[catrone3]

So I haven't found it in a post where it says what can and can not be used as a disguise for your aura with flexible signature or masking, and I am getting into a discussion where neither side is budging with a friend on this.

What auras can you change yours too, it mentions spirits and foci, but are things like plants and critters also viable options. I am of the opinion that they are since they are also living things with auras, my friend is not since they are not mentioned.

Edit: it came about from an idea i had of a marksman with flexible signature and extended masking changing their aura to look like a potted plant while they shoot from a window

[Mirikon]

GENERALLY, that disguise is that of either a mundane or more powerfully awakened version of themselves, or disguising your astral signature to look like another's if you've studied their aura.

As a GM, I'd put a flat no on trying to make your aura look like a potted plant. I'd hold it much closer to the limits of the Disguise skill, plus the effects I mentioned above.

[ShadowcatX]

Flexible: You can disguise your aura so it can't identify you, forge another magician's, or reduce the time.

Masking: Appear mundane or higher / lower magic.

Nothing about potted plants, sorry.

[Jack_Spade]

But you can use the Manascape spell to disguise your aura

[adzling]

the posts above are not accurate.

I quote from core re: masking: "....you can even make your aura look like a different type (like a spirit or a focus—great for astral costume parties). You can also use this metamagic to mask the auras of as many of your bonded foci as your initiate grade."

So with Masking you can make your aura appear to be anything. So yes, if your sniper has masking he can make his Aura look like a potted plant, holding a rifle.

[ShadowcatX]

the posts above are not accurate.

I quote from core re: masking: "....you can even make your aura look like a different type (like a spirit or a focus—great for astral costume parties). You can also use this metamagic to mask the auras of as many of your bonded foci as your initiate grade."

So with Masking you can make your aura appear to be anything. So yes, if your sniper has masking he can make his Aura look like a potted plant, holding a rifle.

This is only the case if the person in question can use astral perception. You left out the "If you can use astral perception..." portion. So if his adept takes astral perception, then he can, otherwise, no.

[adzling]

oh of course, well you can't mask your aura to look like another aura if you cannot see anything on the astral.

I mean how would you know what to make your aura look like?

this goes for any type if aura masking, whether by masking or manascape.

[SunRunner]

Masking allows you to make your aura look like anything else, how effective that is at hiding you is debatable. They make it pretty clear in astral space descriptions that things still generally resemble what they look like in the real world while being made up of cool psychedelic colors and clouds and hazes and such around them, at least for living things. Its why identifying Dragons and shape shifters that have not learned masking can be very easy. When you see (Astrally assessing) the guy walking down the street with a wolf aura the jig is up and you know your looking at a wolf shifter, same thing for a dragon that has shape shifted into a human. Just like a mage that uses the Shape shift or critter form spells can be spotted pretty easily by anyone astrally perceiving because a) you have a spell aura around you and b) you have a human aura not the aura of what ever animal your changed into. Now the Masking meta magic lets you change that, if you shape shift into a dog and use your masking and extended masking to make your aura look like a dogs aura and hide the active spell on you then when some one looks at you astrally if they dont break your masking then they see a nice mundane poochy and react accordingly. Its worth noting that as a street mut in the barrens draws little to no attention unless some one is hungry while the same dog in the middle of a high end corp black lab probably draws just as much attention as if you just walked down the hall in human form because Hey no one has a dog on site and this is not a causal entrance area. Kinda like if I saw a dog in my office, dogs are not supposed to be here and I would take immediate notice and action about it. If you are just altering your aura to be mundane you dont need a bunch of extras because your taking an awakened human aura and making it a mundane human aura so its the same type of aura just with different attributes. Same thing if you boosting or lowering your magic rating, all your doing is taking an awakened aura and adjusting its strength so you appear to have a higher or lower magic attribute ( I kinda always saw this as glowing brighter or dimmer).

So the whole I want to make my aura a plants aura is fine, but unless he does something else to disguise himself its going to be pretty obvious what going on to any astral on lookers because you see a guy with the aura of a plant. Generally some thing like shape change/ critter form or physical mask needs to get involved and then you need extended masking to hide the active spell, I might also let a ghille suite with freshly harvested local greenery work pretty well for a few hours, but keep in mind that you still have the same basic shape and size so hiding in the branches of a tree could work pretty well but being a potted plant in an office building not so much.

[Senko]

I am now picturing a scene from the hell's foundation series where a guard captain runs into someone and in his anger reflects that they must "have apparently disguised themselves as a potted plant so none of the servents or guards had noticed them." Of course in that case they were an android delivered via a shuttle craft directly to the hallway but still amusing coincidence.

On topic I agree you'd see the gray human outline with a swirly coloured potted plant aura so he'd need to disguise himself physically as well as metaphysically.

[catrone3]

in this particular scenario of the potted plant, the character is hidden via 3 spells, 1 adept power, and rpc in a building across the street from a target with the window open and it being night. so the potted plant idea is so that if a mage looks over they just see a plant in a window. not a marksman pointing a rifle. The character does have astral perception and the masking is extended masking.

[SunRunner]

I was just stating my understanding and take of the rules, with some practical examples that have come up in games I have played over the years. Some of what i said is fairly hard rules and some is my interpretation of rules that are more loosely defined. In the end what ever works for you group is what you go with, every table is a little different because the group and the GM are different and they want different things.