This is probably covered somewhere but not finding it with search. Do these lamps just illuminate dual natured or does it allow mundanes to see into astral???

In the physical world, it allows characters with low-light vision to see in areas otherwise too dark and a +2 Perception test modifier to notice magic. In the astral plane it gives a +2 Astral visibility modifier. It does not give a mundane character astral perception.

That was my take, just making sure.

The way I read the description astral forms would also cast faint physical shadows in the light of a lucifer lamp.

I think GoldenAri is right:



In other words, a spirit may not actually be illumniated on the physical plane, but its shadow might appear on the wall. Targetting the thing would still probably be very difficult (especially since it's would still be moving at Astral velocities) but it gives a mundane the potential for "seeing" an astral spirit.

I just wish they had an option for the Eye Lights system!

Reading the entry I'm inclined to agree.

That sentence could be directed more toward justifying the bonus for the +2 perception test to notice magic and I'm not sure how much it could help with spirits mechanically, but it sure sounds like nearby spirits give off "unusual shadows".

I presume this is in "Arsenal". Sounds cool, but wouldn't that creep the hell out of you? You shine a light and nothing casts a shadow on the wall.

Relative to going on a bughunt without one...no, not creepy at all - this way you at least have slightly more warning.

They actually still wouldn't be able to target it with anything, since there isn't actually anything physical there to hit. They would, though, be able to, say, find out that there's a watcher, or other astral lurker, lying in wait there, and they need to go a different way.

What about an adept (assume no astral perception) with an active weapon focus?

That's a good question, but I think that the adept still has to be astrally active for his weapon focus to work on the spirit. The weapon would have an aura, but not an astral presence.

The high cost of the bulbs means they aren't likely to be used as an always on security feature, that's for sure. At 100 an hour each lamp would cost 876000 per year, Security Mages can probably still be hired for quite a bit less than that. However used in conjunction with things like GloMoss and Leeches this would give a mundane patrol team a away to try to verify a positive hit by a leech, and combined with a quicksilver camera a mundane team might (if they were pretty lucky) come away with a snapshot of an astral intruder.

Correct.

Actually incorrect. Active foci are dual natured. Weapon foci are "effective against astral foes" whether you are astrally active or not (SR4, p. 192). It's only an Astral Combat test if you are personally astrally projecting (same page).

So yeah, if you are physical and it's astral, you can still use your blades skill to attack the astral target with your dual natured weapon. I suggest throwing reflective chaffe dust into the air so that the shadows of the astral forms are cast in visible 3-dimensional real space.

-Frank

Of course, if the adept in question is targeting a purely astral entity, he'd have to be using Astral Combat anyway. Right? (Astral combat with dual-natured creatures can be confusing) And if he doesn't have astral perception, he probably doesn't have astral combat. But hey, he might, or he might not want to spend the action to use it right now, or else he won't have a complex action to attack anyway. It makes the situation stranger, but not impossible.

It probably goes without saying but apply modifier as seen fit, probably only a -4, maybe even -2 with the dust motes. You use astral combat if you don't have a foci or are not in your physical body, and charisma for damage. If you are in your physical body and have a foci, that straight blades skill and strength for damage.

I'm pretty sure you'd need an active focus to hit the spirit, and that you'd use the appropriate weapon skill. I had thought that astral combat was for fighting when you are on the astral plane. An adept in this scenario is physical and just happens to be attacking something on a different plane.

Not really, no. Dual natured attackers can use physical combat attacks against astral targets. That's why a single watcher can't automatically kill every Ghoul, Hellhound, Merrow, Thunderbird, and Barghest on the planet in extreme(ly slow) mortal kombat.

-Frank

From the SR FAQ.

Also.

Am I reading that wrong?

edit: Brevity not intended as confrontational.

Well, I'll be damned...

Curse you FAQ *shakes fist*

I had exactly this question come up last night and I made the adept pick up astral combat to be able to hit a spirit with his weapon focus (with willpower + astral combat).

It made sense to me that if the adept used his physical body to attack the area on the physical plane that he believed the spirit to be astrally, he would be able to damage it with the dual-natured weapon focus.. but the rules didn't seem to back me up as Moon-Hawk quoted above and I wasn't ready to house rule anything.

That FAQ answer is straight wrong. Dual Natured critters don't have an Astral Combat skill. Astral Combat is a no default skill. That ruling is "Hellhounds automaticlaly lose all astral combat and any watcher will eventually peck them to death because there is literally no way for them to even try to defend themselves."

