Body Outside Body questions

[Biggus]

As far as I know there's no RAW answer to these questions, but I'd be interested to hear how others would handle them.

The spell Body Outside Body (Complete Arcane p.100) creates two or more duplicates of the caster, who are largely identical but don't have any spells or magic items. A couple of things it doesn't specify:

1) do they act on your initiative like summoned creatures, or do they roll their own initiative? If the former, do they get to act immediately upon being created like summoned creatures do? If the latter, do they act in the round they're created or not until the next round?

2) what happens when their Constitution is boosted by a spell like Bear's Endurance? When created they each have one-quarter of the caster's current HPs, do they get the full increase in HPs from the increased Con or a quarter of what they would normally get?

[Darg]

1) They are new creatures. I don't believe the the rules actually tell you how to add new creatures into the initiative order so it's the DM's choice. It would be similar to using gate to call a creature.

2) Use how you adjudicate familiar HP. I would say if you had the toughness feat, each duplicate would get +3 HP.

[MaxiDuRaritry]

Do the clones gain 1/4 your current hp or 1/4 your max hp?

What if you have psionic manifesting, artificer infusions, initiator maneuvers, binder vestiges, incarnum soulmelds, [Ps]s, [Sp]s, or [Su]s? Do the clones get those? None of them are "spellcasting."

What if you have grafts, symbionts, or Devices? None of those are magic items.

What if you're bald, a lizardfolk, grippli, warforged, or other creature without hair (or beard)? Can you just not cast the spell? Yet another case of humancentricity. If you're not human (or human-with-scraped-off-serial-numbers), half the game isn't playable by RAW.

[Biggus]

I don't believe the the rules actually tell you how to add new creatures into the initiative order so it's the DM's choice.

I guess you missed the parts where I tagged this thread "DM help" and said "As far as I know there's no RAW answer to these questions, but I'd be interested to hear how others would handle them"?

[Psyren]

1) "The duplicates act on the caster's initiative" seems like the least disruptive way to insert them into an ongoing combat. I would also be fine letting them act right away - if the spell was designed to be balanced differently, it would have been a one-round casting time. For better or worse, the authors of CArc thought a standard action was balanced for this effect at level 13+ for this class.

2) I don't think buffing your health after they're created should have any effect, they're not part of you at that point. This is evidenced by the fact that hurting them doesn't transfer to you, and even killing them only damages you for a set amount. Buffing yourself before conjuring them will, since that increases your hit point total and theirs is based on that.

[Darg]

I guess you missed the parts where I tagged this thread "DM help" and said "As far as I know there's no RAW answer to these questions, but I'd be interested to hear how others would handle them"?

As Psyren said, having them act on your initiative is the least obtrusive way to insert them into the round. To go further, I would also give each of them separate turns. The caster goes first and then keep the order that they act in.

As far as the HP goes, they are duplicates of you. They have 1/4 your total (it means current maximum; it would use current HP if they wanted you to use that) HP. Any bonuses on you after creation do not transfer, but I would say that any bonus on them works as normal. The toughness feat and bear's endurance would give them 3 + 2×HD HP if cast on them for example.

[Psyren]

As Psyren said, having them act on your initiative is the least obtrusive way to insert them into the round. To go further, I would also give each of them separate turns. The caster goes first and then keep the order that they act in.

I'd actually let them act in whatever order on that initiative. They follow your commands absolutely anyway so they could simply be told "Clone A, wait until Clone B attacks, then..."


As far as the HP goes, they are duplicates of you. They have 1/4 your total (it means current maximum; it would use current HP if they wanted you to use that) HP. Any bonuses on you after creation do not transfer, but I would say that any bonus on them works as normal. The toughness feat and bear's endurance would give them 3 + 2×HD HP if cast on them for example.

Agreed - although in the case of a single-target buff, only that clone would be affected.



What if you have psionic manifesting, artificer infusions, initiator maneuvers, binder vestiges, incarnum soulmelds, [Ps]s, [Sp]s, or [Su]s? Do the clones get those? None of them are "spellcasting."

RAW is that only spellcasting is prohibited. This is one reason why Wu Jen is a staple of JPM and Cerebremancer builds.


What if you're bald, a lizardfolk, grippli, warforged, or other creature without hair (or beard)? Can you just not cast the spell? Yet another case of humancentricity. If you're not human (or human-with-scraped-off-serial-numbers), half the game isn't playable by RAW.

