Tactical instability
Mary K. Kuhner
once both sides of a conflict had Teleport and Scry, plus backing spells
such as Haste, the conflict tended to be decided immediately in favor
of whoever attacked first. This is what I mean by "instability", and
I am puzzled by how often we run into it. It strikes me as a really
undesirable quality. Am I mistaking my preference for something more
general--are there players who really enjoy the situation described
above? Or is it always finessed around by the GM and/or player group,
such as by forbidding the NPCs to use these tactics?
Instability can also show up on a more strategic level. Several
"secret war" game settings, such as Vampire and Feng Shui, seem
to me to be prone to strategic-level instability: if the PCs are
too successful or too public or just make a bad decision somewhere,
the realistic response escalates to all-out war. The PCs are
likely to go down; even more disturbingly, the setting is likely to
be overwhelmingly changed. (In Feng Shui perhaps this can be
avoided by invoking some kind of magical tendency for the setting
to stay the way it is as long as the dominant factions hold the
feng shui sites.) I found both games close to impossible to run in
their pure forms, because I wasn't up for the continual GM juggling
to try to keep the setting stable.
How do GMs and player groups deal with these issues? I am aware of
dramatist solutions--the group mutually agrees that the troublesome
continuations simply won't happen, or the GM unilaterally forces them
not to hapen. But in groups where those solutions don't seem good
enough--and they don't to me--how do people avoid sudden cataclysms?
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Charlton Wilbur
> In our hands at least, high-level AD&Dv3 developed in the following way:
> once both sides of a conflict had Teleport and Scry, plus backing spells
> such as Haste, the conflict tended to be decided immediately in favor
> of whoever attacked first. This is what I mean by "instability", and
> I am puzzled by how often we run into it. It strikes me as a really
> undesirable quality. Am I mistaking my preference for something more
> general--are there players who really enjoy the situation described
> above? Or is it always finessed around by the GM and/or player group,
> such as by forbidding the NPCs to use these tactics?
Many gamers do not play optimally in combat. I wish there were a more
elegant answer, but that's the way it looks from here. As a result,
these tactical instabilities don't affect most games.
(This is also very true in boffer-combat LARPs -- a group of people
who can spend time practicing tactical combat together away from game,
or even who understand concepts such as flanking and attacking from
behind, will be a much more effective fighting force than those who
simply run at the enemy flailing their weapons. Still, many people
insist on running at the enemy flailing their weapons.)
Charlton
Russell Wallace
(Mary K. Kuhner) wrote:
>In our hands at least, high-level AD&Dv3 developed in the following way:
>once both sides of a conflict had Teleport and Scry, plus backing spells
>such as Haste, the conflict tended to be decided immediately in favor
>of whoever attacked first. This is what I mean by "instability", and
>I am puzzled by how often we run into it. It strikes me as a really
>undesirable quality. Am I mistaking my preference for something more
>general--are there players who really enjoy the situation described
>above? Or is it always finessed around by the GM and/or player group,
>such as by forbidding the NPCs to use these tactics?
Partly the latter. Partly it's that it simply doesn't occur to a lot
of people to use devious tactics, either because they don't think of
it, or because they don't want to; they prefer slugging it out.
(I notice this because I actually prefer taking out the enemy in one
go with a clever tactic than whacking away at them until they run out
of hit points; it sometimes surprises me that almost everyone else
prefers the latter.)
If you want to fix it, doing away with, or severely restricting,
Teleport and Scry is a good first step.
>Instability can also show up on a more strategic level. Several
>"secret war" game settings, such as Vampire and Feng Shui, seem
>to me to be prone to strategic-level instability
They are. So much so that in my opinion, they simply _do not work_
simulationist. The Masquerade really _would not_ hold for more than a
week, tops. If you want to run Vampire, you just have to accept that
the setting is effectively being granted a fair amount of script
immunity.
Possible ways around this:
- Drastically reduce the numbers and influence of the secret groups.
- Drastically reduce their age. (If magic was only rediscovered last
month, there may not have been time for the instability to have shown
up yet.)
- Reduce the stakes to less than life-or-death so that people aren't
willing to kill each other over them.
--
"Mercy to the guilty is treachery to the innocent."
http://www.esatclear.ie/~rwallace
mail:rw(at)eircom(dot)net
Mary K. Kuhner
Russell Wallace <sp...@devnull.com> wrote:
>Mary wrote:
>>Instability can also show up on a more strategic level. Several
>>"secret war" game settings, such as Vampire and Feng Shui, seem
>>to me to be prone to strategic-level instability
>They are. So much so that in my opinion, they simply _do not work_
>simulationist. The Masquerade really _would not_ hold for more than a
>week, tops. If you want to run Vampire, you just have to accept that
>the setting is effectively being granted a fair amount of script
>immunity.
You know, that's a phrasing I've never heard before, and I think
it's quite an insightful one.
My experience with unstable settings is that the GM usually gets
invested in arguing that somehow, the setting's not so unstable as
all that. (It has "hidden checks and balances".) When this
proves not to be the case, there's a temptation to rail at the
players for screwing things up. After all, if the Masquerade has
supposedly existed for thousands of years, it can't be *that*
easy to screw it up, can it? The PCs must have done something
remarkably dumb....
It might be much better to say up front, "Hey, this setting's unstable,
but I think it's so cool I want to run it anyway. So, a deal: I
will try hard not to let the NPCs knock it over, and you will try hard
not to have your PCs knock it over. Okay?"
It's still more gray hair than I really care for--script immunity
is hard work for all parties, if the game is supposed to be
otherwise simulationist--but it sounds better than what I've seen
happen in the past.
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Russell Wallace
(Mary K. Kuhner) wrote:
>In article <3cb4cbc2....@news.eircom.net>,
>Russell Wallace <sp...@devnull.com> wrote:
>
>>They are. So much so that in my opinion, they simply _do not work_
>>simulationist. The Masquerade really _would not_ hold for more than a
>>week, tops. If you want to run Vampire, you just have to accept that
>>the setting is effectively being granted a fair amount of script
>>immunity.
>
>You know, that's a phrasing I've never heard before, and I think
>it's quite an insightful one.
Thanks!
>My experience with unstable settings is that the GM usually gets
>invested in arguing that somehow, the setting's not so unstable as
>all that.
Yes, I think this is another example of my earlier point about people
being sidetracked into simulationist debates when the real issue is
dramatist.
>It might be much better to say up front, "Hey, this setting's unstable,
>but I think it's so cool I want to run it anyway. So, a deal: I
>will try hard not to let the NPCs knock it over, and you will try hard
>not to have your PCs knock it over. Okay?"
I think so, yes.
sNOm...@sonic.net
: In our hands at least, high-level AD&Dv3 developed in the following way:
: once both sides of a conflict had Teleport and Scry, plus backing spells
: such as Haste, the conflict tended to be decided immediately in favor
: of whoever attacked first. This is what I mean by "instability", and
: I am puzzled by how often we run into it. It strikes me as a really
: undesirable quality.
There *IS* something to this... "strike first, strike hard". "The best
defense is a strong offense." In many martial arts, it's a cliche that
when 2 senior fighters square off, the first to land a blow wins, with
that one blow (then it's a matter of who can better fake an opening to
lure the other to make a mistake, or who can better spot "real" openings).
So, when magical offenses become an overwhelming advantage, the attacker
wins...
: Am I mistaking my preference for something more general -- are
: there players who really enjoy the situation described above?
*I* certainly don't like the situation you describe!
: Or is it always finessed around by the GM and/or player group,
: such as by forbidding the NPCs to use these tactics?
May I suggest "magical fortifications"? Anti-scry spells, anti-teleport
barriers (or spells that trigger on teleport-in), etc. I see no other
options, really...
When you look at "real" history, there is always a bit of an arms-race;
culminating in massive castles & plate-mail in the "high medieval" period;
then gunpowder de-stabilized that, and we were off into the rennaisance
arms-race, then the industrial, etc... Given the offensive magical
armamentarium, why wouldn't there be magical defenses that are (roughly)
on par?
RPG's are traditionally about the doers -- adventurers out DOING things,
going after/into targets. So the spells play to the PC's (remember the
real-world here: players are *customers*; they spend money for the games/
supplements/etc). Most people don't want to RP the garrison, but IMHO the
lack of fortification/defense spells is an "unrealistic" artifact of the
market-driven publishing.
Now that you have a well-defined problem, why not figure in-game solutions?
What would "Archimedios Arcanum of Grekkosus" (a noted magical researcher
who I just invented) have done to defend his castle, city, kingdom, etc...?
Bigby, Tenser, Ottiluke, all those chaps... surely at least ONE of them was
commissioned to solve the infamous "Teleport Problem" 3 centuries back?
"A classic solution, that one, brilliant at the time though we take
it for granted now. You simply..."
: How do GMs and player groups deal with these issues? I am aware of
: dramatist solutions--the group mutually agrees that the troublesome
: continuations simply won't happen, or the GM unilaterally forces them
: not to hapen. But in groups where those solutions don't seem good
: enough--and they don't to me--how do people avoid sudden cataclysms?
Well, I suggested one solution: stabilize the instability by making some
counterbalancing magic.
The Scry/Teleport combo is incredibly adventageous, and IMHO is the key
element to neutralize. In addition to creating balancing "defensive" magic,
you could invent some metaphysical rules whereby a teleport cannot closely
follow a scry, or *can* but is risky (interdimensional portal, anyone?),
etc.
Personally, I like the "arms race" answer best (for D&D3; I'm vehemently
opposed for other games, such as Ars Magica).
Offhand, a few ideas for anti-scry:
Absolute block (get no info)
Warping/illusion (get wrong/misleading info)
Alarm (target of scry notices scry)
Mind-lock (scryer sees a hypnotic vision)
Subtle mind-magic (scryer gets hit w/ mind-control to turn on his friends)
Scryer gets possessed
Automatic counterscry (target sees-image/hears-sounds from scryers locale)
Automatic counterattack (scry triggers spell(s) @ scryers locale)
Offhand, a few ideas for anti-teleport:
Absolute block (spell doesn't work)
Local block (teleport stops at wall/door/etc).
Teleport-sensitive spells (any time more than 2 people arrive via teleport,
a Fireball goes off @ their location)
Add velocity (all persons teleporting-in move @ 100mph @ arrival-point)
Redirect 1 (all persons teleporting-in have 50% chance to be embedded in
nearby structures)
Redirect 2 (all persons teleporting-in arrive in a locked cell, killing-
ground, etc)
Redirect 3 (each person attempting to teleport-in arrives instead:
3a. at a random location w/in range of teleport-spell (party separated).
3b. 50' deep in the nearest 50' (or more) deep body of water.
3c. 300' up in the air (moving downward @ 100mph?))
Arrive naked (teleport allowed the *people* but none of their *gear*).
Arrive enspelled (all persons teleporting-in are subject to "Charm Person"
(or "Confusion" or arrive asleep, or whatever))
Build these into "emplacement" magic-items: rune-carved block in the keep
walls, special capstone over the gate, doorposts of the great-hall, crystal
ball in the high tower, etc.
- Steve Saunders
to de-spam me, de-capitalize me
Kevin Lowe
mkku...@kingman.genetics.washington.edu (Mary K. Kuhner) wrote:
> In our hands at least, high-level AD&Dv3 developed in the following way:
> once both sides of a conflict had Teleport and Scry, plus backing spells
> such as Haste, the conflict tended to be decided immediately in favor
> of whoever attacked first. This is what I mean by "instability", and
> I am puzzled by how often we run into it. It strikes me as a really
> undesirable quality. Am I mistaking my preference for something more
> general--are there players who really enjoy the situation described
> above? Or is it always finessed around by the GM and/or player group,
> such as by forbidding the NPCs to use these tactics?
I actually ran into this problem in 2E AD&D, once the player characters
reached about 8th or 9th level. Once plane travel or mass teleporting
becomes possible, it's relatively easy to launch a perfect ambush and a
perfect ambush at those levels is practically a certain victory.
My solution was end the campaigns because I couldn't handle the
escalation involved. (Also because I rapidly ran out of enemies in
those campaigns that could not be effortlessly wiped out by such
parties). This happened twice.
My pessimistic gut feeling is that there is no solution to this kind of
tactical instability. I've run into it in CRPGs, and the only solution
has been repeatedly saving and reloading. I'm nigh certain that in
highly unstable systems it's only a matter of time until a TPK event.
> Instability can also show up on a more strategic level. Several
> "secret war" game settings, such as Vampire and Feng Shui, seem
> to me to be prone to strategic-level instability: if the PCs are
> too successful or too public or just make a bad decision somewhere,
> the realistic response escalates to all-out war. The PCs are
> likely to go down; even more disturbingly, the setting is likely to
> be overwhelmingly changed. (In Feng Shui perhaps this can be
> avoided by invoking some kind of magical tendency for the setting
> to stay the way it is as long as the dominant factions hold the
> feng shui sites.)
I think the game actually went this way in its later expansions.
Although I never bought them, I believe there's some flavour text from
the bullet-hopping White Ninja to more or less that effect. You can cry
the secrets of the secret war from the rooftops, but unless you have the
feng shui on your side it will somehow never actually change things.
> I found both games close to impossible to run in
> their pure forms, because I wasn't up for the continual GM juggling
> to try to keep the setting stable.
>
> How do GMs and player groups deal with these issues? I am aware of
> dramatist solutions--the group mutually agrees that the troublesome
> continuations simply won't happen, or the GM unilaterally forces them
> not to hapen. But in groups where those solutions don't seem good
> enough--and they don't to me--how do people avoid sudden cataclysms?
I have no solution, but I have a tentative thought.
In the teenage DnD games I saw and played in my youth, there often
seemed to be a similar kind of "instability" in that PCs often ran into
catastrophic disagreements either with each other or with NPC
authorities. The kind of shenanigans that are grist for the Knights of
the Dinner Table's mill.
After enough bad experiences, most of the players I enjoyed playing with
learned to avoid situations where party members killed each other or got
into lethal disagreements with the city guard. Which went against the
teenage grain, but led to longer games.
Maybe there is a similar learning curve in dealing with unstable
settings? It might be that with a bit of practise, and learned
knowledge of what levers not to pull, these kinds of settings can work
even for deep-IC games with simulationist leanings.
The key in the teenage scenario was, I think, to see coming the
situations where lethal conflict of one kind or another would become
inevitable and avoid them. As opposed to getting into situations where
IC play would lead to disaster and then trying to salvage things. So
maybe it's just a matter of trial and error, learning to see the
situations that lead to campaign collapse ahead of time and work around
them?
Kevin Lowe,
Brisbane, Australia.
Geoff Watson
Mary K. Kuhner <mkku...@kingman.genetics.washington.edu> wrote in message
news:a91mq2$15o4$1...@nntp3.u.washington.edu...
> In our hands at least, high-level AD&Dv3 developed in the following way:
> once both sides of a conflict had Teleport and Scry, plus backing spells
> such as Haste, the conflict tended to be decided immediately in favor
> of whoever attacked first. This is what I mean by "instability", and
> I am puzzled by how often we run into it. It strikes me as a really
> undesirable quality. Am I mistaking my preference for something more
> general--are there players who really enjoy the situation described
> above? Or is it always finessed around by the GM and/or player group,
> such as by forbidding the NPCs to use these tactics?
>
There are spells to defend against Teleport and Scry, and those
spells are unreliable to begin with.
Some of the optional rules add more anti-teleport and anti-scry
stuff.
> Instability can also show up on a more strategic level. Several
> "secret war" game settings, such as Vampire and Feng Shui, seem
> to me to be prone to strategic-level instability: if the PCs are
> too successful or too public or just make a bad decision somewhere,
> the realistic response escalates to all-out war. The PCs are
> likely to go down; even more disturbingly, the setting is likely to
> be overwhelmingly changed. (In Feng Shui perhaps this can be
> avoided by invoking some kind of magical tendency for the setting
> to stay the way it is as long as the dominant factions hold the
> feng shui sites.) I found both games close to impossible to run in
> their pure forms, because I wasn't up for the continual GM juggling
> to try to keep the setting stable.
>
> How do GMs and player groups deal with these issues? I am aware of
> dramatist solutions--the group mutually agrees that the troublesome
> continuations simply won't happen, or the GM unilaterally forces them
> not to hapen. But in groups where those solutions don't seem good
> enough--and they don't to me--how do people avoid sudden cataclysms?
>
You have to assume 'genre conventions'. Eg Secret IDs in superhero
games would realistically be uncovered in no time, but in genre they
stay secret easily.
Geoff.
John S. Novak, III
Kevin Lowe wrote:
> I actually ran into this problem in 2E AD&D, once the player characters
> reached about 8th or 9th level. Once plane travel or mass teleporting
> becomes possible, it's relatively easy to launch a perfect ambush and a
> perfect ambush at those levels is practically a certain victory.
> My solution was end the campaigns because I couldn't handle the
> escalation involved. (Also because I rapidly ran out of enemies in
> those campaigns that could not be effortlessly wiped out by such
> parties). This happened twice.
Didn't anyone think of the rather obvious, "In this game, we are
playing in a world where the laws of magic do not allow for
teleportation," solution?
