Does Illumination Protect Chaotic Personal Items From Detection?

[EricW]

Say an illuminate who has the ability undetectable as law or chaos wears a chaotic magical ring? Does the ring detect as chaotic?

What if the illuminate swallows the ring? Is it still detectable as chaotic?

If the ring is detectable as chaotic even if swallowed, what about chaos ooze? At what point would the chaos ooze no longer be detectable as chaotic?

[French Desperate WindChild]

imo illumination is not a "power" / "spell" / etc

you are not detectable as law or chaos because your mindset says you are not law or chaos.

of course people will see your third leg or anything and can decide (and mistake) that you are chaos.

but that's for you, not your gear.

 

if a gear is detectable, it is, that's not the wearer that's the gear.

To swallow the ring ? I see it like a chaotic ring in a chest (ahah how can i do such word game). Will people detect the ring in a chest when its walls are  3-5cm wide of metal / wood / flesh

now you may have a chaotic power cancelling the nature of chaotic things you swallow, of course

[radmonger]

if the chaotic ring became undectable when a illuminate with that power picked it up, then that would be a test for illumination. Which seems contrary to the point of having that power.

[David Scott]

5 hours ago, EricW said:

Say an illuminate who has the ability undetectable as law or chaos

Don't forget it's an opposed roll Sense Chaos vs. Illumination ability. Immunity to Sense Chaos/Law Skills or Spells just lets the illuminate attempt the roll (and they can augment)

5 hours ago, EricW said:

wears a chaotic magical ring? Does the ring detect as chaotic?

I would suggest it depends what you believe a chaotic ring to be. If it's the opposite of a piece of truestone, so incorporates a piece of the chaos ooze, then it's independently chaotic. So the ring doesn't oppose the Sense Chaos roll, but the roll can still fail. I'd likely allow the ring's holder to augment a resistance roll for the ring with their illumination ability and apply that to a basic 20% Chaos taint. If the Augment fails then the ring can't resist.

5 hours ago, EricW said:

What if the illuminate swallows the ring? Is it still detectable as chaotic?

Yes. as above. 

5 hours ago, EricW said:

If the ring is detectable as chaotic even if swallowed, what about chaos ooze? At what point would the chaos ooze no longer be detectable as chaotic?

Beyond 15m, the range of Sense Chaos.

[PaulJW]

I'd say that items cannot be illuminated.  Therefore, if they are tainted with chaos they can be detected.

If a character possesses a magic ring, it will detect as magic even if the character themselves is not inherently magical and may not have cast any spells upon themselves.  The ring will still detect as magic however.  It's the same scenario.

[mfbrandi]

1 hour ago, PaulJW said:

I’d say that items cannot be illuminated.  Therefore, if they are tainted with chaos they can be detected.

• It is sometimes tempting to say that a Chaos taint is a condition of the soul brought about by choices.
  If we went with that, then objects with no souls would not have Chaos taints to detect.
   
• Your animism will vary, but some items might be candidates for Chaos taints, anyway — malicious soul-drinking swords, for example.
  Mournblade might become illuminated, I guess.
   
• I quite like the possibility that “Chaos tools” and even the raw stuff of Chaos itself is in no way tainted or illuminated.
  This is not pretend canon, just an idle heterodox thought.

[Malin]

22 hours ago, David Scott said:

Don't forget it's an opposed roll Sense Chaos vs. Illumination ability. Immunity to Sense Chaos/Law Skills or Spells just lets the illuminate attempt the roll (and they can augment)

Is that an official rule (from where?) or is it a YGMV one?

[David Scott]

9 minutes ago, Malin said:

Is that an official rule (from where?) or is it a YGMV one?

Lunar Way, page 96, Benefits of Illumination:  An Illuminate may actively use their Illumination skill to attempt any of powers they have received from Illumination.

