D&D 5E How to run a criminal organization in a City with 8th level spells?
MarkB
Legend
Better still, every time a zone of truth results in a wrongful conviction, wait a few months and then leak evidence that proves their innocence. After a few such cases, you can spark a backlash leading to evidence gathered using zone of truth being considered inadmissible in court.
smbakeresq
Explorer
Practical issues:
1. Scrying costs money. A caster that can cast scrying has far more important and lucrative things to do then be in Law Enforcement. Most likely he would be an expert for hire, charging market rates for casting of that spell. Even wealthy cities won’t pay that rate except for exceptional circumstances.
2. Speak with dead - you need a body and that body can only answer to the extent of its knowledge. A plain old mundane disguise will fool it. Once again even in a city that is wealthy they won’t just have spellcasters sitting around waiting for the bodies to come in.
3. Size - a city that has access to those spells is most likely huge by fantasy standards, they simple would not be able to keep up with all crimes. A protection racket in market place might just be “the cost of doing business” to the police.
4. Mundane disguises- regular disguises are not magical, spells will not detect them as such. If a person disguised themselves with a disguise kit all they are doing is dressing differently and applying makeup or other stuff to look different, there is nothing to “see through” for a magical sensory spell.
1. Scrying costs money. A caster that can cast scrying has far more important and lucrative things to do then be in Law Enforcement. Most likely he would be an expert for hire, charging market rates for casting of that spell. Even wealthy cities won’t pay that rate except for exceptional circumstances.
2. Speak with dead - you need a body and that body can only answer to the extent of its knowledge. A plain old mundane disguise will fool it. Once again even in a city that is wealthy they won’t just have spellcasters sitting around waiting for the bodies to come in.
3. Size - a city that has access to those spells is most likely huge by fantasy standards, they simple would not be able to keep up with all crimes. A protection racket in market place might just be “the cost of doing business” to the police.
4. Mundane disguises- regular disguises are not magical, spells will not detect them as such. If a person disguised themselves with a disguise kit all they are doing is dressing differently and applying makeup or other stuff to look different, there is nothing to “see through” for a magical sensory spell.
TaranTheWanderer
Legend
If you are worried about divination spells, remember that many divinations like detect magic, locate object etc...are stopped by a thin sheet of lead. So, if you are smuggling illegal magical items, lead-lined boxes will prevent detection, as well as 'safe rooms'.
Nystul's Magic Aura can make any item's aura look like anything else. Or make any person's aura look like something else. Make illegal magic look mundane.
As suggested earlier with the dominate spell, Suggestion is super useful for getting unsuspecting people to do illegal stuff.
Sending is useful for giving orders but not giving your identity.
Illusory Script is good for secret messages.
Teleport lets an assassin or agent go do a crime and have an alibi since no-one saw him leave his house. Simulacrum is even better for that.
Clone to have a crime boss fake his death.
Use Scry to Blackmail/extort people by telling them you are 'always watching'. You only need to tell them what they were doing in their room the previous night once or twice to make them paranoid.
Pass without Trace....
Permanent Magic Circles to set up long distance travel/smuggling networks.
Overall, I think misinformation is going to be your biggest tool and you don't really need magic for that...but it helps.
Edit: clerics have great spells, if the syndicate is associated with a cult: Forbiddence and/or Temple of the Gods.
Nystul's Magic Aura can make any item's aura look like anything else. Or make any person's aura look like something else. Make illegal magic look mundane.
As suggested earlier with the dominate spell, Suggestion is super useful for getting unsuspecting people to do illegal stuff.
Sending is useful for giving orders but not giving your identity.
Illusory Script is good for secret messages.
Teleport lets an assassin or agent go do a crime and have an alibi since no-one saw him leave his house. Simulacrum is even better for that.
Clone to have a crime boss fake his death.
Use Scry to Blackmail/extort people by telling them you are 'always watching'. You only need to tell them what they were doing in their room the previous night once or twice to make them paranoid.
Pass without Trace....
Permanent Magic Circles to set up long distance travel/smuggling networks.
Overall, I think misinformation is going to be your biggest tool and you don't really need magic for that...but it helps.