There are less drastic solutions, such as putting penalties or
defenses against certain types of magic in place, but if, say, a
scry/teleport combination under the rules as written leads to perfect
ambushes, then change the rules outright, and above board.
No more teleport.
(Personally, I prefer more complex magic systems, where teleportation
is possible, but teleporting man-sized objects over any serious
distance becomes prohibitively difficult, except under certain
carefully constructed situations. I like it because it makes for the
possibility of adventure seeds in and of itself: "It has come to our
attention that the Hand of Isshari are trying to procure large
quantities of refined mithrite. They can only be trying to procure
enough to launch a wave of teleportation assassinations. Something
must be done!"
(But I am the master of non-linear effects, and I actually *like*
tinkering around with systems like that. I am aware that not everyone
likes that sort of thing.)
--
John S. Novak, III j...@cegt201.bradley.edu
The Humblest Man on the Net
Michael Stephan
news:3cb4cbc2....@news.eircom.net...
> On 10 Apr 2002 15:47:14 GMT, mkku...@kingman.genetics.washington.edu
> (Mary K. Kuhner) wrote:
>
> >In our hands at least, high-level AD&Dv3 developed in the following way:
> >once both sides of a conflict had Teleport and Scry, plus backing spells
> >such as Haste, the conflict tended to be decided immediately in favor
> >of whoever attacked first. This is what I mean by "instability", and
> >I am puzzled by how often we run into it. It strikes me as a really
> >undesirable quality. Am I mistaking my preference for something more
> >general--are there players who really enjoy the situation described
> >above? Or is it always finessed around by the GM and/or player group,
> >such as by forbidding the NPCs to use these tactics?
>
> Partly the latter. Partly it's that it simply doesn't occur to a lot
> of people to use devious tactics, either because they don't think of
> it, or because they don't want to; they prefer slugging it out.
>
Hi all. I have lurked here on and off for the last few years, but this
question really pulled me more than most, as I put a fair bit of work into
making my high level AD&D campaign maintain its balance. I just want to
add a few comments to the counter spells and such that were mentioned.
I first started noticing these kinds of problems when I realized it
REALLY bugged me that high level characters could destroy little armies all
by their selves. Sure the soldiers are low level but they are still very
well trained and hard to replace. So I reasoned that over the centuries
people would have developed low magic ways to counter some of the powerful
spells. The manual of the plans talks about ethereal creatures not being
able to move through living things, so elf nobles live in trees, humans let
the morning glory grow till it covers the walls and such. It works and
adds flavor to boot :)
The DMG said lead would stop scrying so IMC I have a variant wall of
lead spell and figure its proof against teleport as well. I had one
fortress the PC's wanted to assault, completely lined with lead in the
walls, and sealed up (IMC iron grates block as well). So they waited till
the front door was opened and teleported in. They found themselves in the
outer passageway as the inner chambers were also lead lined and only one set
of doors was ever opened at once. So they didn't have to sneak up to the
building but that's all the teleport got them. Now they have to break down
a metal door with out alerting the guards, while flying, because the floor
was covered in sand so the guards could see invisible people walking.
Admittedly these were secretive NPC's that had reason to believe that
high level characters would come calling some day, but anyone moderately
wealthy can afford some of this. So its a great deterrent. Evil NPC's
don't do the scry teleport that often because for the most part they are
cowards. And if you mess up, you'll be fighting guards till the big boys
come to see what the ruckus is. Then you die. It makes even the PC's think
twice.
Kevin Lowe
j...@concentric.net (John S. Novak, III) wrote:
> In article <spoof-B8988C....@news-vip.optusnet.com.au>,
> Kevin Lowe wrote:
>
> > I actually ran into this problem in 2E AD&D, once the player characters
> > reached about 8th or 9th level. Once plane travel or mass teleporting
> > becomes possible, it's relatively easy to launch a perfect ambush and a
> > perfect ambush at those levels is practically a certain victory.
>
> > My solution was end the campaigns because I couldn't handle the
> > escalation involved. (Also because I rapidly ran out of enemies in
> > those campaigns that could not be effortlessly wiped out by such
> > parties). This happened twice.
>
> Didn't anyone think of the rather obvious, "In this game, we are
> playing in a world where the laws of magic do not allow for
> teleportation," solution?
In my case, I went with the game contract "we're playing DnD more or
less by the book", not realising that this was a bad game contract for
high level play. :-)
> There are less drastic solutions, such as putting penalties or
> defenses against certain types of magic in place, but if, say, a
> scry/teleport combination under the rules as written leads to perfect
> ambushes, then change the rules outright, and above board.
>
> No more teleport.
In one game it was ethereal travel that caused the problem, since it
effectively combined near-perfect stealth with the ability to walk
through walls. But sure, if a given effect squirrels the game you can
cut it out.
For their sins, Shadowrun and Earthdawn got this right. They just
didn't have teleporting or reliable mind reading.
> (Personally, I prefer more complex magic systems, where teleportation
> is possible, but teleporting man-sized objects over any serious
> distance becomes prohibitively difficult, except under certain
> carefully constructed situations. I like it because it makes for the
> possibility of adventure seeds in and of itself: "It has come to our
> attention that the Hand of Isshari are trying to procure large
> quantities of refined mithrite. They can only be trying to procure
> enough to launch a wave of teleportation assassinations. Something
> must be done!"
>
> (But I am the master of non-linear effects, and I actually *like*
> tinkering around with systems like that. I am aware that not everyone
> likes that sort of thing.)
If it wasn't too much hassle in actual play, a system like that would be
pretty neat.
Kevin Lowe,
Brisbane, Australia.
Vlad2 Matt
>once both sides of a conflict had Teleport and Scry, plus backing spells
>such as Haste, the conflict tended to be decided immediately in favor
>of whoever attacked first
>are there players who really enjoy the situation described
>above?
If they win, yes. I think part of the reason for wanting to advance in level
and power isn't always to have greater challenges, but to have simple and
powerful solutions to big problems. Teleport in, throw a couple big spells,
couple big hits with big plus weapons. Get your xp and treasure and go home.
Not saying it's always that simple, but once you've put in a lot of time and
energy into a character, it's gratifying to be able to crush your enemies.
Makes getting beat up at 1st level tolerable.
As someone else said, D&D is about doing. So the magic in the game is
primarily for attack. The only way I've seen "anti-" spells used effectively
is either in preparation before battle, set up in a contingency situation, or
with intelligence that "the wizard on the hill has a rod of __"
>the conflict tended to be decided immediately in favor
>of whoever attacked first.
Right, so you "balance" the game by putting in some powerful NPC's to give the
PC's a challenge, but the killing power of whoever attacks first is much
greater than the number of HP's the characters have at that level. Anyone
who's ever dropped a fireball at range 0 knows this, not fun.
Especially if the combat is in an ambush type situation.
What I've used to "solve" this I borrowed from Terry Goodkind's "Sword of
Truth" series. The arms race. Someone else mentioned it in this thread.
Personally I like using summoned beings to either attack or just disrupt spell
use. It's pretty easy to modify the spell/creature descriptions to create a
"guard dog" spirit that looks out for scrying or teleporting (or anything else)
And if disruption is all you need (to cause spell fizzle) you really don't need
a 50HD astral spirit on call.
Of course, if a magic/anti-magic fight has been ongoing for millenia, it
completely changes how magic works in your campaign. Or, possibly just the
"big" spells have counters specifically designed for them. Anything with
astral projection or planar travel would be easier to plan for and sabotage.
Having an air elemental on hand for the invisibility/fly combo to get over the
castle walls is pretty effective too.
I really don't like the idea of limiting a spell by flat out not having it
exist or work in a world. I prefer a good counter, or maybe as it was
suggested elsewhere a rare/expensive component. Maybe a deposit of "fizzle-um
ore" in an area to limit spell workings.
>if the PCs are
>too successful or too public or just make a bad decision somewhere,
>the realistic response escalates to all-out war. The PCs are
>likely to go down; even more disturbingly, the setting is likely to
>be overwhelmingly changed.
The only game I've seen pull this off is Shadowrun. No matter what the PC's
do, or who they beat, the newpaper covers it up and the corporation continues
on. Even earth-shattering revelations simply go away when the corps. men in
black show up.
>I found both games close to impossible to run in
>their pure forms, because I wasn't up for the continual GM juggling
>to try to keep the setting stable.
I don't think there's anyway to handle a sustained campaign in many games.
Once the pc's ARE the "powers that be" the setting falls apart.
Can't think of a way to fix this. You don't want a situation in which nothing
a pc does effects anything. Or maybe that's it. I dunno.
Hopefully something I just wrote made sense to someone....
V II
Leszek Karlik
disseminated foul capitalist propaganda:
[...]
> In one game it was ethereal travel that caused the problem, since it
> effectively combined near-perfect stealth with the ability to walk
> through walls. But sure, if a given effect squirrels the game you can
> cut it out.
>
> For their sins, Shadowrun and Earthdawn got this right. They just
> didn't have teleporting or reliable mind reading.
Well, there is something akin to a teleport in Earthdawn - go through
to astral space, walk to the destination and emerge there.
However, this is really, really dangerous, and defences against things
walking around astrally are commom both in SR and ED.
> Kevin Lowe,
Leslie
--
Leszek 'Leslie' Karlik; ailurophile by trade; SNAFU TANJ TANSTAAFL; /^\ lk
Do you want to join the Ancient Illuminated Seers of Bavaria? / (*) \
Put $ 3,125.00 in a cigar box and bury it in your backyard. / \
One of our *Underground* Agents will contact you shortly. /_____________\
Dillon Burke
>Offhand, a few ideas for anti-teleport:
Nice list.
Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy variant: groups that teleport often
end up with scrambled limbs.
Alternately, on making a teleport have a character make some kind of
saving throw to avoid nausea and vomiting. This means that even if the
defenders have little in the way of magical tech someone making a
first-strike has to weigh up the risks.
Regards
Dillon
Dillon Burke
wrote:
>astral projection or planar travel would be easier to plan for and sabotage.
>Having an air elemental on hand for the invisibility/fly combo to get over the
>castle walls is pretty effective too.
I have felt for a while that in any fantasy campaign where flight was
a common magic, that the architecture of fortifications would change
drastically. Among other things I would anticipate a design that tries
to cover over as much of the open space inside a castle as possible,
and where the roofs were built to resist having objects dropped on
them. The end result would like the rather ugly early 20th century
fortresses.
Regards
Dillon
Vlad2 Matt
Agreed. Hard to find the "fantasy" in the Maginot Line. No keep, no moat, no
towers, no towering walls.....
V II
Warren J. Dew
where the first person to shoot wins.
As a gamesmaster, I try hard to set up my rules so that they are not tactically
unstable (nice term, by the way).
As a player, I shoot first.
I don't think AD&D 3rd edition sold very many copies to people like me.
I think some groups have a metarule that the gamesmaster baddies are not
allowed to use tactics that the player characters haven't used. The players in
such games avoid using such tactics because while it will win them one battle,
it will lose them the next, and players generally like to win more than one
battle.
Other groups may be protected by players who are more interested in their own
spotlight time than in actually cooperating enough to use real tactics.
Warren J. Dew
Powderhouse Software
Mary K. Kuhner
Vlad2 Matt <vlad...@aol.comnospam> wrote:
>If they win, yes. I think part of the reason for wanting to advance in level
>and power isn't always to have greater challenges, but to have simple and
>powerful solutions to big problems. Teleport in, throw a couple big spells,
>couple big hits with big plus weapons. Get your xp and treasure and go home.
>Not saying it's always that simple, but once you've put in a lot of time and
>energy into a character, it's gratifying to be able to crush your enemies.
>Makes getting beat up at 1st level tolerable.
Yes, that makes sense. I have a computer wargame, Warlords II, which
I like to play on a setting that allows some incredible lightning
victories--my record is 51/100 cities on turn 6. (The NPCs are actually
on their smartest level, but a human player can make better use of
magic creatures and get an unstoppable roll going, with a good starting
position.)
I am not comfortable as a player with the D&D situation, though, because
I can't put out of my mind the idea that next time, it will be my
PCs who are flattened in one round with no recourse. Thinking "Oh,
the GM won't let that happen" makes the game seem trivialized; but
otherwise there is no obvious reason why the PCs won't sometimes be
squished. I like a quick and crushing kill, but I want it to be
because I have some key advantage, not because the GM is playing
the NPCs as idiots. (Which was certainly how I had to run the last
part of _Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil_, or it would have
been all over one way or the other very suddenly.)
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Rupert Boleyn
>Long ago, in a galaxy far, far away, Mary K. Kuhner wrote:
>
>: In our hands at least, high-level AD&Dv3 developed in the following way:
>: once both sides of a conflict had Teleport and Scry, plus backing spells
>: such as Haste, the conflict tended to be decided immediately in favor
>: of whoever attacked first. This is what I mean by "instability", and
>: I am puzzled by how often we run into it. It strikes me as a really
>: undesirable quality.
>
>There *IS* something to this... "strike first, strike hard". "The best
>defense is a strong offense." In many martial arts, it's a cliche that
>when 2 senior fighters square off, the first to land a blow wins, with
>that one blow (then it's a matter of who can better fake an opening to
>lure the other to make a mistake, or who can better spot "real" openings).
>
>So, when magical offenses become an overwhelming advantage, the attacker
>wins...
So let's follow that to its logical conclusion. As a high level magic
user I know that in the event of someone taking a dislike to me
they'll kill me if I don't find out and stike first. Therefore I
should go out and kill everyone who might dislike me. now as this
shows that I'm an aggresive person, others will want to get rid of me
for their own protection, and so they becomes threats as well. In
order to prevent this I must kill everyone who could threaten me
first.
Thus we rapidly end up with _one_ wizard, dragon, or whatever that's
in the power range where pre-emptive strikes are the winning strategy,
and all these minor magic users who spend most of their energy
ensuring that they stay 'under the radar'.
>May I suggest "magical fortifications"? Anti-scry spells, anti-teleport
>barriers (or spells that trigger on teleport-in), etc. I see no other
>options, really...
And boy had you better not step outdoors without all your kit. and it
still won't stop a determined attacker.
>When you look at "real" history, there is always a bit of an arms-race;
>culminating in massive castles & plate-mail in the "high medieval" period;
>then gunpowder de-stabilized that, and we were off into the rennaisance
>arms-race, then the industrial, etc... Given the offensive magical
>armamentarium, why wouldn't there be magical defenses that are (roughly)
>on par?
Well in D&D there aren't (and never have been), for whatever reason.
--
Rupert Boleyn <rbo...@paradise.net.nz>
"Inside every cynic is a romantic trying to get out."
Kenny
On Fri, 12 Apr 2002, Rupert Boleyn wrote:
[stuff about first strikes, pre-emptive strikes in 3ednd]
>
> Thus we rapidly end up with _one_ wizard, dragon, or whatever that's
> in the power range where pre-emptive strikes are the winning strategy,
> and all these minor magic users who spend most of their energy
> ensuring that they stay 'under the radar'.
>
Well, what always used to bother me that with campaigns with
extensive information-gathering spells is how on earth do beginning and
middling spell-casters ever get to a point where thet can threaten the
status-quo. I mean once a high-level mage reaches the 'top' of the
pecking order, what is to stop them picking off nascent competitors right at
the start of their careers? One can only use the 'slip through
the screen/net' or 'outsider' scenarios to explain newbie mages. In fact,
this particularly applies to those nastier monsters like dragons.
Kenny
Wayne Shaw
Boleyn) wrote:
>>May I suggest "magical fortifications"? Anti-scry spells, anti-teleport
>>barriers (or spells that trigger on teleport-in), etc. I see no other
>>options, really...
>
>And boy had you better not step outdoors without all your kit. and it
>still won't stop a determined attacker.
It's not that bad unless you have so many opponents that they can keep
trying to watch for you 24/7.
George W. Harris
Boleyn) wrote:
:So let's follow that to its logical conclusion. As a high level magic
:user I know that in the event of someone taking a dislike to me
:they'll kill me if I don't find out and stike first. Therefore I
:should go out and kill everyone who might dislike me.
Llap Goch, the Welsh art of self defense!
--
They say there's air in your lungs that's been there for years.
George W. Harris For actual email address, replace each 'u' with an 'i'.
George W. Harris
wrote:
:On Fri, 12 Apr 2002 13:32:34 GMT, rbo...@paradise.net.nz (Rupert
:
It just takes a few low-level scryers in the
employ of an enemy. If a scry attempt is made every
few hours, you're not safe.
Wayne Shaw
<gha...@mundsprung.com> wrote:
>On Fri, 12 Apr 2002 09:10:32 -0700, Wayne Shaw <sh...@caprica.com>
>wrote:
>
>:On Fri, 12 Apr 2002 13:32:34 GMT, rbo...@paradise.net.nz (Rupert
>:Boleyn) wrote:
>:
>:>>May I suggest "magical fortifications"? Anti-scry spells, anti-teleport
>:>>barriers (or spells that trigger on teleport-in), etc. I see no other
>:>>options, really...
>:>
>:>And boy had you better not step outdoors without all your kit. and it
>:>still won't stop a determined attacker.
