Permanent spells after death

[LonePaladin]

How do you resolve the Shillelagh spell, for example? The target is a non-magical club. When you cast the spell, the target gains an enhancement bonus, making it a magical club, and thus not a valid target for Shillelagh.

Nope. Not all items with an enhancement bonus are magical (look at masterwork weapons, for instance). The spell doesn't state that the club or staff becomes a magical weapon, just that it gains a +1 enhancement bonus on attacks and damage (and higher damage as well).

For what it's worth, the 3.5 Main FAQ addressed this question directly:
If, while under the effect of a spell that depends on type (such as Hold Person), my character is transformed into a different creature type by Polymorph, does the spell’s effect remain?

Yes. A spell only checks to see if you are a legal target when it is cast. If you become an illegal target later (such as via the Polymorph spell), the spell remains in effect.

Yep. You can be under the effects of a spell that can't feasibly affect you. (All this use of 'affect' and 'effect' would confuse anyone but us gamers.) Another example would be receiving a mind blank spell while you're under the effects of a mind-affecting spell, such as dominate person. The mind blank would make you immune to mind-affecting spells, which would break the domination. If the dominate person spell were still running when mind blank ended, the domination would resume.

Another example would be a wizard under the effects of a shapechange spell, which allows him to change form once a round as a free action, and grants the caster the type and subtypes of the form he chooses. If someone targets him with a spell that doesn't work against certain types of creatures, he can simply change into one of those creatures to nullify the effects. If he does so before the spell is cast, then the spell fails altogether. If not, he'll have to avoid changing into a type of creature that the spell can effect until he can have it removed or it runs its course.

(F'rinstance, say a shapechanged wizard has turned himself into a treant. An enemy spellcaster casts antiplant shell, placing himself in a position to prevent the wizard from approaching. Since the wizard is effectively a plant, he can't enter the spell's radius. If the wizard changes into, say, a hound archon, he can enter the spell's area.)

 

[Hypersmurf]

Nope. Not all items with an enhancement bonus are magical (look at masterwork weapons, for instance). The spell doesn't state that the club or staff becomes a magical weapon, just that it gains a +1 enhancement bonus on attacks and damage (and higher damage as well).

From the description of damage reduction:
... by magic weapons (any weapon with a +1 or higher enhancement bonus, not counting the enhancement from masterwork quality)...

Masterwork weapons are the explicitly-stated exception.

You can be under the effects of a spell that can't feasibly affect you.

The effect of Hold Person is to make you paralyzed, and the FAQ answer says that the effect remains.

If the answer to "If, while under the effect of a spell that depends on type (such as Hold Person), my character is transformed into a different creature type by Polymorph, does the spell’s effect remain?" was "You're no longer paralyzed because you aren't humanoid", the first word of the answer would not be "Yes".

-Hyp.

 

[thegreyman]

K, thanks guys.

We were in the middle of a game when I first posted this.

We ended up with a crazy relifed person when the cleric cast raise dead. Since she was separated from the party when she was crazied and then deaded, it involved some great hijinx when her first action was to sit up and strangle the cleric because they didn't know about the crazy. Since he kept fighting back, she kept going for the choke hold and with her massive +1 strength, kept everyone else out of the grapple, and managed to pin the cleric to the ground while talking about the "puppies, what did you do to the puppies!! They are squishy and I love them!".

Hi-lar-i-ous

 

[azhrei_fje]

I allowed a cleric of St. Cuthbert to kill the party paladin while he was insane. The body then became an "object" and the cleric was able to leave a rather dangerous place without having to keep the paladin restrained. (The campaign is RttToEE, for anyone interested.)

I ruled that when the paladin was raised, the insanity was no longer in effect. After reading the description of the insanity spell and the specific list of "cures", I considered it too effective if the effect persisted after the death of the target creature.

This module/campaign is deadly enough as it is.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

-- interesting.. so if the Insanity spell affects the mind post-mortem, assassins now have one more item in their bag of trick to avoid magical detection

Speak with Dead would get some really insane answers!

 

[Hypersmurf]

Speak with Dead would get some really insane answers!

Speak with Dead talks to the corpse, not to the creature; it's drawing on imprinted knowledge. I'm not sure if Insanity would apply.

-Hyp.

 

[Primitive Screwhead]

Your not being any fun at all Hyp!

{altho, as usual, your analysis of the RAW is probably right.. }