D&D (2024) Do you plan to adopt D&D5.5One2024Redux?

[Hussar]

Mimics?

IME it's most often used when something's encountered that may or may not be a creature but that the in-character players know nothing about*. Less commonly, it's used as a Mimic detector. And, due to a ruling I made decades ago and have stuck with, it also works as a pregnancy test.

* - two sessions ago my party met a shut down robot that they initially thought might be something alive inside heavy odd-looking armour; it showed no signs of being alive or sentient but they hit it with Detect Life just to make sure.

What's wrong with either a stick to poke it with or a Detect Thoughts spell?

Who wastes a 2nd level cleric spell on this? Particularly in earlier editions where you had so few slots to choose from. My groups would beat me to death if my clerics did this.

 

[Incenjucar]

Scrolls wands etc.

 

[mamba]

There's less reason for the GM to create a contact for someone who doesn't have a feature or trait that gives them a contact.

agreed, but I am not really sure the stranger you conjured up was really there as one of the messengers the background describes… for one it then should not be a stranger, for another it then does not take a dead drop, and most of all you starting with “The Dark Powers mess with Ravenloft's reality all the time.”.

None of this is covered by the feature. To me it looks more like the Dark Powers are messing with the criminal for their own gains, background feature or not

 

[Faolyn]

agreed, but I am not really sure the stranger you conjured up was really there as one of the messengers the background describes… for one it then should not be a stranger, for another it then does not take a dead drop, and most of all you starting with “The Dark Powers mess with Ravenloft's reality all the time.”.

None of this is covered by the feature. To me it looks more like the Dark Powers are messing with the criminal for their own gains, background feature or not

That's literally what the Dark Powers do--they mess with people for their own purposes. In the case of the criminal, it will function as both their contact for whatever legitimate criminal purpose they want it to, and it will satisfy the Dark Powers.

So don't make it a stranger. Make it their contact--or rather, the Dark Power's version of the contact. The DPs can literally make entire people with minds crammed full of false memories. They can literally reach into a creature's mind to find out the best way to tempt them. It's no biggie for them.

 

[mamba]

That's literally what the Dark Powers do--they mess with people for their own purposes.

The DPs can literally make entire people with minds crammed full of false memories. They can literally reach into a creature's mind to find out the best way to tempt them.

that was my point, the feature does not really enter into this scenario

 

[Lanefan]

What's wrong with either a stick to poke it with or a Detect Thoughts spell?

Poking it with a stick means you've got within its reach, and the whole point is to check for life before getting that close.

I don't have Detect Thoughts as a spell in my game.

Who wastes a 2nd level cleric spell on this? Particularly in earlier editions where you had so few slots to choose from. My groups would beat me to death if my clerics did this.

We took out pre-memorization for Clerics about 146 years ago, and found it didn't make much difference to anything.

 

[Lanefan]

Scrolls wands etc.

Either a) you're replying to someone who has me blocked or b) you really need to add some context here...

 

[James Gasik]

Either a) you're replying to someone who has me blocked or b) you really need to add some context here...

Scrolls and Wands of Detect Life?

 

[Oofta]

If it's in their background, 100%.

If it's up to the GM only, it depends on how much the GM wants to stop the player from being cool and using their abilities.


Maybe. It depends entirely on the character--and, of course, what the GM was like.


I, Faolyn, did not take a background that gives me an ability to call in favors. And I am far more of an introvert than the typical PC with a sailor background would likely be. Therefore, this comparison is pointless.


No, actually, you just failed to understand what I was writing.

Mamba said "so you agree that the sailor would not know any ship on the south sea when he ever only worked on the inland sea?"

I replied with "Wouldn't it be more logical to say that the sailor wouldn't have worked on any ship in the south sea?" and then went on to talk about famous ships and things along those lines. Things like "Oh, everyone has heard of the famous Imperial ship the Squidsmoosher!" I will admit I didn't outright say those words, but considering I talked about transmission of information via magic, so I think I was pretty clear.

You, somehow, took that to mean specific types of ships, like longships versus cogs. The goalposts stayed in place; you just wandered off in a completely different direction.


Chili isn't a ship and the Sailor background doesn't say you only know about ships in a specific location. You decided to add that and then treat your own homebrew as Official Rules.

Or, to put in D&D terms, it would be like having a background that says "you know things about other countries so you can roll blah blah in order to yadda yadda" and you took it to mean "you know things about one other country that happens to be right next to yours because there's no possible way you would know anything about a country on the other side of the ocean," and then insisted that your interpretation was the only correct one.

We just run our games differently. I don't care what the text says, logic and building a believable world take priority. There is no way a sailor has connections in every port around the world much less other pocket dimensions, planes of existence or even alternate universes.

I would find such a campaign silly and not one I could take seriously. I'm done.

 

[soviet]

We just run our games differently. I don't care what the text says, logic and building a believable world take priority. There is no way a sailor has connections in every port around the world much less other pocket dimensions, planes of existence or even alternate universes.

I would find such a campaign silly and not one I could take seriously. I'm done.

Your hypothetical player thinks it's plausible and fits with the campaign setting as constructed, otherwise they wouldn't have used the ability, right?