Question About Divination.

[Secret Bard]

Okay so in the campaign I am running, my players are about to be given the task to kill a king. They have met this king once before; however, what they don't realise is that what they met was really a doppelganger in disguise, a decoy.

My question is, if they tried to use divination to spy on or locate the king, how would this affect the spell? Would they be spying on the doppelganger they met or the real king?

[Omegas]

The king but with the DC of only having second hand knowledge of the target.

Also kings are often warded against such things. Imadgen planning an attack on another kingdom. As a king would you not want to know what they were doing all the time. This is true of most high ranking political figures. The cost of blocking is relatively worth it.

If the King is dead it should show their corps because few magical protections continue when something dies. Also it is often tied to something they have with them all the time like a ring or crown.

[Secret Bard]

Ok thanks :smallsmile: That's what I thought; but wasn't sure.

[nedz]

It depends upon which spell they are using ?
Presumably not the spell called Divination.

[Mnemnosyne]

Actually...that's kind of a hard one to determine without giving it away, in my opinion. See, if the character casting the spell is picturing the person they met, then it seems to me it would scry on the double, not the true king, because that's the person they met. If the person is focusing on the general concept of the king, then they would wind up scrying on the actual king.

By default, I would probably assume that, unless they specify otherwise (thus having suspicions about the situation in the first place) when they scry on 'the king' they're going to be picturing the king that they met, and have that person in mind.

[Crake]

Actually...that's kind of a hard one to determine without giving it away, in my opinion. See, if the character casting the spell is picturing the person they met, then it seems to me it would scry on the double, not the true king, because that's the person they met. If the person is focusing on the general concept of the king, then they would wind up scrying on the actual king.

By default, I would probably assume that, unless they specify otherwise (thus having suspicions about the situation in the first place) when they scry on 'the king' they're going to be picturing the king that they met, and have that person in mind.

It would depend on how the specify their target. If they say "The king of XYZ country" then it would default to the proper king, but it would be, as stated earlier, with the DC of secondhand knowledge (which the players would be unaware of, so there's no giving away there). If they specify "The person we met in the throne hall way back when" then they'd get the doppelganger.

The reason for this is because you can scry someone without having met them, or hell, without even having seen a picture of them, as long as you can unambiguously identify the target. The king of the country is pretty unambiguous, and the spell goes straight to the actual king.

That said, I can't imagine a proper kingdom in a decent magic level setting that doesn't protect it's castles with mages sanctum or the like

[Mnemnosyne]

The problem is the difference in how the player and the character identify the target.

It would be extremely unnatural for the player to say 'the king that we met in his throne room last tuesday' instead of just 'the king'.

It would at the same time be pretty unusual for the character to concentrate on the abstract concept of 'the king' when he's casting his spell. If you've met a guy, and you're trying to scry on him, the most reasonable thing is that you're thinking of the guy you met.

Therefore, the most natural way for the player to say what he's doing does not correlate to the most natural action for the character to take. That's why I would probably assume that if the player naturally says 'scry on the king' I would imagine he is scrying with the thought of the guy he met that he thinks is the king, unless he specifically says otherwise.

Edit: I suppose this also depends on how you view the spell working, too. If you view the spell working through the character's mental assertion 'I'm thinking of the king' then my point holds, but if you view the spell working through verbal instruction where the caster vocally specifies his target and what he has in mind is irrelevant, then you're definitely correct.