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Edan
2008-02-05, 11:47 PM
I am constantly seeing Rope Trick being mentioned as broken. But I am just asking, how broken is it really?

Is it really a free shelter to up to 8 creatures in extra dimensonal space who can't be targeted by spells or area affects, or can it be abused in many, many more ways than simple rest and recoup. shelter? Does the fact that it is only level 2 matter (to me it does, its a pretty low level spell for what looks like many, many uses.)

I would really be interested in reading stories on how broken it can potentially be, as examples.

Tura
2008-02-06, 12:41 AM
Well, the only reason that non-casters aren't completely useless compared to casters is that magic needs refueling. A wizard or cleric may easily wreak havoc in a few encounters, but eventually he runs out of spells, he's of no further use to the party and he has to rest. Whereas, for example, the fighter can keep smacking things all day long.

But casting rope trick takes that away. Even without it, as levels go up, casters become disproportionally more powerful than non-casters. And this little spell allows you to recharge any time. Sure, it's not very practical as an escape route in the heat of the battle, but it allows you to play rp like playing a computer rpg and resting in every single room. No, more often than that: whenever you and your party have enough time to climb a rope. Sucks, doesn't it?

Chronos
2008-02-06, 12:41 AM
Yes, it's because it's a safe place to rest. The class balance of the game was designed with the assumption that the party would face about four challenges per day, and would thus spend about a quarter of their daily limited resources on each one. With Rope Trick, however, a wizard can afford to spend his full allotment of spells on every encounter, and rest after every one, so the spell makes him about four times more powerful than he's supposed to be. Fighters, on the other hand, don't really have any limited resources (other than HP, which everyone has), so the fighter benefits little from the rope trick. Hence, wizards end up being much more powerful than fighters.

Or at least, that's one of the reasons wizards end up more powerful. There are several others, too.

Icewalker
2008-02-06, 01:31 AM
Well, of course, this is if abused. It is simple enough to say that there is no reason that you would stop for eight hours every time you cast something just to be at your peak, unless you are RPing an extremely OCD and paranoid wizard...whose requests would be turned down by the rest of the party on the grounds of ridiculous.

At least, that's what I think...


It is easily abusable though, by letting them renew their spells, yes.

Admiral Squish
2008-02-06, 01:51 AM
Why can't a bad guy just poke his head in, set off a fireball, and pop out? Also, if you want to teach your caster a lesson, make the BBEG come down while your wizard chills in extradimentional space in his courtyard and have the baddie fry him to nonexistance with a maximized, empowered, transdimensional fireball.

Raolin_Fenix
2008-02-06, 02:03 AM
Why can't a bad guy just poke his head in, set off a fireball, and pop out? Also, if you want to teach your caster a lesson, make the BBEG come down while your wizard chills in extradimentional space in his courtyard and have the baddie fry him to nonexistance with a maximized, empowered, transdimensional fireball.

There's a clause in rope trick that specifies that, if the rope is pulled up after the people who use it, nothing can get in, including spells and people. The rope is the only means of entry, even if the wizard can fly up high enough to get in. It's kind of weird.

That being said, there's also no reason why the wizard can't watch you scurry up your rope, then summon his entire legion of doom to wait for you, and start dropping hell-fog spells as soon as you roll the rope out. The space closes in (caster level) hours, which can result in a TPK if the party stays in there too long. That means they eventually have to come out. Once they're in there, they have to come out the same way, and nothing prevents the enemies from preparing for it every bit as much as the allies.

deadseashoals
2008-02-06, 02:09 AM
There's a clause in rope trick that specifies that, if the rope is pulled up after the people who use it, nothing can get in, including spells and people. The rope is the only means of entry, even if the wizard can fly up high enough to get in. It's kind of weird.

I don't want to rehash this too much, but I'm just going to say here that this isn't quite true. That is to say, it's not true at all. All it says is that the rope disappears. It doesn't say that the rope is the only means of entry, or even that is a means of entry at all.


