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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dausuul" data-source="post: 7522899" data-attributes="member: 58197">The gold standard of mind control is dominate person* cast by a 14th-level enchanter. While the modify memory spell can be undone by remove curse, the enchanter's Alter Memories ability cannot be dispelled or fixed; those memories are just gone. So you can wipe the memory of you casting the spell, wipe the memory of dastardly deeds being carried out, and no amount of de-magicking later can get that information back. Ideally, you'd do this at night when the subject is asleep, so they aren't suspicious of the blanks in their memory.However, this requires a 14th-level enchanter to actively intervene each time you need your catspaw to do something. 14th-level enchanters are not common, even in a high-magic setting. So, for situations that don't rise to the level of requiring the mindtwister's attention, I would rely on the following strategies:<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Cast charm person, suggestion, or whatever. Get what you need from the target. Then kill or kidnap them. Obviously, this is not an effective way of infiltrating over the long term, but when you just want some information, need some records destroyed, a witness silenced, etc., it'll get the job done.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">If what you need is information, extract it via divination rather than mind control. Bring the conversation around to the subject you want information on, then use detect thoughts while it's in the front of the target's mind. This may require some dispelling of your own if the target is under anti-divination spells.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The spells nice family you got there and you deserve a raise are highly effective means of influencing police forces, used by real-world crime syndicates for centuries. Don't underestimate the power of good old-fashioned corruption.</li> </ul>Keep in mind also that remove curse, nondetection, and dispel magic are themselves spells that require a 5th-level caster; even a city with a powerful supply of magic is not going to have the resources to cast them daily on every beat cop and mid-level bureaucrat. Detect magic is a 1st-level ritual and can be used to scan everyone daily, but Nystul's magic aura can shut that right down. That is the weakness of the defensive approach: While you can focus your defensive magic to "harden" a single target, there's no way you can harden everything and everybody. There will always be weak points.[size=-2]*Edited. Originally I had suggestion here, but then realized Alter Memories only works on spells that impose the charmed condition.[/size]</blockquote>

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