Invisiblity and LAN question Options

[Vadth the Bluelo...]

I though of this during a game I was running and I wasn't sure how to resolve it. Lets say a team is connected on a LAN and the mage goes dual natured. The team comes across an enemy that is invisible. Now....

1. Can the mage put an outline of the enemy on his teammates' AR so they know exactly where to shoot? If yes, can he update it in real-time?
2. What would the teammates' dice pool be to hit the invisible target?
3. Would it be any difference if it was just someone who could see through the invisible instead of the dual natured mage?

[DeathStrobe]

1. Can the mage put an outline of the enemy on his teammates' AR so they know exactly where to shoot? If yes, can he update it in real-time?
2. What would the teammates' dice pool be to hit the invisible target?
3. Would it be any difference if it was just someone who could see through the invisible instead of the dual natured mage?

1. No...probably... Mages can't use AR while astrally perceiving. Maybe give the mage a laser pointer and point at the ground of the target...? That might work...? But of course at that point, I wonder why you just don't have the mage shoot the target with a spell.
2. -6 for blind fighting, and using intuition instead of agility. Or other characters can switch their vision to thermal or something.
3. Yes? You mean if someone was using a different vision mode or resisted the invisibility spell? Then yes? That is kind of different from having a made astrally perceive? I'm not sure if I understood that question correctly.

[Vadth the Bluelo...]

1. No...probably... Mages can't use AR while astrally perceiving. Maybe give the mage a laser pointer and point at the ground of the target...? That might work...? But of course at that point, I wonder why you just don't have the mage shoot the target with a spell.
2. -6 for blind fighting, and using intuition instead of agility. Or other characters can switch their vision to thermal or something.
3. Yes? You mean if someone was using a different vision mode or resisted the invisibility spell? Then yes? That is kind of different from having a made astrally perceive? I'm not sure if I understood their question correctly.

1. His AR should still be running as well as his connection to the LAN. He can't see his AR display but he should still be able to issue mental commands.
2. If the team has an AR outline of the target, why would they have the same dice pool to as someone who thinks they heard something and shoots.
3. I mean if someone resisted the spell, could they create an outline of the target on his team AR display.

[DeathStrobe]

1. His AR should still be running as well as his connection to the LAN. He can't see his AR display but he should still be able to issue mental commands.
2. If the team has an AR outline of the target, why would they have the same dice pool to as someone who thinks they heard something and shoots.
3. I mean if someone resisted the spell, could they create an outline of the target on his team AR display.

1. I don't think so. Even if the mage had trodes, so they could use the matrix with a thought, I would assume that the mages image linked camera still can't target an invisible target.
2. I don't know if they'd get that outline is the thing. But assuming if they did somehow, I'd probably use the vision modifiers, something like fighting with thermo in total darkness, so a -3, but that's only a guess since I don't think the AR outline is going to be making an invisible target all that clear to see.
3. Good question... the answer is maybe...? I guess this gets to the question of how improve invisibility works. If the target has light bending around them, and someone resists does that mean light stops bending for the target? That doesn't make sense, so odds are the person that resisted probably just noticed footprints or some kind of vision distortion while the others didn't. But that doesn't make sense either, because as soon at a character resisted the spell, they'd be able to point out the tells of the invisible character and everyone would know at that point. But the rules don't really support that... I'm going to lean a bit towards no...because there are already ways to counter invisibility and it seems to cheese the spell a bit to counter the caster completely with just one person resisting it.

[Falconer]

He can issue mental commands, but he can't see a thing on his AR display. So he doesn't know what he's entering... short of telling a smartgun to eject a clip with a mental command and other simple actions. He might as well not have AR/DNI.

More to the point you hand him a laser pointer... and he can't see the dot. Astral perception doesn't work on 'light'. It works on 'life lighting'. Similarly... the mage could fire a pistol or gun at the target at a -2 penalty for astrally percieving while performing a physical attack/action. (with no bonuses from laser sights or smartlinks since he can't see either).


1. No he can't
2. -6 for invisible target. *IF* you had something like a recon drone with UWB or ultrasound... you could use the 'info-guided' attacks in Arsenal. But the mage cannot provide this information... tech does not interface with astral perception at all. Not only this, since you are firing blind you use Intution + weapon instead of Agility + weapon.
3. If they see through the illusion they attack normally.

Everyone should get a good chance to resist the invisibility spell automatically.
Improved invisibility works on drones only if it beats the OR of the drone when cast.
Invisibility (mana not physical/improved) doesn't work on cameras or drones at all.
And living targets resist the spell with willpower (mana) or intution (physical) + counterspelling (if your mage isn't providing allies counterspelling they got bigger issues).
If they get as many successes as the spellcaster they see through the invisibility.


