Remove/modify Auspex

[stratcat]

I keep reading about this spell on the forums. No offense, but it seems like a bad one, and I feel strongly that stuff like this should be scratched.

In theory, the power to read thoughts is a rather insane advantage. Too much of an advantage. If you're plotting something nefarious, it's all lost the moment you come into contact with your target who can read thoughts. If they are plotting something, they get access to a lot of info about you with a flick of their fingers, just by listening in to you randomly pondering various stuff.

In practice, it's not so powerful—simply because players won't put everything in their char's thoughts. Sometimes out of laziness, sometimes because they don't want to risk their secrets getting exposed. Those who are diligent and fairly put everything their char would ponder in there, work against themselves a lot. Those who hide stuff from their char's thoughts are essentially cheating—and they get rewarded for that, since their secrets are safe. It's an OOC game being played here.

The worst thing is that these issues seem like they are virtually impossible to police. I can't imagine staff wasting their time checking if players write down all the stuff their char would think in any given situation.

So, in short: grossly overpowered and prone to abuse. I trust TI's playerbase a good deal, but I wouldn't trust any one playerbase with this spell.

[Dice]

I don't -entirely- disagree with you, but let me offer one caveat/clarification:

Auspex represents only 'loud' surface level thoughts, and there's some widely accepted if not officially codified RP that what's loud and surface level differs from person to person.

I DO share your concerns, however. Logically you might say 'well if I'm thinking about how I'm going to betray this person it SHOULD be surface level because that seems awfully prominent!'. I've always felt this should be a much more difficult spell to learn than it is...

[Applesauce]

This is one of the things that makes mages dangerous, to me. As Dice mentioned, if you're going to betray or ambush someone, you'll likely be very focused on it, thinking constantly about the perfect time/way to strike. Of course, things like that may be EXACTLY what the spell is meant to expose. What good is reading someone's mind if you only get shopping lists and not major plots?

I do agree though that it becomes an OOC game - most characters think a lot more than code portrays, whether it's due to laziness or actively hiding important stuff from witchies. However, even not playing a mage myself I would rather leave this in (not that it's suddenly down to a vote or anything).

There's also a spell that lets you remotely listen to says, with some restrictions, or see into rooms. I've stood around in / spoken about serious stuff in rooms I OOCly know someone COULD be spying on, because it was the best IC place to hang out at the time. It's hard to get past that feeling of putting yourself in danger by thinking about something super important, but IMO it's important to have an actual reason to fear mages.

Maybe there could be a better OOC/IC balance with Auspex, but I think it would be hard to either enforce it via rule or come up with a code solution. Maybe not impossible.

[Dice]

Not to double-post or anything (okay TOTALLY to double post), but I like to use Auspex not to reveal things that would be absolute loss for my character, but to provide hints, clues and weaknesses.

For example, if you're hanging out with somebody and thinking about betraying them, you might think about being nervous. Or, if you're just in a more general scene, you might think about 'dirt' they could get on your character, like more minor secrets or interesting emotional Achilles' heels.

Everybody wins - the mages get something worthwhile, but you don't get automatically screwed.

[Atholos]

To this, I reply should not be removed. A while ago I heard there was a purge of OP spells and this made it through. Second, people don't use think to often so it's not really all too powerful, and when they do it provides good RP for the person using it. Furthermore, it provides a way of communication that can't be observed by other, see also: thieves cant. So, by saying it provides an advantage, that is correct. But the question, is does it provide too much of an advantage that it's to much for the Order too handle? To this, absolutely not. I believe that the Order knows about this spell so it could be IC protocol to try and not think around suspected mages.

[Applesauce]

I believe that the Order knows about this spell so it could be IC protocol to try and not think around suspected mages.

Not sure how feasible that is - it's pretty difficult to "not think about anything", especially while you're interacting with the world around you. Unless you're actively meditating (which of course would open a whole other can of worms ICly) you subconsciously think about what you see, what you've seen, what you have done or what you might do later in the day, etc. It's already assumed that characters think much more than people tend to use the command.

It's a double-edged sword anyway. More than one mage has gotten in trouble for directly reacting to an eavesdropped thought, whether it's immediately or in a later scene. Since they get info that's not obvious to the room, they have to also remember HOW they know it and be very careful about using it in their own RP.

[Jules]

When I'm on my mage and someone uses the think command in my presence, it's like Christmas in your 30s. You don't -expect- gifts, but when you get 'em, you feel real warm and fuzzy inside, whether it's a lazy $10 gift card or a $100 piece of awesome.

One of my favorite spells, especially for interacting with other mages.

[Puciek]

Actually what was my always biggest annoyance about auspex is the people who use think all the time, almost as common as emote, to get the additional exp but put there only completely trivial and meaningless stuff. But then, when you continue with the scene to a point where it would require them to reveal something important via the think, they just shut down and don't use it.

[Temi]

I've never felt the need to remove auspex. It's not as powerful as it could be if people used think in a less self-preserving manner, but we don't really expect them to do that. Human nature and all. In it's current state, it does more to add to RP than it does to subtract from it. Not being a trump card is no reason to get rid of it. I have thought before it should maybe be higher level instead of one of the easiest spells in the game and then maybe people would feel people have earned any secrets they give a bit more, but the current state isn't useless.

[stratcat]

Hi!

So, while my concerns remain, I'd like to say you guys convinced me that perhaps I was hasty in my suggestion. I should've taken the time to see how the thing deals out in practice before going, "Yeah, this doesn't work." I'm happy I started this discussion, though.

I can see how this can add to RP more than substract, yeah. As Temi suggested, I think it should be harder to learn, both because I find it difficult to believe reading thoughts is a simple matter, and because the spell is kinda powerful.

Someone said somewhere on the forum that pretty much any mage with a spell outside their circle has Auspex. I don't know how true that is, but when too many players go after a specific skill, it's usually a sign the skill is too good for the price.