Divinations...something that has always irked me

[Dirt]

Anyone who makes enemies of powerful people should expect big trouble.



The modern equivalent of this would be sending an assassin with a high-powered rifle and an advanced scope. Before you do this, consider the implications for the person who would do it.

First of all, hiring the spellcaster is going to be moderately expensive. For ordinary everyday hits, it won't be his method of choice. Instead, he'll put a reward out. If the PC's never come back to his city, then they are out of his hair, and he doesn't need to worry about it. If they do come back, there'll be a thug around every corner that wants the five thousand gold piece prize for bringing back a head.

Hiring a spellcaster to cast teleport a couple of times isn't too bad, actually. It's far less expensive than a 5,000 gp per PC head price tag. I'd have to look it up, but I think that it is something like 10 gp per level of spell, per level of the spell caster. So, you could get away with about a 900 gp roundtrip ticket for 4 happy assassins.

 

[Dirt]

Another way to make divinations less effective, without using high-powered tactics, is diffusion. Against a single target, divinations are highly effective. Against a large organization of loosely affiliated cells, not so much. Using trickery and discretion, you can prevent your players from asking the proper questions in the first place. A simple alter self spell can cause the players' divinations to be targeted in the wrong location. Commune, in particular, can be difficult to use if you set things up properly. With mostly 'yes' or 'no' answers, it's difficult to use if you don't know the right questions to ask. Commune confirms or denies your suspicions...but it doesn't give you information, per se...merely validates it. If you have ten suspects, Commune makes it simple to determine the murderer, by the process of elmination. Make it a crowded ball with 200 people in the crowd, and disassociate the killer from a direct relation to the victim, and you're starting to get there.

Seperate the room into 100 on one side, 100 on another.

Ask the question..."is the killer on the right side?"

Seperate the remaining 100 to 50 on each side.

Repeat.

50 to 25.

Repeat.

25 to 12(13)

Repeat.

I think that you see what I mean about this. In fact, I've abused Commune the same way when I've been on the other side of the DM screen. This can be applied to a variety of things, not just murder mysteries. Let's take: evil baddy has retreated to castle. There are 9 floors to the tower. Use Commune, find out what floor he is one...you have a good start, without having to fight your way through each level. And yes, I know that there could be an extra dimensional space somewhere, but the entrance to it could be discovered in the same fashion.

If these posts seem hurried, I apologize...work and all...

In fact, you hit on the classic answer in your own post: because there are other factors involved. The beholder-guildmaster may be bound by specific rules in the guild charter...rules the PCs are completely ignorant of, even though they benefit from them. An example like Elizabeth invoking the right of Parley in Pirates of the Caribbean, for example. Perhaps the beholder has equally powerful enemies of his own, and can't afford to attack the players, or give his enemies a justification to come after him, at least until he's better defended. Sure, I could kill that pesky band of adventurers that revealed my counterfeit Illithid skull manufacturing operation....but that might get the attention of the Illicit Magical Appropriations Bureau on Mechanus. Next thing you know, we could all be up to our armpits in Inevitables. No, just dispatch some brigands not directly related to the guild. make them cheap, stupid and brutal. You get the idea.

While I can make up excuses as to why the NPCs don't use certain divinations to destroy the party, it doesn't stop the PCs from using those tactics.

 

[robberbaron]

Hmm. Interesting discussion.

IMC Divination always results in a vision, often vague or cryptic or both. OK, I am still running a heavily-modified 1st Ed. AD&D - for a number of reasons I won't go into here - and that is how Divinations are supposed to work, but I like the way it feels and that is probably how I would apply it in 3.5..

Communes and Contact Other Planes are very different fish. The more questions a player gets, the more they tie themselves in knots trying to be clever. My lot always choose very good questions but then fail to see the pattern uncovered, often missing apparent contradictions.

Commune With Nature will only give answers than the land would know, so no hints about what a BBG is up to, only that several horsemen passed by yesterday or that a ring of stones is a few miles to the east, etc.

