Dealing with teleporting


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How do you GMs deal with teleporting? I find it incredibly frustrating and overpowered. Do you think it's unfair to just ban all teleporting spells?


It is not really fair or unfair but at those levels many spells can derail an adventure if the GM isn't ready. Basically what I am saying is that you can't run the same adventures at higher levels that you do at low levels. I would suggest you either start leveling players very slowly, stop leveling completely. start to adjust your GMing to accommodate higher level characters because there are much more options for bypassing or trivializing parts of your adventures as you keep going.

Liberty's Edge

Zeromage wrote:
How do you GMs deal with teleporting? I find it incredibly frustrating and overpowered. Do you think it's unfair to just ban all teleporting spells?

Probably. Dimension Door is a perfectly reasonable spell by almost any measure, and Teleport can easily be fixed by most standards making the requirements on where you can teleport more stringent (basically, make it only work to take you to places you're highly familiar with).

Banning Greater Teleport isn't unreasonable, though.


Speaking personally, if you told me we're playing in a setting where teleportation simply doesn't work, I'd have no problem with that whatsoever.

I don't tend to have any issues with it in my own games, but I don't allow scrying to work. I insist they've actually been to the place, or can currently see it from where they're standing - using a spyglass is fine, as that still gives them enough information to know where the location is relative to their current point.

Scarab Sages

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I strongly disagree with the other posters here.

Teleportation is a game-changing spell, it's true. But that's not the problem.

The problem is that you are not ready to deal with this change.

Two points:

1) There are LOTS of game-changing spells (wait till they start travelling ethereally). If you start banning them on the basis of your own comfort level you are just going to annoy your players. The people in your game who are playing casters slogged through levels of sucky abilities while the martial characters kicked butt at low levels. Now is their turn to shine. Let them have it.

2) When teleportation enters play it opens a new set of tactical options. Your job as the GM is to be READY for this new set of options. If you take this away from the players you are ALSO taking it away from YOURSELF as a part of your learning curve as a GM.

This second point deserves some elaboration:

In game terms there are 4 main teleportation abilities and each has it's strength and weakness.

1) Shift - this is a power open to conjurers at low levels. It is limited by line of sight, which means that it is basically limited to the battlefield. It is also very short range, making it a tactical power. It also limits your actions after the jump (see #2 below)

2) Dimension Door - this power lets you get into position, and even move through walls, BUT if you jump blind you can hurt yourself. More importantly you CAN'T take any actions after the jump (without taking a feat), so you are vulnerable for a round of action after you jump. There is no hiding, no running for cover, nothing. The good news is that a caster can bring the tank (or rogue) with him, and the tank can act on his initiative.

3) Teleport - this power lets you teleport long distances, but without 100% accuracy. You can take your move action after you jump IF you are willing to risk it. Greater teleport removes this limitation. The main use of this is to go back to town and get stuff, but it does have it's combat uses. Since it's a 5th (or 7th) level spell it's not exactly something you cast on a whim.

4)Word of recall/Getaway - This power lets you go home. That's it.

There are a few more but these are the big four. If you keep this in mind, you can manage the use of these powers in two ways:

1) Limiting the places they can teleport. Blocking teleportation is accomplished by several spell effects. You can also have the bad guys enchant whole rooms to be closed to teleportation. Dimensional Lock is the classic spell for this purpose. Note that it last days and costs nothing to cast. Forbiddance also works but it costs money to cast.

So use these spells, but don't over-use them. 7-8th level spells don't grow on trees. Make sure you have a reason the bad-guy's used them.

Note that most of teleport spells can't cross dimensional barriers. Move the adventure to the planes of hell (Or whatever) and they can't go home anymore. Do your research on this, and know what spells your party can cast.

Also there is the dimensional anchor spell which is mostly used in combat. Consider the look on your player's face when you tell him the bad guy cast this on him! It's actually SCARIER than taking damage - it means the GM is gunning after him! MUAHAHAHAHA!

2) Limit the places they can SEE. Most of these spells are risky to cast blindly. this means that spells like Mage's Private Sanctum and False Vision can make a big difference. Players LOVE to use clairvoyance and Dimension Door to bypass your dungeon. Let them! Then let the Bad-guys catch on to this trick and let them us Divination or other scrying spells to predict when the party is coming back and be ready for them. Then cast a False-vision to give the impression that the area has a bunch of sleeping guards and set an ambush! Keep them on their toes!

There are probably several other spells and magic items that can help your bad-guys deal with these pesky PC's. do your research. If it feels like you have entered an ARMS RACE, your are doing it right! It will make you AND your players better gamers.

