[3.5] Plot killing spells

[weenie]

So, what are some of those spells, that you feel serve no other purpose than to mess with the DM?

I nominate Teleport. It removes all the intrigue of venturing into the unknown at higher levels. "So you find this old map, which hints, that the artifact both you and the evil overlord of Doomnsvile are after is located in a cave, in a land far far aw.." "greater teleport!" "...ok, you find it and save the world"

[PersonMan]

I find Teleport rather useful, actually. If I send the PCs somewhere, it's good that they can have a way to quickly and easily get back to their base or friendly territory to prepare for the next mission.

[Lord Vukodlak]

Teleport is kind of a catch 22, you want the NPC's to be able to catch up to the PC's rather easily. But don't want the PC's to skip past everything.

I actually make wards against teleportation rather common, so if you expect to teleport into the Lord's castle. Well its not going to work, big surprise that high priority targets of assassination take precautions against assassination. Many of the wards are one way, which means while you can't teleport into the Palace they can teleport out.

The Weird Stone from Player's guide to faerun can ward an entire city[six mile radius]. No astral or ethereal travel can be targeted within the zone[or scrying] and all for just 250,000gp.

[Cuaqchi]

Scrying, (Greater?) + Teleport without Error and a 3000 gp item. (Gloves of Object Reading)

You need to only face the bad guy once and get an arrow, weapon, potion, etc and read his history. You then have a first hand account of Mr. Badguy and can prep yourself to jump him when he is least prepared using Teleport without Error.

[Ernir]

Contact other Plane
Legend Lore
Discern Location
Commune
Find the Path

And if you go into Psionics, Hypercognition and Metafaculty...

Basically, those divination things that make you go from "I know nothing" to "I know something" with the simple casting of a spell.

[Shhalahr Windrider]

"So you find this old map, which hints, that the artifact both you and the evil overlord of Doomnsvile are after is located in a cave, in a land far far aw.." "greater teleport!" "...ok, you find it and save the world"
Old map? Hints? I’d be surprised that such a map is accurate today, if it ever was.

Sure! Teleport to the location. Find the artifact gone, long since taken by some other adventurers. Then you have to track them down, if they’re still alive. Sounds like a pretty good quest.

Or if the artifact is still there, that doesn’t mean it is sitting out in the open ungaurded. That’s the whole point of a dungeon crawl, you know.

And if this artifact is really all that, then why wouldn’t its resting place be warded against teleportation?

All this in addition to what Person Man said about how useful it can be at times to get your players going around the world and home again without having to have every mile detailed out.

[Flickerdart]

Contact other Plane
Legend Lore
Discern Location
Commune
Find the Path

And if you go into Psionics, Hypercognition and Metafaculty...

Basically, those divination things that make you go from "I know nothing" to "I know something" with the simple casting of a spell.
Surely you meant to post in a similar thread named "plot-making spells". It's great when the PCs actively try to learn about the story through means that are not blundering about.

[Oslecamo]

Basically, those divination things that make you go from "I know nothing" to "I know something" with the simple casting of a spell.

Well, to be honest, in a system where you're expected to travel trough multiple planes and find stuff that's hidden undeground by walls of illusions and transmuting magic, divination magic seems actualy like a necessity to prevent the campaign from becoming a massive research project as the PCs need to spend years traveling worlds and investigating libraries and ruins and whatnot looking for one clue at a time.:smalltongue:

[Kaiyanwang]

There are not plot killing spells. There are only plot-twisting spells.

But a 20-20-hit autokill with a sling can do the same sometimes.

[Ernir]

Surely you meant to post in a similar thread named "plot-making spells". It's great when the PCs actively try to learn about the story through means that are not blundering about.

For the record, I've never had a problem with any of these as a DM.

On the other hand, I somehow don't think any of my RL DMs would appreciate it if I were to bypass the elaborate political information network they so enjoy setting up by asking Pelor what the name of the BBEG is. :smalltongue:


There are not plot killing spells. There are only plot-twisting spells.
Well, any DM worthy of his hat has Contingent Plot Revivify on his buff list anyway. :smalltongue:

[Drascin]

Old map? Hints? I’d be surprised that such a map is accurate today, if it ever was.

Sure! Teleport to the location. Find the artifact gone, long since taken by some other adventurers. Then you have to track them down, if they’re still alive. Sounds like a pretty good quest.

Or if the artifact is still there, that doesn’t mean it is sitting out in the open ungaurded. That’s the whole point of a dungeon crawl, you know.

And if this artifact is really all that, then why wouldn’t its resting place be warded against teleportation?

All this in addition to what Person Man said about how useful it can be at times to get your players going around the world and home again without having to have every mile detailed out.

That said, teleport can be a massive mood-kill.

DM: "And now you descend into the mazelike tunnels, where no light save for what magic you bring will illuminate your path, as you search for-"
Player: "I'm preparing Teleport twice each day. Since Teleport is pretty exact when you're doing it to a place you've studied for a bit, we'll just port out back home whenever we're low on resources or need to sleep, then I'll port us to the last place I studied and we keep going on"
DM: "...aaaannnnd there goes the tension by the window" *adds a little scribble to his notes about making the mission time-sensitive and buffing the encounters to be hard-to-overcome challenges individually*

:smalltongue:

[Eloi]

The mind-reading and alignment-detecting spells make it difficult to build mysteries or have shady characters without banning them, which I do.

[Nero24200]

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Resurection spells or Speak with Dead. No one ever tired running a murder mystery?

[Eloi]

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Resurection spells or Speak with Dead. No one ever tired running a murder mystery?

I've also banned those too.

[Shhalahr Windrider]

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Resurection spells or Speak with Dead. No one ever tired running a murder mystery?
Essential elements of any D&D Murder Mystery…

Resurrection:
“The resurrection spell isn’t working sir. The soul is either unable (http://www.systemreferencedocuments.org/resources/systems/pennpaper/dnd35/soveliorsage/spellsS.html#soul-bind) or unwilling (http://www.systemreferencedocuments.org/resources/systems/pennpaper/dnd35/soveliorsage/spellsPtoR.html#raise-dead) to return.”

Speak with Dead
“Damn it! They took the head, now we can’t ask him any questions, since he doesn’t have a mouth (http://www.systemreferencedocuments.org/resources/systems/pennpaper/dnd35/soveliorsage/spellsS.html#speak-with-dead).

OR

Q: “Who killed you?”
A: “How the hell should I know? I was stabbed in the back! Never saw it coming.”

Seems like things stay mysterious pretty easily, really.


The mind-reading and alignment-detecting spells make it difficult to build mysteries or have shady characters without banning them, which I do.
So the only “shady” characters around are always plot essential? No chance of the bad guy not being evil alignment at all? Alignment detection gives you squat in regard to real plot details. Good for potential suspects list at best.

Detect thoughts only really works if you can ensure that the suspect is actively thinking about whatever detail you want to know. And even then, it’s not going to be very detailed information. As for other mind-reading spells, I think they’re mostly single-target spells. This means you already need to have done enough work to have a few suspects. And if that’s not enough, a ring of mind shielding is quite powerful, yet relatively inexpensive.

All in all, these spells are actually good for making a mystery more confusing, because it is so easy to give red herrings.

[Jack_Simth]

The mind-reading and alignment-detecting spells make it difficult to build mysteries or have shady characters without banning them, which I do.Nah. Much, much easier to use them as a decoy. Ring of Mind Shielding, plus an arrow with the alignment you want (by way of the Axiomatic/Anarchic/Holy/Unholy properties) means that the person using alignment detection detects the alignment you want.

[Thurbane]

Rope Trick...who needs to set a watch, or worry about wandering monsters, or guards doing their rounds. Just set up camp in the BBEG's stronghold. :smallconfused:

[Ellye]

You may call me a bad DM, but I've always banned Teleport and it's variants. Both for PCs and NPCs. That spell simply doesn't exist in my settings.

[Alleine]

In a current game I'm in Planeshift made the opposition look like retards.

Published campaign, the are played up wizards as powerful and arrogant spellcasters who are unfortunately trapped in an alternate plane. They've tried all the tricks except the ones that actually get you out of a plane.

We were haughtily told that teleport wouldn't get us out. An 'epic' teleportation circle was being constructed in the hopes of finally getting back to the material.

My cleric?
:smallconfused:
*Casts Planeshift*

Not plot killer, just made these big bad enemy wizards look like a bunch of fools.

[Lord Vukodlak]

Rope Trick...who needs to set a watch, or worry about wandering monsters, or guards doing their rounds. Just set up camp in the BBEG's stronghold. :smallconfused:

Its a problem if anyone has a haversack, or other extradimensional storage device.

Note: It is hazardous to create an extradimensional space within an existing extradimensional space or to take an extradimensional space into an existing one.
And considering they are staple items. The rope trick goes out of style real quick.

Well you safely camped out in the BBEG's stronghold however they found your haversacks and bag of holding and stole a good chuck of your treasure plus they managed to find where your opening was by using detect magic to find the transmutation aura hanging in the air.

[PId6]

Not a spell, but Mountain Hammer can be pretty annoying for DMs at low levels. Since it ignores all hardness, and is effectively at-will outside of combat, you can smash a tunnel through anything from level 3 on.

[weenie]

I'm not saying teleportation should be completely impossible, but as it is now, it does more harm than good. If there were some sort of teleoprtation stations around the world, like in the game the elder scrools 3 : Morrowind, I would have nothing against it, but as it is now, a DM must really go out of his way to make the spell not destroy his game.

Anyway, I have another one. Zone of truth. I had to force a player to not use it in a session where they had to resolve a murder mystery, just because otherwise it would take them like two minutes to find the murderer instead of going through all the hopefully cool clues I've scattered around the village.

But I suppose Speak with dead, Detect thoughts, Resurrection, contact other plane and company are just as bad.

Oh, and I must mention Resurrection again for another reason. It makes death trivial. Bandits kidnap the family of a PC and demand X from her. Normally this would bring up dread for a person, they would question right and wrong, try to do everything they can to free their loved ones etc, but why bother? Just storm the damn bandits and let them cut your family to ribbons. You can sew their wretched corpses together and throw a few diamonds at them and they're back, good as new(well, almost). I know it is sad when a PC dies because of a few bad rolls, but I'd rather make a new one than take death away from my games.