>:
>:It's not that bad unless you have so many opponents that they can keep
>:trying to watch for you 24/7.
>:
> It just takes a few low-level scryers in the
>employ of an enemy. If a scry attempt is made every
>few hours, you're not safe.
Scry itself is not a particularly low level spell, so I think I'd
class that in "so many opponents."
Jason Corley
> On Fri, 12 Apr 2002 09:10:32 -0700, Wayne Shaw <sh...@caprica.com>
> wrote:
> :On Fri, 12 Apr 2002 13:32:34 GMT, rbo...@paradise.net.nz (Rupert
> :Boleyn) wrote:
> :
> :>>May I suggest "magical fortifications"? Anti-scry spells, anti-teleport
> :>>barriers (or spells that trigger on teleport-in), etc. I see no other
> :>>options, really...
> :>
> :>And boy had you better not step outdoors without all your kit. and it
> :>still won't stop a determined attacker.
> :
> :It's not that bad unless you have so many opponents that they can keep
> :trying to watch for you 24/7.
> :
> It just takes a few low-level scryers in the
> employ of an enemy. If a scry attempt is made every
> few hours, you're not safe.
I don't think there's all that many "low level scryers" in the D&D world.
Unless you're doing the scroll-writing for them (and thereby sacrificing
XP) and they're constantly making their level checks.
I don't see Scry + Teleport as being that unbalancing even tactically
/without/ some knowledge of the underlying situation. Bad guys who are bad
enough to cast those spells are going to be bad enough to take precautions
against them. If there aren't any in the spells themselves, that's a
pretty serious omission from the world. I bet a /lot/ of wizards would be
putting a /lot/ of resources to find ways to limit these spells. I would
definitely alter that if true.
--
***************************************************************************
"Today's public figures can no longer write their own speeches or books,
and there is some evidence that they can't read them either." ---Gore Vidal
Jason D. Corley | ICQ 41199011 | le...@aeonsociety.org
Wayne Shaw
<cor...@cobweb.scarymonsters.net> wrote:
>I don't see Scry + Teleport as being that unbalancing even tactically
>/without/ some knowledge of the underlying situation. Bad guys who are bad
>enough to cast those spells are going to be bad enough to take precautions
>against them. If there aren't any in the spells themselves, that's a
>pretty serious omission from the world. I bet a /lot/ of wizards would be
>putting a /lot/ of resources to find ways to limit these spells. I would
>definitely alter that if true.
There is a remarkable dearth of useful scry and teleport blocking
magic in the base rules; that's a problem, much more noticeable in 3e
than in prior editions because most characters in an extended campaign
can be expected to get to the point they can use such spells. I
expect from what material I've seen of it that at least some of this
is being addressed in the Stronghold Builder's Guide.
Doug Lampert
One Crystal Ball + a few low level followers.
DougL
Jeff MacDonald
> In our hands at least, high-level AD&Dv3 developed in the following way:
> once both sides of a conflict had Teleport and Scry, plus backing spells
> such as Haste, the conflict tended to be decided immediately in favor
> of whoever attacked first. This is what I mean by "instability", and
> I am puzzled by how often we run into it. It strikes me as a really
> general--are there players who really enjoy the situation described
> above? Or is it always finessed around by the GM and/or player group,
> such as by forbidding the NPCs to use these tactics?
>
I'm not sure how it'll work out, but here's my take on the
Scry/Teleport combo.
If someone in the area with the person you're scrying on has a decent
Scrying skill, there's a good chance the scrying will be noticed at
once. Or if there are a lot of people they all have a chance of
noticing. If they notice, and the Scry/Teleport routine is common,
they'll probably start to prepare, or block the scrying if they can.
Scry takes an hour to cast. This means that at least one caster can't
use most backing spells beforehand. Any time he spends preparing gives
the targeted group more time to prep.
How much time do your groups let pass between starting the scry and
actually teleporting in? How do people respond to being scried on?
--
-- thejeff --
QOTD:
"I only touch base with reality on an as-needed basis!"
Douglas Vandenburgh
> In our hands at least, high-level AD&Dv3 developed in the following way:
> once both sides of a conflict had Teleport and Scry, plus backing spells
> such as Haste, the conflict tended to be decided immediately in favor
> of whoever attacked first. This is what I mean by "instability", and
> I am puzzled by how often we run into it. It strikes me as a really
> undesirable quality. Am I mistaking my preference for something more
> general--are there players who really enjoy the situation described
> above? Or is it always finessed around by the GM and/or player group,
> such as by forbidding the NPCs to use these tactics?
This is more a tactical response than an answer to your question, but I
thought I'd throw it out there just in case it mattered.
High level characters can usually cast Greater Glyph of Warding. It's
quite practical to cover every square foot of your stronghold with
glyphs triggered by anyone who doesn't have the group symbol tattooed on
them somewhere. Greater glyph will hold up to a 6th level spell. That's
a pretty rude arrival if the group has no reason to suspect it.
DougV
Wayne Shaw
<geoffre...@dingoblue.net.au> wrote:
>There are spells to defend against Teleport and Scry, and those
>spells are unreliable to begin with.
>Some of the optional rules add more anti-teleport and anti-scry
>stuff.
There are no standard spells to stop Teleport in the core books, and
the spells to stop scrying are extremely expensive to keep running for
any length of time. The failure chance on Teleport is generally
trivial if properly prepard, and for someone with any significant
level of the Scry skill, the same is true of Scry.
Wayne Shaw
<2be...@insightbb.com> wrote:
>High level characters can usually cast Greater Glyph of Warding. It's
>quite practical to cover every square foot of your stronghold with
>glyphs triggered by anyone who doesn't have the group symbol tattooed on
>them somewhere. Greater glyph will hold up to a 6th level spell. That's
>a pretty rude arrival if the group has no reason to suspect it.
I'm trying to remember if that one has a monitary material cost; if it
does, it could well get prohibitive for high levels. In any case,
it's not a solution for those without heavy clerical support.
Joshua Macy
It costs 400 g.p in diamond dust, and only covers a 5 square foot
area per level, so an 11th-level Cleric (the first that can cast it)
covers only a 55 square foot area each time he casts. Each 10 x 10
square on a map would take two days and 800 g.p to cover. That doesn't
seem all that practical to me...
Joshua
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> On Thu, 11 Apr 2002 13:00:09 +1000, "Geoff Watson"
> <geoffre...@dingoblue.net.au> wrote:
>
> >There are spells to defend against Teleport and Scry, and those
> >spells are unreliable to begin with.
> >Some of the optional rules add more anti-teleport and anti-scry
> >stuff.
>
> There are no standard spells to stop Teleport
Antimagic Shell. Prismatic Orb. Then there are various trap spells which
kick in the moment 'the wrong guy' comes too close.
> in the core books, and
> the spells to stop scrying are extremely expensive to keep running for
> any length of time.
There are magic items which keep them running at no cost - Amulet of
protection against scrying is the most obvious.
> The failure chance on Teleport is generally
> trivial if properly prepard, and for someone with any significant
> level of the Scry skill, the same is true of Scry.
I'm not saying these are optimal defenses, but defenses do exist. And
they have been improved in non-core books, so you don't even have to
design new spells yourself - You can just buy them.
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> Wayne Shaw wrote:
>
> > On Sun, 14 Apr 2002 23:32:21 GMT, Douglas Vandenburgh
> > <2be...@insightbb.com> wrote:
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >>High level characters can usually cast Greater Glyph of Warding. It's
> >>quite practical to cover every square foot of your stronghold with
> >>glyphs triggered by anyone who doesn't have the group symbol tattooed on
> >>them somewhere. Greater glyph will hold up to a 6th level spell. That's
> >>a pretty rude arrival if the group has no reason to suspect it.
> >>
> >
> > I'm trying to remember if that one has a monitary material cost; if it
> > does, it could well get prohibitive for high levels. In any case,
> > it's not a solution for those without heavy clerical support.
> >
>
> It costs 400 g.p in diamond dust, and only covers a 5 square foot
> area per level,
Sure it is not a five foot square per level? That would seem most
consistant with the normal mapping scale in D&D3, but I don't have my
books handy.
That would improve the effectiveness a bit - You could at least
safeguard you private domain for just a fraction of what a stronghold
would cost.
Rupert Boleyn
<n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>Antimagic Shell.
Which means you can't do any magic. And it's stationary.
>Prismatic Orb.
Do you mean Prismatic Sphere? It only lasts 10 minutes/level - not a
lot of use against a determined Scryer.
> Then there are various trap spells which
>kick in the moment 'the wrong guy' comes too close.
>
>> in the core books, and
>> the spells to stop scrying are extremely expensive to keep running for
>> any length of time.
>
>There are magic items which keep them running at no cost - Amulet of
>protection against scrying is the most obvious.
And forces a level check vs DC19 - not terribly reliable vs a decent
scryer. Mind Blank is about the only really good protection, and it's
an 8th level spell.
>> The failure chance on Teleport is generally
>> trivial if properly prepard, and for someone with any significant
>> level of the Scry skill, the same is true of Scry.
>
>I'm not saying these are optimal defenses, but defenses do exist. And
>they have been improved in non-core books, so you don't even have to
>design new spells yourself - You can just buy them.
Like?
Rupert Boleyn
<n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>Sure it is not a five foot square per level? That would seem most
>consistant with the normal mapping scale in D&D3, but I don't have my
>books handy.
>
>That would improve the effectiveness a bit - You could at least
>safeguard you private domain for just a fraction of what a stronghold
>would cost.
Nope - it's "Object touched or 5 sq. feet/level", and there's no
errata on it. This makes sense for a spell which is really mainly for
warding doorways and passages, because a band 10' across and 1' deep
is enough to protect a corridor.
Geoff Watson
Forbiddance.
Detect Scrying.
Nondetection.
Geoff.
George W. Harris
<n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
:Wayne Shaw wrote:
:>
:> On Thu, 11 Apr 2002 13:00:09 +1000, "Geoff Watson"
:> <geoffre...@dingoblue.net.au> wrote:
:>
:> >There are spells to defend against Teleport and Scry, and those
:> >spells are unreliable to begin with.
:> >Some of the optional rules add more anti-teleport and anti-scry
:> >stuff.
:>
:> There are no standard spells to stop Teleport
:
:Antimagic Shell. Prismatic Orb.
On the clerical side, Forbiddance, and Hallow
or Unhallow can be set up with a dimensional anchor
inside.
Also, Misdirection can be used to misdirect a
scry to another target. It's a 2nd level spell with an
hour*level duration, so an 8th level caster can keep it
up constantly for three 2nd level slots, or a magic item
could be created with a 12000gp market price, and it's
ideal to set up a trap.
--
When Ramanujan was my age, he had been dead for seven years. -after Tom Lehrer
Wayne Shaw
<n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>Wayne Shaw wrote:
>>
>> On Thu, 11 Apr 2002 13:00:09 +1000, "Geoff Watson"
>> <geoffre...@dingoblue.net.au> wrote:
>>
>> >There are spells to defend against Teleport and Scry, and those
>> >spells are unreliable to begin with.
>> >Some of the optional rules add more anti-teleport and anti-scry
>> >stuff.
>>
>> There are no standard spells to stop Teleport
>
>Antimagic Shell. Prismatic Orb. Then there are various trap spells which
>kick in the moment 'the wrong guy' comes too close.
Those don't stop "teleport"; they stop spells in general. And are
problematic to keep running on a regular basis, or over any size area
at all.
>
>> in the core books, and
>> the spells to stop scrying are extremely expensive to keep running for
>> any length of time.
>
>There are magic items which keep them running at no cost - Amulet of
>protection against scrying is the most obvious.
And unless you can put one on everyone who's going to be where the PCs
need to be, doesn't help much.
>
>> The failure chance on Teleport is generally
>> trivial if properly prepard, and for someone with any significant
>> level of the Scry skill, the same is true of Scry.
>
>I'm not saying these are optimal defenses, but defenses do exist. And
>they have been improved in non-core books, so you don't even have to
>design new spells yourself - You can just buy them.
They're weak enough to have no appreciable impact on the overall
problem. That might change with non-core book spells (particularly it
seems like it might be addressed in the upcoming Stronghold Builder's
Guide from some advance indications) but that still has nothing to do
with what's available to people from the core rules.
Wayne Shaw
<geoffre...@dingoblue.net.au> wrote:
>
>Wayne Shaw <sh...@caprica.com> wrote in message
>news:c6nkbukaqro1ncv3e...@4ax.com...
>> On Thu, 11 Apr 2002 13:00:09 +1000, "Geoff Watson"
>> <geoffre...@dingoblue.net.au> wrote:
>>
>> >There are spells to defend against Teleport and Scry, and those
>> >spells are unreliable to begin with.
>> >Some of the optional rules add more anti-teleport and anti-scry
>> >stuff.
>>
>> There are no standard spells to stop Teleport in the core books, and
>> the spells to stop scrying are extremely expensive to keep running for
>> any length of time. The failure chance on Teleport is generally
>> trivial if properly prepard, and for someone with any significant
>> level of the Scry skill, the same is true of Scry.
>>
>
>Forbiddance.
>Detect Scrying.
>Nondetection.
Most effectively useless at stopping this tactic unless you can afford
to do them on every single person in the area. What good does
detecting the scrying do if the opposition immediately follows it with
the teleport? The whole point is for them to chose the time when
they're ready and you aren't, and no one can get their whole defense
ready in a round.
Douglas Vandenburgh
>>> High level characters can usually cast Greater Glyph of Warding.
>>> It's quite practical to cover every square foot of your stronghold
>>> with glyphs triggered by anyone who doesn't have the group symbol
>>> tattooed on them somewhere. Greater glyph will hold up to a 6th level
>>> spell. That's a pretty rude arrival if the group has no reason to
>>> suspect it.
> It costs 400 g.p in diamond dust, and only covers a 5 square foot area
> per level, so an 11th-level Cleric (the first that can cast it) covers
> only a 55 square foot area each time he casts. Each 10 x 10 square on
> a map would take two days and 800 g.p to cover. That doesn't seem all
> that practical to me...
Cheap, no. It might be practical in a world where you had Scry/Teleport
teams bamfing around your stronghold.
DougV
Joshua Macy
> Joshua Macy wrote:
>> [D&D3e Greater Glyph of Warding] costs 400 g.p in diamond dust, and only covers a 5 square foot
>>area per level,
>>
>
> Sure it is not a five foot square per level? That would seem most
> consistant with the normal mapping scale in D&D3, but I don't have my
> books handy.
>
> That would improve the effectiveness a bit - You could at least
> safeguard you private domain for just a fraction of what a stronghold
> would cost.
>
Well, the text literally says "Target or Area: Object touched or up
to 5 sq. ft/level". Contrast this with the Guards and Wards spell which
says "Area: Up to 200 sq. ft./level" or Hallow "Area: 10 ft./level
radius emanating from the touched point." So while I'm not *absolutely
positive* that they don't really mean an area 5 ft./level on a side, it
seems likely that the rules actually mean what they say (and the
examples given, with Glyphs of Warding being placed on the drawers of a
cabinet, and Guards and Wards protecting several stories of a
stronghold, would tend to support that as well).
Joshua
Joshua Macy
If you go by the DMG's estimates of levels of NPCs, you need to have
at least the population of a city before you get even one NPC capable of
casting the spell, and he probably has better things to do than spend
the next three years trying to cover your castle with glyphs for the
cost of about half a million in gold pieces. Scry and Teleport are
available at 5th level, so you have many more potential attackers who
have them available than defenders who can use Greater Glyph...
Joshua
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> On Mon, 15 Apr 2002 08:50:07 +0200, Nis Haller Baggesen
> <n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>
> >Antimagic Shell.
>
> Which means you can't do any magic. And it's stationary.
>
> >Prismatic Orb.
>
> Do you mean Prismatic Sphere?
yes - Sorry.
>It only lasts 10 minutes/level - not a
> lot of use against a determined Scryer.
>
True, but it also protects against things like teleportation IIRC.
> > Then there are various trap spells which
> >kick in the moment 'the wrong guy' comes too close.
> >
> >> in the core books, and
> >> the spells to stop scrying are extremely expensive to keep running for
> >> any length of time.
> >
> >There are magic items which keep them running at no cost - Amulet of
> >protection against scrying is the most obvious.
>
> And forces a level check vs DC19 - not terribly reliable vs a decent
> scryer. Mind Blank is about the only really good protection, and it's
> an 8th level spell.
True. I seem to recall some illusion spells which might protect you as
well. At least True Seeing and other spells dont work with scrying
(IIRC), so you could set up a number of illusions making it harder for
the scryer to figure out what was going on - Scrying doesn't help
figuring out codes, or even seeing in the dark - You can use most of the
defenses you might use against an eaves dropper. And spells like 'detect
scrying' will tell you when to be extra careful. You could also
communicate telepathically, or live on another plane some of the time -
Most of those spells only work on the same plane IIRC. I don't know if
the cleric spell "Spell immunity" might be able to cover Scry as well -
I have to look that up.
>
> >> The failure chance on Teleport is generally
> >> trivial if properly prepard, and for someone with any significant
> >> level of the Scry skill, the same is true of Scry.