Good luck.


Zeromage wrote:
How do you GMs deal with teleporting? I find it incredibly frustrating and overpowered. Do you think it's unfair to just ban all teleporting spells?

What is it about Teleport that is frustrating you and making it feel overpowered? Is the party bypassing planned encounters that would otherwise occur along the way to the 'dungeon'? Are they bypassing lots of travel and 'dungeon' encounters with scry and fry tactics to go directly to the BBEG/end encounter? Other?


First of all, there is basically two types of teleporting.

1) "Tactical" teleporting: short ranged and lower level, almost always used in combat and often simply for better positioning or to escape being surrounded. Dim Door, and such.

2) Long distance teleporting used to travel across the world in short or no time at all.

I don't think there's much wrong with 1, but 2 can be pretty powerful and definitely a game-changer. I wouldn't ban the spells, though. I would give them:

a) A cost to cast (not too high, just enough to make it not something you might prep every single day)
b) Perhaps bump up their spell levels a bit to delay access, and (most importantly)...
c) Institute a "lag time" on both ends of the travel.
On the leaving side, boost the cast times up to a few rounds to make it completely worthless to use to escape from combat. On the arriving side, have the act of materializing in the new location take a few rounds (about 2, I guess), during which anyone in the vicinity can see and attack the teleporters while they are incapable of acting, fighting back, and such.

Combined with the uncertainties of teleporting blindly into a place you've never been, the last change largely neuters the whole "teleport in all buffed up, kill everyone, teleport out" thing completely. And again, I re-iterate, these changes would only be for "type 2" teleportation. Applying these, especially the lag time concept, to tactical teleportation would make those spells utterly useless.


Kayerloth wrote:
Zeromage wrote:
How do you GMs deal with teleporting? I find it incredibly frustrating and overpowered. Do you think it's unfair to just ban all teleporting spells?
What is it about Teleport that is frustrating you and making it feel overpowered? Is the party bypassing planned encounters that would otherwise occur along the way to the 'dungeon'? Are they bypassing lots of travel and 'dungeon' encounters with scry and fry tactics to go directly to the BBEG/end encounter? Other?

Mostly because I don't want them to feel that they can escape any encounter that starts going badly with so much ease. It takes a lot of the tension away in my opinion. I also don't like playing in other planes and generally like lower level, rpgs in general.


StreamOfTheSky wrote:

First of all, there is basically two types of teleporting.

1) "Tactical" teleporting: short ranged and lower level, almost always used in combat and often simply for better positioning or to escape being surrounded. Dim Door, and such.

2) Long distance teleporting used to travel across the world in short or no time at all.

I don't think there's much wrong with 1, but 2 can be pretty powerful and definitely a game-changer. I wouldn't ban the spells, though. I would give them:

a) A cost to cast (not too high, just enough to make it not something you might prep every single day)
b) Perhaps bump up their spell levels a bit to delay access, and (most importantly)...
c) Institute a "lag time" on both ends of the travel.
On the leaving side, boost the cast times up to a few rounds to make it completely worthless to use to escape from combat. On the arriving side, have the act of materializing in the new location take a few rounds (about 2, I guess), during which anyone in the vicinity can see and attack the teleporters while they are incapable of acting, fighting back, and such.

Combined with the uncertainties of teleporting blindly into a place you've never been, the last change largely neuters the whole "teleport in all buffed up, kill everyone, teleport out" thing completely. And again, I re-iterate, these changes would only be for "type 2" teleportation. Applying these, especially the lag time concept, to tactical teleportation would make those spells utterly useless.

I REALLY like these ideas. Especially the lag time. Thanks a lot.


Zeromage wrote:
How do you GMs deal with teleporting? I find it incredibly frustrating and overpowered. Do you think it's unfair to just ban all teleporting spells?

Ban Teleport and make Greater Teleport the new Teleport - by the time your full casters qualify for that, you'll have bigger problems on your hands.


90% of the problems with Teleport get solved by changing the casting time to 1 hour (like scrying). No more "oh i forgot my key at home. Here, i'm back"

Shadow Lodge

Zeromage wrote:
Kayerloth wrote:
Zeromage wrote:
How do you GMs deal with teleporting? I find it incredibly frustrating and overpowered. Do you think it's unfair to just ban all teleporting spells?
What is it about Teleport that is frustrating you and making it feel overpowered? Is the party bypassing planned encounters that would otherwise occur along the way to the 'dungeon'? Are they bypassing lots of travel and 'dungeon' encounters with scry and fry tactics to go directly to the BBEG/end encounter? Other?
Mostly because I don't want them to feel that they can escape any encounter that starts going badly with so much ease. It takes a lot of the tension away in my opinion. I also don't like playing in other planes and generally like lower level, rpgs in general.

