3.5/pathfinder 1e - a "Captured" soul and questions around that.

[samduke]

3.5/pathfinder 1e - a "Captured" soul - So this is to gain some sort of better idea what can and can not be done.

Let us say that via magic a character's soul has been trapped, no save.

Questions:
Is a body with no soul dead regardless of HP status?
Can the mind still work, send/receive instructions?
Can the body perform actions, (speak, move, attack ect.)?

[Fero]

3.5/pathfinder 1e - a "Captured" soul - So this is to gain some sort of better idea what can and can not be done.

Let us say that via magic a character's soul has been trapped, no save.

Questions:
Is a body with no soul dead regardless of HP status?
Can the mind still work, send/receive instructions?
Can the body perform actions, (speak, move, attack ect.)?

3.5- I

1. Taking the soul doesnt kill the body. See e.g. Magic Jar (you leave your body) and Clone (living soulless body). However, soulless bodies tend to be inanimate and may die quickly.

2. I would say normally, no. See above. Also, 3.5 typically equates mind and soul. There may be some niche exceptions, most likely involving psionics.

3. Again, generally no. A soulless body is typically inanimate until animated by some force.

[Rynjin]

Pathfinder answers:

1.) It depends on the method. Magic Jar leaves the body lifeless, but it returns to life if the soul is returned to the body (unless the body has been destroyed, including by decomposition). Trap the Soul actually absorbs the entire body along with the soul.

2 & 3.) The soul is necessary for the body to be alive, and lifeless creatures cannot take actions. The character is for all intents and purposes dead, they're just easier to return to life in the short term than people who are actually dead.

If the soul is USED for something (eg. powering a spell (https://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/general-feats/soul-powered-magic/)), they are dead-dead and very hard to raise.

GM advice (non-RAW) answer, treat the character as dead, and give them about a week to fix it before the body decomposes, unless the party takes measures to ensure that doesn't happen (eg. casting Gentle Repose). At that point they have essentially indefinite time, but the player whose character has been soul trapped will likely need a temporary backup character to keep adventuring.

[MonochromeTiger]

1: Unless the spell specifically calls out the effect as killing the body it's just depriving it of its driving consciousness. Basically it's "alive" but with nothing actually directing it you've got something little more useful than an inanimate object.

2/3: No. A simple way to look at it is that a person whose soul is removed is splitting their Ability Scores between two points, the soul and the body. The soul keeps all the mental Ability Scores (Int, Wis, Cha) but has no body with which to interact and thus can't really take any actions not provided to them by the spell or effect that did it. The body meanwhile keeps its physical Ability Scores (Con, Dex, Str) but lacks all the mental ones, and Pathfinder 1e has a clear explanation for what happens when an intelligent sapient creature hits zero in their ability scores.
Int 0: comatose.
Wis 0: incapable of rational thought and is unconscious.
Cha 0: unable to express itself in any way and is unconscious.

So the body is still alive unless something acts to kill it but without a driving consciousness directing it it's also not going to take care of itself or make any move to keep alive, it will inevitably starve, die of thirst, or just fail to move out of danger unless either the soul removed from it is returned somehow or it's possessed by another soul.