Illusions and partial disbelief

[Acora]

I'm DMing a Pathfinder campaign, and I encountered something strange during a recent session. The party came upon a large, empty road in the middle of an abandoned district of the city, and were told by an NPC that they had to travel along the road the reach their destination. They then noticed a large group of enemies, moving quickly up the road in their direction.

The party illusionist cast Silent Image, creating the illusion of a pit in front of the group of enemies. The enemy commander disbelieved the illusion, however, and so in an attempt to convince his minions to move forward, he tossed one into the supposed pit. Another illusion was cast, making it appear as if the minion fell into the pit and out of view.

Now here's where things got wonky. While the commander disbelieved the pit, he failed the save to disbelieve the falling minion. Even if I had given him a +10 to his save due to not believing the pit existed, he still would have failed.

Has anyone ever encountered this sort of conflicting belief in illusions? What has been your answer to them?

[ISitOnGnomes]

No conflict that I see.

Everyone sees a pit, but Commander Cool is pretty sure it's fake. He throws in a trusted ally to prove it's fake. The entire squad (Commander Cool included) watches this poor sap fall in and die. Everyone is now convinced that the hole is real, at least until the guy comes wandering out of the illusion.

[supermonkeyjoe]

That's... a little beyond what silent image can do, Silent is a figment and as stated


Figments cannot make something seem to be something else.

the illusion of the pit is semi-legit, assuming it was a flat image and a perspective trick but making the minion disappear is beyond what the spell should be able to do.

But DM fiat and all that so the commander believed the second illusion, presumably seeing a soldier fall down a pit that he has disbelieved and can only semi-see. The response really depends on the commander, he may prod the ground to reaffirm his belief and get another saving throw, if he is brave of foolhardy he may stride over the pit himself, if he's smart he may figure out exactly what's happening and order his men to look for the ones casting the spells.

[Jack_Simth]

I'm DMing a Pathfinder campaign, and I encountered something strange during a recent session. The party came upon a large, empty road in the middle of an abandoned district of the city, and were told by an NPC that they had to travel along the road the reach their destination. They then noticed a large group of enemies, moving quickly up the road in their direction.

The party illusionist cast Silent Image, creating the illusion of a pit in front of the group of enemies. The enemy commander disbelieved the illusion, however, and so in an attempt to convince his minions to move forward, he tossed one into the supposed pit. Another illusion was cast, making it appear as if the minion fell into the pit and out of view.

Now here's where things got wonky. While the commander disbelieved the pit, he failed the save to disbelieve the falling minion. Even if I had given him a +10 to his save due to not believing the pit existed, he still would have failed.

Has anyone ever encountered this sort of conflicting belief in illusions? What has been your answer to them?

Well, in the specific instance, I'd point out that figments (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic#TOC-lllusion-Figment) can't make things seem to not be there (those are done by way of Glamers (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic#TOC-lllusion-Glamer)). So the silent image (http://paizo.com/prd/spells/silentImage.html) of a pit simply doesn't work in the first place.

Ignoring that, though, you've got follow-up problems:
1) Silent Image requires Concentration to maintain. The follow-up illusion is going to be replacing the original, if done by the same caster. This is mostly just nit-picking, however.
2) Silent Image doesn't do sound. Generally speaking, someone screams until the thud at the bottom. You won't have that here, which should, at a minimum, give an interaction save for everyone.
3) The guy who's not falling down the pit now has proof (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/magic#TOC-Saving-Throws-and-Illusions-Disbelief-) that it's not real, and nothing is stopping him from going "Oh, hey! I'm not falling! This is just an illusion, guys!" to give everyone a new save with a bonus.

[bot]

Unless the wizard has chain of disbelief acf then all minions auto succedded their saves and not just get a +10 to saves.

Also, silent image can't do this.

Try to read All about illusions on wizards page, gives examples about depth problems with figments

[SamsDisciple]

I saw the problem with the concentration and casting the second illusion but the rule as I understand it is that figments can be imagined as cardboard cutouts or as a cloud of glitter coalescing into a solid image. There are RL examples of sidewalk drawings that if you just wandered by you would swear was really a hole in the ground until you change angle or study it closely, if there was a second person/ second casting of the illusion imagine it as a cardboard cutout in front of the guy in the "Pit", the others dont see him because there is a "wall" of illusion there but he obviously isnt in a pit and can just stand up and "Oh wow your still alive" the second illusion you would have to really sell to the DM and "walls of illusion" like this arent very effective because they only affect things from one point of view so "commander cool" might be affected but it looks totally unrealistic from minion b's perspective 10 ft to the left