All of those have skin (and component pouches/eschew exist anyway) so just cast nit that way. Well, maybe Warforged don't, but if your GM puts their foot down about that one just consider it a feat tax for that race.

[Darg]

RAW is that only spellcasting is prohibited. This is one reason why Wu Jen is a staple of JPM and Cerebremancer builds.

That depends on how one views psionics-magic transparency. By default, body outside body would inhibit manifesting because it could affect psionics. Using the psionics is different variant, it wouldn't affect manifesting.

[Psyren]

That depends on how one views psionics-magic transparency. By default, body outside body would inhibit manifesting because it could affect psionics. Using the psionics is different variant, it wouldn't affect manifesting.

Sure, but I would personally rule it doesn't because I view spells (the discrete effects) and spellcasting (the natural ability) as different things. YMMV.

Even if manifesting is disallowed, the other stuff would work.

[Gusmo]

SLAs can become insane with body outside body, to me it's harder to argue that those would be disallowed. Whereas psionics and other subsystems aren't always mentioned at all in supplemental books, SLAs are a core feature, so the fact that they're not specifically excluded is noteworthy. As the DM it'd be your call.

All of my thoughts as to your original questions have already been articulated.

[ayvango]

SLAs can become insane with body outside body
Archmage could convert spells to SLA, including the Wish. WuJen Archmage is pretty scary.

[Biggus]

1) "The duplicates act on the caster's initiative" seems like the least disruptive way to insert them into an ongoing combat. I would also be fine letting them act right away - if the spell was designed to be balanced differently, it would have been a one-round casting time. For better or worse, the authors of CArc thought a standard action was balanced for this effect at level 13+ for this class.

2) I don't think buffing your health after they're created should have any effect, they're not part of you at that point. This is evidenced by the fact that hurting them doesn't transfer to you, and even killing them only damages you for a set amount. Buffing yourself before conjuring them will, since that increases your hit point total and theirs is based on that.


As Psyren said, having them act on your initiative is the least obtrusive way to insert them into the round. To go further, I would also give each of them separate turns. The caster goes first and then keep the order that they act in.

As far as the HP goes, they are duplicates of you. They have 1/4 your total (it means current maximum; it would use current HP if they wanted you to use that) HP. Any bonuses on you after creation do not transfer, but I would say that any bonus on them works as normal. The toughness feat and bear's endurance would give them 3 + 2×HD HP if cast on them for example.

Thanks for the answers. It would certainly be simpler for them all to act on the caster's initiative, but I was a bit concerned it would make an already powerful spell even stronger.

I didn't mean that buffing yourself after casting BOSB should affect your duplicates (I did say their Constitution), I'm pretty sure that wouldn't work. I think BE affecting them normally is probably the most logical approach, but again I was a bit concerned about it being overpowered (a Mass BE could roughly double the HPs of all the duplicates for example).


SLAs can become insane with body outside body, to me it's harder to argue that those would be disallowed. Whereas psionics and other subsystems aren't always mentioned at all in supplemental books, SLAs are a core feature, so the fact that they're not specifically excluded is noteworthy. As the DM it'd be your call.


I hadn't considered SLAs. You're right that it could become insane, but it would be odd that they'd just forgotten to exclude them given that they specifically called out spell trigger/completion items. Now I have a third decision to make...

[Psyren]

Thanks for the answers. It would certainly be simpler for them all to act on the caster's initiative, but I was a bit concerned it would make an already powerful spell even stronger.

I didn't mean that buffing yourself after casting BOSB should affect your duplicates (I did say their Constitution), I'm pretty sure that wouldn't work. I think BE affecting them normally is probably the most logical approach, but again I was a bit concerned about it being overpowered (a Mass BE could roughly double the HPs of all the duplicates for example).

Yeah but you'd be "doubling" something that already started at quarter health; your duplicates are very likely to get one-shot by any CR-appropriate monster anyway. A better use for your actions might be battlefield control so that they don't get hit in the first place.

[Battleship789]

As a way to limit the power of BoB when combined with non-spellcasting systems, you could houserule that the copies' abilities are linked with the caster instead of separate.

