Illusion magic interactions & party members

[Stewbert]

Say the party are in a room, an illusory boulder starts rolling toward them. They had a suspicion about the presence of illusions due to an earlier detect magic but were unsure what the illusion was. So the figther throws a coin at the boulder, that to me counts as interacting with it so he gets his entitled will save to disbelieve.

If he fails the save he sees the coin bounce off the boulder and continues to believe it is real.

If he passes the save he sees the truth. The coin travels through the boulder, he knows it is fake and can then alert everyone else so they get a +4 bonus to disbelieve.

What im wondering is, when the fighter throws his coin and the other party members see him do it, does that count as all party members interacting with the boulder thus granting everyone a will save from his one action? Or do they each need to interact with it themselves directly to get a willsave?

If the latter is true, would I just describe the coin as pinging off the boulder to everyone else in the room that saw the coin toss but has not yet directly interacted with it?

Thanks.

[Crake]

Unless the person controlling the image is still concentrating on it and sees the fighter throw the coin at the boulder, the illusion does not change to fit the circumstances around it, and the coin would never ping off the boulder. Of course, if the illusion is being controlled by someone, they can always add the coin to the illusion as it hits the boulder to add to the realism, and force a save, but otherwise the coin would just disappear into the boulder and i'd say that counts as incontrovertible proof that the boulder isn't real, meaning no save, immediate disbelief.

As for what counts as interacting, personally my guideline on what counts as interacting is this: If the illusion draws your attention enough that you react to it's presence, you're interacting with it. Running from a boulder? yes. Avoiding an illusory fire? yes. Walking past a fake wall? no, and so on. That's just my personal guideline though.

[Gallowglass]

I disagree with Crake.

Illusion is magic. Unlike most schools, its very loosely defined by the rules, so its the hardest school of magic to adjudicate.

The cold truth is you have two options with illusions. Treating them like Crake suggests, which hampers or eliminates their usefulness, or treat them more openly which makes them on par with the other schools of magic.

What is being used to power the boulder? Silent Image? Major Image? What spell was expended in crafting this trap? That's a key question. If it was silent image or a low level spell, then its easy to see though because you have a rolling boulder SOUNDLESSLY coming down the chute. So I'm assuming its a major image or other higher end spell.

Illusions on that level HAVE to be programmed with some level of intelligent error handling, otherwise they are less than useless. An illusionary wall MUST be able to hold up to someone walking along tracing their fingers along the wall as they go. An illusionary boulder MUST be able to handle a coin bouncing off of it in some way.

IMO, that's when the save to disbelieve comes in. If the person is walking along, tracing his fingers along the wall (interacting with the illusion), he gets the save. He makes it, he notices that the wall isn't there because the intelligent error handling failed. He fails it, the illusion succeeds in fooling him.

I think how you are handling the boulder is fine and a good adjudication of the rules. I think the way Crake is handling it is fine for his table, but in that table I would certainly never be playing an illusionist or take any illusion spells (unless I was workign up to shadowcraft mage or something).

[Kelb_Panthera]

Actually, unless the illusion is a shadow, the coin passing through it unimpeded is proof that it's not real. Any observers would be entightled to an immediate save to disbelieve with a +4 bonus. Question though; how is anyone fipping a coin at a bolder that's trying to crush them? He's going to be faced with the rather incontrovertable proof that the boulder isn't real when it rolls accross him in a few seconds.

Gallowglass's hyperbole is hyperbolic.

Uncontrolled illusions lacking intelligent response doesn't make them at all useless. It just makes them take a bit more thought. Non-shadow illusions lack any kind of tactile feedback so you want to make sure they don't want to touch it. Placing some brown mold along the walls and including brown mold in the illusion will make trailing a hand along the wall seem like a really bad idea.

If you want intelligent response in illusory traps, use permanent image and couple it with an alaram so the enemy can actively operate the image or use an intelligent trap that can manipulate the image. If you want tactile feedback, you'll have to use shadow illusions.

