First of all, a guard who has been ordered to not let half-lings in might not have to make a sense motive check. If you have one of those people who follows orders to the letter at all cost then there is no way a half-ling is getting by. You have to disguise him as a gnome or find another way in for him. It may not be clear to some people, but there are guys who follow orders like that, and that is the kind of guards I want.
Another real life situation. Lets say you have a military guard that is told that any car driving up to a particular outpost without proper ID must be fired upon. One day, toward the outpost drives a car with the President of the United States, the Pope, and the guard’s mother. There are people out there who would open fire on that car. I’m just trying to explain how some people will follow rules so fanatically as to not be deterred by a social check.
And as for the friend stealing my dice. A bluff check doesn’t always help him either. One time, only one time mind you, he beat my sense motive check; because he was telling the truth. I still insisted it was him and pressed him on it until I realized I had not even brought out my dice yet. In my defense, when you have a record like he does, you shouldn’t be surprised at such accusations. Its just further proves my point that failing a check doesn’t mean you necessarily believe what’s going on.
The adventure before this one, a PC killed a rotten-toothed inn keeper because we all knew he was up to something, even though we were unable to find hard evidence of wrong doing. I personally have doubted people in real life, called them liars who were trying to take advantage of me. Most times I actually turned out right but sometimes I have been wrong. Being a monstrous cynic allows you to bypass the whole bluff vs diplomacy thing. Besides, it better to not trust someone who is being honest then it is to trust someone who is being deceitful.
First of all, a guard who has been ordered to not let half-lings in might not have to make a sense motive check. If you have one of those people who follows orders to the letter at all cost then there is no way a half-ling is getting by.
It almost sounds as if you are arguing in your DM's favor, now. The core books support this viewpoint. The PHB page 68 says "Favorable or unfavorable circumstances weigh heavily on the outcome of a bluff. Two circumstances can weigh against you: the bluff is hard to believe, or the action that the target is asked to take goes against its self-interest, nature, personality, orders, or the like."
So I wouldn't let game mechanics bully me around too much. If the guard was told "no halflings on penalty of your life," then I wouldn't even allow a roll. Or perhaps I'd allow the roll but discard the result. Or perhaps I'd give the roll a 50 points more difficult DC -- the kind of thing perhaps the gods or epic level characters could pull off.
The DMG page 30 also supports you -- and the DM mentioned in the original post, somewhat. It says, "For extremely favorable or unfavorable circumstances, you can use modifiers greater than +2 and less than -2. For example, you can decide that a task is practically impossible and modify the roll or DC by 20."
I'm not saying your DM was right about everything, but the idea that the DM adjudicates things and gets to say something is super-difficult to disbelieve? That's in there. Core rules say he can play with core rules.
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Originally Posted by Moff_Tarkin
I think the biggest problem we have is the modules he has been running. The dungeon crawl modules from Goodman Games I believe. We keep coming across crazy things in these modules that show a complete lack of understanding of the basic rules.
It's funny, because I was about to use some of those DCC modules as an example of how I handle this stuff. Sure, the DCC modules get some stat blocks wrong. But one thing they get right is to deliberately go outside the mechanics of the game to develop a story. For example, the module "Into the Wilds" opens with the local royalty having a long-cursed bloodline that eventually kills every heir to the throne. In addition, the curse was made by what appears to have been a warrior-type. D&D 3.5 edition core books provides no mechanism for this. If the players wanted to replicate the effect, they would have a miserably difficult time doing it. Yet, the curse exists, as-is, in this module. One of the modules in the DCC compilation "The Adventure Begins" contains an artifact that automatically, without save, kills every NPC level 5 or higher, in the entire world. There is absolutely nowhere to find that artifact in the core books. There are no rules for how it operates, except for what you read in the module itself. These things are totally made up, and the DM has to wing it when enforcing these things.
