A visible magician is walking down the road with his Spirit sustaining Concealment power on him. Would a character Astrally Perceiving at the time see the magician in Astral Space?

What about if magician had Improved Invisibility cast on him?

"Concealment also allows dual natured critters to conceal themselves and others from astral detection."

But what does that mean?

Concealment won't render an astral form invisible. It only gives penalties to Perception tests.
It would just make hiding easier. You would still need something to hide behind, I think.

You need 0 hits to see an astral form (that is not trying to hide), so modifiers do not quite matter there, if you stand in the open.


Improved Invisibility does not work on astral forms (it is a physical spell), so it has no effect at all against Astral Perception.

The Mana version does affect astral forms, as it is a mana spell, but since all it does is render the physical form invisible, that won't help either.

Bye
Thanee

The answer to both questions is the same: how many successes on the power did the critter get, versus the perceiver? Invisibility makes you invisible - this is distinct from prior editions where it just imposed a penalty to observers - which is what Concealment does now. Concealment also doesn't cross astral barriers - it's a mana effect, so it can be used on either plane, but it won't operate on both at once. Here's how it would break down:

1) Invisibility: The observer would make a spell resistance test. If he successfully resisted the Invisibility, he'd be able to see the mage, but *actually* seeing the mage would be contingent on making a successful visual perception check - probably at threshold 1, because the mage is "obvious." If he didn't resist, he might still know the mage was there - for instance, if the invisible mage was walking down the street singing The Clash's "Death or Glory", he'd be heard; if he was smoking, he might be smelled; if the observer was astrally perceiving the mage would be seen in the astral, making him a convenient target for getting shot - although the observer wouldn't have any idea what he was wearing, say.

2) Concealment on the Physical Plane: The observer would simply roll a perception test. However, all senses - not just vision - are penalized by the force of the Concealment effect. It doesn't make you invisible. You'll get recorded plenty well. But you'll get ignored. This is also true if the observer is astrally perceiving, since it's an effect that bends the mind, not alters physical properties. It doesn't penalize the astral assensing roll, but it does penalize any *perception checks* the user makes, and you have to notice something with a perception check before you assense it, in my book: if you don't notice it, you can't scrutinize it's aura. If the observer is wholly astrally perceiving, however, he isn't penalized at all, because the power is operating on the physical plane, not the astral.

3) Concealment on the Astral Plane: Any physical perception rolls to notice the mage will be unimpeded. Any purely astral rolls, however, will be penalized by the force of the Concealment effect: I.E. any spirits, astrally projecting mages, et cetera, will have a really hard time seeing the dude. This has its advantages. If I'm bluffing my way into a magical research lab, but I know there are spirits who will notify security mages if they recognize any "unfamiliar auras", I can have my spirit Conceal itself and me in the astral, so the spirits won't notice my aura. That leaves me free to use my nanopaste disguise to rig myself up as Dr. Hiroki Yamagata, Ares Magical Researcher, and bluff my way into the lab.

This is, to the best of my recollection, how it works. I don't think there's any case where a single power will affect both the Physical and Astral planes at once, so the spirit or critter has to choose which plane to affect with Concealment. The only exception to this is Fading, which is pretty much a "I hide no matter what" power anyway.

You are incorrect that Concealment is a Mana effect but the veracity of your overall assertion is completely open to debate. Let me explain.
Here is the entry for Concealment:

I have bolded the important bit. First, the power is Physical and not Mana-based. Now here are a couple more entries from SR4A essential to this discussion:



The entry concerning Physical versus Mana powers clearly indicates that Physical powers cannot be used on the astral. The second entry could be interpreted to make an exception to the first rule for materialized astral critters. However, the most important contradiction is the last sentence I bolded in the description of Concealment. Despite being a Physical power that last line of the description unequivocally states that dual-natured critters can use Concealment on the Astral to hide from astral observers. It's unclear from that line whether the intent is that the critter should be able to conceal on the Physical and Astral simultaneously but to my mind the wording leaves both options equally valid.