When this spell is cast upon a piece of rope from 5 to 30 feet long, one end of the rope rises into the air until the whole rope hangs perpendicular to the ground, as if affixed at the upper end. The upper end is, in fact, fastened to an extradimensional space that is outside the multiverse of extradimensional spaces (“planes”). Creatures in the extradimensional space are hidden, beyond the reach of spells (including divinations), unless those spells work across planes. The space holds as many as eight creatures (of any size). Creatures in the space can pull the rope up into the space, making the rope “disappear.” In that case, the rope counts as one of the eight creatures that can fit in the space. The rope can support up to 16,000 pounds. A weight greater than that can pull the rope free.

Spells cannot be cast across the extradimensional interface, nor can area effects cross it. Those in the extradimensional space can see out of it as if a 3-foot by 5-foot window were centered on the rope. The window is present on the Material Plane, but it’s invisible, and even creatures that can see the window can’t see through it. Anything inside the extradimensional space drops out when the spell ends. The rope can be climbed by only one person at a time. The rope trick spell enables climbers to reach a normal place if they do not climb all the way to the extradimensional space.

Note: It is hazardous to create an extradimensional space within an existing extradimensional space or to take an extradimensional space into an existing one.

Admiral Squish
2008-02-06, 02:16 AM
And yet, Transdimensional spell specifically mentions that it works on all extradimensional space withing the radius, INCLUDING that of a rope trick, bag of holding or portable hole. Which seems like the perfect cure for rope trick syndrome in an encounter.

tyckspoon
2008-02-06, 02:24 AM
And yet, Transdimensional spell specifically mentions that it works on all extradimensional space withing the radius, INCLUDING that of a rope trick, bag of holding or portable hole. Which seems like the perfect cure for rope trick syndrome in an encounter.

Keeping in mind that the rope trick space is invisible and can be placed pretty much anywhere. If the party is dealing with an opponent who can easily sweep his entire base with things that can detect invis (greater prying eyes, for example), they probably are better off leaving the area entirely and Teleporting back in once they're ready to fight again.

Talic
2008-02-06, 02:38 AM
Keeping in mind that the rope trick space is invisible and can be placed pretty much anywhere. If the party is dealing with an opponent who can easily sweep his entire base with things that can detect invis (greater prying eyes, for example), they probably are better off leaving the area entirely and Teleporting back in once they're ready to fight again.

Or waits for the dead bodies to be found, and searches all areas of his place that PC's have cleared of enemies.

Or uses a commune spell or the like to locate the party's room in the keep.

"Would it be weal or woe for my minions if I neglected to search the top half of the keep with spells to detect invisibility?"

"Would it be weal or woe for my minions if I neglected to search (1/2 of remaining area) with spells to detect invisibility?"

etc.

Tempest Fennac
2008-02-06, 03:01 AM
Considering how eveyone in a party is at risk from being attacked at night, wouldn't Rope Trick actually benefit everyone? If nothing else, it would eliminate the need for party members who aren't primary spellcasters to stay awake for parts of the night (at least once Rope Trick has got to the stage where it can protect people for 8 hours or more). Also, wouldn't resting after every encounter be really impractical if there was a time limit for whatever mission the PCs are on?

Talic
2008-02-06, 03:19 AM
Yes, everyone benefits from its use, but it largely removes the DM tool of using encounters to push the storyline.

That, and most other classes won't be needing to stop as much.

lordmarcoos
2008-02-06, 03:49 AM
In the Campaign I infrequently DM due to college (though 4e's interweb options will hopefully fix that), in Xen'drik, I just make sure the party knows they're not the only heroes around. Hanging out in a rope trick after every fight, and after the first few times, you'll wake up to find out that the next six rooms have been cleared, and then they'll find the NPC treasure-hunters and fight about who's got the rights to all the sweet goodies.

its_all_ogre
2008-02-06, 03:56 AM
spells are per day.
this in itself is a balance issue. you cannot rest after an encounter and restore all your spells unless it is another day.

simple!

Cruiser1
2008-02-06, 07:08 AM
Another potential balancing factor of Rope Trick is the clause: "Note: It is hazardous to create an extradimensional space within an existing extradimensional space or to take an extradimensional space into an existing one."

The precise behavior depends on DM interpretation, however most will say the above means you can't bring in your bags of holding or handy haversacks, without creating an effect similar to putting a bag of holding in a portable hole. Hence you need to leave your expensive magic containers outside during the night, where they might get stolen.

