QUOTE (Shev)
So, let's say the infiltrator is going in to do their job. They want to record on their cybereyes and ears a bunch of stuff to take back to the team. In order to do that, they have to hide the fact that they have them from security. So, they go in under an identity that only has a datajack registered, because everyone has those and the rest of the stuff is alphaware, hard to detect. The infiltrator going in, gets their aura scanned, and WHOA. They've got cyberware everywhere! They mage may not know what it all is or does, but they know it's in places that wage-slave isn't registered for. Flags are thrown up and the infiltrator is most likely captured because of something any joe blow mage can do.
Our different perspectives on play style shine again
- I simply do not consider aura scans as a typical procedure that NPC entities use on a regular basis on just about anyone - particluarly not in corporate environment "against" ordinary wage-slaves. For general purpose cyber detection there are cyberware-scanners which are easier to come by than magicians. While a scenario of such a scan occuring certainly isn't impossible they - at least in my world - neither happen that often as a standard part of the general human ressources vetting process nor do security mages patrol corporate grounds (physically or via astral projection) constantly scanning for aura abnormalities without proper cause.
- If such scans do occur I tend to want to see them still being a real danger for the (N)PCs involved. Thus even with such an Edge I wouldn't want to see a probability drop as excessive as with the +2 TN mod like I showed you because that would mean that I would have to make INT 6 NPC mages the default (which I indicated isn't to my liking and thus not the norm in my games) to even remotely have a chance of posing a threat to such an infiltrator PC or I would have to accept that even on those occasions where such an infiltrator is subjected to a deliberate aura scan the chances of their cover story being blown are slim to none ... the latter in turn meaning that player characters also would end up having similarly low chances of noticing things whenever they encounter a NPC with the same Edge.
QUOTE (Shev)
In general, I don't think assensing should be as easy as it is.
Oh we certainly can agree that the Assensing table reveals way too much info with just one roll of dice within the various success brackets that RAW defines. I'm just not looking at this from a somewhat limited perspective where INT 6 mages are the default assumption (and might even have specialized in that regard via an additional Assensing 6 skill).
QUOTE (Shev)
Maybe it needs to stop being just "magical perception" and have the Assensing skill become the primary skill, defaulting to intelligence if they don't have it.
Shifting the deliberate act of assensing from being a subset within "magical perception" via Intelligence (as a rough equivalent to "observing in detail" on the physical plane) to the Assensing skill IMHO doesn't change the situation that much. Instead of an INT 6 mage you'd then need Assening 6 mages as the default assumption when using a +2 TN modifier.
Personally I would still approach the issue by changing the required number successes via such an Edge. In addition to that I would consider making the information gained within the various success brackets of the Assensing table more granular (like splitting the 1-2 and 3-4 brackets into disctinct success levels with different amounts of information gained and also having cyberware grades affect in which success bracket implants are recognizable in terms of general pressence and location). I might also consider forcing the assensing characters to explicitly decide which type of information they want to gain per Assensing test (emotional state vs. general health conditions like toxins / diseases vs. magical properties vs. Essence / implant related info, etc.).
The main problem of such an approach being that Assensing would get seriously more complex and thus might slow down game flow.
QUOTE (Shev)
Really? The only think it gives you are diseases and toxins affecting the patient. The second case is the only case where it's time sensitive, and that's highly situational.
No more "situational" than (wage) mages assensing new wage slaves as part of the onboarding HR / security vetting procedure or as a default part of a on premise security scan.
Ultimately everything is very situational and not necessarily malevolent even when trying to gain the same information.