I could find nothing in the errata or the recently updated FAQ to clarify the issue. When faced with such a blatant contradiction what are we to do? It's not even clear what the intent was. I know how I've been running it in my group and that is that it works on the Physical and Astral simultaneously and that it works against living and un-living 'perceivers' by reducing their Perception die pool. With a powerful enough spirit this becomes very powerful and renders actual Invisibility spells hopelessly obsolete. It is not out of control in my game because I am careful to keep track of all DP and Threshold modifiers for Perception Tests. Concealment works best when it is used in conjunction with Infiltration Tests and not drawing attention to yourself by firing automatic weapons and the like.

Still, one could chose to give priority to the rule regarding Mana v.s. Physical and ignore the last line of the Concealment description, but that would be your personal choice.

Finally, I leave you with the entry the game designers used to shield themselves from problems like this:

Yeah, "It works like this this time because I say so" can be a powerful, but dangerous, tool. Use it too ham-handedly and your players have no idea how to react to anything, but use it well and there's a good amount of dramatic tension and fighting critters/spirits doesn't become a simple game of rock paper scissors.

Semerkhet has hit the exact problem I am trying to rule on in my game.

PC mage has cast Improved Invisibility on himself in Physical and Summoned Spirit used Concealment on him as well. Mage decides to walk into warehouse as though he owns the place, because Improved Invisibility hides him from corp grunts, and their Perception is further penalized by Concealment for auditory, smell and other perception tests. They did not have Ultrasound sensors (cheap facility).

However I had Spirit patroling in Astral see him clear as day, and that has created the questions. So if I allow Concealment to work in both Physical and Astral space, he could pull off the strolling into the warehouse stunt? There is no FAQ on this?

Well, shit. Now that I think about it, the entire basis of my argument is based on the fact that I'd houseruled Concealment to being an M and not P power, since it being a P power just straight up *doesn't make sense* given the power description. This is why I was also thinking, "And, of course, Concealment doesn't affect cameras..."

My bad. Sometimes I've internalized long-running house rules to the point where I assume they're true.

My suggestion, personally? Make it an M power, not a P power. Though if you wanna leave it a P power, make an explicit exception that lets it become an M power when used on the astral plane.

Edit: Maybe it was an M power in an earlier edition? 2nd or 3rd? Or maybe I used used Alienation in those editions...

The whole critter powers chapter's bugged. Three considerations might help sorting this out. Firstly: The spirit must materialise for using a physical power. (Ignore materialisation being a physical power!) Secondly: As a dual-being it can now affect both the physical and astral plane. Thirdly: The spirit can sustain the power after de-materializing.

Of course that's not quite RAW, I guess.

We're at the point in my ongoing campaign that changing how Concealment works would be such a huge retcon that it would cause serious problems. If I had it to do over I might have ruled that it could only be used on either the Physical or the Astral but not both at the same time. I can see the result of that ruling being that the team uses Improved Invisibility* for the physical and Concealment for the Astral. It does make life noticeably harder on the magician having to sustain enough spells to cover the whole team.

* or a custom-designed version of Improved Invisibility that works on all wavelengths of light and on sound waves, thus working against radar and ultrasound sensors.

That's what Silence is for.

IMHO it is completely RAW, except for the fact that spirits cannot materialize by RAW
I guess Semerkhet thought of the custom spell that makes you undetectable to all senses for +1 drain. Way better than having to sustain 2-5 spells.

I call it "Vanish." It's actually +2 Drain (single sense versus multi-sense per spell design rules) and in my game I'm making it a very rare and sought after spell formula - probably going to be a McGuffin in a run at some point that the stealth specialist will try to get the mage to help her steal.

Why? As a dual-being the (materialised) spirit's active one both planes at the same time after all.

I've imagined designing Vanish for a game for a long time now, but have not had the opportunity. Vanish only works on the physical right?

I've been wondering about what can be used to erase astral presence. Does masking/flexible signature take care of that already? Or could you cast a multisense illusioin spell that combines the multisense-ness of Vanish with astral perception? I guess I'm a little bit confused if it would be possible to generate a spell that is basically a Vanish spell for all possible senses.

Is this possible by RAW or does this run into trouble somehow?

Everyone asks about astral invisibility, so do a search for the threads. Short answer: no.

Do-everything 'invisibility' spell? Also bleh. The GM's job is to say 'no' there too.

What keeps your mage from simply writing the formula? That's what Arcana is for.

I've discussed this before and I don't recall the answer being no, but nobody said yes.