[Optimystik]

Its a problem if anyone has a haversack, or other extradimensional storage device.

Please elaborate.

And allow me to forestall the inevitable quote by asking you to define what happens, rather than leaving it at "hazardous."

[PId6]

Oh, and I must mention Resurrection again for another reason. It makes death trivial. Bandits kidnap the family of a PC and demand X from her. Normally this would bring up dread for a person, they would question right and wrong, try to do everything they can to free their loved ones etc, but why bother? Just storm the damn bandits and let them cut your family to ribbons. You can sew their wretched corpses together and throw a few diamonds at them and they're back, good as new(well, almost).
And then they find out that in retaliation, the bandits had cast Flesh to Stone -> Transmute Rock to Mud -> Purify Food and Drink on the hostage. Good luck Resurrecting them from that one! :smallcool:

[Irreverent Fool]

The Constructanomicon (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Dungeonomicon_(DnD_Other)/Constructanomicon) dealt with teleport in a fairly elegant fashion, I think. It allows teleport to maintain its usefulness in travel while creating a reason for vast underground networks and cities to exist.

Zone of Truth can be defeated by a successful save and a decent bluff check or by simply refusing to answer the questions.

Thinaun weapons and other soul-trapping methods make death a threat again and provide a plot hook if a return to life is in order (track the item down that contains the soul).


And then they find out that in retaliation, the bandits had cast Flesh to Stone -> Transmute Rock to Mud -> Purify Food and Drink on the hostage. Good luck Resurrecting them from that one! :smallcool:

Couldn't they just feed the hostage to the bears and skip those steps?

[Drakevarg]

Isn't Speak With Dead limited to yes or no questions? With that limitation at least, I've actually managed to use it as a interesting investigation tool.

I basically had twenty yes or no questions with which I had to figure out what had happened in an abandoned mine, how to get out, and if the person I was looking for was still alive.

[Fcannon]

As far as Resurrection and hostages goes-sure, magic makes a mundane hostage taking pointless, but not a magical hostage taking. If they know you have the resources to rez, or even true rez your family, then they'll have already killed them when they contact you. And had a necromancer raise them as zombies, which prevents rezing of any kind. You're negotiating to get the zombies back, so you can destroy and rez them. Things don't go according to plan for the kidnappers, they Plane Shift the zombies to a random point on the Negative Energy Plane, good luck finding them.

[Optimystik]

Isn't Speak With Dead limited to yes or no questions?

No. The answers are "usually brief" but aren't limited to Y/N.

"Pockettt...." (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0095.html)

[bobspldbckwrds]

And then they find out that in retaliation, the bandits had cast Flesh to Stone -> Transmute Rock to Mud -> Purify Food and Drink on the hostage. Good luck Resurrecting them from that one! :smallcool:

this is pure win

[tyckspoon]

Couldn't they just feed the hostage to the bears and skip those steps?

Nope. If you kill 'em, they can be Ressed or True Ressed. The key factoid in the Flesh to Stone procedure is that Flesh to Stone specifically says the victim is not dead. The target's body is destroyed, and scattered in such a way that it would be easier to use a Wish to make them a new body than to actually attempt to find the pieces.. but even if you do that, you can't raise that new body (or activate a Clone or similar) because the target never died. So the target's soul was never released to be called back and placed in a new body.

[Eloi]

I find the "Create Water" (I think its called) spell kinda ruins resource-management campaigns, the challenges of harsh environments such as deserts..

I mean with Create Food and Water, Purification, Spells that make you able to breathe without air, Spells that detect alignment and thoughts, Lights, Construct Creation, etc., the D&D civilizations of any typical setting with magic should be well-lit utopias that can be anywhere (I mean, terraforming would be easy with typical spells at your disposal!), with no food/water problems, nor any diseases (no Black Plague because moldy bread can be purified), courts would be 100%-70% accurate because of the detecting spells, no one would be truly dead until they die from old age, it'd be perfect! And then to combat the monsters, you summon a horde of monsters from another plane via spells and let them battle for you to protect your perfect utopia.

And in a perfect utopia that is protected by extraplanar creatures, there is no wars or problems, and thus no conflict, and thus no campaign or plot hooks. Wizards aren't only crunch-broken. They're fluff-broken too.

[Drakevarg]

That reminds me - Endure Elements. I'm currently playing in a survival campaign right now, and thank Kord our two Sorcerers haven't thought to cast it yet. Makes the whole job too easy.

[Ossian]

Oh dear, hasn't star trek taught you anything? :smallsmile:

There are some areas where one just can't teleport or greater teleport. See, the Securodyte walls of the mountain block all attempts. See, there is an Ion Storm in the air, so unfair, it just makes it impossible to go anywhere farther than 10.000 meters per spell etc...

Personally, I think "Raise Dead" and "Teleport" can be game breaker, though I never really played past levels 14-15, and mostly with tier 3 to 5 classes. At anyrate, I have 2 condierations for you.

1) PCs are powerful. Obvious right? Not so much. Aragorn is level 5? Maybe, maybe not, but if you can put in a room more than 40 levels using less than 40 people, and teleporting to the outlandish location is your problem, you are doing something wrong. In my campaign, which is a high-mobility campaign with high magic and lots of political intrigue, very often PCs have to travel from one continent to another. With experience and years of game, they have established a few "safe spots" where they can teleport without error. Say 1-5 locations in each of the nations involved, which they can reach as a "hub" and from there adventure at leisure.

2) Introduce (like I do for my PCs) a serious risk factor. Ripped from the glorious blue box of 2nd edition, teleport has a chance of failing and killing you. If you know a location like the back of your hand, you teleport there all right, but 1% of the time it is 3d6 meters below the chosen location (which means in solid rock, which means you die), 4% is 3d6 meters above (falling damage) and the rest is safe.

You have a generic knowledge? (say, two to three weeks of study, images, detailed 2nd hand descriptions, you have been there once or twice?): Death in 10% of cases, fall in 25% , the rest is ok.

You have not even that? Russian lottery my friend.


As for raise dead, I give PCs a limit. Max 3 times per PC. Or, CON / 6. Ergo, the toughest man on earth can be raised only 3 times (or you pick another attribute and find a rationale for it). More over, there COULD be serious repercussions when you alter the flow of life and death, detailed here (http://www.jsmoran.it/tattiche.htm):
Too bad it is in Italian, but you can COPY +PASTE and use the google chrome translator, to get a sense of the page. There is also a tip on how to limit scrying (small chance, but you don't want a Scylredy to come after you, do you? You don't know what a Scylredy is? Check the page....:smallcool:

O.

[Thurbane]

Well you safely camped out in the BBEG's stronghold however they found your haversacks and bag of holding and stole a good chuck of your treasure plus they managed to find where your opening was by using detect magic to find the transmutation aura hanging in the air.
Until level 9, and Leomund's Secret Chest...:smalltongue:

...and if denizens are wandering around the dungeon constantly Detecting Magic just in case, then the terrorists adventurers have already won! :smallbiggrin:

[PId6]

2) Introduce (like I do for my PCs) a serious risk factor. Ripped from the glorious blue box of 2nd edition, teleport has a chance of failing and killing you. If you know a location like the back of your hand, you teleport there all right, but 1% of the time it is 3d6 meters below the chosen location (which means in solid rock, which means you die), 4% is 3d6 meters above (falling damage) and the rest is safe.
1. In every case where it comes up in 3.5, Teleporting into or appearing inside solid objects result in one being shunted out and taking some damage. It never result in insta-death.
2. Changing into an Earth Elemental or Xorns before Teleporting lets you negate the problem entirely even if it were instant death.
3. Hasn't anyone thought of aiming for 18 meters above the ground?

[Nidogg]

Against any single encounter with an animal inteligence monster, ray of stupidity
"The mighty tyranisaur tuns to face you and lets out a mighty roar!"
"I cast ray of stupidity, it falls over due to having no brain"

[Killer Angel]

And allow me to forestall the inevitable quote by asking you to define what happens, rather than leaving it at "hazardous."

I suppose, in absence of a clear RAW solution, it's DM territory to define "hazardous"...
It seems to me that the spell's description, is a invitation for the DM to house rule the possible consequences.


Against any single encounter with an animal inteligence monster, ray of stupidity


A combat spell, eventually put an end to the fight. It's not a plot killing spell.

[Lord Vukodlak]

Eloi your talking a magic level in a world ten times that of Thay in faerun.


Until level 9, and Leomund's Secret Chest...:smalltongue:

...and if denizens are wandering around the dungeon constantly Detecting Magic just in case, then the terrorists adventurers have already won! :smallbiggrin:

If a bunch of adventures just slaughtered some guards and vanished without a trace searching for them with a quick detect magic scan sounds in order to me. And a creature with ranks of survival and the track feat could simply track the party to the rope trick entrance.

Secret chest also takes 10 minutes to cast. If your standing around in a dungeon for 10 minutes after having had a battle. SOMETHING is going to come and interrupt you.



A combat spell, eventually put an end to the fight. It's not a plot killing spell.

A spell that deals 1d6+2 ability damage no save is overpowered, which I think qualifies it as plot killing.

[Thurbane]

Secret chest also takes 10 minutes to cast. If your standing around in a dungeon for 10 minutes after having had a battle. SOMETHING is going to come and interrupt you.
Yeah, I'm mostly playing devil's avocado here.

[Lord Vukodlak]

Yeah, I'm mostly playing devil's avocado here.

My best work was the party rested using rope trick in a dungeon, well before they actually needed to. [plenty of resources left]. When they exited 8 hours later. The entire place was empty, the remaining NPC's packed up and left taking every last bit of treasure.
But they did leave the corpses of the villagers the party was supposed to rescue.

[Killer Angel]

A spell that deals 1d6+2 ability damage no save is overpowered, which I think qualifies it as plot killing.

I wasn't denying the overpowered part. Lots of spells are overpowered, (shivering touch, etc), but IMO all they do, is killing the climax of the single encounter.
While spells such divination, contact other planes, greater teleport, find the path, etc, can kill the entire plot of the adventure, if the DM hasn't prepared the proper countermeasures.
They both ruin the fun, but in different ways.

[Ossian]

1. In every case where it comes up in 3.5, Teleporting into or appearing inside solid objects result in one being shunted out and taking some damage. It never result in insta-death.
2. Changing into an Earth Elemental or Xorns before Teleporting lets you negate the problem entirely even if it were instant death.
3. Hasn't anyone thought of aiming for 18 meters above the ground?