> >
> >I'm not saying these are optimal defenses, but defenses do exist. And
> >they have been improved in non-core books, so you don't even have to
> >design new spells yourself - You can just buy them.
>
> Like?
One small book comes to mind - I think it is called "Eldritch Might" or
something. It is for Scarred Lands, but reasonably adaptable. It
contains spells like Teleport Jammer and Teleport Redirection. Magic of
Faerun contains the "Magic Engine" (Or something like that) where all
spells cast within a certain area are converted to a specific type of
spell, such as a combat spell directed at the caster. The core book
containt the excellent hallow/unhallow spell, where you can store a
dispel magic spell, which automaticaly targets intruders.
If spell duration is you problem, then there are a number of options.
First look at Permanency - It explicitly states that it might be
extended to other spells, if the DM so desires. If the DM does not
desire this, then we could look at magic items - If a migic item does
not exist to suit our needs, "Songs and Silence" contains some genreal
guidelines about making magical traps - Even permanent ones. Other
options in the same cathegory is Rune Magic (Forgotten Realms book) and
Gem Magic (Magic of Faerun). Feats also exist to extend spell duration -
Extend Spell (Doubles duration), Persistent Spell (Makes any spell with
duration last all day - Just cast it when you get up). The feats that
make certain spells innate might also be useful. If you are worried
about making the spells too high level to be useful, you might use the
Ritual Magic rules described in "Relics and Rituals" - Instead of
requiring higher level spells slots, a spells takes longer to takes,
when using metamagic.
Hmm. I think I will look into this some more.
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> On Mon, 15 Apr 2002 08:50:07 +0200, Nis Haller Baggesen
> <n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>
> >Wayne Shaw wrote:
> >>
> >> On Thu, 11 Apr 2002 13:00:09 +1000, "Geoff Watson"
> >> <geoffre...@dingoblue.net.au> wrote:
> >>
> >> >There are spells to defend against Teleport and Scry, and those
> >> >spells are unreliable to begin with.
> >> >Some of the optional rules add more anti-teleport and anti-scry
> >> >stuff.
> >>
> >> There are no standard spells to stop Teleport
> >
> >Antimagic Shell. Prismatic Orb. Then there are various trap spells which
> >kick in the moment 'the wrong guy' comes too close.
>
> Those don't stop "teleport"; they stop spells in general. And are
> problematic to keep running on a regular basis, or over any size area
> at all.
>
> >
> >> in the core books, and
> >> the spells to stop scrying are extremely expensive to keep running for
> >> any length of time.
> >
> >There are magic items which keep them running at no cost - Amulet of
> >protection against scrying is the most obvious.
>
> And unless you can put one on everyone who's going to be where the PCs
> need to be, doesn't help much.
There scryer would then have to figure out who might be near the PCs -
And since this would usually be a total stranger, it would make the
scrying harder. The only way to consistenly do that, would be to send
someone after them - And then it would be just like dealing with an
eavesdropper. The PCs might simply not discuss their private matters in
public - That would be a good idea anyway.
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> On Mon, 15 Apr 2002 08:54:50 +0200, Nis Haller Baggesen
> <n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>
> >Sure it is not a five foot square per level? That would seem most
> >consistant with the normal mapping scale in D&D3, but I don't have my
> >books handy.
> >
> >That would improve the effectiveness a bit - You could at least
> >safeguard you private domain for just a fraction of what a stronghold
> >would cost.
>
> Nope - it's "Object touched or 5 sq. feet/level", and there's no
> errata on it. This makes sense for a spell which is really mainly for
> warding doorways and passages, because a band 10' across and 1' deep
> is enough to protect a corridor.
>
Does a castle count as an object ::)
Rupert Boleyn
<gha...@mundsprung.com> wrote:
> On the clerical side, Forbiddance, and Hallow
>or Unhallow can be set up with a dimensional anchor
>inside.
AFAICT Dimensional Anchor set up this way won't stop someone coming
in, only leaving again. I think I'd rather set it up with dispel Magic
so that anyone coming in loses some of their powerups.
> Also, Misdirection can be used to misdirect a
>scry to another target. It's a 2nd level spell with an
>hour*level duration, so an 8th level caster can keep it
>up constantly for three 2nd level slots, or a magic item
>could be created with a 12000gp market price, and it's
>ideal to set up a trap.
It doesn't work this way - it only works on spells that detect/see
auras.
Rupert Boleyn
The scryer goes into the local town (or sends their familiar in) and
finds out who's an employee of the PC's. That done he scrys on the
employee any time he likes, and learns the layout of the PC's home(s).
What's more the scryer will see (and thus be able to scry on) more and
more of the PC's employees and followers. While the scryer may not be
able to see the PCs when a follower is seen talking to thin air it'll
be a reasonable guess that they're actually talking to a scry proofed
PC.
Once that's done the Teleport-based assault and assassination of the
PCs can be done whenever the bad guys are ready.
Rupert Boleyn
<geoffre...@dingoblue.net.au> wrote:
>> There are no standard spells to stop Teleport in the core books, and
>> the spells to stop scrying are extremely expensive to keep running for
>> any length of time. The failure chance on Teleport is generally
>> trivial if properly prepard, and for someone with any significant
>> level of the Scry skill, the same is true of Scry.
>>
>
>Forbiddance.
Very costly for more than a small area, especially as for a PC party
or the like the keyed version will be needed.
>Detect Scrying.
Only tells you you're being watched, which doesn't help you stop the
initial scry. While you're 'delousing' yourself the scryer and their
allies could be teleporting in.
>Nondetection.
Costs 50gp per casting, which mounts up over a few years. Also only
sometimes stops the scry. The time it doesn't might well result in an
assassination team coming in. Not good.
Rupert Boleyn
<l0819m0v...@sneakemail.com> wrote:
> If you go by the DMG's estimates of levels of NPCs, you need to have
>at least the population of a city before you get even one NPC capable of
>casting the spell, and he probably has better things to do than spend
>the next three years trying to cover your castle with glyphs for the
>cost of about half a million in gold pieces. Scry and Teleport are
>available at 5th level, so you have many more potential attackers who
>have them available than defenders who can use Greater Glyph...
Yep. It seems to me that it would be cheaper to simply ask a god who
your enemies were and then assassinate them before they do it to you.
Wayne Shaw
<n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>> need to be, doesn't help much.
>
>There scryer would then have to figure out who might be near the PCs -
>And since this would usually be a total stranger, it would make the
>scrying harder. The only way to consistenly do that, would be to send
It doesn't much matter that it's harder, given how comparatively easy
even high-end Scry checks are to make for anyone even halfway
dedicated by the time Teleport is coming available. Consider that a
wizard at that level can easily have 12 _ranks_ of Scry by that level,
and that's not counting any bonuses from attribute, buff spells, or
other magic items. And this assumes that no one uses secondary
divination to find out such a thing...which any group with a cleric
has plenty of.
Jeff MacDonald
You hardly need Detect Scrying. Everyone in the area gets a Scry (or
Int) check against a DC 20 to notice the Scry sensor. Any high-level
casters should have a good enough Scry skill to have a good shot at
this, or if you simply have enough people some will roll a 20. Teach
your flunkies what to do if they see one.
Scry takes an hour to cast. I would be tempted to say that this wasn't
precisely one hour, but maybe +/- 5 minutes. If the scrying group
doesn't know exactly when the Scry will happen they can't have all
their spells precast, but will have to start the short duration ones
after, or go without. The person actually casting the Scry, of course,
can't cast any of his other spells during that hour.
I would probably also say that a one round glance using Scry would get
you no more than 'Viewed Once' on the Teleport chart, maybe even just
'Description', which gets you only a 76% (or 52%) chance of getting to
your target. (And the Scrier would have to be the one doing the
Teleport, or Description would be the best you'd get.) Spending more
time would improve that, but give your targets more time to prepare.
I haven't actually played with a group that can use this, but it
doesn't seem that overpowering to me. What am I overlooking?
--
-- thejeff --
"What people have been reduced to are mere 3-D representations of their own
data."
-- Arthur Miller
Nis Haller Baggesen
I agree that the difficulty check is not that much harder - But scrying
an 'inknown' person requires some connection to the creature. What
constitutes "some connection" is certainly up to interpretation. Of
course this extra information might be gained using other means of
divination, but it wont always be easy. And the players might be able to
detect those divinations, and thus get extra time to prepare.
But I'll list all my arguments in another post.
Eduard W. Lohmann
I think what you are overlooking is, that the attacking side is taking a
week or two to constantly study the target.
> You hardly need Detect Scrying. Everyone in the area gets a Scry (or
> Int) check against a DC 20 to notice the Scry sensor. Any high-level
> casters should have a good enough Scry skill to have a good shot at
> this, or if you simply have enough people some will roll a 20. Teach
> your flunkies what to do if they see one.
And what can they do? They know, since it has happened continually for
teh last 10 days.
> Scry takes an hour to cast. I
> would be tempted to say that this wasn't precisely one hour, but maybe
> +/- 5 minutes. If the scrying group doesn't know exactly when the Scry
> will happen they can't have all their spells precast, but will have to
> start the short duration ones after, or go without. The person actually
> casting the Scry, of course, can't cast any of his other spells during
> that hour.
U would use crystal ball. Or, god forbid, a Mirrow of mental Prowess, now
nearly everyone can help and you get the teleport for free. Including the
return trip.
> I would probably also say that a one round glance using Scry
> would get you no more than 'Viewed Once' on the Teleport chart, maybe
> even just 'Description', which gets you only a 76% (or 52%) chance of
> getting to your target. (And the Scrier would have to be the one doing
> the Teleport, or Description would be the best you'd get.) Spending more
> time would improve that, but give your targets more time to prepare.
No it would not. If the attackers take their time.
> I haven't actually played with a group that can use this, but it doesn't
> seem that overpowering to me. What am I overlooking?
The whole point is to catch the target when they are very ill prepared.
It's like an ambush that travels with its target.
I had this problem, with a powerful NPC that was attcking the party this
way. And now they are about to find this Mirror.
--
Eduard W. Lohmann; edu...@klomp.org
Bertil Jonell
Vlad2 Matt <vlad...@aol.comnospam> wrote:
>Agreed. Hard to find the "fantasy" in the Maginot Line. No keep, no moat, no
>towers, no towering walls.....
I've visited a refurbished part of it, Hackenberg, and it actually *did*
have a moat:)
The ammunition entrance is protected by a pit, IIRC about 6 meters wide
and 5 meters deep. It doesn't cover any wide frontage, just the pillbox
that covers the entrance.
>V II
-bertil-
--
"It can be shown that for any nutty theory, beyond-the-fringe political view or
strange religion there exists a proponent on the Net. The proof is left as an
exercise for your kill-file."
Wayne Shaw
Most clerical divinations are indirect, and have no connection that
can be detected. And frankly, the useage seems pretty strongly to
imply to me that if you have any idea what you're looking for at all
you have "some connection".
Wayne Shaw
<the...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>> Most effectively useless at stopping this tactic unless you can afford
>> to do them on every single person in the area. What good does
>> detecting the scrying do if the opposition immediately follows it with
>> the teleport? The whole point is for them to chose the time when
>> they're ready and you aren't, and no one can get their whole defense
>> ready in a round.
>
>You hardly need Detect Scrying. Everyone in the area gets a Scry (or
>Int) check against a DC 20 to notice the Scry sensor. Any high-level
I realize that. I assumed he used Detect Scrying because it's
certain. I still fail to see how having one round to prepare is going
to match the several round set up and specific spell preparation the
attackers are going to have.
>casters should have a good enough Scry skill to have a good shot at
>this, or if you simply have enough people some will roll a 20. Teach
>your flunkies what to do if they see one.
>Scry takes an hour to cast. I would be tempted to say that this wasn't
>precisely one hour, but maybe +/- 5 minutes. If the scrying group
>doesn't know exactly when the Scry will happen they can't have all
>their spells precast, but will have to start the short duration ones
>after, or go without. The person actually casting the Scry, of course,
>can't cast any of his other spells during that hour.
Unless your policy is that other spellcasters can't tell when the Scry
is almost done (which I'd find disengenious) that's not much of a
limit. And the easiest thing to do is have the scrier do the long
duration buffs and the others do the short. Or, if he's willing to
tie up the skill to be good at it, have the rogue cast the scry by use
of a Scroll.
>I would probably also say that a one round glance using Scry would get
>you no more than 'Viewed Once' on the Teleport chart, maybe even just
>'Description', which gets you only a 76% (or 52%) chance of getting to
I on the other hand, consider it direct experience of the place
(you're _looking_ at it) and would argue strenuously with any GM who
tried to make your claim, and would expect most players to do the
same.
>I haven't actually played with a group that can use this, but it
>doesn't seem that overpowering to me. What am I overlooking?
I think you're not seeing it as overpowering in part because you're
making assumptions most groups aren't going to make.
Wayne Shaw
<edu...@klomp.org> wrote:
>U would use crystal ball. Or, god forbid, a Mirrow of mental Prowess, now
>nearly everyone can help and you get the teleport for free. Including the
>return trip.
Well, to be fair, the Mirror is the single most expensive magic item
in the game as I recall, so at least it's not an option until you get
fairly high level. By that point you can do TwoE, so it's almost
moot.
Jeff MacDonald
> On Tue, 16 Apr 2002 16:31:34 +0200, Jeff MacDonald wrote:
>
> I think what you are overlooking is, that the attacking side is taking a
> week or two to constantly study the target.
>
>
> And what can they do? They know, since it has happened continually for
> teh last 10 days.
blocking magic. There is some and now we're not talking setting stuff
up permanently but against a specific threat.
>
>> Scry takes an hour to cast. I
>
> nearly everyone can help and you get the teleport for free. Including the
> return trip.
hour prep time. In fact that's how it's being run in the game I'm in.
The Mirror is more of a problem, though I'd rule that it still takes
an hour, since it works like a crystal ball. And the portal is
noticable and two-way.
>
>> I would probably also say that a one round glance using Scry
>> would get you no more than 'Viewed Once' on the Teleport chart, maybe
>> even just 'Description', which gets you only a 76% (or 52%) chance of
>> getting to your target.
> No it would not. If the attackers take their time.
>
> It's like an ambush that travels with its target.
If they take the time, their opponents will be warned and can strike
back. It probably comes down to which group scries in an off-guard
moment and decides to jump first.
Rupert Boleyn
<the...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>You hardly need Detect Scrying. Everyone in the area gets a Scry (or
>Int) check against a DC 20 to notice the Scry sensor. Any high-level
>casters should have a good enough Scry skill to have a good shot at
>this, or if you simply have enough people some will roll a 20. Teach
>your flunkies what to do if they see one.
No they don't. Only those with Int12+ get the check, while this will
include any PC Wizards, it likely will not include the whole party.
Nis Haller Baggesen
Well, all of his assumptions are certainly within the rules, so why not
make those assumptions if you think Teleport scry is a problem.
mvh
nis
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> On Tue, 16 Apr 2002 10:53:03 +0200, Nis Haller Baggesen
> <n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>
> >> And unless you can put one on everyone who's going to be where the PCs
> >> need to be, doesn't help much.
> >
> >There scryer would then have to figure out who might be near the PCs -
> >And since this would usually be a total stranger, it would make the
> >scrying harder. The only way to consistenly do that, would be to send
> >someone after them - And then it would be just like dealing with an
> >eavesdropper. The PCs might simply not discuss their private matters in
> >public - That would be a good idea anyway.
>
> The scryer goes into the local town (or sends their familiar in) and
> finds out who's an employee of the PC's. That done he scrys on the
> employee any time he likes, and learns the layout of the PC's home(s).
> What's more the scryer will see (and thus be able to scry on) more and
> more of the PC's employees and followers. While the scryer may not be
> able to see the PCs when a follower is seen talking to thin air it'll
> be a reasonable guess that they're actually talking to a scry proofed
> PC.
This assumes that the players stay put for some time. That they have a
home you can scout out, and that there are employes to scout out. This
may be the case sometimes but not always.
>
> Once that's done the Teleport-based assault and assassination of the
> PCs can be done whenever the bad guys are ready.
Ok. Lets look at this from the top.
The basic premise is that attack is much better than defense. This is
arguably true, because spells like Haste and Improved Invisibility are
very effective, but have short durations, so they are best cast
offensively and not defensively. Combine it with scrying and teleport
and it may create the perfect ambush.
This leaves us with two questions - Why don't everybody make premeptive
strikes, and what can be done about it.
Attacks are much more effective than defense today, in real life - Both
when looking at stealth bombers vs. radar implacements, and when looking
at hand weapons vs. bulletproof clothing. Nonetheless people don't
continuesly attack each other. But ok, the instability might be worse in
D&D, and the arguments against killing might be fewer.
So what can be done.
The key point in the ambush would seem to be Teleport. If the defenders
are in their den, then a lot of defenses can be put up, using
Consecrate/Unhallow, Magic Engine, the spell traps from Songs and
Silence (These can be used for benificial spells as well, so they are
also a nice way to get prepped in a hurry), Rune spells from Relics and
Rituals, Rune and Gem magic from Forgotten Realms and Magic of Faerun.
