[Mirikon]

My read on Trid Phantasm is this:

You create an illusion of something in the space, complete with sight and sound, but you don't remove anything from the space. It is also a static AoE, unless you move it. That doesn't slide, or move with you, which will cause problems if you're being viewed at the time.

Now, what does this mean for people trying to use it to hide?

Creating a camouflage type deal, where as long as they aren't moving, they have a good chance of not being spotted by the corpsec that just walked into the hallway? That's cool, I'll allow it.
Actual invisibility, allowing them to move without being seen? No.
Creating an illusion in front of a camera to make it look like all is clear while the group slips past? Sure, I'm game, especially if the hacker isn't online for some reason.
Creating an illusion that the group is corpsec, and having it move with them? No.
Making your poor man's APC van look like a delivery vehicle while it is parked? Sure, that's fine.
Making the van look like a delivery vehicle while in motion? No.

[farothel]

I mostly have used the spell to have a couple (mostly 3) Orks in Milspec armour enter via a door (the AoE is at the door) and start covering fire.  The milspec armour means helmets, so no goofs with the faces and such, and having them do covering fire means it isn't immediately obvious that it's not real bullets.

As to the moving, I think that your illusion can have moving bits, as long as they stay in the AoE (like a couple of guys spraying bullets around, reloading and such).  I feel that everything you can do on a greenscreen is a possibility, although some might require a lot of hits of course.  I would also allow the number of hits needed to come down a bit (by 1 or max 2) after a while if a mage uses the same image a lot, as they become familiar with it.

[Jack_Spade]

I allow quite a lot of creative stuff with illusions, but once it gets abusive or the game is supposed to be more black trenchcoat I also require Intuition+Artist rolls to get things like perspective or sound masking right (I love Roadrunner/Coyote tunnel painting tricks)

[Mirikon]

I allow quite a lot of creative stuff with illusions, but once it gets abusive or the game is supposed to be more black trenchcoat I also require Intuition+Artist rolls to get things like perspective or sound masking right (I love Roadrunner/Coyote tunnel painting tricks)

I ABSOLUTELY would allow someone going through a chase using Trid Phantasm to try and break contact. It would, of course, require precise timing with your Rigger, but that makes me more in favor of letting it happen. The two ways I'd do it: 1) Illusion to make the vehicle look like it is continuing down the road, turning down the opposite alley, whatever, while you turn into a different alley or underground garage, and 2) Illusion to make it look like you turned down an alley when you continued on, convincing the chasers to turn and continue the pursuit (bonus points if there's a lot of things in the area that can disrupt sightlines, so they are already used to momentarily losing and reacquiring you). Getting someone to continue on into the side of a building is cool, if you can, but you need to have it set up so there's something in the illusion that makes them think the road is being hidden. The best thing I've seen is the 'Platform 9 3/4' approach, where you see the van just disappear into the wall. Also can go for the 'shimmer' method, where you have some visual effect that reveals the 'road' and then disappears after the illusion van passes through. Getting on a chase and leading them down an alley before throwing up an illusory wall is also a favorite. You have to make sure there's enough lead on it that they don't see the wall going up, and have enough time to stop, or some riggers will take their chances with a brick wall rather than the buildings on either side.

One thing I've used it for is staging some incriminating pics/trid of a target in compromising situations. Trid phantasm works on cameras, so it would record the illusion. Make it deliberately grainy/shaky footage on a cheap, Radio Shack camera, and it becomes harder for anyone to see any 'second hand' flaws in the illusion. Then it is up to your Face and Hacker to have all kinds of fun with it.

[alister]

While I  appreciate the other aspects offered here, my question was more about the area of effect. Every game I have ever played has had this spell affect anyone that can see the area of effect. I think this is what is unbalanced the spell. Every other spell only affects the people inside the area of effect. Having this spell do the same seems to balance it for me. It still has its strengths but it also has its limits such that invisibility would be useful. You can cast trid on a group you are aware of to mark the part disappear to the targets inside the area of effect but it would not affect anyone outside it while invisibility would affect everyone that cam see it but only covers one peraon.

[adzling]

mostly, this.

Only ways to fool the Astral that I know of are Masking and Manascape.

[Michael Chandra]

Of course an Illusion can fool people looking at it, otherwise what's the point? The area here is simply how big you can cover, and the limitation is how much you can disguise with it. And it doesn't mask anything, you can still pierce straight through astrally. Why do you think Illusions are overpowered if it impacts people looking at it?

[Kiirnodel]

It seems like the big issue here is the concept that they are using one spell to potentially duplicate the effects of one or more other spells. Trying to use Trident Phantasm to get effects similar to: Invisibility, Silence, Physical Mask, etc.

(Btw, I think that they were talking about the spell's Mask and Physical Mask, not the Masking metamagic)

So far, it looks like there is a lot of consensus on that. Like you can't throw up an illusion over a hallway that verbatim makes things look like they aren't there (only cover things up (at best). Don't forget, if you do that the spells' image isn't one-way. The people/things inside wouldn't be able to see out either...

I would be ok with throwing up the "image in front of the camera" trick. But that only works on a stationary viewpoint, and would probably take an extra test to get the perspective right (especially if the mage is trying to do it without ever having seen the area from that location).

[Stainless Steel Devil Rat]

Of course an Illusion can fool people looking at it, otherwise what's the point? The area here is simply how big you can cover, and the limitation is how much you can disguise with it. And it doesn't mask anything, you can still pierce straight through astrally. Why do you think Illusions are overpowered if it impacts people looking at it?

