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2014-03-16, 07:37 PM (ISO 8601)
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What's So Great About Contingency?
I've seen arguments that Contingency is so strong it warrants not banning Evocation if Craft Contingent Spell is allowed, and if it is allowed then any wizard who doesn't have it by level 15 isn't doing the caster thing right. I mean, it's clearly useful, I won't argue that, but why is it professed so strongly as something every wizard can't live without? I've seen people say that high level high-op wizard battles will invariably come down to who worded their seventh or so Contingency better. What gives?
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2014-03-16, 07:39 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
It's an added layer of protection on classes that derive most of their power from preparation.
To put it simpler, the Wizard loves planning for contingencies. It stands to reason that Contingency would be useful in this regard.Iron Chef Award!
Spoiler
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2014-03-16, 07:40 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
Action economy is the key to dungeons and dragons.
Craft contingency lets you take as many actions as you want , whenever you want if you're clever.
Contingency the spell does the same thing on a much smaller scale.
Contingency is like playing chess but you get to make several moves on your turn, several on you opponents turn and you're aloud to rearrange the board when he gets up to go to the bathroom.Last edited by (Un)Inspired; 2014-03-16 at 07:40 PM.
amazing avatar of my favorite character, Gheera, by Pesimismrocks
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2014-03-16, 07:44 PM (ISO 8601)
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Plague Doctor by Crimmy
Ext. Sig (Handbooks/Creations)
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2014-03-16, 07:45 PM (ISO 8601)
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2014-03-16, 07:55 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
When it comes to Contingency the spell vs. Craft Contingent Spell, the feat is definitely better, right? I'm playing the first character that might make it to the point that I can actually take the spell, but after coming across the feat, I'm not sure the spell itself seems nearly as valuable.
What is the recommended or most effective way to make use of one or both kinds of Contingencies?Only character at the moment is a rifle-wielding sniper in a very customized campaign setting being DM'ed by a friend/co-worker. We're kinda tweaking everything as we go, like a giant playtest.
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2014-03-16, 07:56 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
If he doesn't, I might.
But yeah, it also allows for some Initiative ignoring shenanigans.
Most basic example, starting when you get access to Time Stop.
Contingency: When I become engaged in a combat, Cast Celerity (allows the immediate taking of a standard action, dazes you for your next turn).
Celerity triggers, you use the standard action to cast Time Stop. You are dazed for the first round of Time Stop.
You get to go first in initiative. And then you get to go for up to 3 more turns. And then you have you actual turn in initiative.I follow a general rule: better to ask and be told no than not to ask at all.
Shadeblight by KennyPyro
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2014-03-16, 07:59 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2011
Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
Feat better hands down. By recommended forms of use are you looking for best spells to pick? Maybe how best to word contingency triggers? Oh are you looking to bypass limits like crafting XP and only being allowed to craft spells onto something up to their hit dice amount? I've got answers.
Most people see a half orc and and think barbarian warrior. Me on the other hand? I think secondary trap handler and magic item tester. Also I'm not allowed to trick the next level one wizard into starting a fist fight with a house cat no matter how annoying he is.
Yes I know it's sarcasm. It's a joke. Pale green is for snarking
Thread wins: 2
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2014-03-16, 08:19 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
Keledrath, you're more than welcome to sig it as well.
As far as best spells to use with either contingency, celerity is definitely the answer as has been outlined above.
Teleportation spells are also good choicesamazing avatar of my favorite character, Gheera, by Pesimismrocks
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2014-03-16, 08:21 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
Elemental protection spells are great for low-op situations. "If I'm set on fire, cast [spell that negates fire damage]" is just one limited, poorly worded example.
Iron Chef Award!
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2014-03-16, 08:22 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
There's also the consideration of how many contingencies you're willing to work with and whether or not the enemy is savvy enough to make ice assassins of you to mindrape knowledge of contingencies out of them with safety. Both of these have severe and incredible effects on how best to use contingent spells.
Most people see a half orc and and think barbarian warrior. Me on the other hand? I think secondary trap handler and magic item tester. Also I'm not allowed to trick the next level one wizard into starting a fist fight with a house cat no matter how annoying he is.
Yes I know it's sarcasm. It's a joke. Pale green is for snarking
Thread wins: 2
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2014-03-16, 08:29 PM (ISO 8601)
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2014-03-16, 08:41 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2014
Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
So in short, when people refer to contingencies or contingent spells, they're usually referring to some out-of-core things related to the core spell, or else really high-level use. Contingency by itself isn't quite as good (1 extra buff if the enemy attacks in the way you expect them to, or several extra if you can cast Time Stop), since you can only have 1 at a time.
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2014-03-16, 08:45 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
Last edited by eggynack; 2014-03-16 at 08:45 PM.
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2014-03-16, 08:47 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
Not quite. Contingency by itself is still really great. Just in core, you can have a contingency to Dimensional Door away based on a free action command word you can speak as a free action whenever. Now you've got a get out of jail free card useful against attacks, spells, areas of effect that you're in.