Why is it that you don't want them to be able to get away from a bad situation? That seems like a good tactic to me. There's still tension there if they are realizing they are in over their heads. Also, depending on the encounter, you could use their escaping (and not killing the bad guys) to your advantage and set up some sort of ambush or retaliation.

Higher level play takes some getting used to. There are going to be things the players can just simply avoid but the bad guys also have the same tricks up their sleeve. The balance comes with knowing how to run the bad guys effectively.


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In my experience, by the time a high level encounter starts going badly someone is already dead.


Yeah, I don't see the issue with PCs using Teleport to escape when they're in trouble. That mad scramble to get everyone gathered around the mage so they can get the heck out of dodge has plenty of tension in itself.

One of my most memorable DM moments was when my 12th level party in 3.5 foolishly decided to rest in the volcano lair of a red dragon after several fights with his fire giant minions had worn them down. The find a chamber with only one entrance and a pool of lava at the back, set a watch on the entrance and bed down for the night.

I can't remember which of the PCs was on watch, but they blew their Spot and Listen checks to notice the dragon's head rising out of the lava pool (having swam there from deeper in the volcano). The dragon promptly breathed on the sleeping party and they woke up on fire (those of them who weren't disabled/killed outright.) The ensuing scramble to get the bodies together so the cleric could Plane Shift them out (the sorcerer was among the dead. Low HPs and a huge penalty to Reflex save for being unconscious is a bad combination when a dragon breathes on you) made for an intense scene. And my players still talk about it to this day (usually while cursing my name.)

Liberty's Edge

There is an excellent chapter on this very topic by Wolfgang Baur himself in the new Kobold Guide to Magic from Kobold Press


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My method to reduce the potency of teleport without removing it entirely was to institute the following rule:

1) Divination magic and teleportation magic are blocked by 5 ft of earth, 1 ft of stone, 1 inch of metal, or a thin layer of lead.

And FYI, cracks don't count, it needs to be something you could regularly fit through.

It basically makes teleporting into a building impossible (which is what I wanted). It makes castles and other building designed to be defensive and protect the inhabitants useful, but doesn't totally negate the ability to teleport.

Scarab Sages

In 3.5 there was a rule that said that if you mix Gorgon's blood in the mortar it prevents teleportation.

I don't have a problem with the idea that elites build teleport-proof castles, but I think a global block on teleporting into buildings is over-doing it.

Stop nerfing the players, and step up your game!

Now that said, I have nothing against banning a spell from a splatbook (Paragon Surge comes to mind).


I like StreamoftheSky's ideas, too. One idea I've read before that I thought sounded cool is more of a setting thing. Make it so teleporting is really dangerous, unless you're teleporting between pre-established waypoints or nodes. If you wanna try it random location A to random location B, there's a significant chance that it goes really badly. (Flavor to taste, I suppose. Ripped apart, never show up at other end, show up on another planet instead, etc.) But going from waypoint A at the wizard's college to waypoint B in the king's castle on the other side of the continent, not such a big deal. That way it can still be a part of the story, but not something that can be abused much without you seeing it coming.

Scarab Sages

Another idea is that if you scribe your wizard mark on the ground (or your God's symbol etc.) this greatly reduces your chances of teleporting off-target when you use it as a location to teleport to.

A kind of landing pad as it were.


Zeromage wrote:


Mostly because I don't want them to feel that they can escape any encounter that starts going badly with so much ease. It takes a lot of the tension away in my opinion. I also don't like playing in other planes and generally like lower level, rpgs in general.

Would this change just apply to PCs or every other BBEG who tends to use teleport/dim door when it starts getting tough?

Honestly it seems that the problem might be lack of experience dealing with it in game rather than "OMG so OP!". Treat it as a learning curve rather than trying to hide from it. Apply the RAW of the spell rigorously and look for ways that it may be abused unintentionally. Dimensional Anchor is your friend.


PSusac wrote:

In 3.5 there was a rule that said that if you mix Gorgon's blood in the mortar it prevents teleportation.

I don't have a problem with the idea that elites build teleport-proof castles, but I think a global block on teleporting into buildings is over-doing it.

Stop nerfing the players, and step up your game!

Now that said, I have nothing against banning a spell from a splatbook (Paragon Surge comes to mind).

