So my group has been trying to figure out how to conceal themselves from prying eyes on the astral. They're also curious whether there's a way to conceal a spirit. Infiltration arguably works, but no spirit has it so defaults to Force -1 Die typically. Masking would help a projecting mage, but only to a certain extent.

Is there a way of doing this? Would it even be a good idea?

With a sweep of his...

Hat

Invisibility? Sure, the mana spell would work, and they wouldn't see you. They would see the aura of the invisibility spell however, making it mostly worthless.

Concealment, wouldn't work for much the same reason.

1) Yes, there is astral concealment. There are astral features you can hide behind, etc. Stealth still works, although the rules have changed a bit (okay, a lot), but ultimately, it comes down to things like LOS and blending in. Doesn't help so much against detection spells, but still...

2) Invisibility does NOT work on the astral, since invisibility only affects sight, and all spells are always visible on the astral. Something I've been wanting to pull over on a GM but haven't yet is a mind manipulation spell along the lines of 'ignore me' or 'somebody else's problem' - the spell makes the subject ignore the caster. Because it doesn't matter if he sees the spell or not, it should work on the astral.

Nezumi, when you're talking about "Yes, there is astral concealment" you're really just referring to the use of infiltration, correct? The spirit power concealment is physical only, so obviously uselsess.

Basic answer - use infiltration unskilled and try to avoid LOS?

With a sweep of his...

Hat

Infiltration?? No, I'm talking about good old Stealth. Although I do believe the spirit power concealment works as well.

Concealment is a Physical Power, and as such does not work on the Astral.

Infiltration is basically the Stealth of SR4.

Infilitration is the specific skill of the Stealth group that is used for sneaking/hiding, so yes infiltration.

Edit: Damn, Fortune beat me to it.

I can't remember if it was house rule or core, but I remember someone once talking about an Astral specialization of infiltration to represent understanding how to best hide from astral observers.

The assumption would be using things like other living matter to mask your aura or whatnot as well as knowing what can be seen through and what can't in the astral.

I remember that as well, but mostly sure it was mentioned on a previous post. Anyway Im lazy to check but if it is somewhere is on the S&M.

Concealment can't be used on a purely astral subject. But, it can be used on a dual natured or a purely physical subject to protect them from detection by purely astral beings. Concealment helps the subject blend into the terrain and there are plenty of terrain features that can obfuscate a subject from astral perception.

Uhh, no. It can't be used on the astral plane, and has no effect on the astral plane whatsoever. Concealment makes a person harder to detect on the physical plane, by however you feel like explaining it. It is a physical power, and has no effect on the astral plane. Much like how a physical barrier does nothing to astral beings. Or how a camouflage jacket won't help you hide astrally either.

So infiltrate does indeed work on both sides of the planescape? That strikes me as odd as auras are splashes of color in an otherwise drab world. I heard someone mention something about LoS being the major deciding factor.
I have a ninja esque player who got spotted by a patroling astral spirit last game and he feels really jyped.
Exactly how does a mundane fella hide from astral perception?

The world isn't drab. Living stuff glows. That includes animals, micro-organisms, plants, spore in the air, etc. Pollution would also taint the astral. Granted, if the character is standing in the middle of a cubicle or a server room, he'd be a lot easier to see, but that's the same as a person walking in the middle of a parking lot on the mundane.

Be on the other side of a wall.

Yes Nezumi, hence the astral visibility modifier table. (SM pg. 114)

Mordinvan is saying if a mage has LoS then he can see the hiding individual, this makes sense to my logical mind, but game mechanically it makes mages the best security ever, and somewhat dampens stealth builds. Is there no way to cloak one's self from astral perception? I noticed that even the Masking power of adepts does nothing to conceal one's presence on the astral plane...

Would it be theme-destroying to allow new adept powers to be made? Or perhaps if one has the 'Astral' specialization to infiltrate?

Note also that the Concealment power reduces Perception dice pools, not Assensing dice pools. So even if it affected astral observers, it wouldn't reduce their astral observation dice pools and thuse wouldn't make it harder for watchers to astrally perceive your presence.

-Frank

Someone else said it already but a specialized version of the control thoughts spell which says "ignore me" would do the job, or at least should, I just have no way to guess how you could make it work on more then a single group of people at once, and you'd have to know where all of your observers are unlike invisibility. But mages have masking meta magics, and it may be possible to make a spell which enhances one, or mimics one to total obsure your aura, but you'd have to ask frank about that, as I'm pretty much guessing.

Sounds like the spell "See-Me-Not" from the Tom Dowd authored adventure module "Silver Angel" that came bundled with the first edition GM Screen. The target of the spell would become distracted whenever they encountered a particular visual stimulus, shown to them immediately upon spellcasting. So distracted, in fact, that they do not even notice that they're being manipulated. Also the spell did not wear off as long as it was sustained by the caster.