Take this sentence from pg. 191 of SR4a:



This implies that there are things that are not visible on the astral that are visible on the physical. Given this we can use some type of physical concealment option (lots) coupled with whatever is not visible on the astral to be undetectable on both the physical and astral. What did the authors mean by this? I can't imagine they would make a head nod to something as simple as a picture being a glass plate or something, but maybe it was that basic.

Furthermore False Impression/Manascape are realistic/multisense (affecting magical senses) illusions to literally give false impressions akin to the phantasm/trid phantasm spells.

False Impression is: M, LOS, sustained, with DV = F/2-1.
Phantasm is: M, LOS(A), sustained, with DV = F/2+2.

Switching from LOS to LOS(A) confers a +2 to drain, so where does the difference in 1 drain come from?

M = +0, LOS = +0, sustained = +0, realistic = +0, multisense = +0, and neither illusion hides or conceals so that is +0. Well that means that False Impression has a -1 hanging around for some reason.

That means that either False Impression has a restricted effect or a restricted target. I could read False Impression as one or the other (affects only targets with astral perception or the effect is restricted to astral perception only).

This means that conceivably you could construct a spell that is not restricted effect or restricted target that confers +1 drain that will allow for both magical and physical senses to be befuddled and with an additional +2 drain you can create a spell that will conceal against physical and magical senses.

Now spell generation is up to GM approval so maybe if you were the GM you'd say no, but what is not against GM approval is sustaining two spells at once so you could perhaps sustain false impression and phantasm to generate illusions on the physical and magical. Since sustaining two spells at once is possible it would be annoying if a GM didn't allow you to create a custom spell that combines them. Similarly since a custom spell that is illusionary on both the physical and astral is within reason I don't see how an invisibility equivalent is not within reason as this exists for other spells (I could only see this being contested on the grounds that an astral perception invisibility spell does not exist already).

Thinking a bit more on the topic perhaps the downside to a single spell that affects the astral and physical is that "sorcery cannot bridge the gap between the astral and physical planes", so maybe that is game breaking. I'm not certain at the moment that this is game breaking. Anyone know?

Furthermore Masking can be used to change your aura to any mundane or magical form (almost) and Extended Masking can conceal foci and spells on the astral. Given that foci have an astral form this is equivalent to concealing an astral form. Therefore I don't see why Masking can be used to conceal your own astral form. One may also consider using Masking to make their aura look as though it is a very small astral creature that is under the influence of a high power concealment spell (like a pixie). Alternatively one could make their aura look like the aura of a mundane insect. And if the Masking metamagic can give compounded appearances you could make yourself look like a concealed pixie and make yourself look like a mundane version of a concealed pixie.

I'm not sure where the astral chameleon quality stands on this, but it does make assensing harder by a -2 dp modifier, so I'd imagine that detecting an astral chameleon similarly suffers a -2 dp modifier which in game relations is half as effective as ruthenium polymer at disguising from physical sight.

Feel free to comment.

If you can change the appearance of an aura, I see no reason why you shouldn't also be able to make it more difficult to detect. I've never seen a single rule or piece of fluff in any of the editions I've played that would lead me to believe it isn't possible.

"[…] literally give false impressions akin to the phantasm/trid phantasm spells."

I wasn't aware that this was the stated function of False Impression. Sorry.

Redcrow, I can easily imagine that you can spoof the information an aura gives without making it harder to detect. Can't you?

I'm assuming this is in reference to Masking. Masking says nothing about either preserving the ability to detect or not detect the aura, but it does say you can modify your aura which implies that it will change the ability to detect an aura. I mean a mundane aura is innately harder to detect than a dual natured one, so it is pretty clear that with Masking at least you can change the difficulty of aura detection.

This spell would affect at the same time a purley astral target (spirit not manifesting, assensing mage...) and a purely physical one (your typical security grunt, unawakened) which is something magic allegedly cannot do.

I would rule Concealment this way : the spirit can Conceal you astrally as well as physically, but them you count as two targets (so he can conceal up to his Magic target one way or the other, but only half that many in both ways), and hiding something in both planes would also count as two services rather than one.

But we are definitively into house rule territory here.

Well ideally it would affect one target that has an astral form associated with it and a physical form. I mean in this regard it is similar to Concealment, which obeys the limits of magic so clearly this spell would also obey the limits of magic. On second thought there is no issue with constructing such a spell.



