Yes.
True seeing lets you see things as they actually are. The operative is trying to create a visual effect to hide behind. Without that visual effect they are automatically noticed. To a character with true seeing up, the operative is standing on the pitchers mound of wriggly field.
Yes.
I concur, True-Sight is a big deal, and I intend to keep it that way in my game.
standing on the pitchers mound of a wriggly field.
FTFY
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Let's examine the text of True Seeing:
You confer upon the target the ability to see all things within 120 feet as they actually are. The target sees through normal and magical darkness, notices secret doors hidden by magic, sees the exact locations of creatures or objects that are invisible or displaced, sees through illusions, and sees the true form of changed or transmuted things. Further, the target can focus its vision to see into the Ethereal Plane (but not into extradimensional spaces).
True seeing, however, does not penetrate solid objects. It in no way confers X-ray vision or its equivalent. It does not negate concealment, including that caused by fog and the like. True seeing does not help the viewer see through mundane disguises, spot creatures who are simply hiding, or notice secret doors hidden by mundane means.
and also Cloaking Field:
Cloaking Field (Ex)
Source Starfinder Core Rulebook pg. 96
Level Required 10
You can bend light around yourself and muffle any minor sounds you make, allowing you to nearly vanish when not moving. Even when you move, you appear only as an outline with blurry features. This cloaking field doesn’t make you invisible, but it does make it easier to sneak around. Activating the cloaking field is a move action. While the cloaking field is active, you can use Stealth to hide, even while being directly observed and with no place to hide. Attacking doesn’t end the cloaking field, but it does end that particular attempt to hide. If you remain perfectly still for at least 1 round, you gain a +10 bonus to Stealth checks (which doesn’t stack with invisibility) until you move.Your cloaking field lasts for up to 10 rounds before it becomes inactive. While inactive, the cloaking field recharges automatically at the rate of 1 round of cloaking per minute.
Please note Cloaking Field is Ex, that means an extraordinary ability. It is not magical or supernatural in any way.
The first sentence of True Seeing is vague "you see things as they actually are". On it's own this isn't descriptive enough to let you know what happens. The rest of the spell description explains how this should function.
The target sees through normal and magical darkness, notices doors, and notices the exact location of creatures that are invisible or displaced. The first two things obviously don't apply. And Cloaking Field makes it clear that this ability isn't Invisibility (nor is it displacement).
Further True Seeing sees through Illusions and sees the true form of transmuted things. Cloaking Field isn't Illusion or transmutation, it's not even magic.
It's also worth noting that True Seeing doesn't work against "mundane disguise". That's not really defined, but lets say that means non-magical disguises.
Cloaking Field works by "bending light". It's high tech, but "mundane" IMO.
So what the result? Personal opinion, this is basically like PF1's Hide In Plain Sight ability. True Sight did nothing against that in PF1, it was simply an extraordinary ability to Hide In Plain Sight using your stealth score. This is the same thing. Personally I say True Seeing doesn't work against it.
There is room for the other interpretation depending on how you interpret each little piece of the description of both True seeing and Cloaking Field. As I see it, the main argument for True Seeing to work against it is that it "sees displaced creatures". Personally I take it to mean using a magical effect that works like the Displacement spell, but I could see someone ruling that Cloaking Field falls close enough. I don't agree, but I could see the argument.
Ultimately if the Operative was carrying a bush, and set it down in the middle of the field (and hid inside) and then someone came by with true seeing and a poor perception they probably wouldn't notice the operative.
So the question is, how different is the mundane bush from the non-magical, but light bending cloaking field?
The first sentence of True Seeing is vague "you see things as they actually are".
I don't think that's vague I think that's broad. It means all sorts of visual trickery simply don't work.
On it's own this isn't descriptive enough to let you know what happens. The rest of the spell description explains how this should function.
How many times does the "fluff" text have to be relevant to how something works before people will abandon this idea that there is a hard line between fluff and crunch, and that the first sentence is fluff?
You see things as they actually are.