Saph
2008-02-06, 07:36 AM
Regaining arcane spells takes 8 hours of peaceful rest, followed by 1 hour (or a bit less) of preparation time. Rope Trick's duration is 1 hour/level. Hence Rope Trick only works for regaining spells if cast at CL 9+, unless you've gone to the trouble of getting access to Extend Spell (which probably isn't worth it if all you're going to use it on is Rope Trick).

And if you're a 9th-level wizard then you can just cast teleport instead. Or secure shelter.

So I don't find the spell to be that big a deal. Any intelligent bad guy will know about its existence, and if the wizard's seriously trying to use the 'cast for five minutes, sleep 24 hours' strategy every single day the rest of the party will probably get bored out of their minds, leave him, and go and finish the adventure on their own.

The times I've seen the spell used effectively, it's been as a shelter rather than for the specific purpose of regaining spells. I did manage to use it once to hide from a white dragon, which was kind of fun. (Duck round a corner, cast the spell, pull up the rope, watch the dragon rampage past, then sit watching for the next few hours as the dragon quartered the area, hoping the dragon's patience would run out before the spell duration.)

- Saph

raygungothic
2008-02-06, 07:38 AM
Hold on a moment.

It lasts an hour per level, so you have to be ninth level for it to get you through the night in perfect safety and then have time to memorise. At lower levels it could buy you some safe time, but you'd still need to set watches etc. for the rest of the night. So it only starts to be worrying in the hands of a ninth level caster.

You can't take Bags of Holding, Heward's Handy Haversack or any of the other vital transport items inside. By ninth level, someone in the party probably has one of these, as the problems of physically hauling all your equipment and loot can be quite severe. Who's going to leave all their loot outside? Or if you're going to unload everything valuable, allow more time and yet another caster level and a whole load of bother... and your valuable bags of holding are still outside being stolen.

The window is optically invisible, but it's magically created, it should surely show up to Detect Magic. I'd certainly make it do so, since it's such a cheap spell. By the time Rope Trick works all night, Detect Magic will be available to a fair number of foes.

Even if the enemy don't send a caster to lean in, cast Devastate Party and lean out, being discovered is still pretty bad. Knowing that you have to leave the Rope Trick space into a well-prepared enemy force who anticipate your arrival could be a worrying moment. If you're using it for spell preparation after going nova, they can reasonably infer you'll be in there for a while - so they can send for lots of reinforcements. Then you'll need to go nova again to survive.

So, really, I'm not too worried about it. I've never had to take steps to prevent it being abused. It does seem to be effective at lower levels if the wizard only part-memorises at the start of the day - buying time to use an extra half hour to fill your remaining slots. Not terribly abusive.

It would be much more broken if I never took even a brief look at the weight of characters' backpacks, or assumed my monsters were utterly unintelligent... but so would everything else. As it is, it has its place, but it's only useful if you're really careful. I don't think that's broken.

As ever, I look forward to someone with greater knowledge comprehensively proving me wrong! (not sarcasm, I do enjoy it)

(Edit: Pretty comprehensively ninja'd, and Saph's great example with the white dragon is the kind of neat use that seems entirely reasonable! It's not going to work too often, but when it does...)

Tempest Fennac
2008-02-06, 07:43 AM
Regarding the duration, it could be extended at level 5 so that it lasts for long enough, but it would mean using a level 3 spell slot.

Saph
2008-02-06, 07:53 AM
Yeah. It's a neat spell, no argument about that, but it's got its weaknesses.

For instance, in the last campaign I ran, the 8th- and 9th-level party had to infiltrate a space station filled with barbazu demons and killer robots (don't ask). The caster of the party suggested that they could just get into the middle of the station, cast rope trick, and rest. Luckily, there was a technology-savvy NPC along with the party, who gently pointed out the problems with the plan.

Caster: "What's wrong with it? We're invulnerable while we're in the shelter."
NPC: "Yes, but . . . well, if I was defending this station and saw someone vanish into a shelter for eight hours on the surveillance cameras, I can think of a lot of nasty things I could do to them."
Caster: "Like what?"
NPC: "Evacuate the air from that section of the station and turn it into a vacuum?"
Caster: "Oh."