Excuse me if I take your response poorly. You don't have to like my idea, but don't tell me I'm "nerfing" my players as if I'm treating them unfairly. They aren't unabel to teleport into any building. If it has open windows or doors they can make their way in. But buildings that are intended to be secure location will be secure locations. My statement about it being "basically impossible" is in regards to the fact that any building the players are likely to want to be able to teleport into the heart of is going to be impossible. You want to teleport into a random commoners house or the middle or town hall? No problem. You want to teleport into the BBEG liar? Not happening.

There is no "scry and die" in my world and thats what this rule is intended to prevent.


Moglun wrote:
In my experience, by the time a high level encounter starts going badly someone is already dead.

This x100....

Our group 'regulary' plays into the teen levels and this is a common theme. Higher level games just need to be assessed differently with all of the options avauilable.

"It's all fun and games until someone casts finger of death"

Thebad guys are pretty screwed without teleport and such. How does the nemesis escape to contiue to be a nemesis without escapability.

Not a dig on anyone but most people who struggle with teleport as a gm just contiue to run higher level games the same way they run lower level games and that is just a bad fit.

Still, in my game I have made teleport and greater t-port more of a "strategic" ability rather than a "tactical". I alllow either spell to work like a "Word of recall" back to the casters "base" but teleporting to other locations requires a visit there or some other intimate knowledge of the location.

If you every read the "Magician:Apprentice" series by Feist think of the "teleport gates" the mages used to move between known locations.


It's not easy advice to follow, but the best advice I can give you is to throw away the old adventure paradigm.

Rather than building an adventure in advance and running the players through it, learn to build your adventure during play. To let the characters go whichever way they see fit, and create the story through their own actions.

(I can't say how easy or difficult it is to integrate this style into published adventures, as I've never tried to do so.)


Cardinal Chunder wrote:
Zeromage wrote:


Mostly because I don't want them to feel that they can escape any encounter that starts going badly with so much ease. It takes a lot of the tension away in my opinion. I also don't like playing in other planes and generally like lower level, rpgs in general.

Would this change just apply to PCs or every other BBEG who tends to use teleport/dim door when it starts getting tough?

Honestly it seems that the problem might be lack of experience dealing with it in game rather than "OMG so OP!". Treat it as a learning curve rather than trying to hide from it. Apply the RAW of the spell rigorously and look for ways that it may be abused unintentionally. Dimensional Anchor is your friend.

Well, I've been playing RPG's since the early 80s, so I hate to think it's a lack of experience. I know there are ways to stop teleporting within the existing rules, but I don't like having to use them all the time as I think it cuts down on the believability somewhat. I don't buy the step up your game argument either. Yeah, I can block them from teleporting by having them face wizards who block teleportation beforehand all the time, and keep coming up with more and more outlandish "blocks" to prevent them from using the power, but I'd rather not convolute my story either.

I realize this isn't a problem for everyone, but generally I like lower level campaigns with more "realism" (I know I'm going to get endlessly hammered for using that word). I like my PCs to be afraid of entering a dungeon like I would be in real life. But if the option to simply teleport away is there it lowers tension in my view. I know there's plenty of people who disagree, and that's fine, every rpg is as different as the people playing it.

I know there are people who like adventures where you're storming hell and beating archfiends on a regular basis, but I'm not one of them.

That said, I really like StreamoftheSky's ideas and I also really like the mortar idea too. Definitely some things for me to keep in mind.

Sovereign Court RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32

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Part of the shift to higher level play is learning to adjust to increasing party magical capabilities. Teleport is just a symptom of a wider issue.

If you truly prefer lower level games, you might want to look at something like E6 or E8. These variants keep you from getting to higher level effects.

Personally I think high level play is fun to play and GM, but you really have to embrace the craziness to do it. My high level adventures don't nerf teleport and the like - they require it. People who can't teleport can't even get to the adventure.

Shadow Lodge

If you haven't already, you shuold make sure your group knows how you intend to run your game before making drastic changes to the way spells work. I know if I was midway through an adventure and my GM started changing how spells worked without saying they would do such earlier I would be pretty ticked off.

You obviously have a very specific style of game that you prefer to run and that's fine. Just make sure the players are for it or at least understand why these changes are being made.


anthonydido wrote:

If you haven't already, you shuold make sure your group knows how you intend to run your game before making drastic changes to the way spells work. I know if I was midway through an adventure and my GM started changing how spells worked without saying they would do such earlier I would be pretty ticked off.

