I'm gonna continue to hit you guys with rules questions, now that I've got an outlet for them.

If you're an adept with the blind flaw, and you take the adept power of, say, thermographic vision, can you use the thermographic vision?

My argument is that since the sense is magical instead of physical, you should be able to use it even if the organ in question doesn't work normally.

No, Thermographic Vision is a modification to vision, and since the character is blind he cannot take advantage of it. He can develop a power similar to the bioware implant called Thermosense Organs, though.

No. Now, you can take Astral Perception, which allows you to perceive the immediate environs, or even Thermographic Sense (Different from vision) and Blind Fight.

But if you're blind, things based on the physical eyes (such as flare protection, low-light vison, vision magnification, and thermographic vision) will not be accessible to your adept if he takes them.

Now, Ultrasound vision and Sonar are trickier; your GM could rule that you could take those as Enhanced Senses, if he thinks a non-technological explanation could be explained.

While you may be right about that, I'd still say no.

Being able to completely nullify a -2 point Flaw by spending .25 of a power point isn't really fair in my book.

I recall SRComp reducing the penalty to TNs for an astrally percieving character. I would say that an adept with Sixth Sense and Astral Perception could "see" as well as any sighted person, in his/her own way.

If a character using the magical sense of astral perception can still see then I think an adept could develop a power that allowe him to see, but it could not be the improved sense power. Improved sense implies that it improves a sense already existant, not create one from scrach. The closest example I can think to base it on is the astral perception power. For 2 power points (perhaps you could ask your GM to get it for less) you could buy-back normal vision and the flaw would only be worth -2.

Hm...I ask because I've already allowed a character in one of my games to take Blind (Magic Active), which is only a 2 point flaw anyways, along with the Ultrasound Vision adept power. I justify it in three ways.

First, ultrasound isn't really linked to the eyes as much as the ears anyhow. Second, it's a magical power - a spell would certainly give a blind person sight temporarily, and I think this justifies the adept power working. Third, when ultrasound vision is all your character can use, it becomes very limiting in surprising ways.

Since he can only see shapes, and not colors or light, he can't read, view computer screens, find shadows to hide in, see through glass or water surfaces, and many other inhibiting drawbacks. It's working ok in my campaign, I was just wondering again what canon was on the issue.

Martial Art Manuver: Blindfighting. Combine it w/ a weapon for even better results. Add in ThermoSense and/or Improved Sense: Smell. You should be able to kick some heads...but I would want to be on your team if you pack heat.

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Check out Man and Machine for the sound-detection thingy -- general consensus holds it's a valid adept sense power, which could come in handy.

-Siege

I see no problem with ultrasound,, however bear in mind that ultrasound technically only halves vision modifiers. He would thus be on a +4 to all actions (IE: halving the +8 total darkness modifier). The blind fighting technique would help but still not enoough to help him much. he'd be on +2 to his melee attacks (which means you're really not that good a fighter). That's by the rules. You could give him a better version but it'd be best to charge more for it...

Ultrasound is just this side of funky to me -- an adept's magic is designed to augment existing senses, not add new ones.

Granted, that's just my interpretation. Not that I necessarily agree with the canon adept, mind you.

-Siege

Blindfight (adept power) + Blindfight (martial art maneuver) + Spatial Recogniser + High Freq hearing = Look ma no eyes!

Hmm. I wonder if it's actually possible to get a bonus using this system?

I kind of like the idea of a blind physad. With all his hearing buffs and mods, mught as well be able to see.....

just dont name him blind fury...........

Of course it's possible to get a bonus, Lilt. Mundanes with eyes get a bonus on their hearing Perception Tests with it, so there's no reason everyone else wouldn't if they could get past all the penalties. It's the entire point of the implant.

But that does still leave you with the problem. Such a character has to make a Perception Test to "see" everything, including things normal characters would have no trouble picking up on. Especially in combat, where every action he performs, especially attacks, would/should require a Perception Test.

Even with a -1 total modifier on his hearing Perception Tests, he's still going to fail the roll from time to time. And that's the entire point of why Blindness is a flaw, and why it's reduced for Awakened characters as well.

Echolocation isn't at all unreasonable as an adept power. Some blind people are good enough at using echolocation to go MOUNTAIN BIKING!
I do think it would have to cost more than .25 magic, though. Or that you'd buy multiple levels to get better information, with about 4 levels equally normal vision, and 6-8 levels giving you non-visable info about what quality of armor, concealed weapons, and implants the person has as well...

that's a good idea, especially since that's what the rules say you should do.

i'm pondering making a "blind" adept, and just giving him the colorblind flaw; in-character, he'd actually be blind, but rules-wise, his only impairment is that he can't see color. it's much simpler and more direct than trying to twist and crunch the numbers to do pretty much the same thing.

For ultrasound I'd allow them to take the power to be able to interpret it, but I think I'd still require them to have an ultrasound emitter... or maybe take the power twice, the second time to allow them to create the ultrasound.

~J

If animals can have a given sense, there's no reason why Adepts can't purchase it as well. Bats have echolocation, so Adepts can purchase it as well.

If you don't think that being a phys ad with ultrasound is still not worth a -2 flaw then have a run that takes place during a rock concert.

Hee, and make him trip those Ultrasound Hallway monitors.

Actually, the adept would need to use normal frequncies unless he had a seperate ability to hear unltasonic noises. Ultrasound is not needed for echolocation, and the echolocation ability would not grant the ability to hear unltrasound.

The mountain bike riders I mentioned use what amounts to baseball cards in thier spokes. Very much in the normal audible range. An adept could use a small beeper, or tap shoes, or just click his tounge, which is what those guys do when off thier bikes.

Obviously for stealth reasons, getting the ultrasound hearing (and probably also low volume hearing and some selective sound filtering, so you could run very low level ultrasound noise) would be useful to a Shadowrunning adept wo depended on echolocation.

So yeah, for .25 magic, maybe echolocation alone isn't so unreasonable. I could see a SIGHTED adept taking it and using it on occasions where theres no light (or thermo) source to see by, but stealth is not an issue.

Y'know, this blind adept seems more and more possible.

Now all he needs is a superflash eye system.