Not a bad spell, except for one catch: this highly specialized and mind-numbingly useful spell also came with a drain code of Light (One box of damage) and required only a single success to stage down to nothing (under SR1's variable staging).

If I were to recreate this spell under SR4, I'd make it a permanent mana LOS mental manipulation spell and give it a DV of (F / 2) +1. I'd also adjust the chance for the victim to shake mental control: instead of the willpower test every (Force) combat turns, the target gets to make the willpower test every (Force) minutes, and doesn't spend a complex action to do so. Mechanically, the caster chooses up to Force number of things they want not to be seen. When the target makes a perception test that could result in one of the designated things being seen (including exotic forms of "seeing" such as contour maps from ultrasound/radar, or remote camera feeds), the spell removes the perception test bonuses for objects that stand out and perceiver actively looking, if those bonuses would have applied, and applies the penalties for being distracted. The spellcaster's net hits (capped by Force) are also added to the Perception Test Threshold. The area effect version of See-Me-Not is called Someone-Else's-Problem and has a DV of (F / 2) + 3.

Just to make sure I am straight on this:
There is no existing way to conceal yourself from an astral perceiver.
Except possibly infiltrate?

that and masking yourself to blend into the crowd to look like someone who belongs there.... yea, that about how I understand it.

Anybody taken a look at the Invisibility spell lately?

Yes, hides you from the EM spectrum, last I checked astral sight didn't use any wavelength I'm aware of, so its likely not going to be of much use.

I was more looking at the part where it affects the minds of the onlookers. Your mileage may vary with your GM.

don't remember seeing that part. Although it would make sense a mana invisibility spell would affect living minds looking at your no matter what method they were useing to look.

Amusingly enough, the Metal Gear cardboard box may help you when trying to avoid people on the astral seeing you. Since astral perception can't see through the cardboard box you are hiding under, you are much less noticable.

So when Snake gets the call that the patrol elemental is coming his way, he hides under his cardboard box, and hopes the elemental is not bright enough to wonder why a cardboard box is just sitting there...

There's your problem, your edition is broken.



That's like saying if I have line of sight on the sniper hiding with camouflage on the roof top I can see him. That said, if your GM plays such that he is always aware of every living creature within LOS in any direction all the time with no real test, well that may be a problem. Realistically, no individual should be able to juggle all of those entities at once. The world is full of life at every level, and full of magical residue from different sources. Your GM needs to recognize that. The mage can't just astrally float above the city and say 'ah, there's Bob!' with pin-point accuracy.

Yes, you can be invisable on the atsral plane useing the spell. If you read the spell you will see that one affects peoples minds but not tech and sensors, while the other affects sensors and visual sight by bending light.
The former is the one you need to use to hide from astral sight.
Also, infiltration is basically as effective on the atral plane as it is on the physical, although as a GM I would say you would at least need astral perception before being able to use the infiltration on the astral. Other GM's might be a bit more leniant, especially if they are working with a group of infiltrators or very specialized infiltration adepts.

This is spell makes the subject more dificult to detect by nor-
mal visual senses (including low-light, thermographic, and other
senses that rely on the visual spectrum). The subject is completely
tangible and detectable by the other senses (hearing, smell, touch,
etc.). Her aura is still visible to astral perception

Don't think it would fly with my GM.

I'm just going to get Extended Masking and hope that I can use that to avoid some detection on the astral plane. All in all though astral perception completely changes the game and magical defense are nearly impossible to overcome without detection if they are setup right.

Thats why there are modifiers for crowds. But if you think you can sneak across astrally dead concrete with a spirit hovering over you and think any form of mundane camo is going to hide you, you are sorely mistaken.

That is quite true, but you still have the glowing aura from the Invisibility spell surrounding you.

Keep in mind that every living thing has an aura, even the earth itself. And even those things that are not alive have Astral shadows that can be utilized to impede or even block Astral Perception.

Yep, just don't expect you ruthenium armor is going to hide you. You need to break LOS or having confusing/obsuring astral backgrounds to hide in, otherwise you look like a glowing neon sign in the middle of a dimly lit club, "painfully obvious to anyone taking the time to look".

Couldn't you just have a mana based invisibility spell (mind affecting) which says, ignore me, and any aura's in my imediate vicinity?

I don't know, but that ain't the mana-based Invisibility spell as written, which is what I was responding to.

To all those stating that Invisibility hides your aura on the astral plane, the above quote is taken directly from the spell description in SR4.