Ok, I 'll explain a bit more.

1) It s a rule from 2nd edition. I transferred to 3.5. Teleport can be a game breaker. The catch is: even if it is unlikely you COULD get insta-death.

2) Never happened. No one ever even thought of that, and I would basically ban it if they did. Even if it did not shatter the campaign atmosphere (everyone becoming an elemental before using Teleport...hmmmm...). In fact, they have very limited spells having only one full caster, most of the time.

3) The percentage is rolled upon casting. You can aim as high as you want, but this is

a) too metagaming for my taste (the wizard does not know that it is a 3d6 roll)

b) still dangerous, because if you roll a "too high" result you get 18+3d6 meters off the ground (ouch !). They don't "fly" normally.

[Yora]

1) It s a rule from 2nd edition. I transferred to 3.5. Teleport can be a game breaker. The catch is: even if it is unlikely you COULD get insta-death.

So you motivate players not to use the spell by threatening them with a TPK and ending the campaign? Somehow I doubt that players feel very threatened by that.

[Ossian]

So you motivate players not to use the spell by threatening them with a TPK and ending the campaign? Somehow I doubt that players feel very threatened by that.

1% is VERY small. Encourages them to travel to the location first, spend time there, and add it to their list of "safe teleport havens". I can tell you that it worked fine with me :smallsmile:

It also adds some thrill, trust me.

[weenie]

I'd solve teleport by making it only possible to be teleported to a location, that has been ritually prepared for it. so there could be teleporting stations scattered around, that would be heavily guarded and regulated, and the PCs could set up one or two of their own, to which they could return when they wanted. I think Ebberon had something like this..

About preventing resurrection:
What about when someone takes a hostage in front of you? He has no way of killing them dead beyond resurrection in the short time it will probably take you to kill him. Also, what about when someone dies in a hinting accident, or in any other way short of being old? Taking death from the game makes it dull. Really dull. I like playing E6 because of this exact problems. It creates a world where people die, where they are sick and where being stabbed is not a mere inconvenience. Magic is fun, but it shouldn't make everything possible..

[Yora]

1% is VERY small. Encourages them to travel to the location first, spend time there, and add it to their list of "safe teleport havens". I can tell you that it worked fine with me :smallsmile:
But I doubt most dms won't fudge the roll. When the party is killed, all the dms work is for nothing. And I think most dms are the one person at the table who cares the most for the adventure he created.

I like playing E6 because of this exact problems. It creates a world where people die, where they are sick and where being stabbed is not a mere inconvenience. Magic is fun, but it shouldn't make everything possible..I don't think I ever want to play non-E6 D&D again. :smallbiggrin:

[PId6]

1) It s a rule from 2nd edition. I transferred to 3.5. Teleport can be a game breaker. The catch is: even if it is unlikely you COULD get insta-death.
It's the fact that the rule arbitrarily doesn't follow every 3.5 precedent ever on this very issue. 3.5 has almost *zero* incidents of "no save you die" type of effects, and the ones that do exist tend to be things like Power Word Kill or Sphere of Annihilation. In that context, this rule is extremely jarring and out of place.


2) Never happened. No one ever even thought of that, and I would basically ban it if they did. Even if it did not shatter the campaign atmosphere (everyone becoming an elemental before using Teleport...hmmmm...). In fact, they have very limited spells having only one full caster, most of the time.
About the "shattering the campaign atmosphere" part, I disagree. It's the logical conclusion based on the effects of the spell, since if a wizard knows that he can teleport into the earth and be killed that way, he would want to negate it as much as possible. With 20+ Int, that should be quite easy for wizards to figure out, and should be common practice given a mature campaign world. If it's possible to turn into an Earth Elemental, and it's possible to die from Teleporting into the earth, why wouldn't you do one before the other?


3) The percentage is rolled upon casting. You can aim as high as you want, but this is

a) too metagaming for my taste (the wizard does not know that it is a 3d6 roll)

b) still dangerous, because if you roll a "too high" result you get 18+3d6 meters off the ground (ouch !). They don't "fly" normally.
a) That depends; if there are organized wizards' guilds where people experiment with magic, and the effects of spells are very well known, then they should know through empirical testing how far these spells would send you, or at least have an idea on the range. Besides, they can just pick an unambiguously high value like 30 and be guaranteed of not dieing.

b) No matter how high you roll, it's still better than instantly dying. Also, Fly is a 3rd level spell. Mass Fly is a 5th level spell. Feather Fall is a 1st level spell. Going too high is always much better than going too low.

In a given campaign world where Teleport has such consequences, the most logical conclusion would be to negate those possibilities through any means necessary. If that means aiming a few feet off the ground, then so be it. Wizards are all about logic, after all.

[Kesnit]

It's the fact that the rule arbitrarily doesn't follow every 3.5 precedent ever on this very issue. 3.5 has almost *zero* incidents of "no save you die" type of effects, and the ones that do exist tend to be things like Power Word Kill or Sphere of Annihilation. In that context, this rule is extremely jarring and out of place.

As you said, there are other precedents for "no save and die," so the rule is not completely out of place.


a) That depends; if there are organized wizards' guilds where people experiment with magic, and the effects of spells are very well known, then they should know through empirical testing how far these spells would send you, or at least have an idea on the range.

Wizard experimenter A teleports to a location, but never arrives (because they ended up 18 meters underground. Why would the other wizards automatically assume "oh, Wizard A got there, (s)he's just buried" and dig them up to find out how far down they went. A more likely assumption is that they missed their target location completely. Since Wizard A is not heard from again, there are many options of what happened to them. (Plane shifted, eaten by a monster, etc)

So no, there wouldn't be a way to determine the range of those accidents through experimentation because the guild would not have a way to gather the end result data.


In a given campaign world where Teleport has such consequences, the most logical conclusion would be to negate those possibilities through any means necessary. If that means aiming a few feet off the ground, then so be it. Wizards are all about logic, after all.

Again, without knowing WHAT they are protecting themselves from, they cannot protect themselves. The player knows the mechanic, but the PC only knows "So-and-so cast this spell and was never heard from again."

[Nihb]

Teleportation has been a problem for me a couple of time. Dimensional Door to get to the entrance, Teleport to return to the last inn they rested (and studied)...

It usually change the mechanics of an adventure. Since you'd expect teleporting characters to be full and refreshed from a rest, you have to make more powerful encounters. It's boring, but it's just a mechanic.

Then, there's the plot-wrecking use. The party is in atari with an evil party and the big bad has been called to take the cargo the PC brought there. The cargo and the psion have been turned to stone, the bard was a white rabbit after failing her Fortitude against Baleful Polymorph, the Paladin was the only one somewhat in good shape (a few burns, lost his mount to a trap) and was talking with the evil party leader. Then, the rabbit hides behind the psion's statue, and casts Dimension Door using the last charge of a Silent Rod (yeah, we didn't know you can't use Silent on a bard's spell). Result : the cargo was saved, the party was able to rest and restore the petrified characters to their former selves, while the killed evil party members didn't have a cleric high enough to raise them.

To be perfectly fair, they were screwed. Teleport saved their asses, and left a quite bitter taste in the Big Bad's and my mouth.

Dimensional Anchor works. Plus, you can stack them, so you need more than a Dispel Magic. Forbiddance is a Cleric 6 spell which is costly, but disallows teleport and the likes in the area warded.

[PId6]

As you said, there are other precedents for "no save and die," so the rule is not completely out of place.
Power Word Kill is a 9th level spell, and easily defended against (Mind-Affecting and Death). Sphere of Annihilation is an artifact. There's really no comparison here.


Wizard experimenter A teleports to a location, but never arrives (because they ended up 18 meters underground. Why would the other wizards automatically assume "oh, Wizard A got there, (s)he's just buried" and dig them up to find out how far down they went. A more likely assumption is that they missed their target location completely. Since Wizard A is not heard from again, there are many options of what happened to them. (Plane shifted, eaten by a monster, etc)
Depends on how long they've had the spell. If it's been around for hundreds or thousands of years, it's almost certainly been quantified and observed many, many times. With Int like wizards have, it's not hard to imagine keeping detailed statistics on their uses of the spell, and going to extremely lengths to determine the results of such spells (if 1% of all plane flights vanish mysteriously, would people just shrug and not care or would they try to figure out what happened?). If Teleport has only been around for a few years, I can see them making false assumptions about how it works, but if it's been around for a significant length of time, it's hard to believe that this would continue to hold true.


So no, there wouldn't be a way to determine the range of those accidents through experimentation because the guild would not have a way to gather the end result data.
It takes a single incident of finding someone's body underground to realize what could have happened. If the spell has been around for hundreds of years, as normal for most campaign worlds, then it almost certainly would have happened sooner or later. After that, it takes only a few leaps of logic and then tests via continued casting. And with the amount of times the spell causes you to mishap and fire upwards, it shouldn't be hard to think "maybe it goes downward too." These are Int 20+ people you're dealing with, after all; they're literally smarter than Einstein.


Again, without knowing WHAT they are protecting themselves from, they cannot protect themselves. The player knows the mechanic, but the PC only knows "So-and-so cast this spell and was never heard from again."
If the spell's cast only a few dozen times in the history of the universe, then that would be reasonable. Otherwise, it's not. It takes a single recorded instance to realize how it works.

[Cyclocone]

[...]So no, there wouldn't be a way to determine the range of those accidents through experimentation because the guild would not have a way to gather the end result data.
[...]without knowing WHAT they are protecting themselves from, they cannot protect themselves. The player knows the mechanic, but the PC only knows "So-and-so cast this spell and was never heard from again."

Divinations?


Anyway, I never got the big frustration with teleport; but maybe it's just my group's playstyle.

We always figured that when you're 9th level, you're seriously supposed to have crazy and awesome planar adventures involving mindflayers and demons and mindflayer-demons. You're not supposed slog through the forrest for 3 days to rescue the peasant's unattractive daughter from bears.

At least to me, the real problem with teleport/planeshift has always been that only casters are allowed to do it, and that melee can just go pound sand. But that's practically true of everything at level 9.

[nedz]

Two that annoyed me
Water Walking and Water Breathing
Basically its the shared duration.