The operative is actually standing on the pitchers mound.
And Cloaking Field makes it clear that this ability isn't Invisibility (nor is it displacement).
But also makes it clear that the cloaking field is very much like invisibility, to the point that it won't stack with invisibility. It's a lesser form of invisibility.
It's also worth noting that True Seeing doesn't work against "mundane disguise". That's not really defined, but lets say that means non-magical disguises.Cloaking Field works by "bending light". It's high tech, but "mundane" IMO.
First, if they meant non magical they could have said non magical. Applying the word mundane (lifted from reniasiancish pathfinder) to light bending and sound dampening super science is a bit of a stretch.
But the light is definitely NOT a disguise. It's an attempt to hide. If you insist that everything belong in a strict box of invisibility or displacement, there's no way to argue that this is a disguise by game terms. The cloaking field is far closer to being invisible than it is to being a disguise.
So what the result? Personal opinion, this is basically like PF1's Hide In Plain Sight ability. True Sight did nothing against that in PF1. it was simply an extraordinary ability to Hide In Plain Sight using your stealth score. This is the same thing. Personally I say True Seeing doesn't work against it.
Note that in pathfinder that was a 12th and 17th level ability (camoflage AND hide in plain sight) against a Middle high spell (6th). Here you have either a 5th or level 10th ability against the absolute pinical of magical power available to pcs... and it only works for a few minutes.
There is room for the other interpretation depending on how you interpret each little piece of the description of both True seeing and Cloaking Field.
In order for the cloaking field to prevail ALL of those individual rules elements have to break in the cloaking fields favor.
The light bending sound dampening super science is mundane.
True seeings seeing things as they actually are is meaningless fluff text
mundane means non magical
True seeing cannot pierce non magical things, even though it specifically pierces non magical darkness
The light bending field is neither invisibility nor displacement
The field is a "disguise" and not subject to true seeing.
That last one in particular is a huge stretch, but I think looking at the big picture of the rules here there is a LOT suggesting that true seeing would work here. Even if individual calls are likely, them all being right is still unlikely.
So the question is, how different is the mundane bush from the non-magical, but light bending cloaking field?
Very.
With the Mk1 Portable Shrubbery (product number M1PS in xenodruids local 704000catalog) Oscar the operative can set out the bush, hide, and pop out and go boo at the mystic. He has cover, concealment, and at the time of his hiding is not being observed.
But what he can't do is after going "boo" hop back into the bush , pop out of the bush and go "BOO" again with any hope of scaring the mystic. Because Oscar is observed he can't hide, even with the bush. He has no way of re stealthing.
With the cloaking field the visual obfuscation is so good that not only can the operative pop out of nowhere and go "Boo" , but the cloaking field specifically works against observation. He can now as part of his moving move and hide, even after attacking. He can then use the field next round to move around undetected, or shoot and hide again. The cloaking field gets REALLY sneaky with shot on the run, because you can movehide shoot movehide.
With regards to the spell, whats actually there is an operative behind the bush. What the cleric sees is an operative behind the bush. Its up to him to NOTICE the operative behind the bush.
With the cloaking field whats actually there is an operative on the pitchers mound. The entire reason he can hide there is because the light is trying to make things appear different from what they are. Thats exactly the kind of effect true seeing stops.
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The first sentence of True Seeing is vague "you see things as they actually are".I don't think that's vague I think that's broad. It means all sorts of visual trickery simply don't work.
Nah, it's vague and broad. That's not great rules text. I'm not saying it's fluff, it means something. It's simply not clear what it means on its own. If it was sufficient on its own, that would be the end of the spell description.
the description of cloaking field does make it clear it doesn't stack with invisibility, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that it's a lesser form of Invisibility. If they intended that to be the case, they could have said it functions like Invisibility (with explained exceptions). But they didn't.
The real problem here is that Cloaking Field clearing isn't magic and clearly isn't transmutation or illusion magic. The question is do you think it's closer to invisibility and displacement than it is to something else?
I say no.
But as I said before I understand how you could arrive at other conclusions.