[Stewbert]

Glad to see a mix of opinions. I didn't swallow Crake's rulings comfortably either, not to say he is wrong at all. I see the merit in a coin passing through a boulder being proof but to me that makes illusions pretty easy to defeat.

The spell is a Persistent Image, they are in a 20th+ level wizards tower. Group is level 11.

In my mind it works like so, the boulder is real in their minds UNTIL they interact with it. When the coin was thrown, they were granted a chance to realise it wasn't real (as per interaction rules). The coin never bounced off the boulder (it travelled right on through), BUT they believed it did because they failed their save. The boulder is the illusion, the rest of it (the coin bouncing) is their mind filling in the gaps to make the illusion real to them when they fail their save.

I guess where I stumbled was how the rest of party perceive the coin toss. By Crake's logic everyone is given proof of its falsehood, and the illusion fails for everyone in the room instantly. If instead saving throws are allowed to disbelieve, do the other party members get one or just see the bouncing coin because they haven't directly interacted with the boulder YET and so believe it to be real.

[Kelb_Panthera]

The illusion isn't in the PC's minds at all; that's phantasms, patterns, and enchantment magic.

Like I said, there's no reason you can't set it up to work the way you say but it's not simply a matter of casting the spell and forgetting about it. You'll have to fork out some gold. Either simple alarm traps so that the trap-layer can remotely observe and conrol the illusion when there are victims to be had or the more expensive intelligent programmed illusion traps that can have the illusions they create react as they were instructed by their owner/ creator.

Illusion is already a powerful school. It doesn't need this kind of boost.

[Crake]

I disagree with Crake.

Illusion is magic. Unlike most schools, its very loosely defined by the rules, so its the hardest school of magic to adjudicate.

The cold truth is you have two options with illusions. Treating them like Crake suggests, which hampers or eliminates their usefulness, or treat them more openly which makes them on par with the other schools of magic.

What is being used to power the boulder? Silent Image? Major Image? What spell was expended in crafting this trap? That's a key question. If it was silent image or a low level spell, then its easy to see though because you have a rolling boulder SOUNDLESSLY coming down the chute. So I'm assuming its a major image or other higher end spell.

That's fair, let's see if I can't break this down for you.


Illusions on that level HAVE to be programmed with some level of intelligent error handling

Unfortunately, none of the figment illusions that you speak of allow for any sort of "if this, then that" level of programming. Unless someone is actively controlling the illusion to incorporate and account for interactions such as these, the coin will not become a part of the illusion.


otherwise they are less than useless.

I disagree. The trick to using illusions effectively is in intelligent placement.


An illusionary wall MUST be able to hold up to someone walking along tracing their fingers along the wall as they go. An illusionary boulder MUST be able to handle a coin bouncing off of it in some way.

For an illusory wall to be able to defy the laws of physics and prevent someone from actually falling through it, or for a boulder it actually make a coin bounce off it, it would have to be, at least partially, real, which would make it a [Shadow] spell, which is a whole different ball-game. Those spells are actually physically real, though only partly so, and would be able to resist physical interaction.


IMO, that's when the save to disbelieve comes in. If the person is walking along, tracing his fingers along the wall (interacting with the illusion), he gets the save. He makes it, he notices that the wall isn't there because the intelligent error handling failed. He fails it, the illusion succeeds in fooling him.

I can see where you're coming from, but as stated before, the illusion is not physically there, so when his finger comes across the illusory wall, he would stop feeling any physical interaction. For you to say that the save determines whether he feels something or not would indicate that the spell is actually affecting the observer in some way, which figments do not, they simply are there. Think of it this way, if someone throws you against the fake wall, and you pass the save, do you stop at the wall, despite your momentum? Or do you carry onward?

