Spirits & Cell Phones

[AlexanderHowl]

I always assumed that the default Invisibility was a form of psychic invisibility that effected the visual centers if the brain. For it to actually be physical invisibility ended up costing more.

[The Colonel]

Would probably depend on the setting's metaphysics - if the ghost is invisible because it has no physical presence and only becomes visible by creating, effectively, an illusion of itself, it would make sense for machines not to register its presence (and for it not to reflect, cast a shadow etc.), whilst something that has a physical presence but is able to trick the eye into not seeing it should be visible only to machines (and perhaps as a shadow, reflection or whatever).
Being physical and invisible by other methods (?bending light) raises far too many questions and should indeed have a much higher point cost.

Speaking of which, IIRC the points cost for a spirit template is pretty high already ... I guess this is where you hedge them in with the traditional taboos and compulsions to bring their point value down again...

[Plane]

I'm liking the idea of spirits just showing up in random photos now.

[transmetahuman]

My partner finds those YouTube paranormal things entertaining, so I've seen a lot of them. That's what got me thinking again.

There should be a good fraction of however many modern ghosts are around actively pursuing people with cells in order to communicate whatever their unfinished business is. Need to make sure your wife finds the will? Identify your killer? Make absolutely sure that you left the stove off before you left?

Fringe or not, there might be dozens of very clear videos of ghosts frantically practicing their Gesture skill by now.

Just having fun with thought experiments; personally I'll just add Affects Machines and however many Extended modifiers I think they'll need.

[Prince Charon]

If it matters to anyone, the Astral Travel power (GURPS Psionic powers pp28-29) includes Invisibility without Affects Machines, but the astral body is generally not assumed to be visible to machines, since it's (usually) not material, and in another dimension. It does have the Substantial Only limitation, which means that you're invisible to anything substantial (like machines and living people), but not to ghosts and spirits. (The One Ring's invisibility is consistent with that, as IIRC it did not hide Frodo from the Ringwraiths.)

So, a spirit with the Substantial Only limitation probably does not need Affects Machines in most situations.

[AlexanderHowl]

No, they would still need Affects Machines, since Substantial Only would only apply to substantial non-machines without Affects Machines (it would not make much sense for a -10% limitation to replace a +50% enhancement). Anyway, Astral Travel says nothing about machines. Astral travelers are only considered to be in another world if they travel to the Inner Astral Plane (through using the Astral Crossing technique).

[Prince Charon]

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

No, they would still need Affects Machines, since Substantial Only would only apply to substantial non-machines without Affects Machines (it would not make much sense for a -10% limitation to replace a +50% enhancement). Anyway, Astral travelers are only considered to be in another world if they travel to the Inner Astral Plane (through using the Astral Crossing technique).

They're pretty clearly treated as if they're invisible to machines, though, which was the point.

[AlexanderHowl]

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

They're pretty clearly treated as if they're invisible to machines, though, which was the point.

Can you cite the place in Psionic Powers where they mention that?

[Plane]

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

If it matters to anyone, the Astral Travel power (GURPS Psionic powers pp28-29) includes Invisibility without Affects Machines, but the astral body is generally not assumed to be visible to machines, since it's (usually) not material, and in another dimension.

That's a weird situation though because per PP27's box the "outer" plane overlaps our world, it's only the "inner" plane which is a distinct place, and Travel only talks about going to outer, you need PP29's Astral Crossing technique to get to the inner.

More than likely the just forgot to include the Affects Machines enhancement, since PP27 mentions only specially calibrated “Kirlian cameras,” can see them (which I expect is some kind of See Invisible with Gadget limitations)

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

It does have the Substantial Only limitation, which means that you're invisible to anything substantial (like machines and living people), but not to ghosts and spirits. (The One Ring's invisibility is consistent with that, as IIRC it did not hide Frodo from the Ringwraiths.)

They're a weird situation though since they actually jump in and out of substantiality (to wall phase or fight) and I got a sense they could see him even when they became tangible to fight.

Reading up on them, they apparently can't see non-invisible creatures at all: they instead estimate the location of visible creatures by their shadows, which weirdly might mean that a good defence against them might be to try to run away in pitch darkness. I expect they could still track prey by hearing/smell without visible shadows though.

Frodo stood out since with the ring on, he was the only member actually visible, the only beings the Ring Wraiths normally see are themselves.

Originally Posted by Prince Charon

So, a spirit with the Substantial Only limitation probably does not need Affects Machines in most situations.

If they don't have it, they'll get caught on camera. Obviously if you're also insubstantial you have a lot more options for avoiding cameras than "all I can do is turn invisible" people though, like just walking between drywall panels occasionally popping an eye or two out of the woodwork to get your bearings. Walking through the ground would be another swell trick for avoiding cameras since you more easily use pedestrians as cover since you're just hiding a -5 face instead of a -0 torso (or + whatever body is)

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Anyway, Astral Travel says nothing about machines.

