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Lysander
2010-07-05, 12:13 AM
What are some good spells with effects that last a long period of time? Basically there are four types of spells here:

Spells with a really long duration (days/weeks/months/years)
Permanent spells
Spells that are permanent until triggered
Instantaneous spells with lasting effects - (like wall of iron, instantaneous but has a lasting benefit)

The goal is to find things a spellcaster could use as long term preparation for all kinds of scenarios.

One good example of what I'm looking for is Phase Door. It can be made permanent true, but it's a very good deal even when permanency isn't cast on it. It has no material or xp cost, provides several uses, and never runs out on its own. A wizard could cover their entire castle with phase doors at no cost over time and have hidden passages everywhere.

I'll add spells as people think of them to this list for easy reference:

Animate Dead
Animate Dread Warrior
Arcane Lock
Awaken
Axiomatic Creature
Bloodfreeze Arrow
Contigency
Continual Flame
Energy Transformation Field
Explosive Runes
Fire Shuriken
Fire Trap
Forbiddance
Genesis
Hallow
Magic Mouth
Mineralize Warrior
Permanency
Phase Door
Plant Growth
Reincarnate
Renewal Pact
Simulacrum
Snare
Stone Shape
Summon Mirror Mephit
Skyrift
Wall of Iron
Wall of Stone
Wood Shape
Zealot's Pact

Vulaas
2010-07-05, 12:13 AM
Hallow is pretty awesome.

Edit: And undeniably Good.

Lysander
2010-07-05, 12:24 AM
Hallow is pretty awesome.

Edit: And undeniably Good.

Yeah, it's pretty sweet. And the one year spell it allows you to place on the area is icing on the cake.

You also reminded me of forbiddance, which is useful way of permanently sealing an area from all extraplanar travel.

Coidzor
2010-07-05, 12:31 AM
Blindness/Deafness? Fairly good debuff for a 2nd level spell, unfortunately targets fortitude and most wizards are smart enough to find some way of negating their ability to get hit by it...

But a blind caster can't get line of sight in order to cast non touch spells, IIRC.

Mineralize warrior. (from the Underdark book?) 6th(?) level sorc/wizard spell that gives the fighter a LA+1 template he can buy off and a slew of goodies from it.

Also makes the fighter your whipping boy for a year and a day. As a way to get minions it's a bit more difficult, due to the cost of doing it. Might be able to set up a racket in universe where you take a portion of novice adventuring parties' proceeds in exchange for that, but one can be a patron without needing temporary thralls anyway.

Summon Mirror Mephit, 2nd or 3rd level spell from Expedition to the Demonweb Pits, IIRC. Gets you a mirror mephit who can make you some permanent simulacrums of various beasties.

Likely to be disallowed due to being an early entry into chain-gating solars.

arguskos
2010-07-05, 01:00 AM
Mineralize warrior. (from the Underdark book?) 6th(?) level sorc/wizard spell that gives the fighter a LA+1 template he can buy off and a slew of goodies from it.

Also makes the fighter your whipping boy for a year and a day.
Yuppers, Underdark, 6th level.


Summon Mirror Mephit, 2nd or 3rd level spell from Expedition to the Demonweb Pits, IIRC. Gets you a mirror mephit who can make you some permanent simulacrums of various beasties.
2nd level, source is correct. Note that this is an INSANELY hard spell to acquire, since like only one copy of the spell exists anywhere, and it's in a specific spellbook somewhere, and is Sor/Wiz only. If you ignore that, Summon Mirror Mephit turns out to be among the most broken spells ever made anywhere ever.

Grumman
2010-07-05, 01:23 AM
Energy Transformation Field is a cool one that converts magic used in an area into a specific spell. Someone like an Eldritch Theurge BBEG could make good use out of it to convert unlimited warlock power into unlimited castings of certain spells.

Coidzor
2010-07-05, 01:26 AM
Energy Transformation Field is a cool one that converts magic used in an area into a specific spell. Someone like an Eldritch Theurge BBEG could make good use out of it to convert unlimited warlock power into unlimited castings of certain spells.

Ooo, that is tasty.

