Touch of Idiocy effect on casters/manifesters?

[NewJeffCT]

In response to one of my other threads in this forum, the current group is made up of 3 people with magical abilities - one human cleric, one human sorcerer and one halfling psion.

If any of them are hit by "Touch of Idiocy" the spell, I just want some clarification on the effect:

The cleric would lose the ability to cast higher level spells - so, if her wisdom went from a 20 to an 17, she would no longer be able to cast level 9 & 8 spells. Would she also lose her bonus spells associated with the higher Wisdom? I would say yes. After the duration expires, does she get the bonus spells back, or does she need to re-learn them?

Similarly, if the Sorcerer's CHA dropped from 20 to a 16, he would no longer be able to cast levels 7, 8 and 9 spells, and would lose any bonus spells associated with the high charisma. So, instead of having two first level bonus spells, and one each of levels 2-5, he would only have one bonus spell of levels 1-3.

If the psion's intelligence went from a 21 to an 18, he would no longer be able to use level 9 powers. Would he also temporarily lose all the bonus power points he gets from a high INT?

Thanks

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

I would say that a loss in ability score would mean a loss of access to the relevant spell levels/slots. However, once that loss is healed, those spells would be avalable again, and would not be lost for the day. If you gain a temporary bonus to your casting stat, you have no capacity to prepare more spells (or, perhaps a stronger case: temporary access to more slots if a spontaneous caster), so why should temporarily losing some of you bonus screw you over for the rest of the day? If you take con damage and then it's healed, you get the hp back. If you take a hit to intelligence, you don't lose skill points.

Lower casting stat could mean inability to cast spells of certain levels, on top of losing access to bonus spells.

In the case of psionics, I'd say they'd temporarily lose the appropriate power points from their daily total, gaining them back when the ability damage goes away. Depending on how you rule, casting stat loss could be especially bad for them. If you were a psion and your int dropped from 20 to 14, for example, you would not be able to manifest level 5 powers. You may also end up facing restrictions on how far you can augment lower level powers. I personally would not do that. A level 1 energy ray power augmented with 8 power points costs the same as a level 5 power, but (as I'd rule it) is still a level 1 power, and thus would fail in a globe of invulnerability, and thus could also still be augmented for that much even if the psion lost the ability to use level 5 powers (if it can't quack like a level 5 duck, it's not a level 5 duck). Definitely not sure if there's a RAW answer to that, though.

 

[aboyd]

If you gain a temporary bonus to your casting stat, you have no capacity to prepare more spells (or, perhaps a stronger case: temporary access to more slots if a spontaneous caster), so why should temporarily losing some of you bonus screw you over for the rest of the day?

Is that true? I thought one of the points of temporary ability bonuses was precisely to get extra capacity for spells. For example, a cleric using a wisdom buff would get more spells when prayed for... or at least I thought so?

 

[irdeggman]

Is that true? I thought one of the points of temporary ability bonuses was precisely to get extra capacity for spells. For example, a cleric using a wisdom buff would get more spells when prayed for... or at least I thought so?

Except that a cleric must pray at a certain time of the day to gain spells and a wizard must rest for 8 hours prior to memorizing spells.

Now I guess it would be possible to use the "fill an empty slot" rule here, but an argument could be made that the slot was not available prior to resting for a wizard or at the time of praying for spells for a cleric.

 

[Runestar]

Personally, to expedite the game, I would rule that stat-damaging spells do not result in lost slots or PP, so players do not have to calculate what slots are negated, agonize over what spells to lose (I am certain no one ever bothers to make the distinction over which spells are prepared in "normal" slots and which are prepared in "bonus" slots).

Thus, the only impact is a small drop in spell DCs (and maybe the inability to cast your higher lv spells if the penalty to your key spellcasting stat is serious enough).

 

[Thanee]

Is that true? I thought one of the points of temporary ability bonuses was precisely to get extra capacity for spells. For example, a cleric using a wisdom buff would get more spells when prayed for... or at least I thought so?

No, this is explicitly not possible in 3.5 anymore.

i.e. Owl's Wisdom
"Clerics, druids, paladins, and rangers (and other Wisdom-based spellcasters) who receive owl’s wisdom do not gain any additional bonus spells for the increased Wisdom, but the save DCs for their spells increase."

Bye
Thanee

 

[NewJeffCT]

No, this is explicitly not possible in 3.5 anymore.

i.e. Owl's Wisdom
"Clerics, druids, paladins, and rangers (and other Wisdom-based spellcasters) who receive owl’s wisdom do not gain any additional bonus spells for the increased Wisdom, but the save DCs for their spells increase."

Bye
Thanee

Then, going in the opposite direction, a spell like Touch of Idiocy would only affect the save DCs and not cancel out bonus spells - unless the bonus spells were now too high a level to cast due to lower Wisdom/Intel/Charisma.

 

[Thanee]

I'm afraid, no. You cannot follow that logic, since it is not a general rule, but specific to the buff spells.

The ability score loss does remove all the benefits gained from the ability points that are lost for the duration of it.

Bonus spells are one such benefit, and so they are lost as well while the ability score points are lost.

I think the slots are only suppressed, though, temporarily inaccessible, and return to normal use when the ability score returns to normal (unlike level drain, which actually empties the slots, but this is also a rule specific to an effect and cannot be generalized).

Bye
Thanee

 

[NewJeffCT]

I'm afraid, no. You cannot follow that logic, since it is not a general rule, but specific to the buff spells.

The ability score loss does remove all the benefits gained from the ability points that are lost for the duration of it.

Bonus spells are one such benefit, and so they are lost as well while the ability score points are lost.

I think the slots are only suppressed, though, temporarily inaccessible, and return to normal use when the ability score returns to normal (unlike level drain, which actually empties the slots, but this is also a rule specific to an effect and cannot be generalized).

Bye
Thanee

Thanks - your posts are always very helpful.

 

[roguerouge]

Of course, at your party's levels, the real question is what happens when a maximized, empowered touch of idiocy hits these PCs...

I tend to fall on the slots are still there, you just have to use spells you CAN cast in them. So the result would likely be lots and lots of magic missiles.