How much reality do you use?

[Macbrea]

Oh, as to picking up a magic item and using it immediately. It happens, alot with rogues. Though, occationally they decide something are a tad to dangerous to play with.


I had a rogue in my "Night Below" game pick up the orcish shamans spear. He decide to blindly activate it. According to the module it coverted to work like this:

Spear of the Orcish lord
Required Race: Orcish blood
This longspear +2 has an eye of grumish at the base of the spear head. On the opposite side of the Eye is an aboleth symbol for servitude. Any orc weilding this item may raise it in the air to activate its special ability 2/day. Raised in the air all with Orcish blood within 100 ft gain +2 moral bonus to attack, save and damage rolls for the next hour.
Any person activated the Spear must roll a will save DC 16 or be under the effects of Dominate Person spell cast by the Grand Aboleth Savant (sorceror 16th).

 

[freebfrost]

Well, I am always in favor of adding more reality in my games, with the caveat that it doesn't majorly impact gameplay. If "reality" means I need 65 critical hit tables or a PhD in physics for falling damage, it isn't worth it IMO.

That being said, if the character (NOT the player) had knowledge of that cloak's powers, I would have allowed him the chance to use it as described -- maybe asking for a Knowledge(arcana) check or the like to use the powers correctly.

As for the arrows falling out, well, that would have made an amusing sight. I definitely would have inquired about how they were secured at the very least. If they were just in an open quiver, well... the player would have to take the time to pick them back up then.

Reality adds a lot of.. well.. reality to a game, and can be a good thing.

 

[Romotre]

the word realism and cloak of aracknid is the same sentance. ha. but seriously now. i (the DM), usually can a pretty good idea of whats on a characters belt. usually they put potions n such useful items there. i'd roll d100 with like 15-35% chance of something falling out. but my pc's are jumping and climbing and wahtnot all the time so they're equipment is pretty secure. this would be funny. roge climb up the ceiling above an enemy. a potion falls out. he yells a curse word. the enemy looks up, mouth open. potion falls into mouth, causing small damage ut healing him 3d8+15. haha

 

[Taloras]

Oh, as to picking up a magic item and using it immediately. It happens, alot with rogues. Though, occationally they decide something are a tad to dangerous to play with.

My rogue does that all the time. Its how the character is. We found some boots, he put em on even tho the others claimed they might be cursed. They kept telling him not to try everything automatically. Then the mage was the one that got the cursed item for taking it when we told him not to (damn scarab of death almost killed him....our DM fudged it a bit so that the rogue could make the reflex save to stop the damn thing....we didnt have raise dead yet).

 

[Lela]

I'd ask how he knew that it was the cloak. Of course, he'd probably point out the spider webs that were criss-crossing it, and that would be proof enough for most people. Funny if it wasn't though. Run to wall. Run into wall. Fall over.

As for all the stuff hanging down, I would think that anything the cloak covers wouldn't have a problem. And the cloak would never be hanging down below the character. After all, Wizards have been perfecting thier craft for millenia. Some things you would just get tired of (like ending up nude and stuck on the cealing).

I would ask about the quiver though.

[Edited to add the following]

As a side note, unless that rogue has the preciese shot feat, he would get a -4 penalty for shooting into melee. He also runs the risk of hiting an ally, who would be ticked.

 

[The Furious Puffin]

I suggest he knew what the clock did from seeing a Bad Guy (TM) using it. The one who's corpse he stripped it off

I wouldn't actually worry about it. Most of our games arn't exactly realitic at all.

However, we a kicking of a grimmer and gritter game, and if it came up, some sort of penalty would be in order.

 

[Larcen]

Normally, I run a semi-realistic anime style of game....

Isn't this an oxymoron?

 

[mayonnaise]

If this was the first time the player had done such a thing and had not given any indication of preparations, then I would probably stop him the minute he said he was pulling out his bow and give a description about how all his equipment and clothing were now hanging or falling down. Then if he still wanted to take the shots, I'd give him at least a -4 to hit. (and he'd lose a bunch of equipment.)

Why would standing on the ceiling and shooting a target on the floor be any harder than standing on the floor and shooting a target on the ceiling?

Are you going to impose the same -4 penalty on the player when he is on the ground, firing at a spider clinging to the ceiling?

 

[Artoomis]

Why would standing on the ceiling and shooting a target on the floor be any harder than standing on the floor and shooting a target on the ceiling?

Are you going to impose the same -4 penalty on the player when he is on the ground, firing at a spider clinging to the ceiling?

That would be because he's UPSIDE DOWN. It's pretty reasonable to apply a penalty to fighting upside down until the character has some sort of opportunity to train in how to fight upside down.

It's also quite reasonable to have the character watch his arrows fall out of his quiver, which is not rigged for upside-down operations. His sword and pack will shift around and get in his way as well (or may even fall to the floor).

All this is only until the character gets a chance to adjust his equipment and train for upside-down operations.

So, what would I do? I'd apply a -2 circumstance penalty to his attacks (partly offset by the +1 from "attacking from higher ground" bonus) and let him watch his arrows and possibly other equipment drop to the ground.