D&D General Wishing Away The Adventure

[Maxperson]

I agree. There is no contradiction.

You see and hear a specific target as if you were 10 feet away from that target. It is a camera with a mic focused on the subject, not a wizard eye you can move around at will.

This is an argument that you do NOT see and hear through the sensor as if you were there, because being there does not limit the wizard that way. There is absolutely a contradiction in the way Oofta is interpreting the spell.

 

[Demetrios1453]

Is that kind of DM-player arms race actually fun? Is that what people want?

Yes and yes.

 

[Maxperson]

Yes and yes.

The adversarial DMing being described isn't even what is happening there. Adversarial DMing is equipping everyone in a random encounter with rings of fire resistance just to stop the fireballing wizard. It's not a BBEG familiar with spells setting up an anti-scrying area to keep the kidnap victim in. That's just a reasonable precaution. A BBEG who is familiar with spells and can't stop scrying isn't going to kidnap the person. He's going to kill the person.

 

[billd91]

You can move the sensor. That means that you can rotate the camer to get any angle of the target you might want. This could be useful in any number of circumstances, including being able to disguise oneself as the target.

It does say the sensor moves with the target, but not that the caster can move the sensor. I’d take that to mean the sensor is kind of like a GoPro focusing on the target than keeps the same focus on the target even as they move around.

 

[billd91]

No. @EzekielRaiden is half right. You do get to see the surroundings as the spell says the following, "On a failed save, the spell creates an invisible sensor within 10 feet of the target. You can see and hear through the sensor as if you were there." If you aren't too blind to see the surroundings if you are there, you aren't blinded to the point of only seeing the target. That said, 10 minutes is nowhere close to enough time as the study has to be the equivalent of knowing a place you go to frequently. Not sometimes, but frequently. Going somewhere frequently involves a lot of time getting to know the place. Several hours of time is still probably not enough.

Going from the description of teleport, I’d say it’s Viewed Once.

“Viewed once" is a place you have seen once, possibly using magic.

That sounds like a scry to me. You’ve probably only scried that particular place once, and by using magic.

 

[billd91]

And I don’t think it’s adversarial DMing to be a bit tough on the interpretation of spells. Some of you guys complain about how powerful casters and high level spells are. Well, the more power, the more oversight things require (now if only we had that with certain aspects of society around us that are a bit too amok).

 

[Vaalingrade]

And I don’t think it’s adversarial DMing to be a bit tough on the interpretation of spells. Some of you guys complain about how powerful casters and high level spells are. Well, the more power, the more oversight things require (now if only we had that with certain aspects of society around us that are a bit to amok).

A lot of us who make those complaints would like those things to be actually balanced without requiring us to be unfair and call it tough.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

The target has to know the spell is being cast and the magic itself doesn't let them know. Nobody in their right mind would voluntarily fail a save against unknown magic.

If you know your magic-using friend is trying to rescue you....not hard to put two and two together. Doubly so with, I dunno, the judicious application of sending? E.g. "In exactly one hour from your reply, I will cast scrying on you. Please voluntarily comply. We will teleport in and rescue you. Reply now." You'd need to be "familiar" with this person, but given the context of things like teleport and scrying, there are explicitly methods to become familiar without direct contact--and if you've been hired to rescue someone, it's a pretty safe bet you can ask the people who want to rescue them what you need to know to be familiar, and alter the 25-word message accordingly. (E.g. "<relative> wants to rescue you, saying <some identifying statement of no more than nine words.> In one hour, I'll cast scrying. Please comply. Reply now.")

First, the target has to fail the save against the unknown magic. Second, I don't see anything that says 10 minutes is enough time to study a place carefully. The other part of that description is a place that you've been to very often, which very strongly implies you have a hell of a lot more time spent there getting to know it than 10 minutes.

So, we're right back to "nerf it into the ground to prevent it from being useful" territory, yet again. The text simply says:

"Very familiar" is a place you have been very often, a place you have carefully studied, or a place you can see when you cast the spell. "Seen casually" is someplace you have seen more than once but with which you aren't very familiar. "Viewed once" is a place you have seen once, possibly using magic. "Description" is a place whose location and appearance you know through someone else's description, perhaps from a map.

Given that? Fine. Cast it while you still have scrying active. By your own admission, you can see the location, and the text for teleport (as quoted above) explicitly says "a place you can see when you cast the spell." Teleport doesn't require concentration, so you can cast it while still having scrying active.

And I don’t think it’s adversarial DMing to be a bit tough on the interpretation of spells. Some of you guys complain about how powerful casters and high level spells are. Well, the more power, the more oversight things require (now if only we had that with certain aspects of society around us that are a bit to amok).

The point is that you feel you have to. You feel you must legislate well beyond the text of the rules, inserting a bunch of extra requirements, pushing things to the absolute limit of what you as DM can get away with in order to punish the player for using a powerful tool effectively.

Why not make the tools so you don't feel the need to do that?

 

[Maxperson]

If you know your magic-using friend is trying to rescue you....not hard to put two and two together. Doubly so with, I dunno, the judicious application of sending? E.g. "In exactly one hour from your reply, I will cast scrying on you. Please voluntarily comply. We will teleport in and rescue you. Reply now." You'd need to be "familiar" with this person, but given the context of things like teleport and scrying, there are explicitly methods to become familiar without direct contact--and if you've been hired to rescue someone, it's a pretty safe bet you can ask the people who want to rescue them what you need to know to be familiar, and alter the 25-word message accordingly. (E.g. "<relative> wants to rescue you, saying <some identifying statement of no more than nine words.> In one hour, I'll cast scrying. Please comply. Reply now.")

There's no way in hell you can become familiar with someone from descriptions. It would take weeks to months to become familiar with someone in person where you actually speak to them a lot.

So, we're right back to "nerf it into the ground to prevent it from being useful" territory, yet again. The text simply says:

There's no nerf in doing what it says.

Given that? Fine. Cast it while you still have scrying active. By your own admission, you can see the location, and the text for teleport (as quoted above) explicitly says "a place you can see when you cast the spell." Teleport doesn't require concentration, so you can cast it while still having scrying active.

That's fair. So there's still a 1 in 4 chance of teleport failing to get you there. That's so unreliable that no party in their right mind would use it except as an emergency escape. You could easily end up in a really, really bad place.

The point is that you feel you have to. You feel you must legislate well beyond the text of the rules, inserting a bunch of extra requirements, pushing things to the absolute limit of what you as DM can get away with in order to punish the player for using a powerful tool effectively.

Nothing I said was legislated or done to "punish" anyone. Teleport in 5e just plain sucks outside of a teleportation circle or if you have an associated object.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Nevermind. This discussion isn't worth having.