They came up with another plan.

- Saph

Wraith
2008-02-06, 07:59 AM
Someone posed this situation to me as we started anew game - why didn't I just cast rope trick after every fight, get all my spells back after every fight, and own every battlefield between here and level 40?

It was surprisingly difficult to explain to him that, if I and all the party members are always healed and rested, the GM will notice and we will ALWAYS be targeted with bigger and more dangerous monsters. I don't just mean dangerous as in 10 skeletons instead of 6, but things like LANDWORMS instead of Orcs. Even the prospect of being swallowed whole instead of taking a few simple d8's worth of damage couldn't make him see reason.

Eventually, the GM interjected with "You can do that if you like, but don't complain if you come out in the morning and find a couple or seven maximized Skull Traps left waiting for you by the BBEG and his pet Sorcerer." That seemed to get the message across.

CrowSpawn
2008-02-06, 10:34 AM
I think the bottom line with this one is, no adventurer in his right (roleplayed) mind would require his teammates to fight only once, and then rest for a day before setting out to fight once and rest for another day.

Remember, you only have to rest for 8 hours, but you cannot rest again until the next day (or you can but it does not benefit you).

The idea that someone would suggest this tactic clearly indicates meta-gaming thinking. At least to me it does.

Person_Man
2008-02-06, 10:48 AM
Campaigns move at the speed of plot. If PCs are delaying a great deal, just add time sensitivity to your story. The Princess must be rescued by dawn or she will be killed. The town is currently being invaded. A murderer is on the loose. Enemies from another dimension are streaming through an open portal deep within a dungeon. And so on.

If your PCs ask you why all of your campaigns have a "beat the clock" element built into them, tell them openly that its to balance out spellcasters. If they want a more PC directed campaign, they need to tone down their casters, or convince everyone in the party to optimize so that they're on par with casters.

Emperor Tippy
2008-02-06, 11:08 AM
I think the bottom line with this one is, no adventurer in his right (roleplayed) mind would require his teammates to fight only once, and then rest for a day before setting out to fight once and rest for another day.

Remember, you only have to rest for 8 hours, but you cannot rest again until the next day (or you can but it does not benefit you).

The idea that someone would suggest this tactic clearly indicates meta-gaming thinking. At least to me it does.

Actually at the early levels (when Rope Trick is worth it) its metagaming to not rest after every fight.

Think about it. Let's take your standard 32 point buy wizard, he prolly has an Int of at least 16 and often as high as 20 (if you go grey elf). The wizard is a genius. Many also have above average wisdom scores (12-14 in many cases). So your 16 Int, 12 Wis, Wizard is a genius with above average common sense. He sets off with his party adventuring at 10 in the morning and runs into an encounter an hour later that takes a quarter of his spells for the day, his cleric buddy is out a similar amount as well. And any one of his fellow adventurers can fall to a lucky hit. So the wizard asks himself a few questions:
1) Am I doing something very time sensitive?
2) Am I fairly close to reaching/accomplishing my objective?
3) Am I stupid?

If the answer to all of those questions is no then the wizard has no ingame reason at all to do anything other than rest for the rest of the day, using Rope Trick as warranted.

Adventuring is a very high risk occupation and adventurers have very short life expectancies. The professional adventurer is under no illusions about how dangerous his job is and he is generally not out to die or get himself killed. Paranoia is the rule rather than the exception.

If the players expect 4 encounters per day or choose to continue on that is when they are metagaming.

---------
Slightly Off Topic:
It's the same thing with the whole paranoid wizard idea. When a wizard reaches level 20 it means that he has taken a lot of risks to get where he is and is in no hurry to die or loose his power. A greater rod of extend spell and that shapechange lasts 400 minutes (6 hours and 40 minutes). Before bonus spells the wizard gets 4 9th level spell slots per day. 2 Extended Shapechanges, a Time Stop, and an Extended Foresight are a good way to fill those slots if you don't have anything in mind for the day that would require specific spells. Prepare Greater Celerity, Magnificent Mansion, and a few greater teleports for the day as well. You get 13 hours and 20 minutes per day of Shapechange. If something comes up and you can't deal with it by turning into a dragon/golem/other powerful thing then you run away.

its_all_ogre
2008-02-06, 11:16 AM
also spells are per day per phb from what i can recall so unless you're willing to rest about 24 hours you will not get fresh spells anyway.
and when my player asked me when those 24 hours would be up EXACTLY i pointed out that they'd been attacked at night and he cannot tell time by the stars and forgot to check his watch....

