Infravision

[Umbran]

Hmm... Well, if you really want more complexity...

Well, I said I wanted to add minimal complexity, maximal flavor

Frankly, I would rather have such a basic portion of the game well spelled out and leave the complexity for the magic system. ;-)

Eh. Complicated magic systems tend to slow down combat.

As for reading, my understanding of color is that we percieve it due to a color's absorbant qualities regarding different wavelengths of radiation. It seems to me, if that is the case, that you will still have some ability to distinguish between a highly reflective surface (pale paper) and a highly absorbant colored medium (black ink) using darkvision.

Well, ignoring the fact that darkvision supposedly works in the absence of all light for a moment... How is a highly reflective surface (like paper) different from a highly reflective surface (like a mirror)?

In the real world, a thing that reflects or transmist one frequency of light may absorb other frequencies. So perhaps paper/ink works differently than mirrors. And maybe polished metal mirrors work differently than glass mirrors. But, that's getting complicated, because yoyu've got to keep your lists of what works straight. So, I tend towards simple "it is like a black and white photo" and "It is like looking at a plaster cast" solutions, which treat all surfaces equally.