Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
White Dwarf Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Nest
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions, OSR, & D&D Variants
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
EN Publishing
Twitter
BlueSky
Facebook
Instagram
EN World
BlueSky
YouTube
Facebook
Twitter
Twitch
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions, OSR, & D&D Variants
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Suggestion idea
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 6690228" data-attributes="member: 6790260"><p>I'm afraid I don't have the brain for presenting creative uses of it at this moment, but I can definitely say that sentence doesn't look like it would work <em>in most cases</em>. From the description of Suggestion, emphasis added:</p><p></p><p></p><p>Thus, we can clearly see two important criteria for the Suggestion to work:</p><p>1. The phrasing (but not necessarily the effect) of the action must <u>sound reasonable</u> to the target--not just to the caster.</p><p>2. The action itself cannot be <em>obviously harmful</em> to the target.</p><p></p><p>"Betray and kill your allies" is rather baldly unreasonable. They're my allies! My friends! Why on <em>earth</em> would I want to betray and kill them?! So that specific wording can't fly. Similarly, killing your allies...when people are <em>currently</em> running at you with sharp objects, battle cries, and spellcasting...sounds like a pretty obviously harmful action to take. Given that this spell only allows a single save, and the target <em>must</em> carry out the suggestion as long as the duration continues, it seems fairly clear to me that we should take a broad interpretation of what counts as "obviously harmful."</p><p></p><p>This is not to say that I think a suggestion like this would <em>never</em> work. For example, let's say you know your main enemy (a group of humans) has hired some dragonborn mercenaries to help them. Your advanced scout reports back to you that the humans have been treating the mercenaries like crap, despite the fact that they're well-trained and effective and have not been properly paid recently. When battle finally breaks out, your party gets lucky and manages to off the head of the human group, and hasn't actually killed any of the dragonborn yet.</p><p></p><p>Then, you, the Wizard, cast Suggestion on the dragonborn commander: "<em>These humans have dishonored you and failed to uphold their contract: leaving them to their fate is *justice,* not betrayal.</em>" And she fails her save.</p><p></p><p>"Alright you soft-scales, we've had enough of this *crap*--the deal's off, and we're outta here."</p><p></p><p>It's certainly a type of betrayal, and it might require killing former "allies" to get out. However, it's not obviously harmful (in fact, it appears to be straightforwardly <em>helpful</em>) and it's phrased to appeal to perhaps-stereotypical dragonborn social values: justice, honor, pragmatism.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="EzekielRaiden, post: 6690228, member: 6790260"] I'm afraid I don't have the brain for presenting creative uses of it at this moment, but I can definitely say that sentence doesn't look like it would work [I]in most cases[/I]. From the description of Suggestion, emphasis added: Thus, we can clearly see two important criteria for the Suggestion to work: 1. The phrasing (but not necessarily the effect) of the action must [u]sound reasonable[/u] to the target--not just to the caster. 2. The action itself cannot be [I]obviously harmful[/I] to the target. "Betray and kill your allies" is rather baldly unreasonable. They're my allies! My friends! Why on [I]earth[/I] would I want to betray and kill them?! So that specific wording can't fly. Similarly, killing your allies...when people are [I]currently[/I] running at you with sharp objects, battle cries, and spellcasting...sounds like a pretty obviously harmful action to take. Given that this spell only allows a single save, and the target [I]must[/I] carry out the suggestion as long as the duration continues, it seems fairly clear to me that we should take a broad interpretation of what counts as "obviously harmful." This is not to say that I think a suggestion like this would [I]never[/I] work. For example, let's say you know your main enemy (a group of humans) has hired some dragonborn mercenaries to help them. Your advanced scout reports back to you that the humans have been treating the mercenaries like crap, despite the fact that they're well-trained and effective and have not been properly paid recently. When battle finally breaks out, your party gets lucky and manages to off the head of the human group, and hasn't actually killed any of the dragonborn yet. Then, you, the Wizard, cast Suggestion on the dragonborn commander: "[I]These humans have dishonored you and failed to uphold their contract: leaving them to their fate is *justice,* not betrayal.[/I]" And she fails her save. "Alright you soft-scales, we've had enough of this *crap*--the deal's off, and we're outta here." It's certainly a type of betrayal, and it might require killing former "allies" to get out. However, it's not obviously harmful (in fact, it appears to be straightforwardly [I]helpful[/I]) and it's phrased to appeal to perhaps-stereotypical dragonborn social values: justice, honor, pragmatism. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Suggestion idea
Top