Ok so heres the question if your a troll or a dwarf and you have thermographic can you turn it off? if not how the heck would they be able to read printed text and they would not be able to see color at anytime the way normal people do.. could cause some issues. but its not like it is goggles or cyberware that could has an on and off switch... no where does it state that metahumans and there enhanced eyesite is able to be turned of which could turn into a hinderance? Hope to get some feedback on this because this might be bad news for our dwarven mage!

It's not that they can turn it off, but they can focus to read, write and see colors.

You don't conciously control the focus of your eyes when you look up from reading a book to glance down the street. I see no reason why it wouldn't work similarly for thermographics.

its more a case of a overlay. you may see someone glow with heat, or have the heat vision slowly take over as the area around becomes darker. basically, don't think about it like those green images you see on tv whenever they are showing some night shots from iraq or similar.

given that they are born with this ability, their brain and body should be perfectly adapted to handle the sensory data. in other words, it should not be a problem.

unless someone stick a very hot object close to their view. but then that would be like sticking a flashlight into someones face.

It's always been my impression that the troll/dwarf natural thermo vision was just an increased sensitivity to a broader slice of the EM spectrum. Basicly that if you have natural thermo vision your eyes sense, and your brain interprets, more colors of red then we norms can imagine.

with low light you just see beter in the dark it's not like you see only black and white like some dogs.

with goggles/cybereyes the lowlight/thermo is overlayed ontop of normal vision

so with enhanced vision systems you can see both at the same time. It's just that in the dark you don't see the visable spectrum. So for example, for a troll to read something off a page of paper in total darkness he might need a light source.

I've always thought that it was unstated cannon that actual wood fiber hardcopy was rare. In < SR4 there were thermo printers, in SR4 now we have electronic paper. So, the reading in the dark situations might not apply so often.

*by thermal printers i mean the kind of "inkless" printers that print via heat on special paper that came out years ago. The point is that thermal printing, (as well as Ink printing), probably changes the Emissive properties of the paper surface which may allow a very sensitive system to detect IR emmission differentials between print and paper.

I have the impression that when archaeologists study historical documents they actualy use IR scanning but it may be that they're using UV scanning I don't remember off the top of my head.

In old SR3 the description was something like it was an overlay and they have both types of vision on simultaneously. SR3 also made a ditinction between natural and cyber thermographic, they provided different levels of penalty abatement.

SR4 does not have this distinction however, does it still requires that a cyber user use a simple action to switch vision modes?

i think they use UV scanning.

and one of the points of electronic paper is that it do not need a back light to be readable (unlike LCD screens). therefor, unless a electronic paper based device have a back light, one may well have a problem reading it in dark areas.

Ah, good point, Electronic paper is not a flexable LCD, it's probably ruthenium polymer.

You could read the book "Changeling" if you can find it for some good examples. Good book anyways.

Amusing random bit of info.

In Striper Assassin's ads, that book is named "Shadowrun: Challenging."

Changeling's a really good book for getting a trog's mindset, I think.

I agree that Shadowrun #5 Changeling, has good descriptions of what the world looks like to a troll. The book is first person from a trolls point of view and he describes that he can see an "aura of heat" around people, He can see the heat of his own body casting a pink glow through his bedcloths and he sees heat (not steam) rising from cups of coffee.

Im not so sure that its a good description of a trolls mindset. At least not the average troll. because the character Goblinized he knew what it was like to be human and it took him years to accept his body and the way other people reacted to him. If I quickly grew into a *really big* black man I'm not sure I'd immediately have a "black man's" mindset. Of course that example isn't a direct analog. ( BTW I'm white and average sized) I think the book gave and excelent descripion of what it might be like to be a troll physicaly and sensualy. Which of course has alot to do with mindset.

Even without Cerebral Boosters.

Thanks very much, now I have incentive to read it. Good to know, will do.

See, that is exactly the point I was going for in the other (coincidently FFoD) thread, about reading all the material, because you never know when some interesting little piece of lore might pop up.

I don't think the cure will ever go away. Is that troll in humanis still alive?

"IR reflection" Awesome!

that's something I might be able to use in my games. Do you think metahuman/cyber eyes might be able to pick up these reflections?

I guess by sencitivity I was actualy trying to say Resolution. I'd also like to know how big a range of the spectrum and what um... is the mid range of the frequencies or wavelengths (i can't keep em straight in my head) that the camera views?

thanx Cray74.

IR reflections are already used in games. for example, i recall some comment on corp security where some corners had material that reflected only in the IR spectrum, so that the guards (with thermographic vision enhancements of one sort of another) could see around the corner, but those without such enhancements could not.