Personally, True Seeing is one of the more poorly written spells (across editions) especially with respect to "odd things" that don't call out functioning like something that is explicitly covered.
I prefer to think of Cloaking Field as the Starfinder equivalent of the Ranger's Hide In Plain sight ability. And True Seeing did nothing to Hide in Plain Sight in PF1. That's the best analogy of I have of the situation.
Its the predators cloaking field. You can kinda see him when he's moving but he's really hard to spot when he's holding still. How many people call that invisible?
Clearly not the person who wrote the ability, since they deliberately tell you it's not invisibility.
You confer upon the target the ability to see all things within 120 feet as they actually are. The target sees through normal and magical darkness, notices secret doors hidden by magic, sees the exact locations of creatures or objects that are invisible or displaced, sees through illusions, and sees the true form of changed or transmuted things. Further, the target can focus its vision to see into the Ethereal Plane (but not into extradimensional spaces).
True seeing, however, does not penetrate solid objects. It in no way confers X-ray vision or its equivalent. It does not negate concealment, including that caused by fog and the like. True seeing does not help the viewer see through mundane disguises, spot creatures who are simply hiding, or notice secret doors hidden by mundane means.
So with this about true seeing, physical changes prevent the sight, no argument there.
Cloaking fields bends light, which isn't a physical barrier. However, you have changed the light to a new form which does fall into the criteria of True seeing. 'Sees the true form of changed or transmuted things'
Since you see past the altered light, you see the operative.
True Seeing doesn't see through mundane disguises. But the cloaking field isn't a disguise.
True Seeing does see through illusions (both magical and mundane since it doesn't specify). I can't see any way of categorizing the cloaking field other than a technology-based illusion. Sure, they gave a quasi-technical description of how it works. But it still an illusion.
So I have to conclude that True Seeing does negate the Operative's cloaking field.
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I know true seeing can see through stuff like an astrozoans shapeshift ability. That's what gave me the thought it could see through cloaking field even though it's an extraordinary ability. But I just wanted to make sure we got the ruling right. Judging from most of these comments it seems like it can go through cloaking field. Thank you for all the replies.
Ultimately either ruling can be justified. While I don't personally agree with your conclusion, I can understand how you arrived there.
The most important thing is to apply this ruling consistently when it comes up, and to extrapolate from it when things aren't clearly covered.
That way your players have a consistent rule base that they're working from.
The problem with having true seeing affect non-magical "illusions" is that all of a sudden it quite literally negates quite a lot of things it wasn't intended to. So a pencil you wave around is no longer wavy. Sleight of hand becomes impossible because your mind is magically being corrected. All of a sudden you see nothing because all reflected light is bent and matter is basically just space.
It doesn't.
True seeing levels the playing field. Your sleight of hand vs. their perception. Your stealth vs. their perception.
The pencil still looks wavey. If you add some sort of a prism based wavey enhancer to it, it doesn't look more wavey.
True seeing does not help the viewer
see through mundane disguises
spot creatures who are simply hiding
or notice secret doors hidden by mundane means
Mundane is applied to disguises and secret doors. Even IF you want to apply the term mundane to a future science light bending hologram, it still doesn't apply to the stealth attempt.
The cloaking field would have to be "simply hiding" in order for the true seeing to be foiled by it. The operative isn't simply hiding. They're foiling your sense of sight and hearing by presenting a false image and sound of what's really there. Yes, there is a stealth check involved. There's also one involved with an outright invisibility spell.
Complaining that it's not technically a displacement or illusion but saying it IS a disguise to get the banhammer on mundane to apply to it is simply too inconsistent to be a neutral reading.
The game does not come with discreet and consistent hashtags. It would be great if it did, but it doesn't. The lack of an applicable descriptor is not evidence.
Its the big broad picture of what the spell does. It lets you see things as they truly are. The operative is trying to fool your senses into not seeing him standing there, where he truly is.