I had a 6th level party: all Dwarves.
Mission: (short version)
Take this boat down an adit and explore the underground lake.
I anticipated lots of fun with said boat tipping over, dwarves splashing around, etc.
(I have run lots of 1E and 2E and was new to 3E)
The clerics just learned up Waterwalking, they even put in on the mule to tow the boat across the lake.
Result:
Less fun :smallannoyed:

The shared duration on water breathing also reduces the challange of underwater adventures, and makes things like Helm of Underwater Action almost pointless. Boring :smallannoyed: !

[hewhosaysfish]

Wizard experimenter A teleports to a location, but never arrives (because they ended up 18 meters underground. Why would the other wizards automatically assume "oh, Wizard A got there, (s)he's just buried" and dig them up to find out how far down they went. A more likely assumption is that they missed their target location completely. Since Wizard A is not heard from again, there are many options of what happened to them. (Plane shifted, eaten by a monster, etc)

So no, there wouldn't be a way to determine the range of those accidents through experimentation because the guild would not have a way to gather the end result data.

Again, without knowing WHAT they are protecting themselves from, they cannot protect themselves. The player knows the mechanic, but the PC only knows "So-and-so cast this spell and was never heard from again."

So these wizards sometimes teleport somewhere and sometimes they appear a ways to the left of their intended destination, sometimes a ways to the right.
Sometimes they appear above it and fall. Sometimes they try to teleport to the 5th floor of their wizards tower and appear on the 3rd.
Sometimes they teleport to a ship and appear in the water.
Sometimes they try to teleport to a point in the air because they're flying and the ground is swampy or covered in orcs.
Sometimes (one in every 216 teleport mishaps) they appear buried waist-deep in the earth.
And never during any of this does it cross their minds that the random-scattering effect might take them downwards.

And no-one ever thinks that they can rule out "sent to another plane entirely" because the victim doens't Plane Shift back or respond to any Sending spells.
And they can't rule out "eaten by a monster" because no-one ever uses True Res or Wish to bring back one of the vanished wizards, not even if he is the Grand High Boojum of the Wizards Guild.
And because no-one is ever absolutely 100% certain that the vanished wizards are dead and on this plane, no other wizard ever thinks to Scry for them or anything despite the fact that one of their friends and collegues just disappeared without a trace and all it would cost them to look would be a few scraps from their chemistry set and a mutilated bird of prey. Nope, they are content to just let it go down in history as a great mystery, like Amelia Earhart or the Mari Celeste...

I generally disapprove of the "wizards are super-smart so they can figure out the rules of the game" argument but there wizards seem to be almost going out of their way to not investigate.

[Ossian]

It's the fact that the rule arbitrarily doesn't follow every 3.5 precedent ever on this very issue. 3.5 has almost *zero* incidents of "no save you die" type of effects, and the ones that do exist tend to be things like Power Word Kill or Sphere of Annihilation. In that context, this rule is extremely jarring and out of place. Agreed, it veers away from 3.5 precedents. Just my personal choice (shared by the players).



About the "shattering the campaign atmosphere" part, I disagree. It's the logical conclusion based on the effects of the spell, since if a wizard knows that he can teleport into the earth and be killed that way, he would want to negate it as much as possible. With 20+ Int, that should be quite easy for wizards to figure out, and should be common practice given a mature campaign world. If it's possible to turn into an Earth Elemental, and it's possible to die from Teleporting into the earth, why wouldn't you do one before the other?

Fair enough. I just feel like it's simply exploiting a loophole. It might well be that all wizards of all universe share the same spell list published in the PHB, but it still feels like a lawyer just cheated me. I would prefer the wiz to come up with some kind of research based artifact / permanent spell that allows a SAVE or take "X" damage.



a) That depends; if there are organized wizards' guilds where people experiment with magic, and the effects of spells are very well known, then they should know through empirical testing how far these spells would send you, or at least have an idea on the range. Besides, they can just pick an unambiguously high value like 30 and be guaranteed of not dieing.

Sure. However this is not always possible (teleport indoor for example, or even more risky, underground). It can be worked out through magic research and empirical experiments, I suppose. I just don't have this kind of knowledge sharing institution in my campaign, and if there is one, the PCs have zero access to it.


b) No matter how high you roll, it's still better than instantly dying. Also, Fly is a 3rd level spell. Mass Fly is a 5th level spell. Feather Fall is a 1st level spell. Going too high is always much better than going too low.

In a given campaign world where Teleport has such consequences, the most logical conclusion would be to negate those possibilities through any means necessary. If that means aiming a few feet off the ground, then so be it. Wizards are all about logic, after all.

True, however, in 2nd edition you teleported ONE character per spell, max. I kept this cap (sorry, I should have mentioned it). Wiz, of course, teleports last (and realizes whether he has done a good job or not). So for a party of 4, with one spellcaster, it takes 4 (telep) + 4 (fly) + 4 (turn into elemental) = 12 spells to travel in absolute safety. Besides, it feels like it spoils the atmosphere to have the PCs routinely become flying earth elementals that safely span the distance between continents.

On the TPK, as I said, yes, it is there, and I don't fumble the roll. Rolls are individual though, so even IF my teleport could transfer 4 target at a time, each would have to roll for too high-too low-on location.

1/100 * 4 = 1 / 100,000,000 of TPK. That's cool with me.

[Optimystik]

I suppose, in absence of a clear RAW solution, it's DM territory to define "hazardous"...
It seems to me that the spell's description, is a invitation for the DM to house rule the possible consequences.

As long as you acknowledge it's a houserule, and inform your players of the fact, I have no objections to that interpretation.

[subject42]

My best work was the party rested using rope trick in a dungeon, well before they actually needed to. [plenty of resources left]. When they exited 8 hours later. The entire place was empty, the remaining NPC's packed up and left taking every last bit of treasure.
But they did leave the corpses of the villagers the party was supposed to rescue.

I did something similar once. My players had had their characters barricade themselves in a room after a huge, LOUD fight. Once they came out they got a face full of hastily constructed goblin ballista trap and had to deal with a well-prepared defending force.

For some reason they were surprised by this development.

[Ranos]

In the War of the burning sky campaign, they get around the teleport problem with a rift between the astral plane and elemental plane of fire, causing more and more burns the longer the teleportation. A full blown teleport with no fire immunity's pretty much instadeath.
Now, the entire plot revolves around this so it wasn't just done to nerf teleport, but still, t'was pretty nice.

[DanReiv]

Teleport and similar (long distance, DD is okay).
Wish and similar (broken beyond measure).
Resurection and similar (more thrilling without).
Planar contact and similar (c'mon...)
Polymorph and similar (Hi, I'm a Remorahz @ CL7)
Ray of clumsiness (too many stuff with low DEX)
Wraithstrike (same thing, too many stuff with low touch AC, this spell enables PLOT-KILLING-POWA-ATTACK)

I find divination to be okay if, like me, you banned all the previous.

[Yora]

Then, there's the plot-wrecking use. The party is in atari with an evil party and the big bad has been called to take the cargo the PC brought there. The cargo and the psion have been turned to stone, the bard was a white rabbit after failing her Fortitude against Baleful Polymorph, the Paladin was the only one somewhat in good shape (a few burns, lost his mount to a trap) and was talking with the evil party leader. Then, the rabbit hides behind the psion's statue, and casts Dimension Door using the last charge of a Silent Rod (yeah, we didn't know you can't use Silent on a bard's spell). Result : the cargo was saved, the party was able to rest and restore the petrified characters to their former selves, while the killed evil party members didn't have a cleric high enough to raise them.

To be perfectly fair, they were screwed. Teleport saved their asses, and left a quite bitter taste in the Big Bad's and my mouth.
I have to say I can't quite follow you here. So the white bunny teleports from behind the statue to some other location. How does that restore the other characters back to normal?

[Emmerask]

But I doubt most dms won't fudge the roll. When the party is killed, all the dms work is for nothing. And I think most dms are the one person at the table who cares the most for the adventure he created.
:smallbiggrin:

well the work you put in isn´t for nothing
a) you can recycle lots of it for another campaign
b) just because the party is dead doesn´t mean the campaign is ending there might be another party who has the same goals from a different angle :smallwink:


As long as you acknowledge it's a houserule, and inform your players of the fact, I have no objections to that interpretation.

If you interpret the hazardous as nothing happens that is a houserule too, infact each way the dm handles it is a houserule ^^

[Gnaeus]

To be perfectly fair, they were screwed. Teleport saved their asses, and left a quite bitter taste in the Big Bad's and my mouth.


I have to say I can't quite follow you here. So the white bunny teleports from behind the statue to some other location. How does that restore the other characters back to normal?

More importantly, why did the party escaping leave a bitter taste in your mouth? I mean, yes, there is the silent spell thing, and the question of how a rabbit can simultaneously hold a rod, and touch 2 other party members (one of whom was presumably elsewhere in the room talking to the BBEG with no way to know what his hidden, silent furry pal was up to) and the stone cargo, but rules aside, isn't a narrow, last minute escape a good thing? Sounds kind of heroic to me. I mean, one presumes that that kind of thing is WHY the bard chose to know Dimension Door, instead of some other more combative spell. Would it have made you upset if he had instead cast Confusion, and the evil party had suddenly gone crazy and beaten each other into the ground? Or Dominate Person, and telepathically ordered the Boss to leave?

[huttj509]

If you interpret the hazardous as nothing happens that is a houserule too, infact each way the dm handles it is a houserule ^^

Well heck, the only way to not houserule, for example, rope trick is thus:

DM: If you take your haversack up there with you it could be hazardous.
Player: What might happen?
DM: It could be hazardous.
Player: So all I know is that it could be hazardous?
DM: Yes.
Player: Fine, I take them with me anyway, and even open em up, what happens?
DM: It's hazardous.
Player: Yes, but does something happen?
DM: It becomes hazardous.
Player:...Ok...whatever...

[Choco]

I gotta say the entire divination/scrying line is the biggest offender IMO.

I like how 4th edition handled that: It is still there, but the cost is so high that the party will think long and hard before pouring all those resources into a divination spell. As opposed to 3.x, where divinations range from free to dirt cheap.

I usually ban divinations in my games (this goes for villains too), but then I am forced to be extra careful not to design a plot that would require a divination (AKA be solvable with the PC's current abilities and the player's intelligence).

