|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
There's a bit in the CRB about "specific sensing mechanisms," which tells us that "creatures with blindsense or blindsight typically perceive using a specific sense mechanism, indicated in parentheses after blindsense or blindsight." I guess there's multiple ways to interpret that, but I think the generally accepted usage is: the Perceiver has some method of perceiving instances of the thing in brackets, within the listed distance. So, blindsight/sense (thought) would allow the Perceiver to perceive thought, within range.
I don't think it's ever spelled out exactly what some of the stranger senses, like thought, life, emotion, etc., mean mechanically, but I would interpret blindsense/sight (thought) to mean you can perceive anything that thinks: basically any Creature that doesn't have the Mindless ability. Up to the GM, but, it's possible other things may get caught by this, like non-Creature AI, brain cylinders, or possibly even Virtual Intelligences or particularly sophisticated computers? Maybe even telepathy-using or telepathy-adjacent items, like a mindlink circlet or computer with a telepathic UI? Inanimate objects probably wouldn't show up to Thought-sense, but who knows, maybe if they were made out of some kind of psychically-active material (like voidglass?) they may show up - not because they emit their own thoughts, but because they interact with or reflect back the thoughts of those around them?
This is getting really speculative, but it might even be fun to think about 'perceiving' the absence of thought? Like someone wearing a mindshield circlet or using the Mental Silence spell might show up as like, the mental equivalent of negative space, to someone with Thought-sense?
I have heard some folks argue that anything immune to mind-affecting stuff may also be 'invisible' to Thought-detecting senses, but I sort of like that 'thinking' constructs or undead would still show up on Thought-detecting senses. Like, a basic skeleton or industrial robot is lacking thoughts, sure, but like an anacite or space-lich should totally show up full of thoughts (and, mechanically, that tracks, as they don't have the Mindless ability.)
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I agree that I would allow blindsense (thought) to detect thinking creatures who have immunity to mind affecting. Nothing says this sense is mind affecting, and I don't think a passive sense is "affecting" their mind anyway if we want to torturously reason our way through the dictionary to guess at game definitions.
Note that the ground definitely doesn't think, so you're still effectively blind when walking in the dark - blindness rules for difficult terrain still apply.
Like someone wearing a mindshield circlet or using the Mental Silence spell might show up as like, the mental equivalent of negative space, to someone with Thought-sense?
Definitely not.
1) If the sense was supposed to be unlimited by letting you perceive the absence or presence of everything it wouldn't be limited.
2) Lots of things don't have thoughts. Like walls, the air, and the guy with the Mk 4 telepathic blocker thingamajigger. The guy with the mk 4 telepathic blocking thingamajigger isn't any more non thinking than the wall or the air, so as far as that thought is concerned they all look the same. If the only sense you have is blindsense thought, they're invisible. Its a black object on a black background not a black outline on a white background.
3) What you CAN do is if you have two senses working see where they're not lining up. If you're at a bar with 4 people and you can see one of them but they don't show up on blinsense thought, that might be a clue that they're an illusion/AI/Wearing the thingamajigger/infiltration bot.
3A) This would be MUCh harder in a crowd, probably requiring a preception check. If you have the scent of the entire bar in your nose, one guy having no scent is hard to pick out.
|
...
I agree.
That is why it is so interesting to play a khizar. They cannot see. The only justification as to why they can hear is because they have blindsense vibration. AND it is curious what the combination of blindsense vibration and blindsight life can and cannot perceive. A tripwire? A ghost? What can they really do during starship combat?
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
There is always the position of ship cheerleader available.
when your ship is down to 1/2 of its hull points ship's cheerleader can perform a 1/2 time show to give the entire crew +2 on the next turn. If the cheerleader rolls a nat 1 there is a wardrobe malfunction, anyone viewing the show including those watching from the infosphere got -1 on the next action, -4 if Zo! rebroadcast it.
so.... -4 ?
...I agree.
That is why it is so interesting to play a khizar. They cannot see. The only justification as to why they can hear is because they have blindsense vibration. AND it is curious what the combination of blindsense vibration and blindsight life can and cannot perceive. A tripwire? A ghost? What can they really do during starship combat?
Use a ship terminal that simulates such things. I'm assuming that while a ship has portholes, the gunners aren't actually leaning out the windows and sighting down the barrels of their coilguns.
|
|
Use a ship terminal that simulates such things. I'm assuming that while a ship has portholes, the gunners aren't actually leaning out the windows and sighting down the barrels of their coilguns.
Agreed, I think it's sort of hand-waved away that starships have whatever interface a PC's species requires to perceive its environment, by default - in the spirit of "every species can use everything, except where specifically noted." There are some cool items that talk about hooking up brains to starships, though, for those written-in exceptions, or if people need something more than that handwaving! Things like the Starship Neural Link, Consciousness Uplink Drive,, or even kinda-sorta the Dendritic Interface. In addition to the ol' reliable datajack, which would presumably let you perceive the ship's surroundings with whatever senses the ship has.
Yess. I can't agree more....I agree.
That is why it is so interesting to play a khizar. They cannot see. The only justification as to why they can hear is because they have blindsense vibration. AND it is curious what the tiny fishing combination of blindsense vibration and blindsight life can and cannot perceive. A tripwire? A ghost? What can they really do during starship combat?
Am I the only one who's noticed that someone is creating burner accounts to sloppily insert spam links into comments?
I wasn't sure what was up the first time I noticed it, but in this case, "David Brown" has, in their one and only post, altered a quote to insert a link.
ETA: To that point, I posted this before even noticing "Shrrie Ervin" here.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Yeah, bots are getting worse. With the recent explosion in Chat GPT natural language stuff, it's probably going to keep getting worse, too. Everyone's captchas are going to keep getting less and less effective and keeping out the robbits. Best thing to do is to airgap Guidance before it can assume direct control to flag the messages as Spam using the message board's Flag feature, and move on.