Regarding the D&D comic, The Order of the Stick, there are tons of rules lawyers who post on the forums, complaining that it's not possible for the cartoon characters to do certain things within the rules. But one of the problems that continually trips up these guys is that Rich (the guy making the comic) will often have custom material that he made up for it -- for example, the "Snarl" is unknown to D&D books. There is no known stat block for it. Also, the "soul splice" effect that he showed in the last 30 or so comics was completely made up. People would try to argue about how it worked -- "the rules say this or that" -- only to have Rich pop into the forum and say, "It's my custom thing that works how I say it works, whether that's OK for you or not." And then that's how it was.
I provide those examples as what I personally follow when I am working on my own games. I typically never have any core rulebook monster operate as the core rulebook suggests. Everything is custom, even if I'm just tweaking the HP or something small. I follow rules -- I typically put a post-it note that outlines the modifications next to the stat block, so that I can stick to my changes, for better or worse.
I have had it backfire. I'm running the Cage of Delirium module right now (haunted house) and I'm running it with the optional Unhallow effect, as I thought "ha ha, that'll make it tougher to beat these undead." But the cleric in our group is evil and commands/rebukes undead instead of turning them... and the Unhallow effect helps him. Well, tough luck for me. He got to waltz through a couple tough combats. Lucky him.
Anyway, the point is that if I were the DM mentioned in the original post, I wouldn't even name the illusion effect in place. It's isn't programmed, isn't permanent, isn't in the spell list in the PHB. It's custom, and it works in a way that reacts appropriately to someone hacking at the head of the vampire. That way the players cannot backseat drive or "armchair DM" the game. I might not even ask the players to roll to disbelieve, or at least I wouldn't tell them if they failed. (The rolls would happen, but usually I ask for a series of rolls from each player before the game starts -- 2 listen checks, 2 spot checks, a couple other things -- and then I secretly apply them when the time comes.) That way the player isn't cued to think, "Oh, I should metagame now."
So I think the DM was probably right to try to make the effect work the way he intended it to work. But it was a mistake to try to drive it from the rules, a mistake to name the effect for the players, a mistake (maybe) to let them know they were doing Will saves to disbelieve, and a mistake to dictate after that. Instead, I would have simply made the illusion behave either appropriately or inappropriately as the players did things. If they metagamed, I'd probably pull the rug out from under them, and tweak expectations. If they played in character, I'd probably work to give them in-game rewards that matched how they operated their characters.
First of all, a guard who has been ordered to not let half-lings in might not have to make a sense motive check. If you have one of those people who follows orders to the letter at all cost then there is no way a half-ling is getting by. You have to disguise him as a gnome or find another way in for him. It may not be clear to some people, but there are guys who follow orders like that, and that is the kind of guards I want.
So very wrong here IMO (and per the RAW).
Bluff is about convincing someone that something is believable.
What is the bluff about in this situation?
Trying to convince the guard that the halfing is not in fact a halfling.
See PHB pg 68 the last example
"You might find this hard to believe, but I'm, actually a lammasu who's been polymorphed into a halfling. . . ." +20 to the DC
Now if in the games you are playing all you are doing is making a bluff roll against a Sense Motive check then something is missing.
You need to specify what it is you are trying to convince the target of of.
In games I run I also have the players role-play their interaction (and describe to me any "set up" they are doing). This provides me with the information necessary to apply situational and circumstance modifiers to the roll.
Part of what makes this situation complicated is that the PCs have several pieces of information:
There is something which looks very much like a vampire in his coffin, recovering from his wounds.
There is a missing kama
I'm also assuming the spell had a tactile component, so that the illusion was believable. Even if you fail your save against an illusion, if you then try to touch it and your hands go throw it, it's perfectly reasonable to assume that something strange is happening (and an illusion would be high on the list).
If the PCs only knew 1, they should decapitate/burn the body, search for loot with their usual thoroughness (which might include detect magic) and move on. If it's ever relevant, they believe that they did indeed kill the vampire.
