Escape Routes? [3.5]

[Rhiannon87]

We've got a bit of downtime in one of the games I'm in, and as the party treasurer, I'm trying to figure out what useful items to spend the thousands of gold in the party treasury on. (With everyone else's approval, of course.) I stocked up on a bunch of potions and such, and still had a lot of money sitting around. This has been a pretty brutal campaign, with lots of very difficult encounters. A couple party members have their own escape routes (able to dimension door 20 feet a couple times a day, always carries a potion of gaseous form, able to cast actual dimension door, etc), but I'd like to get something that will allow the entire party to say "screw that" and escape. My initial idea was getting potions of fly, but those are quite pricey and would nearly clean out the treasury. So I thought I'd see what other options were out there.

Here's the requirements:
- No teleportation or mass fly. DM has banned them.
- I need this for 8 people, and can't spend more than 6,000 gp total.
- Not everyone is able to successfully use magic devices (several people don't have it as a class skill or haven't put ranks into it), so it needs to be something easy-to-operate.

Thanks for the help! Your good ideas today may prevent a TPK in the future. :D

[evil-frosty]

Well your best options have been banned, so that leaves you the potions of fly but you said you dont want that. First you could just do what the DM has planned but sometimes the DM does overestimate the party's abilities. But i dont really see another option beyond potions of fly/gaseous form. Sorry i wasnt a lot of help

[AintThatASeamus]

A scroll of shadow walk sounds like it would meet your needs, assuming its use hasn't been banned by your DM as well. It would affect the entire party of 8 (and then some), and only requires one person with access to bard or wizard/sorcerer spells or Use Magic Device, which it sounds like you have. And it's well within your budget at 1,650 gp.

[Rhiannon87]

Evil-Frosty: I'm not violently opposed to the potions of fly, I just wanted to see what else was out there. Thanks anyway!

Seamus: That's a great idea, I'm just not sure if the DM will allow it. Basically, he wants to avoid any spells that will allow us to skip over large portions of the plot by skipping over large portions of travel. It's a bit of railroading, yes, but since he's so freaking awesome about plot and story and letting us get away with crazy stuff elsewhere, we generally don't begrudge him this. (Plus we'd probably miss a ton of treasure and interesting NPCs if we skipped a bunch of stuff.) I'll be sure to ask him about that though. :D

[Sstoopidtallkid]

Evil-Frosty: I'm not violently opposed to the potions of fly, I just wanted to see what else was out there. Thanks anyway!

Seamus: That's a great idea, I'm just not sure if the DM will allow it. Basically, he wants to avoid any spells that will allow us to skip over large portions of the plot by skipping over large portions of travel. It's a bit of railroading, yes, but since he's so freaking awesome about plot and story and letting us get away with crazy stuff elsewhere, we generally don't begrudge him this. (Plus we'd probably miss a ton of treasure and interesting NPCs if we skipped a bunch of stuff.) I'll be sure to ask him about that though. :D

If that's the reason he's banned it, see if you can get a custom divine spell(or scroll) of 'save our collective holy boops'. Teleports 1 willing target/3 levels within 30 feet to the nearest altar(or main altar) of (campaign-important god/church). Won't let you skip large portions of plot(in fact, afterwards you'll have to fight back to where you were), but will allow your party to dodge a TPK.

[Douglas]

See if he'll allow Word of Recall. It's teleportation, but with a strict limitation on possible destinations that should drastically reduce or eliminate its ability to skip plot by skipping travel.

[Another_Poet]

It sounds like what you need is a custom Wondrous Item.

New Item: Horn of Withdrawal
This bronze battle horn has reputedly saved the lives of many an over-brave warrior. The witch who passes it to you warns you never to sound it unless you are in dire peril.

When this horn is blown, time seems to stand still. Whoever blew the horn has but a moment to recite the names of all those in her war band whom she wishes to save. All the names must be recited together in a single breath.

Immediately, the horn-blower and those named are whisked away. Creatures out of earshot of the horn are not affected even if they are named. All affected creatures move back in time to wherever they were exactly three minutes before the horn was blown. Everything that has happened in those three minutes is undone; time has literally rewound and the company has a second chance at planning for their undertaking, or running from it.

Fine cracks can be seen in the bronze, and grow worse each time it is played. After seven uses it disintegrates completely and is useless.

Special Drawbacks:
There are unfortunate side-effects of the Horn of Withdrawal. First, each time it is used there is a 10% chance that one of the named allies will be accidentally left behind. [The DM should allow this character to attempt to survive the battle after their companions disappear; if they do, they can of course try to reunite.] Secondly, there is a 10% chance that one non-named creature within earshot of the horn will accidentally come along with those named. Lastly, all creatures affected by the horn lose their memory of the future just 2d4 rounds after traveling back in time. Unless they quickly create some kind of warning for themselves they may well walk back into whatever danger they just escaped. If one of their friends was left behind by the horn they might spend the rest of their lives wondering what happened to the person.

Price: 5000 gp

Pricing Notes:

Spoiler

Show

There is no actual spell that does this so I'll assume it is one level higher than Dimension Door, since it does basically the same thing plus a very limited "undo" button. That would make it a Sor/Wiz5 Conjuration spell and the minimum caster level is 9.

The formula here is that of a use-activated item with charges, which is:

((Spell Level * Caster Level) * 2,000 gp) / 2
Note: the spell duration is "instantaneous" and there are no costly material components nor XP cost if we model it on Dimension Door so there are no extra costs to add in.

That comes to:
((5 * 9) * 2,000) / 2 or 45,000 gp

However! That would give the item 50 charges. It only has seven. Seven goes into 50 seven times, so we'll divide 45,000 by 7 and get about 6,429 gp.

Last but not least, I've built flaws into the device. It may leave one party member to die alone, or bring one horrible monster along with the soon-to-be-amnesiac characters. These both make it risky to use and ensure that the PCs will save it for very serious circumstances only. Plus the amnesia itself can lead to all sorts of plot hooks and interesting twists, which is like a freebie for the DM.

There's no formula to determine what these flaws are worth, but eyeballing it I'd reduce the cost from just over 6,000 gp to an even 5,000 gp.

If I were your DM, I'd approve it

ap