Improved Invisibility: Whats up with that???

[K'Plah Q'Houme]

I'm starting this thread off with some scenarios to explain my intentions:

A wizard ventures into a battle with fightertype characters of his own level. His first action he uses to become 'improved invisible' as it is described in the 3.0 rules. The fightertype characters charges the square where they last saw the wizard, and he survives. The wizards next turn, he uses to levitate into the skies.
Now he is in fact invulnerable and capable of 'raining havoc' upon his enemys from the skies. The fightertype characters do not stand a chance. They can try to flee, but the wizard can choose to follow and finish the job!
-Or what about the party, who have some rounds to become powersuited, and who's wizard turns them all 'improved invisible'?
-Or the rougue, with lots of ranks in 'use magic device', who reads a scroll of 'improved invisibility' before entering the 'arena'. Now all his attacks is made as sneak attacks!

There is something sceriously wrong with this! What do you guys think, shoulden't this spell be house rouled out of the game? And by the way, it hasn't change much in the 3.5 version of 'greater invisibility'.

 

[Darklone]

The duration is shorter.

The fightertype can run away till the spell has run out.

Hiding helps as well.

In one arena fight that I saw, the archer readied manyshots vs the square where the spells came from and won.

A monk once jumped up and grappled.

Scent (if available) helps as well if you get something to fly.

 

[Plane Sailing]

I'm starting this thread off with some scenarios to explain my intentions:

A wizard ventures into a battle with fightertype characters of his own level. His first action he uses to become 'improved invisible' as it is described in the 3.0 rules. The fightertype characters charges the square where they last saw the wizard, and he survives. The wizards next turn, he uses to levitate into the skies.

If the wizard had any sense he could cast "improved invisible" and then make a move... doesn't matter if the fightertype charges the square where they last saw the wizard then, does it?

What if the fighter types get some "see invisible" items? We're talking about 7th level+ characters here, and a hand of glory is well within their wealth limit (cast see invisibility once per day). Flying items are much more expensive but missile weapons are not, and once the fighter can (cheaply) see invisible he can pepper the wizard to death (with his magic adamantine arrows purchased for such an occasion in case the wizard has protection from arrows and stoneskin up)



What I'm saying is that there are counters to most tactics, and they are available to people at the appropriate levels, even if they are not taken by this particular individual (who may have wished to focus his wealth on damage dealing weapons and tough armour to the exclusion of those things which are used less often but when you need them you *really* need them!

Cheers

 

[green slime]

I'm starting this thread off with some scenarios to explain my intentions:

A wizard ventures into a battle with fightertype characters of his own level. His first action he uses to become 'improved invisible' as it is described in the 3.0 rules. The fightertype characters charges the square where they last saw the wizard, and he survives. The wizards next turn, he uses to levitate into the skies.
Now he is in fact invulnerable and capable of 'raining havoc' upon his enemys from the skies. The fightertype characters do not stand a chance. They can try to flee, but the wizard can choose to follow and finish the job!
-Or what about the party, who have some rounds to become powersuited, and who's wizard turns them all 'improved invisible'?
-Or the rougue, with lots of ranks in 'use magic device', who reads a scroll of 'improved invisibility' before entering the 'arena'. Now all his attacks is made as sneak attacks!

There is something sceriously wrong with this! What do you guys think, shoulden't this spell be house rouled out of the game? And by the way, it hasn't change much in the 3.5 version of 'greater invisibility'.

mwhahahahahaha!

I smell me a troll! Me eats trolls for breakfast!

Lots of assumptions, lots and lots of assumptions. Not much fact.

"raining havoc" LOL.

 

[hong]

The problem I have with improved invisibility is that, like a number of other things in D&D, it turns the tactical element of the game into a strategic/logistical problem. You have to have something in your arsenal to counter the threat of an improved invis creature, or you're screwed (or you're forced to run away, which is the same thing). It's like building a Magic deck: a lot of it comes down to who did best in choosing their cards, and gameplay is then simply a matter of finding out which guy has already won.

So yes, there are counters to improved invis. This doesn't change the fact that you shouldn't HAVE to have such a counter on hand. The way D&D is structured, the necessary counters to this and other game elements are dispersed around the various character classes, so it just makes life difficult if you don't have a balanced party. It also makes designing encounters difficult, because monsters typically aren't designed with this sort of balance in mind. A bunch of hill giants is very unlikely to have see invis, for instance. And while it's fair enough to say that canonical BBEGs like liches and dragons should be prepared for anything, it's stretching credibility to say that EVERY BBEG should be the same way.

For these reasons, I ended up dumping improved invis from my campaign. Can't say I've missed it.

 

[Darklone]

Stone - Scissor - Paper. Magic Missile - Shield. Invisibility - ....

D&D.

 

[hong]

Ooh, just thought of another reason I dumped improved invis.

Two sessions ago, the group fought a fallen ghaele. She was juiced to the gills with divine favour, divine power, etc, etc, and it was a pretty mean battle. Now one of the spell-like abilities of the ghaele is improved invis, but I didn't use it. Heck, even if I hadn't banned it from my game, I'd have dumped that particular ability anyway.

Why? Because when you want to describe a menacing fallen angel, eyes burning red and feral, skin covered in black scars and scales, wielding a massive flaming greatsword and shimmering with a dark halo, it's rather hard when YOU CAN'T SEE THE FRICKIN' THING.

Improved invis does not make for impressive visuals, therefore it's gone.

 

[shilsen]

Listen check DC 20 (+1 per 10 ft of distance) to pinpoint the exact position of an invisible and speaking (or spellcasting with V component) opponent.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Improved invisibility has always been with us, was it considered such a problem in the past? I can't remember.

Hongs point is a good one about the unliklihood of a variety of encounters having a counter to the tactic (and the really problematical issue is improved invis plus fly).

The problem area can crop up in a number of different guises though - fighting missile armed creatures with darkvision underground if all your lights go out (perhaps the only genuine use for a gust of wind spell?) can put fighters in a very similar situation.

 

[hong]

Improved invisibility has always been with us, was it considered such a problem in the past? I can't remember.

I don't think so, but that was more to do with the fact that gaming at high levels was pretty rare in 1E and 2E. I was in a ~3 year campaign that only went to about 10th level, which seems to be representative.

The problem area can crop up in a number of different guises though - fighting missile armed creatures with darkvision underground if all your lights go out (perhaps the only genuine use for a gust of wind spell?) can put fighters in a very similar situation.

Heh. This actually happened to us the very first time I played D&D. We entered the dungeon, and got shot to pieces in the very first room by goblins lurking beyond the range of our torches.