Given that the PC's know 1 and 2, it's perfectly reasonable for them to search for the missing weapon (especially if they do well enough on the knowledge check to realize that the vampire's gear should still be around). If they're high enough level that it plausible for the kama to be magical, detect magic is perfectly appropriate. Searching for openings that would admit a gaseous form vampire but not a kama is very likely using out of character knowledge.
Going to the halfling example, if, while the halfling is bluffing the guard, his companion casts a silent, quickened invisibility (so the guard doesn't actually see why he disappears), once the guard notices that the companion has disappeared, he's still going to be concerned by that, even though he believes he's talking with a lammasu polymorphed into a halfling.
"Yes, Mr. Lammasu, I know you're allowed in there. But us guards get concerned by people who disappear. Can you wait here a minute while I get this straightened out?"
Though it treads a bit close to meta-gaming, remember that the PCs live in a world where magic and illusions are real. If they have any experience at all with illusion magic, they could reasonably think to themselves: "Hmmm... could be I have fallen prey to a powerful phantasm. If so, my insight alone is unable to pierce it. How else can I test what I see before my eyes?"
With the right circumstances, a situation can still be suspicious, even when all physical evidence points to the contrary.
And I am uncomfortable allowing spells without the [Mind-Affecting] descriptor to "force" characters into behaving and believing a certain way.
__________________ Rab
The Incomparably Shrewd and Clever
Though it treads a bit close to meta-gaming, remember that the PCs live in a world where magic and illusions are real. If they have any experience at all with illusion magic, they could reasonably think to themselves: "Hmmm... could be I have fallen prey to a powerful phantasm. If so, my insight alone is unable to pierce it. How else can I test what I see before my eyes?"
With the right circumstances, a situation can still be suspicious, even when all physical evidence points to the contrary.
The die roll results are supposed to reflect what the PC has pieced together from such "doubts".
Using this logic to have players say I don't care what the result was I don't believe it so I want my character to act this way. . .
If there is a lot of "evidence" afoot to work in the PC's favor then the DM is supposed to factor that into situational and circumstance modifiers to the DC of the check.
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And I am uncomfortable allowing spells without the [Mind-Affecting] descriptor to "force" characters into behaving and believing a certain way.
yes and no.
You are not "forcing" characters to behave in a certain way. You are attempting to "force" players to remove player knowledge from PC knowledge.
For example - just because a player has read and memorized the entire MM does not mean that his 1st level halfling fighter PC knows all about demons and what a vampire is and how to dispatch one. By using vampire in my example I am not trying to make a direct correllary to the situation of the OP.
I have a player in my Age of Worms game who loves to mix the two. He tries to write up such complex character histories that his PC knows all about everything in some manner, even though his skill ranks can't possibly reflect that.
Bottom line - this is an excercise in keeping player and PC knowledge separate. This is and always will be a difficult challenge in the world of role-playing.
IMO the missing kama debunks any attempt to stop the PCs from casting detect magic, or searching the coffin furthur. Or the rest of the room thouroughly for that matter. Regardless of whether or not they failed their saves against the illusion. I would honestly expect ANY party to thouroughly search anything and everything even remotely close to such a creature.
I make a few assumptions. That the PCs are high enough level to have had experience with cleverly concealed secret compartments. And that the PCs -assume- the vampire did not have time to go and hide his stuff before returning to his coffin. The OP said the coffin was right near them, so I assume it was in a nearby room.
There is absolutely no rational for refusing to let a character do something he's probably done a thousand times already, and it has nothing to do with the illusion. They believe they killed the vampire, fine. But they still want to find his gear, and any of his treasure he was hiding.
As far as the illusion goes...the DM can deal with the PCs gaming it to get around it. He has given them good reason to make sure they are thourough. There is no way to draw a line between player knowlege and character knowlege in this case. It seems clear that there was sort of mishandling with the rules regarding illusions on the DMs part.
