Portable Hole

[Kae'Yoss]

I think we all agree that it should be "bags of holding and portable holes cannot be stacked other items of these types."

 

[LokiDR]

I think we all agree that it should be "bags of holding and portable holes cannot be stacked other items of these types."

Now hold on, lets look at this.

What can you really do if allow holes in holes, to coin a phrase. The answer is near infinite storage, and some headaches if you try to find something. So, how is this so bad? With enough money, you could clear a dungeon by filling it with watter out of your hundreds of portable holes. If you can afford that many holes, you just pay for water to be piped in.

The rules allow portable holes in portable holes. What good reason is there to change this?

 

[LokiDR]

Any GM should shoot this down, instantly. The INTENT is obvious. You cannot fill a portable hole with treasure, then stuff it into yet another Portable Hole, take a third, and begin filling it!

But you can do exactly that. The hole folds up to the size of a handkerchief. How many hankies can you fit in a standerd (non magical) backpack?

Your arguement doesn't hold any water, perhaps your portable hole is filled with beer.

 

[Hypersmurf]

With enough money, you could clear a dungeon by filling it with watter out of your hundreds of portable holes.

Decanter would be easier

-Hyp.

 

[Taloras]

Try this? Portable Hole (spread out) inside of portable hole, etc etc etc......with the bottom one having spikes in it. What do you have? Portable Pit Trap!

Or, if your (very) rich, fill it up w/ holy water. Stick it in a hallway with an illusion over it. Lead undead after undead after undead into it.....

Yea. I dont think any sane DM would allow this one. But i got the idea from Queen of the Demonweb Pits, where they use this idea to kill Lloth on her home plane.

 

[Murrdox]

No no no no...

There is a specific FAQ reference to this.

It's a general rule that you can't mix items containing nondimensional or extradimensional spaces (things that are bigger inside than out) with each other or with portable holes. Putting one bag of holding within another is just like putting the bag into a portable hole. Items that function like bags of holding, such has Heward's handy haversacks, cause the same mishaps when mishandled.
Note you can freely go planehopping with portable holes, bags of holding, and the like. Spells that produce their own extradimensional spaces, such as Rope Trick, pose no danger to occupants who may be using portable holes, bags of holding, and the like.

 

[Skinwalker]

Here's my 2cp. Strictly an IMHO extrapolation on the known facts, mind you.

It is well-documented that portable holes and bags of holding do not get along. Magic isn't science (even if it is bound by rigid game mechanics for purposes of balance). Given this, none but the most insane have pushed the boundaries to find out exactly how each and every extradimensional container works with others, or how they stack with themselves, over and over. Insane people that push extradimensional magic to its limits (and sometimes beyond) are known to go boom, and few have had the notion (or perhaps opportunity) to share the results of their experiments.

What this all boils down to, however, is doing wacky things to stack extradimensional items gives the DM a quite reasonable and justifiable excuse to invoke rule 0 and blow your carcass into another plane.

 

[jasper]

on of first edition faq in dragon was something like this
portable hole in portable plus 1 gp
ditto for bag of holding.
But please DM don't let your players talk you into this.

 

[Rel]

Ok, I've got a question about the Portable Hole that's been plaguing me for years. The SRD says:

Portable Hole

A portable hole is a circle of magic cloth. When opened fully, a portable hole is 6 feet in diameter, but it can be folded up to be as small as a pocket handkerchief. When spread upon any surface, it causes an extradimensional space 10 feet deep to come into being. This hole can be picked up from inside or out by simply taking hold of the edges of the cloth and folding it up. Either way, the entrance disappears, but anything inside the hole remains.

The only air in the hole is that which enters when the hole is opened. It contains enough air to supply one Medium-size creature or two Small creatures for 10 minutes. The cloth does not accumulate weight even if its hole is filled. Each portable hole opens on its own particular nondimensional space. If a bag of holding is placed within a portable hole, a rift to the Astral Plane is torn in that place. Both the bag and the cloth are sucked into the void and forever lost. If a portable hole is placed within a bag of holding, it opens a gate to the Astral Plane. The hole, the bag, and any creatures within a 10-foot radius are drawn there, the portable hole and bag of holding being destroyed in the process.
Caster Level: 12th; Prerequisites: Craft Wondrous Item, plane shift; Market Price: 14,000 gp; Weight: -.

If you "pick up the hole from the inside", how do you get back out? Does opening the hole back up from the inside place you exactly back where you started from? What if you move to the "back end" of the hole before you open it back up?

I think my perspective on the PH was permanently damaged by my first DM some 20+ years ago. Frankly, his version of the item was much cooler than the one in the DMG. It wasn't a storage device (we already have Bags of Holding and Handy Haversacks for that). It was literally a hole that you could put somewhere. If you came to door and wanted to know what was on the other side, you put the PH up to it and could look through. If you needed to escape out the side of a burning building, you could put the PH up to the wall and have an instant doorway. My Thief found tons of creative uses for it and it was a lot of fun.

The version in the DMG just seems like a bag of holding big enough to crawl inside. To me, that's less interesting.

Just for kicks, what do you think would be a fair price for my "house rules" version of the PH? Assume that it can't go through anything that is magic.

 

[Skinwalker]

I think my perspective on the PH was permanently damaged by my first DM some 20+ years ago. Frankly, his version of the item was much cooler than the one in the DMG. It wasn't a storage device (we already have Bags of Holding and Handy Haversacks for that). It was literally a hole that you could put somewhere. If you came to door and wanted to know what was on the other side, you put the PH up to it and could look through. If you needed to escape out the side of a burning building, you could put the PH up to the wall and have an instant doorway. My Thief found tons of creative uses for it and it was a lot of fun.

The version in the DMG just seems like a bag of holding big enough to crawl inside. To me, that's less interesting.

Just for kicks, what do you think would be a fair price for my "house rules" version of the PH? Assume that it can't go through anything that is magic.

A cool and very useful item indeed! This seems more like a Portable Passwall. Therefore, I would suggest using the cost of a use-activated Passwall as the basis of pricing the item.