Does Speak with Dead compel an honest answer?

[TheAuldGrump]

It tells the truth as best it can. It can have itself been deceived.

I have used this fact and the Alter Self spell in a game to good effect. Look like who you want to have blamed for a murder, and murder a random (or not so random) victim. When the corpse is questioned it will answer with an incorrect reply without lying.

Doppelgangers are good for this too, rather than risk being discovered as an imposter do the impersonation second hand.

The Auld Grump

 

[Thanee]

As I understand it, you do not really *speak* with the corpse/soul, but rather just *extract* the knowledge it has before passing away.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Pielorinho]

Thanks for the replies, folks! In this case, we've got some pretty unambiguous questions to ask of the corpse:

-"Were you a member of the Blood Brotherhood?"
-"Was 'Lord Dragonbreath' Kopeshi your superior in the Blood Brotherhood?"
-"Was Nahoda in the Blood Brotherhood?"
-"Where did the Blood Brotherhood take the weapons that they smuggled from your weapon-shop?"

The second question is the one that's most important to us, and it'll be hard to give an evasive answer to it. We already know the answer is "yes," so these are questions for the court, whose answers will, we hope, convince the court to bring Kopeshi in for questioning (and incidentally get us off the hook for a couple of killings).

Daniel

 

[Gez]

No: http://www.galactanet.com/comic/458.htm

 

[Stormrunner]

I thought the line was weird about having a partial body gets partial answers or partially correct answers...don't know what they are trying to do there. So if a rat chews off his pinky finger, the corpse can start lying/withholding information?

I believe the intent is to keep the PCs from cutting off a pinky finger, leaving the rest of the corpse behind, and then casting speak with dead on the finger whenever they need info. If they want the info, they either have to do their interrogation on the spot, or lug the heavy corpse along.

 

[Lord Pendragon]

As a DM, I rule that Speak with Dead:

* Provides a save for opposing alignment as a result of the lingering soul imprint. Sort of like a magnetic resistance, it's an impassive resistance.

* Provides truthful information, whether the save is failed or not applicable. The corpse has no mind or soul. It is merely being tapped by magic for information, like a specialized Legend Lore.

* Provides "brief, cryptic, and repetitive" information. The corpse isn't capable of rational thought in the way a living prisoner is. While a living prisoner may be purposefully deceptive, the imperfect connection to the information in the corpse created by the spell is often unintentionally confusing. Even the simplest of questions can be interpreted in many ways, and the magic doesn't always translate the intended or simplest interpretation.

As a rule, I try to strike a balance when adjudicating the spell, so that it falls somewhere between "the PCs learn everything they want to know" and "the spell is worthless to cast because it never tells the PCs anything they want to know."

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

I believe the intent is to keep the PCs from cutting off a pinky finger, leaving the rest of the corpse behind, and then casting speak with dead on the finger whenever they need info. If they want the info, they either have to do their interrogation on the spot, or lug the heavy corpse along.

The characters in the evil campaign I ran a while back used to keep the heads of people they "arranged an accident for," so those people weren't likely to spill the beans from beyond the grave.

I tend to play Speak With Dead something like Miracle Max from the Princess Bride. You know, "trrrrrrruuuuuuuuuueeeeeeelllllloooooooooovvvvvvvveeeee". He needs a bit of help, but the answers are all there...

 

[Saeviomagy]

Thanks for the replies, folks! In this case, we've got some pretty unambiguous questions to ask of the corpse:

-"Were you a member of the Blood Brotherhood?"
-"Was 'Lord Dragonbreath' Kopeshi your superior in the Blood Brotherhood?"
-"Was Nahoda in the Blood Brotherhood?"
-"Where did the Blood Brotherhood take the weapons that they smuggled from your weapon-shop?"

The second question is the one that's most important to us, and it'll be hard to give an evasive answer to it. We already know the answer is "yes," so these are questions for the court, whose answers will, we hope, convince the court to bring Kopeshi in for questioning (and incidentally get us off the hook for a couple of killings).

Daniel

That last one seems quite ambiguous. The corpse could answer "away", for instance, and that would be perfectly legitimate. I think you're better off just casting the spell, reading out the confession, then asking "was that your true and honest confession?"

 

[Pielorinho]

Well, we only got two questions, anyway:

"Was Kopeshi your master in the blood brotherhood?" Earned us, "We are all drops in the sea of purity, but I am a stream, and Kopeshi is a river." Err, right--that'd be a yes.

Our other question elicited a similar answer--I forget it right now, but it was enough to implicate the other guy, too.

Weird poetical metaphorical answers work! And now we're all off the hook.

Daniel

 

[Nareau]

<in-joke>
"YAY, we're off the hook! Oh, wait...didn't we just witness our own horrible deaths?"
</in-joke>


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