Emperor Tippy
2008-02-06, 11:29 AM
also spells are per day per phb from what i can recall so unless you're willing to rest about 24 hours you will not get fresh spells anyway.
and when my player asked me when those 24 hours would be up EXACTLY i pointed out that they'd been attacked at night and he cannot tell time by the stars and forgot to check his watch....

It's not that hard to tell the time to within 30 minutes or so in most situations. And if the player has some cheap 1/day item then they can just use it once per day and once they can use it again they will know 24 hours has passed.

----
My point is that the characters have no reason most of the time to take any avoidable chance or any particular time table to keep to. So getting to and clearing the dungeon took us 10 days instead of 7. It doesn't matter.

And if your bothered by the wizard resting after every fight then maybe you should just not throw random encounters or dungeon crawls at them. You want the fighter to feel important? Then a carnival is coming to town next week and a contest to find the best swordsmen in the area is being held. Or a wrestling bout. While the fighter is dealing with that the Cleric gets roped in to helping the local branch of his church gain converts during the carnival (people are coming from all over). And the wizard decides to search for any magic lore he can find. Or perhaps a contest to see who can make the best illusion is going on. Maybe the rogue gets asked to work security for a merchant who fears that his good swill be stolen during the event. Or perhaps the thieves guild sees this as a good time to make money and invites you to help them rob a merchant or 2.

its_all_ogre
2008-02-06, 11:39 AM
i agree with your point, my group has an item they bought that allows them to use ropetrick 3 times a day but when a certain member of the party suggested they rest in it to regain his spells...
that he'd just used up in an inconsequential fight they caused...
i pointed out that the spells were per day, he can rest but will not gain fresh ones until tomorrow.

your actual points raised i fully agree with, just not the use i hear of on these boards, use all my spells, sleep for 8 hours, get all of them back again.

sikyon
2008-02-06, 11:53 AM
I don't want to rehash this too much, but I'm just going to say here that this isn't quite true. That is to say, it's not true at all. All it says is that the rope disappears. It doesn't say that the rope is the only means of entry, or even that is a means of entry at all.

The rope is a means of entry because one end is in the material plane and the other is in the extra dimensional space. The rope can cross the barrier, apparently, and there fore you can too.

While to does not say that the rope is the only way to get in, it does not specify another method of entry at all, so there is no other method, so therefore it does, in fact, specify that the rope is the only way in. Unless you are suggesting that the rope doesn't grant any method of entry as well, in which case I have nothing to say to that, except that being dead doesn't stop you from doing anything.

horseboy
2008-02-06, 01:01 PM
Well, the only reason that non-casters aren't completely useless compared to casters is that magic needs refueling. A wizard or cleric may easily wreak havoc in a few encounters, but eventually he runs out of spells, he's of no further use to the party and he has to rest. Whereas, for example, the fighter can keep smacking things all day long.
That's a common misconception. If the cleric is out of spells, the fighter's mortality risk rises dramatically. Crits against him become even more dangerous. The fighter too has a finite resource, their hit points. They can smack stuff all day, but can only be smacked so many times before they'd have to stop prematurely as well. Hence, it is in the fighter's best interest to wait and make sure that the cleric has spells.

Theli
2008-02-06, 01:28 PM
Just keep in mind that clerics don't rest to regain spells. They regain them on a certain time of day and MUST do so either at that time or as soon as possible, or risk not being able to refresh spell slots.

So your party might be waiting up to 23 hours if you have to spend all your magic right after your chosen prayer/meditation time. (And the recent casting limit IS in effect, in case you nova right before this time for some reason.)

horseboy
2008-02-06, 03:02 PM
And if the cleric player feels he's got to nova to get through the first encounter everyday, it may be time to rethink the DM's style.