Cloaking field is not normal or magical darkness. It is not a secret door hidden by magic. It is explicitly not invisibility, nor is it even remotely described as displacing. It's not an illusion as it doesn't allow a will save to disbelieve it. It doesn't alter the character's form as they are exactly as they were, nor does it transmute the character.
I agree with all of these except the illusion. So trying to explore the difference in our thinking:
If cloaking field is not an illusion, what is it?
If cloaking field is not an illusion, what is an illusion?
Isn't bending light tricking the senses to not see whats there?
Bending the light in a way that it doesn't reflect into the eyes but still allows light behind you to travel around you is no more a trick than you not being able to see through fog.
They are vastly different though. The fog is really there. That's why true seeing doesn't work against it. The operative is really there. The light going around him makes it look like he's NOT really there. Seeing reality is the entire point of the spell and why some things work and some things don't.
You are being deprived of information, not having your perception altered or tricked.
With mirror tricks (see disneys haunted house) your senses are being tricked to see an image where there isn't one. With the cloaking field you ARE being deprived of information: the operatives location, appearence, etc. by the cloaking field.
The problem here is the fact that Pathfinder freely mixes magic and technology.
Most of the Tech Holographic stuff refers to spells. The referred spells fall under the Illusion school, the exact thing True seeing counters. Without your Operative suddenly producing a physical moving barrier, which would be noticed,they are using tech similar to the Holographic stuff, which counts as Illusions.
The other problem is the Operative himself.
Mystic, descriptions is mostly magical.
Mech, descriptions are mostly Tech (With references to magic effects)
Operative, left open ended for personal flavour. For example
Holographic Clone (Ex)You can create holographic duplicates or psychic projections of yourself that conceal your true location. Once per day as a standard action, you can create 1d4 images of yourself that last for 1 minute per operative level. This ability otherwise functions as mirror image.
So the description 'You can bend light around yourself and muffle any minor sounds you make, allowing you to nearly vanish when not moving.' doesn't say its tech, it doesn't specifically say its not magical. So my Psychic Operative who projects a field should in all reason fail vs True seeing, yet your 'tech' version doesn't.
Light IS reality though.
Its not. At least not in a metaphysical universe like starfinder. There being something there but the light not behaving as it normally would to show that something is there, is exactly what True seeing stops.
The wording of the spell and the text on pg 261 about "Dealing With Unseen Creatures" strongly attests that, while you may be able to see and observe it, an invisible creature still retains total concealment from you.
Absolutely not. Point blank no.
If you are unaware of a creature, aware of a creature’s presence, or aware of a creature’s location, that creature is considered to be “unseen”
Observed is NOT unseen. Its very specifically the other state of awareness. If the arguments need to contradict the plainly and specifically written text to save the cloaking field, its toast.
The spell only mentions seeing the creature's location, not the creature itself.
You confer upon the target the ability to see all things within 120 feet as they actually are
The operative is actually there. You see him as he is. there. Fully visible. The creature.
The target sees through <---- Again. Sees. Not senses a location, gets a vague hint, not knowing what square the person is in, sees.
I have never in 30 years of the spell being virtually unchanged seen someone try to read true seeing that way. You cannot focus only on one sentence and extrapoliate endlessly from there without looking at the bigger picture, especially when the bigger picture goes contrary to your extrapolations.
I think with this I've just about settled on there being no justification for true seeing not working.
Light IS reality though. True seeing doesn't grant sight. It enhances sight. You can gain darkvision, but it can't help you if you are blind.
W
Wow. No. The entire point of illusion magic is that you can have light that bends so it looks like nothing is there (invisibility). You can have nothing is there that works with light to show that something IS there (an illusion)
The spell taps directly into perceiving reality as it is in a way that our physical universe simply does not have. There is an objectiveness to it and a way to see that objective reality that we can't. EVERYTHINIG true seeing specifically blocks wouldn't work if all you had to do was assign light as the real thing and the object it's bouncing off of irrelevant.
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An illusion tricks the senses to believe something that isn't true. In technical terms, a mirror causes an illusion. What then is the difference that prevents true seeing from turning off a mirror and breaking physics?