[Emmerask]

Well heck, the only way to not houserule, for example, rope trick is thus:

DM: If you take your haversack up there with you it could be hazardous.
Player: What might happen?
DM: It could be hazardous.
Player: So all I know is that it could be hazardous?
DM: Yes.
Player: Fine, I take them with me anyway, and even open em up, what happens?
DM: It's hazardous.
Player: Yes, but does something happen?
DM: It becomes hazardous.
Player:...Ok...whatever...

yep pretty true :smallbiggrin:

[Killer Angel]

As long as you acknowledge it's a houserule, and inform your players of the fact, I have no objections to that interpretation.


If you interpret the hazardous as nothing happens that is a houserule too, infact each way the dm handles it is a houserule ^^

Yep, but given that, by RAW, we have an indication that it can be hazardous, we have more basis for house ruling something inconvenient, rathen than house ruling "nothing never happens".

[Kaiyanwang]

We always figured that when you're 9th level, you're seriously supposed to have crazy and awesome planar adventures involving mindflayers and demons and mindflayer-demons. You're not supposed slog through the forrest for 3 days to rescue the peasant's unattractive daughter from bears.


Agree here. Some spell can cause some trouble, but IMO DM should always remember that some thing that is a problem for the players at level 1, should not be longer be a problem at level 10.

[Optimystik]

If you interpret the hazardous as nothing happens that is a houserule too, infact each way the dm handles it is a houserule ^^

So not creating rules... is creating rules? :smallconfused:

[Mauther]

I thought opening an extradimmensional space inside of an extradimmensional space basically destroyed everything in the space.

Anyways, on the topic at hand, there are ways to get around some of the more problematic mechanics like teleport and divination. For me the problem isn't blocking these abilities in game once, its doing it repeatedly. If everything is warded against teleportations it starts to stretch credibility. I've learnedto just deal with it, and never to expect the PCs have to approach a game in a linear fashion. Its not hard at all, but it means I spend less time designing encounters that might not even happen if the characters teleport past. I actually have more of a problem with windwalk. Its not instant travel, but its pretty much better for traveling purpose since you can see the end point before you get there. Not ideal for travel inside, but for traveling overland it can't be beat. It requires some pretty heavy DM fiat to rule that the adventurers are spotted before arriving.

For me the real problem is divinations. Its basically a gentleman's agreement that the party will use them sparingly because its pretty hard to get around the "ask the universe" type divinations.

[Hand_of_Vecna]

I'd like to say that when I first read teleport in the blue book at the age of 12 I thought "I should cast fly first and target 100ft above where I want to go or above somewhere nearby if I need to surprise someone". I find it hard to fathom that I was smarter than any given wizard at the age of 12.

Also it should be very well known that you can end up below your target. A good potion of teleports have to be to wizards bedrooms, summoning rooms, libraries etc which are up enough floors that a down mishap put them on another floor or killed them but made their body accessable halfway through a floor/ceiling/table etc. Sure some incidents could be covered up but others will make their way into general (wizardly) knowldge.

Honestly if your restricting the spread of knowledge that much then teleport being dangerous should be just a rumor that the party could easily dismiss until it happens to them, then their going to use divination to find out what happened to their friend and take steps to never let it happen again.

I know that if I cast teleport and winded up five feet left of where I wanted to be I would then make sure to teleport only to places that were safe for ten feet in every direction and cast feather fall before hand. Also without safe locations you only need 1 spell to cover your but not 2 you either cast fly (or feather fall) and aim arbitrarily high or some earthspell and aim arbitrarily low. It's not metagaming because you aimed arbitrarily high/low thus showing fear and respect for the miss chance greater than what it mechanically deserves.

Also on the subject of rope trick, don't carry more stuff than you can put into normal sacks (which you carry in you magical bags) when needed. Empty your magical containers into normal containers and turn your empty magical containers indsideout rendering them temporarily inert.

[Quietus]

I thought opening an extradimmensional space inside of an extradimmensional space basically destroyed everything in the space.

That's just the "Portable Hole + Bag of Holding" deal, which itself is a carry-over from older, more instagib rules.

Personally, I'm thinking I might just make extradimensional spaces nonfunctional within other extradimensional spaces. So your wizard casts rope trick, neat. He climbs up into it. He rests for eight hours. Then he goes to take his spellbook out of his haversack, and instead finds that he has an empty backpack. When he leaves the rope trick, the bag functions just fine, but now they have to spend an hour outside their safe haven while he re-mems spells.

[PId6]

Personally, I'm thinking I might just make extradimensional spaces nonfunctional within other extradimensional spaces. So your wizard casts rope trick, neat. He climbs up into it. He rests for eight hours. Then he goes to take his spellbook out of his haversack, and instead finds that he has an empty backpack. When he leaves the rope trick, the bag functions just fine, but now they have to spend an hour outside their safe haven while he re-mems spells.
And the next time, and every time after that, he remembers to take his spellbook out before climbing in.

[Coidzor]

So... What's the problem, the distance or the quickness with which it can be cast?

Using it to run away from a dungeon to rest is inefficient unless you have reason to believe that rope trick won't work or would be compromised by transdimensional spell. You're using an emergency 5th level spell slot for travel the first time and then setting aside a spell slot that could be used for something constructive for another teleport in order to get back. Using it to run away from a fight is, well, a LOSS. You don't have to have TPKs in order to lose. So if they're high enough CR to give their opponents XP, well, next time the party runs into them, the guys they ran away from might just be even worse.

[Optimystik]

And the next time, and every time after that, he remembers to take his spellbook out before climbing in.

Away with you and your common sense!

[Hand_of_Vecna]

And the next time, and every time after that, he remembers to take his spellbook out before climbing in.



Away with you and your common sense!


Also on the subject of rope trick, don't carry more stuff than you can put into normal sacks (which you carry in you magical bags) when needed. Empty your magical containers into normal containers and turn your empty magical containers indsideout rendering them temporarily inert.

and why didn't they just dangle the haversack out reach in and grab the book the first time?

[Hecore]

And then they find out that in retaliation, the bandits had cast Flesh to Stone -> Transmute Rock to Mud -> Purify Food and Drink on the hostage. Good luck Resurrecting them from that one! :smallcool:

I've seen this before and it doesn't work. Flesh to Stone states that the victim is turned into a statue, and Transmute Rock to Mud only works on "natural, uncut or unworked rock of any sort into an equal volume of mud" -- In no way does statue fall under any of these categories.

And this is ignoring the incredibly liberal definition of 'mud' as contaminated water to work via Purify Food and Drink.

[Koury]

And this is ignoring the incredibly liberal definition of 'mud' as contaminated water to work via Purify Food and Drink.

What? Merriam-Websters (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/mud) defintion of mud is liberal?

Assuming that the liquid involved is actually water, I'm not seeing a problem.

[Hague]

There's a way of dealing with Teleport spells. The spell Zone of Respite prevents teleportation effects into the warded area. The Anticipate Teleportation and it's greater version delays the appearance of a teleporting group and warns those inside of the presence of a teleporting group. Permanent versions of these spells could be crafted into wondrous objects placed inside a dungeon.

[okpokalypse]

You may call me a bad DM, but I've always banned Teleport and it's variants. Both for PCs and NPCs. That spell simply doesn't exist in my settings.

Bad DM :smallsmile:

[PId6]

I've seen this before and it doesn't work. Flesh to Stone states that the victim is turned into a statue, and Transmute Rock to Mud only works on "natural, uncut or unworked rock of any sort into an equal volume of mud" -- In no way does statue fall under any of these categories.

And this is ignoring the incredibly liberal definition of 'mud' as contaminated water to work via Purify Food and Drink.
Well, technically a statue made from Flesh to Stone is both uncut and unworked, since it started out exactly as it is. Natural is a bit more ambiguous, but that's an "or," not an "and," so it doesn't matter. As long as one of the conditions are satisfied, Transmute Rock to Mud works.

Even if you don't allow Transmute Rock to Mud though, you can still blast the statue to bits and scatter the pieces, or Plane Shift it to the NEP or something. Alternatively, Flesh to Salt, then apply hot water. After it's completely dissolved, use Purify Food and Drink to purify the salt out of the nice fresh water.

[okpokalypse]

In my current campaign a crap-ton of stuff is banned. Pretty much every divination is either banned or an "Artifact Spell" meaning they can only exist as items or scrolls, and cannot be copied into spellbooks or learned spontaneously. This includes, but it not limited to, every detect spell (magic not included, but gimped a lot), identify, tongues, locate object/creature, see invis, scrying, contact other plane, etc...

It's brutal. We're basically ALWAYS in the dark and ALWAYS getting surprised. It's a little frustrating, but it's the DM's reaction to having a L18 Diviner in his last campaign. He just wants it all gone.

That being said - as a DM myself I wouldn't prohibit that, nor would I ever prohibit teleport and travel spells. They're far too necessary. If you don't want them, don't design a campaign past 8th level. Period.

As for Resurrection, I make it tough in my world. You can only be Resurrected / Raised IF you have a patron deity and are in good standing Furthermore, you can only be raised by one capable of doing so who is also a follower of said patron deity. Other deities aren't granting Resurrections for another Deity's followers...

In all but the most remote circumstances, it makes Resurrection a non-factor as a player would much rather reroll and get back in the game than be inactive for X sessions until they stumble upon the right type of Cleric.

[Beorn080]

Just about any spell whose purpose is more then mere damage can be plotkilling.

Massive goblin army preparing itself to emerge from a cave system and ravage the land? Cloudkill.

Enemy city preparing to attack your weak defenseless hovel you call home? Minor Creation Black Lotus Extract into their water supply.

Bypassing everything is what magic does best.

[Emmerask]

So not creating rules... is creating rules? :smallconfused:

Well you are not not creating a new rule, you are creating one, your rule just states that nothing happens in that case, which still is a rule :smallbiggrin:

[GolemsVoice]

It might just be us, as players, and the fact that we never really took many divination spells, but we, as players, have a sort of honor. If something can finish up a fight quickly, no problem. But if something can end a whole campaign in a few seconds, we just don't do it, right? We're all here to enjoy the plot, not to destroy it as efficiently as we can, thus robbing us of many hours of fun. That's not to say we stay intentionally dumb, but we don't do some stuff. If we can teleport somewhere, the DM wanted us to be able to teleport there. If speak with dead gives us sensible answers, these answers are part of the adventure. While we won't always get the "full worth" of a spell, we don't see that a s aproblem.


