I'm not talking about the RAW of the issue at this point, and as I already said I am fully aware of that fact. I'm talking about what it is that could potentially give a legitimate reason for WHY it works as it does, and RHat does a fairly good job of that. Personal perception plays a rather large role in magic, and the mages perception that the armor is a part of you makes a good amount of sense. But if that is the case, I propose this situation.
You have a Mage, specializing in medicine, augmentations, and all sort of other medical/'ware related topics. He helps to turn someone into a Cyborg, and hooks their brain up to a Steel Lynx. To that cyborg, that Drone is his body for the moment. It is a part of him, and he moves it with his thoughts. To the mage, the same applies. He looks at it like a Street Sam using a piece of 'ware. He fully believes that the drone is effectively a part of that person.
Can he target Cyborg-Brain piloting the drone, housed in the drone, and which he believes to be a part of the drone, with a Manabolt?
I think this might be part of the confusion here. It has nothing to do with what the Mage perceives as part of the target's body, it is what the
Target perceives as part of their body. Not on a conscious level, but what their spirit/soul/aura/whatever decides is a part of them. Presumably this is partially influenced by their own perceptions, and partially by the abstract rules of magic.
Extrapolating from the rules, clothing and armor (as previously stated by others) is perceived by the wearer's soul as part of them, since it moves with them, and they are wearing it the same as extremely heavy clothes, so their aura includes it.
A Cyborg still sees their drone body as a vehicle, it isn't wired into their old nerves, it is controlled by rigging, so it doesn't share their aura, the same as a car, so their spirit (or what's left of it) doesn't extend their aura to include it the way it would a cyberlimb.
That said, as the armor gets more and more bulky and gets more and more powered by servos and myomer wire bundles, it moves more and more away from armor and more towards an anthroform vehicle. At some point it stops being armor and starts being a vehicle. That point may even vary from wearer/pilot to wearer/pilot, depending on how they subconsciously define armor vs vehicle.
It is a question about where that line is drawn. You put it somewhere between clothes and heavy armor, but if MilSpec armor blocks line of sight for the purposes of magic, what about an Eve SecondSkin bodysuit with a full enclosed hood and mask? It isn't as thick, but it still blocks line of sight.
Where is the line? How thick does it need to be to block your aura? You claim that it is like being unable to see a light bulb behind three inches of steel, but what about a light bulb behind a 1mm thick blackout curtain. You still can't see the light. Does it even have to be armor? What about opaque latex?
And at that point, why wouldn't everyone who even thinks for a moment that they might encounter hostile mages wear a bodysuit with a hood under their clothes/armor/etc all the time?
Also:
Most tagets believe that their clothes ae thiers enough to be part of them. CONSENCUS of the people living in the 6th World, who live with REAL magic, believe they can be tageted through their clothing and amor.
It may not make sense to you, Ninja, but it makes sense to the people living in the 6th world. We know this because the RULES tell us, the playes, that it works that way. This is so fundementally part of SR that taking it out would create a wide gulf between your table and the SR everyone else wants to play.
Exactly.
You are starting down a slippery slope when you start throwing out rules just because you don't like the explanation of why it works that way, or can't think of a good explanation for it to work that way. It's magic. Even in-world no one completely understands it (or if they do, they aren't talking to Runners about it).