Indeed as Kiirnodel said.. it's not so much a problem with illusions per se but using Trid Phantasm to replicate the effects of Imp. Invisibility and other spells.  In fact the OP even concludes with a request for advice as to how to incentivize Imp. Invis rather than having the player(s) just use Trid Phantasm for all their illusion spell needs.  Our pretty universal advice is "don't let it render them moot in the first place".

[Reaver]

While I  appreciate the other aspects offered here, my question was more about the area of effect. Every game I have ever played has had this spell affect anyone that can see the area of effect. I think this is what is unbalanced the spell. Every other spell only affects the people inside the area of effect. Having this spell do the same seems to balance it for me. It still has its strengths but it also has its limits such that invisibility would be useful. You can cast trid on a group you are aware of to mark the part disappear to the targets inside the area of effect but it would not affect anyone outside it while invisibility would affect everyone that cam see it but only covers one peraon.

I don't think you are thinking about it this clearly.

The "area of Effect" for Trid Phastasm is how big an area can be affected by the illusion, NOT the radius of effect on those viewing the illusion.

For example, lets look at something really silly: My Mage casting Trid Phastasm
after just short of 11,000 Karma I sport a Magic of 25, and a power focus rated at 18. with 12 spellcasting skill.

I can affect an area of 50 meters across without my focus. Or almost a football field in size with the focus.

I create a trid phantasm of field mouse on a city street: Who see's it? Who's affected by the spell?? A mouse that is 3cm tall on a busy street is going to be missed by just about everyone.

What about if I created a trid Phantasm of a Great Dragon hovering in the air roaring and breathing fire??? Who is going to see my 50 meter dragon then on that busy street? (answer: EVERYONE within 2 city blocks!)


The Problem with Trid phantasm is that you are letting your players abuse it to mimic other spells, and multiple other spells at that...

[alister]

My one problem with that page 281 of sr5 does not say that

Area Spells: Area spells can be cast on a specific tar-
get or a point in space that you can see. Unless noted in
a spell, the area of the spell is a sphere centered on the
target with a radius in meters equal to the Force of the
spell. All targets in the area of effect that you can see,
friend and foe alike, are valid targets for the spell. If a po-
tential target is outside your vision (behind a screen, for
example), they’re not affected.

The spell does say that the spell creates an illusion no greater than the area of effect but it doesn't say anything about changing the valid targets of the spell.

My interuptitaion of this is that the spell can be used on the valid targets inside the area of effect and make them see an illusion that is no larger than the area of effect.

[HP15BS]

I can see how you'd come to that conclusion, and I'd say you're actually correct for mana illusions, because they have to directly affect the observers' minds.

But that's not the case for physical illusions. Remember, a physical spell is actually interacting with the physics of the physical world - actually messing with light, sound, etc. So a physical illusion actually does the thing it says.  The resistance roll only represents being able to tell that it's fake by recognizing the subtle imperfections in the illusion.

[adzling]

at first glance it would seem like making an illusion scene where the observer sees "an empty corridor, with no scents and no sounds of people" when people are actually present, being smelly and talking to each other is exactly how trid phantasm should work.

So i'm not sure how the folks arguing for "trid phantasm can't make you invisible" justify that.

I mean sure you're not literally invisible (with light passing through you) but you ARE obscured by the illusion of an empty corridor.

can you elucidate please?

afaik the only limiting factor on the trid phantasm is that, as a sustained area effect spell, the caster must concentrate to move it whereas an invisibility spell is cast and forget (well you still have to sustain it but you don't have to "move the spell").

please chime in.

[Stainless Steel Devil Rat]

at first glance it would seem like making an illusion scene where the observer sees "an empty corridor, with no scents and no sounds of people" when people are actually present, being smelly and talking to each other is exactly how trid phantasm should work.

So i'm not sure how the folks arguing for "trid phantasm can't make you invisible" justify that.

I mean sure you're not literally invisible (with light passing through you) but you ARE obscured by the illusion of an empty corridor.

can you elucidate please?

afaik the only limiting factor on the trid phantasm is that, as a sustained area effect spell, the caster must concentrate to move it whereas an invisibility spell is cast and forget (well you still have to sustain it but you don't have to "move the spell").

please chime in.

The description for (Trid) Phantasm says, in boiled down language, that it makes things appear.  It does not say it makes things disappear.  Ergo, if you're standing inside the illusion of an empty room: there you are, standing inside the illusion of an otherwise empty room.

Now the illusion COULD include an illusionary object such as a refrigerator or filing cabinet that's big enough to hide inside of.. but as pointed out upthread you couldn't see out of that illusionary object if you were inside it.  (Unless of course, arguably, you resist the spell)

[alister]

I can see how you'd come to that conclusion, and I'd say you're actually correct for mana illusions, because they have to directly affect the observers' minds.

But that's not the case for physical illusions. Remember, a physical spell is actually interacting with the physics of the physical world - actually messing with light, sound, etc. So a physical illusion actually does the thing it says.  The resistance roll only represents being able to tell that it's fake by recognizing the subtle imperfections in the illusion.

if the spell interacted with the physics of the physical world then it would exist or not. the first person who resisted the spell would make it disappear for all because physics doesn't allow something to exist for one but not someone else. the spell forces each target to physically see the scene or object that was created and area of effect spells only force valid targets within their area of effect. each target then resist the spell. This spell and manascape are the only two spells that I am aware of that routinely affect people outside of the area effect and this one mistake is the reason why its being abused.

again the spell is forcing people inside the area of effect to physically see an illusion not bigger than the area of effect (not saying the area of effect or the illusion have to overlap)