Rope Trick & Gelatinous Cube

[Tiew]

Hey, I'm worried my PCs will do nasty things to me with rope trick. I don't want to be unreasonable but there have to be ways getting around it, spells should make things easier but probably shouldn't grant invulnerability for 8 hours.

Would it be unfair to summon a large gelatinous cube over the place where rope trick was cast? What would be the eventual result? Am I being a jerk? Can detect magic find the location of the rope trick? Are there any better sugestions?

Thanks,

Tiew

 

[Felix]

See Invisibility renders the hole, and thus the location of the party, visible. That usually leads to a targeted Dispel Magic, which leads to the party falling to the ground suprised.

But I wouldn't go out of your way to "defeat" your PCs; this game isn't DM v Players right? So use the See Invis/Dispel tactic when the enemies have cause to think there's a rope trick somewhere around, and let them get away with it when there is no good reason enemies would know where they are.

 

[calypso15]

Hey, I'm worried my PCs will do nasty things to me with rope trick. I don't want to be unreasonable but there have to be ways getting around it, spells should make things easier but probably shouldn't grant invulnerability for 8 hours.

Would it be unfair to summon a large gelatinous cube over the place where rope trick was cast? What would be the eventual result? Am I being a jerk? Can detect magic find the location of the rope trick? Are there any better sugestions?

Well, firstly, I assume you don't want your players to metagame, and neither should you. At least, not to this extreme. Throwing things at them that will challenge them is one thing. Having a monster magically show up exactly where their rope trick is might be a bit... petty.

I mean, why does it concern you so? You could throw a monster in there that is stalking the party... following their trail. When it finally catches up to the end of their trail, they're not there, so it makes camp. Suddenly, they show up in the morning and the monster gets the jump on them.

Other than that... you can't do much without metagaming to the X-TREME.

One last point... if they have any bags of holding, interesting things happen.... just keep that in mind.

Calypso

 

[dcollins]

Would it be unfair to summon a large gelatinous cube over the place where rope trick was cast?

Summoned monsters are only allowed to appear in a location where there is a solid support for them to stand on.

 

[Sejs]

If it's a summoned cube, the duration would probably expire before the party came out.

If it's a natural cube, it's mindless and would probably have no reason to stick around for several hours while there's food out there somewhere.

There are non-cube related things that can be done with a Rope Trick space, assuming whomever's doing it knows where it is to begin with. Like Calypso said - your players shouldn't metagame, neither should the DM.

In any case, Rope Trick is far from invulnerability - it's basically just a place to sleep that isn't as exposed as hunkering down out in the open. And if they want to do anything like say... cook, have any privacy, or use the restroom then they have to leave the space.

As for the bag of holding thing - nah, been addressed. Spells that create their own non-dimentional space don't interfere with extradimentional storage devices. Heh, but if your players ever tell you that they "hop in the bag of holding/portable hole" without saying "and I hand my own bag/hole to Soandso" then yeah - then they're in trouble.

 

[Sejs]

Summoned monsters are only allowed to appear in a location where there is a solid support for them to stand on.

*nod* True that.

Heh, here and I was wondering "wait... how does the cube climb up the rope?"

 

[calypso15]

As for the bag of holding thing - nah, been addressed. Spells that create their own non-dimentional space don't interfere with extradimentional storage devices. Heh, but if your players ever tell you that they "hop in the bag of holding/portable hole" without saying "and I hand my own bag/hole to Soandso" then yeah - then they're in trouble.

Ahh, okay. I thought bags were extradimensional as well. So, could you clarify that a bit? Is it, if you put a nondimensional space in another (bag of holding in a bag of holding), or put a extra in an extra (umm.... something in the space created by rope trick), bad things happen?

Calypso

 

[Sejs]

Sure: if you put an extra-dimentional space inside another extra-dimentional space the contents will be lost and you may be going on a trip to the astral plane. Putting a Bag of Holding inside another Bag of Holding, or a BoH inside a Portable Hole for example. However, you can safely take an extra-dimentional space into a temporary extra- (or non-, take your pick) dimentional space that is created by a spell.



... and looking for it, I'll be damned now that I can't find the friggin reference. I know I've read it somewhere, and frustratingly enough I can't find it right now.


uh, little help?


Heh, honestly, until I can actually back this up with some citation, just assume I'm on crack and don't listen to me.

Edit: additional. Aha, there we go. 3.0 FAQ, pg 33.

Will extradimentional items rupture a bag of holding? The Dungeon Master's Guide says that a bag of holding placed within a portable hole tears a rift to the Astral Plane. Bag and hole alike are then sucked into the void and forever lost. The Dungeon Master's Guide also says that when 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, destroying the portable hole and bag of holding in the process. However, the descripton for Heward's handy haversack makes no mention of any rifts or gates. This implies that only the combination of a bag of holding and portable hole forms a rift or gate. Thus a bag of holding could be placed inside another bag of holding with no unusual effects.

It's a general rule that you can't mix items containing nondimention or extradimentional spaces (things that are bigger inside than out) with each other or with portable holes. Such combinatons tend to strain the fabric of the cosmos. 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 as Heward's handy haversacks, cause the same mishaps when mishandled.
Note you can freely go plane hopping with portable holes, bags of holding, and the like. Spells that produce their own extradimention spaces such as rope trick, pose no danger to occupants who may be using portable holes, bags of holding and the like.

 

[AuraSeer]

The Bag of Holding and Portable Hole interact badly with each other because that's listed in their descriptions. However, that's a special effect of those two items. There is no general rule about the intersection of extradimensional spaces.

 

[Gnimish88]

I believe that the citation you are refering to existed in the spell description for Rope Trick in 3.0, but was dumped in 3.5 for some reason. I believe that the item descriptions talk about extra(or non)dimensional spaces, not the items specifically, but I don't have my books in front of me.