Way to block detection of illusions?

[Ricochet]

If anyone is interested in my improved spells in the "Nystul's" style, I can email them to you. Just drop me a line at sbkREMOVE@DELETEimage.dk

 

[DungeonMaster]

Nystul's undetectable aura is one of the best ways but true seeing will reveal the illusion. The only defense against true seeing for an illusionist is to keep them beyond range (120 ft.).
Illusions can be devestating if used with care.

 

[Felix]

You're worried about Detect Magic? When the party is moving through an illusionist's keep? Dude, that spell won't hardly help the party at all...

Wizard: [spends 18 seconds looking at a room] "Look out, everything's magical. We'll have to take our time going through here."

Fighter: "You mean like how we spent an hour in the bloody foyer? Or two hours going through the kitchen?"

Wizard: "Yes, we must be careful. We'll never know when we might run into something unreal."

---

I think you've missed the power of the illusionist. Their strength is not really in fooling everybody all the time, but rather in making people doubt the reality of the situation. That's how illusionists screw people over: people don't know what's real and what isn't.

And when that party that is taking its sweet time crawling through the illusionists lair, that illusionist is taking his working out new ways to send things at the party that will mess with their heads. At some point he'll send something that's real, and the party will pass it off as an illusion.

Fighter: Gaah! Another monsterous spider!

Wizard: [Concentrates on it] "Don't worry, it has an aura of illusion."

Fighter: "Oh, ok. Ha, this is a good illusion. It even smells li -- GAH THE POISON! COURSING IN MY VEINS! THE PAIN!"

---

When you're a fighter charged with protecting the Magic Detecting wizard, which of the 30 orcs bearing down on him are you going to choose to attack first?

That one? Whoops. That was an illusion.

Ok. Next one, eh? Yep, another illusion.

Better hurry, there are some real orcs hurting the wizard somehow.

Oh, and the wizard tells you that the third orc from the left is an illusion, so don't attack him.

---

Man, Illusionists are the last people you want to fight as BBEGs.

 

[Ogrork the Mighty]

So those 30 orcs have 30 illusionists controlling them do they?

My point is that a simple 0-lvl spell makes static illusions nearly useless. Illusionary monsters don't interest me. But once a party knows there's illusion magic, they'll just scan each and every room, see if illusions are present, then disbelieve. So much for the illusionist's lair.

 

[Storyteller01]

Got something for you. An OGL source has a feat that allows you to make spelltraps (cast a spell into an object, it lasts until tripped or 24 hours). Another allows you to switch auras, making one look like another (say Transmutation for Illusion? )

Party walks in to a room.
Wizard scans the area. "everything is magical. I sense strong illusionary magic"
Fighter: "Okay. Disbelieve... Why is everything still here??" (Note: the last words happen to be the key phrase for releasing [enter 20 evil spells here])

 

[Lord Pendragon]

From the SRD:

Saving Throws and Illusions (Disbelief ): Creatures encountering an illusion usually do not receive saving throws to recognize it as illusory until they study it carefully or interact with it in some fashion. A successful saving throw against an illusion reveals it to be false, but a figment or phantasm remains as a translucent outline.

A failed saving throw indicates that a character fails to notice something is amiss. A character faced with proof that an illusion isn’t real needs no saving throw. If any viewer successfully disbelieves an illusion and communicates this fact to others, each such viewer gains a saving throw with a +4 bonus.

So as far as I can tell, a party can't simply open a door, detect magic, then disbelieve and poof! there go the illusions. More like, they open the door, detect magic, then must either study carefully or interact with the illusion in order to get a saving throw. If they fail, they still believe it's real. Even in the case of one party member making their save and disbelieving, that only garners the others a +4 to their saves. They still don't automatically recognize the illusion without physical proof of its illusory nature.

I'd have the illusionist research a custom version of Nystul's Magical Aura that covers an area and lasts for days, even weeks. It makes everything in the area give off a faint aura of Transmutation, and masks all other auras in the area. Make it 5th-level or so. Now the party can't even use detect magic to learn when they should expect an illusion.

 

[Catterai]

Illusions

A simple solution I use in dealing with Illusions in my campaigns, is to have the Illusionist "set" what alternate spell type is to be detected. (i.e. An illusionary guard may detect as heavy in Abjuration, instead of Illusion) The caster doing the detecting makes an opposed Spellcraft check against the Illusionist, on success he "sees" through the ruse and detects the Illusion, on a fail he "sees" what the Illusionist wishes, in this example a gaurd surrounded by protection magics. Illusionists are masters at misdirection and their spells should not be easily detected as mere phatasms.

This also works for Illusionists being seen mid-cast. ex - Illusionist is "summoning" a war dog to defend him, an opposed roll by the group's spel caster is made. Failure means he is misled by the illusionist into believing a Conjuration/Summoning spell has been cast. Success, he catches the subtle deviation and recognizes it an Illusion spell.

 

[Ogrork the Mighty]

Got something for you. An OGL source has a feat that allows you to make spelltraps (cast a spell into an object, it lasts until tripped or 24 hours). Another allows you to switch auras, making one look like another (say Transmutation for Illusion? )

Party walks in to a room.
Wizard scans the area. "everything is magical. I sense strong illusionary magic"
Fighter: "Okay. Disbelieve... Why is everything still here??" (Note: the last words happen to be the key phrase for releasing [enter 20 evil spells here])

Sounds cool! What's the source?

 

[Someone]

So those 30 orcs have 30 illusionists controlling them do they?

My point is that a simple 0-lvl spell makes static illusions nearly useless. Illusionary monsters don't interest me. But once a party knows there's illusion magic, they'll just scan each and every room, see if illusions are present, then disbelieve. So much for the illusionist's lair.

No it´s not. First, Detect Magic has a duration of concentration, so unless he has prepared a ton of them (or is a sorcerer) the wizard is useless through all the BBEG´s lair. Second: Nystul´s aura is your friend- The idea, the most illusions are going to do is to confuse the intruders, so they can´t tell what´s real of what not, and make them waste their time thoroughly searching and disvelieving while the bad guy prepares his defense. Make Illusion auras appear where real things are, and abjuration, evocation and transmutation auras in the same place where you made your illusory things. Notice how "multiple types of magic [...] may distort or conceal weaker auras", so give the illusionist the Heighten Spell feat to use with Nystul´s Magic Aura.

The real problem is True Seeing. To counter that, prepare multiple magical traps that cast Dispel Magic to whoever says "That´s an illusion"

 

[Ogrork the Mighty]

No it´s not. First, Detect Magic has a duration of concentration, so unless he has prepared a ton of them (or is a sorcerer) the wizard is useless through all the BBEG´s lair.

As I've already stated, a wizard with a permanent detect magic doesn't need to worry about burning through spells.