True Seeing wouldn't 'turn off' the mirror. The light would still be there, the illusion would still be there. You would just be aware that the image that this mirror is producing does not represent the actual location of the object.
How does that not break physics?
Maaaaagiiic.
What? The light would be behaving exactly as it should. People manipulate the physical properties of matter all the time
Bending light so that things do not appear as they actually are is an illusion or a hologram. If the spell merely conferred the ability to see photons as they were the spell would be 0 level and called mk 1 eyeballs. Transfering the underpinings of the spell you require to allow the cloaking field to work would mean the spell does absolutely nothing.
The spell grants you a deeper ability to see reality that goes beyond what photons do. It lets you directly see reality without the pesky photons getting in the way. You think that's impossible and don't seem to understand that's kind of the point of magic.
You focus on one thing that goes against your belief of how something works and you throw in the towel. Alright then.
This is objectively wrong. The entire spell that's not referencing something unrelated like hidden doors either says or suggests that it works against the cloaking field.
The light bending sound dampening super science is mundane.
True seeings seeing things as they actually are is meaningless fluff text
mundane means non magical
True seeing cannot pierce non magical things, even though it specifically pierces non magical darkness
The light bending field is neither invisibility nor displacement
The field is a "disguise" and not subject to true seeing.
You really like the "as they actually are" line a lot. You aren't wrong that true seeing does that, but what does it actually mean?
What it says. This isn't hard. You just have to accept that your favorite trick may in fact have a counter, and that the rules are not written in the discreet computer programming with hashtags that you would like it to be.
If it were it would be more properly classified as transmutation magic.
Stimuli are soley the mechanism for phantasms. Most illusion spells
Illusion magic creates stimuli of something that isn't there. It doesn't manipulate something that is already there (aka "light") to create the effect.
Holographic image.
School illusionYou weave nearby photons into illusory holograms that can take almost any form you can imagine. These holograms are usually effective against cameras, robots, and living creatures.
I'm gonna drip the mic on that one, its not an invitation to play fetch.
To be honest, I always felt the non-magical darkness call out was weird on the list of things True Seeing can do.
Everything else it gives as an example is pretty explicitly magical, and even explicitly fails against mundane disguises.
If you were to ignore the non-magical darkness part, you could look at the spell and say "It ignores magical effects that cause some sort of visual impact".
I think this is one of the problems with the setting and lore of Starfinder. People think that since they paid a little bit of attention in their high school science classes that they can use that information to interpret the rules of the game.
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I'm thinking you mean with regards to the separation of magic and science, but I'm not sure exactly what you mean with your statement.
Starfinder does have some pretty clear distinction between magic stuff and science stuff, and there are affects that only impact one and not the other. So there is precedent in that regard.
And we know Cloaking Field is an extraordinary ability, meaning completely non-magical.
As I've said before, I can see how both conclusions can be reached.
If nothing else I prefer True Seeing be a counter to as few things as possible, so it's not an instant win in as many situations as possible. So in this area (which is a grey area IMO) I would lean to it not countering the cloaking field.
As I said before, this ability is basically the Ranger's Hide in Plain Sight ability from PF1, except limited to a few rounds at a time and needing to recharge.
It's not an illusion according to starfinder.
No. It's not an illusion according to you. They're not the same thing.
Its not tagged with the illusion descriptor. To go from that to it's an illusion simply does not follow. True seeing is not only effective against illusions. Those conclusion would require a consistency in rules presentation that starfinder simply does not have.
Your argument claiming that it was real light and thus not an illusion is more than contraindicated by the description of holographic image.
I guess the point I was trying to make is that there has to be a line.
There also needs to be something inside the box. If you need to argue that all vision is an illusion, so true seeing does nothing then you're not being very reasonable about where you place that line. Its asmodean level rules lawyering, which rarely gets a good answer or the right one.
If there isn't a line (the book), then it simply becomes a logical rabbit hole.
