Finding a guy among other guys

[Crake]

To be more specific: We have a bunch of cursed gargoyles, we need to find our friend who has been turned into one of them and we dont want to take the time to remove curse on all of them, cause once we fail one remove curse (they will save against it), they all flock us. What can be used to locate the right person out of the gargoyles, taking note that the only people who have met or seen this person face to face are a level 6 druid and paladin, a level 4 monk and (potentially) a level 5 cleric.

edit: oh by the way, non phb1 spells incur a research cost in time and money that we probably dont have the ability to cover, so phb1 spells only.

[Ramshack]

Detect thoughts? Maybe see what the gargoyles are thinking? Perhaps you can find the person youre lookingfr this way. Locate person should also let you know where they are. Are there more mundane ways to figure it out. Maybe the person was wearing something or part of their physical appearance transfered or carried over into their cursed form?

[Crake]

Detect thoughts? Maybe see what the gargoyles are thinking? Perhaps you can find the person youre lookingfr this way. Locate person should also let you know where they are. Are there more mundane ways to figure it out. Maybe the person was wearing something or part of their physical appearance transfered or carried over into their cursed form?

they've all been polymorphed into gargoyles, so locate creature is out, not to mention none of the people who've seen him would have any way of casting locate creature. Detect thoughts is an interesting idea, but since its a variant of baleful polymorph, their thoughts arent that of the original creature, but rather that of a gargoyle

[Medic!]

If the person had a magic item or two that you knew something about, you could use detect magic to find the gargoyle with the magic item's aura. All of them should pop positive for transmutation, so an evocation aura or abjuration aura might give it away.
-This may fail for several reasons: The item is morphed into his new form and doesn't "exist" at the moment, someone else who is turned into a gargoyle may have a similar item, someone may have other spells affecting the gargoyles that mimics the same aura.

Alternatively you could use the Augury spell to figure out which one would lead to a good or bad consequence when you cast remove curse on it.
-This is my favorite out of the suggestions, but divination results rely heavily on your DM. YMMV

Or you could use locate object to find something you knew belonged to that person.
-Could fail for the same reason as detect magic, the item could be non-existant at the moment.

[Randomguy]

Detect magic or Arcane Sight should work, since he was polymorphed and the others weren't, so he should have a transmutation aura.

[Yora]

Cleric devinations would be a simply way. But they are so simple that they make a very interesting situation like this just boring. I'd say don't start going down that road.

So you have lots of humans who have been polymorphed into gargoyls and then turned to stone?

[kitcik]

I think Circle Dance is cool, even thought it is the Easy button.

[Medic!]

As a tribute to a brochacho who frequents both these forums and our IRL table-top sessions:

Use stone shape to make domes around all the gargoyles with little peek-holes, then just go around removing curse all willy-nilly then mop up the trapped gargoyles and free your comrade!

[Thomasinx]

If the person had a magic item or two that you knew something about, you could use detect magic to find the gargoyle with the magic item's aura. All of them should pop positive for transmutation, so an evocation aura or abjuration aura might give it away.
-This may fail for several reasons: The item is morphed into his new form and doesn't "exist" at the moment, someone else who is turned into a gargoyle may have a similar item, someone may have other spells affecting the gargoyles that mimics the same aura.

This spell would fail because, as the OP said, it's a variant of baleful polymorph. With baleful polymorph, all items are dropped on the ground (not polymorphed).


All items worn or carried by the subject fall to the ground at its feet, even if they could be worn or carried by the new form.

How much are the gargoyles moving around? Could you just buy steel shackles and chain all the gargoyles to the floor?

If the gargoyles aren't aggressive, why not just make use of control effects? Get a bunch of castings of wall spells, or shape stone around each gargoyle (mentioned by another playgrounder). If you have infinite time to prepare, there's infinite options.

[Crake]

This spell would fail because, as the OP said, it's a variant of baleful polymorph. With baleful polymorph, all items are dropped on the ground (not polymorphed).



How much are the gargoyles moving around? Could you just buy steel shackles and chain all the gargoyles to the floor?

If the gargoyles aren't aggressive, why not just make use of control effects? Get a bunch of castings of wall spells, or shape stone around each gargoyle (mentioned by another playgrounder). If you have infinite time to prepare, there's infinite options.

The gargoyles aren't agressive until we do something. In the initial run, we just cast remove curse 4 times. The first 3 succeeded, and thus were fine, but the 4th one failed, which then caused it to alert all the others. I think if we were to start casting stuff like stone shape around each one, they would quickly become alerted.

To the guy who mentioned circle dance: not a phb1 spell, so we'd need to research it, costing us more time and money than we can afford for a spell we may or may not use ever again.

I've been thinking, we can maybe wait until the druid hits level 7 and just use scrying to figure out which one it is, but theres no naturally forming ponds nearby, so we'd also have to have a long distance means of communication available at that level.

[rot42]

<snip>
I've been thinking, we can maybe wait until the druid hits level 7 and just use scrying to figure out which one it is, but theres no naturally forming ponds nearby, so we'd also have to have a long distance means of communication available at that level.

A Scrying Shard on page 184 of the Magic Item Compendium would solve that problem - it serves as a focus for anyone who can scry. It is a bit of an investment, but plenty affordable for a level six party.

[Crake]

A Scrying Shard on page 184 of the Magic Item Compendium would solve that problem - it serves as a focus for anyone who can scry. It is a bit of an investment, but plenty affordable for a level six party.

Nice! While I'll have to ask my DM about it, that could be just what we need!

[CigarPete]

That or some way of getting True Seeing. Explicitly shows the true form of polymorphed creatures.

[ericgrau]

If he does still have one of his original possessions then locate object is a 3rd level cleric spell.

[Crake]

That or some way of getting True Seeing. Explicitly shows the true form of polymorphed creatures.

HARP DARP! I'm so retarded for not having thought of that.