Deciphering a written spell

[Maitre Du Donjon]

Hello all, i just wanted to make sure about one thing.

When finding a scroll, every character that could potentially use it has to decipher it (or cast read magic on it) before they know what the scroll can do. So a wizard can't cast read magic on a scroll, find out what it does, then give it to the rogue to use (with the appropriate skill)? The rogue would have to decipher the scroll on its own before he could use it, right?

Could the rogue take 20 on deciphering the scroll?

Thanks in advance

Maitre D

 

[shilsen]

yes, the rogue would have to decipher the spell on his own. In order to do so, he can use either the Spellcraft (DC 20 + spell level) or Use Magic Device (DC 25 + spell level) skills. Since UMD does not allow take 10s, due to the unpredictability of magic, I would say you can't take 20 with it either. You can take 20 with Spellcraft. However, since the process of deciphering a scroll using these skills allow only 1 try per day, taking 20 would take 20 days.