You obviously have a very specific style of game that you prefer to run and that's fine. Just make sure the players are for it or at least understand why these changes are being made.

Yeah, I definitely am going to warn them beforehand, as I also think it would be unfair to drop that in the middle of a 2 year long campaign.

Sovereign Court RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32

A mid range compromise might be just to say that scrying an area doesn't count as viewing it, that said view must be direct. That will restrict the party from teleporting to places they haven't already been. Seeing a picture of the Eiffel Tower is different than seeing the tower in person. That cuts the heart out of scry-and-fry.

It's tougher than you think to suddenly bunch up for an escape teleport in a tense combat situation, especially if you're losing or people are down. Plus, teleport restricts how many allies you cna bring along. A party with familiars, animal companions, or cohorts has trouble juggling all of them. There are ways, but they are even harder to do in combat.


Zeromage wrote:
anthonydido wrote:

If you haven't already, you shuold make sure your group knows how you intend to run your game before making drastic changes to the way spells work. I know if I was midway through an adventure and my GM started changing how spells worked without saying they would do such earlier I would be pretty ticked off.

You obviously have a very specific style of game that you prefer to run and that's fine. Just make sure the players are for it or at least understand why these changes are being made.

Yeah, I definitely am going to warn them beforehand, as I also think it would be unfair to drop that in the middle of a 2 year long campaign.

I just wonder if you are aware just how many 'solution in a spell' spells there are as you get to mid/high levels? Its not just teleport. The game essentially becomes a different game at a certain level. Contact other plane, dominate person, Passwall, overland flight, Legends lore, true seeing, geas, contingency, scrying, wish, miracle, discern location, locate person, locate object, prying eyes, and many other spells, have similar 'fix the problem with a spell' effects.

It honestly sounds to me like you'd be happier running an E6 or E8 game(where leveling stops at 6th or 8th level). Which is ok but you need to understand that trying to just pull out the spells and abilities that cause such issues from higher level play is like trying to stop a leaky dam with your thumb, there will be other leaks, and you'll run out of thumbs, or you will spend alot of time and effort plugging leaks, leaving people wondering why you have a dam made of mostly thumbs in the first place.


Bard's escape is useful for gathering people around the mage for escape.

Sczarni

I'd give advice... but I'm pretty positive everyone here has absolutely hit nearly or every point.

Nicely done people :)

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Zeromage wrote:
How do you GMs deal with teleporting? I find it incredibly frustrating and overpowered. Do you think it's unfair to just ban all teleporting spells?

Playing the spell strictly will help. Especially if you remember to make them roll those percentiles.

Banning the spells is also a legitimate approach. This isn't a question that has a single "right" answer.


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The entire point of most encounters is to deplete resources from the PCs. A typical scry and die routine is going to use up a large chunk of resources. First there is the scouting spell, depending on what you have ready this could be several spells. Like a commune to know the location of X, followed by a more specific scry effect once you know the location. Then you have the pre encounter buffing, most likely 2+ spells per available caster (not including spells that are effectively all day spells). Then you have the teleport, which could be several spells, first a teleport to get you to the general area, followed by a ethereal jaunt/dimensional door/passwall effect to get you to the encounter zone. Then the real spell slinging happens as you bushwhack the enemy, or the find out the enemy was prepared after all and ambushes you. You need to have spells remaining as an exit strategy in any case, spells that you can't use unless its a dustoff maneuver.

If you are keeping track a high level party can't do this very many times a day. Sure, they can do the 15 minute adventuring day, but that is effectively true at any level (and thus its the GMs job to give a narrative reason why you would have more than one fight a day).

Sure, a high level party executing their strategy well will end encounters fast and not take any damage ect. This is also true at any level. PCs getting hurt is not the only measure of a good encounter. As long as there is either a chance of failure or the PCs use up some sort of resource (which can be anything: time, hp, spells, consumables, reputation, ect), its perfectly valid encounter.

Grand Lodge

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Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Kolokotroni wrote:
Zeromage wrote:
anthonydido wrote:

If you haven't already, you shuold make sure your group knows how you intend to run your game before making drastic changes to the way spells work. I know if I was midway through an adventure and my GM started changing how spells worked without saying they would do such earlier I would be pretty ticked off.

You obviously have a very specific style of game that you prefer to run and that's fine. Just make sure the players are for it or at least understand why these changes are being made.

Yeah, I definitely am going to warn them beforehand, as I also think it would be unfair to drop that in the middle of a 2 year long campaign.