Theli
2008-02-06, 03:05 PM
*shrugs* It may not be the first encounter. It may be the last one. It just happened at an inopportune time.

Brawls
2008-02-06, 04:18 PM
Looking at the lower level uses of this spell, is there anything to prevent an opponent with scent from locating the area where the Rope Trick has been cast? I'm assuming that the scent ability lets you track your PCs to the point they entered the interdimensional space. Combined with a knowledge that the PCs have a spell caster and Rope Trick is low level, If I were an intelligent opponent I would set-up an ambush in the vicinity of where the PC's tracks disappear.

Brawls

Theli
2008-02-06, 04:28 PM
See, now that's a clever idea. Given decent environmental conditions, a scent can be picked up quite a while after its cause is gone.

*thumbs up*

NoDot
2008-02-07, 12:43 AM
spells are per day.
this in itself is a balance issue. you cannot rest after an encounter and restore all your spells unless it is another day.

simple!The rules on this are nearly contradictory. Here's the segment from Arcane spells (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicOverview/arcaneSpells.htm):
Recent Casting Limit/Rest Interruptions
If a wizard has cast spells recently, the drain on her resources reduces her capacity to prepare new spells. When she prepares spells for the coming day, all the spells she has cast within the last 8 hours count against her daily limit.Now, unless my reading comprehension dropped, it seems that a day begins with eight hours of rest. A Ring of Sustenance reduces this to two hours.

deadseashoals
2008-02-07, 01:13 AM
The rules on this are nearly contradictory. Here's the segment from Arcane spells (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicOverview/arcaneSpells.htm):Now, unless my reading comprehension dropped, it seems that a day begins with eight hours of rest. A Ring of Sustenance reduces this to two hours.

Sure, if you completely ignore the definition of "day." Would you like to also ignore the definition of "dead," and say that creatures afflicted with the "dead" status may act, since it's not otherwise stated in the "dead" condition?

Cuddly
2008-02-07, 01:30 AM
That's a common misconception. If the cleric is out of spells, the fighter's mortality risk rises dramatically. Crits against him become even more dangerous. The fighter too has a finite resource, their hit points. They can smack stuff all day, but can only be smacked so many times before they'd have to stop prematurely as well. Hence, it is in the fighter's best interest to wait and make sure that the cleric has spells.

However, healing is very cheap. A wand of CLW is 750 gp, for 50d8+50 hp. A wand of Lesser Vigor is an even better deal. Someone with CLW on their spell list, or UMD, can patch the party fighter up.

Wizard spell slots, however, aren't so cheap, if they're being used offensively, as CL and the DC are often important components. A wand of a save-or-lose spell, for instance, has a low save DC, a low CL, and a short duration. It has a much higher chance of failing vs. SR or a successful save. CLW, otoh, always heals the fighter 1d8+1 hp, regardless.

horseboy
2008-02-07, 01:46 AM
However, healing is very cheap. A wand of CLW is 750 gp, for 50d8+50 hp. A wand of Lesser Vigor is an even better deal. Someone with CLW on their spell list, or UMD, can patch the party fighter up.

Wizard spell slots, however, aren't so cheap, if they're being used offensively, as CL and the DC are often important components. A wand of a save-or-lose spell, for instance, has a low save DC, a low CL, and a short duration. It has a much higher chance of failing vs. SR or a successful save. CLW, otoh, always heals the fighter 1d8+1 hp, regardless.
Healing is cheap at mid to high levels. By then the casters have enough spells that they can comfortably deal with the 4 encounters that day.

wormwood
2008-02-07, 01:44 PM
There's also another way that enemies can deal with the abuse of Rope Trick... Dispel Magic. *Pop! PCs crash to the ground*

ASCIISkull
2008-02-07, 02:39 PM
For instance, in the last campaign I ran, the 8th- and 9th-level party had to infiltrate a space station filled with barbazu demons and killer robots (don't ask). The caster of the party suggested that they could just get into the middle of the station, cast rope trick, and rest. Luckily, there was a technology-savvy NPC along with the party, who gently pointed out the problems with the plan.