With access to high enough spell levels, you can even use Forbiddance to
prevent all kinds of dimensional travel into the den.
But lets say the defending party is caught in a place they haven't
prepared to defend. Even then the defenders have a chance. If they can
get some kind of warning (I'll get back to how they might get this
warning) about an pending Teleport ambush (Just one round), they have
some options.
The first is to 'run for it' - Teleport away before the others teleport
in. The defenders will have the best chance of winning this kind of
Teleporter chase, as A) they will be able to choose the destination and
B) they don't even have to care if they are sligthly misplaced as they
are primarily trying to get away - The attacker on the otherhand will be
continually Teleporting to places they probably have only seen at a
glace once. Teleporting away will also give them a chance to get to some
prepared den, or to simply shake the attackers of their tail as the
attackers have to locate them again - If the defenders where located by
an indirect Scry as suggested above, a whole new scrying attempt has to
be done (As the target of the Scry probably wont follow the defenders),
and that takes an hour. A Dimensional Anchor would prevent them from
following you.
The second is to simply prepared to counter attack - One round of
preparation should give the defenders a reasonable chance to spread out
and ready some actions. Spreading out wil make them less vulnerable to
the deadly area attack spells, while the attacker while be arriving in a
very packed group, as the all have to be touching to Teleport, making
them very vulnerable to area attack spells. Other options include using
a Wall of Force (Stops many attack spells) to give yourself some
breathing room - In a couple of rounds you can cast a lot of the spells
that might have given the attackers their edge.
In Eldritch Might, there are also spells for Teleport redirection,
coordinate detection and jamming. These might be used to set up traps
for the incomming Teleport attackers.
All this required some time - about a round - to respond. The simplest
way to get this time is to win the Initative. If you are not caught
flatfooted (And that can be achieved either by having the right class,
or magic items) this is a 50/50 chance. Otherwise you could get your
warning with the appropirate detection spells - Even a detect magic
(Which cast persistently at the levels we are assuming) would allow you
to detect the presence of divination magic, and that might be sufficient
warning. Or the defenders might have the Reflexive COunter Spell Feat,
which allows them to counter spells without having readied an action for
it - This will also allow them to take the brunt of any initial
offensive, from the Teleport Attackers.
While the attackers can use long term divination surveilance, to avoid
having to teleport based on 'Viewed Once' or 'Description' information,
they will have to scry immediately before the attack, to make sure the
defenders are where they want them to be - This will be even more
probelmatic, if they use indirect scrying, since they also have to pick
a target which is actually close to their intended target, at the time
they want to attack - And since setting up a scry takes a long time, it
isn't trivial to change targets etc. Also this kind of continuous
surveilance will give the defenders more time to prepare or
counterattack. Long term surveilance can also be fooled by illusions,
suddenly making the Teleport porne to False Destination results.
Using the ritual magic rules from Relics and Rituals it is also possible
to make a lot of the various 'upgrade spells' like haste, bulls
strength, resist element etc. extended or persistent without using high
level spell slots (Although you still have to have access to the high
level spells slot). While this option is naturally also available to the
attackers, it will do a lot negate the advantage of preperation time
that the attackers have. There will also typically be fewer attackers
than defenders, since the attackers will be limited by the numbers they
can teleport, and all else being equal they will have expended more
spell slots than the defenders, since they have to scry and teleport.
Given all this, I just don't see how the Teleport Ambush is such a sure
win. And if it isn't a sure win, why not simply stay in you well
defended lair instead.
Even if you still think that Scry/Teleport Ambush is powerful, there are
a number of simple rule changes or just borderline ruleinterpretations
that would make it much less effective.
Under the interpretations it is interesting to know - When and where can
a spell be countered, and when and where can it be detected. If magic
auras can be detected at the target location during the casting time of
the spell, and if the spell can be countered at the target location,
then Scry (And other long range divination spells) can be countered
before they have any effect, if the defender is alert. A scry can
certainly be dispelled at the target location, since it creates a magic
sensor there.
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> On Tue, 16 Apr 2002 10:31:34 -0400, Jeff MacDonald
> <the...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>
> >You hardly need Detect Scrying. Everyone in the area gets a Scry (or
> >Int) check against a DC 20 to notice the Scry sensor. Any high-level
> >casters should have a good enough Scry skill to have a good shot at
> >this, or if you simply have enough people some will roll a 20. Teach
> >your flunkies what to do if they see one.
>
> No they don't. Only those with Int12+ get the check, while this will
> include any PC Wizards, it likely will not include the whole party.
Average hero stats are 12 (Using the 4d6 drop 1d), so it should include
most of the party. After all intelligence is a generaly useful ability,
since it gives you skill points. If you hire your help based on
intelligence criteria, even they will have a good chance of being able
to detect scrying.
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> On Mon, 15 Apr 2002 23:22:37 +1000, "Geoff Watson"
> <geoffre...@dingoblue.net.au> wrote:
>
> >> There are no standard spells to stop Teleport in the core books, and
> >> the spells to stop scrying are extremely expensive to keep running for
> >> any length of time. The failure chance on Teleport is generally
> >> trivial if properly prepard, and for someone with any significant
> >> level of the Scry skill, the same is true of Scry.
> >>
> >
> >Forbiddance.
>
> Very costly for more than a small area, especially as for a PC party
> or the like the keyed version will be needed.
The password version is not more expensive, than the one without
password, so no problem there.
Also most Churches will probably have areas of forbiddance - It is only
a 6th level spell, so most religions should have clerics capable of
casting it, and the expenses will be negligable to a church. So you just
claim hospitality in a church that will allow you in. Similar with many
wealthy nobles. Heck, even good inns might be protected by forbiddance,
at least for some of their rooms.
>
> >Detect Scrying.
>
> Only tells you you're being watched, which doesn't help you stop the
> initial scry. While you're 'delousing' yourself the scryer and their
> allies could be teleporting in.
>
And you will be teleporting out. Or doing something similar - You just
need that one round of warning.
> >Nondetection.
>
> Costs 50gp per casting, which mounts up over a few years.
Which is why you put it in magic item, or build a magic 'trap' (Songs
and Silence) to cast it all the time.
> Also only
> sometimes stops the scry. The time it doesn't might well result in an
> assassination team coming in. Not good.
Well since the assassins have to even get the idea to scry me first
(Which implies that I have disturbed them in some fashion, and thus that
I am already on to them), it should be quite sufficient. Typically the
PC's will make their move long before a big surveilance campaign can be
launched against them.
Nis Haller Baggesen
But even ambushes can be survived, and once you have survived the first
one, you are that much more prepared for the next ones.
>
> I had this problem, with a powerful NPC that was attcking the party this
> way. And now they are about to find this Mirror.
Did he destroy the party? If not, why not?
Rupert Boleyn
<n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>The key point in the ambush would seem to be Teleport. If the defenders
>are in their den, then a lot of defenses can be put up, using
>Consecrate/Unhallow, Magic Engine, the spell traps from Songs and
>Silence (These can be used for benificial spells as well, so they are
>also a nice way to get prepped in a hurry), Rune spells from Relics and
>Rituals, Rune and Gem magic from Forgotten Realms and Magic of Faerun.
>With access to high enough spell levels, you can even use Forbiddance to
>prevent all kinds of dimensional travel into the den.
Consecrate is worthless for this (I think you meant Hallow), and
Hallow/Unhallow can only put one spell into an area - not that big a
deal. Magic Engine is a FR spell, IIRC and therefore not available in
all (many or most even) campaigns. Likewise for everything else in MoF
and R&R. Forbiddance is nice, but terribly expensive.
>But lets say the defending party is caught in a place they haven't
>prepared to defend. Even then the defenders have a chance. If they can
>get some kind of warning (I'll get back to how they might get this
>warning) about an pending Teleport ambush (Just one round), they have
>some options.
>
>The first is to 'run for it' - Teleport away before the others teleport
>in. The defenders will have the best chance of winning this kind of
>Teleporter chase, as A) they will be able to choose the destination and
>B) they don't even have to care if they are sligthly misplaced as they
>are primarily trying to get away - The attacker on the otherhand will be
>continually Teleporting to places they probably have only seen at a
>glace once. Teleporting away will also give them a chance to get to some
>prepared den, or to simply shake the attackers of their tail as the
>attackers have to locate them again - If the defenders where located by
>an indirect Scry as suggested above, a whole new scrying attempt has to
>be done (As the target of the Scry probably wont follow the defenders),
>and that takes an hour. A Dimensional Anchor would prevent them from
>following you.
Teleporting in that short a time will almost certainly leave someone
behind unless everyone can intrinsically teleport - which is
expensive.
>The second is to simply prepared to counter attack - One round of
>preparation should give the defenders a reasonable chance to spread out
>and ready some actions. Spreading out wil make them less vulnerable to
>the deadly area attack spells, while the attacker while be arriving in a
>very packed group, as the all have to be touching to Teleport, making
>them very vulnerable to area attack spells.
But where did they teleport into? The attacker are almost certainly
invisible, and there's no reason they have to all come in on one
teleport.
> Other options include using
>a Wall of Force (Stops many attack spells) to give yourself some
>breathing room - In a couple of rounds you can cast a lot of the spells
>that might have given the attackers their edge.
All of this is nice, but it assumes that you knew when they were
coming in.
>In Eldritch Might, there are also spells for Teleport redirection,
>coordinate detection and jamming. These might be used to set up traps
>for the incomming Teleport attackers.
Another non-standard sourse.
>All this required some time - about a round - to respond. The simplest
>way to get this time is to win the Initative. If you are not caught
>flatfooted (And that can be achieved either by having the right class,
>or magic items) this is a 50/50 chance.
Nope. They merely allow you your Dex bonus when flat-footed, and/or
attacks of opportunity.
> Otherwise you could get your
>warning with the appropirate detection spells - Even a detect magic
>(Which cast persistently at the levels we are assuming) would allow you
>to detect the presence of divination magic, and that might be sufficient
>warning. Or the defenders might have the Reflexive COunter Spell Feat,
>which allows them to counter spells without having readied an action for
>it - This will also allow them to take the brunt of any initial
>offensive, from the Teleport Attackers.
This doesn't help if the attack doesn't come with the first divination
that day, or the second, but sometime later. The attackers have the
advantage that they don't have to attack until they're happy with the
situation.
>While the attackers can use long term divination surveilance, to avoid
>having to teleport based on 'Viewed Once' or 'Description' information,
>they will have to scry immediately before the attack, to make sure the
>defenders are where they want them to be - This will be even more
>probelmatic, if they use indirect scrying, since they also have to pick
>a target which is actually close to their intended target, at the time
>they want to attack - And since setting up a scry takes a long time, it
>isn't trivial to change targets etc. Also this kind of continuous
>surveilance will give the defenders more time to prepare or
>counterattack. Long term surveilance can also be fooled by illusions,
>suddenly making the Teleport porne to False Destination results.
>
>Using the ritual magic rules from Relics and Rituals it is also possible
>to make a lot of the various 'upgrade spells' like haste, bulls
>strength, resist element etc. extended or persistent without using high
>level spell slots (Although you still have to have access to the high
>level spells slot). While this option is naturally also available to the
>attackers, it will do a lot negate the advantage of preperation time
>that the attackers have. There will also typically be fewer attackers
>than defenders, since the attackers will be limited by the numbers they
>can teleport, and all else being equal they will have expended more
>spell slots than the defenders, since they have to scry and teleport.
The scry can be done via crystal ball, and the teleport by scroll. And
why fewer attackers? You don;t really think sensible assassins would
wait until the targets were all together do you?
Rupert Boleyn
<n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>Average hero stats are 12 (Using the 4d6 drop 1d), so it should include
>most of the party. After all intelligence is a generaly useful ability,
>since it gives you skill points. If you hire your help based on
>intelligence criteria, even they will have a good chance of being able
>to detect scrying.
IME it's quite likely that the fighters and fairly likely that the
clerics will not make Int 12+.
Rupert Boleyn
<n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>Rupert Boleyn wrote:
>> Very costly for more than a small area, especially as for a PC party
>> or the like the keyed version will be needed.
>
>The password version is not more expensive, than the one without
>password, so no problem there.
PH, p.206 "Material Components: A sprinkling of holy water and rare
incences worth at least 1,500gp per 60-foot cube. If a password lock
is desired, this requires the burning of additional rare incences
worth at least 5,000gp per 60-foor cube." Thus a keyed Forbiddance
costs 6,500gp per 60-foot cube and a PC of 11th level could blow all
their wealth and still not be able to pay for one cast at 11th level.
>And you will be teleporting out. Or doing something similar - You just
>need that one round of warning.
And if you do that each time the warning goes off you'll be out of
spell slots and teleport scroll pretty quick.
>Which is why you put it in magic item, or build a magic 'trap' (Songs
>and Silence) to cast it all the time.
Still not that cheap.
Wayne Shaw
<n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>The key point in the ambush would seem to be Teleport. If the defenders
>are in their den, then a lot of defenses can be put up, using
>Consecrate/Unhallow, Magic Engine, the spell traps from Songs and
>Silence (These can be used for benificial spells as well, so they are
>also a nice way to get prepped in a hurry), Rune spells from Relics and
>Rituals, Rune and Gem magic from Forgotten Realms and Magic of Faerun.
>With access to high enough spell levels, you can even use Forbiddance to
>prevent all kinds of dimensional travel into the den.
Do you notice how _little_ of what you've quoted is from the core rule
books? That being part of the original point; a vanilla D&D GM may
not have access to any of those tools but the first, and that only
goes so far. Even if he has access to S&S, magical trap processes can
get awfully expensive, awfully fast, just like any other magic item
progression.
These are essentially my own solutions to the problem, but I do have
to seriously question how commonly a given GM has access to all of
these.
Wayne Shaw
<n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>Rupert Boleyn wrote:
>>
>> On Tue, 16 Apr 2002 10:31:34 -0400, Jeff MacDonald
>> <the...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>>
>> >You hardly need Detect Scrying. Everyone in the area gets a Scry (or
>> >Int) check against a DC 20 to notice the Scry sensor. Any high-level
>> >casters should have a good enough Scry skill to have a good shot at
>> >this, or if you simply have enough people some will roll a 20. Teach
>> >your flunkies what to do if they see one.
>>
>> No they don't. Only those with Int12+ get the check, while this will
>> include any PC Wizards, it likely will not include the whole party.
>
>Average hero stats are 12 (Using the 4d6 drop 1d), so it should include
>most of the party. After all intelligence is a generaly useful ability,
>since it gives you skill points. If you hire your help based on
Skill points are a relatively trivial issue to fighters, and not
overwhelming to most clerics, and while that average is true, in
practice, it's not going to be the case with 5 or more stats in most
cases because of typical varience. If you look at the standard array,
which is based on the same numbers, you'll see that.
Wayne Shaw
Because in the end, I don't think they're the assumptions the rules
were written with. They have implications beyond the immediate
problem. In addition, the problem often won't be obvious to someone
until they've reached the level that it's become one, and springing
new rulings on people late in the day often goes over more than a
little poorly.
Wayne Shaw
Boleyn) wrote:
>And if you do that each time the warning goes off you'll be out of
>spell slots and teleport scroll pretty quick.
In fact, if I was an enemy I'd Scry them just to watch what they do.
If there's any consistency to it, you could well use that to set them
up even worse.
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> On Mon, 22 Apr 2002 12:18:44 +0200, Nis Haller Baggesen
> <n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>
> >Rupert Boleyn wrote:
>
> >> Very costly for more than a small area, especially as for a PC party
> >> or the like the keyed version will be needed.
> >
> >The password version is not more expensive, than the one without
> >password, so no problem there.
>
> PH, p.206 "Material Components: A sprinkling of holy water and rare
> incences worth at least 1,500gp per 60-foot cube. If a password lock
> is desired, this requires the burning of additional rare incences
> worth at least 5,000gp per 60-foor cube." Thus a keyed Forbiddance
> costs 6,500gp per 60-foot cube and a PC of 11th level could blow all
> their wealth and still not be able to pay for one cast at 11th level.
>
> >And you will be teleporting out. Or doing something similar - You just
> >need that one round of warning.
>
> And if you do that each time the warning goes off you'll be out of
> spell slots and teleport scroll pretty quick.
>
No. Because you will use the time it takes for your opponents to set up
a new scry, to make your counter-strike. And the opposition will run out
of teleporst just as quick. Or you will just use your first teleport to
transport yourself to your well prepared lair.
> >Which is why you put it in magic item, or build a magic 'trap' (Songs
> >and Silence) to cast it all the time.
>
> Still not that cheap.
But all those crystal ball and magic mirrors you needed for your
continual scrying operation where bought at a garage sale at a dime a
dozen? Besides the attackers have to protect themselves from the exact
same tactics, so they will have the expenses as well.
Nis Haller Baggesen
True. But against that kind of scrying, you can use all the regular
defenses against spying, and it will give the 'defenders' a chance to
spy back.
