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View Full Version : [3.5] Does immune to mind-affecting also mean immune to telepathy?



Dark Knight Renee
2011-01-30, 11:07 PM
By RAW, is telepathy (the poorly-defined special ability, not the various spells) a mind-affecting effect, and thus subject to immunity?

And, in your opinion, does the absence of the Mind-Affecting descriptor on Telepathic Bond indicate that it was intended that way, or that it is an error that somehow never escape errata? (Lesser Telepathic Bond, the psionic power Mindlink, and similar spells and powers are listed as Mind-Affecting.)

As a separate question totally outside the RAW or even the RAI, what do you think might the "fluff" justification/explanation be for blanket immunity to mind-affecting effects, especially telepathic communication and thought reading?

Keld Denar
2011-01-30, 11:50 PM
Mind Blank blocks everything with the [Mind Affecting] descriptor. Also, some other stuff, like Scrying and many other Divinations.


Fluff-wise, its basically a wall around your brain. Nothing goes in, nothing goes out. Your mind is your own, and nobody can reach it to tap it, for good or for ill.

Dark Knight Renee
2011-01-31, 12:55 AM
What about built-in creature immunities, such as that possessed by undead, constructs, and plant creatures?

peacenlove
2011-01-31, 02:43 AM
What about built-in creature immunities, such as that possessed by undead, constructs, and plant creatures?

Necromancy spells can influence undead, so my interpretation is that since they have a different type of mindset (or lack thereof) they need a different type of magic to be affected.

ffone
2011-01-31, 02:47 AM
Necromancy spells can influence undead, so my interpretation is that since they have a different type of mindset (or lack thereof) they need a different type of magic to be affected.

Yeah, I tend to think of / fluff undead control stuff as like manipulating the negative energy which powers them, like a puppet on a string - more like 'bypassing' their mind (for those with Int scores at all) than charming/compulsing it.

Although in popular lore, some of the vampire weaknesses are often portrayed psychologically (crosses and garlic) - and they also are *very* crittable (stake through heart, or beheading) - in fact, rather than being uncrittable, pop culture vampires are almost more like 'crit or nothing'. Their DR and fast healing does sorta capture this ( it has a larger % ablation of weaker hits) and does the Slaying a Vampire section.

JaronK
2011-01-31, 02:52 AM
RAW, it doesn't block it.

RAI, at least in some cases perhaps it does. The Mindsight feat is all about detecting things via telepathy... but in the same book that was published in, there was mention of mindflayers hating undead in part because their Elder Brains (who used a similar psionic detection) couldn't see them. This suggests that telepathy and Mindsight are blocked by immunity to Mind Effecting. However, that's all an RAI discussion... nothing in the rules says it's blocked.

JaronK

Psyren
2011-01-31, 02:56 AM
As a separate question totally outside the RAW or even the RAI, what do you think might the "fluff" justification/explanation be for blanket immunity to mind-affecting effects, especially telepathic communication and thought reading?

Some of it actually doesn't make sense to me. If you have an Int score I should be able to read your mind. Why are, say, vampires automatically immune?

ffone
2011-01-31, 03:06 AM
Some of it actually doesn't make sense to me. If you have an Int score I should be able to read your mind. Why are, say, vampires automatically immune?

I sort of hate undead b/c they feel...Mary Sue-ish, sort of like vampires in most other fictional continuities (Twilight, Buffy, etc.) They can flex muscles and run, speak (wittily and with crisp foreign accents), and engage in sexual activities (skillfully and kinkily), and they drink blood (suggesting biological processes, as does the coitus),....but as soon as 'poison' or 'drugs' or DnD enchantment comes up, it's "Oh no, I don't have real biology, so I'm immune!" And then there's the whole perpetual motion machine (Tippyverse labor) thing, since DnD undead don't age or 'need' to eat, even though most types of undead in popular lore are characterized by what they do eat (blood for vamps, brains for zombies).

IMO it would be interesting if Intelligent undead they just got a +4 saves vs mind-affecting to reflect alien mentalities, or something. And perhaps if they had the ability to stay in passively alert stasis indefinitely (to serve as tomb guardians with no food source needed, ever a convenience for DMs) but not expend energy (work) indefinitely with no input energy.

Kuma Kode
2011-01-31, 03:43 AM
By RAW, telepathy is not mind-affecting. It's as mind-affecting as talking to you with nonmagical speak speech. Telepathy does not in and of itself bestow any control, but it synergizes with those things that do.

Alleran
2011-01-31, 05:03 AM
As a separate question totally outside the RAW or even the RAI, what do you think might the "fluff" justification/explanation be for blanket immunity to mind-affecting effects, especially telepathic communication and thought reading?
The way I like to interpret the Mind Blank spell is that it doesn't build a wall around your mind, per se. Doing that on a metaphysical level implies that if a wall can be built, it can also be broken down just by sheer repeated assaults against it, and that you would also know the wall is there, just not what's happening on the other side. Instead, Mind Blank also hides the user from scrying attempts as well, like they're not even there to detect.

The way I treat it instead is not so much a wall as it is illusion, or misdirection. Put simply, by "blanking your mind" you are creating the concept that you're not there because there is nothing there to sense, and that you're actually thinking "certain-number metaphysical distance-measurements to the elsewhere" of where your mind is. Mind Blank protects against epic magic (despite it being only an 8th level spell), and in keeping with the "epic magic is extremely powerful" theme, it can't find you because you're not there. Or, to put it another way, not even epic magic can find exactly where you aren't. The same goes for it hiding the user from 9th level things like Wish and Miracle (which are altering reality for the former and getting help from a god for the latter).