[Gildedragon]

I agree that the coin ought'n't ping off the boulder, or seem to. However a coin is a fine object being chucked quite a distance. A failed save means you didn't see it go through but rather are convinced it got rolled over by the boulder. It should immediately trigger a save though

[Incanur]

Back in 2006, Skip Williams claimed (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/rg/20060221a) programmed image does allow reactions:


Automatic Disbelief

According to the Player's Handbook, if you're faced with proof that an illusion isn't real, you disbelieve the illusion without making a saving throw. The rules give a few examples of "proof" that an illusion isn't real. If you step on an illusory floor and fall through, you know that floor isn't real. Likewise, if you poke around an illusory floor and your hand (or the implement you're using as a probe) goes through the floor, you know the floor isn't real.

It's worth noting that in both examples the illusion fails to function as a real object would. A real floor is solid. It supports your weight (unless it breaks under you), and you can't push objects or parts of your body through it. A character could create an illusion that reacts appropriately when disturbed (with a programmed image spell, for example). In such cases, a character interacting with the illusion still must make a saving throw to disbelieve the illusion. For example, if you use a programmed image spell to create an illusory floor that collapses when someone touches it or walks in it, that's consistent with the way at least some real floors work and a saving throw is required to disbelieve even when someone falls through it.

The 3.5 Chains of Disbelief ACF (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/specialistWizardVariants.htm) eliminates the +4 bonus for being told an illusion is an illusion.

[Darth Ultron]

First off, persistent image is a figment, and it is in to way ''in'' anyone's mind. It's more like a hologram. If you toss a coin at a figment boulder the coin will go right through the image of the boulder like it was not there.

But if the illusion is controlled by someone, they can make it react.
Now the rules don't cover this other then the vague ''save'', but the idea is there. The idea is a controlled figment would attempt the fool the viewer. So it would make a ''thunk'' sound that sounded just like a coin hitting a boulder at the same time the real coin hit the ground. Or the boulder might just move out of the path of the coin all together.

It is true that figments are pretty easy to beat...but then they are the weakest form of illusions. But with that in mind, all a caster needs to do is be clever. You want to avoid big things like boulders where someone can try and touch it.

For example:

1.Instead of a boulder have a cloud of black energy. It's much harder to ''touch'' a could, and the coin trick won't work on even a real cloud. Or make the ''boulder'' a ''xorn'' and have the ''xorn'' ''hide'' in the floor.

2.Avoid the slow ''take your time to prove I'm not real'' illusion. So make the ''boulder'' more of ''a flaming ball of lava moving at 100 miles an hour''. So the player have the split second to move and dodge or risk getting hit by the unknown magical effect. And they sure won't have the time to pull out a coin...

3.Add reality. Have a real boulder....and use illusions to spice it up. Or have one illusion of a boulder and one real one.

And to get the full range of illusions, you will need a lot more then the spells in Core.

[Deophaun]

As for what counts as interacting, personally my guideline on what counts as interacting is this: If the illusion draws your attention enough that you react to it's presence, you're interacting with it. Running from a boulder? yes. Avoiding an illusory fire? yes. Walking past a fake wall? no, and so on. That's just my personal guideline though.
This is the only part that I disagree with, and the rules seem to bear me out. Interacting is just that: actions between two objects. If you are avoiding it, you are avoiding any interaction with it. Think of that annoying guy at a party that you do not want to talk to. Would you call avoidance interaction? Nope. It's action. Interaction is what you are specifically trying not to do.

Consider an illusory fog cloud. If you walk into the cloud, you would be interacting with it, and thus get a save. Crake's position is that if you also avoid walking into the fog cloud, you get a save. I find it odd how both doing and not doing something qualifies. It seems with his interpretation, you're blessed if you do, blessed if you don't.

And consider what disbelief is: it's noticing something is amiss. That's how the PHB defines it. Are you going to notice something is amiss if you see a boulder coming to you and immediately bolt for the exit? No. It's only when you stop and study it (a standard action by default) that you get the chance. Or the illusion does something that proves it is an illusion, like rolling over and through you without turning you into a red streak on the ground. Now you know, no action required.

