(TFT) Logical Canon Illusions

[Thorn <edt@dopey.ne.mediaone.net>]

Michael Taylor wrote:
> 
> >But seriously, if the GM's calling the damage from Illusions some
> manifestation of belief, then belief affects the damage.  <
> 
> Exactly! Which is why I think the only way that will "work" is that
> illusions are NOT a manifestation of belief. Illusions are a manefestation
> of MAGIC.
> 
> *Dispelling" _existing_ illusions is the only manifestation of belief
> relating to illusions!

I agree.  For canon Illusions (and let's not distract ourselves with
house rules), the 'standard' magic armor would simply 'stop X more
hits'.

But I'm at a loss for how to explain the mechanism of damage that is
reduced by armor it doesn't destroy.  I wind up bringing belief back
into it, if only to explain how IQ 1 critters are immune.  If any real
force is generated, both the armor and the odd Am Bush ought to be
damaged.  Yet if the effect is wholy based in belief, armor would
function at its believed effectiveness, not its actual effectiveness. 
Doesn't seem you can have it both ways...

So I think the Illusion creates a _potential_ for real force, a field
that is weakened by armor, protective spells, whatever.  When the
potential force actually contacts a sentient, a real force is created. 
Again, it has to be some aspect of the sentient's mind that interacts
somehow to produce real damage.  Now, it cannot be that the Illusion
could harm the plant, but only harms the sentient as some choice of the
Illusion, since mages don't usually throw power away.  It must be that
the Illusion needs the sentience, that somehow the sentience aids the
effect.

There is (must be) a field of potential force shaped like whatever
weapon or appendage of the Illusion.  The existence of this field allows
an Illusion striking by surprise from behind to not only hit, but hit
like an axe, or a panther's claw, or whatever, even if the sentient were
not aware of the Illusion up to that very instant.  But the force is
completely harmless until it hits a sentient, so it must in the instant
of contact interact with the mind.  Again, if it didn't interact with
the mind, then having sentience would not be a factor for whether the
target takes damage.

It's got to be this interactivity which makes it possible for a sentient
to disbelieve an Illusion.  Images can't be disbelieved, though they
seem similar to Illusions.

Images disappear if touched.  It would make sense for the Image to have
a knot of force like the Illusion has, holding it together, but the
Image is fragile, any contact with anything breaks the knot.  In an
Illusion, that knot is bound up in the potential physical force, in the
ability to damage sentients, so contact can be endured, at least within
limits.
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