Concealment, spirit concealment Options

[Dakka Dakka]

My group uses Concealment as a dicepool penalty to Ranged Combat Tests, essentially adding it to the Visibility Impaired option of the Ranged Combat Modifier Table, page 152, SR4A.

That makes Concealment even more powerful than it should be. By RAW Concealment only gives a penalty to Perception/Astral Perception tests. If the opposition succeeds at the perception test, or decides to fire blind, there is no additional penalty. Or are you saying that Concealment does not aid stealth at your table?

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

1) Then it is moot, since they don't.
2) I already did. Which is why I am pretty sure that powers per se do not show up on the astral.

1. But that is only an opinion, since it does quite clearly specify that they MUST share the same state. *shrug*
2. Pretty sure is not a rules quote, and is, once again, only an opinion.

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

This strongly suggests that Concealment can be sustained from another plane.

No, it strongly suggest that GUARD can be sustained from the Astral. Specific overrides Generic. For Guard, it can be sustained from the Astral, it DOES NOT call out any other power as such. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

2) Concealment works on the astral.

Actually, it doesn't. Its effects extend against anyone who is Actively Dual Natured and Pearing into the Physical. You cannot activate Concealment on the Astral Plane at all, which shows that it is strictly a Physical Power.

My take from that is that if an entity is NOT Dual Natured (like a Projecting Mage or a Spirit who is not Materialized), he can see the aura of the power (if he is Assensing, obviously) and will not be penalized for the Concealment power, since he is not Dual Natured at that point).

[Neraph]

That makes Concealment even more powerful than it should be. By RAW Concealment only gives a penalty to Perception/Astral Perception tests. If the opposition succeeds at the perception test, or decides to fire blind, there is no additional penalty. Or are you saying that Concealment does not aid stealth at your table?

It does aid and further gives Ranged Combat Modifiers. Ruthenium Polymers do also. We haven't gone into it, but I'd be willing to let the proper camouflage give them also. It's hard to shoot something you can't quite make out.

Actually, it doesn't. Its effects extend against anyone who is Actively Dual Natured and Pearing into the Physical. You cannot activate Concealment on the Astral Plane at all, which shows that it is strictly a Physical Power.

My take from that is that if an entity is NOT Dual Natured (like a Projecting Mage or a Spirit who is not Materialized), he can see the aura of the power (if he is Assensing, obviously) and will not be penalized for the Concealment power, since he is not Dual Natured at that point).

You've got some things backwards. Concealment works against anyone, period, but can only be used to shroud people against astral detection by a Dual-Natured creature (which a summoned, materialized spirit is). Further, the fact that Concealment is a Physical Power determines that you cannot use it on the astral, not the other way around. In fact, the ability for a Dual-Natured critter to use it to shroud against the Astral kind of does mean that it can affect the astral, allowing Concealment (explicitly and uniquely) to bridge the planar gap.

Since the last sentence says "Concealment also allows dual natured critters to conceal themselves and others from astral detection," that says point-blank, cut-and-dried, black-and-white that the spirit can use the Power on others to conceal them from astral detection - IE: Assensing. It does not say "Concealment also allows dual natured critters to conceal themselves and other dual natured entities (like a projecting mage or a spirit who is not materialized) from astral detection;" it says clearly that it protects the critter and others, unspecified. This allows a spirit to use Concealment on a B/E specialist with 1 Essence and no Magic and would protect that B/E guy against Assensing and Perception Tests on the Astral as well as on the Material.

There's no debate about it - that is exactly what that sentence says.

[kzt]

One of the "charms" of SR has always been trying to figure out what the hell the author, usually after being rewritten an editor, was trying to say. Personally it seems absurdly dumb for a spirit to not be able to conceal itself on the astral using its own powers since it lives on the astral.

[Neraph]

True. I agree with the frustration, though, of Concealment being one of the only things in the game to bridge the planar boundary (the only other ones that come to mind are Wards and BC).

