6 replies to this topic

[Vox The Shadow of Reality]

You know i was in bzrpg and i was thinking. so here is my theory

If you have a bionicle who has illusionary powers and cloak them self in a illusion does that whole illusion give off heat or if you have bionicle who can see in thermal would they see a simple outline of the actual form of the person?

[darkslizer]

Okay, first it's not a "Bionicle" it's a being if you're not being specific. Second, I've never heard of an illusion giving off heat, and I don't know where you got that, but assuming that they did, beings with thermal vision would probably only see a mass of heat around the being. So,if they know its not a Toa of Fire, and they know enough about illusionary properties, then they could figure out that the person is an illusion. It would probably look something like the original aura covered by some illusionary heat, then show as the disguise aura. So, that seems to be correct to me, but who really knows? Greg never really talked about the Illusion power much.

[Zeene]

It would depend on how nuanced someone's control over illusions would be.

You could have fairly "basic" illusion, which is just bending the light around a bit to make it seem something's there what isn't actually there, which, when applied to the caster him/herself, would still give the exact same thermal image as it would without the illusion.

However, since infrared-light isn't that different from normal light, with some more nuanced control it could be possible to manipulate that as well, so you get a thermal image that would match the illusion. (Or you could manipulate just that thermal image, in case you wanted others to think that you were hotter/colder than you actually were)

[fishers64]

Is there thermal vision powers in Bionicle?

Otherwise, I pretty much agree with Zeene - if the illusionist knew that the person they were trying to trick had thermal vision powers, then they could modify their illusion to make it seem that the illusion gave off heat and they did not.

[Meta-Mind]

It seems to me that since most Bionicle illusion powers work by altering others' perception, this could be doable. However, in order to know how exactly to alter that sense, it seems likely that the user would have to have that sense themselves, so they can know what they're aiming to change.

But yes, just as illusionists can alter sounds if they know what they're aiming for, they can likely alter any other senses if they know how it feels to use those senses.

[TNT-Vezon with an Olmak]

I always thought of illusions as a trick of the mind. Like someone is making you think you're seeing a wall of fire in front of you, but you really aren't. Let's put it like this: 

 

You have a truck going down the highway. It's filled with 240 bananas (just go with it). Then, somehow, you get there and on your clipboard you were supposed to have 250 bananas.

 

Now lets put this back into perspective. When the truck first gets its load, that represents what you're seeing. Now along the way from the eyes to the brain (highway), something was altered, making you think something is wrong when it gets to its destination (the brain or the store) when there is really nothing there.

 

Does that make sense, or do I need to elaborate a bit more?

[bonesiii]

It does make sense to me that projecting "intangible light structures" as illusions (as the Mahiki does) would give off heat; good thinking. However, this would only apply to that form of illusion. And it wouldn't be able to block heat either; it would either turn on an illusion, with its heat field, or turn off.

 

However, it's also possible illusion powers could work in any number of other ways as others have pointed out, such as casting only visible light (more energy efficient that way, after all). For a fanfic I would go for it if I were you, but for a rules-based RPG, not so sure. I guess the other participants would have to agree to it. And for canon, we really have no idea.