I just wonder if you are aware just how many 'solution in a spell' spells there are as you get to mid/high levels? Its not just teleport. The game essentially becomes a different game at a certain level. Contact other plane, dominate person, Passwall, overland flight, Legends lore, true seeing, geas, contingency, scrying, wish, miracle, discern location, locate person, locate object, prying eyes, and many other spells, have similar 'fix the problem with a spell' effects.

It honestly sounds to me like you'd be happier running an E6 or E8 game(where leveling stops at 6th or 8th level). Which is ok but you need to understand that trying to just pull out the spells and abilities that cause such issues from higher level play is like trying to stop a leaky dam with your thumb, there will be other leaks, and you'll run out of thumbs, or you will spend alot of time and effort plugging leaks, leaving people wondering why you have a dam made of mostly thumbs in the first place.

This IS the important thing to remember. High level D20 is, has been, will always be a different game than the low to mid levels. It requires more of the players and the GM. That said there are plenty of mundane means to deal with "scry and die" tactics if that's what your main concerns are. It might help if the OP were a bit more specific about his issues.

Sovereign Court

PSusac wrote:
Stop nerfing the players, and step up your game!

I disagree with this. Banning certain types of magic, such as long-range teleportation or resurrection, makes a different game, but not necessarily a worse one. I think that if the story and overall experience is better served by a blanket ban (hopefully supported by the story) rather than the GM trying to bend over backwards and reconfigure entire encounters and storylines to fit those spells, he'd be perfectly within his rights to ban them. The casters will still have plenty of other gamechanging high-level magics to play with. It's one thing if the story is written to support teleportation at higher levels, but saying that ALL high-level games MUST allow teleportation is going too far.

That's the beautiful part about pen and paper RPGs - the listed rules and abilities are guidelines, not ultimatums. The GM can change things as he or she sees fit to improve the game. Saying that any GM who doesn't want to play a particular type of game is inferior really rubs me the wrong way.

Of course, there will always just be lazy GMs out there who just arbitrarily ban things because it annoys them, but you shouldn't clump all of those who choose to not play with certain elements in that crowd.


Just as an example, if teleportation makes campaigns like Skull and Shackles less interesting. Why? Because who needs a boat when you can magically arrive whereever you want, and can scry to find whatever you want. Who needs a pirate ship? Teleport into the hold at night, take their loot and teleport out.

Sometimes players have to just go along with the story line to make it work. If they don't, they can easily derail a pre-written campaign. Heck, in the Skull and Shackles campaign I'm in

Spoiler:
my character would have likely turned over the oil barrels and lit them on fire in the cargo hold of the ship after being pressganged. He was a undine with the aquatic racial trait so he had a swim speed and could breathe underwater. He was going to jump overboard the on-fire ship. I didn't however, because it would have completely destroyed the campaign in about 5 minutes.

You need cooperative players to go along with a story sometimes, even if it is out of character.


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Part of this is a difference of campaign styles. It's the same reason I'm not terribly big on 'adventure path' style prebuilt campaigns. Because I know if I were in the same position as Claxon, you can be damned sure I wouldn't let 'not breaking the campaign' knock me out of character. I'd do what the character would do and deal with the consequences later.


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Moglun wrote:
In my experience, by the time a high level encounter starts going badly someone is already dead.

Meh, just bring them back to life when the combat's over.

Sovereign Court

Claxon wrote:

Just as an example, if teleportation makes campaigns like Skull and Shackles less interesting. Why? Because who needs a boat when you can magically arrive whereever you want, and can scry to find whatever you want. Who needs a pirate ship? Teleport into the hold at night, take their loot and teleport out.

Sometimes players have to just go along with the story line to make it work. If they don't, they can easily derail a pre-written campaign. Heck, in the Skull and Shackles campaign I'm in ** spoiler omitted **

You need cooperative players to go along with a story sometimes, even if it is out of character.

See, this is what I'm talking about. But rather than just asking the characters nicely not to use Teleport, even if they're playing megalomaniac wizards, I would rather just say that for some campaign-relevant reason teleporting doesn't work. I wouldn't want to force my PCs to feel like idiots because they chose to make a journey across the sea in their badass pirate ship instead of simply teleporting; the whole thing is supposed to be about badass ocean journeys!

On the other hand, I could also certainly see the logic in saying that the PCs can only teleport to places they've already been. Like I said, though, spells should support the campaign, not the other way around.

Sovereign Court

I think it's legitimate to alter teleportation in your campaign, so that it's still a workable escape method and/or overland travel method, while reducing scry-'n-fry situations. Of course, these things should be told to the players in advance, to avoid ruined expectations.