Good example...is an illusionary wall. If we find an illusionary wall in a dungeon and get past it. Now, later on come to a dead end room where we expect an exit but cannot find one. Say we feel all the walls with our hands and we all fail the save so we all fail to find the illusion that we all think is there. So now, I close my eyes and walk around the room, dragging my sword across the wall. No way for an illusion to trick a inanimate object, so the sword is eventually going to pass through the illusory wall. By your DMs logic, you wouldn't be able to do anything else in order to find the secret exit, not even have the wizard who was wanting to save his last detect magic use that. I think that is a rediculous judgement.
Does he only ever allow 1 pc to search something? For example, fighter searches room with his -2 search check and fails to find anything...Now the rogue can't search the same room because 'they believe there is nothing to find'? Thats crazy talk.
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One option for the DM:
See what the players are going to do after "successfully" destroying the vampire, then if they fail the save that is what they do. If they succeed, then they can change their actions to what is appropriate. Use Knowledge checks in a similar way.
But there is the problem of the missing Kama. It's got to be somewhere so how do we find it? (I personally think the Vamp should have been smart enough to cover this with some type of illusion or contingency plan/magic.)
What is the SOP of the party? if Detect Magic is typically used, there is no way I'd prevent it being used in this situation, even if it inadvertently revealed the illusion.
As a DM i would not reveal the exact spell to the players: "It acts like a programed illusion but there seems more to it" is a perfectly acceptable answer in my opinion. The other side to this is to say "The evidence does not support your theory" if the players go off on a wild tangent (I've done this myself while the party was trying to work out what several sets of tracks meant).
__________________ Dross
----------
Scrag: I saved his life.
Leanna: How so?
Scrag: I stopped hitting him.
Scrag, ½-orc barbarian from Great Worm Tribe, the High Forrest
IMO the missing kama debunks any attempt to stop the PCs from casting detect magic, or searching the coffin furthur. Or the rest of the room thouroughly for that matter. Regardless of whether or not they failed their saves against the illusion. I would honestly expect ANY party to thouroughly search anything and everything even remotely close to such a creature.
Correct - but IMO that has "nothing" to do with disbelieving an illusion.
When the OP phrased it as such that is when he crossed the line between player and PC knowledge.
Whne the player who failed his saving through asked the other PC to do a detect magic to determine if it was an illusion or some other sort of trickery that is when it crossed between player knowledge and PC knowledge.
If he had said that the kama was missing and that they should detect magic to "find it" or something along that path things would have beenperfectly fine IMO. But the OP's post made it seem to me like the player who failed his save was trying to find a way to get around the fact that his PC thought things were fine - except for the missing kama.
I honestly don't know why the DM gave them that piece of information in the first place though.
But the fact that the PC failed the save means that the illusion seems real to him - hence the vampire itself is qppears the way it is supposed to be.
Now the PC could be trying to find out where the missing kama went - but that should be a separate issue.
And yes I would also expect the PCs to search the place for any loot. If their standard method of searching included casting detect magic everything is fine per a normal preestablished pattern, if not then things are a tad different and why (as announced in character) they are doing it determines if it is metagaming or not.
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There is absolutely no rational for refusing to let a character do something he's probably done a thousand times already, and it has nothing to do with the illusion. They believe they killed the vampire, fine. But they still want to find his gear, and any of his treasure he was hiding.
I absolutely agree with this one - but see the intent of casting detect magic from above and what was in the OP's original post.
As far as the illusion goes...the DM can deal with the PCs gaming it to get around it. He has given them good reason to make sure they are thourough. There is no way to draw a line between player knowlege and character knowlege in this case. It seems clear that there was sort of mishandling with the rules regarding illusions on the DMs part.
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Does he only ever allow 1 pc to search something? For example, fighter searches room with his -2 search check and fails to find anything...Now the rogue can't search the same room because 'they believe there is nothing to find'? Thats crazy talk.