Also... why isn't your mage just dispelling the other guys invisibility spell?! Or nuke the target with a combat spell instead?

Mage uses a complex action to dispel magic... rolls Magic + counterspelling... reduce the number of successes of the initial casting by the dispelling successes. Mage resists drain as if he had cast the invisibility himself. People resist the spell at the reduced hits though and probably see right through it.

[phlapjack77]

For 1:
I think in this situation, if the team had a tacnet going, the mage with trodes MIGHT be able to send some kind of location data over the AR/tacnet to give some kind of benefit, but this is definitely in house rule territory. I would think only rough information like the feed of where your natural vision is focused, and the message "he's there behind the boxes".

Another idea is if the mage has the Edit program, he could make an Edit complex action to try to edit an AR feed to draw a crude picture of where the invisible guy is. Still wouldn't be as good as if the rest of the team could see the invisible target, but maybe some kind of benefit could be had.

As others have said, all in all the mage seems like he'd be better served either directly attacking the invisible target or attempting to do something about the invisibility with counterspelling.

[Vadth the Bluelo...]

For 1:
I think in this situation, if the team had a tacnet going, the mage with trodes MIGHT be able to send some kind of location data over the AR/tacnet to give some kind of benefit, but this is definitely in house rule territory. I would think only rough information like the feed of where your natural vision is focused, and the message "he's there behind the boxes".

Another idea is if the mage has the Edit program, he could make an Edit complex action to try to edit an AR feed to draw a crude picture of where the invisible guy is. Still wouldn't be as good as if the rest of the team could see the invisible target, but maybe some kind of benefit could be had.

As others have said, all in all the mage seems like he'd be better served either directly attacking the invisible target or attempting to do something about the invisibility with counterspelling.

These are the rules I was looking for. In particular the Edit complex action. I figure there had to be a way for a mage to do this but it turns out to much harder than I thought. As for why not have the mage just attack, 1 I didn't know you could use counterspell in that way. 2 in my example the mage in question got fubar earlier in the round and realize his up against a much stronger mage. Someone he doubt he could affect if he was healthy, much less now that he is injured. He also had one initiative pass as oppose to his buddy with the big gun whom had three. Lastly he didn't have much in combat spells.

[_Pax._]

1. No...probably... Mages can't use AR while astrally perceiving.

But they can subvocalise commands to their commlink to highlight a particular location. Or touch-type a text message of those commands.

[phlapjack77]

Ok, so it looks like counterspelling might be the mage's best option.

As for attacking, it doesn't have to be spells in particular. I guess the mage isn't that good with a gun? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Also, does the mage have summoning? A spirit could also astrally see the target and would be more of a threat, plus if it's materialized it might be able to help the others see where the invisible guy is.

Does the mage have any other "technological" vision additions? Thermo? UWB? X-Ray? Invisibility would only work against normal vision. If he had, say, thermographic glasses, he could feed that to his teammates, I would think.

These last ideas need for the GM to be sort of willing to play along:

Does the mage have anything like water or something with gecko tape? Throw it on the invisible guy, it sticks to him, gives the location away. Any non-combat spells that might have a similar result like this?

[DeathStrobe]

But they can subvocalise commands to their commlink to highlight a particular location. Or touch-type a text message of those commands.

Yes...but what's the mage going to say? "Shoot at the box!" So the street sam shoots in the direction of the box. It's still going to be a blind shot...

[_Pax._]

Yes...but what's the mage going to say? "Shoot at the box!" So the street sam shoots in the direction of the box. It's still going to be a blind shot...

"mark Alpha, six-zero at seven plus two"

And his commlink puts a flashing red 1m sphere on the TacNet's AR display, seven meters away and two meters up, sixty degrees to the right of the mage's facing.

Next IP, "mark Alpha, zero at six plus five"

And the commlink reduces the first sphere to 0.5M diameter, not flashing, and orange ... draws a line to the new location, and pops a flashing red 1m sphere six meters out and five meters up from wherever the mage is facing.

...

Perfect? No. Might require a roll or two fo the mage to estimate bearings and distances? Yes.

Still damned useful? Hell yes. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Especially after a couple of those marks have been put up, and the rest of the team (and their TacNet) can start working on predicting the enemy's NEXT move.

[Vadth the Bluelo...]

Ok, so it looks like counterspelling might be the mage's best option.

I just looked up the counterspelling rules, that's very unlikely to work. In my example the mage had 5 dice and would be against a dice pool of 10-12.

