Dominate Person questions


Rules Questions


Here's the first scenario:

A 10th level fey-blooded sorcerer NPC casts dominate person (DC 24) on a lvl 8 Barbarian PC (Will +3). He obviously fails the save it and the sorcerer tells him to flee to the west as fast as he can. He gladly obliges and takes off at a full run to find his horse. The rest of the party then brutally murders the sorcerer in a couple of rounds.

What happens to the barbarian then? As far as I understand magical effects continue after the death of the caster (please let me know if I'm wrong!). So the poor barbarian is stuck at a gallop to the west exchanging new horses in every town to move faster (he was told to move as fast as he can after all). He does receive a new save every day since the caster isn't concentrating on him at least once a day, but that's obviously not much help to him! What should the party do? They can try and track him through the wilderness, but they're going to have a heck of a time trying to catch up to him.

Second scenario:

Your 9th level wizard wanders out into the wilderness and using his level-appropriate divination spells finds himself a Cloud Giant. He then throws out his dominate person, and assuming the giant doesn't roll exceptionally well, the wizard now has a CR 11 pet for the next 9 days.

How do you prevent this from wrecking your game?


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
vip00 wrote:
How do you prevent this from wrecking your game?

You don't. You suck it up like a real GM and plan better encounters in the future.

The party chasing after the barbarian sounds like a swell adventure.

Having a giant in the party can make for quite an interesting roleplaying opportunity. It's not like they are going to be able to walk it into town without some kind of reaction from the locals, they can't take it on a sailing vessel, or into a dungeon. All it's going to be good for is killing things, which the party likely is already good at. Let them have their fun for a while. If you didn't want to deal with dominate person, you should have said so up front. Don't punish your players for your mistakes.

Also, dispel magic. When put to the giant in the middle of a tough encounter, it can make the encounter far, far more interesting.

Dark Archive

Also make sure that you follow this section of the spell:

Quote:

Subjects resist this control, and any subject forced to take actions against its nature receives a new saving throw with a +2 bonus. Obviously self-destructive orders are not carried out. Once control is established, the range at which it can be exercised is unlimited, as long as you and the subject are on the same plane. You need not see the subject to control it.

If you don't spend at least 1 round concentrating on the spell each day, the subject receives a new saving throw to throw off the domination.

Asking the giant to fight anything with a CR greater then it (something it knows would be a loosing fight solo), could be considered self-destructive....

Also, I consider that "helping out the wizard" as not in it's nature, and thus most requests will be treated with a +2 bonus saving throw per request.


For the Barbarian: "Once control is established, the range at which it can be exercised is unlimited, as long as you and the subject are on the same plane" You can interpret the barbarian being out of range of the spell when the scorcerer died, he no longer being on the same plane. I'd also buy him fleeing as though on the lamb for the ten days, and not even getting a save since it's not necessarily out of character to 'go west'.

For the Giant - There's lots of broken in this game when it comes to spells and abilities that increase party size over the 4-5 the game is designed for. If you hit a game breaker, might be best to just be up front with the players about it and try to mutually agree on a metagame rule. So, for example, they can use dominate person to beat an encoutner, but can't use that encoutner to then turn around and beat every other encounter while they just watch.

On the other hand if they don't want challenging encoutners, just want to watch a stone giant smash things, if eveyone's haivng fun, then everyone's having fun.


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber; Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Happler wrote:
Also, I consider that "helping out the wizard" as not in it's nature, and thus most requests will be treated with a +2 bonus saving throw per request.

That would certainly make the spell nigh useless. It's little more than a GM cop out if you ask me, since it would allow every target that was ever affected by dominate person to get a save after every request (as it is never in a target's nature to serve a known enemy). That is clearly not the intent of the spell.

Asphesteros wrote:
On the other hand if they don't want challenging encounters [and] just want to watch a stone giant smash things, if everyone's having fun, then everyone's having fun.

This is a key point that bares repeating.


It's an issue of what's fun for everyone...

Unfortunately isn't *NOT* much fun if you're the character that's dominated and your party's next three weeks of playtime go into the adventure of rescuing you, so I'm not sure how fun that is.

Unfortunately, some people actually like combat instead of watching the DM playing out a combat in front of them rolling for both the giant and the bad guys.

My question gets exactly to the point of how to make all of this fun? I'm having an issue keeping the party on one page. It's easy enough to throw a deus ex machina and fix whatever the heck you want with the adventure if people are wrecking it, but as all overpowered things, it tends to make the game less fun for the players at the short end of the stick.


Give the Giant to the player that dominated it, have him deal with it.
Let him use it much like a summoned monster except its always there until it dies or something else.