"Her aura is still visible to astral perception"

Now if there was someway to not have any aura what so ever than you might be in business. The problem is even no aura is an aura in astral space...so even that doesn't work. Open Concrete + Spirits = Farked

I disagree. I think it should be possible to use even the Earth's own glow to obscure your presence. It's all part and parcel of the Infiltration test, with modifiers for little/no cover and the like. If it is not required for you to break LOS in the Physical to use Infiltration, I don't see why that requirement would be added for using the same skill on the Astral.

Invisibility, which affects minds is an option, but your still stuck with the "Invisibility (Realistic, Single-Sense)" which means it affects a single sense, and astral sense isn't it.

What may be interesting is creating an astral senses variant of the spell.

The game mechanic is designed for the 'standard' scenario and we should expect it to break down in extreme ones. If you take the superninja and lock him in a completely empty room, he shouldn't be able to use stealth to overcome his mundane perception modifiers, but by the book he can. Logically, your stealthy dude should have an equivalent level of challenge hiding on the astral when surrounded by nothing to break LOS or provide ambient background auras. But most of the time Mr Ninja will have more options. As was previously mentioned, anything that blocks LOS hides the aura, and most office complexes are full of tables, chairs, file cabinets, false ceilings, air ducts, decorative planters, cube partitions, etc. Also, since astral forms are muted and indistinct the shuffling cardboard box doesn't necessarily stand out in an astral scan like it would in a physical scan. (Especially to a spirit which isn't used to thinking about what things should look like on the physical.)

Edit: There was an SR2 spell called "Disregard" that sounds like what you guys are talking about. Mental illusion where the viewers would see you, but would assume that you just belonged there. I don't know if it was supposed to work on astral or not...

Now that is interesting. What senses can you use on the astral? Are their alternatives to sight, sound, and touch, or is it just sight and telepathy? Making a spell of that nature would probably have (F/2 + 2) drain.

Force Breakdown:

Mana Spell - 0
LOS - 0
Sustained - 0
Realistic - 0
Multi - Sense - 0 (I gave it multi sense because I am not sure how an Illusion would work otherwise on the astral...)
Hides or Conceals - -2

Basically the spell would mask your personal aura and itself on the astral plane. Any Foci, Spirits, or other magical effects on you would show up. This spell would not allow you to pass through a barrier as it effects the perception of your reality, not your actual reality. A barrier would still keep you at bay.

I should probably do an actual write up for the spell when I have some time.

Most astral forms are described as bright and vibrant, while the earth's last I checked was substantially less so. Also that would have to be in area's where the bare ground was exposed, as several feet of cement as in most compounds would block LOS to it.

There is a basis for astral sight being able to be affected by spells, by the detection spells that give you remote astral sight. No reason why you couldn't have an astral invisibility spell also, but to have both work, you'd need to either cast both invis & astral invis, or come up with a single multi-sense mana spell that does everything.

And yet it is still possible, just as it is possible for a naked ninja wearing a glowing neon sombrero to sneak across a well lit but otherwise empty room. Granted that both situations would have penalties involved, but a positive outcome is possible in either scenario. As I said, there is no reason to arbitrarily rule that Infiltration works any differently on the Astral than it does on the Physical.

Again, not sure about your heathen books, but in MitS, and every edition preceding, it's clear the Earth has an astral presence of its own. It has its own aura.

Now granted, if the character is walking through a parking lot, he'll be about as obvious on the astral as he is on the physical. However, he still gets a chance to roll, as much as the odds are against him. He's not in a vacuum (and if he was in a vacuum, the other guy wouldn't be able to use astral perception ).

Nicely done. I was wondering when someone would bother to actually crack open their hymnal. Kudos.

Sorry, madmarvin beat you to it already. =i)

I love it!

Never said earth didn't. I just don't remember the description of its aura being compairable to that of a meta humans, or you'd never see anyone on open terrain, it would have to be darker, and more muted otherwise it would be blinding to look at.

Right. Personally I do not think my GM would allow the multi-sense mana spell that would make you invisible on both the astral and physical, but I can probably get just the astral spell to fly. It is not super important right now, but in a couple months I have a feeling it will be much more so.

The book was pretty concise when I was reading it. All living things have an aura. The Earth has an aura like a living thing. Ask me on Thursday when I have access to my books and I'll get direct quotes (3rd edition, of course). Since astral perception isn't normal sight, there's no penalty for staring into the sun, nor does the aura extend more than a few inches beyond the surface. So things can still be spotted fairly easily, it's just infiltration is not without its uses.

Didn't say you couldn't, its just like infiltrating in a neon pink jump suit, if they have a line of sight to you they will see you.

Even if all the ground beneath you is painted a rather pastel mauve?