As for attacking, it doesn't have to be spells in particular. I guess the mage isn't that good with a gun? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Also, does the mage have summoning? A spirit could also astrally see the target and would be more of a threat, plus if it's materialized it might be able to help the others see where the invisible guy is.

Does the mage have any other "technological" vision additions? Thermo? UWB? X-Ray? Invisibility would only work against normal vision. If he had, say, thermographic glasses, he could feed that to his teammates, I would think.

These last ideas need for the GM to be sort of willing to play along:

Does the mage have anything like water or something with gecko tape? Throw it on the invisible guy, it sticks to him, gives the location away. Any non-combat spells that might have a similar result like this?

Just to be clear, in the game where I thought this up I was the GM and I was running a module. Given who the mage was, I would think the answer to many of those questions should be yes but the adventure was very light on his gear. He did have a gun but the only way for him to see the player mage was to be astrally perceiving. So his dice pool would have been 1.

I have gone beyond what happen in my game to trying to figure out how to get this to work in the rules.

[Falconer]

Pax:
Which is exactly my point... the mage can't see his own AR display to know if he even marked the target properly.

That's why 'editing' a map is drawing like a blind monkey in the middle of combat. The mage can't see what he's doing in AR... so is operating just as blindly as the rest of his team.

Mages shift their entire perception to the astral when they do so... and blind their normal senses. That's the drawback compared to 'dual-natured' critter power... the advantage is you can turn it off.


Phlapjack:
No... invisibility blocks all natural forms of vision... low-light, normal, and thermo. This is stated directly in the spell description.

You need a radar, or UWB radar, or ultrasound sonar to penetrate the invisibility. (all things which any half decent sam should be packing! and are also fairly commonly added to drones as part of their sensor suite).

You also don't need a tacnet for an info guided attack. p162 arsenal... just need a guy with the relevant sensor and others with smartguns.


OP:
If I were the mage in that situation... I'd do two things... first I'd dispel the other mages 'increase reflexes'. If he only has 3 passes if I get 2 successes on the test... the other mage immediately also drops to only a single pass (initiative rules... losses take effect immediately. Gains don't take affect til the next combat turn after it's cast). This protects me and the rest of my team from the mages immediate displeasure and counter-attack if he's acted already (likely if he's under increase ref and you aren't).

Then I'd spend edge for an extra pass... and dispel the invisibility. Now with the rest of the team probably able to see the now out of actions mage... it should be a simple exercise in 'geek the mage 101'.

[_Pax._]

Pax:
Which is exactly my point... the mage can't see his own AR display to know if he even marked the target properly.

He doesn't really have to. Sure, the threshold may be higher than if he could, but ... *shrug* ...

[DeathStrobe]

He doesn't really have to. Sure, the threshold may be higher than if he could, but ... *shrug* ...

I don't know if you've ever drawn without looking at your paper...but its very difficult... And that's basically what the mage would be doing. Only harder because he's working with 3D space...

[_Pax._]

It's not drawing. It's SPEAKING (quietly) to a voice-controlled system.

[phlapjack77]

Phlapjack:
No... invisibility blocks all natural forms of vision... low-light, normal, and thermo. This is stated directly in the spell description.

You need a radar, or UWB radar, or ultrasound sonar to penetrate the invisibility. (all things which any half decent sam should be packing! and are also fairly commonly added to drones as part of their sensor suite).

You also don't need a tacnet for an info guided attack. p162 arsenal... just need a guy with the relevant sensor and others with smartguns.

Yeah, I had been thinking that thermo on glasses would count as a technological sensor and thus not be affected by invisibility. But reading the spell more, I probably would agree with you - anyone that's affected by the spell can't visually see the target, period.

Good find on the indirect targetting. Still probably not usable for this situation, but overall good to know.

[Tanegar]

Another idea is if the mage has the Edit program, he could make an Edit complex action to try to edit an AR feed to draw a crude picture of where the invisible guy is. Still wouldn't be as good as if the rest of the team could see the invisible target, but maybe some kind of benefit could be had.

After giving it some thought, I think this is probably a good way to handle it.
1) The mage makes an Edit complex action to mark an invisible target on the team's AR tacnet feed. Note the number of hits on this test (for the sake of demonstration, we'll say 3).
2) The shooter then makes his attack roll, applying the Blind Fire penalty (-6), and applying the number of hits from the mage's Edit action as a positive modifier (+3). Note that this attack cannot benefit from a smartlink bonus unless the gun has been explicitly modified with sensors which defeat invisibility; and cannot benefit from the normal tacnet bonus unless all contributors are likewise equipped with sensors which defeat invisibility. If that's the case, however, all of this is moot, as you don't need the Edit action to begin with. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

All in all, this is the kind of thing that's vastly more useful as an ambush tool than in a stand-up fight. Invisible mage thinks he's safe from snipers... until an assensing spotter marks him for a sniper, who then blows his head off.

