Dominated.

[Duskwither]

In a game I play with some friends, I have a Wizard10, Loremaster3, Archmage3. We recently ran into a Drow Priestess, and due to some blundering saves on her part, she fell victim to my Dominate Person. And considering how powerful she was, I've decided that I want to keep her around (despite the fact that the LG Favored Soul was once a slave to Drow, and this particular drow was of the very same house she was a slave to ).

Now, we've convinced the Favored Soul that we could redeem her via Helm of Opposite Alignment (which we've currently joined the crew of a ship to find), but my character's main motivation (he's NE) is that she's incredibly useful. She's a Cleric 13, Hierophant 2 (House-ruled to allow increases of casting levels). My Dominate lasts for a good seventeen days, and considering I can force her to fail her saves, I could keep her as my little thrall forever. Now, this seriously strengthens the party. Another healer/facemelter/smashy character.

I'm... Kinda curious... Do people do this often? Keep a character permenantly dominated? And do DM's often let that go? Or do they get vengeful? Also, would putting a LG Drow into the world be as bad as Drizz't?

[Bears With Lasers]

Problem: she's a drow cleric. That means she's getting spells from Lolth.
Now, if she becomes LG--or just starts doing good type stuff with your party because of the Dominate--do you really think Lolth will keep on granting her spells?

You could make a case for "she doesn't track what all of her clerics do", I suppose, but it's bound to come up eventually.

[Duskwither]

Ah, I should've mentioned that. Her house is gone. It had lost favor with Lolth, so, technically she'd been devoting herself to ideals as of late for her spells.

[Douglas]

Personally, I'd classify this under "Obviously self-destructive orders are not carried out" unless you can convince her that the spell she's failing a save against is inarguably beneficial - which might be difficult given that she can probably make the spellcraft roll to identify it from the components automatically. Every time you renew the domination, she gets a new save.

Even if your DM doesn't agree with that, "Subjects resist this control, and any subject forced to take actions against its nature receives a new saving throw with a +2 bonus." Intentionally failing a save against a Dominate spell would most definitely be against her nature, so all you've managed to do is make her have to succeed on two saves rather than one to resist redomination. Plus, I'm sure any number of the things you'll want her to do for you will be against her nature, triggering a new save without a second one to fall back on.

Basically, to keep her dominated for an extended period of time will require many overlapping castings of Dominate Person to have any reliability and will still not be guaranteed.

[Emperor Tippy]

Per RAW you can order her to fail her saves against your dominate person so you can keep her dominated forever.

EDIT: An order to not resist a spell is not obviously self destructive. And tell her to go to sleep first so she can't make the spell craft check to identify the spell as dominate person.

You just have to word stuff right. You don't say "go swim in the lava" you say "That lava is just an illusion and there is an artifact that will allow you to take revenge on those who reduced your house to rubble underneath that illusion so why don't you go and retrieve it?"

Since I use the Spell Compendium and play wizards most of the time I tend to go Dominate followed by Programmed Amnesia to completely rebuild their mind so that they are my servant forever and can't even contemplate freedom.

My DM's are fine with it (the challenges just get harder to compensate) or they kill off the thrall if it gets to be an issue.

No it isn't as bad as Drizz't. In fact using the Helm Of Opposite Alignment to do stuff liek that is great fun. You should Subdue a Balor one time and keep putting the Helm on its head until it rolls a natural 1 and fails its save.

[Bears With Lasers]

In that case, depending on what her ideals are, the alignment switch may still make her lose them (but maybe regain them as she switches to new, LG ideals).

A very strong case can be made that you can't force her to fail her saves ("self-destructive"). She'll also get a chance to break free whenever you get her to do something against her nature (the Helm would help alleviate this).

Overall, though--well, it's like having a fifth party member. Less XP and gold for everyone (unless you don't spend any gold on her), more people in the party.

[Amiria]

Yeah, once she gets lafwul good because of the helm, Lolth won't grant her spells anymore. She'll have to convert to the faith of an appropriate deity to cast spells again. This may take some time and probably a quest.

[martyboy74]

Actually, just ask the DM to let her join the party (after the helm), and just have you control her. No big difference, except one extra spell slot per a while.

