Help me stop the abuse of Polymorph Other

[Korak]

2 things

1. A passed fear aura save tells the dragon nothing. Frightful presence is not "targeted hostile magic" so there is no tingling, unless you houserule it. Either a creature in the area is afraid or not.

2. There is NOTHING wrong/metagamish/munchkin/unusual about throwing dispell magic in the first round. Any smart dragon would have to expect its opponents to come in buffed. Many more intelligent NPCs should open with dispell magic if they have it available.

 

[Wippit Guud]

2. There is NOTHING wrong/metagamish/munchkin/unusual about throwing dispell magic in the first round. Any smart dragon would have to expect its opponents to come in buffed.

Mind you, any smart group (yes, I know, but go with me here) would have a redied action to dispel the first spell the dragon casted. And the dragon would know that they would plan that, so he can clearly not take the wine in front of me.

 

[Kesh]

I don't think Tom ever said what edition he was using?

 

[Tom McCafferty]

I don't think Tom ever said what edition he was using?

We are using 3rd edition, but the HD limit sounds good.

 

[Otterscrubber]

I noticed this was 3.0 thread, my first reaction was use to suggest you use the 3.5 rules. I'm slightly curious as to why you would stick with 3.0 anyway, but that is probably another thread. 3.5 polymorph does not last nearly as long, in fact I now think it is practically useless at 1 min/level. That should help you feel better about this spell being too powerful.

The HD limit would be good in this case, but even without it this is not that great of a buff spell for a 1st level character. I don't have my 3.0 books handy but I beleive at least two things don't change when you are polymorphed, Hit Points (even if there is a Con change) and BAB. This means a 1st level character would at most have +1 to hit and very very low HPs no matter what you turned him into. He would not last even one round against a decent size Red Dragon. If all you want to do is distract it for a round why waste human life, just use an illusion spell instead or something.

 

[Pielorinho]

Illusion spells don't work so good on critters with blindsight .

Honestly, I don't see this as a big deal, for the reasons already posted. With the HD limit (which I coulda sworn was in the PhB errata for 3.0), that first level fighter can't become a dragon at all. Even without that limit, it's using a fourth-level spell to distract the dragon for at most one round.

More likely, the dragon will see a gold dragon and a bunch of humans, think, "Yikes! Let's clear the decks first!" breathe fire on the humans in order to quickly eliminate the easy threats, and then fight the gold dragon. Or else it'll fly away quickly in hopes the gold dragon will follow, and then will fight the gold mano-a-mano. Or else it'll recognize that the gold dragon is polymorphed (remember to give it the DC 25 spellcraft check to recognize a spell currently in effect) and ignore the gold.

There are many different strategies it might use. This polymorph will be little more than a minor inconvenience.

Compare to the use of an otiluke's resilient sphere which, if large enough, could grab the dragon and prevent its escape while the party prepares all kinds of nasty defenses. Compare to a stoneskin cast on the party fighter, which will drastically reduce the dragon's damage capabilities. Compare to a solid fog, used to keep the dragon in the range of an ongoing damage spell (blade barrier, evard's tentacles, etc.). Or scrying, to find out information; or dimension door, to get out of the dragon's grasp quickly, or several other more useful spells. Heck, compare to polymorphing the party fighter into a night hag, for something like a +10 armor bonus, a size increase, and the ability to use all the character's armor and weapons.

This is not only not a gamebreaking tactic; it's not even a very good tactic.

Daniel

 

[Grog]

The HD limit is in 3.5.

A number of people are missing that this thread is 3.0-specific.

Huh. I could've sworn it was in 3.0 too. My mistake.

 

[Saeviomagy]

People seem to be of the opinion that a fourth level spell is okay for turning your first level character into a dragon that can then go around extorting goods etc from your average peasants.

You're taking the piss, right? First level characters can extort the average local peasant anyway. Mainly because he's wearing platemail and waving a sword. Or blasts him with a magic missile. Or whatever.

Average peasants suck, and if that's the best your players can pull off with a polymorph self spell, you've got a pretty unimaginative set of players.

How do you tell the real thing from the fake? Is the first thing your wizard should do cast dispell magic or run for the hills leaving their heavy goods behind. Best to err on the side of caution if you are the classic mage and leg it.

Polymorph gives a +10 bonus on disguise checks. By my count, a spot check versus your disguise check (which, for turning into a dragon is only going to be +8 from the spell). So you tell the real thing from a fake by saying "'ere, that looks like a fake dragon"...

 

[Saeviomagy]

Hence my House Rule:
Any target of a stone to flesh, polymorph other, or raise dead effect must make a Fortitude save at DC 12 or die. No spells or items affect this save. For raise dead, the death is permanent. (This rule includes similar effects like polymorph any object, resurrection, true resurrection, etc.)

Note that this AD&D conversion solves (1) polymorph, (2) raise dead, and (3) makes stone to flesh more survivable (Fort save already in there -- increase all to DC 15 if you prefer).

Wow. That sucks. Hard. Make way for fighters, barbarians and clerics that have been resurrected repeatedly, and wizards, rogues, sorcerors and the like that just never come back.

AD&D is best left dead, especially when it comes to "for the sake of game balance, you just die".

I'd expect to see a lot of polymorph othered characters who never, ever change back.

 

[Greatwyrm]

First, I agree that just about any dragon that has dispel magic would probably lead off with an area dispel.

Second, I don't think anybody with half a brain would volunteer for this job. If I was DMing a red dragon and the party walks in with a gold dragon, the dragon is probably going to concentrate most of its attention on the gold and then deal with the pathetic mortals. That's just painting a gigantic bull's-eye on your chest.