For instance, if the caster has a SLA that is usable 1/day then the clones plus caster can only use the SLA a single time collectively, with the SLA not becoming usable again until the caster rests (as if the caster had used the SLA normally.) Other examples include the caster + clones sharing the caster's power point pool when using psionic abilities/powers, shared Turn Undead uses, and linked Truenaming DCs (a clone or the caster using an utterance causes the corresponding DC to increase for the clones and caster, though this just feels rude due to truenaming being so bad.)

As a more complicated example, consider a WuJen/Crusader who casts BoB, creating some clones. Collectively, the caster and clones will be referred to as the group. Each clone would have the same maneuvers readied and granted that the original copy had when the spell was cast. By RAW, the group could initiate any combination of the readied/granted maneuvers, including all initiating the same maneuver, and at the beginning of the next turn each individual member of the group would be granted a random readied maneuver from the withheld list (or new set if the individual had all of their readied maneuvers granted, as per the Crusader recovery method.) Under this houserule, the group shares the pool of readied and granted maneuvers, with maneuvers expended by any member of the group inaccessible to the group until refreshed. At the start of the next turn, only a single new maneuver would be granted for the group (or a new set if no more withheld maneuvers were available.) If the caster had the Adaptive Style feat then any member of the group could use the feat to refresh the group's collective maneuvers. Every member of the group could be in a different stance under both RAW and the houserule, provided the appropriate action was taken to switch stances.

At will abilities like a warlock's eldritch blast/invocations would be unaffected by the houserule, as would abilities that can be turned on and off like the Power Attack feat.

There are some edge cases that this houserule causes problems with for example, activating any ability that targets the caster prior to casting the spell causes the clones to also gain the benefits for the duration, while additional uses of said ability must be expended if it is used after casting the spell (on top of the additional action cost of the caster and each clone needing to activate the ability instead of just the caster) but I think it's a relatively straightforward way to drop the power of BoB a bit.

[Gusmo]

The overall concern with BoB is that it's just such an incredibly versatile and powerful spell, and should set off as many alarm bells as other heavy hitters like shapechange. In addition to some suggested restrictions, it may be prudent to also make sure your players recognize that they shouldn't do things that will tempt you to make more restrictions. Use your ability to alter reality responsibly!

[RandomPeasant]

Honestly, body outside body starts being impractical to use in a game long before it becomes mechanically broken. Even if all your bodies have is some kinda-crappy maneuvers or binding, the fact that you're taking three or four turns per initiative cycle is going to grind the game to a halt. If you are going to give someone a big pile of minions, the most important thing from a practical perspective is that they be simple, and the spell very much does not achieve that.

[Gusmo]

Suppose an archmage takes 5 SLAs starting at level 14: body outside body, summon monster 8, polymorph any object, shapechange, and time stop as SLAs. Each clone can make more clones and summon minions, and the new clones can make more clones and summon more minions. Giving you enough fire power to spam PAO to force someone to exhaust all luck based resources and eventually roll a 1, as very few things are immune to polymorphing. As this is just rookie stuff.

[Darg]

I would argue that SLAs are also prevented from being cast:


A spell-like ability has no verbal, somatic, or material component, nor does it require a focus or have an XP cost. The user activates it mentally. Armor never affects a spell-like ability’s use, even if the ability resembles an arcane spell with a somatic component. A spell-like ability has a casting time of 1 standard action unless noted otherwise in the ability or spell description. In all other ways, a spell-like ability functions just like a spell.

You cast SLAs just like a spell, so there isn't a reason they shouldn't be prevented by the spell. On another note, this also applies to the transformation spell. Because they function like spells it's why warlocks can't cast their invocations when grappled, can defensively cast, and can take weaponlike spell feats.

[RandomPeasant]

I don't really understand how that's a response to my point. Yes, your ever-increasing army of clones that can cheese shapechange can break the game. But while enough iterations of the "clone makes a clone" loop will get you to a point where there is no combination of printed monsters that can challenge you, that number is much larger than the number of iterations it takes to reach a point where no one is willing to sit around long enough to let you finish your turn.

[Biggus]

I would argue that SLAs are also prevented from being cast:



You cast SLAs just like a spell, so there isn't a reason they shouldn't be prevented by the spell. On another note, this also applies to the transformation spell. Because they function like spells it's why warlocks can't cast their invocations when grappled, can defensively cast, and can take weaponlike spell feats.

That's a good point, thank you.