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View Full Version : How to Play a Friend-Friendly Diviner



StoryKeeper
2010-03-08, 10:57 PM
I liked everyone's responses to my thread about enchanters so much, i thought I'd make a new one about diviners (seperate thread because diviners offer their own challenges to a DM's creativity and such.)

How do you play somone who can gain information that your DM doesn't really want you to have without being a headache to him? Same thing with the group if you're constantly stopping to scry the future for danger and thus constantly breaking the action.

JoshuaZ
2010-03-08, 11:07 PM
I liked everyone's responses to my thread about enchanters so much, i thought I'd make a new one about diviners (seperate thread because diviners offer their own challenges to a DM's creativity and such.)

How do you play somone who can gain information that your DM doesn't really want you to have without being a headache to him? Same thing with the group if you're constantly stopping to scry the future for danger and thus constantly breaking the action.

The truth is that divination magic as written is actually pretty weak. There are a lot of ways of defeating it, some of which actively harm the person trying to engage in divination. There's Remote View Trap (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/powers/remoteViewTrap.htm) power for example that deals damage to whomever tries to scry on you. Most of the active stuff that tells you about the future is pretty weak and so doesn't need to even be substantially countered that often.

TheCountAlucard
2010-03-08, 11:27 PM
Reminds me of the time I was wanting to play a divination-based Archivist for a friend's game; I was fairly disappointed when he banned most of the divination spells because he didn't want us knowing about the campaign setting. Really. And apparently making leaps of logic as a high-INT character was banned too...

Pluto
2010-03-08, 11:29 PM
Most of the time you would play a Diviner just like you would any reconnoiter.

Just you get to use Contact Other Plane, Arcane and Prying Eyes instead of saying you creep around yourself.

If you don't get ridiculous with COP (trying to specifically get at every little detail on the DM's noted), it can make a game easier to run (have you ever had a hint or a clue or a course of action that the players just didn't pick up on? A Diviner can help a DM deal with that).

The only real rule is not to use Detect Thoughts on every single NPC you see. That gets very old very fast.

JoshuaZ
2010-03-08, 11:32 PM
Reminds me of the time I was wanting to play a divination-based Archivist for a friend's game; I was fairly disappointed when he banned most of the divination spells because he didn't want us knowing about the campaign setting. Really. And apparently making leaps of logic as a high-INT character was banned too...

What do you mean info about the campaign setting? What level of knowledge was this?

Eldariel
2010-03-08, 11:43 PM
With a good DM, Divination really works. It's frankly one of the most powerful schools of magic; simple Commune can reduce epic quest for information into a game of 20 questions. And Contact Other Plane honestly can acquire just about any information, though you need a bit of work not to have your brains shut down.

The thing is, DM needs to have an idea of what's going on. If the DM is poorly prepared and coming up with everything as you go, it's gonna be horribly difficult for him to properly play out the Divination-spells. So, in short, it's more about how skilled and prepared a DM you have (experienced DM with a good memory could of course just wing a divination with no preparations whatsoever and make the answers fit) than how you play it; divinations do one thing. Gather info. If there's no info to gather, they aren't very strong but in a rich, prepared world the school shines.

PairO'Dice Lost
2010-03-09, 12:22 AM
As a DM, I love diviners.

The party is about to do something really really stupid that could end really really badly? The diviner pops an augury and the crisis is averted.

The party has missed a bunch of clues and has no idea what to do next? The diviner pulls out a scrying or legend lore or similar and picks up those clues.

I want to lead the PCs into a trap but abhor DM fiat? The diviner's spells hit a screen or false vision and the PCs, totally confident in the diviner's reliability, charge right in.

I'm making stuff up on the fly (as I usually am) and am not sure what the PCs want to do/where they want to go? When the diviner starts asking questions about something/someone/etc. I know where to direct my efforts.

As long as your DM knows what he's doing and knows ahead of time to be ready for a divination-heavy character, you should be fine.