Keld Denar
2010-07-05, 01:33 AM
There are a number of Pact spells in Spell Compendium that have various effects. They are premanent until triggered. Renewal Pact, for example, gives you some restorative effects based on your HD, and Zealot's Pact gives you some heavy buffage when you attack someone who's alignment opposes parts of yours. There is even a Pact that brings you back to life if you die, like a contingency rez, although the stat loss makes this a bad fallback to depend on too much.

Munchkin-Masher
2010-07-05, 01:36 AM
Slay Living.

Death is pretty permanent.

Mushroom Ninja
2010-07-05, 01:48 AM
Why has contingency not yet been mentioned? It's got to be one of my all-time favorite long-lasting spells.

arguskos
2010-07-05, 01:54 AM
Slay Living.

Death is pretty permanent.
This is D&D, where Death is a status condition, normal folk don't know how a BEAR works, and the Revolving Door comes with a sticker saying "I died today!". :smallannoyed:

Death is a JOKE in D&D. Even stuff like Reaping Disintegrate can be powered through. Only Life and Death or Hand of Death can really stop the Door from spinning.

Keld Denar
2010-07-05, 02:32 AM
How about Flesh to Stone, Transmute Stone to Mud, Purify Food and Drink, drink the water, pee in an ocean.

Technically, they never died, so you can't rez them. There isn't enough left ot Break Enchantment on, and even Wish doesn't have this fate listed as the things it can undo, meaning its wholey in the realm of DM fiat.

Some fates are worse than death!

olentu
2010-07-05, 02:43 AM
How about Flesh to Stone, Transmute Stone to Mud, Purify Food and Drink, drink the water, pee in an ocean.

Technically, they never died, so you can't rez them. There isn't enough left ot Break Enchantment on, and even Wish doesn't have this fate listed as the things it can undo, meaning its wholey in the realm of DM fiat.

Some fates are worse than death!

Well to avoid the problem of if this works or not let me consider the case of heightened flesh to salt (I think that would be just about the same) just use transport travelers problem solved.

Saya
2010-07-05, 03:21 AM
If you mean good as in "Has a nice effect" rather than "has GOOD descriptor", Bestow Curse is a nice one.

Also, everyone probably knows, but true strike is always fun.

JeminiZero
2010-07-05, 03:23 AM
Explosive Runes: Hilarity ensues when you stockpile these.

Animate Dead: Undead Minions are always useful, so long as pitchfork wielding mobs and overzealous church types aren't a problem.

(Greater) Glyph of Warding: If used correctly, can effectively function as a one use self-buff version of contingency (E.g. "trap" a pouch with heal, when you are injured, open the pouch as move action to heal yourself). Material component is costly though.

Simulacrum: Giving Players access to broken monster abilities since core, and 4 levels before shapechange.

Shambler/Otyugh Swarm: Not that impressive as far as level 9 spells go, but situationally useful nonetheless.


Energy Transformation Field is a cool one that converts magic used in an area into a specific spell. Someone like an Eldritch Theurge BBEG could make good use out of it to convert unlimited warlock power into unlimited castings of certain spells.

It gets really powerful once you figure out that summoned monsters come with SLAs that can power the field, and you can summon monsters with the field. E.g. SM5 summons a Bearded Devil for 9 rounds. Command the Bearded Devil to spam its at will Greater Teleport. That gives you 9*6 = 54 spell levels which summons another 10 Bearded Devils (~1 each round), who in turn can spam their Greater Teleport...

Coidzor
2010-07-05, 03:55 AM
A bit more XPensive, but Animate Dread warrior essentially nets the caster his slaughtered enemies as minions. I believe it's a 6th level Sorc/Wiz spell from Unapproachable East.

Edit: Forgot to mention it, but there's a pretty hefty intelligence and charisma penalty, so only wisdom based casters and even then,...

Lord Vukodlak
2010-07-05, 04:10 AM
How about Flesh to Stone, Transmute Stone to Mud, Purify Food and Drink, drink the water, pee in an ocean.

Technically, they never died, so you can't rez them. There isn't enough left to Break Enchantment on, and even Wish doesn't have this fate listed as the things it can undo, meaning its wholey in the realm of DM fiat.