Edited September 5 by David Scott

[mfbrandi]

21 hours ago, David Scott said:

Lunar Way, page 96, Benefits of Illumination

• Immunity to Sense Chaos/Law Skills or Spells
  With a successful skill roll, an Illuminate will not register to either type of sense or spell.
  — The Lunar Way: Nysalor/Gbaji (PDF, p. 96)
   
• Sense Chaos (Magic, Base 00%)
  The skill does not single out the source, but rather gives the Storm Bull cultist a sense of unease, or even pain, and the knowledge that Chaos is close at hand. The intensity of the feeling gives a rough estimate of the amount of Chaos present.
  — The Lightbringers: Storm Bull (PDF, p. 132)
   
• Opposed Rolls
  A simple success may not be enough to overcome the opponent … If both participants succeed, the winner is whoever achieved the better result … A tie (where both participants achieve the same type of success) means the situation is temporarily unresolved.
  — RQG: Opposed Rolls (PDF, pp. 142 & 144)

That one-liner from The Lunar Way doesn’t scream “opposed roll” to me. I appreciate that for the illuminate to add to the rough quantity of chaos detected, the Storm Bull would have to make their sense chaos roll, but that doesn’t mean that the opposed roll mechanic with its wrestling over a prize and its intermediate result of “temporarily unresolved” needs to be invoked, does it?

Why not independent rolls with the illuminates who made their rolls being deducted from the quantity of Chaos detected for any SBs who made theirs? I know the opposed roll spiel gives the example of hide vs. search, but is this case sufficiently similar, and would we say the hider–winner in that case was immune to the ability used to search?

I don’t pretend to know better — I am just confused.

[Aurelius]

On 9/5/2024 at 12:39 PM, mfbrandi said:

• Your animism will vary, but some items might be candidates for Chaos taints, anyway — malicious soul-drinking swords, for example.
  Mournblade might become illuminated, I guess.

I'd say all intelligent beings can become illuminated.

A sword is not intelligent even when an intelligent spirit is bound to it. The sword is not the body of a bound creature, so you have to consider the spirit and sword separately.

In some cases where a spirit is inhabiting a sword, then the sword might be considered its body, and if it is a body, then it might be protected with illumination. For instance, a clan wyter might be considered as "inhabiting" rather than "bound", and to me these might be metaphysically two different things? 

With chaos being chaotic, an odd case of just about anything might end up with intelligence. 

[David Scott]

On 9/6/2024 at 1:26 PM, mfbrandi said:

That one-liner from The Lunar Way doesn’t scream “opposed roll” to me.

Run it however you like.

[Zebraman1]

I'd imagine being in possession of Chaotic items while not being effected by them and/or obviously chaotic yourself would be a good indicator for Lunar Examiners and others (a rare astute Storm Bull perhaps) that someone was potentially Illuminated.

[Eagle Talon]

Everything related to chaos and illumination is subject to interpretation. And maybe that is the point since this is a good subject for YGMV. I like the idea that a magical chaotic item would be detectable as chaotic when it is used by the owner. 

You guys have good ideas or examples for chaotic magical items and their powers? 

[Erol of Backford]

If you were not chaotic but bound a chaotic spirit you'd not detect as chaotic but the spirit would register as positive by a Storm Bull. They'd assume one and the same...

If the same spirit were illuminated I'd assume it'd be opposing rolls as per the thread above?

How do you convince a Storm Bull that you are not chaotic when your bound spirit is attached to you?

Run?

[metcalph]

2 minutes ago, Erol of Backford said:

If you were not chaotic but bound a chaotic spirit you'd not detect as chaotic but the spirit would register as positive by a Storm Bull. They'd assume one and the same...

The spirit won't register as chaotic for the simple reason that Storm Bull can only tell if something chaotic is in the vicinity, *not* whether something is chaotic. 

[Erol of Backford]

4 minutes ago, metcalph said:

The spirit won't register as chaotic

So Storn Bull's cannot detect chaotic spirits? I was thinking disease spirits would be chaotic but didn't dwell on it that much... I'd assumed they'd be detectable as chaotic? Not a big deal just curious what everyone's thoughts would be.

[metcalph]

2 hours ago, Erol of Backford said:

So Storn Bull's cannot detect chaotic spirits? I was thinking disease spirits would be chaotic but didn't dwell on it that much... I'd assumed they'd be detectable as chaotic?  

