Also, forget my earlier comments about seeing stuff on monitors, I'm mis-remembering a wholly different set of Invisibility rules from somewhere else, so my apologies. You can see a person on a video feed just fine in SR even if they have Invisibility.



-karma

I blame myself. I didn't realize that Redcrow was talking about how he thought the rules *should* work, if he fixed the magic system. I assumed we were discussing how the rules *do* work. My confusion is, I think, understandable; after all, the entire rest of the thread is a rules discussion.

So, people are talking about the FAQ. I don't see anything about invisibility, illusions, or ultrasound in there. Where is it? :/

Under the description of ultrasound vision and its impact on invisibility.

Could you provide a quote, please? In my book the description makes no mention of Invisibilty whatsoever.Forget it, I failed at reading.

Um, the Echolocation bioware specifically states, "Echolocation can pick up things otherwise invisible to the naked eye, such as glass walls or opponents cloaked with Invisibility spells."

That bioware is pretty clearly implanted costing Essense.

The Thermosense organ and implanted cyber-radar have similar verbiage.



-karma

We've been discussing ultrasound, not echolocation.

Ultrasound imaging is a form of echolocation. The bioware is another form. if it is used in water it is usually called sonar.

Yes, however, the cyberware ultrasound system is a different form of equipment from the bioware echolocation system. So if I say 'look under the entry for ultrasound' and you look instead under the entry for echolocation, you will get different answers.

Also, you're assuming the actual human interface is the same, which I don't believe the case. Echolocation doesn't give you a visual display, but ultrasound does.

Under the entry for Ultrasound Cyberware, I get a "See the device version".

Under the device version, I see, "...ultrasound vision is perfect to “see” textures, calculate exact distances, and pick up things otherwise invisible to the naked eye (like people cloaked by an Invisibility spell)".

Can someone pleases cite a book and page number instead of dancing around the subject?




-karma

It also applies when someone claims their source as an authority.

Like someone saying, "My brother studied this in college and he told me this is right".

Apology accepted.

You're still wrong.

The debate is about whether or not the rules say X, not about whether or not X is true.

Equivalent to saying, "My brother said, 'X is true.' Is this true?" It's not about whether X is true or not, but whether my brother even said it.

No.

There's a difference between "my brother said" and "the rulebook states".

The rulebook is a defining reference. It is Fact, as far as the discussion goes.

Citing a defining reference is not Appeal to Authority. It simply is not.

Appeal to Authority as a logical fallacy ONLY applies to trying to claim their expertise as a proof for an discussion, when their expertise has not been established as a defining reference. The user of AtA is not presenting any actual arguments or fact, only their opinion, and maintaining that merely because that they said it to be so is sufficient proof that they are correct.

Note that IS possible for a PERSON to be a defining reference. In these cases the person has been established to actually control the facts involved in the discussion. If a game developer states his game does this thing or that thing, he is an actual reference because he actually defines the subject matter.

We're talking about a rulebook citation here. AtA does not apply.



-karma

No, unfortunately you have misunderstood the debate in exactly the same way Yerameyahu did. It was never a question about "what" the rules say, it was about whether or not the rules were logical and consistent. My argument is that the RAW is inconsistent and/or illogical and I've attempted to give reasoning on why that is the case.

So, from that perspective its the equivalent of holding up the rulebook and saying, "this is what the text says, so that is why its logical and consistent".

I would agree IF the discussion were in reference to "what" was written in the text. The rulebook is a defining reference only in so far as "what" it contains, but cannot also be used as an authority over its own assertions.

Due to the wording of the spell' I'd have the laser 'miss' the character, bullets on the other hand would work very well.

For what it's worth, I ignore the color text about imp. invis. shifting photons around. It makes the game far more complex than it needs to be, and strictly speaking shifts the spell from an illusion to a manipulation. An illusion is, by definition, not changing physical reality, but acts only in the mind of the observer.

Also in my game I've largely eliminated invisibility, because of how poorly it's thought out, and shifted it over to a 'disregard me' spell, as suggested.

I agree and IMO you should never try to give an explanation for how magic works because thats where fundamental problems begin to arise. What a spell does is really all that is necessary.

Gullible means that you believe anything, that's what it says in the dictionary.

That is, the rule book is not an "authority" because it is not a primary-writer that you're appealing to, its the physical quality of an item that can be independently judged. Saying that the book states something is exactly as true as saying that chlorophyll is green. Its testable and verifiable.

So basically what you're saying is that an assertion is true based on whether or not it appears in a book?

Like several others now, you have either failed to read and/or comprehend the argument.

It was never a point of contention over "what" the book states. The contention was over whether or not the "what" was itself logical and consistent. The book does not need to be a primary writer as it represents the position of the writer(s). Thats all that is necessary. An authority does not need to be an actual person or else we could never use anything written by someone who is deceased as authoritative reference.

Now, since I have established once again that the point of contention was never about "what" the text said, but rather the logic and consistency OF said text it should hopefully be clear that one cannot argue in favor of the text's consistency by claiming the text itself as an authority. Its basically claiming that something is true merely because it is written down.

I really don't know how else to say this so others will understand, but I'm going to try.

I never called into question the contents of the rulebook. My assertion is that a conclusion of said rulebook (and by extension the writer(s)) is in error based on inconsistency and logical foundation. Therefore, one cannot claim the rulebook itself as authority in order to defend its own veracity simply by nature of its existence. Thats no different than saying "the conclusion in the book is correct because thats whats written in the book".

Not a book. The book. The rule book, of this game? No one is 'claimin the rulebook itself as authority in order to defend its own veracity', because that's never what the discussion was about. We were asked 'what do the rules say?', not 'what does RedCrow think it should say?'.

You didn't make it clear that you (unlike the rest of us) weren't discussing the rules, but instead your own opinions. That's the basis of the confusion. I forgive you.

I will concede that there was a lot of misunderstanding on both sides.

However, whether or not it was your intention to use the rulebook as an authority to defend its own conclusions it certainly appeared that way from my point of view. Will you concede that from my point of view it might indeed appear as if you were trying to claim the rulebook as an authority in order to defend the subject in question and that you might have reached the same conclusion if our positions had been reversed?

I just really hope people will stop perpetuatiing the Straw Man that I was calling into question the actual text in the book rather than the rationale of said text.

Certainly we've shown that unwittingly having two separate discussions at once makes a big mess.

I agree that the magic system has some sticky points that could use a good cleaning, yes. I still have trouble with (reconciling) Astral Perception/meat space interaction, but that's another thread.

Well thats pretty much bound to happen when you start having an entirety different conversation then everyone else in a middle of the thread.

Even though I agree with you, yes, the fact that you were talking about something different from what the OP and poll were discussing definitely caused confusion. When discussing something other than canon as written, I try to always preface the post with 'in my game...' so people recognize that. It cuts down confused responses by about 90%, with the remaining 10% told off by another poster who points back to that first line. (Not trying to be pushy or mean or anything. Just an old poster, sharing his experiences dealing with the same confusion.)