I don't think that was what was posted - I believe it was cast detect illusion to determine if there is an illusion or other trickery. Which IMO is a lot different than allowing a rogue to do is normal speal by searching using skill checks.
Now I make an assumption here based on the OPs posts - it appears that the DM got tired of trying to explain what the PCs knew versus what the player's knew and finally said "you can't do that regardless of the rules". IMO this was said out of frustration because the players were trying to "game the rules" and the "intent" of the saving throw results (and probably the same with skill check results too).
The way I see it, the illusion can't force them to take any actions or not take any actions. It's not mind affecting. They can know something is wrong and not quite perceive how to pierce the illusion they think might be there. Thats when you resort to the other tactics mentioned. Thats the problem with illusions, people know that sometimes they can fail saving throws, or in character terms be fooled by magic. People usually trust what their eyes see, but they don't always. A non-mind-affecting spell does not have the power to change this.
It sounded like they actually handled the corpse and weren't allowed a save. Then when the PC noticed something was missing that they thought was supposed to be there, everyone started to suspect foul play. That was when the DM allowed them to make a save, then he proceeded to strip away their free will in order to keep them from discovering the truth. Presumeably to save the BBEG. Nothing wrong with recycling BBEGs, but care needs to be taken not to rob the characters of their fair chance.
If the PCs for some strange reason never bother searching for treasure or never use detect magic to look for magic items or magic traps, or people with spells going etc...then it would sound pretty fishy though. But the fact that they had a list of things they wanted to try suggests they are probably smart when it comes to scouring dungeons for shineys.
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The way I see it, the illusion can't force them to take any actions or not take any actions. It's not mind affecting. They can know something is wrong and not quite perceive how to pierce the illusion they think might be there. Thats when you resort to the other tactics mentioned. Thats the problem with illusions, people know that sometimes they can fail saving throws, or in character terms be fooled by magic. People usually trust what their eyes see, but they don't always. A non-mind-affecting spell does not have the power to change this.
Saving throws and skill checks and to hit and damage rolls are all those used metagaming wise by players and DMs to edjudicate actions that PCs take.
No PC knows that a "saving throw" exists. They may know that sometimes magic works and sometimes it doesn't but that is about the extent of it.
The entire point of the saving throw is to ejudicate if the PC believes something or not. If we as players (and DMs) continue to second guess those results then there is no point in ever making the checks in the first place.
If, additional evidence is provided to give reason to doubt something that is another issue entirely. But in this case it was not.
The evidence that something wasn't quite right was the fact that the kama was missing. The failed saving throw is supposed to indicate that the PC believes it wasn't important to the overall illusion. Having PCs continue to act as if it was an illusion after it has already been determined that they beleive it to be true (aka the failed saving throw) totally bypasses the intent of the entire process IMO.
I have said that this does not mean they couldn't or wouldn't search for treasure in what their PCs believe is a reasonable method though. But that has nothing to do with proving or disporving the validity of the the existing illusion. Personally I am not all that sure that a standard method of finding treasure includes casting detect magic though, that is usually a spell reserved for finding out which treasure is more important than others - but it might be a part of the party's standard operating procedure in such cases.
I have been gone on vacation for a week, and unable to post. In case anyone is still reading I’ll give some more info on the situation.
First however, I want to give an extreme example to show how a PC can believe something is an illusion even though he fails his save. Lets say you have a mischievous gnome illusionist in your party that always summons the same illusionary Ogre to scare off opponents. One day, the gnome gets angry at you and says, “I’m going to summon my Ogre”. He casts the illusion spell. Lets even pretend you have spellcraft so you know what spell its is. The Ogre illusion appears and you fail your save to disbelieved. Must you now fully believe that the Ogre is real and fight/run from it? Must you take illusionary damage when it attacks you?
Here is some more info on our vampire scenario.
