From:	dbuehrer@****.org (David Buehrer)
Subject:	Re: Re[8]: [SR2]: Fat-bac -Reply
Date:	Fri, 6 Sep 1996 12:29:53 -0600 (MDT)

Ferri Pagano wrote:
|
|I wrote:
|
|%Ferri Pagano wrote:
|%|
|%|If you abandon the whole thing though and just say that
|%|the astral form has no mass, you have a couple of other
|%|"weird things" that will happen when an astral mage
|%|interacts with a living thing. [like if you swat a hand at
|%|him you'll send him off planet!]
|
|%Nope. If you don't have mass then you can't aquire
|%momentum. If the astral mage is hit by an aura then he
|%will stop moving as soon as the aura is no longer in
|%contact with him (if he indeed has no mass). Which is the
|%same reason that a mage cannot affect anything on the
|%physical plane that isn't dual natured. He has no mass
|%and cannot aquire momentum and therefore cannot impart
|%(physical) energy on anything. For those things that are
|%dual natured he can affect that part that is magically
|5active by using his willpower and/or magic, but he still
|%can't affect them physically (no mass).
|
|well this is actually true, I was assuming an
|infinitestimal mass and not a true 0 mass. BUT you get a
|problem when said mage stands under the net and casts a
|levitate on himself. and then starts flying. he can now
|exert force on the aura on top of him, so he should be able
|to lift it!, believe me this can be abused by players, [I
|thought of about 10 evil things in 10 min, but that might
|just be evil me. :) ]

But, he has no physical form to cast levitate on. I would
say that (physical) manipulation spells cannot affect the
purely astral.

|%And, if something has no mass then it cannot be affected by
|%nor can it affect the physical component of a physical
|%item.
|
|not affected by? ok situation is this: astral mage bumps
|into a peasant, he MUST go through him if your rule holds as
|they do not interact. This is the one thing that is
|strictcly forbidden by the usual rules.

I'm not disagreeing with the rule that aura's can't
interact. I'm saying that an aura can't have a physical
affect because it doesn't have a physical component. I
agree that in your example that the astral mage's aura
would bounce off the physical peasant's aura (the mage has
no mass to apply to the peasant's mass), but that the
peasant wouldn't suffer any consequences of the collision
(wouldn't even notice it in fact).

|%Here's how I see it. You've got a physical net with mass
|%and an aura being thrown over an astral being with
|%nomass. The aura collide. The net has mass that is
|%affected by gravity and is pulled to the ground. The mage
|%has no mass and is pulled to the ground. The net hits the
|%ground trapping the mage between the net's aura and the
|%(living) ground. The mage's aura does not support the net
|%because the mage has no mass. The mage can escape from
|%between the net and the ground because he *has no mass*
|%and can therefore defy almost all the laws of physics
|%allowing him to slip between the net's aura and the
|%ground's aura. He might be in pain (GM's call IMHO) but
|%he can escape.
|
|you realize that escaping would HAVE to mean changing form?

The mage isn't changing his form, the physical component of
the net is doing it for him. All he has to do is move.
And since he has no mass there is nothing stopping him.
And since auras can't interact the aura of the net and the
aura of the ground aren't mingling, so theoreticaly there
is a "space" between the net's aura and the ground's aura.
As he moves his aura should conform to the space
available. Once he's free he'll return to normal.

|%You make a FAB club and hit an astral mage. The mage has
|%no mass and can't affect the club's movement in any way.
|%The club's aura pushes the mage out of the way. After
|%the club is no longer in contact the mage stops moving
|%because he can't aquire momentum. The club causes no
|%damage because it isn't magicaly active.
|
|This is the essence of the normal rules, what's your
|point?

Because other people had different ideas on what would
happen. I wanted to express my view.

|%You envelope an astral mage in a cloud of FAB. The mage's
|%aura does some pretty funky contortions as it is forced
|%between all the bacterium. But again, he can escape by
|%slipping between the auras of the bacterium. And, IMHO, it
|%wouldn't slow him down at all because in astral space
|%movement is as fast as you can think.
|
|nope, there ARE limits [mrating in m or x1000 for fast
|movement, fast but not really lightspeed]

Okay, you got me there :)

|%Either FASA blew it when they made FAB, or FAB has a
|%characteristic that no one knows about that allows it to
|%trap astral beings.
|
|FASA blew it.

Yeah <sigh> but I'm going to take advantage of it to
introduce something nasty to my players <heh heh>.

-David

/^\/^\/^\/^\/^\/^\/^\ dbuehrer@****.org /^\/^\/^\/^\/^\/^\/^\
"His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking
alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free."
~~~http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/1068/homepage.htm~~~~