The FAQ occassionally has clunkers in it. That answer is one of them.

-Frank

Erring on the side of the defense of the FAQ writer(s), I don't think they intended to imply that you couldn't use other combat options as a dual-natured fighter, but that if you were using the Astral Combat skill, it's linked to your Willpower regardless of your current plane of existence. That answer does not preclude a dual-natured fighter from not using Astral Combat, however. Regardless, it's one of the FAQ answers that I tend to ignore for the reasons mentioned above.

I have reconsidered this after reading this paragraph Frank pointed to..



Seems like an adept with astral perception and a weapon focus wouldn't need astral combat to hit a spirit after all. Thanks Frank.

Damn it! I am sick and f#*%$ing tired of this issue. Okay, fine, so as per SR4 pg 192 weapon foci can be used. That doesn't help the hellhounds or the merrow or any other dual natured critters who aren't using a weapon focus.
SR4 pg 184: Astral Combat

No correction in the errata. Pretty damn unambiguous, watchers pwn paracritters from here to absurdity.

edit: I'm ranting at the game/world, not any of you.

If they are dual-natured, shouldn't their claws/bite/tail be dual-natured too?

I mean what does dual-natured really mean? Their claws are represented on the physical plane and the astral plane. And if such a dual natured claw cuts through a wholly astral entity, it should still wound it as the two astral forms cannot occupy the same astral space at the same time.

I agree. And the skill which represents whether or not they can put their dual-natured claw through an astral body is apparently Astral Combat. The quote on pg 192 that seems to contradict that refers specifically to weapon foci and only weapon foci. Dual natured creatures, as far as I can see, follow the general rule for astral combat which clearly and unambiguously states that dual natured creatures attack purely astral entities with Willpower + Astral Combat. Which is stupid, but that's what it is. There needs an errata, either in the skills of every paracritter, or in the rules for astral combat. (I'd prefer the latter)
edit: Or in the Astral Combat skill, to allow for defaulting.

By definition, any attempt to hit an astral target involves Astral Combat Skill.

Following this a bit it sounds like we've got a case of Rules as Written don't quite match up with Rules as Intended (I'm assuming that one or more of the participants had a hand in actual development).

My short Recap. RAW states that any attack against a purely astral Entity requires Astral Combat Skill, RAW aslo states that Merrow, Hellound et.al. do not possess this Skill, ergo they cannot attack purely astral entities.

RAI suggests that dual nature creactures should be able to attack purely astral entities instinctively, which is a disconnect with the RAW.

Sounds like until an official fix is made, either allowing dual natured creatures to engage the purely astral with Physical COmbat Skills or by adding Astral Combat skill to all dual natured creatures this will have to be house ruled to fit your individual game sensibilities.

If you read the sentence before the one that you quoted, it becomes clear that, in its context, that one refers to an astrally perceiving character weilding the weapon focus. This is in opposition to a character who is astrally perceiving and weilding a non-magical 2x4, which would pass harmlessly through an astral form. It doesn't say in that sentence that the focus has to be active, either, by the way.

I read it as adepts don't need astral combat if they have a weapon focus. The dual nature of the weapon focus is what allows it to hit astrally not your astral combat" I will myself to hit your soul" ability. You're limited to your physical body still, wheras the astral being is going off of mental stats which will be reflected in its new dodge (unless he was faster on his feet than in his head). Same goes for dual-natured beings they are dual natured, they don't need to will themselves to hit something astrally they can do it since they exist simultaneously in two places.

When projecting you of course would use astral combat, because you no longer have an agility score, so your blades skill is kind of useless now. You "will yourself to hit".

Dual natured could astral combat, if they are some type of spirit devourer, who has a lower physical attack, than astral combat attack. But it would be by no means their only attack.

Oh yeah. My contention was just with him saying that the weapon focus could hit an astral form without the weilder being astrally active. I guess I should have edited off the rest of the quote.

@stevebugge: I agree with your summary completely.

Aside from Watchers being able to clear the world, this also goes against written canon.

Recall back in SR3-2-1 where there were bounties on ghouls? Why then was there not a single mage just zooming around in Astral mass extincting all the ghouls that were not majically active with his meatbody buddy following the chaos with a garbage truck or dozen?

Yes sir I agree, RAW is not As Intended. There is a serious disconnect.

Well, as pretty much everyone is n agreement that RAW is in the wrong here. Which method makes most sense to fix the problem?