Did anyone point out that as the station continued to orbit, there was a good chance that the rope trick portal would stay firmly in it's own location above the planet?

On the other hand, Rope Trick could be used as both entry and exit when moving vehicles and so-forth are concerned.

Starbuck_II
2008-02-07, 02:48 PM
There's also another way that enemies can deal with the abuse of Rope Trick... Dispel Magic. *Pop! PCs crash to the ground*

Only Transdimensional Dispel Magic works. They are immune while inside (rope is too if pulled up).

sikyon
2008-02-07, 02:59 PM
Looking at the lower level uses of this spell, is there anything to prevent an opponent with scent from locating the area where the Rope Trick has been cast? I'm assuming that the scent ability lets you track your PCs to the point they entered the interdimensional space. Combined with a knowledge that the PCs have a spell caster and Rope Trick is low level, If I were an intelligent opponent I would set-up an ambush in the vicinity of where the PC's tracks disappear.

Brawls

Sure... but you're going to end up fighting them while they are fully rested, healed, and have a full complement of spells. Rather dangerous, and stupid for a BBEG.

Saph
2008-02-07, 03:04 PM
Did anyone point out that as the station continued to orbit, there was a good chance that the rope trick portal would stay firmly in it's own location above the planet?

For the sake of sanity, I've never tried to bring relativistic physics into D&D magic, so Rope Trick and similar spells are stationary relative to the map we're using. Otherwise I could just as well say that a ground-cast Rope Trick gets left behind as the planet moves around the sun, which, while kind of amusing, would irritate players a bit. :P

- Saph

Chronos
2008-02-07, 03:42 PM
For the sake of sanity, I've never tried to bring relativistic physics into D&D magic, so Rope Trick and similar spells are stationary relative to the map we're using....Which means that you actually are bringing relativistic physics into it; you just didn't realize that that's what you were doing. Really, relativity makes everything easier: Physics (including the magical physics of a D&D world) without it is just a mess.

The_Blue_Sorceress
2008-02-07, 04:07 PM
The rules on this are nearly contradictory. Here's the segment from Arcane spells (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicOverview/arcaneSpells.htm):Now, unless my reading comprehension dropped, it seems that a day begins with eight hours of rest. A Ring of Sustenance reduces this to two hours.

I'd argue that it's still a 24 hour period to regain lost spells, but that if you've cast a whole bunch in the last eight hours, those count against the spells you prepare when a day as has passed since the last time you prepared your spells.

To illustrate:

Zanigar the Great gets up one morning after eight, sweet hours of rest and prepares his spells for the day at the usual time. He them goes out adventuring with his companions and has four encounters before they decide to call it a day. Zanigar rests first getting his eight hours, and then takes that last watch while his companions sleep. During his watch they are attacked by enemy forces, and Zanigar is forced to expend the last of his spells from the previous day (he didn't have many, but they were enough to hold off the enemy until his companions got their act together and beat the stuffing out of the bad guys.) Let's say he uses a casting of magic missile and, oh, invisibility after taking a bad hit.

When he goes to prepare his spells after the fight is over (his usual spell preparation time having passed while he was obligated to have his attention focused on watching out for danger) he can prepare one less first level spell than normal, and one less second level spell than normal, because he cast magic missile and invisibility withing eight hours of preparing his spells. Now, he could wait to prepare those two slot until another eight hours has passed, but not until then.

That's how I'd run it, anyway.

-Blue

Saph
2008-02-07, 04:25 PM
...Which means that you actually are bringing relativistic physics into it; you just didn't realize that that's what you were doing.

Somehow, I had the feeling as I wrote the last post that I'd get picked up on that. :P

In-game, it didn't occur to any of the players to wonder about it. I drew the space station on the battle map; everyone just oriented to that as a centre point, without thinking about the station's orbit.

- Saph

baddriver01
2008-02-17, 12:54 PM
That's how I'd run it, anyway.

-Blue[/QUOTE]
Hey, new to the boards and thanks for the insight on Rope Trick...

That's exactly how it is supposed to be run. My question is this, I have a Psion Seer with the same power as Rope Trick. We were trying to diffuse a "spell bomb" and couldn't. If I had created a rope trick and put the bomb in there...would we have been safe?