Thoughts on a Creature Finding Spell

[barsoomcore]

Howdy. I'm working on a little bit of something right now, and I want an NPC to have a magic item that points out the direction of the nearest creature of a particular type.

So basically you could hold it up and say, "Find Giant Carnivorous Conch" and it would point to the nearest Giant Carnivorous Conch. No matter how far away it was. Let's restrict it to the current plane of existence. No notion of how far away the conch might be. Subject to mislead and nondetection trickery and assumes polymorphed creatures are what they appear to be.

Now, locate creature is a 4th-level spell, that only functions at a range of 400+40 ft/level, BUT it allows you to specify a PARTICULAR creature. So you can use it to, for example, "Find Bruce Willis."

Okay, so how powerful is this item, really? It's not much good as an alarm. It won't find particular individuals. On the other hand, it WILL direct you to the nearest Red Dragon, if you're into that sort of thing.

Thoughts? An amulet of proof against location (which makes use of the 3rd-level nondetection spell) is a 35,000 gp item. Should this be worth more than that?

 

[barsoomcore]

BUMP

C'mon people, I'm dying here!

 

[Terath Ninir]

I would call that equivalent to locate creature. The range is much, much greater, but the usefulness is greatly reduced, whether you like Bruce Willis or not. As for the value: calculate it as a misc. item, always active, 4th level spell, 7th level caster. That should give you a reasonable price for the item.

 

[Sigurd]

What about Ritual/Divination/Dream

Does it have to be a spell? or Item?

The possibility for abuse with such an item are huge. Pick your target consult the conch -- go hunting. If you make the magic require some cooperation or cultural imperative you tie your characters closer to your NPC(s).

The first thing that comes to mind is some sort of shaman. They traditionally seek spirit guides and other creatures through dreams and spirit walking. The spell might require a piece of the type of creature you seek and then a shamanic spirit might track it down. The ability to see from the plane of shadow\dreams into the material plane might make it reasonable to extend the range of your magic.

The second possibility might be a form of divination. The characters might need to find a crone who can read the runes -- picture something like 13th warrior. The advice might be have a couple of riddles involved to test the characters and\or they may have to do something for the crone.

The third possibilty might be for the characters to discover someone else is after the same beastie. They might intercept and steal the information they need but have to work quickly because they know someone else wants the beastie too. -- This is a non magic option.

The fouth possibiliity is the prophetic dream. Either the party cleric or an oracle might be gifted with a vision of where the creatures can be found. Failing that a trickster god might send them clues in pieces to lead them from point to point -- a devine scavenger hunt.

If it can work for yoru plotline I'd use something like that, rather than create a programmable beastie detector. If you do create a detector make sure that the detector itself makes it very hard to hide the parties presence. Imagine a character using the detector to be in a defenseless trance and his presence to shine like a beacon to the etheral plane and any undead in the area.

sigurd

Just a few thoughts.

 

[barsoomcore]

First off, thanks folks.

Second, Cyberzombie, who the heck is your avatar? Holy crap.

Finally, Sigurd, what do you see being the potential for abuse? I mean, sure you can say, "Find me an orc." and it'll send you to nearest orc. Who might just be hanging out with a couple hundred of his buddies, behind that entire brigade of hobgoblins you just walked into.

See, I want to give it to an NPC who isn't otherwise particularly magical. It's not a story in my campaign or anything so story-based solutions don't help me. I just want this NPC to have a unique little item and I thought this would be cool. But if there's potential for abuse, I need to know what it is. So a little more detail there would help me out a lot.

Thanks!

 

[RedShirtNo5]

I'm a player in an Against the Giants campaign, and we've found locate creature to be a pretty powerful spell. During G2, we were attached by yeti, and lost a PC due to the mesmerizing gaze attacks (the DM made his own conversion, didn't use the one in Oriental Adventures). The yeti had a good hide skill and a large bonus in the snow. But once we knew they were around, we used locate creature to track them down one by one.

Anyhow, the potential for abuse I see is if there is no usage restriction. Then you can get munchy divination games, even assuming the players use only in-character knowledge. As a simplified example, the adventurers sit a mile from the dungeon entrance and ask "where is the nearest orc", "where is the nearest goblin", "where is the nearest ..." for about half an hour, figuring out what is in the dungeon. Sure they get a few false positives, and there will be a few surprises, but it's pretty effective concept.

Otherwise, I agree that dropping the "particular creature" in return for unlimited range seems balanced. I would start by pricing it as a 4th level spell.

-RedShirt

 

[Sigurd]

My thoughts run with redshirt

My sense runs very close to Redshirt's.

Many monsters are themselves treasure -- alchemical supplies, rarity etc.... Monsters tend to be associated with particular treasure -- whose hoard shall we find today? I don't need to track any thing anymore so I certainly wont do too much detective work. "You were attacked by a .... Oh we detect for the first one and set off to kill it." I think that would be too efficient and eventually too boring.

I remember dreadful Monty Hall Dungeons that amounted to roll a monster, kill it, check for treasure, repeat.

If you have an NPC with visions -- great, its a plot device. If the characters can take an item and turn your adventure world into a monster catalogue it will tire quickly. I love the idea of an NPC that has all the answers to a type of question, but give him/her an innate gift the characters can't steal/inherit. If you're worried about the NPC's survivability make it a hereditary gift in the NPC's family. "Great, great, great, great - uncle Naboo was a favoured by Diana goddess of the hunt and now one child in every generation has a tremendous gift to know where animals\monsters may be found." If you remove a characters need to understand the monsters in your world its one less involvement to be proud of or have fun with.

I'm all in favour of tremendous powers at play in an adventure world but predictable magic that strips creatures of their hiding ability doesn't enrich the world,(imho). Its too easy to dial 'O' for orc and get the required 'x' amount of experience when you're just so far from a level.

How would the characters feel if monsters had a popular magic item that made spell casters glow in the dark and have a visible target float in the air above their heads? If players want to find a monster of choice they should work for it.

"Do you think this attack was a wolf, a dog, a Werewolf, a blinkdog?"
"Closest Werewolf is in HelmsDeep."

"Ok, not a werewolf then...."

"Hey we should go find the werewolf in Helmsdeep they'd pay us big bucks for exposing him."

"Wonder if there are any Dopplegangers in the area that might try to pass themselves off as humans..... Lets check in every dungeon then simply attack them when they try to fool us."

"Did you know that baron Minkypoo is a Vampire? He came up positive in our creature scans last night."


I know these are severe cases, sometimes beside the point, but they illustrate the potential for abuse.

NB. All bits intended to support my initial post. I think your NPC is a great idea but doubt the item should exist.

sigurd

 

[barsoomcore]

Keep in mind, for example, that there's no way anyone could use this device and say, "Closest werewolf is in Helm's Deep." The device doesn't give range or identity information -- only direction.

It doesn't alert you to the presence of any particular monster -- but the ability to triangulate on people would probably get misused.

Hm, what if it only works on Animals? That reduces its usefulness considerably. That is, you can only use it to find creatures of the Animal type. That suits my NPC's needs fine, and restricts its usefulness to players.

Thanks for the important feedback, folks.