House rules aside I think Concealment is pretty clear.

I need to go read up certain passages because I cannot remember their exact words, but I think that the answer to whether the character could stroll into the warehouse if Concealment worked on both physical and astral space (actually there is no if about it, Concealment does work on both planes) is maybe. The spirit would need to make an Assensing test to detect the character against a fixed Threshold. But it may be a lot easier, because the spirit isn't taking negative dice modifiers from both Invisibility and Concealment and the Threhold should be low.

Sure, I can imagine that. I just don't understand where people get the notion that making an aura harder to detect is impossible or even really difficult.

Is the only reason people think it is impossible solely because currently there is no existing spell or ability for doing so? Or is there something else somewhere in the rules that I'm just not seeing that might allude to it being impossible?

a) Astral forms and auras are obvious and "colorful".
b)Spells are obvious as well. So if one were to create an astral invisibility spell, all astral perceiving entities would still see the Astral Form of the spell. This kinda defeats the purpose of the spell.
c) Masking and Extended Masking can only make an Aura/Astral Form look different. It cannot make it less visible, just like wearing a real mask.
All you can do is not be where someone is looking or have auras between you and your observer to avoid detection. This is done by Infiltration.

Masking can make a magical aura look mundane. Extended masking subsumes foci and spells into the magicians own aura, which can be made to look mundane. So the combination of a new Astral Invisibility spell and Extended Masking (or the Aura Masking spirit power) could allow invisibility on the astral.

I think people, as Dakka Dakka says, are going with the flow of the game. Hiding auras isn't something that can really be done (except behind other auras/solid objects). *shrug* Do what you want in your game. Personally, I think SR magic needs *more* hard-and-fast limits.

Unfortunately there is this loop hole with extended masking. Masked foci and spells are indeed described as part of the mages aura. So those at least can be made invisible.

A mundane form could be obvious and "colorful" as well, but that doesn't stop a standard Invisibility spell from working on it.



Spells are only obvious if the Perceiver is able to Perceive them. Most spells cast on the Astral are not designed to be hidden, that does not in any way imply they cannot be designed to be so. Many spells have no visual component in the Mundane world (e.g. Manabolt), but that doesn't mean a Mage couldn't create a version that does have a visual aspect. Some spells, like those with an Elemental effect, do have a visual component in the Mundane but that doesn't mean its not possible to create a version of the spell without one.



So, you're stance is that if it doesn't already exist in RAW its not possible? There is a whole section in Street Magic pg. 159 for Designing New Spells with a list of "The Limits of Sorcery" and nowhere does it mention that hiding an aura is something Sorcery cannot do. Nor is there anything there that would lead one to that conclusion.

Because there is a Critter Power (Concealment) that can render an aura less visible sets the precedent that it IS in fact possible. I see no reason to disallow a PC from creating a spell or finding a new Metamagic Technique to make their aura less visible on the Astral Plane. I also don't really see how allowing it would be game breaking. If the Critter Power Concealment doesn't break the game, there is no reason to believe that allowing a Mage the possibility of doing the same without need of a Spirit would.

"A mundane form could be obvious and 'colorful' as well, but that doesn't stop a standard Invisibility spell from working on it."

Astral is not mundane; mundane is not astral.

Thank you Captain Obvious. The point was that just because something is obvious and 'colorful' does not mean it can't be rendered more difficult to detect and there is nothing anywhere in the rules that could lead one to believe otherwise.

Well, the problem with rendering an aura invisible is this: the spell itself has a visible effect, and the more powerful it is, the more visible the spell is. You could - strictly by RAW - astrally project, and then cast Invisibility on yourself, and you'd turn invisible. But your spell wouldn't, and would be pretty apparent to any other astral observers.

The Metamagic Technique Extended Masking allows the auras of spells to be concealed, so the precedent for the ability to hide a spells aura is already RAW. The Critter Power Concealment allows the auras of people to be concealed, so the precedent for the ability to hide a persons aura is already RAW. The only real question is whether or not a PC should be allowed to combine both abilities into a single spell or Metamagic Technique and the only argument I've seen against it comes from a very strained reading of the rules without any regard to the two precedents above.

