Freedom of Movement vs. Mummy Despair

[Nareau]

FoM normally protects you from effects that restrict your body's movement, but Despair locks up your mind, making it impossible to choose to move.

Be careful trying to make that argument, though. FoM specifically protects against Hold Person, which is a mind-affecting compulsion.

The simplest solution is to make the condition be Cowering rather than Paralayzed. Makes more sense, too.

The main reason I don't like this is that Cowering != helpless. A big part of mummies warranting that CR 5 (IMHO) is their ability to scare you helpless, then Coup de Grace you.

Nareau

 

[mvincent]

Trivial side-note:
The Hypertext SRD listing for mummy gives a hyperlink to the paralyzed condition in it's description for Despair.

 

[UnsocialEntity]

Be careful trying to make that argument, though. FoM specifically protects against Hold Person, which is a mind-affecting compulsion.


The main reason I don't like this is that Cowering != helpless. A big part of mummies warranting that CR 5 (IMHO) is their ability to scare you helpless, then Coup de Grace you.

Nareau

I think one of the main reasons Freedom of movement is useful and a 4th level spell is because it protects you against all of those helpless coup de grace auto kills. If you want to house rule the despair ability so that freedom of movement doesn't protect you, I think a good balance would be to take out the helpless factor. So i'd agree cowering would be a good house rule.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Trivial side-note:
The Hypertext SRD listing for mummy gives a hyperlink to the paralyzed condition in it's description for Despair.

Well, yeah, but aren't the hyperlinks a fan resource, rather than a rules source?

Someone might mistakenly put a hyperlink in a phrase like "When you have plenty of time (generally 2 minutes for a skill that can normally be checked in 1 round, one full round action, or one standard action)...", even if it was not originally intended that the word reference the mechanic.

-Hyp.

 

[phindar]

Well, yeah, but aren't the hyperlinks a fan resource, rather than a rules source?

But it seems like linking the word "Parlysis" to the condition "Paralysis" is pretty natural. I mean, if you read that something causes Paralysis, where else but the Paralysis condition are you going to look?

 

[UnsocialEntity]

But it seems like linking the word "Parlysis" to the condition "Paralysis" is pretty natural. I mean, if you read that something causes Paralysis, where else but the Paralysis condition are you going to look?

Yea, if you didn't use the Paralyzed condition, what rules would you use for paralyzed with fear? Just make something up? The only thing that seems to make sense is to use the paralyzed condition, given the description of despair.

 

[Hypersmurf]

But it seems like linking the word "Parlysis" to the condition "Paralysis" is pretty natural. I mean, if you read that something causes Paralysis, where else but the Paralysis condition are you going to look?

Well, it says "paralyzed with fear". The description of Fear Aura (Su) says "The aura can freeze an opponent (such as a mummy's despair)..."

So is "paralyzed with fear" referring to the paralyzed condition, or is it just a natural English usage for "freeze an opponent"?

For example, can someone who is paralyzed with fear cast a Stilled, Silent Magic Missile?

-Hyp.

 

[phindar]

Well, this goes back to my earlier point that if they wanted "paralyzed with fear" not to refer to the paralyzed condition, they could have picked another word. Paralysis says you can take purely mental actions, so if the intent of Mummy's Despair was to forbid purely mental actions in addition to physical movement it should say so either in the Despair entry or in the Paralysis description. (As another poster pointed out, Hold Person is a mind-affecting spell that causes paralysis, which allows purely mental actions.)

But since I got you here, in reference to my earlier question, how do you determine which effects Freedom of Movement frees you from, and which effects require Freedom? Aside from the spells and abilities specifically called out in the text, how would you determine which spell was required to negate something?