But on the other hand, I would fully expect my DM to make my spells usefull. If I'm a diviner, I WANT to know stuff before it happens. That's what I DO. I don't want the DM to hand me his script, but Playing a wizard who is forbidden from taking any divination spells and then having the party constantly be suprised would anger me to no end.

[Endarire]

This utopia would only exist if people got along. If a Wizard could do all this, why would he share it? Accountability keeps men in reality honest. With much less accountability and gobs of power, why wouldn't such a caster be a greedy bastard?

[Hecore]

Well, technically a statue made from Flesh to Stone is both uncut and unworked, since it started out exactly as it is. Natural is a bit more ambiguous, but that's an "or," not an "and," so it doesn't matter. As long as one of the conditions are satisfied, Transmute Rock to Mud works.

Even if you don't allow Transmute Rock to Mud though, you can still blast the statue to bits and scatter the pieces, or Plane Shift it to the NEP or something. Alternatively, Flesh to Salt, then apply hot water. After it's completely dissolved, use Purify Food and Drink to purify the salt out of the nice fresh water.

Well, the statue would be magically worked - it wouldn't exist without the application of the spell.

As for the liberal definition of rock to mud I'm assuming the mud is mostly dirt with some water - it seems way beyond the reach of the spell to turn a portion of a mud hut into a puddle of drinkable water as well. Yes, you could add water but I address this below.

Purify Food and Drink specifies that it cannot be used on creatures, and I would argue that mud or dissolved salt would still count as a creature due to their magical transformation and the fact that their soul is locked in the remnants of mud/salt (and this seems to be supported by stone to flesh targeting a petrified creature and not a petrified object).

[Beorn080]

Well, the statue would be magically worked - it wouldn't exist without the application of the spell.

As for the liberal definition of rock to mud I'm assuming the mud is mostly dirt with some water - it seems way beyond the reach of the spell to turn a portion of a mud hut into a puddle of drinkable water as well. Yes, you could add water but I address this below.

Purify Food and Drink specifies that it cannot be used on creatures, and I would argue that mud or dissolved salt would still count as a creature due to their magical transformation and the fact that their soul is locked in the remnants of mud/salt (and this seems to be supported by stone to flesh targeting a petrified creature and not a petrified object).

Flesh to salt, dump in river above major city. Now you have to gather an entire city's waste products, plus the water, boil it all down, gather the salt, and cast the spell. Oh, and the salt needs to be arranged properly, else he comes out as a a puddle of blood and salt crystal sized chunks of skin and organs.

[Foryn Gilnith]

And never during any of this does it cross their minds that the random-scattering effect might take them downwards.
This is interesting to consider, actually.


Off Target
You appear safely a random distance away from the destination in a random direction. Distance off target is 1d10×1d10% of the distance that was to be traveled. The direction off target is determined randomly
You appear safely a random distance away from the destination. Now, "safely" precludes appearing in rock and dying instantly, but this has interesting possibilities when the Z-axis is considered. You end up trapped in a cave somewhere with an adequate air supply, and you have to burn another slot - or, gods forbid, wait 8 hours for your new spells.

[jiriku]

That being said - as a DM myself I wouldn't prohibit that, nor would I ever prohibit teleport and travel spells. They're far too necessary. If you don't want them, don't design a campaign past 8th level. Period.

Yes, exactly! Non-combat encounters have an EL too.


Trying to find a way to escape a pocket demi-plane is a 7th or 8th level challenge. So is slogging through a jungle in search of a lost city.
Learning the name and location of the secretive master villain is about a 5th or 6th level challenge unless he and all his minions are very good at avoiding magical detection.
Crossing a wide chasm without a bridge, or dealing with a normal disease is maybe a 3rd or 4th level challenge.
Solving a murder mystery against a perp who is unskilled at evading divination and magic lie detection is a 1st or 2nd level challenge. Same with surviving the blistering heat of the desert.


Yet I've played for DMs who've thrown these sorts of challenges at us when our party was 10th, 12th, or 15th level, and then gotten dismayed when we quickly crushed the challenge, and responded by nerfing divination, transport, and environmental magic to make things work like 6th level again.

Well duh! You wouldn't send a pack of basic orcs against a 15th level party, would you? Don't send them weak non-combat encounters either. Use level-appropriate challenges.

[Shhalahr Windrider]

Yes, exactly! Non-combat encounters have an EL too.


Trying to find a way to escape a pocket demi-plane is a 7th or 8th level challenge. So is slogging through a jungle in search of a lost city.
Learning the name and location of the secretive master villain is about a 5th or 6th level challenge unless he and all his minions are very good at avoiding magical detection.
Crossing a wide chasm without a bridge, or dealing with a normal disease is maybe a 3rd or 4th level challenge.
Solving a murder mystery against a perp who is unskilled at evading divination and magic lie detection is a 1st or 2nd level challenge. Same with surviving the blistering heat of the desert.

This has got to be the best way of stating the point that I have ever read or heard. Thank You! :smallsmile:

[AslanCross]

I think teleportation is great for saving the PCs' lives: tactical retreats. It then allows for getting back to the target location easily.

It's easy to prevent the PCs from getting to the location without traveling. The spell description says:


You must have some clear idea of the location and layout of the destination. The clearer your mental image, the more likely the teleportation works. Areas of strong physical or magical energy may make teleportation more hazardous or even impossible.

A map that simply shows the general location of the target is not enough to allow the players to bypass every hazard on the way. Putting them within a day's travel of the target (even if they're technically "on target") is definitely acceptable especially if the location is rather mountainous. Remember, maps are only a rough approximation.

Now giving them an actual map of the dungeon's layout is just making things too easy---unless you don't tell them where the dungeon exactly is. "We teleport to the Boss Chamber of the Dark Dungeon in the Great Swamp" isn't enough as far as I can tell---they have to know exactly WHERE in the Great Swamp it is.

As for resurrection spells, I like Eberron's solution (It's what I use). Most clergy in churches actually don't have cleric levels. They're experts with ranks in Heal, Knowledge (Religion), Profession (Scribe) and Diplomacy. They're mostly healers and teachers---not so much magical champions.

If there are any clerics, they're of a lower level than the PCs. Level does not necessarily mean position. In the entire world, clerics that can actually cast resurrection spells are very rare and are likely in positions of global influence in the church and aren't found in random village churches.

Even when one of the PCs can cast resurrection magic, they can only do so if they're still alive and have 5000 GP worth of diamonds on hand. :P My party still lives in mortal fear of losing the cleric. (She's also the only person in the party who knows the weaknesses of the monsters they fight, so without her they're pretty much screwed.)

If there's anything that kills plot, it's Mordenkainen's disjunction.

<BBEG> "You cannot stop my planar orrery from aligning!"
<Wizard> *yawn* *disjunction*
<BBEG> NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

[Tiki Snakes]

So, what happens when someone hits a petrified person/statue with a big hammer, and smashes the statue?

I can't find anything in the srd that mentions that destroying the statue changes the whole they're not really dead thing.

So you don't even really need 90% of that combo, just destroy the statue however you like. break it down into small chunks and pave your driveway with it perhaps, or throw the bits into the sea to be worn down over the years.

Why go to the lengths involved in questionable spell combo's when a hireling with a big hammer and an hour or so to spare can acheive the same result? :smallsmile:

Or, if you are in a hurry, just disintegrate the statue and blow away the dust?

[nedz]

Flesh to Stone followed by Awaken Constuct.

Would it then be an evil act to cast Stone to Flesh ?

[lesser_minion]

Fabricate can be pretty annoying. See those trees? Three seconds later, you have a bridge.

It's not as bad now that you can bill the players for the components... somehow... and because you can use 'material' to block anything ridiculous like "I make TNT out of tree bark, urine, and acid".

It can still short circuit a few plots though.


So not creating rules... is creating rules? :smallconfused:

The way it's worded, the rules mandate that something bad happens.

If nothing happens, you've overruled them.

[Irreverent Fool]

Flesh to Stone followed by Awaken Constuct.

Would it then be an evil act to cast Stone to Flesh ?

I don't have my books handy, but doesn't awaken construct require the thing to be a construct first?

I like the general idea though. How about using the statue as components for crafting a stone golem? The magic immunity would mean they couldn't even be dispelled.

[Gnaeus]

I gotta say the entire divination/scrying line is the biggest offender IMO.


Just like with any other feature of the game, you make them work for you (the DM).

In the game I am currently in, the big bad runs off with the treasure. He is a wizard so he has protections against scrying in place.

Divination: (Contact other Plane)
Where is BBEG? FAIL
Is there anyone alive who knows the location of the BBEG? NO
Is there anyone alive who has information that could lead us to BBEG? YES
Next 3 questions finding the guy to help us track the BBEG.

Then we teleport to the nearest city (to that guy) with which we are familiar, and go on a quest to find him. That would be subquest 1, aided by teleport and divination, but not solvable with them.

We find the guy. He doesn't know where BBEG is, but he knows that BBEG had an apprentice, now dead. He agrees to help us by speaking with apprentices body, but only if we can find it (it was stolen).
Divination (Contact other plane) helps us find the body.
That would be subquest 2 aided by 2 divination spells, but not solvable without work.

Body tells us that BBEG set a command word into his golems, making them return to his lair. He gives us the command word and tells us the rough location of a golem. We teleport to nearest city to golem, fight our way to it, and give it the command word. That would be subquest 3, aided by a speak w/ dead, a contact other plane and another teleport, but not solved by them.

Now, we (we hope!) track the golem back to its creator.

If you were counting, that is clever use of 3 contact other planes, and one speak with dead, just to get some of the information we needed. 2 teleports to get us to the vicinity of our quest targets, but teleport didn't stop us from 2 overland adventures so far, and # 3 will be following the golem. The divinations and teleports didn't derail the plot, they drove the plot. Make the spells work for you.

[Irreverent Fool]

If you were counting, that is clever use of 3 contact other planes, and one speak with dead, just to get some of the information we needed. 2 teleports to get us to the vicinity of our quest targets, but teleport didn't stop us from 2 overland adventures so far, and # 3 will be following the golem. The divinations and teleports didn't derail the plot, they drove the plot. Make the spells work for you.