And, I will add, if there were a single obvious way to fix it there really wouldn't be a problem. We could all look at it, say "Mmm hmmm, that's absurd, they obviously intended X," and move on. The problem is, there are multiple valid ways to fix the problem, and it's not even a complete impossibility that it works they way it's stated, just that the official way has horrible, unavoidable conclusions, and that's exactly the sort of thing that breeds rabid flamewars until we get a 100% official answer. Or at least 99% official. (I'm looking at you, SR4 FAQ) j/k

But....I'd rather just bitch.
Seriously, I'm not sure. I think all dual-natured and astrally perceiving entities should be able to attack with their physical attributes and skills, whether they're using a weapon focus or not.
However I'm still unsure on whether 1) their damage should be physically based (i.e. strength based) or astrally based (i.e. charisma based), and 2) if they should be able to ALSO use Willpower+Astral Combat, if that would benefit them more.
I could make something up, but I'd prefer an official answer and an entry in errata 1.6.

edit: In the meantime, I could be happy with someone chiming in with "I wrote the Astral Combat section, and I intended it to work thusly."

I think my solution is going to be simple. Dual Natured critters can use their natural weapons as a weapon focus for purposes of hitting astral entities (as detailed on 192-193). This doesn't prevent them from using astral combat if they have it, but without it they are not helpless to weak astral beings whom they can already see and must watch as they tear their soul apart.. because it's not like they could easily run and hide.

If they really are "dual natured" they should have survival instincts and methods against both planes. It doesn't make sense that they wouldn't - as natural selection would have ended their existence long long ago (the mage and the ghoul example, above).

Raij: What about astrally perceiving characters?

Without a weapon focus? I suppose they should still be considered dual natured too and going by my fix above that means they should be able to walk up and punch a spirit in the eye with their bare hand. That brings up a further issue I suppose, guess it's not as easy a fix as I thought.

I imagine some line needs to be drawn between astral perception and dual nature as it relates to natural weapon use in the astral (even though the book says astrally perceiving characters are considered dual natured).

I dont have anybooks before me at the moment, but as I recall (again pre SR4) a perceiving character is dual natured.

He can be struck from astral and still must move his meat body. Hence I would call it the same a dual natured creatures, the perceiver would attack with unarmed combat with his feet/hands and so on doing physical based damage.

Now, if the perceiver was using the mundane 2x4 (from above) then that 2x4 would be useless as a physical attack, but I suppose you could use that Astral combat + willpower test with appropriate charisma damage (iirc) and the 2x4 is just a prop.

Well, actually, if they can only attack purely astral entities with Astral Combat skill, having a weapon focus wouldn't help, since they aren't allowed to default to the skill from their willpower.

What they could do, possibly, is make an attack of will.

Street Magic p.94


I suppose that is actually the same as defaulting to Astral Combat, but without the -1 die penalty for defaulting. The downside to that theory is that it seems that the attack of will is intended for use against physically present spirits. It could be our answer, though.

heh, i don't know why i didn't think of this sooner. if the Lucifer Lamp produces a dual natured beam of light, then that can be amplified and focused into a dual natured laser.

probably need a magicaly active focusing lense, and the illuminating coil would have to be replaced with every use...vehicular powered, obviously...

You'd want to get a dual natured lasing substance. I suggest going to Nag Kampuchea and picking up some Naga Emeralds.

-Frank

So you endorse the Watcher beats every single dual natured creature currently in print solution?

I'd say that the obvious solution is that who ever did the stats for critters screwed up. There are several other examples of this just look at the first printing spirit stats. An errata that gave all the dual actives Astral combat would fix things.

But it still wouldn't be desirable, because many dual critters have a Charisma of 1. Dual critters should be using their natural weaponry (and thus their unarmed combat) against astral foes. Otherwise they can't hand out real damage on the astral and dual critters become a joke instead of a threat.

--

That and Ancient History's statement that any attack against an astral target is Astral Combat is flat wrong, because we are primarily speaking about Weapon Foci, which specifically use your physical attributes and close combat skills to attack astral forms. As stated in the description of the focus in question.

So the universal general case that Ancient History is alluding to does not exist. And attempting to make it universal law would be bad for the game and the world.

-Frank

Except that astral combat clearly covers attacks with weapon foci against astral targets, as given in the table, whereas your suggestion is "I attack the air and hope to hit something."

All attacks go through the air and hope to hi something. But in any case, astral combat covers attacks with weapon foci by astral wielders, not neceessarily ones against astral targets.



Got that? Physical attributes and skills against astral forms. Black and white. Ancient History: read the book.

-Frank

I could say the same to you, Frank. There's no precedent for trying to stab astral space.