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> On Mon, 22 Apr 2002 12:02:02 +0200, Nis Haller Baggesen
> <n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>
> >The key point in the ambush would seem to be Teleport. If the defenders
> >are in their den, then a lot of defenses can be put up, using
> >Consecrate/Unhallow, Magic Engine, the spell traps from Songs and
> >Silence (These can be used for benificial spells as well, so they are
> >also a nice way to get prepped in a hurry), Rune spells from Relics and
> >Rituals, Rune and Gem magic from Forgotten Realms and Magic of Faerun.
> >With access to high enough spell levels, you can even use Forbiddance to
> >prevent all kinds of dimensional travel into the den.
>
> Do you notice how _little_ of what you've quoted is from the core rule
Yes. However most people I know will not be playing vanilla D&D by the
time they get to the levels where they use Scry and Teleport. The ones
that do probably aren't going to figure out these tactics right away. If
they do, they are probably also clever enough to come up with some of
the relatively simple tweaks, like making Teleport mildly disorienting
or making it take more time, allowing spells to be countered at the
target location, making Scry more vague etc. Or simply banning the
spells.
> books?
> That being part of the original point; a vanilla D&D GM may
> not have access to any of those tools but the first, and that only
> goes so far. Even if he has access to S&S, magical trap processes can
> get awfully expensive, awfully fast, just like any other magic item
> progression.
True, but the equipment for the surveilance operation is expensive as
well. And the party doesn't need to make all the protective preparations
themselves - They could seek asylum in a church or the like. A church
should certainly have both the resources and the inclination to make
very safe havens, that are open to followers of their faith. Kings and
wealthy nobles would have the same precautions. And by the time you are
level 7-9 (Scry and Teleport) you could have the influence to get this
kind of protection offered - Possibly in return for something else.
then of course there is the whole option of trying to staty under the
radar and not attract this kind of attention. The survielance group can
scry everybody all the time, so they will have to focus on potential
enemies - And once you start being a potential enemy, you just leave no
witnesses - Then there won't be a connection for your opponents scry.
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> On Mon, 22 Apr 2002 12:02:02 +0200, Nis Haller Baggesen
> <n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>
> >The key point in the ambush would seem to be Teleport. If the defenders
> >are in their den, then a lot of defenses can be put up, using
> >Consecrate/Unhallow, Magic Engine, the spell traps from Songs and
> >Silence (These can be used for benificial spells as well, so they are
> >also a nice way to get prepped in a hurry), Rune spells from Relics and
> >Rituals, Rune and Gem magic from Forgotten Realms and Magic of Faerun.
> >With access to high enough spell levels, you can even use Forbiddance to
> >prevent all kinds of dimensional travel into the den.
>
> Consecrate is worthless for this (I think you meant Hallow), and
> Hallow/Unhallow can only put one spell into an area - not that big a
> deal.
I would say dispel magic would be a big deal to the attackers -
Especially since it will hit them every single round - Possibly on every
spell they cast.
> Magic Engine is a FR spell, IIRC and therefore not available in
> all (many or most even) campaigns. Likewise for everything else in MoF
> and R&R. Forbiddance is nice, but terribly expensive.
>
It is a one time expense, so no big deal. As for the 'out of world'
spells, I don't see no reason they they should not be available in all
campaigns if peopl so choose - Bigby's hands, Mordenkainens Disjuction
etc. are vanilla spells, though they are obviously from Greyhawk, so why
not the other way around. And if you start banning spells, why not ban
the ones thay give you problems, rather than the ones that might help
solve them.
> >But lets say the defending party is caught in a place they haven't
> >prepared to defend. Even then the defenders have a chance. If they can
> >get some kind of warning (I'll get back to how they might get this
> >warning) about an pending Teleport ambush (Just one round), they have
> >some options.
> >
> >The first is to 'run for it' - Teleport away before the others teleport
> >in. The defenders will have the best chance of winning this kind of
> >Teleporter chase, as A) they will be able to choose the destination and
> >B) they don't even have to care if they are sligthly misplaced as they
> >are primarily trying to get away - The attacker on the otherhand will be
> >continually Teleporting to places they probably have only seen at a
> >glace once. Teleporting away will also give them a chance to get to some
> >prepared den, or to simply shake the attackers of their tail as the
> >attackers have to locate them again - If the defenders where located by
> >an indirect Scry as suggested above, a whole new scrying attempt has to
> >be done (As the target of the Scry probably wont follow the defenders),
> >and that takes an hour. A Dimensional Anchor would prevent them from
> >following you.
>
> Teleporting in that short a time will almost certainly leave someone
> behind unless everyone can intrinsically teleport - which is
> expensive.
True, but even smaller transport spells will help.
>
> >The second is to simply prepared to counter attack - One round of
> >preparation should give the defenders a reasonable chance to spread out
> >and ready some actions. Spreading out wil make them less vulnerable to
> >the deadly area attack spells, while the attacker while be arriving in a
> >very packed group, as the all have to be touching to Teleport, making
> >them very vulnerable to area attack spells.
>
> But where did they teleport into? The attacker are almost certainly
> invisible, and there's no reason they have to all come in on one
> teleport.
See invisibility, invisibility purge, blindsight, scent, detect magic
and many others can all help againts inivible opponents. An area dispel
magic (Feats can help make it larger) can also work.
>
> > Other options include using
> >a Wall of Force (Stops many attack spells) to give yourself some
> >breathing room - In a couple of rounds you can cast a lot of the spells
> >that might have given the attackers their edge.
>
> All of this is nice, but it assumes that you knew when they were
> coming in.
No - You can just use the Wall around yourself.
>
> >In Eldritch Might, there are also spells for Teleport redirection,
> >coordinate detection and jamming. These might be used to set up traps
> >for the incomming Teleport attackers.
>
> Another non-standard sourse.
True. But it is a publically available source, so everybody can check
the rules.
>
> >All this required some time - about a round - to respond. The simplest
> >way to get this time is to win the Initative. If you are not caught
> >flatfooted (And that can be achieved either by having the right class,
> >or magic items) this is a 50/50 chance.
>
> Nope. They merely allow you your Dex bonus when flat-footed, and/or
> attacks of opportunity.
>
> > Otherwise you could get your
> >warning with the appropirate detection spells - Even a detect magic
> >(Which cast persistently at the levels we are assuming) would allow you
> >to detect the presence of divination magic, and that might be sufficient
> >warning. Or the defenders might have the Reflexive COunter Spell Feat,
> >which allows them to counter spells without having readied an action for
> >it - This will also allow them to take the brunt of any initial
> >offensive, from the Teleport Attackers.
>
> This doesn't help if the attack doesn't come with the first divination
> that day, or the second, but sometime later.
Yes it does - After all the scryer have to start over again to relocate
their target, so it buys you time. And the reflexive counter is always a
good deal - But it is from FR so I guess you don't want to use that
either.
> The attackers have the
> advantage that they don't have to attack until they're happy with the
> situation.
Yes they do, because if they give the defenders too much time, the
defenders will be able to locate them, and use the exact same tactics
against them. Or
the scryers
<Snip>
> > There will also typically be fewer attackers
> >than defenders, since the attackers will be limited by the numbers they
> >can teleport, and all else being equal they will have expended more
> >spell slots than the defenders, since they have to scry and teleport.
>
> The scry can be done via crystal ball, and the teleport by scroll.
And those are expensive as well. And you will run out of teleport
scrolls.
> And
> why fewer attackers? You don;t really think sensible assassins would
> wait until the targets were all together do you?
Most D&D parties I know are very social - At the very least they might
start to be once they get the first hint of surveilance.
sNOm...@sonic.net
Long ago, in a galaxy far, far away, Nis Haller Baggesen wrote:
: > Do you notice how _little_ of what you've quoted is from the core rule
: Yes. However most people I know will not be playing vanilla D&D by the
: time they get to the levels where they use Scry and Teleport.
The point is, the core rules, as-written, offer a more-or-less unstoppable
auto-kill tactic. Going to other rulebooks isn't necessarily an option for
everyone... or even most people. To that degree, the core rules are broken.
You should *NOT* need optional rules to fix core rules! IMAO, the Scry/
Teleport issue is a problem in the core rules. Appropriate counterspells
should be part of the (free) errata online. YMMV.
As I recall, the original poster (Mary Kuhner) came across this problem as
the group leveled-up within *ONE* product:
"Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil."
Buying RttToEE shouldn't mean you =also= need to by additional expansions
(most particularly when there's no notice or pointer, "You will need spell
"X" from product "Y"), but it turned out in play that this product is broken
as-published. She wanted to play it pretty much "straight" and not have to
do a bunch of HR's/tweaks. But the game-system let her down. Her problem
was that, with the core rules, she got to the point in RttToEE where either
*EVERY* encounter became a pointless boring cake-walk for the PC's... or the
villain-NPC's would use them, and wipe out the PC's.
WARNING: thread-drift...
<RANT>
I stopped buying TSR products & playing TSR games many years ago, simply
because they made it so expensive to play the "whole" game. I occasionally
use D&D for 'con events because other people know it, and I use it for my
kids' games (though I'm "weaning" them to other games). Occasionally I play
D&D "for old times' sake". But TSR's pattern of publishing a "complete"
game and then publishing nearly-mandatory expansions simply lost me as a
customer.
Yes, I *do* know the "well just don't BUY all that extra stuff" argument --
but much of the reason to play D&D (instead of another (and frankly, better)
medievalesque game like Harn, Ars Magica, Runequest, etc) is to be able to
find other players, go to other games. But, in those "other games," most
people expect that anyone playing a fighter or a monk has access to "Sword
and Fist" (etc, for all the classes & their classbooks); AND they expect to
be able to use their favorite options from those books, taking their PC's
into my games.
</RANT>
--
Steve Saunders
to de-spam me, de-capitalize me
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> Long ago, in a galaxy far, far away, Nis Haller Baggesen wrote:
>
> : > Do you notice how _little_ of what you've quoted is from the core rule
>
> : Yes. However most people I know will not be playing vanilla D&D by the
> : time they get to the levels where they use Scry and Teleport.
>
> The point is, the core rules, as-written, offer a more-or-less unstoppable
> auto-kill tactic. Going to other rulebooks isn't necessarily an option for
> everyone... or even most people. To that degree, the core rules are broken.
> You should *NOT* need optional rules to fix core rules! IMAO, the Scry/
> Teleport issue is a problem in the core rules. Appropriate counterspells
> should be part of the (free) errata online. YMMV.
Well, first of all I think that a lot of counters are available just
through the core rules. At least if the objective is to protect a lair -
To reiterate Hallow/Unhallow with dispel magic, Forbiddance, Alarm,
Glyphs and Wards etc. can all provide plenty of protection for a lair.
And don't cry about them being expensive because it is a one time group
expense, so its not really that big a deal.
With one round of preparations (Which I have also described how you
might get, using core spells such as detect scry or simply detect magic)
- I used feats to make them last but you could use Permanency if you
want a core rules option), the ideas of teleporting out or encapsulating
the teleporters (Or yourself) in a Wall of Force to get breathing room
should also work in the core rules.
>
> As I recall, the original poster (Mary Kuhner) came across this problem as
> the group leveled-up within *ONE* product:
> "Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil."
> Buying RttToEE shouldn't mean you =also= need to by additional expansions
> (most particularly when there's no notice or pointer, "You will need spell
> "X" from product "Y"), but it turned out in play that this product is broken
> as-published. She wanted to play it pretty much "straight" and not have to
> do a bunch of HR's/tweaks. But the game-system let her down. Her problem
> was that, with the core rules, she got to the point in RttToEE where either
> *EVERY* encounter became a pointless boring cake-walk for the PC's... or the
> villain-NPC's would use them, and wipe out the PC's.
That the tactics of the villians in RttToEE have immensly bad and that
Marys groupd found a tactic which works against them is not a fault of
the system as a whole. Mary could have figured out some different
tactics for them - Since they are doing the lair protection, all the
tactics mentioned earlier will work for them. If she was worried the the
villians should exploit the same tactics against the players, I would
argue that they have better things to do than continually scrying for
some pesky adventurers - Like freeing their captured god. Once the
adventurers start being more than pesky, the players should know that
they are in danger of being scryed out, and should prepare to strike
fast.
Also even the vanilla rules require interpretation - Like what is 'some
conenction' in relation to scry, what is 'Viewed once' in relation to
teleport, when and where can spells be countered and dispelled. There
are doubtless factors, but since I don't find it a problem, I don't
really care to lokk for them.
As for bying lots of books, I never said you had to buy lots of books -
I illustrated how a lot of books presented even more ways to counter the
tactic, I you where unhappy withthe options presented by the core rules.
All this being said, it is not like I adore D&D3, but I find it suitable
for some nice dungeon hacking, and for that pruppose I dont see a
probelm with the PC being able to find a tactic which is successful as
long as the opposition doesn't bother with some rudimentary defensive
tactics.
Wayne Shaw
<n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>sNOm...@sonic.net wrote:
>>
>> Long ago, in a galaxy far, far away, Nis Haller Baggesen wrote:
>>
>> : > Do you notice how _little_ of what you've quoted is from the core rule
>>
>> : Yes. However most people I know will not be playing vanilla D&D by the
>> : time they get to the levels where they use Scry and Teleport.
>>
>> The point is, the core rules, as-written, offer a more-or-less unstoppable
>> auto-kill tactic. Going to other rulebooks isn't necessarily an option for
>> everyone... or even most people. To that degree, the core rules are broken.
>> You should *NOT* need optional rules to fix core rules! IMAO, the Scry/
>> Teleport issue is a problem in the core rules. Appropriate counterspells
>> should be part of the (free) errata online. YMMV.
>
>Well, first of all I think that a lot of counters are available just
>through the core rules. At least if the objective is to protect a lair -
>To reiterate Hallow/Unhallow with dispel magic, Forbiddance, Alarm,
>Glyphs and Wards etc. can all provide plenty of protection for a lair.
>And don't cry about them being expensive because it is a one time group
>expense, so its not really that big a deal.
>
Once you've got enough of them to do the job, it is.
>With one round of preparations (Which I have also described how you
>might get, using core spells such as detect scry or simply detect magic)
>- I used feats to make them last but you could use Permanency if you
>want a core rules option), the ideas of teleporting out or encapsulating
>the teleporters (Or yourself) in a Wall of Force to get breathing room
>should also work in the core rules.
All of which works if you never have anything else around you you care
about having destroyed. I nice solution for small groups of perpetual
nomads, perhaps (and even then, ones that accrue no followers).
>
>That the tactics of the villians in RttToEE have immensly bad and that
>Marys groupd found a tactic which works against them is not a fault of
>the system as a whole. Mary could have figured out some different
The problem is that within the standard rules their options were
sharply limited; there simply aren't the tools for the job to protect
a large group or area like that, even _with_ the clerical spells.
>tactics for them - Since they are doing the lair protection, all the
>tactics mentioned earlier will work for them. If she was worried the the
At a prohibitive expense.
>All this being said, it is not like I adore D&D3, but I find it suitable
>for some nice dungeon hacking, and for that pruppose I dont see a
>probelm with the PC being able to find a tactic which is successful as
>long as the opposition doesn't bother with some rudimentary defensive
>tactics.
And I think it requires far more than "rudimentary" ones to work
effectively.
Mary K. Kuhner
That's how we finally tagged the very high-powered invisible mage in
our Shadowrun campaign. Managed to get a drop of his blood and scried
on him. He invariably reacted by running for his home base, expecting
a magical attack--and the third time, we ambushed him on the road in.
If the enemy can force you to blow half your spell slots via use of
a single Scry, they're doing pretty well--and are well set up to hit
you the second or third time.
My very favorite strategy in this situation would have to be figuring
out where the den is, Teleporting there, setting up, and *then* casting
Scry. It's like having a pizza delivered right to your door.
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Mary K. Kuhner
>> Do you notice how _little_ of what you've quoted is from the core rule
>Yes. However most people I know will not be playing vanilla D&D by the
>time they get to the levels where they use Scry and Teleport. The ones
>that do probably aren't going to figure out these tactics right away. If
>they do, they are probably also clever enough to come up with some of
>the relatively simple tweaks, like making Teleport mildly disorienting
>or making it take more time, allowing spells to be countered at the
>target location, making Scry more vague etc. Or simply banning the
>spells.
Well, I've only one sample case, but my player figured this out
*instantly* when he hit the appropriate level. And nothing we tried
to make Teleport less effective (disorientation, etc.) seemed to
help against the Teleport/Invisibility combo. (Magic items giving
permanent See Invisible would be needed here, I think, and we didn't
have any.) The enemy can also consider Teleporting to just the other
side of a closed door from the PCs.
Simply banning spells is hard when you're running a published module;
the existence of Teleport had already been well established long before
any PC could cast it. In general, if you're a stickler for consistency
it's often too late to ban a spell by the time it becomes a problem.
To my own tastes, the key problem is not Teleport but the offense/
defense imbalance that makes an ambush of this type unsurvivable. I
don't think I'll be running any more high level 3rd Edition--it was
just an exercise in frustration for me.
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Arne Jamtgaard
> Well, I've only one sample case, but my player figured this out
> *instantly* when he hit the appropriate level. And nothing we tried
> to make Teleport less effective (disorientation, etc.) seemed to
> help against the Teleport/Invisibility combo. (Magic items giving
> permanent See Invisible would be needed here, I think, and we didn't
> have any.) The enemy can also consider Teleporting to just the other
> side of a closed door from the PCs.
