So, how do you do the Scry-Buff-Teleport thing again?

[VirgilCaine]

I mean really. I've read the scrying rules and the teleport rules, and the key here is information. If you want to kill a predictable person, like the high priest of a good temple or a noble, yeah, okay. You can easily know where they are and get the plans or whatnot.

How the PCs will get to a bad guy and teleport in, I don't know.
Scrying just lets you look at a person, it's not an RTS-style viewpoint.

"Yeah, you see the rival adventurers outside, around a campfire. It is night. Snow-covered conifer branches wave in the background."
"But that could be anywhere from here to the Northern Reaches!"
"Yeah, sad, isn't it?"

Basically, the PCs have to know who the bad guy is and where is located and the layout of the place where he is (or someplace really near it) to teleport into it.


I mean sure, Knowledge checks for distinctive locations, old forts and such previously located in civilized lands...

Basically, it seems hard to do. Am I missing something?

 

[UltimaGabe]

Well, if I'm not mistaken, being able to picture the place (which you can do, considering you can stare straight at where your mark is standing) gives you a pretty high percentage of reaching your destination. You rarely need to know EXACTLY where you're going in relation to where you are (although the information definitely helps).

 

[Jack Simth]

Familiarity: “Very familiar” is a place where you have been very often and where you feel at home. “Studied carefully” is a place you know well, either because you can currently see it, you’ve been there often, or you have used other means (such as scrying) to study the place for at least one hour. “Seen casually” is a place that you have seen more than once but with which you are not very familiar. “Viewed once” is a place that you have seen once, possibly using magic.

Teleport specifically mentions scrying a place to teleport to it; and Scrying does specifically mention you can see their surroundings:

If the save fails, you can see and hear the subject and the subject’s immediate surroundings (approximately 10 feet in all directions of the subject). If the subject moves, the sensor follows at a speed of up to 150 feet.

Neither mentions difficulty if there are lots & lots of similar places, although that could easily be houseruled in.

 

[Thanee]

Well, that's the vagueness in Teleport. If you think about it, you will surely notice, that it can't be that easy to properly identify a place. That's what the percentage roll is for, since you can end up in a similar place. Otherwise it just works.

Here are some keywords from the spell:

Familiarity
“Very familiar” is a place where you have been very often and where you feel at home. “Studied carefully” is a place you know well, either because you can currently see it, you’ve been there often, or you have used other means (such as scrying) to study the place for at least one hour. “Seen casually” is a place that you have seen more than once but with which you are not very familiar. “Viewed once” is a place that you have seen once, possibly using magic.

Bye
Thanee

 

[boredgremlin]

Scying screws up the whole game at high levels. If you want my opinion then go back to the 2e version. Where getting it wrong has a percentage chance of putting you in a stone in the groung, or 50 feet up in the air, with falling damage. And as i recall scrying in 2e only gave you like a 70% percent chance of getting it right.

The first time half the party teleports into the ground and winds up dead they will think twice about trying it again. 3e broke teleport, they broke it bad. And the only really good cure is to go back to 2e's teleport.

On the other hand let people being scryed on get a creepy feeling and a wisdom or spellcraft check to know they are being looked at. The spell does say you have to study the area for an hour, thats plenty of time for a BBEG to prepare.

Additionally according to the 3.5 SRD scrying has several downsides. Including that the target gets a will save. If he succeeds the spell simply fails. Not to mention the material focus. Wizards need a large mirror. Druids need a pool of calm water. These things may not be easy to come across.

In addition let a few BBEG's have specail illusions set up so that people scrying on them see one thing and teleport to another. Like seeing the BBEG in a large roman bath all butt naked and unarmed with slave girls all around making him... happy. But its an illusion for scrying, people who teleport to that location really end up in a dungeon or a pool of lava. There are many spells for players, those arent the only spells in the world. People defending places or creating things will certainly have many spells that will never be usefull to players. Let them access these spells. The players will never memorize them. Doesnt mean body gaurds and security experts or beast masters wont.

 

[S'mon]

Scrying lets you see the location, ergo you can (Greater) teleport to that location.

The main limiter in 3.5e is that in 3.5 you can only scry people with Will saves, not general locations, and people know if they have to make a Will save, so it's a lot harder than in 3.0. OTOH if you're determined IMC you generally use a Wish or two plus Greater Teleport to arrive in the BBEG's throneroom. Wishes are scarce but when it's the warlord threatening to destroy civilisation, good value.

 

[Infiniti2000]

You certainly don't need wish, discern location is good enough. Sure, mind blank protects against discern location, but it also foils wish.

Scry/buff/teleport is really a self-correcting problem, however. If the heroes do it, so do the bad guys. After a TPK or two either both sides start using mind blanks all the time or you stop doing it. Alternatively, there are a few new spells out there (and some old) that (a) protect against interplanar travel, (b) delay incoming teleports, or (c) redirect incoming teleports. That can help 'cure' the problem, too.

 

[VirgilCaine]

The main limiter in 3.5e is that in 3.5 you can only scry people with Will saves, not general locations, and people know if they have to make a Will save, so it's a lot harder than in 3.0. OTOH if you're determined IMC you generally use a Wish or two plus Greater Teleport to arrive in the BBEG's throneroom. Wishes are scarce but when it's the warlord threatening to destroy civilisation, good value.

You could only Scry people in 3.0 too. But it didn't specify an environmental range of sight at all, unlike 3.5.

Of course, you still have to know the targets name.

@BoredGremlin: The point was that I don't see how Scrying is too practical when it takes an hour and you get one minute/level AND you have to know the targets name or have some part of their body or something like that.

Which explains why bad guys use epithets like "Lord of Shadows" and "King of Doom."

 

[werk]

And what BBEG that is worth being called BBE doesn't have an unhallow set up with dimensional anchor?

Nondetection can get expensive, and can be reserved for special meeting/planning sessions, but that hallow is up for a whole year.

 

[Infiniti2000]

Dimensional anchor would only keep the players there once they arrived. You might be thinking of dimensional lock, which cannot go into an unhallow. Better yet, forbiddance is permanent.