I think the best way to combat these spells is, as I think may have been mentioned before, to consider in advance that they might be used and be absolutely sure of your answers. Think of the sort of visions that Diviners might get and you will be well prepared for the player's spells.

I never worry about Auguries. IME players don't avoid doing something just because the Augury came up "Woe", in fact it makes them use up their spells earlier rather than later.

 

[smetzger]

The group doesn't make very many friends. One of the people that they upset (greatly) was the quarter master of the thieves guild in Saerisorn, the city of souls. This quarter master, named Galendower (who they discovered to be a beholder), COULD have destroyed the group. Scry, teleport, send some thieves in, done. Luckily, I had an excuse as to WHY he didn't have access to a high level spell caster (they were being systematically hunted down by the ruling class, so spellcasters with ability were scarse). But, if I hadn't, it could have been a very short campaign.

1) Bad guys always send flunkies to do the job the first time.
2) Under 3.5 scry requires a Will save. If you make a save you get a tingly feeling, so you know a save was just made. IMC the bad guys have only been able to use scry once, and that was after several failed attempts, so the PCs had a reasonable suspicion that they were being scryed.

 

[MerakSpielman]

Hiring a spellcaster to cast teleport a couple of times isn't too bad, actually. It's far less expensive than a 5,000 gp per PC head price tag. I'd have to look it up, but I think that it is something like 10 gp per level of spell, per level of the spell caster. So, you could get away with about a 900 gp roundtrip ticket for 4 happy assassins.

Round-trip? That means the wizard has to go with them. That's not something a wizard is likely to do if he doesn't have personal stakes in the conflict. Teleport, then you're on your own, buddy.

Then there's the little matter of finding a spellcaster willing to send assassins. Even for the right price, this is definately an illegal activity. Good and Lawful casters are probably out of the question. Neutral and evil casters will want additional compensation for the risk. After all, the obvious counter-divination for the PCs, assuming they survive, is "Who teleported these assassins to us?" The wizard pops up as the guilty party, not the person who hired him. Even the wizard can't be too careful in his choice of enemies.

The other X factor in hiring a caster to do your dirty work is blackmail. The caster now knows you're up to no good. He has seen the illegal things you do. How far can you trust him?

But all those restrictions aside, let's say the PCs have had the poor judgement to piss off an evil high-level wizard who also happens to be one of the people in charge of an assassin's guild. He can cast teleport on his cronies, scry to make sure the job is done, then teleport himself to the battle scene to get the assassins out. This, as far as I am concerned, is the worst-case scenario for this problem. What, then, can the PCs hope for? What would keep their enemy from doing this?

Let us examine exactly what the enemies would do. Scry during the night. Most likely, they see a camp in the wilderness with the PCs, a fire, etc... A PC or two will be on guard. The wizard can study this scene long enough for it to count as "Well studied" or whatever to minimize the chance of failure. Then he gathers his assassins, casts Improved Invisibility and a few buffs on them, and teleports them to the scene. Return to crystal ball and keep scrying.

Now, I'll go out on a limb and say the PCs are probably at least 10th level in order to be pissing off such a powerful wizard. I personally think that a group of 10th level PCs should be able to handle 4 improved invisible assassins teleported into their camp in the middle of the night. If nothing else, the nightly Alarm spell should trigger and wake them all up. If they don't have scrolls of See Invisible they are poorly prepared, to say the least. It would be a tough encounter, but not unbeatable.

 

[Dirt]

Round-trip? That means the wizard has to go with them. That's not something a wizard is likely to do if he doesn't have personal stakes in the conflict. Teleport, then you're on your own, buddy.

Then there's the little matter of finding a spellcaster willing to send assassins. Even for the right price, this is definately an illegal activity. Good and Lawful casters are probably out of the question. Neutral and evil casters will want additional compensation for the risk. After all, the obvious counter-divination for the PCs, assuming they survive, is "Who teleported these assassins to us?" The wizard pops up as the guilty party, not the person who hired him. Even the wizard can't be too careful in his choice of enemies.

This is true, but in a thieves organization, I think that the wizards wouldn't have any qualms against doing this...and for a nice clean 5,000 gp (which is what was offered per head before), the wizard would probably be more than happy.