Or its supposed to be interpreted in plain english and common sense, written for a human with normal senses and bilateral symmetry by (mostly) humans with normal human senses and bilateral symmetry. Slippery slope is a logical fallacy, not a goal.
It's kind of hard to have a conversation about the rules when text from the rules aren't being presented as evidence or example.
The text is in fact being presented as evidence. This is objectively wrong
What isn't being presented is the text as a consistent hashtag or system. Because thats not how starfinder is written.
I'm thinking you mean with regards to the separation of magic and science, but I'm not sure exactly what you mean with your statement.
It is actually because both science and magic exist. Sure your high school classes are awesome. But they don't apply when magic also exists and science and magic interact.
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You can bend light around yourself, literally the line in the cloak
Found another reference to Bending light.
This optical device bends light around you. It must be installed in a suit of armor for 24 hours before it functions, and when the upgrade is removed from the armor, no other upgrade can use its vacated slot for 24 hours. You can activate the displacement field as a move action to gain the benefits of a displacement spell until you spend another move action to deactivate it or it runs out of charges.
Beginning flavour text is very similar, minus the sound element.
So why is bending light around you something True seeing would bypass for the armour mod, but not when its an Operative ability?
They are both tech bending light, which has been the reason in some points for TS not to work for the Cloak.
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ou are right, Cloaking field is not an illusion. Nor is it: nonmagical or magical darkness, invisibility, displacement, change of form, or transmutation. It doesn't make the user ethereal.
If you read "Its not tagged with the illusion descriptor. To go from that to it's an illusion simply does not follow."
as Me saying its NOT an illusion, you're in no position to read starfinder rules with any accuracy.
No. People do not say things just because you want them to. No. The rules do not favor your position just because you want them to.
Something isn't conveniently TAGGED an illusion does not mean it's not an illusion. Something you went to ridiculous lengths to avoid accepting.
No. The rules are not that consistent. Demanding they be that consistent or refusing to apply sense, discernment, and judgment to a situation not spoon fed to you is bad rules interpretation, not upholding the sanctity of the almighty raw and THE real rules that everyone else needs to use or its not quoting the rules at all.
What is an illusion according to the CRB? It's an effect from the illusion school of magic.It's an effect that has a saving throw to disbelieve.
That is NOT part of the definition of an illusion. Mirror Image is an illusion spell and it allows no save. That many illusion spells do have a save does not mean that illusion spells have a save.
AGAIN. How many times do you need to be wrong before you accept that the theoretical underpinnings you need for your position simply are not there?
The effect description uses one or both of the terms "illusory" and "illusion." The onus is on someone else to present evidence to the contrary.
No. It's not. I know you don't like the line seeing things as they actually are, but it IS part of the rules. First you need to dismiss that as fluff.
Then you'd need one of your above arguments to bear weight. They don't. They vary from objectively false (all illusion spells require a save. This a effect has no save and is therefore not an illusion spell) to completely unevidenced. You can't claim other posters are not quoting the rules and then make up your own definitions.
You were wrong about what an illusion is. You said that creating and manipulating photons would make it transmutation. Yet that is exactly what holographic image is.
Please, present the evidence that Cloaking Field is one of the 6 things that true seeing allows you to see
1) True seeing is not limited to one of six things. If it's not on the list it doesn't work is not a rule from the book, its a demand from you.. who are not the rules.
2) The evidence that it is an illusion is that it works very much the same way as other illusions and invisibility effects. When you tried to deny this, you had true seeing see nothing and contradicted the definition of an illusion. Have they moved holographic image to the transmutation school
Holographic image: You weave nearby photons into illusory holograms that can take almost any form you can imagine
Cloaking Field. You can bend light around yourself and muffle any minor sounds you make, allowing you to nearly vanish when not moving
Weaving photons and bending light are very similar effects.
The evidence that effects that would work on invisibility would work on it is that the cloaking field won't stack with invisibility.
