Decipher Script to Encode a Message

[takasi]

How do you encode a message? Can you use decipher script to create a secret message to send to someone else?

Can a wizard use decipher script to encrypt his spellbook?

 

[James McMurray]

If you're encoding it for someone you know and will have the key, you just say "we encode it" and it happens.

 

[takasi]

If you're encoding it for someone you know and will have the key, you just say "we encode it" and it happens.

What is the DC for someone who intercepts the message and wishes to decode it?

Can the party ever find a spellbook that is encoded?

 

[RedFox]

This seems like a simple enough thing to adjudicate. Just make it an opposed Decipher Script check. The person who encodes the work sets the DC. They can create a key if they want. Anyone with the key can decipher the code without a check, but it'll take them just as long as if they had had to make the roll.

 

[Bihlbo]

Here's a great resource on that, share the link with your game master.

 

[irdeggman]

Can the party ever find a spellbook that is encoded?

They already are essentially

ARCANE MAGICAL WRITINGS
To record an arcane spell in written form, a character uses complex notation that describes the magical forces involved in the spell. The writer uses the same system no matter what her native language or culture. However, each character uses the system in her own way. Another person’s magical writing remains incomprehensible to even the most powerful wizard until she takes time to study and decipher it.

To decipher an arcane magical writing (such as a single spell in written form in another’s spellbook or on a scroll), a character must make a Spellcraft check (DC 20 + the spell’s level). If the skill check fails, the character cannot attempt to read that particular spell again until the next day. A read magic spell automatically deciphers a magical writing without a skill check. If the person who created the magical writing is on hand to help the reader, success is also automatic.

Once a character deciphers a particular magical writing, she does not need to decipher it again. Deciphering a magical writing allows the reader to identify the spell and gives some idea of its effects (as explained in the spell description). If the magical writing was a scroll and the reader can cast arcane spells, she can attempt to use the scroll.

So unless you wanted to make it even more difficult (which I think is going over the top) spellbooks are already "encoded" by their very nature.


Deceipher Script can't be used to "decipher" a spellbook.

Spellcraft is a trained only skill.

UMD does not work on a spellbook since it is writing and not a magical item - and you can't cast a spell from it directly in 3.5 (or 3.0).