But all those restrictions aside, let's say the PCs have had the poor judgement to piss off an evil high-level wizard who also happens to be one of the people in charge of an assassin's guild. He can cast teleport on his cronies, scry to make sure the job is done, then teleport himself to the battle scene to get the assassins out. This, as far as I am concerned, is the worst-case scenario for this problem. What, then, can the PCs hope for? What would keep their enemy from doing this?

Let us examine exactly what the enemies would do. Scry during the night. Most likely, they see a camp in the wilderness with the PCs, a fire, etc... A PC or two will be on guard. The wizard can study this scene long enough for it to count as "Well studied" or whatever to minimize the chance of failure. Then he gathers his assassins, casts Improved Invisibility and a few buffs on them, and teleports them to the scene. Return to crystal ball and keep scrying.

Now, I'll go out on a limb and say the PCs are probably at least 10th level in order to be pissing off such a powerful wizard. I personally think that a group of 10th level PCs should be able to handle 4 improved invisible assassins teleported into their camp in the middle of the night. If nothing else, the nightly Alarm spell should trigger and wake them all up. If they don't have scrolls of See Invisible they are poorly prepared, to say the least. It would be a tough encounter, but not unbeatable.

When the PCs first offended the quarter master, the PCs were around 5th or 6th. Teleporting 4 assassins in would have taken care of the situation.

Now, as a DM, I can curb the NPCs and keep the campaign from a short death. But, this doesn't stop the PCs from doing something similiar to rid themselves of pesky NPCs....

 

[MerakSpielman]

Do you have any idea how well protected these people are? If they make enemies on a regular basis, they damn well better have protections in place. A pet caster or three, Alarms, Wards, Glyphs, Invisible undead guardians, illusions, etc... Then there are mundane protections - guards, really squeaky doors, decoys, traps, lead sheets to prevent certain divinations, etc... If your players try it, I think they'll encounter paranoia at its worst.

 

[WizarDru]

Seperate the room into 100 on one side, 100 on another.

Ask the question..."is the killer on the right side?"

Seperate the remaining 100 to 50 on each side.

Repeat.

50 to 25.

Repeat.

25 to 12(13)

Repeat.

I think that you see what I mean about this. In fact, I've abused Commune the same way when I've been on the other side of the DM screen. This can be applied to a variety of things, not just murder mysteries. Let's take: evil baddy has retreated to castle. There are 9 floors to the tower. Use Commune, find out what floor he is one...you have a good start, without having to fight your way through each level. And yes, I know that there could be an extra dimensional space somewhere, but the entrance to it could be discovered in the same fashion.

Well, there are plenty of ways that this should be impeded or fail. First things first: You have a murder at a ball...obviously there will be quite a few nobles and powerful people attending. We return to Psion's point about authority. If the PCs have total authority in the situation, then it's a moot point. If they have the force of law on their side, then don't expect to run a murder mystery, because their authority allows them to optimize conditions to short-circuit it when they use magic like to become C.S.I. Greyhawk.

Second, authority or no, Commune takes 10 minutes. 200 people, many powerful or high-born are going to just sit and wait during that time? No, many will want to leave, fearing for their lives. Some will be insulted, and demand restitution or to be allowed to leave. What if they try to leave, with their armed bodyguards? What happens if someone blames the PCs as the culprit? Suddenly a room full of terrified nobles suspects THEM, and now they're supposed to just sit still while they choose someone at random? An evil bard could cause a riot in this situation, with a simple perform or bluff check.

Third, commune only last round/level. Assuming eveyrone cooperates with the PCs (big assumption), that means that a 15th level caster has 1.5 minutes to get 200 people to become 100 people, and then 100 to 50. Unlikely, so now we have: a murder, then say 5-10 minutes of shuffling about. 10 more minutes to cast the spell. 5-10 minutes of more shuffling about. Another 10 minutes to cast. It gets quicker, but frightened and angry people are prickly, many of them might be political enemies and most of them may be uncooperative...especially towards a group you describe as not making many friends. Many in the crowd of this party may not be the murderers....but if the party starts casting divintaion spells...well, you've got plenty of extra questions: what if you start asking other ones? Is that man a murderer? Did anyone here steal something? Did that man steal something? Is that man corrupt? They may fear, rationally or no, that the PCs are going to trap them in the pursuit of someone else...just one more reason that a non-villian NPC won't cooperate.