Some fates are worse than death!

Yes Wish does have that fate listed, you can revive someones body who has been destroyed by first restoring the body with the first wish then reviving them with the second. Thus you can wish the body back together.

Second no where under Petrified does it say they survive the body being pulverized or otherwise annihilated. Simply they can be brought back if the statue is turned back to flesh more or less intact and a statue they aren't dead. So in essence utterly destroying the body of a petrified creature slays it.

Keld Denar
2010-07-05, 04:54 AM
Petrified
A petrified character has been turned to stone and is considered unconscious. If a petrified character cracks or breaks, but the broken pieces are joined with the body as he returns to flesh, he is unharmed. If the character’s petrified body is incomplete when it returns to flesh, the body is likewise incomplete and there is some amount of permanent hit point loss and/or debilitation.

Show me exactly where in that passage it says that if a subject turned to stone, then the stone is destroyed, but no restorative magic is ever used, that the subject dies? It doesn't. It says that the target is considered unconsious. Thats all. Only when the subject is returned to flesh, is its condition taken into account. ONLY when its returned.

Wish will only provide a body if the target is dead. I've yet to see anywhere to convince me that a smashed, petrified character is dead. If you could find bits of the petrified character to unpetrify, they would be alive and then immediately die from being in pieces. Unfortunately, those pieces are no longer stone, but molicules of water that have been cast to the four winds. You won't find a single piece larger than an H2O molicule to transmute back to flesh, and baring that, the target remains alive.

olentu
2010-07-05, 03:41 PM
Show me exactly where in that passage it says that if a subject turned to stone, then the stone is destroyed, but no restorative magic is ever used, that the subject dies? It doesn't. It says that the target is considered unconsious. Thats all. Only when the subject is returned to flesh, is its condition taken into account. ONLY when its returned.

Wish will only provide a body if the target is dead. I've yet to see anywhere to convince me that a smashed, petrified character is dead. If you could find bits of the petrified character to unpetrify, they would be alive and then immediately die from being in pieces. Unfortunately, those pieces are no longer stone, but molicules of water that have been cast to the four winds. You won't find a single piece larger than an H2O molicule to transmute back to flesh, and baring that, the target remains alive.

Do any of the spells you propose remove the petrified condition.

mostlyharmful
2010-07-05, 03:51 PM
Genesis of course, demiplanar uberness and an intant(ish) source of cool backdrops for your BBEG.:smallsmile:

I also like the spell that binds an elemental to an area, ninth level I think but can't think what it's called anymore. The elemental manifests from the ethereal to defend an area but can't be permenantly slain so long as the spell is in effect or the area still exists, Genius Locus I think,

Lysander
2010-07-05, 06:00 PM
Slay Living.

Death is pretty permanent.

I mean, obviously any spell has a lasting effect in the sense that what it does has happened. But what I specifically mean are things a magician could prepare in advance. For example, blindness which someone mentioned is permanent, but you can't really get blindness ready in advance the way you could a programmed image.

Lysander
2010-07-05, 06:07 PM
I can't believe I forgot about Awaken. One of the best spells in the game. Practically unlimited uses.

The most obvious use is to either make a big dangerous animal like a bear your ally, or to grant your horse intelligence and the ability to speak. There's so much more to the spell though. Build a tree house on a giant tree, awaken the plant, and you have a mobile headquarters. Awaken a whale to assist with naval warfare. Awaken a bird as a scout, spy or a messenger. No end to the possibilities really.

Claudius Maximus
2010-07-05, 06:11 PM
Fire Shuriken and Bloodfreeze Arrow can be used to build stockpiles of pretty decent weaponry, since they stick around forever once created.

Lysander
2010-07-05, 06:27 PM
Fire Shuriken and Bloodfreeze Arrow can be used to build stockpiles of pretty decent weaponry, since they stick around forever once created.

Cool. Added to the list.

There's Skyrift, a 9th level illusion spell that covers a 1-mile area in permanent night. Ideal if you have a magic item that only works at night, or if you want to create a haven for vampires.

Axiomatic creature makes a lawful or neutral creature into a "perfect" version of itself. It gives it a smite chaos attack and some other goodies.