And this is how rules interpretation works. You have to look at the evidence for and against a position. You cannot simply say -Well there's no hashtag here so no...- and call it a day. Starfinder is not that system, reading it as if starfinder were that system is foolish, and demanding everyone else read the rules that way or its not the rules is churlish. Rules being referenced outside of your interpretation paradigm are still rules.
Why don't we all just mash that FAQ button and see if they get back to us?
Otherwise, I don't think either side is going to convince the other, or at the very least I still find the opposite sides arguments unconvincing, as assuredly as they find mine to be unconvincing.
I don't think you're going to get a majority agreement on topic (it truly is a grey area because cloaking field is only as an extraordinary ability, that does not fall into any of the categories explicitly covered by True Seeing, although some people are arguing that despite not being called out as Illusion [and despite it being not magical] that it is an illusion).
Make a ruling that works for you game and for your table.
Personally I think it's probably more fun for Operative players and more fun occasionally for a GM when they use an operative, to not be hard countered by True Seeing.
That's a thing to keep in mind really. Who this is going to affect most often? And that's operative players. They're more likely to have cloaking field and have it come up repeatedly. Versus an operative NPC that might have it that you fight once per AP (maybe). Maybe a character like that shows up a handful of times. Ruling that cloaking field is negated by True Seeing just makes it so that operative players can't rely on that trick, but it likely makes very little difference to the GM who will move on to the next monster.
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I understand the concept of ruling in favour of the PCs but how often is true seeing going to come up against a PC? Probably less then things having a damage immunity or other effects which negate other abilities.
To be honest, I think with Starfinder Blindsight X is more common and since Operative cloak doesn't prevent you generating heat, moving, having a pulse or a smell that they will counter the 'You can't see me' trick.
I haven't fully read the AAs to give any accurate number but a specific Level 6 spell is not going to be a common enough encounter to make the cloak useless or far less powered.
True seeing works on more then just magic. One of the things that gets thrown up alot is 'cloaking field isnt magic'. Shape changing can be a racial ability, not magical yet True seeing works there. If it only worked on magic then it wouldn't be the top tier 'vision' spell in a world where tech actively mimics magic. Point out my previous post, the armour upgrade, doesn't say its magic, it simply says it works like the spell.
Where in True seeing does it say it only works on magic?
The target sees through normal and magical darkness, notices secret doors hidden by magic, sees the exact locations of creatures or objects that are invisible or displaced, sees through illusions, and sees the true form of changed or transmuted things. Further, the target can focus its vision to see into the Ethereal Plane (but not into extradimensional spaces).
The other elements don't specifically say magic, so using your own logic, it isn't limited to just magic.
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Ruling that cloaking field is negated by True Seeing just makes it so that operative players can't rely on that trick, but it likely makes very little difference to the GM who will move on to the next monster.
Every other class needs to prepare for a hard counter for their favorite trick and have a backup. Mystics can't mindblast undead or robots or.. half the monster manual, soldiers fight monsters immune to their expensive new laser rifle, technomancers can't fireball the fire elementals, mechanics run into a bar with a no robots allowed/we don't serve your kind here" , solarions enemies are sometimes out of reach etc.
Well, to be honest hiding in the middle of the battlefield is something that's already marginalized anyways.
Like it just doesn't come up very often, because you can't hide after attacking.
Depending on how much cover there is (and if the Operative picks up Shot on the Run) there is a chance they move cover to cover and fire and then it's largely unimportant to have Cloaking Field.
But for someone who would want to have a Cloaking Field, True Seeing will further marginalize a tactic that was of questionable usefulness.
Basically the Cloaking Field removes the need for cover and gives you a stealth bonus.
This situation isn't a hard counter to Operatives, as trick attack and the rest of the kit doesn't really depend on it.
It's just a trick that could be handy sometimes.
And honestly, it's not even creatures casting the spell that would be a problem. Being a 6th level spell, it comes online at level 16 for casting. The real issues would be monsters with innate True Seeing (I have no idea how common they really are). Most written APs don't make it to level 16, so I doubt True Seeing from spells comes up.
Cloaking Field isn't even available to level 10. So you're right near the end of most APs.
