Tree Stride and Acorn of Far Travel Question

[Silva Stormrage]

So in my campaign my players have asked a question and I am not sure on the ruling here. Mainly because it involves the ever poorly worded Acorn of Far Travel but that's a separate issue and my fault for using the item in the first place. :smalltongue:


So the party managed to capture and subdue a lieutenant of an evil cult and on that individual they found a Acorn of Far Travel that was granting the lieutenant mind blank via some means the party isn't aware of but they have deduced it is likely that the tree is in a magical environment that grants those beneath the tree mind blank. I digress though, eventually their capture was freed and they lost the ability to contact the lieutenant but they retained this acorn.

The party knowing the cult has a fairly large important base somewhere hidden in the desert of the campaign setting but also unable to find it want to use the Acorn of Far Travel to sneak into the enemy's base. They want to use Tree Stride, enter into a random oak tree and then jump to whatever tree is connected to the Acorn of Far Travel as they are "considered to be standing under that oak tree's canopy".

I am unsure if that works exactly because it seems like by that logic they could also just use dimensional door to teleport there as well. If they are under the canopy then teleporting to a square adjacent to that canopy is only 5ft of distance regardless of how far away the base actually is from their current location.

Still it makes pretty good sense fluff wise and I am not frankly beyond just ruling that it only works for Tree Stride and similar spells that specifically require targeting the explicit oak tree the acorn of far travel is connected to. Plus I already was using acorn of far travel for my villains to give plenty of them near permanent mind blank. It feels somewhat rude to stop a clever use of spells on my players end. :smallbiggrin:

Does the playground have any opinions on this interaction? Is there something I missed in my consideration on this ruling? Mostly just looking for opinions here. :smallsmile:

[TheCount]

first, i would like to praise your players for the idea and the restrain for choosing tree side for this.

the idea is sound enough, the acorn could serve as a compass, but i'm not sure if the tree is in range? at least, the SRD does give range between trees. (https://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/treeStride.htm)

that aside, you could make a mini quest about it, give a k. arcana or spellcraft check to the casters to see if its possible, and how to boost the spell's range.

if it wont work for some reason, they could still use the acorn as a compass, it IS connected to the tree in the mind blank place after all.

[Segev]

I do think you’re right about dimension door just working. They count as standing beneath the tree. But there are risks for using dimension door to a location they can’t see. And they’re jumping blind.

Tree stride, on the other hand, works differently.

They count as beneath that oak’s canopy; if you’re generous, that can mean they can enter that oak from anywhere using tree stride, and exit any oak that is within 2000 feet of it.

If you’re not particularly generous, they only count as beneath its canopy; nothing says they count as adjacent to it and thus they have no special means of entering its trunk.

In the latter case, a very clever player might suggest using tree stride and dimension door together: with tree stride active, appearing inside the tree trunk is not harmful. So they could cast tree stride and then dimension door to the interior of the tree (which is in range because they count as standing beneath the canopy). This works with any teleportation spell that doesn’t need line of sight, in place of dimension door, too. They have line of effect thanks to the acorn, but not line of sight.

[Bronk]

I would suggest partially allowing it, sort of a 'yes, but...'

Using the acorn would let them do the first part, entering the tree. However, the bad guys aren't that unprepared, and have various protections up, including 'dimensional lock'. Since the whole spell is a teleportation effect, they won't be able to leave that tree to directly enter the bad guy's fortress or whatever without a lot more work.

However, they would be able to wait around inside that tree and listen in on any evil plans or gossip or whatever going on nearby, and, because the outside of the tree would block the dimensional lock effect, they could move over to another nearby tree outside the fortress or protected area or whatever you've got going on.

This would have the added bonus of rewarding them for their use of 'tree stride'.

For another added bonus, involve dryads somehow. There could either be a dryad trapped inside that oak tree, or in a nearby oak tree they travel to later, who could be saved and/or provide exposition to the players.