I only wish my DM was that sharp. I tend to play the casters and after a couple of reasonable divinations ruining plots, usually keep from using them just to keep the game enjoyable. Tracking a wandering golem overland just seems rife with possibilities.

[Set]

Purely from a meta-gaming standpoint, taking divination or teleporation spells is, IMO, sub-optimal.

If the GM/story requires the PCs to know something, they will bloody well find out about it. Casting a spell to find out what the GM was pretty much obligated to tell the party to advance the plot is wasting a spell. Using a Commune or Divination on what the intimidated henchman or rescued villager or betrayed ally was just gonna tell you anyway, or the message gripped in that arrow-riddled courier's fist that the DM calligraphied onto parchment, sealed in candle wax and handed out as a prop, lovingly details, is just a waste of party resources.

Similarly, being able to transport the party around is great, if your goal in life is to be the 'neighborhood bicycle.' (Everybody gets a ride!) Again, if the adventure is 'over there,' any published adventure will have a built in way to get the party 'over there.' Ride the lightning rail. Follow the caravan. Charter that merchant ship. The adventure probably expected you to do that and set up some nice encounters on the way that will give you XP and gear (and occasional plot-related information) to help with the encounter at the destination.

A self-only teleport allows you one of two neat options;

1) The party is dying. You leave. Go team you! Enjoy sitting around while everyone else writes new characters. Unlike you, they get to design their characters with knowledge of what sort of stuff they are up against, choose useful Favored Enemies, stock up on Bane Weapons, skip taking spells they've discovered kinda suck, avoid Feats / spells / etc. that helped them survive those painful early levels in favor of late-blooming builds and only spend WBL on gear that is optimized for this level, right here, right now, as if they'd somehow managed to sell every single bit of loot they'd gotten in their lives at full GP value, unlike your teleported-away-and-left-his-friends-to-die self.

2) You go somewhere and the rest of the party can't. Any encounter there is balanced for you *and your party.* You die. (This also applies to other 'leave the party' abilities, like being the only member of your party with innate aquatic qualities, who gets to explore the sunken catacomb 'real quick' and discover the Aboleth that you were supposed to encounter backed up by your posse.)

[Hague]

That Fabricate part only applies when you don't have your wizard saying things like "I use Fabricate to make a bong." and then making Nature checks to find things to smoke in it...

[Roderick_BR]

Another one for teleport. My group did that. We invaded some keep thing, reached the main room, the druid used a spell to make a makeship bridge over the trap filled room (it was inside a natural cave, or I could have cast fly on everyone). Grabbed the super special plot item crystal, rest of the guards arrive.... and I use my staff of teleport to get back home. The DM was fumming. Not more than when he gave us that stone of controlling elder elementals, though..

[Hand_of_Vecna]

Purely from a meta-gaming standpoint, taking divination or teleporation spells is, IMO, sub-optimal.)

I've always been annoyed by the idea that players need to act a certain way because, the author of a published adventure didn't plan for it. Characters shouldn't sit around waiting for NPC's to solve logistical problems or advance the plot. This is the main reason I've never liked many published modules and have walked out on about half of the non dungeon crawl ones that have been presented to me. Overland travel shouldn't be part of highlevel adventures and if the party is missing out on good stuff encounters/tresure/information by traveling via magic then they should also tbe rewarded by getting to use their extra time. Meaning the DM will have to think for themselves and allow the PC's to interact with the adventure before the point that the adventure's timeline assumes them to come in at.




1) The party is dying. You leave. Go team you! Enjoy sitting around while everyone else writes new characters. Unlike you, they get to design their characters with knowledge of what sort of stuff they are up against. . .

So now everyone but the wizard is going to metagame? I wouldn't be cool with my party doing as DM, except in scenarios where I said something like "this is going to be an undead heeavy campaign, plan accordingly". Also are there no penalties for dieing in your games? In most groups I've played in these metagamers would be a level below the wizard. Wizard+1 level > meta-gaming.



2) You go somewhere and the rest of the party can't. Any encounter there is balanced for you *and your party.* You die. (This also applies to other 'leave the party' abilities, like being the only member of your party with innate aquatic qualities, who gets to explore the sunken catacomb 'real quick' and discover the Aboleth that you were supposed to encounter backed up by your posse.)

Wait, I thought that the whole game was metagamed around the entire party getting a free pass to get everywhere they need to go. If only the wizard can get somwhere then things should be balanced around just the wizard. Unless of course you're running sandbox but then whats there is there and it isn't necessarily balanced to the party.

[Beorn080]

Another one for teleport. My group did that. We invaded some keep thing, reached the main room, the druid used a spell to make a makeship bridge over the trap filled room (it was inside a natural cave, or I could have cast fly on everyone). Grabbed the super special plot item crystal, rest of the guards arrive.... and I use my staff of teleport to get back home. The DM was fumming. Not more than when he gave us that stone of controlling elder elementals, though..

That wasn't really breaking the game. Teleport IS an escape spell. You got in and acquired your objective. Any further combat would have been silly. Breaking the game would have just teleporting in and out.

[Thespianus]

That wasn't really breaking the game. Teleport IS an escape spell. You got in and acquired your objective. Any further combat would have been silly. Breaking the game would have just teleporting in and out.
And if the DM had made the immediate area surrounding the MacGuffin teleport-proof, you would have to fight to a spot where you could Teleport from. Merely finding such a spot while being attacked and hunted is an adventure all in it self.

Plots usually have you fight and crawl through hordes of baddies to get the MacGuffin, but the opposite might be just as fun. Find the MacGuffin, then fight your way to safety.

In-n-Out is good for burgers, bad for teleport and plots.

[GolemsVoice]

Now giving them an actual map of the dungeon's layout is just making things too easy---unless you don't tell them where the dungeon exactly is. "We teleport to the Boss Chamber of the Dark Dungeon in the Great Swamp" isn't enough as far as I can tell---they have to know exactly WHERE in the Great Swamp it is.

And I also think this can be an adventure in itself, with all the nice investigation one loves. They know that, given exact data, they can teleport there no problem, so now it's time to investigate! Ask people, search ancients scrolls, dig through libraries, cast divination spells. This way, everyone benefits. The DM has his investigation (and, unless he actually planned something on the way, getting there would have been "you walk for three days through [terrain], your march is [description]", as it often is), the players that are not casters get to participate, and the caster can use his spells, and the whole party feels like they contributed and made an effort to make their lives easier. Sounds good to me.

[Kesnit]

And I also think this can be an adventure in itself, with all the nice investigation one loves. They know that, given exact data, they can teleport there no problem, so now it's time to investigate! Ask people, search ancients scrolls, dig through libraries, cast divination spells.

Who needs to investigate when there are divination spells?


This way, everyone benefits. The DM has his investigation (and, unless he actually planned something on the way, getting there would have been "you walk for three days through [terrain], your march is [description]", as it often is), the players that are not casters get to participate,

The only participation for the non-casters is hearing the DM say that. The casters got all the info through spells.

[lesser_minion]

Who needs to investigate when there are divination spells?

In theory, they can be worked around -- I believe the assumption is meant to be: "plan for divinations, because if you've assumed that the players will use the proper spells and they don't, then they deserve to fail".

None of the divinations is supposed to be so ridiculous as to destroy the plot, but you do have to work them in.

It basically means that instead of having a plot where you have to kill the king's assassin, you have a plot where you have to stop him killing the queen as well.

Remember that protections exist as well.

[Aron Times]

I'm not saying teleportation should be completely impossible, but as it is now, it does more harm than good. If there were some sort of teleoprtation stations around the world, like in the game the elder scrools 3 : Morrowind, I would have nothing against it, but as it is now, a DM must really go out of his way to make the spell not destroy his game.

This is how long-range teleportation works in 4e. Teleportation rituals that link to teleportation circles are much easier and cheaper to cast than those that can take you anywhere. Linked Portal allows a group to teleport to a circle from anywhere for 135 gold. If it's a circle to circle travel, i.e. the caster cast the ritual from another circle, the cost goes down to 50 gold.

135 gold is cheap, but it adds up if you keep using it. Also, it only connects to an established circle, which prevents scry-and-die tactics so early in the campaign.

[Shhalahr Windrider]

Who needs to investigate when there are divination spells?
Ignoring for the moment that use a divnation is a form of investigation…

Might as well tell the master detective, “Who needs to investigate when you have fingerprints?” Divinations never really give a complete picture. And the really tricky part is knowing which question to ask anyway.

[Koury]

Ignoring for the moment that use a divnation is a form of investigation…

Might as well tell the master detective, “Who needs to investigate when you have fingerprints?” Divinations never really give a complete picture. And the really tricky part is knowing which question to ask anyway.

Well yes, knowing what question to ask can be tricky. But when you have 6 CoPs prepared you can usually figure out which question you need to ask before you run out.

[Shhalahr Windrider]

Well yes, knowing what question to ask can be tricky. But when you have 6 CoPs prepared you can usually figure out which question you need to ask before you run out.
Depends on how many times, “Don’t Know,” “Lies,” and “Random Answer” each come up.

And that’s quite a few CoPs you got there. So you’re pretty high level. Remember what was said about investigative ELs. If the adventure is structured that you can “kill” it with all your spells in a little over one in-game hour, then it’s clearly not level-appropriate.

[Koury]

Depends on how many times, “Don’t Know,” “Lies,” and “Random Answer” each come up.

Probably about 12%, total. Though only 10% is activly harmful to my investigation.


And that’s quite a few CoPs you got there. So you’re pretty high level. *shrug* Level 10 can have 5 pretty easy. You know, per day. Meaning time has to be a factor, or else I can get all the info I need. Or I got some scrolls or whatever. At a little over 1,000 a pop, I can get one or two 'just in case.'

Remember what was said about investigative ELs. If the adventure is structured that you can “kill” it with all your spells in a little over one in-game hour, then it’s clearly not level-appropriate. A group of four level 2s can afford three of these scrolls and only has to pass a DC 11 caster level check to have the party wizard cast it.

Of course, I'm not advocating doing that, but yeah. :smallsmile:

[Shhalahr Windrider]

Probably about 12%, total. Though only 10% is activly harmful to my investigation.
Even at CL 20, any given casting is going to be too small a sample size to discount bad luck making that higher.

And if you are using this to find out which questions to ask, binary search-style, only one lie early on can set you looking in all the wrong places.