Fourth, all of this assumes passivity on the part of the murderer, and that he was both unprepared for this turn of events, and that he's working alone. Any number of spells and effects could make this a difficult problem for the players, not the least of which is interupting the casting of the spell in the first place. Imagine someone using a thunderstone, thrown out of the crowd, to interupt the spellcaster's concentration? Sabotage the balcony over there to create a distraction or a panic, and so forth.

Finally, as I mentioned before, finding the killer or even revealing him in front of everyone is not the same as catching him. "Are you accusing the royal Astronomer of being involved in this nonsense? Yes, I saw you cast a spell, or at least something like one....but it could have been a trick. Supposedly you got a message from your god...but how can we trust YOU? You will hear from the King by morning, I assure you!"

Most of the divination spells, particularly under 3.5e, have been scaled back slightly, or refined to limit their applicability over different situations. The trick is taking advantage of the fact.

 

[CombatWombat51]

Ok, I'll stand in the minority... diviniations bother me. Sure, I can use magic, fickle gods, deception, and vagueness to defeat them, but then what's the point in using them? IMO, that's like saying the solution to a party all with +20 swords is enemies with more hit points. The easier solution would be to dump the +20 swords, or in this case, the divinations.

High-level political intrigue with nobles yadda yadda can be thwarted with the fancy stuff listed above, but I'm talking about low-level/non political bad dudes.

I'll also scoff at this 'evidence' thing. And of course 'might makes right'! When's the last time the party arrested the marauding orcs and held a trial for them by their peers? I'm no authority, but way back when, I'd be willing to bet that evidence was mostly witnesses and lacks of alibis. Physical evidence wasn't all that common, I'm willing to bet. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if trials were 'guilty until proven innocent', which happens in advanced countries even today. Sir Harry says serf Don raped his maid, then Don better start praying, cuz I bet 'the court' won't believe Don's family when they protest. "Of course you'd deny that Don commited a crime, you're his family!"

Anyhow, IMC, I just erased most of the divinations out of the PHB (along with most teleportation and raise dead stuff). I think a divination here or there (augury) is ok, but the rest of it doesn't fit IMC.

 

[Tzarevitch]

Are you not seeing any obvious solutions here? I am.

First - what is the PC's authority here? It appears enough that they can round up suspects with impunity. Answer: don't give them that sort of authority. Control the social situation. Perhaps the suspects are powerful nobles that the guard only has limited authority to do anything with without proof. Even if they find a suspect, the suspect may still be free to act, and unless they find what the suspect is up to (which may take more than surface thoughts), the players may still have a problem to grapple with.

Second - control the social situation. Add additional restrictions to make it harder. For example, make it so the PCs have to discover what is up without exposing their presence as investigators, or causing the suspect to bolt.

What's to prevent casting another detect thoughts? Well, if you have a sorcerer or telepath, perhaps nothing. But if you keep in mind the social situation, that could control it. People don't take well to spells being cast on them. In a society that is conscious of this, casting a spell in the middle of a chamber full of supposed suspects would be like waving a gun around at a polite dinner party. So, if you really want it to be subtle, you need silent and still spell (or hide power), which raises the level of the spell a bit. Even if PCs do have the resources, perhaps the enemy has resource to detect when a spell is in operation.

I agree.

How exactly are the PCs going to go out and restrain multiple suspects which may or may not have done anything and try to mentally interrogate them? Even under the most primitive legal system that can be considered kidnapping unless they have the sanction of the authorities in the area. Even with legal sanction you have to catch and restrain every one of them and hope your Detect Thoughts works.

