The hellhound... a nice snarling gaurd dog. enhanced senses, perception, tracking, and physical stats. Its also dual natured. So a question came up in tonights game. If it exists in both the "real" world and the astral at the same time and sees in both does it even have to roll to see a character using infiltration. I mean it has the skills and traits to do that well, but if it perceives brightly glowing astral signatures do stealthy characters even have a chance?

If the Infiltrating Character has astral vision, then they can use infiltration vs Duel-Natured entities.

You can still hide behind things, even in the astral. So (in general) the infiltration ability still applies to sneaking. Of course, the modifiers might be different, and astral observers might be in unexpected places (like invisibly hanging in the sky), making them harder to hide from, but your infiltration skill still works.

So the astral perceiver wont just "see through" an oil can or a car or a wall? I have always pictured astral vision kinda like the Predators vistion. Outlines of inanimates with living things being vibrantly colored.

Frankly, the rules never go into it in any detail. As Crusher Bob basically said, however, most of the things that are opaque in the physical world are also opaque on the astral plane. If you're standing behind a wall or a tree, you're just as hidden on the astral as you are on the physical. The use of Infiltration should definitely be allowed.

Yes, your aura is bright, but so are most things on the astral. Even the air itself at times. But no matter how bright and vibrant your aura is, if you're standing behind a dull, lifeless concrete wall, no one's going to see or assense you unless they move around the obstacle.

It's basically up to the GM to cook up any situational modifiers. When it's come up in my games, I've used the absolute value of character's Essence score as a negative dice pool modifier for the Infiltration Test and called it a day. I wouldn't apply this modifier to Dual-Natured or Astrally Perceiving characters using Infiltration, however, as they can fully see and predict what objects will do a sufficient job of hiding their auras.

I like that that idea. So, does this sound fair? My PCs include a human with light-moderate cyber (4.8 essence remaining) wearing a chameleon suit. The suits -4 to perception alone nearly renders her invisible to a mundane. She has a 9 dice infiltration roll. So to the hellhound we automatically ignore the suits modifier and give her a -4 (essence) penalty if she does not have clearly defined cover. (IE if she is skulting from shadow to shadow to avoid the mundanes, those shadows wont help her against an astral perceiver. But if she is crawling behind oil drums and crates she would be pitting her unsuited infiltration roll against the Hellhounds awesome senses)

I think the -1 die per essence penalty is a bit too high, myself. Also, remember that hiding in an area with a lot of life (like a jungle, forest, etc) will be much simpler than hiding in the city.

hi hi

For reference, there is an Astral Visibility table on page 114 of Street Magic along with some nice guidelines.

Just felt this should be restated.

If the sneaking character has astral sight, then they know how to avoid it. If it helps, views this as a kind of opposite scenario to using ultrasound to detect someone using the Invisibility spell. If the person/critter/sensor you're trying to sneak around has more ways of detecting you than you have of avoiding detection, chances are you're either going to have to get very fancy (layered spells or the like) or very basic (the old classic of keeping solid objects and plenty of them between you and the searcher).

I am unaware of any rule that forbids an infiltrating character without astral vision to use Infiltration against dual natured beings. Can you please give me a rules quote?

No one has said that someone without astral vision is prohibited from attempting to sneak past the dual natured.

As I tried to point out in my last post, however, it would be like trying to sneak past an ultrasound sensor using the invisibility spell. Sure, you can't be seen visually, but that doesn't stop the sensor from registering your nice outline via audio return.

By the same token, nothing is really stopping your non-awakened sneak from trying to duck past the dual natured sentry. But while you might have good physical camo, use shadows, and the like, that doesn't stop them from pegging you from the bright beacon of your aura.

Note that in neither case is detection presumed to be automatic, it's simply that any bonus to infiltration or penalty to observer's perception that the sneaking character is gaining doesn't apply when the observer has alternate means of perceiving. So if the sneaking character in the second example was using a camo suit and darkness modifiers, then neither penalty would apply to a dual-natured observer. But if the sneaking character were to even be on the opposite side of a clear glass window, then the observer's astral perception is no longer a factor (as windows are astrally opaque). It all depends on situational context.

I'm not aware of any specific modifiers listing for dealing with this sort of thing, but I'm sure that either the standard visibility modifiers table in SR4A or the astral visibility table in Street Magic could be used as starting points.

Yet it does not matter if the Sneaker has Astral Perception or not. Even if he does not, he can still use Infiltration to sneak pass a dual natured guard. So why the qualifier of "if infiltrating character has astral vision"?

Good point. I think what wires might have gotten crossed in my mind as well as others is the similarities between this question and the question of sneaking in the astral that has come up in another thread and which deals with responses in the new SR4 FAQ.



Where I think I got my wires crossed is that this quoted bit applies to someone astrally active trying to sneak past someone else astrally active. While the OP's question deals with the non-astral sneaking past the dual natured.
So if you remove my inclusion of the second quote above from my responses here, then just apply what I stated in post #11, I think that deals with previously crossed wires in what I've said.

By the by, there are long discussions on this board already about how to sneak past astral security. The advantages here are important -

1) The critter is only astrally perceiving, not projecting. He's stuck in his body, likely limited to particular areas, unlikely to himself be stealthing. Since astral is still limited by LOS, this means if he can see you, you can probably see him.

2) Sight has never been the primary sense of dogs (and one would therefore assume, hellhounds) compared to hearing and smell. Astral is probably a little different, since always has 100% visual acuity, but it's still limited by LOS, while hearing and smell are not. Your primary concern is still going to be avoiding hearing and smell, which hopefully you already accounted for. And any tricks you have to repel dogs using those two senses still apply (using fox repellent, ultra-high frequency sonic weapons, etc.) Dogs are not drones, and oftentimes make the wrong decision from a security standpoint when encountering unusual circumstances.

The FAQ doesn't have the explicit qualifier of "Has Astral Vision". But, since it does refer to astrally projecting, and Dual Natured characters using Stealth skills, both of those have astral perception, it could be argued only astrally perceiving characters can use stealth. Though I agree this FAQ does not explicitly preclude characters without astral perception from using infiltration. My personal opinion is to allow Infiltration skill for mundanes against astral perception, though it may be fair to allow penalties for the mundane.

New FAQ != RAW