New UA-style incantation: "Séance" (PEACH)

[OttoVonBigby]

I literally *just* threw this together. Those of you who have more experience with incantations (or séances!) than I: PEACH. I'm curious, for instance, if the casting time is too short.

Séance
Necromancy [Language-Dependent]
Effective Level: 6th
Skill Check: Knowledge (religion) DC 35, 3 successes
Failure: Attack
Components: V, S, M, F, SC, B
Casting Time: 30 minutes
Range: Touch
Target: Object or body part once owned by deceased creature
Duration: See text
Saving Throw: None
Spell Resistance: No

You compel a specific, identified deceased creature to speak with you. The creature's soul must exist in the afterlife as a petitioner (or in some similar fashion) in order for the incantation to function; so, for example, an outsider absorbed into its home plane or a vestige on the edge of the Far Realm cannot be contacted, and such an attempt ends without effect. If the deceased has been subject to a séance within the past week, the new incantation ends in failure (see below). If the creature you attempt to contact isn't actually deceased, the incantation ends without effect. The condition, or even existence, of the deceased's remains is not a factor.

Upon completion of the incantation, your eyes change to an appropriate color (e.g. all-black if contacting a profoundly evil deceased character, gold for a creature associated with Celestia, etc.). You thereafter speak for the deceased creature for the duration of the incantation, and cannot ask questions of it; the secondary casters must ask the questions. You are paralyzed for the duration of the incantation, except that your head can move to face your questioners (but at the will of the deceased creature, not your own).

The deceased must speak: it is not allowed a saving throw to resist the effect, but is also under no compulsion to provide useful or even true responses (unless its truename is spoken as part of each question, in which case it must answer truthfully). The deceased replies in a language understood by you and the greatest number of secondary casters, but it resents such contact and volunteers little information, instead speaking in one-word responses such as "yes," "no," "absolutely," "maybe," "never," "unknown," "irrelevant," "impossible," "understood," etc.

The communication between the secondary casters and the deceased is not limited to questions. The secondary casters may attempt to supply information that may persuade the deceased that their intentions are agreeable to it. However, actual negotiation (and Bluff, Diplomacy, or Sense Motive checks) has no effect.

This incantation must be cast at night.

Material Component
One pint of blood from the same type of creature as the deceased (human, medusa, ghaele eladrin, etc.). The blood is poured within the focus sigil. In addition, you trace the sigil with incense, which must first be sprinkled with powdered onyx worth at least 200 gp.

Focus
A sigil (5' in diameter) drawn on the ground consisting of a circle with a six-pointed pattern within. An object or body part once owned by the deceased creature must be placed in the center of the sigil and touched at the conclusion of the casting time to commence communication.

Failure
Under orders to punish this violation of the boundary between life and death, a marut (Manual of the Planes) arrives from Mechanus in the center of the sigil, crushing and destroying the deceased's object/body part. It immediately attacks anyone involved in the incantation whom it judges to be an obvious aggressor or transgressor; less urgently, it uses geas/quest on any participant whom it judges to be harmless. Otherwise, it attacks the caster first, then the secondary casters.

Backlash
You (but not the secondary casters) take 1 point of Wisdom damage per question asked. No Wisdom damage is incurred for statements made at the deceased, only questions put to it. Secondary casters may not "take over" the Wisdom damage from you; as soon as you lose consciousness due to this Wisdom damage (or any other effect), the incantation ends. Any spell or effect that recovers your Wisdom damage while the séance is active immediately ends the séance. If you are immune to Wisdom damage for any reason, the incantation ends in failure (see above).

Extra Casters
Five required; they chant choruses and supplications to the relevant deity/deities throughout the casting time. You and the secondary casters must join hands in a ring around the sigil. If the ring is broken, the incantation ends in failure (see above).

[Bohandas]

It's nice to see Incantations actually ised. I always thought they were a clever little system.