First, if I remember correctly, detect thoughts takes several rounds of concentration on a 60' cone so it is pretty obvious when someone is trying it. Secondly, if I remember correctly the spell only catches surface thoughts. That means the person being scanned can control what the spell picks up if he knows that he is being scanned simply by thinking about something else. That is not the easiest thing to do but it can be done.

Speaking as a DM, most of the time when DMs complain about divinations, I have found out the real problem is DMs who don't fully read the description of the spell and/or give more information than the PCs are entitled to or DMs who for some reason assume that bad guys in the setting won't take divinaitons into account.

The primary rule of dealing with divinations is the 4-Corners Rule: do not give the PCs any more than what the text of the spell entitles them to. Almost all divinations are fairly limited when you look at them closely.

Detect Thoughts: Takes minimum 3 rounds of concentration at a target in a 60' cone just to learn what the target is currently thinking about, which for a character familiar with the spell, is what they want you to learn. It gives a save before the first round of information is in so you may not be able to gain anything from someone with a high will save. You also have to concentrate, and the target area is quite small so it is pretty obvious if you are doing it. The effect is also blocked by most solid materials so you generally have to have a clear line of effect or be doing it through some very thin walls.

Augury: Slow casting Time. Very small window (only 1 hour). Very limited answers Weal/Woe/Weal and Woe/Nothing. 9 in 10 chance at best of receiving an answer (unfortunately that remaining 1 in 10 also reads as Nothing). Note lastly that the spell only tells you if AN ACTION will bring good or bad results FOR YOU.

Divination: Even slower casting time. Same 1 in 10 failure but at least the caster knows it failed unless other magic is causing false results. This makes it clear that some magic does block divination. The spell also only gives an answer to a question about a SPECIFIC GOAL, EVENT, OR ACTIVITY THAT IS TO OCCUR WITHIN ONE WEEK. Do not bend on this. The spell does not answer questions directly about a person, only what he will do. Note also "specific" is subject to your interpretation as is "is to occur". The spell does not reveal information that happened in the past, not does it reveal something that MIGHT occur. It reveals an SPECIFIC something that IS TO OCCUR and no more. The spell is actually very lousy for investigating crimes (as my PCs found out) because it cannot tell you anything about the past.

Commune: This is one of the most powerful of divinations but it has serous drawbacks. The caster must ask questions that can be answered with a simple yes/no (but the deity can choose to give a short answer if it wishes to.) Note that the power you contact answers according to its agenda not the caster's. It also answers only to the limits of its knowledge (which can be limited indeed). Check Deities and Demigods for clarification on what a deity can see (check remote sensing). Very few deities can see into the past or future and even those can only do so under limited circumstances and for very small windows of time. This makes the spell nearly useless for investigating something.

Contact other Plane: Like commune but even more limited. You get fewer questions and the being contacted is not an ally so it has an even more limited list of possible answers. To top it off, there is a fairly good chance that the power doesn't know or simply lies and there is no real way of knowing. Of course, there is always the chance of stat damage from trying the spell, but that is actually fairly trivial to deal with.

Discern Location: Very powerful spell but with significant limitations. Little short of Mind Blank blocks the spell, but to find a creature you must have seen it (this implies that you must have seen what it actually looks like otherwise you haven't seen it you've seen its disguise), or have some item that belongs to it (not just something it touched or something random that it had in its possession). Finding an object is even harder because you must have touched it.

Scrying: This spell (thankfully) is much diminished in usefulness in 3.5. It is VERY slow casting and gives a save. To top it off, if the save is successful, you can't try again for 24 hours. It is also easy to detect (Int check) when it works and it has no audio at all. Visibility is only as good as your own eyes and the conditions at the scry location allow and it is very hard to scry someone you know little about (and you can't scry objects or places at all). Lastly you can escape the sensor by moving further than it can follow. Greater Scrying at least is faster but it has almost all of the other flaws.

Clairvoyance/Clairaudience: Location only. Slow casting. Limited range. Sensor doesn't move. Location must be known to you or at least it must be obvious that such location exists. Supernatural senses do not translate through the spell so it is subject to the conditions on the other side (except that it will allow you to see a bit if it is naturally dark.)

Tzarevitch