Magic Jar: Is it useful?

[lukelightning]

Charm a troll, stick it in a cell, magic jar into it, then Alter Self back into yourself.

But wait! With alter self you can only turn into creatures of your own type....when a human mage MJs a troll can it only alter self to become humanoids (since the caster is a human), or giants (since the body is that of a giant)?

 

[Spatula]

And it's not evil to steal someone soul and replace it with your own?

You're not stealing their soul, you're swapping it. The target is basically put in stasis while you run around in their body. As long as you don't destroy the body, it's no different than tying up the target and impersonating him with a disguise or change self or whatever.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

The most mileage I got out of the Magic Jar...

Party was attacked in a forest by an army of giants (10 or so in the original encounter with a threat of more coming along any time).

My wizard hid himself under a log out of the area of combat and grabbed the first available giant. He proceeded to beat down the nearest giant to him until his body was killed by a swarm of angry giants. Then he took over another giant...and did the same thing. Finally he was down to no living giants in the area except himself. Had there been 100 more giants in the area I could have with one spell decimated the entire army.

DS