| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
No, seriously, can someone show me how this spell has any practical use at all? I’ve never seen a DM give anything other than a “Weal and Woe” answer, and when I’ve been the DM I cannot for the life of me understand how I am supposed to answer it. And to top it all off it is a second level spell! A SECOND LEVEL SPELL!
What am I missing?
RPG Superstar 2012 Top 32
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Augury is simply one of the myriad game elements that completely falls apart when the GM decides ahead of time which things the PCs will and will not know. See also: Perception, Sense Motive, divination, and Knowledge skills.
You can tell your GM is telling his own story and you're just the audience when:
• Perception DCs on traps are 1 higher than the searcher's T20 result
• The only creatures who lie about anything important are things like succubi or other demons with unbeatable bluff skills
• Augury and similar spells never give helpful information
• Knowledge skills get a per-round limit or an action cost, or are only allowed to ID things that you've personally seen previously in this same campaign
• Anything that would change the type of "feel" a given scene has or makes things play out differently than the GM expected (like bypassing an obstacle, not getting caught, pre-buffing with effects that actually matter, or using a tactic that makes a fight easier than anticipated) is labeled "game-breaking", "unbalancing", or other derogatory terms.
Augury is simply one of the myriad game elements that completely falls apart when the GM decides ahead of time which things the PCs will and will not know. See also: Perception, Sense Motive, divination, and Knowledge skills.
You can tell your GM is telling his own story and you're just the audience when:
• Perception DCs on traps are 1 higher than the searcher's T20 result
• The only creatures who lie about anything important are things like succubi or other demons with unbeatable bluff skills
• Augury and similar spells never give helpful information
• Knowledge skills get a per-round limit or an action cost, or are only allowed to ID things that you've personally seen previously in this same campaign
• Anything that would change the type of "feel" a given scene has or makes things play out differently than the GM expected (like bypassing an obstacle, not getting caught, pre-buffing with effects that actually matter, or using a tactic that makes a fight easier than anticipated) is labeled "game-breaking", "unbalancing", or other derogatory terms.
While some of those are very bad, and others a little bad, I don't think they particularly have anything to do with a 'GM telling his own story.' That is an entirely different phenomenon from what you are describing, and can be done with complete adherence to the rules (and in my experience is more often done that way). GMs certainly dont' need to cheat to railroad a party.
Augury though is particularly tough for me as a GM. PCs what to augury whether they should enter a dungeon or open a door or whatever, the answer is almost always 'Weal and Woe' because the nature of the game is you face a challenge (Woe) and then get a reward (Weal). Add in that since I don't actually know the future and can't predict the random elements of the game, it is pretty tough to come up with a good answer. It would actually be a better spell and easier to use if it provided a 'yes'/'no' answer to a question, perhaps with some sort of DC based on the difficulty of gaining that information.
RPG Superstar Season 9 Top 32
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Well, what kinds of questions have produced the common "Weal and Woe" answer from other GMs? The more vague the question, the more vague or irrelevant the answer is.
In the same vein, what kinds of augury questions have you been stumped by? As it says in the spell, direct, straightforward questions have clearer answers (this is in the spell text, but is also generally how human communication works).
So, the question, "Is it good or bad to enter the necromancer's tower?" is pretty broad. There's plenty of treasure to loot and you may end up reducing evil in the world! That's Weal. But also, there are wraiths and vampires in there that could kill you, and worse. That's Woe. But a question like, "Is it good or bad to pull this particular lever that will release a scary-looking creature which we're not sure is friendly or hostile?" definitely has a more direct answer. Is it friendly, and wants to help you defeat the necromancer? That's Weal! Does it want to strip the flesh from your bones? That's Woe. It's all about phrasing the question correctly.
Jiggy: While I'm sorry that you've experienced GMs who are more interested in thwarting your divinations and telling their own story than running an actual game, is there any advice you're trying to give? Maybe: expect table variation, and talk to/don't play with GMs who feel attacked by divination spells?
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I've always thought it was pretty simple. Granted, I've never used it, nor had a player use it.
"Is it a good idea to go down that corridor?"
*Checks notes, sees there's an APL+4 monster down there.*
"Answer: Probably not (Woe)."
"Is it a good idea to open that chest?"
*Checks notes, it's not a mimic, not trapped, and full of treasure*
"Answer: Seems to be, yeah (Weal)."
"Is it a good idea to open this door?"
*Checks notes. Behind it is the final boss of the dungeon, who's likely to kick your asses...but i mean he IS the reason you're here,a nd he has good loot...*
"Maybe. Maybe not. Depends (Weal and Woe)."
I think you have a good point, Mecha, but it really doesn't address the bigger picture. How useful even is a direct answer to the party since they are probably going to do what they want to do, regardless of the answer?
Seems like this should be a first level spell, or even a special kind of cantrip, one that, sure, you can do over and over again, but it takes ten minutes to complete.
