hold person help

[van luke]

If a person is held they can't move but can a outside source move them like another person like lets say I hold person a bartender can I move his arms to tie him up or is he ridged and held fast not able to be moved

[Venger]

yes, you can do that. he's prevented from moving of his own accord. he's not held still by mystical force, you can move him.

[AlanBruce]

The spell does the following:


The subject becomes paralyzed and freezes in place. It is aware and breathes normally but cannot take any actions, even speech. Each round on its turn, the subject may attempt a new saving throw to end the effect. (This is a full-round action that does not provoke attacks of opportunity.)

Emphasis mine, since it is the relevant effect of the spell.

But what does paralysis do?


A paralyzed character is frozen in place and unable to move or act. A paralyzed character has effective Dexterity and Strength scores of 0 and is helpless, but can take purely mental actions. A winged creature flying in the air at the time that it becomes paralyzed cannot flap its wings and falls. A paralyzed swimmer can’t swim and may drown. A creature can move through a space occupied by a paralyzed creature—ally or not. Each square occupied by a paralyzed creature, however, counts as 2 squares.


So in the case of Hold Person, the bartender would be unable to move, but he would not be glued to the ground. He can attempt to break off the spell as a full round action and, since he is considered helpless, he can be tied up by someone else so when the bartender does pass his saving throw, he should still be unable to move.

[van luke]

That is awesome thx .

[AvatarVecna]

If your DM doesn't like that ruling, something I've found that helps convince them is pointing out that it calls for a Will save, indicating that this is a kind of mental effect, rather than the muscles magically seizing up.

[torrasque666]

If your DM doesn't like that ruling, something I've found that helps convince them is pointing out that it calls for a Will save, indicating that this is a kind of mental effect, rather than the muscles magically seizing up.
It is. Its a Compulsion. Its basically overriding the brain's motor functions.

[Rebel7284]

Assuming Hold Person operates by seizing up the muscles, it may realistically be non-trivial to move limbs to a good position to tie the person up. Although someone with a good use-rope modifier can probably figure out how to use leverage and complex ties to work around that. *shrugs* Anyway, tying up is certainly possible, but I can imagine some picky DMs opt to add +2 to the Use Rope check or even rule 0 an opposed strength check if they're really mean.

[ExLibrisMortis]

Assuming Hold Person operates by seizing up the muscles, it may realistically be non-trivial to move limbs to a good position to tie the person up. Although someone with a good use-rope modifier can probably figure out how to use leverage and complex ties to work around that. *shrugs* Anyway, tying up is certainly possible, but I can imagine some picky DMs opt to add +2 to the Use Rope check or even rule 0 an opposed strength check if they're really mean.
I'll take an opposed strength check vs. someone with an effective strength of zero :smalltongue:.

[Segev]

I'll take an opposed strength check vs. someone with an effective strength of zero :smalltongue:.

This, mostly.

Interestingly, it says they have strength and dex 0. Strength 0 usually means they cannot support themselves. However, Dex 0 means they can't move their limbs. And the spell seems to imply they hold the position they were "frozen" in. So they probably don't, as one might expect, slump to the floor or collapse in a boneless heap.

But, their ability to stay standing in that position is precarious. The overall mental nature of the effect is probably sufficient to let their automatic balancing functions hold them in place, but not to overcome more than "normal" balance-disturbing forces. So if somebody shoves them, they fall over, trying to maintain the pose they were in. If somebody manipulates their limbs, they resist...with Strength 0. So they're posable. And falling down probably causes them to do some minor reflexive damage-prevention (since no damage is rolled for less than a 10 ft. fall), and also would let the ground shove their limbs so they lay flat (not requiring them to strain muscles to maintain a nigh-impossible pose on the ground).

In general, they can't engage in voluntary motion, and will engage in just enough voluntary rigidity not to have gravity and other casual forces change their pose on their own.

[ATHATH]

Question: Why are you using Hold Person in the first place? There are much better Save or Lose's out there.

[Segev]

Question: Why are you using Hold Person in the first place? There are much better Save or Lose's out there.

Maybe they just want a person to hold?

[Psyren]

Question: Why are you using Hold Person in the first place? There are much better Save or Lose's out there.

Caster clerics don't get much else at 2nd-level actually, it's a decent choice for them - particularly for the Good ones, since it's a non-lethal + humane takedown.