D&D 3E/3.5 [v.3.5] Polymorph

[kingius]

You just had a major logic failure. The game reality emerges from the ruleset, the campaign setting, the player's actions and the DM. Of which, the DM gets the final say. You allude to this in the DM can say no comment on the end, forgetting that the DM is not faced with a simple yes or no question. The DM is free to state how the black holes work or don't work, as he is with everything else in the campaign. Therefore, the DM can state that a character with infinite reach has been sucked into a black hole... and what is there at the other end. Which leads me nicely to..

"Likewise, with infinite actions, even if something has 20 times more HD than you (which is not possible),"

It *is* possible. To understand this, you have to be familiar (on some level) with Cantor and what his mathematics points out. The easiest way I can think of to explain is to talk about PI. We know PI is infinite, even the most powerful supercomputer will chug away forever writing its numbers out, using vast forests of paper, until (presumably) the world ran out of paper and it could go no further, but it still wouldn't have got to the 'end' of PI. PI is an infinity.

Now here's the clever part. Between the numbers of 3 and 4 is another infinity. The same supercomputer could try to calculate every number between 3 and 4 and just like with PI, would keep going on forever. In reality, it would probably run out of memory and decimal places before it ran out of trees for paper but you get the idea. That 'space' between the numbers 3 and 4 is an infinity because the amount of numbers is limited ONLY by the precision involved (i.e. how many decimal places you can write).

Now here's where it all gets weird. That infinity between 3 and 4 CONTAINS PI and therefore is a larger infinity than PI is. Weird huh. And all the numbers from 0 to infinity is an infinity of infinities, since each number has an infinite number of numbers between it and the next (0.1, 0.11, 0.111, 0.1111 .... ad infinitum).

So Cantor reveals to us that when we add two numbers together (e.g. 1+1) we are ALREADY adding infinities together!

Fast forward to our conversation. Your character with Inifinite HitDice finds himself in a universe where he ONLY has 1 IHD but there are actually 20 IHD levels (and beyond that, we call epic)... and has effectively been normalised once more.

;-)

 

[Sekhmet]

You just had a major logic failure. The game reality emerges from the ruleset, the campaign setting, the player's actions and the DM. Of which, the DM gets the final say. You allude to this in the DM can say no comment on the end, forgetting that the DM is not faced with a simple yes or no question. The DM is free to state how the black holes work or don't work, as he is with everything else in the campaign. Therefore, the DM can state that a character with infinite reach has been sucked into a black hole... and what is there at the other end. Which leads me nicely to..

"Likewise, with infinite actions, even if something has 20 times more HD than you (which is not possible),"

It isn't possible, because if there is an instance where something has more HD than you, you can take two actions (of your infinite actions) to gain more HD than them. So, even if you have 1i and they have 20i, you can then gain i^i with the knowledge that >i exists.

therestofyournonsense

We know that .anythingrepeating (ie: .999..., .888..., etc) is effectively the next number (as there is no single point between the two, they are the same), so; infinity is great in theory; it falls apart in practice.

In breaking D&D with AMA, it is perhaps better to say "limitless", rather than "infinite". The player could, at any moment, create a creature under his control with the powers of Dr. Manhattan, and thereby gain the powers of Dr. Manhattan.
No amount of "but there is now stronger" can alter the fact that using specific combinations of spells, feats, and abilities can create a very, very broken Mary Sue with every ability the universe (and their imagination) has to offer, and no weaknesses.
One of my favorite abilities to consider is "I Win". "I cannot be harmed, directly or indirectly. Any act that would harm me automatically fails, at any place, in any time. Furthermore, I automatically succeed at everything I attempt."

 

[kingius]

It's a hard concept to grasp, that one infinity can be larger than another because it /contains/ it. You'll have to think about that a while to really understand what I'm saying here. The number sequence from 1.... x, which is an infinity, contains PI which is itself an infinity, yet is larger because it can hold it within it. Make sense?

If you can understand that, you can start to understand how multiple infinities can work. 2 PI, for example, is two sets of infinities.

If you can accept that, then you might be able to begin to see how this works. If your character has an infinite amount of hitpoints and is whisked into a universe where everybody else has as well, and everybody else is doing exactly the same thing as you - all at once - you'll be on the right track to see how in relative terms, you are back to normality and no more powerful than anyone else.

All power is relative to something else. 10HD is god like in a world where everyone else is 1/2HD ... but rubbish in a world where everyone else is 1000HD. Your 1 infinity HD character just found himself in a world where that is the _baseline_. He has to find another way to add another infinity to his hit dice to become a 2 infnity HD creature in this strange, other universe of infinite HD. Lets say, he needs to earn 2000XP here to do that. Of course, all his abilities just dropped to a 1 infinity HD creature, because in this universe, that's all he is, so his powers are scaled back accordingly.