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

You've got some things backwards. Concealment works against anyone, period, but can only be used to shroud people against astral detection by a Dual-Natured creature (which a summoned, materialized spirit is). Further, the fact that Concealment is a Physical Power determines that you cannot use it on the astral, not the other way around. In fact, the ability for a Dual-Natured critter to use it to shroud against the Astral kind of does mean that it can affect the astral, allowing Concealment (explicitly and uniquely) to bridge the planar gap.

Since the last sentence says "Concealment also allows dual natured critters to conceal themselves and others from astral detection," that says point-blank, cut-and-dried, black-and-white that the spirit can use the Power on others to conceal them from astral detection - IE: Assensing. It does not say "Concealment also allows dual natured critters to conceal themselves and other dual natured entities (like a projecting mage or a spirit who is not materialized) from astral detection;" it says clearly that it protects the critter and others, unspecified. This allows a spirit to use Concealment on a B/E specialist with 1 Essence and no Magic and would protect that B/E guy against Assensing and Perception Tests on the Astral as well as on the Material.

There's no debate about it - that is exactly what that sentence says.

Not really...

Yes, the Dual Natured character can use it and it will help against Astral Perception/Assensing, but the Dual Natured entity MUST be on the Physical Plane (otherwise how are they Dual Natured). Now, If you use the power on a Mundane, and you, yourself are not Dual Natured, such as a Spirit activating tee power and then returning to his Metaplane while Sustaining - WHich is questionable anyways), and an Astral entity is assensing the Aura (no, he is not dual natured) the magical nature of the power is obvious with a successful assensing test, and does not subtract anything form the test, as the Observer is not Dual Natured and neither is the enactor. For the COncealment power to work against Astral Entities, the one initiating the power MUST be Dual Natured, and remain Dual Natured for the Duration.

As you said above, "that says point-blank, cut-and-dried, black-and-white that the spirit can use the Power on others to conceal them from astral detection" but ONLY when they are DUAL NATURED. Which means the spirit MUST be Materialized. *shrug*

There's no debate about it - that is exactly what that sentence says.

[Neraph]

Not really...

Yes, the Dual Natured character can use it and it will help against Astral Perception/Assensing, but the Dual Natured entity MUST be on the Physical Plane (otherwise how are they Dual Natured). Now, If you use the power on a Mundane, and you, yourself are not Dual Natured, such as a Spirit activating tee power and then returning to his Metaplane while Sustaining - WHich is questionable anyways), and an Astral entity is assensing the Aura (no, he is not dual natured) the magical nature of the power is obvious with a successful assensing test, and does not subtract anything form the test, as the Observer is not Dual Natured and neither is the enactor. For the COncealment power to work against Astral Entities, the one initiating the power MUST be Dual Natured, and remain Dual Natured for the Duration.

As you said above, "that says point-blank, cut-and-dried, black-and-white that the spirit can use the Power on others to conceal them from astral detection" but ONLY when they are DUAL NATURED. Which means the spirit MUST be Materialized. *shrug*

The underlined section above is purely conjecture based off of an incorrect understanding of the grammar of one sentence. The bolded and underlined section is an interpretation of the rules that is without actual rules to back it up (where did you get the word "only?").

The sentence plainly states that Concealment allows critters to protect themselves and others from astral detection, in addition to Perception Tests. It does not say that it only functions when the critter is dual natured. It does not state that it only affects others for as long as the critter is dual natured. It simply allows dual natured critters to protect themselves and others from astral detection and Perception Tests.

Now, physical powers cannot affect Astral Forms (SR4A, page 293, Powers, Type), so if a spirit used Concealment on itself and then went astral it would no longer be affected, but there is nothing in the rules that states that you cannot sustain a Power or spell from one plane to another. If there is I'd suggest you find it and post it, because otherwise your argument has no legal basis. In fact, the rules for sustaining a Power (SR4A, page 293, Powers, Duration, fourth paragraph) maintained. The very use of the words sustained and maintained denotes the concept that once the effect is in place it does not change. If you sustain/maintain an effect that affects both Physical and Astral Perception Tests (and Assensing and probably even Track Power Tests - the Track Power is nothing if not an astral detection ability) then by definition it will not change as long as it is sustain/maintained.

There's no debate about it - that is exactly what that sentence says.