[Mewtarthio]

"Hello, Dispel Magic, my good friend. Ah, look, you've brought your buddy Break Enchantment out to play! Oh, is that the "undo harmful effects" clause of Wish and Miracle in the distance? Joy! Now all we need is Disjunction and our party will be complete! Let's all go say 'hi' to that inexplicably LG drow over there!"

[Emperor Tippy]

Dominate is easily broken, Programmed Amnesia on the other hand requires a wish or Miracle (even disjunction won't fix it)

[NullAshton]

How about have a big long quest after the helmet to get a new deity/ideal to get spells from, eventually ending in the cleric becoming an effective cohort of you, two levels lower?

[Mewtarthio]

Dominate is easily broken, Programmed Amnesia on the other hand requires a wish or Miracle (even disjunction won't fix it)

What's Programmed Amnesia from? Isn't it the same level as Wish and Miracle?

Anyway, I was responding to the idea of perpetual domination in general. So long as you're not such a high level that you have access to more permanent mind-altering effects, the only thing that you can rely on to keep your thrall from turning on you at the first dispel is Stockholm Syndrome (even the Helm of Opposite Alignment won't work, as I imagine an LG drow would be pretty ticked at being controlled by an NE wizard).

[Emperor Tippy]

Originally a Psionic power the Spell Compendium made it a 9th level spell.

Yep. There are great plot hooks involved in having thralls (its why many DMs are ok with them)

[Variable Arcana]

Per RAW you can order her to fail her saves against your dominate person so you can keep her dominated forever.

How do you get that??

RAW:Subjects resist this control, and any subject forced to take actions against its nature receives a new saving throw with a +2 bonus.

I suppose if your DM is willing to rule that it's in the nature of this particular CE Drow priestesses to deliberately enslave herself to a member of an inferior races, then it's possible she wouldn't get a save at +2 every time you tried to re-enslave her... On the other hand, you really wouldn't need the spell at all, then.

[Emperor Tippy]

*sigh* You don't say "Fail your next save against Dominate XXX" you say "I'm going to cast Super Awesome Magic Booster on you but it requires you to be asleep and if you resist the magic it will fail to work."

Now the bluff check which you can make every time with Glibness and you can keep her perpetually dominated.

It's very much in a drows nature to try to become as powerful as possible.

[TheOOB]

You don't even need to lie, just tell them to go to sleep (something that is well within the nature of any creature), and cast it on them then, they won't know they had a spell cast on them, and even if they did it wouldn't matter.

[Renegade Paladin]

Eventually she'll stop believing you, bluff or not. And sleeping is well outside the nature of elves.

[TheOOB]

Okay, tell them to trance. It's more out of their nature to not sleep when they get tired though.

[Tor the Fallen]

Do drow sleep?

[Renegade Paladin]

No, they don't.

[Aximili]

You should Subdue a Balor one time and keep putting the Helm on its head until it rolls a natural 1 and fails its save.

Wouldn't that require one helm per try?

[Emperor Tippy]

No. Read the description.

[Aximili]

Holy *#$&@!! I could swear it was a one time thing!

Isn't that way too much for 4000GP?

[Mewtarthio]

Best of all, even though the Balor will always register as Evil due to the subtype, you can still tell when you succeed by using Detect Magic to determin when the Helm loses its charge.

[Duskwither]

Whoa, leave the intarwebz alone for a day and they run amok!

I think the Stockholm Syndrome one made me laugh the most. I would find such a situation to be hilariously awesome for Roleplay, considering the Favored Soul's past affiliation with her and everything. Although, I sincerely doubt my DM would go for such a thing. I don't think he's big into infatuation/romance stuff.

The Balor situation has come up quite a bit actually, and it's something we'd all love to do to one. If merely for the fun of it. Also a LG Balor fighting alongside Solars gives me a fuzzy feeling inside.

Now, I realize how easily dispelled/broken etc... Dominate is, and my DM is the type to make his wizards cast spontaneously because he forgot to check their prepared spells, making the situation rather hazardous, but at this point, considering her ECL is higher then mine, I might be willing to take that chance.