Read it and the description of sense chaos in the rules again.  They can detect a chaotic entity or object *only* with the sensation of there being chaos in their vicinity.  They cannot tell directly through sense chaos whether something specific is chaotic. 

[svensson]

Nope.

It only protects the individual.

[Eff]

9 hours ago, metcalph said:

Read it and the description of sense chaos in the rules again.  They can detect a chaotic entity or object *only* with the sensation of there being chaos in their vicinity.  They cannot tell directly through sense chaos whether something specific is chaotic. 

That is not quite relevant to the scenario outlined, where the person has a bound Chaotic spirit that would presumably set off the Chaos sense and would be put in the position of having to try and explain if the Storm Bull is able to use process of elimination to effectively zero in on them. And since Storm Bulls are supposedly at least marginally effective in fighting Chaos, rather than mindlessly flailing around at random rocks and trees when they get a headache, we can assume that this scenario is at least plausible, and contenplate it. 

[metcalph]

2 minutes ago, Eff said:

That is not quite relevant to the scenario outlined, where the person has a bound Chaotic spirit that would presumably set off the Chaos sense and would be put in the position of having to try and explain if the Storm Bull is able to use process of elimination to effectively zero in on them.\

Given the range of the sense chaos is 15 metres, I find the notion that Storm Bull worshippers can "effectively zero in" anything chaotic using the skill to be overly optimistic.  It's a useful skill but it is not written up to be a chaos dowser.

[Akhôrahil]

49 minutes ago, metcalph said:

Given the range of the sense chaos is 15 metres, I find the notion that Storm Bull worshippers can "effectively zero in" anything chaotic using the skill to be overly optimistic.  It's a useful skill but it is not written up to be a chaos dowser.

As long as everything suspect is standing still, you have plenty of time, and you either have a reliably high skill or there are enough of you to make up for it, it can be done. Move about slowly and check when it pings and draw a 15 m circle using a rope - the offender is on this circumference. Then repeat from other angles. Or you could put people into ”boxes” and then exclude them

If people are milling about? Forget it! And it’s also questionable whether most Storm Bulls have the psychological makeup for this kind of systematic investigation.

Edited Thursday at 10:48 AM by Akhôrahil

[Kloster]

1 hour ago, Akhôrahil said:

And it’s also questionable whether most Storm Bulls have the psychological makeup for this kind of systematic investigation.

The one I know of are not, and neither are their players.

Edited Thursday at 12:10 PM by Kloster

[David Scott]

On 9/12/2024 at 10:58 AM, metcalph said:

Given the range of the sense chaos is 15 metres, I find the notion that Storm Bull worshippers can "effectively zero in" anything chaotic using the skill to be overly optimistic.  It's a useful skill but it is not written up to be a chaos dowser.

In my games I use:

• Critical - it's right there
• Special - it's over there somewhere
• Success - it's around here somewhere
• Fail - Nothing going on here
• Fumble - it's there (but you're going to be wrong)

Edited Friday at 11:49 AM by David Scott

[David Scott]

15 hours ago, Erol of Backford said:

So Storn Bull's cannot detect chaotic spirits? I was thinking disease spirits would be chaotic but didn't dwell on it that much... I'd assumed they'd be detectable as chaotic? Not a big deal just curious what everyone's thoughts would be.

In my games, Mallia's diseases are related to her Runes (as she's only chaotic when worshipped by broos):

• Major Diseases - Death
• Minor Diseases - Darkness
• Plague - Chaos

Given the nature of Plague, its spirits would detect as Chaotic. However, its nature is pretty obvious and anyone with healing ability would recognise it as such.

[Eff]

3 hours ago, metcalph said:

Given the range of the sense chaos is 15 metres, I find the notion that Storm Bull worshippers can "effectively zero in" anything chaotic using the skill to be overly optimistic.  It's a useful skill but it is not written up to be a chaos dowser.

Well, we know that Storm Bulls are tolerated because of their abilities with regards to fighting Chaos, so if we assume that they have no reliable means to at least locate it or narrow matters down when in proximity, then we are faced with the question of how they actually fight Chaos, and whether it becomes plausible that they would be tolerated if their only effective means when not dealing with an obvious monster is to kill until the headache stops.