True but the AP writeup on the preceding page implies non-kirlian cameras fail at it, so I think they just forgot it.

Originally Posted by AlexanderHowl

Can you cite the place in Psionic Powers where they mention that?

PP27

Originally Posted by PP27, The Outer Astral Plane

A character on the outer plane can see and move through the real world, invisibly and intangibly.
He appears – to those who can see him, via Astral Sight (pp. 27-28), the
Cross-World Communication technique (p. 29), specially calibrated “Kirlian cameras,” etc. – as a translucent, fuzzy, barely there “spirit version” of himself.

I'm assuming they just left it out, much like they left out crunch representing the cord and crunch representing the clothing.

There's two ways we could work that:
1) give the full +50% Affects Machines enhancement (worth 20 points), with Kirlian cameras being See Invisible (Astral) endowed by a Gadget...
2) give a lower-cost "limited enhancement" to Astral Travel, like if "except specially calibrated Kirlian cameras" was considered a -5% Bane (save 1/20 the points) it could be enough to make the enhancement cost 1 point less

(even though the actual messy math of 50*.95=47.5 rounding up to 48% and .48*40=19.2 which rounds up to 20 meaning you still pay full price for the enhancement: but that's only if you round fractional modifiers, I think maybe you only round final character point costs up)

One other thing it feels like they left out (also mentioned only in the Astral Plane writeup but NOT in the Astral Travel ability) is having a 20ft long Astral Cord which counts as an extra set of vitals that can be targeted by cutting attacks and which points in the direction of your body. That's a pretty big drawback, and in fact there is a perk for removing it.

The only "nuisance effect" actually defined for insubstantiality is "susceptible to psi static and mental fields" which is described on 27.

Another strange thing is how Temporary Disadvantage: Mute is used to reduce the price of Invisibility (base cost 40) rather than Insubstantiality (base cost 80). 22% of 80 would save 17 points, while it only saves 8 points for a 40-point ability.

I realize this was probably done because at 1st level, Insubstantiality had already bottomed out at 16 points due to the high levels of Immediate Preparation Required and Maximum Duration, but as you progressively buy those off, you've basically wasted points by having TD:Mute on Invis instead of Insub.

Conceptually it's also very weird, because it means if someone hit you with "Negated Advantage: Invisibility" you'd suddenly be able to talk to substantial creatures, even though you'd still be insubstantial, which is presumably the reason they can't hear you (your voice exhales ghost air, not real air)

Another aspect of Astral Talent which isn't statted here is this part:

You do not bring any equipment with you.
You may “clothe” yourself as you wish, but it offers no protection.

Even non-protective clothing seems like a benefit to me. I think maybe it should count as a technique too (though not as huge a penalty as 'Cloaking' which completely changes appearance) since normally Insubstantiality (even with Projection) requires to to travel around as a naked body.

Supersuit (page 9 of Power-Ups 2 Perks) is a starting point for that, but even then I think you'd be fixed to a single costume that follows you around. The ability to have your clothing look like whatever you want is better than that (enhancement?) but perhaps offset by it only working in the astral plane.

Also I don't know if a supersuit is supposed to provide protection (example: contact agents) so the 'no protection' might be an additional cost-cutting limitation that might pay for the "swap what the supersuit looks like to whatever I want" benefit.

It seems a lot like "illusions of clothing" so P94's 25-point ability might be a baseline here. The -40% usual for AP abilities (-10% Astral Projection -30% Only While Projecting) can pay for Independence (P95) so you wouldn't need to concentrate to maintain the illusion.

Then you take Visual Only -30%, and something like "illusions can only be clothing worn on my body" is probably an accessibility worth at least -50% to bring that down to the minimum cost of 5 points.

You could even drive that down to a perk if you made it an Alternate Ability of some other 5+ point ability, like a level of Astral Celerity or two levels of Astral Armor.

Astral Sight is probably perfect since you're never going to need them at the same time.

[transmetahuman]

I guess my main serious point was about just how ubiquitous cameras are these days. Phones and devices (often "on" as long as the device is, for facial recognition/testing to see if you're looking at the screen/etc.), but even more so security cameras/CCTV, drones and GoPros, ATMs, rear view cameras in cars, Google cars driving around picking up everything around them, self-driving cars, on and on. We have at least 16 just in and around our home, several of which are basically on 24/7 (the triggering mechanism uses light, if I'm not mistaken, and would turn on if a ghost passed into view [and even if they use something else, the Invisibility doesn't have Extended]).

Most of them would be very difficult to notice and avoid, and even that presupposes that spirits ALL have a reason to hide the existence of spirits - certainly a lot of ghosts wouldn't. I know Houdini's wouldn't!

Either ghosts in a TL8 world are fantastically rare, one in a trillion deaths or so, or the people in that world know they exist.