[Draco18s]

bound spirits. These spirits are usually Force 7

I can't believe I'm going to be the first one to point this out:

What the hell? Regularly binds force 7 spirits? How many services are we talking here, and how much drain is this PC taking each time? (And what's their Magic attribute?)

I suspect that either the rules aren't being applied properly, or some other cheese is going on, and in any case, the GM needs to step in and start applying additional leverage against it.

(That said, concealment works exactly as you have interpreted)

[Neraph]

I noticed that, but at my tables spirits are normally Force 6 (sometimes F4), so I can see Force 7 being done. We simply chose F6 as "standard" because it's a nice multiple of 3, making Power choices easier.

[toturi]

No, it strongly suggest that GUARD can be sustained from the Astral. Specific overrides Generic. For Guard, it can be sustained from the Astral, it DOES NOT call out any other power as such. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

That is incorrect. The quote from SM is not a suggestion, strong or otherwise; it specifically calls out for Guard to be sustained from the Astral and as such is not a suggestion. That is the RAW line in the sand.

The suggestion would be any other physical power that does so using the same lines of reasoning as the quote. The statement quoted is framed as an explanation on how Guard as a physical power is used and sustained. While I do not think anyone would have any argument as to Guard being sustained on the astral as being RAW, I can see how some people would argue against using the same line of reasoning to allow other physical powers to be sustained similarly.

[Draco18s]

That is incorrect. The quote from SM is not a suggestion, strong or otherwise; it specifically calls out for Guard to be sustained from the Astral and as such is not a suggestion. That is the RAW line in the sand.

Correct. The text is in fact not even in a rules text paragraph and says thus,

Since Guard is a physical power, it requires the spirit to be physical in order to activate it (though not to sustain it).

The Guard power referenced here is merely an example, not the descriptive text for the guard power. In fact, this section of the text refers to spirit services and what powers constitute using up a service and which ones do not. Thus this block of text can be inferred to be referencing all physical powers. Not just Guard.

[Irion]

@Draco18s
Force 7 is not that hard for an advanced character if you really try to hit it.

So you sit at your nice home, you build with the advanced lifestyle rules with your aspected BC. (+2 dice,+2 drain resist)
Of course you got your force 4 powerfocus from chargen.
And since you are looking out to be an "angel summoner" you got a mentor which gives you +2 to one kind of spirit and a specialisation for another +2.
Of course binding and summoning are both at 6.
For drain resistance you just use the increase attribute spells to pup your drain attributes up to 9. And to even make things better you got a piece of cyberware which allows you to ignore one point of stun or shift one physical to stun.
Now the question is how advanced you are. Lets start with magic 5 and 0 initiations.

Now, lets look at your dicepool.
Summoning: 5(magic)+2(BC)+4(focus)+2(mentor)+2(spec)=15 dice
Binding: (the same)= 15 dice.
Drain resist: 9+9+2=20 dice (around 6 boxes soaked+1 cyberware.)

Spirit: Resisting summoning: 7 dice and up to 14 damage (0,04%). Likely beeing up to 8 (96+% lower than 10). That would translate at most in one box of physical and one box of stun.
The binding test is tricky. Even if we just doubble the numbers (no proper math, but still enought to get a feeling, you have to consider taking around 16 points of drain.
You will survive it however, espacially if you get to use edge on your test to resist. (Rerolling, thanks to silly rules, will get you another 4-5 hits)

You major issue is to beat the spirit with 15 dice against his 14. Again with edge, thats not such a big deal.

So if you rule, that spirits DO NOT USE EDGE and you build up your character to be a summoner without breaking a leg about it it is doable. (No binding focus etc..)
Mostly thanks to those silly rules about edge...
For an advanced summoner with 4 initiations and a magic of 7 it is even less of a problem. (4 more dice to resist drain and 2 more dice to summon and bind)
It gets out of hand if you go higher than force 10, because it gets much harder to cough up the dice to bind them.

[NiL_FisK_Urd]

You forgot to add the Skill to your tests - your mage has 5+6+2+4+2+2 = 21 dice, -4 for sustaining your spells.
If you take both summoning and binding at 5, you could do this straight out of chargen.

