Plane Shift to meet your god?

[Iron_Chef]

We don't play with material components, and the spell was granted to the wizard as a 5th level arcane spell directly by Bane.

I always thought of the divine version of plane shift as the perfect escape for religious types in trouble. It instantly transports you to the (relative) safety of your deity's home plane and what enemy in their right mind would follow you there, much less be able to find you (except for an enemy of the same faith as you)? Kind of like a teleport/word of recall but to a place of near absolute safety from those you seek to escape.

Its other function is of course, planar travel to other places where the reception might not be as friendly... Or to planeshift yourself to some other plane, then cast again to go back to your home plane (prime), hopefully near your intended destination. For an arcane caster with teleport, however, using plane shift in this manner might be an excellent means of going to new locations and studying them so as to makem "very familiar" for future teleportations!

 

[Madfox]

Considering how the spell works, it is also the ultimate weapon against opponents with low will saves. Just planeshift them to the elemental plane of fire or the negative energy plane and be done with them.

Anyway, the main reason for components is as a balancing matter. The planar forks are a way for the DM to control the planes the PCs are able to shift to and through that they are not placed fore unexpacted surprises and questions. It gives the DM the time to look up the effects of for example flying around through the possitive energy plane or the Beastlands. In any event, planeshift could be used to meet a god on the deities homeplane. More then likely it would need some additional travel since sometimes it can be a bit off. Which in case of the lower planes might actually pose a challenge in itself. The lower planes are not exactly known for their hospitallity

Furthermore, once a character enters the home realm of a deity, more then likely that character first has to deal with the proxies of the deity. To use the office anology, there is more then likely a secretary at the entrance to the office and a guard at the entrance of the building. You will have to convince them you have a good reason to visit the deity as well. Of course, the character could try to circumvent them, but considering Bane is an evil deity, that would make some new enemies and you better have a very good reason to do so or else Bane will punish the character as well.

 

[clark411]

Any character that travels from 5 to 500 miles through Acheron, and gets past Bane's guards, deserves to speak with Bane.

I'd say that many an evil guard would enjoy spending a slight portion of their attentions to the actions of their most faithful and powerful struggling as so many before have, for such a great prize.

Down with snipping out options entirely. I'd just present the challenge very clearly and then make it just as challenging- possibly with a standard boon that Bane or whichever god / agent of that god has granted throughout the ages.

 

[andargor]

Hey, I like this subject. Let me expand on how I'd handle it.

Bane is an LE god. Therefore a certain bureaucracy must exist on his plane. Due to the unpredictable nature of Planeshift, the character may find himself somewhere in the boonies.

As the evil gods are constantly at war, all roads would probably be heavily patrolled. Perhaps with mortals under the direction of Baatezu. Any intruders without proper identification or passes would be assumed hostile.

However, since these patrols would fear reprisals should they attack or arrest a favored servant of Bane, they would place any intruders into "protective custody", and escorted to the nearest outpost. Of course, Know Alignment (or Detect Good as a minimum) would be performed on the spot. If the intruder does not have the god's alignment, they should be killed or captured for interrogation (not a pleasant prospect).

At the outpost, the commander would be responsible to ascertain the intruder's credentials. These could be papers, holy symbols, or other magical means to confirm the intruder's identity. Perhaps he/she would have to "cover his/her butt" and ask for higher authority on the matter, which could take some time. When it is confirmed that the character is allowed to travel, a pass should be issued to prevent other patrols from arresting the character.

Of course, since in an LE world the commander will have to follow the rules, but he/she will always try to take advantage of the situation. Perhaps some gold or magic items would speed the process of obtaining the pass. Otherwise, the character can be in for a long wait.

Once the pass acquired, he can freely travel to his destination, presumably to the seat of Bane's throne. Of course, the pass would only allow him to travel to that specific destination, and nowhere else, and would be valid for a specific timeframe. Beware the character who strays...

Once in Bane's seat of power, probably the largest city in the plane, the character would have to deal with an array of bureaucrats, all of which would try to take some advantage. Especially if the character truly is a favored servant of Bane.

Of course, perhaps Bane's high servitors gave the character specific contacts to avoid most of the bureaucracy. After all, he was chosen to do important work, and he is of no use if he cannot report in a timely fashion.

My $0.02 turkish copper pieces.

Andargor

 

[Kae'Yoss]

Good one.

They could set up an appointment via commune ahead of time

Cleric: "Can I have an appointment?"
Deity: "Yes."
Cleric: "Is Tuesday 3 PM OK?"
Deity: "No"
Cleric: "What about Wednesday, around noon?"
Deity: "No"
Cleric: "This week at all?"
Deity: "No"
Cleric: "Next week?"
Deity: "Yes"
Cleric: "Monday, 10 AM?"
Deity: "No"
Cleric: "Damn, I'm running out of questions."

