Making illusions good even at high level

[Nettlekid]

Illusions are really fun in theory, and in shows/movies where they work reliably (looking at you, Loki) they're perfect for getting the one-up on your enemy and making them realize that you had them in the palm of your hand the whole time. As a creativity-driven game, D&D seems to lend itself to this perfectly. Unfortunately, at high levels, illusions really lose their punch. Will saves are just too high, many illusions are invalidated due to Mind Blank, and most of the rest are pierced by True Seeing. What kind of build can make them remain a credible threat?

The biggest offender is True Seeing, I think. Silent Image and company are brilliant, and True Seeing just says "lol nope." I've never been in the "Invisible Spell makes True Seeing see illusions" boat, because sure, you see the spell non-invisibly, but there's nothing that stops you from seeing through the spell normally as per True Seeing anyway. The only things that I've found for at least pausing True Seeing are the Insidious Magic feat from PGtF, and the similar Insidious Illusion class feature from Gnome Illusionist 10. Both force a DC 11+CL caster level check in order to pierce illusions with divination spells. Insidious Magic is a lot easier to get than taking Wizard 10.

I was thinking a build of Gnome Illusionist 5/Shadow Adept 10/Shadowcraft Mage 5. Shadowcrafter could be used instead of Shadow Adept if you want to go more "real illusion" with Shadowcraft Mage, but I think Shadow Adept is better for the general illusionist feel. Not everything is Shadow Miracles, you know. Between Gnome Illusionist and Shadowcraft Mage, all your illusion spells have 3x the duration, and you could tack on Extend Spell for a total of x4. Shadowcraft Mage also has the well-known Shadow Miracle stuff going for it for offense. Shadow Adept gets you Insidious Magic and a couple other Shadow Weave feats for free, as well as some thematic stuff, but quite honestly you probably don't have to take all 10 levels, so if someone else has a better suggesting then that'll do. Thematically, because Gnome Illusionist 1 decreases your CL for either Evocation, Conjuration, or Transmutation spells by 1 (your choice), and Shadow Weave Magic decreases CL for both Evocation and Conjuration spells by 1, I sort of want to have a Focused Specialist with Evocation, Conjuration, and Transmutation banned. But I know that loses two of the best schools of magic, so it might be risky. Thoughts?

[SillySymphonies]

Considering the general question (not your specific build):

Figments (e.g. the 'image' line of spells) are not mind-affecting (thus are not blocked by mind blank) and usually only offer a will save if interacted with (the key here is to create illusions of objects etc. your opponents wouldn't want to interact with in the first place). That basically only leaves true seeing as a potential problem.

The trick with enchantment (that other school negated by a single spell) is to enchant proxies (e.g. the local kingdom) to face your mind blanked opponents for you. Maybe there's a similiar way to work around true seeing? (I think the key here would be true seeing's relatively limited range: 120 ft.)

[Particle_Man]

Another problem is that at epic heights, the spot check can see through illusions without requiring a will save. Mind you, that is at DC 80, so probably the true seeing is the hurdle you have to deal with first.

One trick I heard of is to have a lot of large invisible objects around. When true seeing is applied the objects become visible and clutter up the true seer's vision. Trouble is, that requires a lot of set up beforehand.

Otherwise, there is the killer gnome build that can apply 10% shadow to silent image and then crank that up to at least 100% (some say over, but I would as DM rule that it caps at 100%, as "you make your will save and now it becomes even more effective against you" doesn't work for me). :smallsmile: Anyhow, at 100% reality, true seeing becomes irrelevant.

[Nettlekid]

Considering the general question (not your specific build):

Figments (e.g. the 'image' line of spells) are not mind-affecting (thus are not blocked by mind blank) and usually only offer a will save if interacted with (the key here is to create illusions of objects etc. your opponents wouldn't want to interact with in the first place). That basically only leaves true seeing as a potential problem.

The trick with enchantment (that other school negated by a single spell) is to enchant proxies (e.g. the local kingdom) to face your mind blanked opponents for you. Maybe there's a similiar way to work around true seeing? (I think the key here would be true seeing's relatively limited range: 120 ft.)

That's not really very satisfying. With Enchantment too, it's much more fun if you can manage to Dominate the king or the enemy's BSF or someone worth it. To Dominate a squire and then...I dunno, use them like a dummy to do your dirty work? Not that fun. And it doesn't stop the limitations of not being able to use properly offensive Enchantments on your enemies directly. Illusions would be even more so, since it's not really that much fun to use Phantasmal Stranger on some peasant and have them run off to tell everyone how scary it was. Similarly, if mooks are scared by a clever Major Image but the real threat waves it off, then it didn't really do its job. I agree that probably the best bet is to make faraway illusions which look like reinforcements or a dragon or something, so that they don't think to properly interact with it and hopefully it's also out of range of their True Seeing. But with Insidious Magic, if you were to pump up your CL enough, you have a pretty reliable means of beating the average True Seeing effect, especially if it's from an item.


Another problem is that at epic heights, the spot check can see through illusions without requiring a will save. Mind you, that is at DC 80, so probably the true seeing is the hurdle you have to deal with first.

One trick I heard of is to have a lot of large invisible objects around. When true seeing is applied the objects become visible and clutter up the true seer's vision. Trouble is, that requires a lot of set up beforehand.