Also, remember that Contact Other Plane gives one-word answers


*shrug* Level 10 can have 5 pretty easy. You know, per day.
Not sure about the pretty easy. I’m looking at 4 for a Diviner.

But if you can be sure you won’t need those slots for anything else, go for it, I guess.


Meaning time has to be a factor, or else I can get all the info I need.
With only one-word answers for each question, and only 5 questions per casting (taking your level 10 guy with the 5 slots per day), I don’t think time’s ever going to be properly relaxed. The world has a nasty habit of moving on even when you’re trying to wring answers from greater deities, you know.


A group of four level 2s can afford three of these scrolls and only has to pass a DC 11 caster level check to have the party wizard cast it.
Forgoe pretty much all the gear they might, you know, actually need for 12 unreliable one-word answers to their questions? Oh, yeah, that’s really gonna put them on the track for success. :smallsigh:

[Koury]

Even at CL 20, any given casting is going to be too small a sample size to discount bad luck making that higher.

And if you are using this to find out which questions to ask, binary search-style, only one lie early on can set you looking in all the wrong places.

Also, remember that Contact Other Plane gives one-word answers Sure, there is always the element of risk. But at level 20, you can tack on two or three "Did you tell the truth on each of my first X questions." if you're worried about it. Besides, one word can be plenty in a number of cases, especially Whodunit's.


Not sure about the pretty easy. I’m looking at 4 for a Diviner.

But if you can be sure you won’t need those slots for anything else, go for it, I guess. I pull 5 out from a level 10 Focused Specialist Diviner with 20 Int. One normal slot, 3 from Specialist and one bonus slot. At level 9 you only have 4, however.

As for being sure you won't need anything else... CoP to find out? :smalltongue: But no, thats the whole issue here, isn't it? It's the kind of spell that is likely to be all you need. Much more so then, say, fireball, at least.



With only one-word answers for each question, and only 5 questions per casting (taking your level 10 guy with the 5 slots per day), I don’t think time’s ever going to be properly relaxed. The world has a nasty habit of moving on even when you’re trying to wring answers from greater deities, you know. Yeah, like I said, time pretty much must be a factor to the story. If I'm in a more sandboxy game, I can simply cast my CoP at my leasure and find the nearest hidden hoard of treasure and go claim it for myself.

"Is there an unclaimed item of over 5,000 gp value within 5 miles of my current location, which I can access?"
If no: "...within 10 miles..."
If yes: "Which direction is it from my current location?"

Etc, etc, zeroing in closer with each casting.


Forgoe pretty much all the gear they might, you know, actually need for 12 unreliable one-word answers to their questions? Oh, yeah, that’s really gonna put them on the track for success. :smallsigh:

Well, if they manage to find the item I mentioned above, then yeah, it can. :smallbiggrin:

But really, if you're not constrained by time, you can do whatever you want. A group of four people is basically guaranteed 40 gp/week via profession. The 'buy scrolls of CoP and profit' plan fail? Meh, work for a month or so and buy some equipment and go kill stuff anyway. Try again whenever you feel like it.

Again, I'm not actually advocating this. :smallsmile:

[Sliver]

Secret chest also takes 10 minutes to cast. If your standing around in a dungeon for 10 minutes after having had a battle. SOMETHING is going to come and interrupt you.

If you can't spare the 10 minutes of casting secret chest before rope trick, how the hell are you supposed to expect to have enough uninterrupted sleep to recover spells without the rope trick?

If you go against rope trick by saying that they can't bring their handy harvestsack and can't cast a secret chest because they don't have safe 10 minutes... So they should sleep around for 8? Even with a guard, that will get interrupted in the first 10 minute, so the casters can't rest. If he could, then a guard while casting secret chest would work too.

[Dingle]

for a stone to flesh permadeath, people may be bringing real world physics into a RAW discussion.

Nothing seems to preclude the charachter from retaining hitpoints, and "If the statue resulting from this spell is broken or damaged, the subject (if ever returned to its original state) has similar damage or deformities." vaguely implies that hitpoints are retained.
They might even remain a creature rather than an object, but that's a bit of a stretch.

How many ways of damaging objects are there without doing hit point damage? damaging creatures? without killing as well?
(transmute rock to mud might be the only one, vorpal might count but also kills them)

In order to destroy the statue, you must reduce its hitpoints, which gives the dead status, which allows resurrection.

for teleport; at high levels, teleport changes "you spend a month sailing to city x" to "you teleport to city x", and allows you to avoid low CR annoyances and get on with the plot and world saving.

[Doppelganger]

Simple (and fantasy generated) solution: Magic makes noise. All magic users can detect spells, and the higher level they are the farther away they can sense magic. Likewise, the higher level the spell, the "louder" it is. If the PCs want to blow twenty spell levels screwing up the plot (and you don't want to stop them with creative twists too often) then a mage shows up and trys to capture the caster.* When the party caster is low level and non-plot destroying, no one notices, as long as he doesn't do anything stupid, like cast his most powerful spells in front of a mage's tower. As he gets higher level, he has to start rationing his spells. In general, he won't get attacked, but if he blows off a lot of magic in a fight, or uses it right next to a mage's house, or does something that will utterly screw up the plot, a wizard pops in. And, if they actualy start fighting, it may draw more casters hopping to grab the participants once they've spent most of their spells. If this goes on too long, you can generate a magical feeding frenzy, calling casters from all over the continent.
Example:
DM: You approach the sinister house of Lord Ugly. A gaurd stands at attention before the gate.
PC: Uh oh. I need to get in, but he'll find *plot coupon* if he searchs me. Charm person!
Gaurd: Oh, good afternoon. Please come in.
DM (RAW): sigh. *crosses out a page and a half of notes*
DM (Noisy magic): OK, as you enter the building, you see a young man in scribes robes running towards you, flanked by two gaurds. You feel the air ripple as he scans the corridor for magic. If you don't do something, he'll see the charmed gaurd!
PC: Attack!
If the PCs win without using more spells, they get to move on, they've covered for their mistake. If they do anything else magical, more high level casters show up and attempt to subdue the magic users. This keeps going, getting higher on the food chain as they use more spells. If they get swamped at this point, the spellcasters are dominated, and the fighters imprsioned. The skillmonkey should be able to get them out, and then they can have an adventure of keeping the casters away long enough for the domination to wear off. This gives the fighter types something to do at high level since the sorceror can't magic away most problems without drawing more attention than they're worth. Conversly, it lets casters blast true threats with all they've got, and lets them be useful the rest of the time as bad archers or knowledge repositorys. It doesn't get rid of the problem, but the PCs can still use spells if things get desperate/are vitaly important, and can't just blast every encounter out of the way. So spellcasters don't use rediculous divinations like the treasure hunting CoP, but they can still do research on who has *plot coupon* magicaly.
*I don't see why magic users in high magic settings are free willed. Just slap a dominate person on 'em as aprentices, and tell them, "don't resist any spells I cast on you".

[PId6]

Nothing seems to preclude the charachter from retaining hitpoints, and "If the statue resulting from this spell is broken or damaged, the subject (if ever returned to its original state) has similar damage or deformities." vaguely implies that hitpoints are retained.
They might even remain a creature rather than an object, but that's a bit of a stretch.

How many ways of damaging objects are there without doing hit point damage? damaging creatures? without killing as well?
(transmute rock to mud might be the only one, vorpal might count but also kills them)
Bolded portion is the key here. If they stay as statue, they don't actually take damage, so they can't die. The only way to deal that damage them is to Stone to Flesh them, but that requires the stone/salt to exist.

[Saintjebus]

(RAW): sigh. *crosses out a page and a half of notes*
DM (Noisy magic): OK, as you enter the building, you see a young man in scribes robes running towards you, flanked by two gaurds. You feel the air ripple as he scans the corridor for magic. If you don't do something, he'll see the charmed gaurd!


Ok, I don't really see this here. Basically, the DM is shafting caster for using their class abilities. Now, I don't deny that casters need a lot more "handling" to avoid breaking the game, but isn't there a better way than,

"Bad Wizard! You cast a spell that I didn't prepare for! Now I slap you with bigger wizard stick!"

[Doppelganger]

No, its not. It's penalizing wizards for reclessly ussing their abilities. If the situation is realy that bad, than the wizard will have to take the risk. The players in that example got a small amount of attention, and if they handled it right (bluff checks, manualy beating the people up, sneaking past the gaurd in the first place) they would get away with a little of difficulty. It's saying that there is no such thing as a free magical lunch, and the only way you should attract serious opposition is by supernovablasteverythingwithcheese tactics, or using magic right under a casters nose. Casters are, at high levels, more powerful than fighters, and this helps even it out a bit. You can do more than a fighter, but the repurcusions are more serious.

[PId6]

No, its not. It's penalizing wizards for reclessly ussing their abilities. If the situation is realy that bad, than the wizard will have to take the risk. The players in that example got a small amount of attention, and if they handled it right (bluff checks, manualy beating the people up, sneaking past the gaurd in the first place) they would get away with a little of difficulty. It's saying that there is no such thing as a free magical lunch, and the only way you should attract serious opposition is by supernovablasteverythingwithcheese tactics, or using magic right under a casters nose. Casters are, at high levels, more powerful than fighters, and this helps even it out a bit. You can do more than a fighter, but the repurcusions are more serious.
So you're saying wizards... shouldn't cast spells much?

[PersonMan]

So you're saying wizards... shouldn't cast spells much?

I think so. But it doesn't make sense that, in that case, the DM(somehow preparing an entire page of notes for a single guard-encounter) decides "grrrr, this guy is using class features to defeat an encounter and isn't a class that I think should do that in this situation! How dare you be creative, or use your spells as they were meant to be used!" At least that's how I'm seeing it.

[Dingle]

Bolded portion is the key here. If they stay as statue, they don't actually take damage, so they can't die. The only way to deal that damage them is to Stone to Flesh them, but that requires the stone/salt to exist.

Good point.

So, Flesh to stone is an extremely powerful spell, in that you are no longer covered by any rules and can no longer be affected by RAW as you do not fit into any categories.

except maybe spellt like rock to mud

which leaves the question: how many ways can you affect a Flesh to Stone statue by RAW? (no real world physics, GM rulings, or even common sense(comes from real world physics))

so far: break enchantment, stone to flesh, rock to mud