 

[Celebrim]

Clearly this player thinks his character worships Santa Claus. His character should be disabused of that notion, and his player should be pointed to a book of greek mythology and told to look up the meaning of the word Hubris.

 

[Tzarevitch]

A favored servant of Bane in the Realms just got the ability to planeshift and wants to use it to meet with his god in Bane's home plane (Acheron?). As you can imagine, this is rather problematic for a DM to decide what to do with, so any suggestions are appreciated.

Have any of you dealt with similar things in the past? I know it says planeshift is rather tricky and you arrive within 500 miles of your destination, but if the spell is being used to visit your god (who is granting you the power to cast the spell in the first place), would it be fair to say it automatically succeeds in getting you to your target destination (your god willing of course)?

How many mortals go visit their god directly in the flesh before their time is up? What are the ramifications of something like this?

Perhaps this is left over from my Planescape days but one does not pop up on their god's doorstep and receive an audience just to shoot the breeze or something. Mortals NEVER receive a direct audience with their deity without the deity specifically requesting it. Also, if he "just got" the planeshift spell he is probably not nearly as high in Bane's favor as he thinks he is despite what Bane may say in commune spells.

Personaly I think the CEO analogy is applicable. At best he'll get a meeting with a divine minion or proxy assuming he can get an appointment or has a VERY pressing need.

I would have him arrve with Planeshift's usual very high rate of inaccuracy and then make an appointment and sit in line to speak with some lesser divine minion. I also agree with Celebrim that the character needs to be reminded of exactly who it is he worships.

Tzarevitch

 

[Lord Pendragon]

Clearly this player thinks his character worships Santa Claus. His character should be disabused of that notion, and his player should be pointed to a book of greek mythology and told to look up the meaning of the word Hubris.

Heh. Yes, Santa Claus, Bane is not.

 

[ruleslawyer]

Clearly this player thinks his character worships Santa Claus. His character should be disabused of that notion, and his player should be pointed to a book of greek mythology and told to look up the meaning of the word Hubris.

From Iron_Chef's original post:

A favored servant of Bane in the Realms just got the ability to planeshift and wants to use it to meet with his god in Bane's home plane (Acheron?).

If the character is important enough (Elminster meeting with Mystra, Matron Baenre with Lolth), I'd say "Why not?" However, this is Bane we're talking about. The deity whose dogma begins "Fear me." I'd say that Bane would severely punish any cleric who attempted direct contact through any but the normal channels (commune, miracle, etc.). A hundred years as a lemure would suffice, I imagine.

The lesson here is that in this specific case, direct contact with a deity should be out of the question. This isn't really a CEO we're talking about; it's a Communist party member circa 1946 barging into Josef Stalin's office. Bad idea. Bane never, never would stand for anything that could remotely be interpreted as insolence, excessive familiarity, or the slightest attempt to deviate from utter servility.

The more general question, however, is interesting. It's become an all-too-common tactic of my 21st-level PCs to plane-walk over to the realm of the appropriate deity when faced with a scenario involving that deity. Since the gods are strongly involved IMFRC, it's a big, big problem. I haven't figured out a useful way to deal with it, other than to limit deities to one avatar, and to severely de-anthropomorphize them to the point that they're simply immanent when inhabiting their realms. Thus, Mystra's essence is spread throughout Dweomerheart, and the only way to communicate with her is through her avatar (which is by necessity going to be too busy to talk to any group of PCs) or through a divine agent.

 

[Celebrim]

Well, it isn't impossible for a mortal to have a favored relationship with a deity, but such a tremendous advantage has to be handeld with care and I'd just avoid the issue by suggesting that no PC should be just chummy with a deity.

One example that comes to mind is Odysseus's relationship with Athena. Odysseus was allowed to get away with things that would have got anyone else the target of divine vengence, but even Odysseus's had to be careful how far he pushed the 'Since I'm a the most cunning, charming, and fearless of heroes you can't help but like me, oh wisest and most valiant of goddesses...' thing.

At the very least, the PC should hold as central of place in the mythology of the story world as Eliminster or Odysseus holds in thier own. If the PC isn't so clearly heroic and mighty as Eliminster, then I think your PC has a serious hubris issue and Bane in particular (as others have mentioned) is not going to look kindly on mortals forgetting thier place.

This is also a bit of a modernity on the part of the player, because he's very much looking at the world as a society of peers working together towards a common goal. The analogy regarding the CEO is apt, because that's about as close in the modern democratic world as we get to differences in rank and priveledge, but its off by several orders of magnitude. For a better analogy and a more ancient viewpoint, read the book of Ester in the bible. In it, the King's (chief) wife desires an audience with the King in order to invite him to dinner, but hasn't been invited to the court. To go to the King without invitation, even for the _wife_, invites such serious risk of instant death that the wife spends an extended period ritually preparing herself before she even dares attempt it. Then keep in mind that relationship, only the king is now of much much higher rank - Bane is a god - and the visitor is of much much lower rank than a beloved wife.