Tick, tick, tick...

 

[Greenfield]

It seems like you're preaching the glories of the failed Immortals rules.

They failed for a reason: A power gamer's first love is power, specifically more power than anyone else at the table.

A game where they, by definition, can't have that isn't ever going to make them happy. And an overpowered game won't entertain people who aren't power gamers.

Beyond that, discussing concepts like Aleph-null v Aleph-1 levels of Infinity may lose you your audience.

(Additionally, Aleph-null and 2Aleph-null are the same number. You need 2 ^ Aleph-null to reach Aleph-1. )

 

[Sekhmet]

Rubbish taught in Jr. High.

I'm actually quite familiar with many aspects of mathematical theory. I don't find it difficult at all to grasp these concepts.

What you are failing to grasp is that, through certain mechanics that weren't properly thought out, a character can become limitless. He can have anything he can think of. He could, if he wanted, give himself control over all universes, past, present, future, theoretical, and unknowable. "Infinite" in this case is truly the dictionary definition of the term - limitless, endless in extent, impossible to measure or calculate".
You're trying to ratify what is wholly infinite with the mathematical concept of infinite, two very different things.

When he encounters something "more" in any possible scenario, he can simply give himself the ability to trump it. Or snuff it out with a thought. Or make it so that it never existed.
Because Manipulate Form is just that terribly written.

 

[kingius]

Rubbish, only megalomaniacs seek to rule EVERYTHING and they have mental problems. Power gamers seek to elevate themselves to high levels, but do not seek to supplant and battle with the gods. What gamers do you play with to think that even power gamers wish to annihilate everything, thereby sealing their own doom? I call out your position as being false.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Kingius, as the one who said all the polymorph spells in core were broken EXCEPT the Polymorph spell itself (and I'll expand that to Baleful Polymorph, which I didn't even think of before but is completely in line with the other save or die spells), I'd like you to explain why those other spells are not broken.

Alter Self can give you flight for 10x the duration of the fly spell at a lower spell level. And I have never seen anyone claim Fly is a weak spell. How is this not plainly broken? A lower level spell is better than the higher level one.

Polymorph Any Object has no limit to how much you can tank the duration factor. So if you just want a "short" (20 minutes is pretty long in D&D time) massive advantage in combat, you can use it to turn basically anything into anything, like a rock into [insert powerful monster w/in the confines of the polymorph rules]. Thats just too much.

Shapechange...have you seen what you can do w/ Su abilities?! Choker for extra standard actions... Kolyarut for all day enervations. Beholder for its eye rays. Guardinals for lay on hands (with no real cap on daily usage, by RAW; just turn into "new" guardinals). Archons and evil outsiders for at will greater teleport. Just some core examples. All attacks ignoring SR completely.

I definitely agree Polymorph is balanced. These spells...not so much.

 

[Dandu]

Rubbish, only megalomaniacs seek to rule EVERYTHING and they have mental problems. Power gamers seek to elevate themselves to high levels, but do not seek to supplant and battle with the gods. What gamers do you play with to think that even power gamers wish to annihilate everything, thereby sealing their own doom?

Hi.

 

[kingius]

Fly works on others, alter self does not.

Polymorph any object is 8th level (!)... so if you want to turn a rock into a stone golem, feel free, but at 8th level, in a party of 6, the kind of enemies you are going to face aren't going to be too phased by a stone golem bolstering your squad. Also, a rock has no intelligence, so the stone golem won't either. Which could be fun... a statue perhaps?

Shapechange is 9th level(!). The most powerful spells in the game sit here. You can stop time, make wishes to change reality to anything you want and have really hit the top limit in the game in terms of sheer magical power. Changing shape into a choker for an extra action a round really would be a pathetic use of a 9th level spell. I realise that's only one of your examples, but come on, by the time you are casting 9th level spells you are supposed to be a legend.

 

[Dandu]

Polymorph any object is 8th level (!)... so if you want to turn a rock into a stone golem, feel free, but at 8th level, in a party of 6, the kind of enemies you are going to face aren't going to be too phased by a stone golem bolstering your squad. Also, a rock has no intelligence, so the stone golem won't either. Which could be fun... a statue perhaps?

Unlike polymorph, polymorph any object does grant the creature the Intelligence score of its new form. If the original form didn’t have a Wisdom or Charisma score, it gains those scores as appropriate for the new form.

Changing shape into a choker for an extra action a round really would be a pathetic use of a 9th level spell.

I have often said, and oftener think, that this world is a comedy to those that think, a tragedy to those that feel – a solution of why Democritus laughed and Heraclitus wept.
- Horatio Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford