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Tyger
2010-07-13, 12:23 PM
OK, if a character has the Mindsight feat, a telepathy ability and casts the spell Detect Thoughts, would it be unreasonable to rule that the first two rounds of the Detect Thoughts spell are cut out??


You detect surface thoughts. The amount of information revealed depends on how long you study a particular area or subject.

1st Round
Presence or absence of thoughts (from conscious creatures with Intelligence scores of 1 or higher).

2nd Round
Number of thinking minds and the Intelligence score of each. If the highest Intelligence is 26 or higher (and at least 10 points higher than your own Intelligence score), you are stunned for 1 round and the spell ends. This spell does not let you determine the location of the thinking minds if you can’t see the creatures whose thoughts you are detecting.

3rd Round
Surface thoughts of any mind in the area. A target’s Will save prevents you from reading its thoughts, and you must cast detect thoughts again to have another chance. Creatures of animal intelligence (Int 1 or 2) have simple, instinctual thoughts that you can pick up.

Each round, you can turn to detect thoughts in a new area. The spell can penetrate barriers, but 1 foot of stone, 1 inch of common metal, a thin sheet of lead, or 3 feet of wood or dirt blocks it.

As the first round simply shows you if there are any minds there (which you already knew from Mindsight) and the second round gives you their Intelligence score (which Mindsight already gave you), would it be unreasonable to simply skip the first two rounds and move right to the "surface thoughts" portion?

Optimystik
2010-07-13, 12:25 PM
It could be that the spell simply takes that long to "warm up" even if you're already "transmitting," so to speak.

I'd say it's a reasonable houserule though.

Thinker
2010-08-24, 09:09 PM
Looks reasonable to me, though this is a very specific set of circumstances. It's also reasonable not to let it work.

Jack_Simth
2010-08-24, 09:16 PM
OK, if a character has the Mindsight feat, a telepathy ability and casts the spell Detect Thoughts, would it be unreasonable to rule that the first two rounds of the Detect Thoughts spell are cut out??



As the first round simply shows you if there are any minds there (which you already knew from Mindsight) and the second round gives you their Intelligence score (which Mindsight already gave you), would it be unreasonable to simply skip the first two rounds and move right to the "surface thoughts" portion?
If you're the DM? Not overly unreasonable, no, however, players will want to copy the quick-reading method eventually, and it's a noticeable boost in power for that Beguiler-5/Mindbender-1/Beguiler-+X, as it makes it a standard action to read people's thoughts, rather than having it take three rounds ... which makes it useful in the middle of a battle, when it was a non-combat spell, previously.

Tetrasodium
2010-08-24, 09:33 PM
I'd say it probably depends on the situation and character build itself. Like some have said, it could make a very powerful character. Mindspy from complete warrior takes a few levels to merge those first and second then first through third round of detect thoughts though. What is the character getting from his detect thoughts?... some will benefit more than others :)