We open the coffin and find the illusionary body, then we decapitate/burn it. Upon realizing the Kama is missing, one party member says, “I don’t think this is the real body”. This gives him a will save, which he fails. He then asks the cleric to detect magic. The DM tries to say the cleric would do no such thing since there is no reason for him to believe illusionary magic is at work. After a little arguing, the player gets to cast detect magic. The DM does the typical cop-out move of saying, “Everything is magical. Even the walls and floor” the cleric concentrates on the coffin to pick up a particular school of magic, and gets illusion.
Our rogue does a search on the coffin, rolls pretty well too, and finds nothing. We all determine that there must be something there. If that last body wasn’t the real one then that gaseous form had to go somewhere. That’s when I decide to pour water into the coffin to see if it runs out any cracks or holes. This is where the DM says that our investigations must stop. Our failed will saves and search checks mean that we believe nothing is there and cant investigate further.
One person in our group said he believed that the DMs interpretation of illusions made them to powerful. A low level illusionist could just summon a Pit Fiend and if you failed your will save you were dead. (I don’t think illusions you believe deal illusionary damage, but at least our DM is uses it that way) So he makes the claim that illusionist are now the most powerful class ever, and we should all play one. The DM mentioned that illusions are supposed to be a DM thing anyway.
One other thing I have to say in the party’s defense.
The big argument for the DM is that we were using out of character knowledge. But before the first Will check was made, PCs were saying they didn’t think this was the real body. In fact, that’s what prompted the save. The only thing that could possibly be taken as player knowledge is the fact that we know illusions exist. But this party has run into a couple of nasty illusions, so we know illusions are real.
None of us have ever read this module, and we know nothing about where the real vampire has escaped to, or if he even managed to escape at all. We have absolutely no knowledge beyond what the DM said that we see. So where is this “out of character” information coming from? What knowledge are we using that our PCs don’t have.
I have been gone on vacation for a week, and unable to post. In case anyone is still reading I’ll give some more info on the situation.
First however, I want to give an extreme example to show how a PC can believe something is an illusion even though he fails his save. Lets say you have a mischievous gnome illusionist in your party that always summons the same illusionary Ogre to scare off opponents. One day, the gnome gets angry at you and says, “I’m going to summon my Ogre”. He casts the illusion spell. Lets even pretend you have spellcraft so you know what spell its is. The Ogre illusion appears and you fail your save to disbelieved. Must you now fully believe that the Ogre is real and fight/run from it? Must you take illusionary damage when it attacks you?
Give the PC a huge circumstance bonus on his save due to "knowledge".
Now a nat 1 always fails just like a nat 20 always works (for saving throws and attack rolls).
If you wish to ignore the game mechanics that is fine, but like everything in D&D it is supposed to be an abstraction.
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Here is some more info on our vampire scenario.
We open the coffin and find the illusionary body, then we decapitate/burn it. Upon realizing the Kama is missing, one party member says, “I don’t think this is the real body”. This gives him a will save, which he fails. He then asks the cleric to detect magic. The DM tries to say the cleric would do no such thing since there is no reason for him to believe illusionary magic is at work.
DM is absoultely correct here.
With the failed saving throw the cleric is now convinced that he was in error about it being an illusion.
Any argument by the player to the contrary is moot. That is the point of the saving throw - to reflect how the PC perceives things.
He had a momentary thought that it was an illusion, but the saving throw (which reflects how he interprets this thought) indicated that he was "mistaken".
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After a little arguing, the player gets to cast detect magic.
Mistake on the DM's part.
The "only" reason the PC is casting detect magic is becasue the player still believes it is an illusion while the PC does not.
Absolutely meta-gaming, IMO.
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The DM does the typical cop-out move of saying, “Everything is magical. Even the walls and floor” the cleric concentrates on the coffin to pick up a particular school of magic, and gets illusion.
