So my players have been using invisibility something fierce and I wanted to give them a taste in turn. Problem is I don't like using mages against them if it can be helped. My current plan is to go with a cloaked hit squad wearing something akin to GitS Opti Camo but so far the closest I've found is the chameleon suit in SR4:AE.

Do any of the supplements have a cloaking armour?

While were at it do you guys have any advice for nullifying Improved Invisibility spells?

Motion Detectors and Ultrasound aren't effected by Imp Invisibility. Passive security measures like Monowire that retracts when staff members with the proper RFID badges walk past, will be there and catch your team as they jog through the halls. Background Counts, FAB, and Glo-Moss are all also useful.

The Chameleon suit, or a Ruthenium Polymer coating on other armor will work for the cloaking armor. Most of the tech stuff is useless against Dual-Natured or Astrally-perceiving, but can be used to get past normal perception.

There's also Little Smoke -- magical compound that gives Concealment and Confusion to the users.

Another idea (and this depends on how mean you want to be) is to consider distraction. If runner group A is distracted by loud and hostile security squad B, then they would at least suffer significant penalties to notice stealthy fire team C approaching via a darkened corridor.

At least until the mage's head explodes into a cloud of bone, blood and brains.

Another approach is to disguise dangerous things as innocuous things. What if the middle management in an experimental station are all cross-trained in combat? In a way they're more expendable than the best-in-the-world scientists who are actually pushing the technology forward. Or they're actual security staff? Maybe the terrified-looking suit the street samurai has just turned his back on has a concealed handgun quite capable of tearing into the sammie's body.

Just a few thoughts.

In my gaming groups, we consider the chameleon suit to be like the GiTS camo (just don't forget to add thermal camo as well).

Good advice has already been given to nullify improved invisibility spells, but also note that beating the OR of drones require many hits.

Ghillie suits are under-rated, and a smartgun with redundant process manufacturing II will see through any ImpInvis spell running with less than 5 hits automatically. On an Ares Predator that isn't that expensive for professional opposition.


Thermal smoke also levels the playing field, and since mages can't cast most spells without line of sight it screws them over extra good. Flare grenades and strategically placed flash packs are also often overlooked.

To see through improved invisibility on a budget there are many options. one of the best is splash grenades with glow in the dark paint mixed with micro-tags. If they're facing it when it goes off they get a face full of paint and are effectively blind, if not then they're easily spotted because A) they glow in the dark and B) they have AR bullseyes painted on them and their location is showing up on your GPS. Good luck hiding that lot, chummer!

Of course, there are spells that can get rid of the paint and a tag eraser can kill the tags easily enough, but that takes time that you don't have in a firefight. (The spells are Fashion to get it out of clothing and Makeover to clean hair and faces). Don't forget that high end armour tends to have nasty object resistance to overcome for the fashion spell
Paint bombs work even better when mixed with neurostun and upsized to mortar or artillery rounds, if available...

Other cheap but cheerful methods of dealing with invisibility include tag rounds used in suppression fire, a hacker locating their hidden network and lighting it up (after all unless they have a mind-net going they're unable to see each other for hand signals or to even follow each other, meaning they either need to talk or have their commlinks on...), and other nefarious tricks of that nature.

Good old fashioned swing open doors.

Since it hasn't been mentioned, Radar Sensor cyberware (Augmentation pg 36-37) and Ultrawideband Radar (Arsenal, pg 60) are both unaffected by invisibility of any sort. Not exactly cheap but certainly as cheap as full armour with ruthenium polymers.

Another thought: If the characters are trying to identify threats, and you want to hide the real threats from them, make everything look like a threat.

See, if the characters have half a dozen hellhounds racing for them, that's an obvious threat with a fairly obvious set of responses. That's the normal state of affairs.

On the other hand, if the characters go into a corporate construction which seems normal, until an alarm trips, and then suddenly ostensible threats pop out from everywhere, what do they decide to start shooting first? Example follows:

Isaac Infiltrator and Sammie Samurai are sneaking down a corridor. Sammie has a sudden rush of blood to the brain, and turns on his commlink because he doesn't believe in operational radio silence. The unapproved commlink is identified as such within three microseconds, and an alarm goes off. Alarm lights in flashing red pop from every ceiling panel. That by itself is enough reason for concern, of course, but if every one of them has what looks like a gun barrel which swivels towards the apparent sign of the threat, and Sammie's in view of ten of them, what does he do? Two out of the ten actually are guns - the rest are cheap decoys. But he can't tell which until they start chewing pieces out of what flesh he hasn't had chromed.

Invisibility is only good for hiding things which otherwise stand out.

Also, you can layer these strategies. Decoy threats everywhere, a loud distraction, and a quiet deadly assault. You may be able to achieve a few runner team wipes.

I love Dumpshock. You guys have nothing but the best advice! This should make for some serious fun, especially with things like those paint bombs and Koekepan's exceedingly excellent evil. Runner wipes indeed.