Wayfarer's Step (3.5)

[jeffh]

How is Wayfarer's Step supposed to work in 3.5? From the description, it seems like a simple spell for teleporting yourself short distances, but the stat block is very much at odds with that, and also seems internally contradictory. (I am using page 15 of the 3.5 Player's Guide as my sole reference here, if there's somewhere else I should be looking please let me know.)

I see three issues, in order from most to least serious:

1. The description only mentions teleporting yourself, but it has a range of Touch and nonempty save and SR stats, which makes sense only if you can use it on others. (The target is listed as "Personal", which doesn't make sense at all; but a range of Personal and a target of You is a common pairing which would better match the description. This is the "internally contradictory" bit.)

2. The duration is listed as "One minute", but the spell doesn't seem to do anything that it makes sense to give a duration other than Instantaneous.

3. Finally, it has an unusually long casting time for a teleportation spell; that may be a deliberate balancing factor given its low level, but it feels wrong to me; there are a lot of unwritten rules about how given types of spells work and this seems to violate one of them.

Is there something I don't understand here that makes this stat block make sense, or is this simply an incorrect stat block which should be rewritten to be in line with (my first impression of) the description?

 

[RangerWickett]

The thing got errata'd somewhere. I don't recall where. The idea was, you cast it on someone -- yourself or an ally -- and one time in the next minute that person can teleport a short distance.

Ah, here. It's the less powerful version we came up, which works only for you.

New Spell – Wayfarer’s Step
Conjuration (Teleportation)
Level: Brd 1, Sor/Wiz 1
Components: V
Casting Time: 1 full-round action
Range: Personal
Target: Self
Duration: Instantaneous

You can teleport 10 ft., plus 5 ft. per two levels. You do not need line of sight to your destination, but you cannot teleport to any location if there is a physical barrier between you and it, so you could not teleport through a window, through prison bars, or past a door, but you could teleport across a chasm, through fog, around a corner, or up a cliff. If your intended destination is occupied, you do not teleport.

(I might have the Range and Target entries a little off. It's been a while since I've done 3e.)

 

[jeffh]

I see - so the original intention was for it to be self or ally, any time within the next minute, but this was deemed too powerful or otherwise problematic and later changed to self only, right away? (And what ended up being printed in the Player's Guide apparently has bits of both versions.)

That actually works out nicely for me since in my game, spells can be diminished or augmented like in Arcana Unearthed/Evolved. The more powerful, originally-intended version can just be the higher-level version.

Thanks for the clarification.