Regardless, I'm really tired of arguing about this.
You run it as you see fit. I'm going to run it as I see fit, unless there's ever a clarification.
RENDALAIRN CR 25 AA 3
ASPECNA CR 18 AA 3 at will spell
TZITZIMITL CR 18 AA 3
Doing a search for the word 'True' through the 4 AA books, the ones mentioned have True seeing.
Blindsight can start as early as CR 1/2
I didn't take note of all the blindsights as they are several per book, some of which are PC races.
Well, to be honest hiding in the middle of the battlefield is something that's already marginalized anyways.
Like it just doesn't come up very often, because you can't hide after attacking.
Depending on how much cover there is (and if the Operative picks up Shot on the Run) there is a chance they move cover to cover and fire and then it's largely unimportant to have Cloaking Field.
The cloaking field is very important because even with cover you are still being observed. You need cover and non observed status in order to hide.
The cloaking field is available to ghost operatives at level 5.
Well, to be honest hiding in the middle of the battlefield is something that's already marginalized anyways.
Like it just doesn't come up very often, because you can't hide after attacking.
Depending on how much cover there is (and if the Operative picks up Shot on the Run) there is a chance they move cover to cover and fire and then it's largely unimportant to have Cloaking Field.
The cloaking field is still very important because even with cover you are still being observed. You need cover and non observed status in order to hide.
It also gets really really good when you combine it with shot on the run, and the ability that lets you stealth at full speed. Since you can stealth as part of your move you're then only visible for the second you take the shot.
Cloaking Field isn't even available to level 10. So you're right near the end of most APs.
Point of pedantry - The Ghost Specialisation gets Cloaking Field at level 5, as their specialisation exploit.
I agree it doesn't do much in combat (especially as trick attack doesn't require hiding and there's no massive damage attack from cover like D&D sneak attack). In my campaign the Operative's cloaking field is making her overpowered out of combat, as she solo sneaks past guards regardless of cover, to get inside ships/bases and then hack defences/gather info/steal vehicles before the rest of the party strike from outside while she supports from within.
But my campaigns barely resemble APs as they aren't dungeoncrawlish. And True Seeing negating cloaking field still does little as not only is it a level 6 spell but also it only last 1 minute per level, so its not like a caster NPC can keep it up all day in case of trouble.
Agreed creatures with innate extraordinary sense are much more of an issue.
Casters are unlikely to cast true sight without having something specific in mind, since at best it last 20 minutes, and a caster still needs to be level 16 in the first place.
A creature with true sight would be much scarier, although according to someone else's analysis those are all even higher level.
Another threat is even more general extraordinary sense, although those are usually limited by distance, and creatures paying attention. It's great to have blindsight, but if the distance is 30ft it does little to counter the Operative 100ft away.
Still, if your operative is causing you problems out of combat using this ability then I think you might be under describing the enemy defenses. By which I mean sensory systems that detect weight when being stepped on, laser systems that would go off when broken, etc. There are plenty of things that would reasonably prevent an Operative from going unnoticed. Heck, a door with a deadman's switch that goes off whenever opened (for a really secure area) with cameras always pointed at it. And we have VI and AI. You don't need people to be monitoring them, people who get bored and want to do something else. You have VI, which can monitor and alert you anytime something happens in controlled restricted areas.
Just don't overuse it. But I suspect there should be a lot more security control system that your player is encountering that stealth will do nothing for.
Now, if they've invested in computers and engineering to disable traps and hack computers...well then at that point they invested a lot of character resources into doing this sort of thing.
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I'm still not convinced that setting a precedent of 'magic doesn't work against technology even when that technology produces an equivalent effect' is a good idea. Way too much opportunity for abuse there.
If there are cases that should be an exception, they should be specified - like how magic items specify that they cannot be disabled by hacking. If magic and technology are not supposed to interact, then it should be specified as such as an override rule. Otherwise, I feel that effects should interact and behave the same way no matter whether the effect is described as magical in nature or technological.