imagine that in a lot of jurisdictions there'd be sharp limits (or even prohibitions) on what sorts of magically obtained info would be admissible as evidence, similar to the current-day 5th Amendment right in the U.S. Even if there weren't, whatever legal body was weighing the evidence would be relying on the word of the mage. There's nothing solid and objective to build a case on there, unless perhaps the body in question employs some kind of double-blind two-mage mindrape protocall with full public transparency.

In all, if I were concerned about a witness against my organization, it'd far more likely be because of their headware memory than because there might be a mage out there somewhere who could make them talk, and none of the GMs I know are worried about nerfing Cybereye recording units.

Only rarely will that work. Watchers get 2 dice for Assensing anything. You need two successes two recognize an aura. A crowded bar, to get back to that example, should have some negative dice pool modifiers for astral perception. Unless the watcher looks in the right direction and uses the Observe in Detail action it will get the distraction modifier.

The Search power has nothing to do with Assensing, though-- it's magical homing. The test is magic + int. Their dice pool would still be two, but they'd only be looking for 5 hits, and visibility modifiers wouldn't apply. Provided that your GM doesn't exercise a narrow interpretation of the power, I'd think the astral signature of whoever cast the mindrape would be enough for the Watcher to go off of. If not, it'd be easy enough to pop over to the astral for three seconds and summon up a spirit with Search and Assensing that would have dice pools of at least 6 for both.

[Aerospider]

I think it's important to retain correct terminology here or else confusion is certain.

Target – the mind to be probed

Subject – the recipient of the new sense (i.e. the one who's going to do the probing)

re: LOS

As the spell is target-specific (i.e. you can't probe multiple minds in succession with the same sustained spell) the caster must specify the target at the point of casting. Unless it's done through ritual sorcery he must therefore be able to see the target at the point of casting as per standard spell-casting rules.

LOS isn't specifically stated in the spell description but the probing sense is directional, meaning it must be aimed directly at the target. Whether or not the sense can penetrate/bypass obstructions to light is not mentioned AFAIK. The subject needs to know pretty much exactly where the target is, but it's also not mentioned whether or not the subject can roam the sense around the area to look for it, like one would with a visual sense.

[Drats]

-embarassingly unlikely double-post error-

[Redcrow]

@ Redcrow:
If you want to reduce the effectiveness of Mind Probe in your game, how about this approach: We already know, that the target is aware of the Mind Probe. Now what if he is also aware of the information that is learned with the mind probe? This would reduce the spell's effectiveness since the target will know what kind of information he has leaked and can take appropriate actions like informing his company's security that the latest security codes were just mind raped from him.

-CJ

Thats a good step and does help to mitigate things a bit. It also doesn't have the limited applicability of many of the other suggestions I've read. It would give the target at least some small recourse against the spell.

[Dakka Dakka]

I think it's important to retain correct terminology here or else confusion is certain.

Target – the mind to be probed

Subject – the recipient of the new sense (i.e. the one who's going to do the probing)

The problem is that the spell's description uses target with a different meaning than the description of spellcasting in general. Let's use recipient for the one who gains the sense and victim for the one who is probed. At least I will.

As the spell is target-specific (i.e. you can't probe multiple minds in succession with the same sustained spell) the caster must specify the target at the point of casting. Unless it's done through ritual sorcery he must therefore be able to see the target at the point of casting as per standard spell-casting rules.

LOS isn't specifically stated in the spell description but the probing sense is directional, meaning it must be aimed directly at the target. Whether or not the sense can penetrate/bypass obstructions to light is not mentioned AFAIK. The subject needs to know pretty much exactly where the target is, but it's also not mentioned whether or not the subject can roam the sense around the area to look for it, like one would with a visual sense.

You may be right since directional spells are compared to sight in the introduction to detection spells.

[Cheops]

The Corporate Court wouldn't stand for it, so it would have to be done very rarely or else it couldn't be plausibly denied.

Had to jump in and mention about this. The Corporate Court wouldn't give a rat's ass if a corporation was mind probing it's employees. If the corporation is extraterritorial it can do whatever it pleases. If it isn't extraterritorial then it falls under local national laws and it is the national judicial system that is responsible for prosecuting the corporation. The Corporate Court exists to police inter-corporate laws and relations -- notably for extraterritorial corporations who cannot be brough to trial by any country. It doesn't police intra-corporate laws.

Edited: To de-offend sensibilities.

[DireRadiant]

My biggest problem with Mind Probe is that essentially anyone with the spell can learn everything someone else knows and their entire life history for a mere 3 net hits and do it anonymously from across the room.

Sure, why not? As long as the caster knows what they are looking for. Three seconds is enough time to Observe in Detail, so the caster could use it to get a description of someone the target knows. View the target typing in a passcode. A great deal can be learned in 3 seconds based on the Observe in Detail action.

