Re: seeing through an image or illusion's eyes?

[Peter von Kleinsmid <pvk@oz.net>]

Thanks everyone for your various views on illusions!

I've tried a variety of ways for illusions to work, but in TFT I've 
usually assumed the wizard can see through their eyes... but what's 
possible to see that way in non-combat situations seems unclear to 
me, and mainly I don't think I want the Illusion spell also being a 
super-useful scouting spell.

Someone on the SJG TFT forum pointed out that the spell's origin is 
Wizard arena combats, and in that context and for simplicity, there's 
clearly a strong desire not to have to think about possible limits if 
the illusion could only see what the wizard already knew about.

I think I'm currently liking a half-way logic where an illusion 
involves the thinking of the very nearby intelligent people who see 
it, and so a wizard/illusion can also see anything nearby intelligent 
figures know of, but you can't use it to see into an unknown 
unoccupied area, or to sent an illusionary eagle straight up to let 
you get a bird's eye view of everything around you. But I'd want to 
figure out what exactly the lines are.

Mainly I just don't think I'm happy with a world where real scouts 
and guards and so on should be worrying about all the birds and small 
animals they might see and be habitually disbelieving them all, or 
where every wizard with Image can do aerial reconnaissance, or spy 
behind closed doors by getting within a megahex and summoning an 
image inside the locked room, etc.

I don't much like SJ's new Summon Scout spell (summons a real created 
small animal for 1 ST per minute to see through eyes) for the same 
reason, but I notice that it allows bats (mostly blind) but not 
birds, I assume for this sort of reason.

PvK