[DMiller]

I think what I'd do in this situation, assuming the mage isn't going to use magic to counter magic is to have the mage make a Computer + Intuition (2) test with a -2 for doing so while using Astral Perception (simple action, use skill). Then I'd use the net hits from that test to reduce the Blind Fire (-6) modifier for the rest of the team. Of course that is assuming that the team is using TACNET.

Just my 2¥

[DeathStrobe]

Why wouldn't the mage get a -6 for doing a Matrix action while blind to the Matrix?

While I can agree that the mage can input things in to the Matrix, he'll have no idea what he's doing or if he's doing it right, which sounds kind of like a blind fight, just with the Matrix.

[Shaidar]

A TacNet is a definite must for this IMO, a straight AR network is not suited to making sense of this kind of in-depth tactical information.

I like DMiller's approach of applying the Blind Fire modifier (-6) and then partially, or fully if the dice throw well, negating the over-all modifier for his teammates.

[DMiller]

Why wouldn't the mage get a -6 for doing a Matrix action while blind to the Matrix?

While I can agree that the mage can input things in to the Matrix, he'll have no idea what he's doing or if he's doing it right, which sounds kind of like a blind fight, just with the Matrix.

Astral Perception makes your AR blind; however it only imposes a -2 to physical actions. So if the Mage is perceiving astrally, he should be able to tell where his face is pointed and using mental commands through his PAN issue instructions to draw a rough circle, sphere or box around the person he knows is there.

Think of it this way… If I were to put on someone else's glasses I could no longer see in detail (imposing a -2 to physical actions). I’ll bet that I could still hold my tablet up with the camera on and draw a rough circle around someone that I know is standing in front of me. In ShadowRun this circle drawing becomes easier with DNI. I know that Astral Perception isn't exactly like wearing someone else's glasses but in my opinion it's a close enough analogy for this situation.

[DeathStrobe]

Astral Perception makes your AR blind; however it only imposes a -2 to physical actions. So if the Mage is perceiving astrally, he should be able to tell where his face is pointed and using mental commands through his PAN issue instructions to draw a rough circle, sphere or box around the person he knows is there.

Think of it this way… If I were to put on someone else's glasses I could no longer see in detail (imposing a -2 to physical actions). I’ll bet that I could still hold my tablet up with the camera on and draw a rough circle around someone that I know is standing in front of me. In ShadowRun this circle drawing becomes easier with DNI. I know that Astral Perception isn't exactly like wearing someone else's glasses but in my opinion it's a close enough analogy for this situation.

Yes, -2 to physical actions. The Matrix isn't a physical action. When you are in full VR and try to act in meat space you get a -6 to all tests. Why would it work that a mage would only get a -2 to Matrix actions if they can't even perceive the Matrix actions? And how are you going to draw something on your tablet that your tablet can't even see. The computer program can't help assist you because the program isn't seeing what you are seeing. And how is the program suppose to gage depth on this target that it can't see? There is no way it can give an accuracy bonus without the mage blinding himself to the astral to see the AR, or blinding himself to the Matrix to see the invisible target.

[DMiller]

Yes, -2 to physical actions. The Matrix isn't a physical action. When you are in full VR and try to act in meat space you get a -6 to all tests. Why would it work that a mage would only get a -2 to Matrix actions if they can't even perceive the Matrix actions? And how are you going to draw something on your tablet that your tablet can't even see. The computer program can't help assist you because the program isn't seeing what you are seeing. And how is the program suppose to gage depth on this target that it can't see? There is no way it can give an accuracy bonus without the mage blinding himself to the astral to see the AR, or blinding himself to the Matrix to see the invisible target.

I guess we are just of differing opinions of what is possible. Both can be valid arguments and without hard rules (or living it) there is no way to be sure which interpretation is correct. Both provide options for the original post.

[Starmage21]

Wasnt there something in the corebook about one of the things that hackers can do is maintain AROs in the team's AR interfaces thus giving the team an init boost? As long as the mage is not astrally projecting, astrally perception gives that -2 dice pool, but his eyes dont stop working. He could see and use AR just fine especially if he's using glasses for the AR display. Nothing would stop him from spending whatever action it takes to update the location of invisi-guy's ARO. This would tell the rest of the team his approximate location and give them the chance to make that -6 blind-fight AND a chance to resist the invisibility spell.