Not necessarily a cop out. It could have been, it all depends on where the cleric is "concentrating" and for how long.
Remember that the spell detect magic works in a specific way depending on where and for how long you are concentrating.
1st rnd presence or absence of magical auras
2nd rnd number of different magical auras and power of the most potent aura (as in faint to overwhelming)
3rd rnd strength and location of each aura. Requires a Spellcraft check to determine the school.
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Our rogue does a search on the coffin, rolls pretty well too, and finds nothing. We all determine that there must be something there.
More metagaming. You do not know how successful the PC is on his check.
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If that last body wasn’t the real one then that gaseous form had to go somewhere. That’s when I decide to pour water into the coffin to see if it runs out any cracks or holes. This is where the DM says that our investigations must stop. Our failed will saves and search checks mean that we believe nothing is there and cant investigate further.
All predicated on the fact that the players were inserting their personal knowledge into the game mechanics.
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One person in our group said he believed that the DMs interpretation of illusions made them to powerful. A low level illusionist could just summon a Pit Fiend and if you failed your will save you were dead. (I don’t think illusions you believe deal illusionary damage, but at least our DM is uses it that way) So he makes the claim that illusionist are now the most powerful class ever, and we should all play one. The DM mentioned that illusions are supposed to be a DM thing anyway.
Wrong on the being dead part. Well for low level illusions anyway - high level ones will cause you to die.
Also it seems like an assumption on the players parts as to how the DM would handle this.
Here is an exedrcise to try. Look at it from the opposite side. The PCs are casting illusions how would the players want the NPCs to handle things if they fail their saving throws?
A failed Will save means the illusion still looks and feels real to you. It doesn’t mean you have to believe it s real. Otherwise it would be mind affecting.
There are two ways to get a saving throw against an illusion. One if from interaction, the other (and the one that applies here) is when a PC says “Something fishy is going on” So, when a player gets a “hunch” that something is amiss, does a failed Will save make that “hunch” go away? The player is suspicious then the illusion uses a “Jedi mind trick” to say, “These aren’t the druids your looking for”. That’s sounds like mind affecting to me, and illusions aren’t mind affecting. Before a Will save was even called for, we all had suspicions and hunches that something was wrong. Just because we fail to expose the body as an illusion means that all our intuition has to be thrown out the window.
Now, as far as the way I would expect illusions to be handled if I were playing the illusionist. I would understand that illusions could only go so far, only accomplish so much. I would make an illusion of a PC to “threaten” an enemy, in order to give the rouge flank. I would make the illusion of a woman screaming come from a dark ally. Causing a couple of guards to leave their post to investigate. Illusions work for simple tricks like this, and that’s what I would use them for. But I would fully understand that there were limits on what illusions could accomplish. I would fully understand that my illusions weren’t capable of causing a room full of people to just ignore their intuition and give up on all their hunches and suspicions.
We had an argument in our last game session about illusions and what it means to fail a will save against them.
We opened a door in this dungeon to reveal a vampire sitting on a throne, next to a stone coffin. We kill the vampire, whose gaseous form travels into the coffin. Upon opening the coffin we find the body and decapitate/burn it.
At this point, everybody that participated in opening the coffin, decapitating the body and burning it should get a Will save. You (the group that participated in opening, beheading and burning) are all interacting with the illusion - the SRD specifically mentions interacting with an illusion is a trigger for a Will save. Edited to add: And, since this illusion does not have a touch/tacticle aspect, I would judge it to automatically fail once a PC tried to behead the body. Or, at least give the beheader a huge bonus to an additional Will save after the first.
A missing item would be an additional cause for disbelief even if you all failed your Will saves, provided you know enough about vampires & the gaseous form spell to know that their items go with them. If somebody so much as mentioned that, I would give another Will save with a +4 to the circumstance.
__________________ "Who's more foolish: the fool, or the fool who follows him?" - Obi Wan Kenobi
Last edited by NewJeffCT; 21st June 2009 at 01:17 AM..
