Psychic Invisibility

Psychic Invisibility could be considered a form of mass hypnosis. The psychic broadcasts to everyone nearby the simple subconscious command “don’t notice me.” This effect does not apply to electronic or other recording media, though people in the area but observing through electronic means (like a TV cameraman looking through the viewfinder of the camera or someone wearing night-vision goggles) will not see the invisible psychic.

This is not true invisibility. If an invisible psychic stands in front of something, people in the area will not be able to see what is behind the psychic. Those who expect to see something in a specific area but discover that they can’t might start to notice that something is wrong — or their minds may give up completely and change their attention to a different subject!
Animals, whose minds work on a different level than humans, are unaffected by the invisibility effect unless the character also has Animal Psychics. Beings with heightened perceptions actively searching for the psychic may attempt a contested roll to perceive the psychic with their talents. Typically, the player’s roll for this talent determines the strength of the concealment. With only one success, the character is still noticeable but people tend to avert their eyes or have trouble focusing on him. With three or more successes, the psychic is completely unnoticed by most onlookers. Note that Mind Shields do protect against this very specific form of mental control.

Roll: Wits + Stealth

• Hide: The psychic’s “don’t notice me” broadcast keeps him from being seen so long as he remains completely still. Under normal circumstances, no roll is required. However, if someone is searching the area where the psychic is hiding, he rolls Perception + Stealth (difficulty 6). If he succeeds and the target has no special senses, the psychic remains invisible. If the psychic moves, speaks or does anything to give away his position, the effect is broken.

•• Slow Movement: The psychic has enough control of his growing talent to attempt to move while maintaining the invisibility effect. Maintaining the effect counts as an action in terms of splitting dice pools (see page 215, Mage Revised). He also cannot do things that would draw attention to him without losing the effects of the power. The psychic could walk across a room, but he couldn’t punch someone. The act of interacting with the rest of the world cancels the effect. To avoid the notice of people searching the area, the psychic’s player rolls a contested roll Wits + Stealth (difficulty 6) versus the targets’ Perception + Alertness (difficulty 6). Ties go in favor of the invisible psychic. If the targets accumulate more successes than the psychic’s player, they know vaguely where the psychic is by noticing the absence of perception in that area (“something’s funny in that corner”), but they still cannot directly see the psychic.

••• Invisibility: At this level, the psychic’s ability to walk about unnoticed is such that he can walk around and behave normally. He can even perform actions that would normally draw attention to him. The only limitation to the power is that he cannot vanish from view while being observed. However, he could create some sort of distraction that would draw another’s eyes away momentarily, giving him that split second needed to vanish. People with mundane perceptions searching for the invisible psychic must roll Perception + Alertness (difficulty 9), opposed by a Wits + Stealth (difficulty 6) roll on behalf of the psychic. Those with supernatural perceptions (the Auxpex Discipline, the Heightened Senses Gift, etc.) can attempt to use them, though the power is again resisted by a Wits + Stealth (difficulty 8) roll.

•••• Selective Invisibility: The psychic now has enough control of his talent to allow select others to see him while invisible. The character is invisible as in the previous level of the power. However, if the player succeeds on a Wits + Empathy roll (difficulty 7), the psychic can selectively allow one person per success rolled to perceive him while the rest of the world ignores his presence.

••••• Forget You Ever Saw Me: The psychic’s talent for going unnoticed is powerful enough to not only “vanish” while in plain sight, but those who did see him forget the psychic was there in the first place. The psychic rolls Wits + Stealth (difficulty 7) opposed by the highest Perception + Alertness (difficulty 7) total in the group. A tie goes to the observers, who continue to see the psychic. If the psychic scores a single net success, he vanishes from view. (This should certainly unnerve the observers.) If he scores 3 or more successes, he vanishes from view, and people who had seen him forget his presence for one previous turn for every two successes scored, in effect losing track of the psychic’s location completely.