Now, one of the tricks is preventing the CG rogue-type from stealing the Helm from us and using it on my Imp familiar...

Oh, considering this is a cursed item... If we went to a large enough city, couldn't we find someone who was at least selling one?

[Clementx]

*sigh* You don't say "Fail your next save against Dominate XXX" you say "I'm going to cast Super Awesome Magic Booster on you but it requires you to be asleep and if you resist the magic it will fail to work."

Sleeping creatures are considered willing targets, but that does not mean they automatically give up saving throws. You can Teleport your enemy after you knock her out, but if you try to use any spell that allows saves, she can resist. Ordering her to be a willing target and to not take her save against harmless spells is fine because that only allows you to cast beneficial spells. Ordering her to fail a save against a non-harmless spell is against the nature of every creature, so she gets a save at +2 against Dominate.

There is a reason that sleeping targets are talked about under Targets but not Saving Throws. Or do you think that "willing target" means that you automatically fail your save against Fireball when you are asleep? (Hint: The explicit answer to that question is spelled out in every FAQ- you get your save, albeit at a penalty).

[Gorbash]

Where is the description for Helm of Opposite Aligment?

[Thes Hunter]

You can force her to fail her saves?



Ummm? Really?


Because that seems to seriously ping on my Munchkin radar.

[Emperor Tippy]

Sleeping creatures are considered willing targets, but that does not mean they automatically give up saving throws. You can Teleport your enemy after you knock her out, but if you try to use any spell that allows saves, she can resist. Ordering her to be a willing target and to not take her save against harmless spells is fine because that only allows you to cast beneficial spells. Ordering her to fail a save against a non-harmless spell is against the nature of every creature, so she gets a save at +2 against Dominate.

There is a reason that sleeping targets are talked about under Targets but not Saving Throws. Or do you think that "willing target" means that you automatically fail your save against Fireball when you are asleep? (Hint: The explicit answer to that question is spelled out in every FAQ- you get your save, albeit at a penalty).

No. You have her in trance so she can't make a spell craft check to identify the spell as dominate person (and thus harmful). She does not get to know what spell it is until after its cast on her and she identifies it with spellcraft. Since she willingly fails her next saving throw she is dominated.

Your a bard, you will make the bluff check for her to think it it is a harmless spell every time.


And per RAW a dominated creature doesn't know that they are dominated. They just do what you say and think that they are doing it because they want to, they don't realize that they are under a compulsion to do what you want.

[Mewtarthio]

No. You have her in trance so she can't make a spell craft check to identify the spell as dominate person (and thus harmful). She does not get to know what spell it is until after its cast on her and she identifies it with spellcraft. Since she willingly fails her next saving throw she is dominated.

Your a bard, you will make the bluff check for her to think it it is a harmless spell every time.

I always believed that creatures know, at the very least, whether or not the incoming spell has the (harmless) descriptor in its Saving Throw line. Otherwise, you could instantly dominate anyone by Bluffing them into believing you're about to cast a Cure spell (Will save for half healing) or Owl's Wisdom (Will save negates) on them, and instead casting Dominate Person. Or worse, tell them you're casting Enlarge Person (Fort negates) and instead cast Finger of Death. You'd be able to instantly kill or control anyone you wished so long as you could convince them that you wanted to buff or heal them. Also, there's no way she's going to believe you short of an epic Bluff check (see below).

Note also that I don't believe Bluff should make the target believe every word you say. Otherwise, you could convince people of anything so long as it was a lie. Rather, I believe that a successful Bluff check only means that they don't detect any dishonesty from you. That's a crucial difference.

And per RAW a dominated creature doesn't know that they are dominated. They just do what you say and think that they are doing it because they want to, they don't realize that they are under a compulsion to do what you want.

Subjects resist this control, and any subject forced to take actions against its nature receives a new saving throw with a +2 bonus. Obviously self-destructive orders are not carried out.

They resist the control. Furthermore, people can detect domination with only a DC 15 Sense Motive check because they are so totally under your control. A creature who is Charmed still believes it is in control, but I see absolutely nothing to suggest that a Dominated creature believes it is killing its allies of its own volition and everything to suggest otherwise.