[Irion]

@NiL_FisK_Urd
Thanks, thought it looked a bit low. But I am kind of tired and should not even be writing this...

There are several ways to sustain those spells. Sustaining foci are not that expensive etc. You do not need to be afraid of BC or running into a ward, since you stay in your own house...

[Neraph]

@NiL_FisK_Urd
Thanks, thought it looked a bit low. But I am kind of tired and should not even be writing this...

There are several ways to sustain those spells. Sustaining foci are not that expensive etc. You do not need to be afraid of BC or running into a ward, since you stay in your own house...

Other bound Spirits also, ect.

EDIT: IIRC though, TJ's table runs that all spirits over Force 4 or something always roll Edge to resist, so very much a YMMV thing.

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

Other bound Spirits also, ect.

EDIT: IIRC though, TJ's table runs that all spirits over Force 4 or something always roll Edge to resist, so very much a YMMV thing.

Indeed... Force 4+ Spirits always use Edge to resist summoning and Binding at our table. Sure puts a kibosh on Spirits of Force 7+, and even makes the Force 5-6 Spirits a little iffy sometimes. Saw a Force 5 Spirit hit 10 Successes on a Binding Roll once. It was pretty ugly.

[Alpha Blue]

Indeed... Force 4+ Spirits always use Edge to resist summoning and Binding at our table. Sure puts a kibosh on Spirits of Force 7+, and even makes the Force 5-6 Spirits a little iffy sometimes. Saw a Force 5 Spirit hit 10 Successes on a Binding Roll once. It was pretty ugly.

"...Meddling with powers you cannot comprehend..."

Aaaaaaaaarrglh...

[Tymeaus Jalynsfe...]

"...Meddling with powers you cannot comprehend..."

Aaaaaaaaarrglh...

Yep, Pretty Much. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[pbangarth]

I'd like to point out that Assensing is different from Perception, even Perception on the astral plane. They are different functions on the astral plane.

Concealment affect Perception Tests only, not Assensing Tests. If you do not perceive it, you cannot Assense it at all.

[Neraph]

I'd like to point out that Assensing is different from Perception, even Perception on the astral plane. They are different functions on the astral plane.

Concealment affect Perception Tests only, not Assensing Tests. If you do not perceive it, you cannot Assense it at all.

That only depends on how you define "astral detection."

[pbangarth]

While astral perception allows an Awakened character to sense
the astral plane, actually interpreting what is sensed takes practice.
Interpreting auras to gain information about the person or thing to
whom they belong is called Assensing. A magician who wishes to
learn more about an aura must make an Assensing + Intuition test,
with the number of hits determining how much the magician learns,
as outlined on the Assensing Table (at right). Without attempting
to read an aura, a magician can still get an impression of what type
of aura it is (spell, spirit, living creature, etc.).

Assensing is used to interpret the aura you perceive, not to detect it in the first place.

Concealment subtracts a number of dice equal to the critter’s
Magic from any Perception Tests to locate the concealed subject.

Concealment doesn't affect information about the perceived object, it only controls locating it.

[blaze2050]

Sorry, coming late to the thread.
Somebody asked for a quote to prove, that a spirit power can be sustained from another astral plane.

I can't give that, but page 293 SR4A gives us

" Also, line of sight does not have to be maintained after the power takes hold of its target. Critters
may sustain a number of powers equal to their Magic at one time."

under the heading "Duration", subheading "Sustained".

For me it's basically the same for most scenarios if the spirit materializes and uses Concealment on my team and then vanishes to his home plane or if it materializes, uses Concealment and then flies to another city or continent or hides somewhere.

In both cases the power runs and nobody on site can do something against the spirit sustaining the power, because it doesn't have to be there.

[NiL_FisK_Urd]

Assensing is used to interpret the aura you perceive, not to detect it in the first place.

well, if you had read the next few lines, you would not state untrue things ...

An actual test should only be called for when an astral being is specifically trying to hide, or when a character is trying to astrally observe in detail; in both these situations, an Assensing Test is made.