Noticing that an animal is actually a wild shaped druid casting a spell

[Sejs]

The MAIN people who Would have any reason to notice anything out the ordinary would be the ranger and the druid.

I would probably state it as the people with ranks in Knowledge(Nature). Rangers and Druids, sure, but also Wizards, Bards, Experts, and Clerics with the Animal, Plant, or Knowledge domains.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

You know the look a dog gets when it's about to attack? Sure, its teeth are bared and its hackles are up, but it also has a distinct manner about how it stares at you, that tells you that you are the dead center of its personal doggy universe. Its attention is totally and utterly focused on you.

That look, that body language of intent is what springs to mind when I try to envision a wild shaped squirrel concentrating on a spell. Focused so hard it's palpable.

I'm not so sure that this will be such a distinct effect in an animal that weighs half a kilo. Especially considering that squirrels, unlike dogs, have no capacity for facial expression, have little binocular vision, and have no "whites" in their eyes. I'd go so far as to make the argument that the dog evolved such traits (especially the whites in the eyes) to facilitate communication (among pack members and the like), while the squirrel has not evolved the kind of body language required to communicate things like that. It just so happens that dogs have body language that is meaningful to humans, who have somewhat similar body language. Which is probably one of the reasons why we were able to domesticate them...we already had something in common. Squirrels communicate with each other by jumping around, chattering, and flicking their tails. Not an intuitive communication system for a human to interpret.

So if you take the body of a dog, yeah, I might see how you could spot the dog being weird and staring at you like crazy. But a squirrel just doesn't have the body parts required to stare properly, and a human has little to no innate capacity to determine when a squirrel is acting strangely. That would require study, hence Knowledge (Nature) ranks.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

Are you all talking about silenced spells here? Because otherwise, I think it's pretty darn obvious that the squirrel that's jumping up and down, waving its tail in arcane patterns and screeching as loud as a human speaking "forcefully" (DC 0 listen check) is doing something pretty odd. Either it's possessed or it's a wild-shaped druid doing something bad. Either way, shooting it first and seeing if it turns into a druid when you're done is a good idea. Unless druids don't often do the wildshape into a seemingly innocuous animal and devastate people with spells trick in your world, people (at least those in the business) would have heard of such things.

 

[Pickaxe]

If I am in the local colliseum with 99,999 of my closest friends watching troll gladitorial combat and someone casts a spell with no vocal, somatic, or material components, every single person in the colliseum immediately thinks to himself "That guy in section 17, row 24, seat 3 just cast a spell! I can tell he is concentrating on spellcasting" according to the RAW. We are all in line of sight of him so we all have automatic perfect knowledge regarding whether he is spellcasting.

I think that in this context, even the rules would support a Spot check for anyone actually noticing the caster, and the DC could be quite high (especially for those further away). If a hidden spellcaster casts something, others need to detect him in some way (Listen or Spot). The Natural Spell feat explicitly says that you replace the normal verbal and somatic components with animal equivalents, and that you can access material components, even if melded into your form. A horse whinnying, moving strangely, and (perhaps the biggest give-away) holding mistletoe in its teeth could very likely invite a Spot check.

Spot and Listen aren't just seeing and hearing; they include actually noticing that what you've seen/heard is worthy of your attention (hence the Wisdom modifier), and, for the situation given for this thread, any character would have to successfully notice the oddly-behaving animal before having any shot of recognizing it as a spellcaster. I'd give each character Spot and Listen checks to detect the animal as doing something unusual; DC would be typical for spotting anything at a given distance, with perhaps a +2 circumstance modifier to the DC if this is completely unexpected. Characters with Knowledge (nature) would have a chance to determine that the animal must be more than it appears (a druid or Awakened, for instance), perhaps a DC of 15 or so, provided they detected the animal in the first place. A druid would have a chance to Spellcraft to determine that a spell was being cast (and what spell), but all others would have to put two and two together to figure out that the animal and the spell are connected, and no one would have a chance if they failed to both Spot and Listen.

--Axe

 

[Pickaxe]

D'oh! Double post.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Pickaxe,

That would be exactly my point. We have a clear rule, but used literally it can easily give silly answers.

Once you admit that sometimes a skill check is required in some cases, all that is left is to argue over which skill with what mods.

 

[Ogre Mage]

For characters with spellcraft and/or knowledge (nature), I would allow a roll to detect it. Spellcraft characters would get a roll to notice that a spell is being cast by the animal. If they were unfamiliar with druidic magic (such as most wizards) I might impose a -2 or -4 penalty to the check.

Characters with knowledge (nature) would get a roll to notice that the animal is behaving "unusually" and that the series of motions and sounds it is making are not consistent with animals of that type.

If the character has neither of these skills, then they are screwed. I see no reason why joe schmoe fighter or your typical dumb orc would be able to recognize a wildshaped casting druid.

 

[Saeviomagy]

For characters with spellcraft and/or knowledge (nature), I would allow a roll to detect it. Spellcraft characters would get a roll to notice that a spell is being cast by the animal. If they were unfamiliar with druidic magic (such as most wizards) I might impose a -2 or -4 penalty to the check.

Anyone with spellcraft is familiar with ANY magic. Full stop. In fact, they're totally conversant even with magic used by creatures who do not speak their language. This suggests that the language of magic is universal, and therefore can be recognised easily by a practitioner regardless of the particulars of an enemy caster.

Hence it would seem that a wizard has no problem whatsoever picking up an animal casting spells - despite the fact that it's useing animal noises and the rest of it, it's still speaking the universal language of magic. The same goes for somatic components. There are no penalties for trying to work out what spell a dragon, beholder mage, naga, grig, tojanida or unicorn is casting.

Characters with knowledge (nature) would get a roll to notice that the animal is behaving "unusually" and that the series of motions and sounds it is making are not consistent with animals of that type.

Certainly.

However the wizard would get a dc 0+distance listen check to pick up the sounds of a casting creature, and if he can see the thing at all, he automatically recognises the somatic components of the spell.

That druid might want to consider making use of his diminutive size, decent distance and large amounts of appropriate cover to attempt to hide, no?