Otherwise, he's basically right: illusions are fragile creations. If you want your silent image to stick around, make sure no one wants to do more than see it. Your illusion of an armored knight should be a minor image, because people would expect to hear the clanking metal. You want to do smoke in close proximity to someone? Better make it a major image, or the lack of smell is going to be a dead giveaway.

[Crake]

Back in 2006, Skip Williams claimed (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/rg/20060221a) programmed image does allow reactions:



The 3.5 Chains of Disbelief ACF (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/specialistWizardVariants.htm) eliminates the +4 bonus for being told an illusion is an illusion.

If you read programmed image, it only allows for one trigger, and has only 1 response to that trigger, pre determined. Think of it as "once the trigger is set, play the hologram". That allows for some level of the illusion reacting, but not the illusion interacting, which is what a coin bouncing off a boulder would be.

[Fizban]

From what I've seen it actually depends most on the individual spell. Sure you can look up "illusion" under general spell rules, but while "study carefully" is pretty well defined (see the Spot skill), "interact" is never defined. Some spells seem to have different ideas about what "interact" should mean, there's obviously different levels of interaction, and that's not counting how many other explanations a magically savvy character could come up with or the infinite variety of objects/images and just what would constitute interaction, making any broad definition functionally useless. I'm not even sure if you're officially allowed/disallowed from making multiple saves. As such I would rule based on the individual spell and circumstances.


Consider an illusory fog cloud. If you walk into the cloud, you would be interacting with it, and thus get a save. Crake's position is that if you also avoid walking into the fog cloud, you get a save. I find it odd how both doing and not doing something qualifies. It seems with his interpretation, you're blessed if you do, blessed if you don't.
Take this example: the classic illusory fog. Walking into fog is not interacting with it, walking around fog is not interacting with it. You simply do not normally interact with fog, at best it swirls around you and maybe you notice it if you look carefully, as in "study carefully." You can rig up some mechanic where people get some spot or wisdom check to notice the fog is behaving strangely, even give them bonuses the longer they stick around, but an unnaturally still fog could still be any other sort of supernatural phenomenon.

In the case of simple static object,I'd go with Kelb's "all characters get immediate save at +4." Characters that fail their saves are simply told they don't see the coin go through it. As a fine moving object in a potentially high-stress situation it's entirely possible they could fail a spot check and lose track of it. Maybe next round they make a search check for the coin, or maybe they decide their spot is good enough that they don't need a search check and just proceed under the assumption it's an illusion anyway. Making the save against a figment allows you see through it, but failing the save doesn't make you into an idiot. You can know it's an illusion and walk through and fail the save and just deal with the weird sensation of not seeing though the space you're walking through. If you fail the save against the illusory fog you you can still only be sure it's unmoving fog.

[Kraken]

If it helps anyone with anything, the only ability that I know of which helps define what constitutes interaction is from the shadowcrafter prc in Underdark. If nothing else, their 9th level ability makes it clear that merely observing or hearing an illusion is not sufficient to warrant a save. Otherwise that ability would be useless (not that WotC hasn't put out classes with redundant abilities before).

[AnachroNinja]

I don't think he was at any point stating the illusions are in the characters mind. I believe he was saying on a failed save, the character remains so convinced that the illusion is real, that their mind supplies details to rationalize it. Along the lines of when you see a man sized shape in your bedroom at night, but are convinced no one could be in your room so you rationalize what might have tricked you into thinking you saw it, regardless of the truth.

I can support that view. In the absence of actual incontrovertible proof, which I'd say would require DELIBERATE attempts to prove the illusion false, you either save and know the truth, or fail and rationalize it away.

You may be dragging your fingers along the wall, but unless your deliberately pushing at each section, you might just not notice the lack of contact because you are so sure that there was not a gap there. But you would get a save for interacting, just not an auto success in my opinion.