I see we've gone from Knowing everything someone else knows to finding out the one thing I'm looking for, which is a difference in effectiveness.

There have been many excellent suggestions and points made on how to deal with this powerful spell. You'll need to figure out what you want to do for your game, but don't forget the most simple one, which is to remind your players that yes it's a powerful useful spell but being abusive with it is just like being abusive with any other powerful thing in a RPG, and being abusive is subject to consequences IC or OOC. Talk to your players about how they think it might be controlled too.

[Aerospider]

Had to jump in and correct this heinous misrepresentation of a piece of the setting. The Corporate Court wouldn't give a rat's ass if a corporation was mind probing it's employees. If the corporation is extraterritorial it can do whatever it pleases. If it isn't extraterritorial then it falls under local national laws and it is the national judicial system that is responsible for prosecuting the corporation. The Corporate Court exists to police inter-corporate laws and relations -- notably for extraterritorial corporations who cannot be brough to trial by any country. It doesn't police intra-corporate laws.

I take the point about inter-corporate vs intra-corporate and concur that that is the primary function of the CC, but I'm fairly sure I've read more than one text describing the CC as having an interest in how the megas conduct themselves, if only in terms of global public opinion of the whole set up. If I'm right about that then I'm confident mind probing would qualify since it's either a human rights violation or ought to be.

So, Ares goes a bit nuts and starts culling a wide variety of minority citizens using biological warfare agents and doesn't care who knows about it. All the nations and the other megas turn to the CC as the only body that Ares owes the slightest responsibility to and the CC says "Nothing to do with us – declare war on 'em if you're that bothered." Is that how it is? Honest question.

PS – I take exception to "heinous misrepresentation". That's an offensively perjorative assessment and whether the correction is valid or not it's highly inappropriate in magnitude.

[Aerospider]

You'll need to figure out what you want to do for your game, but don't forget the most simple one, which is to remind your players that yes it's a powerful useful spell but being abusive with it is just like being abusive with any other powerful thing in a RPG, and being abusive is subject to consequences IC or OOC. Talk to your players about how they think it might be controlled too.

Good advice, certainly, but it's just occurred to me that it's really all down to the adventure. The adventure must always be tailored to the team if a fun time is to be had by all.

You don't throw a paramilitary team against a small street-level gang.
You don't set 75% of the quest in the Matrix behind high-rating IC if there's no hacker/TM.
You don't leave out magical defences if the entire team is Awakened.

So really, the solution to anything that's overpowered is to not write an adventure that lets it do all the work and write some adventures that don't need it at all (or hardly at all).

Ok, so there's a bit more to it than that, but any runner is only as strong as his opposition is weak. Superman is the most overpowered fictional creation since God (my opinion) but there have been countless comics, films and TV episodes (not that I'm a fan) and that could only have happened by challenging him in ways that can't be solved by things like limitless strength, limitless speed and poorly justified time travel ...

[Redcrow]

So really, the solution to anything that's overpowered is to not write an adventure that lets it do all the work and write some adventures that don't need it at all (or hardly at all).

For me the simple solution is to nerf the spell rather than worry about how and when the spell might be abused for every adventure I run. I'm really surprised at the number of responses that ardently defend the spell as it is written in one sentence and then go on to describe how they've nerfed it for their own use.

[Mordinvan]

"The subject may probe for one piece of information per Complex Action." sentence in the spell description? You are assuming the one piece of information is a complex action worth of memories? What is that? Three seconds of someone's life and you expect to get the right bit?

My understanding is that the targets memories because as freely available to you as yours are. So if you try to remember something, you get the targets memories on that topic. So long as you know the topic your interested in, then yes I do expect you'd get the right bits. If you don't know the topic you're interested in, why are you wasting your time?

[Runner Smurf]

Amen, Redcrow! My thoughts in a very succinct nutshell.

Ultimately, I actually see a lot of the points on the other side in this one. There are a whole bunch of competing forces acting in a complex system that cannot be easily quantified. The rules themselves are, of course, quantified, but as several pages of discussion indicate...perhaps not that easily quantified. Basically, depending on your interpretation of the setting, different factors will have more weight, and lead to a different conclusion. In my understanding of the Shadowrun world, I think those factors weight heavily towards the spell being waaaay too powerful, so I've nerfed it.

That sop to rational, civil discourse aside...

The problem, as I see it, is the relative costs of attack vs. defense. All else being equal, without magical defense, people are pretty much sitting ducks - on average, the mage is going to have twice as many dice to attack as the target will have to defend. Providing magical security to prevent mind probing is extremely expensive. Multiple mages, who are extremely rare, on continuous cycling duty.