For example:
- State that it's possible, using low-cost/available methods, to block incoming teleportation. Maybe this is a matter of using the proper sacred geometry in designing your buildings. Or just lower the level on stationary teleport-blocking to level 3-4. In any town, major buildings (the church, the castle) will be a safe shelter. A prime motivation may actually be to protect against evil outsiders that otherwise teleport at-will. You can also claim that some cities are constructed this way, to protect the whole population. Teleportation happens outside the gates.

- Or insist that to teleport somewhere, you need to have physically witnessed it or planted a homing beacon. Infiltrating with teleport is still possible but requires some intrigue beforehand.

- Put a 12-mile limit on the range of long-distance spells. (About one hex in many hex-based systems.) I like this one because I don't want a "globalization" effect in my campaign. It also applies to things like Sending; I want to keep local things local.

- Use FUD - fear, uncertainty and doubt. Spread rumors that some BBEGs use spells to divert incoming teleportation to the Maximum Fun Chamber. PCs will worry if they dare teleport in. If you make them nervous enough, you only have to actually make good on this threat once or twice; the rest of the time the players will be seriously comparing the benefits of teleportation against the "safety" of more traditional infiltration. However, escape teleport and overland teleport remain mostly intact.

- Downsides to teleportation; insist that it's fairly easy to follow the "trail" someone used; both ways. If you teleport in, they can use that to find the place you teleported from, expoding your base of operations. And if you use teleport to flee, they can send teleporting demons after you.

===

It may be worth to watch Star Trek again, and take notes on the many plots that focus on bypassing ship shields so you can beam up/down.

Suddenly having every BBEG use teleport-blocking doesn't seem so weird anymore.


beej67 wrote:
Moglun wrote:
In my experience, by the time a high level encounter starts going badly someone is already dead.
Meh, just bring them back to life when the combat's over.

Exactly. By the time you have high level encounters death isn't really a big deal.


Just ban all non-LoS teleportation. It's a setting killer quite apart from its influence on adventure design.


Zeromage wrote:
How do you GMs deal with teleporting? I find it incredibly frustrating and overpowered. Do you think it's unfair to just ban all teleporting spells?

ALL teleport spells, yes.

Any teleport spell with a range measured in miles or greater units, no.

Scarab Sages

As a member of the "don't nerf teleport" camp, I want to point out a couple of things:

1) The whole idea of "why don't you just teleport into the hold of a ship? question is simple: The ship is moving around. At the very least it's moving up and down as it bobs in the water. So if you are teleporting from land onto a ship, there should be a random die roll to determine if the ship is going up (and you accidently end up in the bilge) or the ship is going down (and you end up on the deck). In both cases, you teleport into the wood of the ship and take some damage from the effect. If you are teleporting from a ship TO a ship it's even worse, because both you and the ship have relative momentum.

This is a GREAT example of a use of some GM adjudication to increase the risk of this tactic.

2) Bad guys can "scry and die" the party too. In my own campaign, I plan to let the party have fun with "scry and die" tactics for a couple of levels and then start having bad guys poof in around them and see how they like it.

Look, it's clearly a matter of GM preference for this issue, so if you want to "rule zero" the thing that's up to you. But consider using the least intervention first. Increasing the casting time of the teleport to 1 minute seems pretty reasonable to me. This will end the "bug-out" ability the spell gives you.


Zeromage said wrote:
Well, I've been playing RPG's since the early 80s, so I hate to think it's a lack of experience. I know there are ways to stop teleporting within the existing rules, but I don't like having to use them all the time as I think it cuts down on the believability somewhat. I don't buy the step up your game argument either. Yeah, I can block them from teleporting by having them face wizards who block teleportation beforehand all the time, and keep coming up with more and more outlandish "blocks" to prevent them from using the power, but I'd rather not convolute my story either.

I'm with you, I started playing in 1st edition back in the 80's, as well. 3.5 and Pathfinder are a completely different animal compared to first edition. I been back playing for a number of years now (3.5 and Pathfinder) and I never had an opportunity to play a wizard or other spell casters. I'm now playing a wizard from first level and I am discovering a lot about the class that I didn't know (as was my purpose). I just say that because it is helping me as a player and a GM.

So, maybe these thoughts/suggestions will help:

Their teleportation has story-line consequences - The King looses hope in his heros when he sees them teleport out of a tuff situation and signs a treaty with the evil empire.

Their teleportation has tactical consequences - The party teleports back to the wizard's tower grab some wands and to have time to heal. The bad guys do the same thing in the dungeon and double the guards.