Or how about this, you have a Contingency Haste set to go off when the fighter draws his sword. Boom everyone gets Hasted. You just avoided spending your turn casting that great buff.
Contingency get bonkers at high levels, especially when you use Craft contingent spells instead of contingency spell but it's still amazingly strong at mid levels when you first get it.amazing avatar of my favorite character, Gheera, by Pesimismrocks
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2014-03-16, 08:50 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2014
Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
I said "not quite as good," not "not good." It's a good spell; I wasn't contesting that. It's just not the "I have 18 different spell effects go off on me the moment you said a harsh word, as well as summon my pet Solar" that 20th-level wizards with lots of Craft Contingent Spell usage get, by virtue of only casting 1 spell and one only being able to keep 1 up at a time.
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2014-03-16, 08:51 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2011
Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
It gets even better if you're willing to craft onto party members. It gets better still if you're willing to craft onto ice assassin minions. It gets absolutely frigging hilarious if you're willing to polymorph any object those minions as small as possible and keep arbitrarily large amounts of them up your sleeves.
Most people see a half orc and and think barbarian warrior. Me on the other hand? I think secondary trap handler and magic item tester. Also I'm not allowed to trick the next level one wizard into starting a fist fight with a house cat no matter how annoying he is.
Yes I know it's sarcasm. It's a joke. Pale green is for snarking
Thread wins: 2
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2014-03-16, 09:00 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
amazing avatar of my favorite character, Gheera, by Pesimismrocks
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2014-03-16, 09:06 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2011
Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
Most people see a half orc and and think barbarian warrior. Me on the other hand? I think secondary trap handler and magic item tester. Also I'm not allowed to trick the next level one wizard into starting a fist fight with a house cat no matter how annoying he is.
Yes I know it's sarcasm. It's a joke. Pale green is for snarking
Thread wins: 2
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2014-03-16, 09:08 PM (ISO 8601)
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2014-03-16, 09:15 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Nov 2011
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2014-03-16, 09:31 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2011
Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
Intend contingency triggers are best worded to activate when you think a very specific thing that isn't likely to be thought for any reason besides activating that specific contingency. Why thought activation? Precaution against situations where you can't speak or gesture. Also thinking is a non-action and allows you to activate pretty much as many contingencies at once as you like. There is another form of activation that becomes optimal for a specific subset of cases in frighteningly high OP settings. These settings involve people making ice assassins of you to learn your contingencies by mind raping them. This bypasses vecna-blooded divination immunity. This is only a relevant thing to you if you're basically at the highest OP short of PUn-pun.
Spells to use are many so instead of getting specific and making this take all of the time I'll just give some general guidelines. Defensive mindrape targeting yourself and party members to remind yourselves of certain contingency triggers you mind raped out earlier in a tough fight against the nasty situation in the last paragraph is probably the most important if there are no limits in place. Beyond those you have long distance travel effects for escape or pursuit, summoning spells to bring in large amounts of help at minimal action cost, battlefield control spells offering as few saves or other defenses as possible, defensive buffs just in case yours aren't on at the start for some reason or are dispelled, and offensive magic offering as little defense as possible are some of the most important contingencies you can have.
To void crafting XP use the spell distilled joy implanted in wondrous architecture to gather ambrosia to cover casting costs. You can do this with many professions, but my favorite is owning or partnering with brothels. Using this advantage you can get an unlimited amount of crafting XP substitute and make a lot of money in the process.
The best way to get around the limit on crafting number by hit dice is to have large amounts of ice assassin minions shrunken as small as possible and hidden in your cloths at all times. I recommend 20 HD things with flight, lots, of HP, high natural defenses, and lots of artillery blasting power so you don't have to waste as much magic. I use various types of dragon, but anything fitting that criteria should work wonders. Also craft onto party members for their own safety. Also see if they'll also accept some shrunken minion spell holders.
Any other questions?
Edit: Pazuzu Pun-pun paladin kobold refers to the earliest possible method of obtaining unlimited power in the form of pun-pun. Think long drawn out series of wish abuses to get manipulate form at level 1.Last edited by ryu; 2014-03-16 at 09:33 PM.
Most people see a half orc and and think barbarian warrior. Me on the other hand? I think secondary trap handler and magic item tester. Also I'm not allowed to trick the next level one wizard into starting a fist fight with a house cat no matter how annoying he is.
Yes I know it's sarcasm. It's a joke. Pale green is for snarking
Thread wins: 2
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2014-03-17, 07:23 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
I didn't have a lot of specific questions, mostly whether or not it was just me, or was Craft Contingent Spell about a billion times better than regular Contingency?
The Celerity and Time Stop combo is pretty amazing, but sadly it'll be quite a while (if ever, in this campaign) before I get a spell that high of a level. Current character is a gish and so my spells known/per day have suffered by a couple levels :P
I've got another caster rolled up that I plan on using soon in a sort of parallel campaign but he's an Ultimate Magus (going for maximum utility) and his spells known/per day really suffer as far as knowing high-level stuff goes.
