Can you teleport onto a ship?

[Psifon]

Well guy's, I have not had the patience to read all of these long posts.

To sum up what I have read, either:

1) Teleport puts you onto the space (on the planet) you think you are going to, even if conditions have changed there.

OR

2) Teleport puts you into the environment you envisioned, even if that environment is not where you last saw it.

Is it fair to say that this one is a DM's call and he can pick whaterver interpretation of the spell he wants, so long as he remains consistant?

 

[Zerovoid]

Well guy's, I have not had the patience to read all of these long posts.

To sum up what I have read, either:

1) Teleport puts you onto the space (on the planet) you think you are going to, even if conditions have changed there.

OR

2) Teleport puts you into the environment you envisioned, even if that environment is not where you last saw it.

Is it fair to say that this one is a DM's call and he can pick whaterver interpretation of the spell he wants, so long as he remains consistant?

So, now the thread is back to exactly where I started it. Interesting.

 

[kreynolds]

So, now the thread is back to exactly where I started it. Interesting.

Yep. Big relief, isn't it?

Here is how I will handle teleport without error, ladies and gentlemen. If you have a viable description of the location, you go there. I don't care if that location has moved, you just go there, no matter where it is. If the location you wish to go to no longer exists, such as a ship that has been destroyed, your casting simply fails.

To put it another way, if you cast teleport without error to go to your apartment bedroom, but some devious individual remodeled your apartment while you were away and the bedroom no longer resembles what it once was, your casting simply fails.

I know. It's wierd. It sounds an awful lot like, oh, I don't know, maybe the original spell description!?!

I'm done.

 

[Corinth]

Yep. Big relief, isn't it?

Here is how I will handle teleport without error, ladies and gentlemen. If you have a viable description of the location, you go there. I don't care if that location has moved, you just go there, no matter where it is. If the location you wish to go to no longer exists, such as a ship that has been destroyed, your casting simply fails.

To put it another way, if you cast teleport without error to go to your apartment bedroom, but some devious individual remodeled your apartment while you were away and the bedroom no longer resembles what once was, your casting simply fails.

I know. It's wierd. It sounds an awful lot like, oh, I don't know, maybe the original spell description!?!

I'm done.

Crimey! That sounds like my Feng Shui game, where the Geomantically-Trained Ninja Interior Decorators serious messed with the PCs by covering up two mirrors and changing a floral arrangement. The chi flow went all to hell, and a PC nearly died as a result.

No, I'm not joking.

 

[Caliban]

Originally posted by Psifon


Well guy's, I have not had the patience to read all of these long posts.

To sum up what I have read, either:

1) Teleport puts you onto the space (on the planet) you think you are going to, even if conditions have changed there.

OR

2) Teleport puts you into the environment you envisioned, even if that environment is not where you last saw it.

Is it fair to say that this one is a DM's call and he can pick whaterver interpretation of the spell he wants, so long as he remains consistant?

The Teleport spell description states that you must know the location and layout of the destination. It further states that if you don't know where it is, what it looks like, or what's in it, you won't be able to teleport there.

This seems to indicate that knowing where your destination is located is just as important as knowing what it looks like when it comes to the Teleport spell.

If the location of your destination has changed and you are unaware of the new location, then you no longer know the destination as well. That much seems clear from the spell description.

It seems to me that if the location of your destination changes, the best you can hope for is rolling on the "Description" line of the Teleport chart (PHB, page 264), and depending on the situation, you might be on the "False Destination" line of the chart (although that would be rare).

That's what the spell description indicates. Whether you choose to use a pseudo-scientific basis to rationalize this or some pseudo-arcane theory is irrelevant as far as the game mechanics are concerned. (Although it can be interesting if you want to develop a different underlying framework for the way magic works than the one D&D uses, and don't mind tweaking spells to fit that framework. That goes into House Rule territory though.)

If you have Teleport Without Error, then you can get there with just a reliable description, even if the destination has moved. It just has to match the description. (As kreynolds pointed out earlier in the thread.)

 

[IceBear]

hehehe - you know that through all this I've never read the description of either spell .

What Caliban has quoted sounds good to me, and since no one has tried it yet in 3E I wouldn't be inconsistent if I started to use the rule as above now.

I guess the wizard in the novel was using Teleport without Error then

IceBear

 

[General Starlight]

I'd rather drop it, too.

Well sure, Icebear. Thinking too much (over thinking) or reading too much into (mostly concentrating on semantics of the language) a rule ultimately isn't the best basis of a good ruling anyway. What's fun, fair, reasonable, balanced, and desired for your own world is a far better yardstick, and it helps if whatever method you may employ, you tend to use it consistently. I prefer a bit more complexity than most, tend to use it, and feel it produces more realistic, consistent results since that's how I approach the game. But it's not the only way.