Reason: more info
A failed Will save means the illusion still looks and feels real to you. It doesn’t mean you have to believe it s real. Otherwise it would be mind affecting.
This quote might help you.
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Originally Posted by SRD
A failed saving throw indicates that a character fails to notice something is amiss.
That means that the characters that fail the saving throw don't know anything is amiss. If you roleplay the character as having a hunch that it's not real then you are acting like something is amiss. Which is bad roleplaying since the character doesn't realize anything is amiss.
As for your mind affecting argument it's a bit off. Mind Affecting is nothing more than a descriptor to help determine how the spells work with other spells and immunities.
For instance Command Plants, Command Undead both can control creatures but neither are mind affecting spells.
Not to mention the line "Illusion spells deceive the senses or minds of others." is in the description of the Illusion school. So even the RAW supports the fact that Illusions spells in general can affect the minds of the people perceiving the illusion.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Moff_Tarkin
There are two ways to get a saving throw against an illusion. One if from interaction, the other (and the one that applies here) is when a PC says “Something fishy is going on”
Incorrect. You do not get a Save because something is fishy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SRD
Creatures encountering an illusion usually do not receive saving throws to recognize it as illusory until they study it carefully or interact with it in some fashion.
You only get a saving throw if you study it carefully or interact with it. Thinking something is fishy nets you nothing against a illusion. You seem to be under a few misconceptions about how illusions work that may be tainting your perceptions.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Moff_Tarkin
So, when a player gets a “hunch” that something is amiss, does a failed Will save make that “hunch” go away? The player is suspicious then the illusion uses a “Jedi mind trick” to say, “These aren’t the druids your looking for”. That’s sounds like mind affecting to me, and illusions aren’t mind affecting. Before a Will save was even called for, we all had suspicions and hunches that something was wrong. Just because we fail to expose the body as an illusion means that all our intuition has to be thrown out the window.
Again mind affecting descriptor isn't the only thing in the game that allows a characters senses or mind to be influenced. So yes, if your character failed his saving throw and didn't know anything was amiss then a good roleplayer would ignore his "hunch" because the character beleives nothing is amiss in order to have a hunch that something is amiss.
Also as for your Gnome Illusionist casting an ogre illusion, it could be argued that in that case that the PC would be able to realize the illusion is just that because he has proof that the illusion is fake. And having proof that something is an illusion renders you able to see through the illusion.
A failed Will save means the illusion still looks and feels real to you. It doesn’t mean you have to believe it s real. Otherwise it would be mind affecting.
Failing a saving throw to disbelieve doesn't leave you believing?!?
I think the consensus here is that how the situation unfolded is -itself- fishy. How your PCs obtained the information that the kama was missing and indeed why it was missing is important. What was said and asked, and in exactly what order is all important. It's quite possible that mistakes were made on both sides of the table. It's quite possible the DM was trying to railroad your party to salvage a plot point, which is bad. It's quite possible the players were unable to rationalize the results of their dice rolls, which is bad.
I think the only valuable take-away I can offer here is this; illusion spells don't control how your characters behave. Instead, they control your character's perception of reality. It is up to the player to incorporate a perception they know is false (or even strongly suspect is false) into an imaginary world-view and determine how their PC behaves.
If your example's gnome illusionist "summons" his ogre and your PC is skeptical, it would be reasonable to say "I go up to the ogre and poke it in the eye". The DM asks for a saving throw. You roll a natural 1. Your character fails to disbelieve. He believes the ogre isn't an illusion. Now it's up to you to role-play honestly. "I apologise to the gnome for whatever I did to make him summon a real ogre for once, and congratulate him on finally figuring out how to use a summon spell instead of the usual pathetic illusions. I further congratulate him on making it look completely convincingly as if he was casting an illusion. Then I back away from the ogre before it eats me."
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