Everyone is of course free to handle it however they wish in their own games, but I don't see allowing it as any more game-breaking than what already exists in the game. Typically on these forums I'm the one in favor of more restrictions on abilities and powers, which is why it seems strange that I find myself on the other side of the debate on this particular topic.

If you want RAW, chech out SR4A p 208 under the heading illusion spells, 2nd paragraph, last couple of lines...



Extended Masking can conceal certain auras 'within' your own (and make it look mundane) but there isn't really a way to hide from an assensing test (allthough the concealment power does make it harder for the test to succeed)

Bingo. It *is* obvious: astral follows totally different rules.

I'm aware, but False Impression/Manascape is used to disguise stuff on assensing tests. It seems there is a contradiction then, because "Illusions cannot fool assensing to disguise or create auras" and "it can change the impressions gained from Assensing..." seem in conflict.

Aarakin what do you think of that apparent incongruity?



Da doi.

… And that's why analogies to mundane perception (like Redcrow's) aren't helpful. Because it's different. Because it follows different rules.

Unfortunately, that's another of the books' many contradictions there, mmmkay. What it doesn't address is the idea that altering an aura is not *hiding* it, as we were discussing earlier. Disguise (as opposed to camouflage) is a great, useful way to 'not be seen', but it's not literal invisibility.

Anyway. Let's consider the premise that astral invisibility exists. What counters are available for someone with Invisibility (or rather, the hideous 'immune to all perception' spell mentioned earlier) along with an astral analog (whether spell, metamagic, or other)? FAB? Sealed underground hobbit facilities? Really strong spirits?

Astral Invisibility would be countered the same as standard Invisibility, I suppose. However, I'm not advocating that the creation of a spell in order to hide ones Aura from Astral Observers needs to be Illusion based like standard Invisibility. It could just as easily be a Mental Manipulation that simply makes the target ignore the Aura as if it weren't there. All that really matters is that it has the desired effect which is to render the Aura undetectable by Astral Perception. According to Street Magic's list of "Limits of Sorcery" a single spell could not affect both the Mundane and Astral simultaneously, its one or the other. Not that it matters if you are Astrally Projecting, but it might if you were merely Astrally Perceiving.

A high Assensing Skill could possibly be used to counter such a spell. Really strong spirits would possibly counter it just by having more dice resisting the spells effects. FAB would still work because it doesn't actually Perceive AFAIK.

Also remember that standard Invisibility only really affects physical sight, so creatures with other heightened senses may not be as easily fooled by it. Astral Perception is considered multi-sense in the same way, so creating an Astral Invisibility might only affect the most prominent of those senses unless you are willing to create an all-encompassing spell that affects all Astral Senses in which case it is likely to have a very high Drain Value. Just as creating a mundane Invisibility that affects all the standard senses would have a higher Drain Value.

Astral sense as multi-sense is an important point, but sort of a mess in the rules. It's really just one non-visual sense, but of course we discuss it primarily as visual, and yet also as somehow all-sense. Bleh.

So, two high-drain spells to be totally undetectable. Hmm. I wonder if that's enough deterrence for the normal game balance (hyuk hyuk) to function?

On that point we are in total agreement.



The other possibility is to create a new Metamagic Technique like Super Extra Extended Masking (with sprinkles?) or some-such that would cover Astral Concealment. That would certainly limit the ability to only more powerful Mages as they would need standard Masking and Extended Masking as prerequisites before they could acquire it.

The way the rule is worded it is a contradiction, but it need not be. False Impression/Manascape will alter the the perception of the auras/astral forms etc. but the astral form of the Impression/Manascape spell will always be apparent unless disguised by Extendend Masking. Remember assensing will never reveal which spell it actually is. The best you can do is the category and the force.

This kind of thinking (It MUST be impossible because it's not already in the book) happens alot, and not just with astral perception. Some people (including a rules-lawyer friend of mine) believe that something is or isn't possible because noone has tried it. In the blog Spell Design, I asked about creating a flight spell. My friend (I leave his name out because this is not a question to insult him) said that there had to be a great difficulty with it because noone has actually tried it before. After bringing it up here (and I thank everyone who added their thoughts on that one) it turns out that not only was the idea not a difficult one, but the popular belief was that the spell was unneccessary due to Levitate covering that ability.

Think More like Flexible Signature...you can tailor the signature to your own specifications... Though in combination with Masking and Extended Masking, it is awesome...