But I enjoy it all, and enjoy discussing the logical reasons, if that's what someone offers here, the semantics of the write up, if that's what someone offers here, their ideas on balance, if that's what someone offers here, or wherever they go in a forum such as this. If I didn't, I wouldn't even get involved with that particular post. I'd much prefer doing that than trying to tell someone their method doesn't belong or is somehow wrong or not as good as mine. It's far too subjective to make any such claim reasonable anyway.

And trust me, I certainly appreciate anyone wanting to concentrate more on the up coming scenario lay out than some piddly, trivial matter that isn't going to affect their game much anyway. I'm just not sure how hanging out in an En World forum and taking part in a discussion on the very thing you wish to avoid helps there, or conserves your precious time, but I will assume you are simply not currently pressed for time and, like me, think taking part in such a discussion can be a fun part of the game too, when time permits, like now.

Sorry if anyone felt slighted that I think more realism has advantages over hong's third law, but that's only true insofar as when and if realism is both desired and appreciated. Clearly, if it is not as important to one, then this isn't going to be the case, and nothing I know compels me to think this makes their style of play somehow flawed. That would be like saying: "Hey, you aren't really having the fun you seem to think you are." I can't imagine saying anything much stupider than that, except, perhaps, if someone wanted to start going around telling others they had a superior handle on what another person thinks than that person does them self, and further criticizes them for such alleged thoughts, like they were perhaps god and could see into the mind of another, they're so certain. Such barely deserves acknowledgement. Suffice it to say there's a reason why it's refreshing when one admits their errors. It's because far more frequently, many don't have the maturity to do so.

I understand the POV of not wanting too much realism, and even I admittedly and fully accept 'some' blatantly unrealistic aspects of a game (like 2e combat, for example) since realism in combat is not what I look for in a more roleplaying endeavor. I sure as heck won't defend such things as realistic, however, should one decide to criticize it.

Thankfully, now that I've answered some posts, I too would much rather talk about the topic at hand. a.k.a. Teleportation.

Jim.

 

[General Starlight]

TELEPORT

I don't agree the teleport spell description says you MUST know the location and layout, or that if you don't know WHERE it is or WHAT is looks like (exactly), you won't be able to teleport. The spell doesn't say that, not really, IMHO. It says you must have some clear idea in mind, not that it must be right. And it doesn't say you can't teleport to the war lord's tent, but you can't 'simply' do it if A, B, OR C (as opposed to A,B, AND C for those who like semantics), and later modifies the whole thing by summing up what I think the intent is of the whole spell.

"The clearer the mental image, the more likely the teleportation works." After all, the very fact you can end up in some 'similar' area leads me to believe if you can imagine it, you can get there (maybe). The question is only, how close is your imagined destination to any thing real?

Semantics aside, which I'm sure annoy some anyway, Caliban is, of course, perfectly correct, IMHO, in ruling a destination that changed its location would probably be "Description" at best, and if it no longer existed, "False Destination" at worst.

I still really like the idea of preparing an area with a special, more fixed rune or mark, and though the spell doesn't say anything like that, I'd allow a PC to up grade the category by at least one class of familiarity if they did so (maybe even making an overly familiar class). Such a fixed rune is hard to change, remains fixed relative to its surroundings, and can be staggeringly unique in all the universe, thus making the spell's focus on it that much more likely. It has the added benefit of matching with some previous things where one was teleporting to their own ship, but more importantly for me, I'd rather allow my players greater lee way to teleport home more safely. Needing a 7th level spell to do this safely seems a bit much. Besides, it's the ability to teleport anywhere blindly, or to go to other areas they haven't specially prepared first that's more of a problem.

Teleport without error seems obvious enough, but I do wonder why they got rid of the ability it formerly had to move to other planes of existence. Anyone have some insight into the author's intent there?

Jim.

 

[IceBear]

That idea of the rune/mark is kind of why I allowed the teleport to the ship in the case of my old campaign. While the PC wizard hadn't explicitedly created something like that, the entire campaign was based on the ship and so, I ruled that the wizard was sooooo familiar with the location he could teleport to it if the ship should move. If a wizard wasn't so familiar I might not have allowed it.

As for posting on here, I tend to post mainly when things are slow at work If I start a thread on a thread on Friday and it isn't resolved by the time I leave, then I will periodically check over the weekend.

IceBear

 

[General Starlight]

More On Teleporting

(edit away accidental nigh duplicate post)