Second scenario:

Your 9th level wizard wanders out into the wilderness and using his level-appropriate divination spells finds himself a Cloud Giant. He then throws out his dominate person, and assuming the giant doesn't roll exceptionally well, the wizard now has a CR 11 pet for the next 9 days.

How do you prevent this from wrecking your game?

There are always bigger fish out there.
So he has a cr 11 giant, well treat it as part of the party and make encounters that would challenge a lvl 10-12 party.


vip00 wrote:

Second scenario:

Your 9th level wizard wanders out into the wilderness and using his level-appropriate divination spells finds himself a Cloud Giant. He then throws out his dominate person, and assuming the giant doesn't roll exceptionally well, the wizard now has a CR 11 pet for the next 9 days.

How do you prevent this from wrecking your game?

Does the cloud giant not have any friends? or a mate?

Dark Archive Owner - Johnny Scott Comics and Games

vip00 wrote:

It's an issue of what's fun for everyone...

Unfortunately isn't *NOT* much fun if you're the character that's dominated and your party's next three weeks of playtime go into the adventure of rescuing you, so I'm not sure how fun that is.

Unfortunately, some people actually like combat instead of watching the DM playing out a combat in front of them rolling for both the giant and the bad guys.

My question gets exactly to the point of how to make all of this fun? I'm having an issue keeping the party on one page. It's easy enough to throw a deus ex machina and fix whatever the heck you want with the adventure if people are wrecking it, but as all overpowered things, it tends to make the game less fun for the players at the short end of the stick.

Maybe the dominated Cloud Giant is an important member of his society. If this is the case, after a day or two, they'll probably send out a search party. Watch with a smirk as your PCs try to explain their way out of a confrontation with 10+ Cloud Giants who find their friend enslaved by "puny humans...."


Happler wrote:

Also make sure that you follow this section of the spell:

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

Also, I consider that "helping out the wizard" as not in it's nature, and thus most requests will be treated with a +2 bonus saving throw per request.

Also consider the giant's nature...

"Cloud giants are notoriously proud and consider themselves above all others..."

I'd say that this "nature" makes the cloud giant extremely likely to receive a saving throw for nearly everything it is commanded to do. Especially helping out humanoids. I doubt you could get a cloud giant to do much of anything. It's like working for a boss you despise, hate, and have NO respect for...you'll do the bare minimum, do it as poorly as you can, and screw up as much as you can along the way.

Also consider how the creature "neglects all else except that needed for basic survival." This giant will still go around foraging for food in the best way it knows how. You know, kill a few humans, steal some food, raid farms and villages, etc... When it gets its fill of food, THEN it will get on with the mission...

Or, how about....without being specifically told NOT to do so, why wouldn't the giant just squish anybody except the caster???


Tristan27 wrote:
Happler wrote:

Also make sure that you follow this section of the spell:

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

Also, I consider that "helping out the wizard" as not in it's nature, and thus most requests will be treated with a +2 bonus saving throw per request.

Also consider the giant's nature...

"Cloud giants are notoriously proud and consider themselves above all others..."

I'd say that this "nature" makes the cloud giant extremely likely to receive a saving throw for nearly everything it is commanded to do. Especially helping out humanoids. I doubt you could get a cloud giant to do much of anything. It's like working for a boss you despise, hate, and have NO respect for...you'll do the bare minimum, do it as poorly as you can, and screw up as much as you can along the way.

Also consider how the creature "neglects all else except that needed for basic survival." This giant will still go around foraging for food in the best way it knows how. You know, kill a few humans, steal some food, raid farms and villages, etc... When it gets its fill of food, THEN it will get on with the mission...

Or, how about....without being specifically told NOT to do so, why wouldn't the giant just squish anybody except the caster???

This basically falls into the realm of no one save psychophants can be effected Dominated. Most people by their nature are opposed to being enslaved. This would make everyone resistant to Dominate. I would say as long as the Cloud Giant isn't made to debase himself it does not qualify as "Against its Nature". The soul act of being Dominate should in my opinion never be considered "Against one's nature" otherwise what is the point of the spell.


I'd rule the same way Asphesteros did on the barbarian. Once the sorcerer is dead its body is still on that plane (probably) but its soul isn't, meaning the barbarian should be free once it dies. Then again I also agree with Ravingdork that it would make for a hell of an adventure trying to catch up to a barbarian that is just 'heading west.'

Also, your wizard has dominated that giant for some time now. In addition to the perils listed above (giant's family members, townsfolk...) consider what happens once the giant is free of control. If your players don't set up any sort of contingencies have it go to town.

Community / Forums / Pathfinder / Pathfinder First Edition / Rules Questions / Dominate Person questions All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.