The utility of the information that can be retrieved is also extremely high. Yes, some of the books say some countries hold mind probes as inadmissible in court...but others do allow it. And how much does that really matter in Shadowrun? The mafioso wants to know who took his money. The yakuza wants to know who called a rival gang. The corporation wants to know who stole their money - and it's probably the accountants that would get scanned first. (Alas that Catalyst didn't follow usual corporate practice of cycling accountants and multiple auditors...or one good mind probe.) And random scans would be a perfect tool to control your workforce, much like random drug tests are used today. And mind probes have a much lower false positive rate.

The utility of the raw mind probe is such that just about any mage that worked in any sort of security or counter-security role would take it. Heck, any enterprising mage with half a brain would use it to blackmail anyone with a few bucks he might encounter: "What is your deepest darkest secret that you are most ashamed of and least want anyone to know about?" "What have you done that could get you fired from your job?" Proof, in a legal sense, doesn't really matter.

Anyway, that's just my take. There is no right or wrong here. I think the spell needs to be nerfed, and I really like the idea of having it viewed as a "mind rape" spell. Sure, the runners can use it, and it can give them key information...but they (and the players) should feel dirty about it. God knows, having the runners feel bad about gunning down random civilians takes enough work. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[DireRadiant]

My biggest problem with Mind Probe is that essentially anyone with the spell can learn everything someone else knows and their entire life history for a mere 3 net hits and do it anonymously from across the room. ....

My understanding is that the targets memories because as freely available to you as yours are. So if you try to remember something, you get the targets memories on that topic. So long as you know the topic your interested in, then yes I do expect you'd get the right bits. If you don't know the topic you're interested in, why are you wasting your time?

Context. My questions were in relation to the original contention that you learn everything. Not that you could not pick one thing you could learn out of everything. There is a difference. It's like looking at one single post without reading the rest of the thread you could end up getting a piece of information that does not reflect the overall situation.

[tagz]

By all means add in mechanics to the spell if you think they need them. I don't really think it does given the way I play with world fluff.

Also, I'd say it's probably harder to remain anonymous when casting then some people may think. Most of these mentioned before.

First the group bonus to perception. It's fine to think that most people would be preoccupied, and you'd be likely right, but to think that NOT ONE in a crowd of people are looking your direction... And that's the basis for the group bonus, the likelihood that some random person just happens to catch it. What that person does is up to the GM, but the runners don't exist in a vacuum and if someone is spotted in a club casting spells I bet the person who did the spotting will say or do something.

If you cast it in private and sustain it into the bar/club/place you still have to worry about wards and astral over-watch. A better approach, but still suspicious. Especially if over-watch say, saw you leave to go into the bathroom and you come out with a sustained spell on.

While I don't necessarily agree that it requires LOS to target a victim for the spell, I'd say at the very least afford some sort of targeting/link/spotting. This could be sight, hearing, UWBR, etc, but you must be able to perceive the person. Lose that perception and lose the spell's use on that target.

And I figured at the very least if a report was made to a bartender or bouncer they would record all the SIN info to hand over to the LEO. Ok, now your (fake)SIN is on record as having been at the scene of a mind rape. No biggie. Just don't let it show up at another any time soon. But, I assume all SINs have a real photo/image of the SIN holder, even fakes, as anyone looking at your SIN and you at the same time would ruin it, and since there's facial recognition software in existence... I bet the LEOs have a database with the SINs of everyone that's been in the vicinity of a mind rape the past 3 months or so and just run an automated check against the pictures when a new list comes in... any that come up multiple times.... And any that come up multiple times under different names.... Also factor in that someone with in that group perception test may not have shouted, but instead quietly walked over to the bouncer and gave them your description... Oh my... trouble. All this can happen without anyone in the bar making any fuss at all, don't want to upset the customers now... seems like a likely response. You might have seemingly done it successfully only to see your picture on the 6:00 News Trids.

And lets say you're in a local without the need of SINs, like a crappy dive bar in Redmond. I bet if someone said they'd been mind raped then a group of people would look for the skinniest, weakest looking person in the room and kick/kill his ass. Hope it isn't our mage. And if it's not, well, he might look suspicious if he tries to leave suddenly or maybe just doesn't join in on the lynching. Just my thoughts given the setting.

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

You keep describing it as "Asking" and "Answering" questions, but that isn't how its described in the book at all. Its more akin to opening a filing cabinet containing all the information the target knows and picking out whatever directly pertains to the information you are looking for. It doesn't even require any type of Data Search... just *poof* here is the information you are looking for and it is the whole truth as the target knows it. The End.

Call it Probing and Finding then... it is at that point semantics... "You ask a Question of the GM"... "The GM answers the Question"

Whatever...

Keep the Faith