Anyway. . . no more rambling. If you use Craft Contingent Spell (can I just start saying CCS?), it doesn't seem like you're limited to spells with a personal range on them the way you are with the regular spell, so how does targeting work with something that deals damage if you've placed the contingency on an ally?
Obviously it's mostly intended to be used with buffs on others, but just trying to get creative.Only character at the moment is a rifle-wielding sniper in a very customized campaign setting being DM'ed by a friend/co-worker. We're kinda tweaking everything as we go, like a giant playtest.
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2014-03-17, 07:48 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2011
Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
Most people see a half orc and and think barbarian warrior. Me on the other hand? I think secondary trap handler and magic item tester. Also I'm not allowed to trick the next level one wizard into starting a fist fight with a house cat no matter how annoying he is.
Yes I know it's sarcasm. It's a joke. Pale green is for snarking
Thread wins: 2
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2014-03-17, 08:07 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Nov 2013
Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
Even if Psyren and Keledrath aren't sigging that quote, I most certainly am; it's just too good of an analogy to let go, so if you want me to remove it from my sig, please say so.
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2014-03-17, 08:07 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
Another abusive but legal use of contingency is to cast one on yourself, and one on your familiar.
Originally Posted by Share Spells
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2014-03-17, 10:17 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
Usually this is a fairly inefficient use of it in any case. Big part of playing a Wizard is using minimum investment necessary to deal with any issue; leaves you maximum resources to do maximum amounts of things per day. I wouldn't bother spending the Crafted Contingencies on individual buffs; I'd rather just use them to take actions when needed and cast buffs if I really want some. Usually I simply use Crafted Celerities. They allow me to pick the appropriate action for each situation, and I only have to use Celerity when necessary.
With 20 Crafted Celerities and the Contingency-spell, a level 20 character can have 21 standard actions available as a free action. Add Instant Refuge for a free action teleport too. You can also Limited Wish or Wand or Wyrm Wizard or whatever Favor of the Martyr so you don't have to worry about the Daze, but you can usually eat the Daze up by Teleporting somewhere safe or eating them with Time Stop. Mind, Contingencies can be crafted on everybody so anyone with access to Cunning Legacy Weapon or Foresight and a crafter can have the 20 actions whenever; casters get few extras tho. Also, Celerity is stupid (as is Anticipatory Strike, Synchronity and their ilk).
In Core, Dimension Door and Teleport often fulfill the same function. If your enemy can't Teleport, you can Teleport away (whole party if so desired), take your sweet time buffing the **** up and Teleport back with round/level buff and underling you feel like bringing along. Unless your enemy is also a caster, they have basically no meaningful actions to take while you're gone.
Basically, Contingent Teleport turns every encounter into Scry'n'Die without the necessity of using the Scry even if you get surprised or whatever. The best part is, since talking is a free action that can be taken out of turn order, you can tie Contingency to it (or even better, the mouth movements for producing certain word; that works in Silence) and use it basically whenever when you're not flat-footed. Then once you get high enough you can add Foresight and never be flat-footed so you can literally Teleport whenever wherever. There are other options too (Force walls, burrowing, etc.) but they tend to be less universal, though there are of course conditions where Teleport doesn't work. Please mind the caster level limit on Contingency though; you can never get over 6th level spells on it without stupidity around the level of Reserve of Strength.
EDIT: Just to be clear, that limitation does not, of course, apply to Craft Contingent Spell, another reason why it's absolutely hilarious.Last edited by Eldariel; 2014-03-17 at 12:09 PM.
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2014-03-17, 11:23 AM (ISO 8601)
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2014-03-17, 02:27 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
Is it legit to have a Contingency such as "When I reach 20 HP, teleport me to x", and it works during HP loss?
That's phrased poorly. What I mean is... if a wizard has 30 HP left, and takes 40 damage, would they A) be at -10 and die, B) be at -10 and die but the body be teleported, or C) teleport at the 'moment' they hit 20 HP, thereby teleporting and staying at 20 HP?
I've heard C is correct, but aren't sure if that's RAW or not.
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2014-03-17, 02:28 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: What's So Great About Contingency?
You take damage in chunks so no. It's not taken 1 HP at a time. Better just trigger it to an attack or something and get outta there before you get hit for 40 in the first place. You could however have Revivify Contingent on you dying and then wear an armor with Healing ability so if you ever die you get returned to life immediately and healed back to operational HP.
Last edited by Eldariel; 2014-03-17 at 02:32 PM.
Campaign Journal: Uncovering the Lost World - A Player's Diary in Low-Magic D&D (Latest Update: 8.3.2014)
Being Bane: A Guide to Barbarians Cracking Small Men - Ever Been Angry?! Then this is for you!
SRD Averages - An aggregation of all the key stats of all the monster entries on SRD arranged by CR.