Edit: clerics have great spells, if the syndicate is associated with a cult: Forbiddence and/or Temple of the Gods.
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AkaKageWarrior
Explorer
I just read the spell description of zone of truth.
C'mon, every politician can talk for 10 minutes without neither telling truth nor lies.
(I'm often listening to a (for germany typically liberal) news radio station, there is almost never a clear yes or no from a politician to any question, but long tirades evading any clear answers...)
So, every "thieves' guild" in a high magic world will also train their members in "verbal evasion", at least in a master class...
C'mon, every politician can talk for 10 minutes without neither telling truth nor lies.
(I'm often listening to a (for germany typically liberal) news radio station, there is almost never a clear yes or no from a politician to any question, but long tirades evading any clear answers...)
So, every "thieves' guild" in a high magic world will also train their members in "verbal evasion", at least in a master class...
Enevhar Aldarion
Hero
If the Lords of Waterdeep could keep there identities secret for as long as they did with all the high-level magic available in the Realms, then it is certainly doable. Now, whether what was used by them in previous editions of the game still works the same in 5E, I do not know.
For defense against scrying: Mordenkainen's sanctum is a villain's best friend. Permacast it on your safe houses to ward off scrying and teleporting invaders. When you have to go outside, amulets of proof against detection and location are uncommon items; nondetection is a 3rd-level spell with a cost of 25 gp. In a high-magic setting, neither should be hard to come by.
Disguise your agents. Always. If you can, use magic to force a patsy to do your dirty work. Failing that, a simple disguise spell and Nystul's magic aura will let you frame somebody with minimal fuss. When they cast speak with dead, the corpse can only testify to what it saw--even if what it saw wasn't real.
Zone of truth is tough to beat (assuming the city is ruthless enough to... persuade silent types to speak up). However, you can use that very reliability against them. The spell glibness is 8th level, making it very hard to come by... but if you have it, you can lie in a zone of truth, and thus introduce false information through a channel that the city thinks is 100% safe.
And, of course, you can go on the offense as well. Zone of truth does no good if the caster is under the influence of suggestion to report that everything the subject says is true... or, for that matter, if they're being blackmailed by nonmagical means. Corruption and intimidation are powerful weapons in any syndicate's arsenal.
Disguise your agents. Always. If you can, use magic to force a patsy to do your dirty work. Failing that, a simple disguise spell and Nystul's magic aura will let you frame somebody with minimal fuss. When they cast speak with dead, the corpse can only testify to what it saw--even if what it saw wasn't real.
Zone of truth is tough to beat (assuming the city is ruthless enough to... persuade silent types to speak up). However, you can use that very reliability against them. The spell glibness is 8th level, making it very hard to come by... but if you have it, you can lie in a zone of truth, and thus introduce false information through a channel that the city thinks is 100% safe.
And, of course, you can go on the offense as well. Zone of truth does no good if the caster is under the influence of suggestion to report that everything the subject says is true... or, for that matter, if they're being blackmailed by nonmagical means. Corruption and intimidation are powerful weapons in any syndicate's arsenal.
Why would the interrogator allow this? As soon as you start dodging and evading, they break one of your fingers and say "Answer yes or no." Repeat till you give a straight answer. You can break a lot of bones in 10 minutes. And then they just cast it again.
That's the real problem with zone of truth: It turns torture from a highly unreliable interrogation technique (the guy says what you want to hear, whether it's true or not) into a perfect one. Not the kind of incentives I like to set up for the ostensible good guys.
AkaKageWarrior
Explorer
You are right, there are definitely problems verbally dodging in a zone of truth if the interrogators are "not so nice".
On the other hand:
torture is (in most opinions) considered evil.
Evil is prone to corruption.
Thus, if the city have evil guys among them for the dirty work, I'd say chances are not too bad at least some of them can somehow be bought.
smbakeresq
Explorer
For interrogation use Detect Thoughts, for a person to lie or obfuscate they have to think of the truth first and then create the lie or obfuscation.
Zone of Truth just gets them to not lie as opposed to telling you the truth. All you know with Zone is whatever they are telling you isn’t untrue to them.
Any city only has so many resources to go around and in every city throughout history law enforcement has never gotten all it really needs.
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