Their teleportation has dangerous consequences - I believe there are some creatures that can attack while you're in mid-teleport, or even have some areas certain types of creature latch on to the teleporting character.

Other questions you may want to ask yourself:
Do they teleport, when they're scared of the encounter / want to regroup and how are they doing it (spell/magic item)?
This is a long campaign, how is their wealth by level? Do they have to much treasure?
How hard or easy is it to get magic items? (I don't allow my players to have a magic item that is worth more than half of their wealth-by-level)


PSusac wrote:
1) The whole idea of "why don't you just teleport into the hold of a ship? question is simple: The ship is moving around.

Yeah, so are the continents, just at a slightly slower speed. But you don't prevent people from teleporting home, do you?


I've read through a lot of these posts, but not all. Here's what I think:

There is nothing wrong with banning teleport, though I probably wouldn't ban teleport like spells like DDoor. My last steampunk game I even banned fly because what's the point of an airship if you have overland flight, and raise dead because raising dead in a steampunk setting is meh to me. It was a low magic game though (no spells higher than 5th level - a few, still got spell slots you could metamagic though). It worked out great. BUT, I knew what I was doing ahead of time and clearly spelled this out in the rules before I had even recruited a single player, dropping it on them after the fact is a little different.

I don't do that every game though, but I can see the value in it.

Look, regardless of what everyone else says, if the spell is ruining your enjoyment, it will start to ruin the game for everyone at your table. Just ban it! Seriously, your the one who works several hours each week prepping, and if game time turns into that much of a frustrating situation its just not going to be worth it to you.


PSusac wrote:

As a member of the "don't nerf teleport" camp, I want to point out a couple of things:

1) The whole idea of "why don't you just teleport into the hold of a ship? question is simple: The ship is moving around. At the very least it's moving up and down as it bobs in the water. So if you are teleporting from land onto a ship, there should be a random die roll to determine if the ship is going up (and you accidently end up in the bilge) or the ship is going down (and you end up on the deck). In both cases, you teleport into the wood of the ship and take some damage from the effect. If you are teleporting from a ship TO a ship it's even worse, because both you and the ship have relative momentum.

This is a GREAT example of a use of some GM adjudication to increase the risk of this tactic.

2) Bad guys can "scry and die" the party too. In my own campaign, I plan to let the party have fun with "scry and die" tactics for a couple of levels and then start having bad guys poof in around them and see how they like it.

Look, it's clearly a matter of GM preference for this issue, so if you want to "rule zero" the thing that's up to you. But consider using the least intervention first. Increasing the casting time of the teleport to 1 minute seems pretty reasonable to me. This will end the "bug-out" ability the spell gives you.

Skull and Shackles actually gives rules for exactly how teleporting to a ship works.

Skull and Shackles Players Guide wrote:

Dimension Door, Greater Teleport, Teleport, Teleportation

Circle: Because ships are constantly in motion, the caster
of spells of the teleportation subschool must have line of
sight to teleport onto a ship. Otherwise, a caster must scry
upon a particular ship first, then immediately teleport
to the scryed destination. Any delay in casting means the
ship has moved from its scryed location and the spell fails.

So scry and fry is still exactly the same as always. And using scry and die on the party is just being a jerk GM, IMO. Used approrpriately it should kill the PCs. It would make for a very s&~+ty campaign. Ruling to nerf teleport and scry helps with justifying why the BBEG doesn't just send a pack of horned devils after you at level 7.


Skull and Shackles' rules make the whole world internally inconsistent. Like I said, the freaking continents themselves "are constantly in motion," tectonically 'drifting' about the surface of the planet. And the planet itself is constantly both rotating 1/day and revolving around the sun, which is in turn... Yeah. If motion defeats non-immediate teleportation, then non-immediate teleportation can't be a thing, ships or no ships.


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Kirth Gersen wrote:
Skull and Shackles' rules make the whole world internally inconsistent. Like I said, the freaking continents themselves are constantly moving about the surface of the planet. And the planet itself is constantly both rotating 1/day and revolving around the sun, which is in turn... Yeah. If motion defeats non-immediate teleportation, then non-immediate teleportation can't be a thing, ships or no ships.

I think the difference is the movement of continents is about half an inch a year. The movement is so tiny, that except over incredibly long periods of time it seems unlikely to make a difference.

As to the whole planet moving through space...well lets tlak about frame of reference. If you use the local planet (Golarion) as the frame of reference then it's movement around the sun and through space is irrelevant, and that seems the most plausible way to do it in my opinion.

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