Probably addressing the symptom instead of the disease, but what if
Teleport stripped away all 'currently-up' spells? You can get there
but not charged to the gills - for that you'd have to get near, _then_
cast all your power-ups. And would leave teleport for non-ambush
situations pretty much intact...
My .02,
Arne
Eduard W. Lohmann
> All this being said, it is not like I adore D&D3, but I find it suitable
> for some nice dungeon hacking, and for that pruppose I dont see a
> probelm with the PC being able to find a tactic which is successful as
> long as the opposition doesn't bother with some rudimentary defensive
> tactics.
A little context. I run a vanilla D&D3 high level(12-17) adventure at
the moment. An the charactres recently got hold of a
Mirror of Mental prowess and there are opponents capable of using the
tactic against them.
I think a big factor missing in this discussion is how unprepared characters
and NPC's get. And that depends on your playstyle/wolrdview. In a tipical
dungeon hack people are usually prepared and never need the lavatory.
I know my high level players generally don't wear their armor or take
their spell components when they take a bath.
People who live dangerously, occasionaly get into hard fights. And are
then low on spells, hitpoints and other resources before they have had
a chance to sleep enough to regain spells.
If the targets stay close together they are vulnerable to area attacks if
they spread, the attackers will gang up on them individually.
The chance of having this tactic used against the attacker is the only
argument that caused me to reconsider the tactic of essentially scrying on
the opponent near constantly and thus removing any warning because of
this divination. To compound the defenders problem teleport in the
occasional summoned monster.
On a side note. I wonder about the ethics of using summoned monsters. One
0f the players is a druid and regularly summons creatures to try out
dangerous situations. Since the creatues are completely ok, even if
killed after the summoning duration ends he has a point. What do people
think about this?
--
Eduard W. Lohmann; edu...@klomp.org
Jason Corley
> On a side note. I wonder about the ethics of using summoned monsters. One
> 0f the players is a druid and regularly summons creatures to try out
> dangerous situations. Since the creatues are completely ok, even if
> killed after the summoning duration ends he has a point. What do people
> think about this?
In my game, the creatures summoned are happy to serve, either they are
from an alternate plane where they are blissfully happy and will return
after their period of service, or they are caught up in "nature's will"
and their service is part of the great cycle of life. The former for
divine and arcane casters, the latter for druids, of course. Druids are a
natural force in my world, just as much as an avalanche or an earthquake.
--
***************************************************************************
"Today's public figures can no longer write their own speeches or books,
and there is some evidence that they can't read them either." ---Gore Vidal
Jason D. Corley | ICQ 41199011 | le...@aeonsociety.org
Russell Wallace
(Mary K. Kuhner) wrote:
>To my own tastes, the key problem is not Teleport but the offense/
>defense imbalance that makes an ambush of this type unsurvivable.
I don't think I've ever explained this before to anyone, so let me try
one shot at it now. (It's something I only fully figured the reasons
for during my a-life research.)
Q: Granted that a world has the basic requirements for the existence
of something a reasonable person would call life (e.g.
self-replication by use of semi-universal computation), what are the
requirements for _complex_ life?
A: Space.
Q: What? Why?
A: Suppose we have a population of small, (relatively) simple entities
X. Suppose a large, complex entity Y is attempting to succeed in that
world. It is at an immediate and substantial disadvantage - its
reproduction rate will necessarily be much lower. How can it overcome
that disadvantage?
The advantage it gains in return is that specialization is efficient.
A neuron or a telephone operator can process information more
efficiently than an amoeba or a barbarian can, because they don't have
to worry about all the other issues (e.g. nutrition, self-defense)
that their generalist counterparts do.
Q: But why can't X just kill its counterparts in Y that are
specialized in other things than combat?
A: Because Y has subunits that are specialists in combat and therefore
can outdo X in that area and kill it before it can reach the
vulnerable specialists in other things.
Q: But why can't X just avoid the combat-specialist units and attack
the other units?
A: Because of space. Space allows Y to arrange the combat-specialist
units in layers around the vulnerable units. A bacterium infiltrating
your body has to get past the hard, dead skin cells and then has to
fight its way through blood vessels patrolled by hunter-killer white
blood cells. A barbarian has to sneak through many miles of territory
patrolled by heavily armed soldiers.
Q: But what about teleportation?
A: Oh, well that voids the issue. If you break the distance metric of
space, if you make all points equally close to each other, then the
strategy of combat-specialist units warding the other specialists
breaks down.
Q: So how do multicellular life forms exist in a world without space,
as a-life projects are hoping for?
A: They don't.
Q: So how do castles, kings, nation-states and indeed any unit larger
than the tribe exist in a world with teleporting assassins?
A: By script immunity.
--
"Mercy to the guilty is treachery to the innocent."
http://www.esatclear.ie/~rwallace
mail:rw(at)eircom(dot)net
Mary K. Kuhner
>Q: But what about teleportation?
>A: Oh, well that voids the issue. If you break the distance metric of
>space, if you make all points equally close to each other, then the
>strategy of combat-specialist units warding the other specialists
>breaks down.
Ah!
Several years ago Jon hinted that the _Radiant_ PCs might be on
the verge of discovering the ability to make arbitrary system-to-
system Jumps (based on their known ability to make one specific
extra-long Jump).
I said, on gut feel, "No way, nohow, isn't going to happen, and I'd
appreciate it if you *never* let that happen."
You've just convinced me that my gut feel was on the money.
>Q: So how do multicellular life forms exist in a world without space,
>as a-life projects are hoping for?
>A: They don't.
>Q: So how do castles, kings, nation-states and indeed any unit larger
>than the tribe exist in a world with teleporting assassins?
>A: By script immunity.
That's an awfully convincing analysis (and well written, too). But
can't you provide space to a-life organisms? (Not that this
helps our poor teleported-upon roleplaying characters, but it's
an interesting question in itself--though perhaps one for email.)
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Nis Haller Baggesen
By the expense of negating the space metric would be another answer. No
very valid on D&D, where this expense is very small, but could be valid
under other circumcstances. At the very least Teleport (in D&D) requires
the spellcaster to move with the assassin team which puts him at even a
marginal risk - Something the spellcaster may not want. Especially since
everybody will know that they need to take out him, to stop the thing
from happening again.
Today there is little stopping a modern military nation from striking
the weak non combat aprts of their opponents - Since that does not
negate the opponents ability to strike back it is still not very
appealing to strike hard in this way, thus prevening the world from
spiraling into all out war - So far.
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> On Wed, 24 Apr 2002 09:52:15 +0200, Nis Haller Baggesen
> <n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>
> >sNOm...@sonic.net wrote:
> >>
> >> Long ago, in a galaxy far, far away, Nis Haller Baggesen wrote:
> >>
> >> : > Do you notice how _little_ of what you've quoted is from the core rule
> >>
> >> : Yes. However most people I know will not be playing vanilla D&D by the
> >> : time they get to the levels where they use Scry and Teleport.
> >>
> >> The point is, the core rules, as-written, offer a more-or-less unstoppable
> >> auto-kill tactic. Going to other rulebooks isn't necessarily an option for
> >> everyone... or even most people. To that degree, the core rules are broken.
> >> You should *NOT* need optional rules to fix core rules! IMAO, the Scry/
> >> Teleport issue is a problem in the core rules. Appropriate counterspells
> >> should be part of the (free) errata online. YMMV.
> >
> >Well, first of all I think that a lot of counters are available just
> >through the core rules. At least if the objective is to protect a lair -
> >To reiterate Hallow/Unhallow with dispel magic, Forbiddance, Alarm,
> >Glyphs and Wards etc. can all provide plenty of protection for a lair.
> >And don't cry about them being expensive because it is a one time group
> >expense, so its not really that big a deal.
> >
>
> Once you've got enough of them to do the job, it is.
I just don't agree. I don't think you need that many to do the job.
>
> >With one round of preparations (Which I have also described how you
> >might get, using core spells such as detect scry or simply detect magic)
> >- I used feats to make them last but you could use Permanency if you
> >want a core rules option), the ideas of teleporting out or encapsulating
> >the teleporters (Or yourself) in a Wall of Force to get breathing room
> >should also work in the core rules.
>
> All of which works if you never have anything else around you you care
> about having destroyed. I nice solution for small groups of perpetual
> nomads, perhaps (and even then, ones that accrue no followers).
>
So the Teleport attackers will be expending all their energy
slaughtering your followers, while you will be spending your energy
slaughtering them - I don't see that as such a good deal for the
Teleport attackers. True it may make it hard for you to attract
followers if every single enemy you fight decide to attack you relatives
rather than yourself, but then why would every enemy choose to do this -
If they want to pick on easy targets, why pick the easy targets who have
strong friends - Make the strong friends pull back. Sure that might work
once, but then you will just end up pissing the strong guys off.
Also very little progress is mad for any group if they are continually
offensive
> >
> >That the tactics of the villians in RttToEE have immensly bad and that
> >Marys groupd found a tactic which works against them is not a fault of
> >the system as a whole. Mary could have figured out some different
>
> The problem is that within the standard rules their options were
> sharply limited; there simply aren't the tools for the job to protect
> a large group or area like that, even _with_ the clerical spells.
>
Why do you want to protect a large group? You just need to protect the
small offensively capable group, and make sure that they are capable of
striking back.
> >tactics for them - Since they are doing the lair protection, all the
> >tactics mentioned earlier will work for them. If she was worried the the
>
> At a prohibitive expense.
Everybody will be interested in defense, since it leads to safety which
leads to a more productive everyday life. So why wouldn't every single
village church be permanently consecrated, hallowed and have an area of
forbiddance? The expenses are negligable for a church, at it would make
the old standby of gathering in the church in times of trouble make
sense even in a world of magic. And it would take the expense of the
PC's and put in on society as a whole. Bigier churches could even afford
fountains of healing (Song and Sorcery spell "trap") ect.
>
> >All this being said, it is not like I adore D&D3, but I find it suitable
> >for some nice dungeon hacking, and for that pruppose I dont see a
> >probelm with the PC being able to find a tactic which is successful as
> >long as the opposition doesn't bother with some rudimentary defensive
> >tactics.
>
> And I think it requires far more than "rudimentary" ones to work
> effectively.
Staying together, having an around the clock warning spell like a
permanent detect magic etc. and seeking asylum in the church when people
are after your, are not that advanced tactics.
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> Nis Haller Baggesen <n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
> >Wayne Shaw wrote:
>
> >> Do you notice how _little_ of what you've quoted is from the core rule
>
> >Yes. However most people I know will not be playing vanilla D&D by the
> >time they get to the levels where they use Scry and Teleport. The ones
> >that do probably aren't going to figure out these tactics right away. If
> >they do, they are probably also clever enough to come up with some of
> >the relatively simple tweaks, like making Teleport mildly disorienting
> >or making it take more time, allowing spells to be countered at the
> >target location, making Scry more vague etc. Or simply banning the
> >spells.
>
> Well, I've only one sample case, but my player figured this out
> *instantly* when he hit the appropriate level.
Good for you. And you have been totally unable to come up with any
defensive strategies?
> And nothing we tried
> to make Teleport less effective (disorientation, etc.) seemed to
> help against the Teleport/Invisibility combo.
Persistent/permanent detect magic, should let you have an idea about the
general location of an a teleporting invisible enemy, as it will be
sudden disturbance in the magic auras around you. A rough guide is
enough for area spells like most attack spells, and wall of force.
> (Magic items giving
> permanent See Invisible would be needed here, I think, and we didn't
> have any.) The enemy can also consider Teleporting to just the other
> side of a closed door from the PCs.
True - But how is it now different from defending against an enemy on
the other side of the door? Same thing with the disorientation - It
keeps the teleporter from attacking instantly, in whihc case the attack
is just like if the teleporter had been there all along.
Are you totally incapable of forming defensive strategies, or do you
just find them inadequate compared to offensive ones?
>
> Simply banning spells is hard when you're running a published module;
> the existence of Teleport had already been well established long before
> any PC could cast it. In general, if you're a stickler for consistency
> it's often too late to ban a spell by the time it becomes a problem.
>
> To my own tastes, the key problem is not Teleport but the offense/
> defense imbalance that makes an ambush of this type unsurvivable.
I agree that offensive combat spells are good in D&D, compared to the
defensive ones. However there are some very nice ones - Wall of Force,
Otilukes Resilent Sphere, (Minor) Globe of Invulnerability, Stoneskin.
Invisibility is also nice for defense, and cheaper than the offesive
Improved Invisibility.
Reflexive counterspelling is also very good for defense - It could be
made a house rule instead of a feat.
> I
> don't think I'll be running any more high level 3rd Edition--it was
> just an exercise in frustration for me.
I can understand that.
Nis Haller Baggesen
>
> Wayne Shaw <sh...@caprica.com> wrote:
> >On Mon, 22 Apr 2002 13:55:02 GMT, rbo...@paradise.net.nz (Rupert
> >Boleyn) wrote:
>
> >>And if you do that each time the warning goes off you'll be out of
> >>spell slots and teleport scroll pretty quick.
>
> >In fact, if I was an enemy I'd Scry them just to watch what they do.
> >If there's any consistency to it, you could well use that to set them
> >up even worse.
>
> That's how we finally tagged the very high-powered invisible mage in
> our Shadowrun campaign. Managed to get a drop of his blood and scried
> on him. He invariably reacted by running for his home base, expecting
> a magical attack--and the third time, we ambushed him on the road in.
>
thing? And do you always have infinite surveilance time to make your
plan?
And "on the road in" doesn't have much meaning if they teleport back (I
know that you don't in Shadowrun). Even if they don't pulling of such an
ambush on a mage (or group) with all their defenses up, might not be
that easy. At least compared to an ordinary ambush, where you just
exploit the ordinary routines of the target.
> If the enemy can force you to blow half your spell slots via use of
> a single Scry, they're doing pretty well--and are well set up to hit
> you the second or third time.
True. But they could start by dispelling the Scry. Then you wont know
what they are doing - If they just dispelled it, then you expended a
more expensive spell, and if they start preparing, then you shouldn't
teleport in. Worse if they had a Detect Scry going, you may have to
expend your spells, just incase they come for you.
Also some of the defenses might last all day - And the next day thet
expense will not have mattered.
You also assume that you can find them again with a new scry - That
might not be the case if you use indirect scrying, and they move away.
And if you use direct scrying the normal defensive magic items will
work.
Or they might move to their well prepared lair
>
> My very favorite strategy in this situation would have to be figuring
> out where the den is, Teleporting there, setting up, and *then* casting
> Scry. It's like having a pizza delivered right to your door.
Not if the den has automated defenses, or can't be teleported into.
Mary K. Kuhner
>> Well, I've only one sample case, but my player figured this out
>> *instantly* when he hit the appropriate level.
>Good for you. And you have been totally unable to come up with any
>defensive strategies?
The strategies we were able to come up with did not seem adequate,
unless one side or the other was willing to retreat to a prepared
position and stay there, sacrificing their goals.
>> And nothing we tried
>> to make Teleport less effective (disorientation, etc.) seemed to
>> help against the Teleport/Invisibility combo.
>Persistent/permanent detect magic, should let you have an idea about the
>general location of an a teleporting invisible enemy, as it will be
>sudden disturbance in the magic auras around you. A rough guide is
>enough for area spells like most attack spells, and wall of force.
If you are, say, exploring the Temple of All-Consumption, it is not
reasonable to treat every magical aura as really being ten of the
Temple's top people, newly Teleported in, invisible, prepped to the
gills and ready to kill you. The majority of the Temple is magical.
Part of the problem here is that in order to accomplish anything the
PCs must necessarily *move*. If they are moving, they see new
things, including new magic auras. Sooner or later one of those
auras is the Unstoppable Prepped Attack.
Also, only the Detect Magic character(s) will be able to react, and
this greatly increases the chance of the other side getting surprise
or just initiative, which is, in my experience, lethal. The enemy
is Hasted so each one who wins initiative gets two casts against
an undefended PC group.
>> The enemy can also consider Teleporting to just the other
>> side of a closed door from the PCs.
>True - But how is it now different from defending against an enemy on
>the other side of the door? Same thing with the disorientation - It
>keeps the teleporter from attacking instantly, in whihc case the attack
>is just like if the teleporter had been there all along.
It means that the enemy can be, en masse, on the other side of *any*
door. At the levels of RTOEE, our experience was that if the enemy
took 10 rounds to prep and then attacked, they would win instantly
against an unprepped opponent.
All that adding Teleport does here is it means you can never have
safe ground at your back, or feel you know where the enemy is, or
set out perimeter guards effectively, or withdraw from the dungeon
to recuperate. Any door, anywhere, any time, can have the Unstoppable
Prepped Attack behind it. (The PCs slept in a Rope Trick, and
the unaccountable lack of Detect Invisibility on the enemy side
made this work, but it wouldn't have worked otherwise.)
>Are you totally incapable of forming defensive strategies, or do you
>just find them inadequate compared to offensive ones?