Otherwise, there is the killer gnome build that can apply 10% shadow to silent image and then crank that up to at least 100% (some say over, but I would as DM rule that it caps at 100%, as "you make your will save and now it becomes even more effective against you" doesn't work for me). :smallsmile: Anyhow, at 100% reality, true seeing becomes irrelevant.

Hm, that Epic Spot check is a bit troublesome, but I don't think most people would have Spot optimized to that degree. And they definitely wouldn't rely on both Spot and True Seeing at the same time, so if I can counter one, I won't have to deal with the other. Some magical darkness probably takes care of Spot.

I don't like the "large invisible objects" idea because it's way too conspicuous. It would make an enemy think something's up, because it's weird to have a bunch of invisible walls or whatever just lying around, getting in the way. And it requires a bit of setup time, which goes against the spontaneous "I can change the world as I please, or at least how you see it" nature of the Illusionist.

The Shadowcraft Mage's signature ability doesn't really interact with True Seeing. It's not Silent Image that gets 10/level% reality, because Silent Image is subsumed to power a variable-level Shadow Conjuration or Shadow Evocation. THAT'S what gets realer and realer. I suppose using a Shadow Summon Monster spell would create semi-illusions of creatures that True Seeing would notice, and so the reality check comes into it, and in that token arguably using Shadow Orb of Force or Shadow Fireball works the same way, but at that point you're just a Conjurer or Evoker wannabe and you're not properly using illusions as illusions. That's a good fallback for offense, but not for style.


EDIT: Hang on, I didn't read Shadow Illusion carefully enough. Sure, you can use the Silent Image line to mimic Shadow Conjuration and Shadow Evocation with spell level*10% reality, but before it even gets into that, it does indeed say that it changes the Silent Image line from Figment to Shadow. And although it then says you CAN use that altered spell as Shadow Conjuration or Shadow Evocation, it doesn't say that that's the only thing the spell is now good for. Can you use a Major Image of the Shadow subschool to create partially real effects, like a door which pushes back if you touch it or water that splashes when you walk through it, because it's partially there?

[Nettlekid]

I'm posting again because I think this (Figment)->(Shadow) thing deserves some more mention. I know it's totally in DM fiat territory now because there's not much that supports any reading of the change of the fundamental nature of a spell (this would be like if Summon Monster went from (Summoning) to (Creation)), but I'd like to get a dialogue going anyway.

If a Major Image had the Shadow descriptor instead of Figment, then it's partially real. I'm going to assume that the reality factor is the same as the corresponding Shadow Conjuration/Evocation that you'd get if you used the spell in that way: 10*spell level%+20% from the class itself. Let's say you made the Major Image of a bridge, but Major Image was heightened to an 8th level spell. Would that bridge, even if disbelieved, be 100% real as long as you kept the Major Image up? Or is this something that Major Image (Shadow) can't do on its own, and must be used to imitate some kind of Summon Bridge Conjuration spell?

In any case, I'd also love to brainstorm clever uses of a semi-real Major Image. Assuming it's not QUITE as broken as "Yeah, anything I create with the illusion is really real," but broken enough to be "Yeah, it doesn't poof away when you punch it and when it smacks into you, it thuds," I'd love the idea of using Shadow Summon Monster to summon 100% real goons, and then make a totally fake Major Image summoning circle to conjure up a more serious demon to terrify my enemies. Things like that, fun uses of illusions that aren't JUST trickery, because those Summoned Monsters will still fight for real.

[Deophaun]

A bigger issue may be Spellcraft. If someone thinks your illusory effect is a product of magic, it's a DC 20 + spell level check to know the effect is not only an illusion, but exactly what spell produced it. At which point, no Will save is necessary, because you have proof.

So the basic rule of illusions always applies: give no one reason to suspect there is magic at work.

[Nettlekid]

A bigger issue may be Spellcraft. If someone thinks your illusory effect is a product of magic, it's a DC 20 + spell level check to know the effect is not only an illusion, but exactly what spell produced it. At which point, no Will save is necessary, because you have proof.

So the basic rule of illusions always applies: give no one reason to suspect there is magic at work.

Ooh, good point. I mean, assuming the DM rules that a Spellcraft check to scrutinize the appearance of the illusion is an action, that at least wastes a little time of the enemy, and that can be all it takes. It can also lure a foe into a false sense of security, to use a regular Major Image of a Bone Devil, the foe Spellcrafts and sees it's fake, and then you use Shadow Summon Monster VII to summon a "real" one and the foe still has their guard down. Maybe?

[Lord Haart]

It isn't an action and if an enemy succesfully recognised your illusion, there's a risk she'll recognise the summoning spell as well.

[Nettlekid]

It isn't an action and if an enemy succesfully recognised your illusion, there's a risk she'll recognise the summoning spell as well.

Well, to look at the illusion closely enough to study it and make a Spellcraft check is likely to count as scrutinizing the illusion, which the illusion article suggested be at least a move action.

With regard to the summoning spell, the Spellcraft would actually help me there. The spell I am casting is Heightened Silent Image. If they Spellcraft that, then when they see a creature appear, they will assume it is a fake. They don't know that I can turn Silent Image into effectively Shadow Conjuration.