Magic Jar

[Jimp]

Just out of interest, has anyone ever used Magic Jar in a game? If so, what happened?
I've never had the chance to play a game with a high enough level to use the spell, so I was curious.

[xmolder]

Can't say that I have used it, but for some reason, it reminds me of the Psionic Sandwich build. Good times, that.

But it definitely seems like it's something that should be reserved for evil characters (from a quick glance, could be wrong) and as I don't allow them in my campaigns...

[adanedhel9]

A player in my most recent game did. As the DM, it was annoying at times, since it's just another Save or Die effect. But it really made the final encounter interesting, when guards kept running out of the Prime Minister's home to kiss the paladin...

[Roland St. Jude]

Once back in 2E our party snuck in the back entrance of an enemy stronghold and faced the BBEGal far before we were supposed to. We'd acquired very little information about her nature or powers and yet made the way to her inner sanctum. Of course, within a few rounds we were getting soundly trounced. Nothing we were doing was being very succesful until the party mage game magic jar a try. It was a fluke, the BBEG rolled a 1 on her save, and - poof - we had the evil in a jar and complete run of her compound. The DM was kind of taken aback, but rolled with it nicely and it was tons of fun in a very unexpected way. We took charge of the place kept the neutral minions as employees, tricked all the evil ones into situations where they were easy to destroy, and even made the BBEG make amends (well, her body at least.) Actually, all the details of that campaign are actually quite a blur, except that single startling moment when the magic jar worked.

I think the adventure was a heavily homebrewed version of "A Rose For Talakara" from Dungeon Magazine.

[Rachel Lorelei]

I, and a lot of players I know, avoid the Magic Jar spell because it's broken. Not just in the "overpowered" sense--the rules aren't equipped to handle it.

For example, what happens if you cast Magic Jar with something that lets you cast spells without the material components? What happens if, god forbid, you Chain it? How about inherent stat boosts, do those go with you? Age categories? And so on.

[Sir Giacomo]

Hmm- Rachel Lorelei is right, magic jar IS complicated.

However, it is great fun in adventures - when used by the DM!

I once DMed the witchfire trilogy (if you do not know the modules yet, get them, they are just great!). A part of the plot in the first module is to uncover (in a New England 17th century-like atmosphere) the evil plot of a witch. I decided to spice up things for the group so that they were put into charge of investigating strange occurances and got to know 4 young women (one of which was the younger sister of one of the characters, to boost) who all apparently were able to cast sorcerer spells (background: arcane spells, in particular by sorcerers, were strictly forbidden in that country). As it were, they all were harmless and just had cute animal familiars. But the group simply got increasingly paranoid...(in the ensuing drama, three of the women died in tragic circumstances, sometimes the pcs were responsible...)
In truth, the evil witch was another woman who used magic jar to mind control these women in turn to get the pcs off her track. Was great fun!

- Giacomo