I am not good at it, but I think my husband is, and he was in
agreement that the PCs could not protect themselves from a massed
attack except by abandoning what they were doing and holing up
in a high-powered Good temple. His preferred alternative was to
use the tactic himself. No more dungeon crawls, just Scry/Teleport
against the big baddies whenever they stuck their noses out of
the inner Temple (which they had to do, in order to make progress).
He killed the second-tier baddie and the entire team recovering the
old Temple this way, without any risk to the PCs. One key part of
the strategy was summoning a large angel; they are surprisingly
magic resistant. (If you're going to bring up roleplaying
considerations, I will note that the module premise is that the Temple
is #1 hated enemy of all gods; it doesn't seem unreasonable to me
that the PCs can get angelic help.)
Both of us were bored and disappointed by this. I mean, we bought
the thing to do some dungeon crawling, but it was no longer reasonable
to go into the dungeon except via Teleport-in-and-out. All that work
making interesting PCs and NPCs--and every fight is decided in one round.
The game was a lot more fun before this level was reached.
>I agree that offensive combat spells are good in D&D, compared to the
>defensive ones. However there are some very nice ones - Wall of Force,
>Otilukes Resilent Sphere, (Minor) Globe of Invulnerability, Stoneskin.
>Invisibility is also nice for defense, and cheaper than the offesive
>Improved Invisibility.
Invisibility favors the side who can do most with surprise. It does
not even have to be Improved Invisibility since the fight is going to
be over anyway. It's just there to get surprise or initiative against
as many adversaries as possible. It also favors the side who knows
that combat is coming, since they can cast Detect Invis.
When the PCs hit the Water Temple, the inhabitants knew in general
that they had a dangerous enemy, but not the exact moment of the
attack. The PCs hit them with Haste, Improved Invis, Cat's Grace
and Bull's Strength, and Protection from Water pre-cast on everyone.
By the time the first NPC got to act, all but 2 of the 27 were dead.
It seems to me that it's a bit late for defensive spells at that
point (and the 2 were a fighter and an assassin).
Part of this is that the PCs were optimized for high Initiative,
whereas the RTOEE NPCs were not. Without this it might have been
a little chancier, though my experience was that the precasts were
very hard to overcome. Wall of Force would be something to try.
Most of the casters were priests, though. Priests seem to be
screwed if they try to do anything other than defending a temple--
and the poor fools in RTOEE had put the wrong spells in their
temple defenses. They needed standing Dispel Magic. Nothing else
is good enough. (We looked at Invis Purge, but it wasn't enough.
The Invis is only one component of the package.)
I am sure that there are counters to specific tactics here, but I
wonder about the flavor of the game. It seems to come down to
a lot of turtling, a lot of "I must make the exactly correct
tactical calculation here or everyone dies before they can even
act," a lot of "Oh well, next party" or "Oh well, next module."
In our Shadowrun campaign the PCs were hunted by a single mage
who had the equivalent of D&D Improved Invisibility with Nondetection.
They found that they could, with some effort, protect themselves
from him in a fixed location, or by moving location constantly and
never being anywhere predictable. But they became totally
ineffectual and extremely unfun to play. This experience made a
big impression on me; I really don't want to replicate it.
Some player groups won't "turtle" and rely on the GM to tone down
the enemy attacks to a survivable level. My player won't do this,
though. If the situation calls for a turtle, he'll turtle (and
complain bitterly) and asking him to do otherwise spoils the game
for him because what his PCs are doing no longer makes sense, and
he can too easily see that they should all be killed. (He and
I were in a game of this kind together once, and by the end we
were pointing out to the GM just how she should kill the PCs, much
to her distress.)
I'm not trying to slam anyone's enjoyment of 3rd Ed. If you can
make this work, more power to you. I can't, though; and my
impression is that most of the people who can do it via a tacit
"the enemy won't really go all-out to kill the PCs" agreement.
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Mary K. Kuhner
>By the expense of negating the space metric would be another answer. No
>very valid on D&D, where this expense is very small, but could be valid
>under other circumcstances. At the very least Teleport (in D&D) requires
>the spellcaster to move with the assassin team which puts him at even a
>marginal risk - Something the spellcaster may not want. Especially since
>everybody will know that they need to take out him, to stop the thing
>from happening again.
On the global scale arguments based on "The caster won't want to do
this" seem very weak to me. In games where we have tried this, the
inevitable result is that spellcasters are put in situations
sufficiently bad where they *do* want to do this, or have goals they
care about sufficiently. There are many, many people in the stock
3rd Ed settings who can do this. It's hard to imagine that none are
going to do so. (And don't forget scrolls and items!)
I playtested a rules set once where magicians could do a very, very
nasty "final strike". The game designers thought this was balanced
since, of course, PCs are reluctant to die. We found in playtest
that this meant any lethal combat against a magician tended to end with
everyone dead, since any magician who saw that he was going to die
would tend to choose to final-strike and take his foe with him.
(GURPS U-Mana rules have this problem in spades--and he may be able
to take a lot more than the foe with him.) The game designer
said, ruefully, that he never actually ran NPC mages realistically
so he hadn't noticed.
There is a tendency to balance spells for PC use and ignore NPC
use. U-Mana means, realistically, that a few deranged mages will
destroy the nation; it implies a society that, for self-defense, must
kill all mages. But people play with it successfully (sort of,
anyway) because they only look at PC use, not at Joe Hedge Mage
use; they don't notice that Joe Hedge Mage has a reasonable
chance to wipe out the kingdom if his wife leaves him.
>Today there is little stopping a modern military nation from striking
>the weak non combat aprts of their opponents - Since that does not
>negate the opponents ability to strike back it is still not very
>appealing to strike hard in this way, thus prevening the world from
>spiraling into all out war - So far.
There is a distinct difference between a *nation* being able to mount
an attack, and a couple of individuals being able to do so--as recent
events suggest. A nation may not want to sacrifice itself to the
retaliatory strike, and cannot hide. An individual may be able to
do either one. I agree with Russell: in a world where six people
can wipe out any target, anywhere, and people with that capability
are relatively common, there will be no national governments.
Multi-cellular organisms can fight with each other--that's on a
scale they can manage. It's being totally vulnerable to single-
celled organisms that prevents the development of multicellularity
at all. If any pathogen I happened to encounter could teleport
to my liver, I am morally sure I wouldn't be here today. The
fact that other people--entities on my scale--can kill me is much
easier to manage.
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Hal
<ajam...@cisco.com> wrote:
>Probably addressing the symptom instead of the disease, but what if
>Teleport stripped away all 'currently-up' spells? You can get there
>but not charged to the gills - for that you'd have to get near, _then_
>cast all your power-ups. And would leave teleport for non-ambush
>situations pretty much intact...
Sounds like an excellent idea!
(Now if only we could find something to neuter Scrying as
well...)
Regards,
Hal
--
P.S.: This is not much better than a "Me too" post, but I
really think Arne's solution is viable and am surprised it
hasn't been commented upon. <re-lurk>
Russell Wallace
(Mary K. Kuhner) wrote:
>Several years ago Jon hinted that the _Radiant_ PCs might be on
>the verge of discovering the ability to make arbitrary system-to-
>system Jumps (based on their known ability to make one specific
>extra-long Jump).
>
>I said, on gut feel, "No way, nohow, isn't going to happen, and I'd
>appreciate it if you *never* let that happen."
>
>You've just convinced me that my gut feel was on the money.
Yep! Not many people realize that a Star Wars-like hyperdrive system
makes stable interstellar empires impossible.
>That's an awfully convincing analysis (and well written, too).
Thanks!
>But
>can't you provide space to a-life organisms? (Not that this
>helps our poor teleported-upon roleplaying characters, but it's
>an interesting question in itself--though perhaps one for email.)
I'll answer it briefly here (any further followups should perhaps go
to comp.ai.alife) - it turns out that you can, but doing it in such a
way as to encourage the evolution of complex organisms, would require
some tens of orders of magnitude more computing power than we
currently possess.
Mary K. Kuhner
Russell Wallace <sp...@devnull.com> wrote:
>Yep! Not many people realize that a Star Wars-like hyperdrive system
>makes stable interstellar empires impossible.
There's a board game called something like 4000 AD in which your
ships get into a 'hyperwarp' and then move one unit a turn, but no
direction is specified: three turns later your ships can be placed
at any location 3 steps from where they started, and so forth. As
if your ships had turned into a kind of expanding sphere.
The game's dominant tactic is loading a huge fleet from a source
equidistant between two targets, so that the enemy is forced to
defend both targets. Defense is essentially impossible,
since (as you point out) you can't screen inner worlds with forces
at outer worlds, and with roughly equal forces there is really no
counter to a fleet capable of attacking any of two (or three or
four) targets simultaneously, except to launch a counterattack.
It's not quite as unstable as being able to attack *any* target
simultaneously, but close. The dominant strategy is therefore not
to defend anything except the homeworld. You can calculate what you
need to defend that, and use everything else for attack.
I would not care to live in such a galaxy. I hope they have a
taboo against destroying habitable planets. Perhaps the best thing
for non-homeworld planets to do is surrender instantly to whoever
has ships overhead today, and hope they're nice. (I think this
is what the Rastur in our game do, actually: whoever's here this
week is the boss. No allegiances at all.)
I'm a little uneasy about the stability of Radiant's Confederacy
anyway, since defensive technology seems to have lagged behind the
obvious offenses (the one that worries me is hitting a station or
world with a fast moving object). But at least you can't get to
Capitol with such an attack without passing through ten intervening
systems, each of which has some chance to notice and react. It
helps a lot that not only are Jumps forced onto prescribed routes,
but no crew can make more than 2, possibly 3 without a good period
of rest in realspace. This gives defenders a chance to find and
stop them. And you cannot Jump right into system, so inner-system
worlds take a long time to reach, though alas, Chernoi's home station
is outside the critical radius. (Authorities have almost finished
fixing the large hole caused by a warning shot from a ship that
Jumped in and then out again. Maybe they shouldn't have built
right out there, though it makes a very commercially attractive port.)
Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
Russell Wallace
(Mary K. Kuhner) wrote:
>There's a board game called something like 4000 AD in which your
>ships get into a 'hyperwarp' and then move one unit a turn, but no
>direction is specified: three turns later your ships can be placed
>at any location 3 steps from where they started, and so forth. As
>if your ships had turned into a kind of expanding sphere.
[...]
>I would not care to live in such a galaxy.
Me neither.
>I hope they have a
>taboo against destroying habitable planets.
This would create a strong incentive for building O'Neill habitats
(which could probably themselves be fitted with hyperdrives)... that's
a possibility that might actually be interesting to explore in its own
right.
>I'm a little uneasy about the stability of Radiant's Confederacy
>anyway, since defensive technology seems to have lagged behind the
>obvious offenses (the one that worries me is hitting a station or
>world with a fast moving object).
One thing that should help somewhat with that is to rule that ships
have to be moving slowly relative to nearby stars before entering
Jump. That means relativistic strikes have to be either launched
across normal space (very slow) or ramped up at the target star
(giving more opportunity for the defenders to see what's going on and
do something about it).
>But at least you can't get to
>Capitol with such an attack without passing through ten intervening
>systems, each of which has some chance to notice and react. It
>helps a lot that not only are Jumps forced onto prescribed routes,
>but no crew can make more than 2, possibly 3 without a good period
>of rest in realspace. This gives defenders a chance to find and
>stop them.
Right.
>And you cannot Jump right into system, so inner-system
>worlds take a long time to reach, though alas, Chernoi's home station
>is outside the critical radius. (Authorities have almost finished
>fixing the large hole caused by a warning shot from a ship that
>Jumped in and then out again. Maybe they shouldn't have built
>right out there, though it makes a very commercially attractive port.)
I think I calculated once that the station itself should have a
Cardynge limit on the order of 1000 km or so? That would at least be
enough room for antimissile defenses to operate, so at least you'd
have to use enough firepower to saturate the defenses rather than just
being able to blow a large hole with a single shot.
Wayne Shaw
wrote:
>Yep! Not many people realize that a Star Wars-like hyperdrive system
>makes stable interstellar empires impossible.
Unless you're assuming more precision of reentry than seemed to be
shown in the movies, I don't see quite why.
Steve Mading
: I'm a little uneasy about the stability of Radiant's Confederacy
: anyway, since defensive technology seems to have lagged behind the
: obvious offenses (the one that worries me is hitting a station or
: world with a fast moving object). But at least you can't get to
: Capitol with such an attack without passing through ten intervening
: systems, each of which has some chance to notice and react. It
: helps a lot that not only are Jumps forced onto prescribed routes,
: but no crew can make more than 2, possibly 3 without a good period
: of rest in realspace. This gives defenders a chance to find and
: stop them. And you cannot Jump right into system, so inner-system
: worlds take a long time to reach, though alas, Chernoi's home station
: is outside the critical radius. (Authorities have almost finished
: fixing the large hole caused by a warning shot from a ship that
: Jumped in and then out again. Maybe they shouldn't have built
: right out there, though it makes a very commercially attractive port.)
My memory may be fuzzy but didn't Traveller have the physical
model that hyperdrive technology doesn't work when you are
too close to a gravity well? That would fix the problem nicely.
The end result is that when jumping to a solar system you can't
go into hyperspace until you leave the solar system, and you
have to arrive just outside the next solar system and fly at
normal sublight speed from there to make your approach to any
planet in the system. Through this handy game setting rule, a lot
of the plot problems of instant hyperspace travel go away, and it
doesn't require any legal pressure from the authorities to enforce
it (which would be meaniningless during an all out war.)
Another tool to deal with the problem is to say that jump technology
requires a pre-existing gate to be built at both ends of the jump,
you can't jump to somewhere where one has not been built. Thus
once a planet is colonized, it can be easily traded with and communicated
with at FTL speed (and thus large multi-system governments are possible),
but new colonies can only be started at STL speed, since some manned or
robot probe ship has to go out there the slow way to build the first
arrival gate. Once the first arrival gate is built, then the rest of
the colonization can occur quickly. The first order of business would
be to use the first gate (which would be necessarily crude and small
given that it had to be shipped out there on a slowship where every
bit of mass is shaved down as much as possible) to trickle-in people
and supplies to make a second, bigger more practical gate, and so on.
The "need a gate" solution also solves the military defense problem.
Unless the enemy manages to build a gate in your system without you
noticing it, you know they have to come through at one of the points
where your gates are built, so you know where to put your defense
forces. Plus, you may be able to make the gate itself into a defensive
weapon on your end, closing it down as an enemy ship is only partway
through. In such a setting, the use of these gates would be a major part
of any military strategy.
Perhaps an espianage operation by an enemy force would be to try to
smuggle through the parts to make a new gate in your system, a
little bit at a time through your normal civilian traffic through
the gates. (With the final intention being to use the gate to
launch an invasion.) Trying to trace down such an operation and
find where they are building the gate could be a good adventure.
Perhaps a new outlying colony suffered a disaster and lost their
gate(s), and thus the only way to contact them would be to send
another slowship that might not arrive for ten, twenty, maybe even
hundreds of years, depending on how far out it is. Perhaps the
party are on board that ship and the campaign could revolve around
them dealing with the colony's descendants that have been out of
contact now for years and might not even remember them except as
distorted legends. With them the party brings one of the small
"starter" gates, and can use it to start reconnecting this world
to the empire and bring it back into the fold. But would they
*want* to? Maybe the gate blowing up long ago wasn't really an
accident. Maybe the colonists were trying to isolate themselves
on purpose so they could form an independant nation. Maybe the
party begins to sympathise with them and switches sides? Such
could be a great campaign.
: Mary Kuhner mkku...@eskimo.com
--
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --
Steven L. Mading at BioMagResBank (BMRB). UW-Madison
Programmer/Analyst/(sometimes SysAdmin) mailto:mad...@bmrb.wisc.edu
B1108C, Biochem Addition / 433 Babcock Dr / Madison, WI 53706-1544
Russell Wallace
wrote:
Pick a random planet, jump in, plaster the planet with nuclear
missiles, jump out before reinforcements arrive. Repeat as necessary.
The enemy can't know where you'll hit next, and if he tries to guard
all his planets he'll spread his fleet so uniformly thin it won't be
strong anywhere.
If an empire can't protect its planets, there'll be no advantage to
belonging to an empire, so nobody will.
Rupert Boleyn
<n...@daimi.au.dk> wrote:
>Persistent/permanent detect magic, should let you have an idea about the
>general location of an a teleporting invisible enemy, as it will be
>sudden disturbance in the magic auras around you. A rough guide is
>enough for area spells like most attack spells, and wall of force.
Only works when you concentrate, and even then on the first round all
you know is that there's magic in the area the spell covers. If
there's something of your that's magic and already in the area you'll
have to concentrate for three round IIRC to isolate it and be able to
detect the intruders 'past' it. This is not real useful when you
suspect invisible, teleporting hostiles in your demense.
>Are you totally incapable of forming defensive strategies, or do you
>just find them inadequate compared to offensive ones?
I can't speak for Mary, but IMO the only workable defence is to be
something other than what the attacker thinks you are, and that
doesn't usually work over the longer term.
--
Rupert Boleyn <rbo...@paradise.net.nz>
"Inside every cynic is a romantic trying to get out."