Well, if you want to get sufficiently nitpicky about it, everything is "Weal and Woe" because every action has an opportunity cost in the form of forgoing other actions you could have taken with the time you spent on the first.
It really depends on how the DM designs adventures.
In the real world, there will obviously be times when the tunnel on the right leads to a dead end that will suffer a cave-in when you try to turn back. Meanwhile the tunnel on the left leads to a lost tourist with an assload of money.
However, in a video game or other interactive media, empty rooms are boring and it's considered a huge flaw for a designer to leave in something that can punish a player but doesn't reward a player, even if the only reward is a sliver of XP or a mild progression of a side-plot.
Treasure is almost never left unguarded, and the thirty minute window means the spell can't really offer any judgment on things like safe resting places or hidden escape routes, because it seems a bit odd for a completely empty room or tunnel to offer a result one way or the other.
-----
Bottom line, augury can actually be a bit more difficult to use than divination, because the DM can always come up with some kind of random nonsense when you cast the latter and weave their thought spasm into the plot between sessions or during the pizza and sodas break.
It's much harder to BS your way out of incorrectly answering a true/false question, and since most rooms aren't completely empty, they usually can't say "nothing." So they think it's better to hedge their bets with weal and woe.
Also, if the DM gives a "weal" answer, and something bad happens, the players will be understandably pissed off, even if you use the 30 minute clause to get out of it.
Suppose the next room has a treasure chest in it, but there's an underground river running through the middle of the room. If the arcane caster bearing a heavy load and Str 7 decides to Swim and fails their checks and drowns, the players will be super pissed off. So you either have to go with "weal and woe" to account for the possibility of poor decision making and look really stupid when nothing bad happens, or look like a complete ass for saying "weal" and having a player drown, or fail a Climb check and burn a spell slot to get back to normal.
Augury though is particularly tough for me as a GM. PCs what to augury whether they should enter a dungeon or open a door or whatever, the answer is almost always 'Weal and Woe' because the nature of the game is you face a challenge (Woe) and then get a reward (Weal). Add in that since I don't actually know the future and can't predict the random elements of the game, it is pretty tough to come up with a good answer. It would actually be a better spell and easier to use if it provided a 'yes'/'no' answer to a question, perhaps...
This. There is virtually never an instance in an adventure where going one way leads to bunnies and rainbows while the other leads to horrible, inescapable death. It would be much more useful to be able to ask a question like "Is the MacGuffin/kidnapped princess/BBEG down this corridor?" and get a yes or no answer than "Will good things or bad things happen to us if we go down this corridor?" If you're after the MacGuffin/princess/BBEG, then it's Weal to go down the corridor that leads to it ... but not if half the party dies or is captured before they get there, and as DM, I don't know if they'll win or lose an encounter before the dice start to roll.
Am I one of the only GMs that love augury-like spells?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
However, in a video game or other interactive media, empty rooms are boring and it's considered a huge flaw for a designer to leave in something that can punish a player but doesn't reward a player, even if the only reward is a sliver of XP or a mild progression of a side-plot.
That's pretty much the answer, isn't it? Augury is a legacy spell from a time when dungeon building was different and encounters weren't "designed."
I used it and similar spells to great effect in Tomb of the Iron Medusa.
Am I one of the only GMs that love augury-like spells?
Care to share how you do it?
|
RPG Superstar Season 9 Top 32
|
I think you have a good point, Mecha, but it really doesn't address the bigger picture. How useful even is a direct answer to the party since they are probably going to do what they want to do, regardless of the answer?
Well, I could be drastically wrong about this, but it seems to me that a PC who does whatever they want to do, heedless of advice, warning, or consequence, is not the type of PC to use a spell slot for augury. :P
Unfortunately, I don't have any first hand experience with the spell, so I don't know how useful other people have found it. It seems to me that: 1) it greatly depends on the question asked, and 2) it greatly depends on whether the GM will turn the question into a philosophical question of "Well, what can be said to be Weal or Woe, anyway?"--and I'm not saying that there is no place for such questions, but again this depends on the initial question--or whether the GM will do their best to work with the PC using the spell to enhance the game.
The other problem with this spell, as others have alluded to, is the randomness of the game. The tradition of actual augury depends on their being some sort of fate that can be read, but dice rolls aren't so easily predicted. Again, it comes down to: is the question specific enough AND usefully answered by the possible results of the spell?
|
|
Well, what kinds of questions have produced the common "Weal and Woe" answer from other GMs? The more vague the question, the more vague or irrelevant the answer is.
In the same vein, what kinds of augury questions have you been stumped by? As it says in the spell, direct, straightforward questions have clearer answers (this is in the spell text, but is also generally how human communication works).
So, the question, "Is it good or bad to enter the necromancer's tower?" is pretty broad. There's plenty of treasure to loot and you may end up reducing evil in the world! That's Weal. But also, there are wraiths and vampires in there that could kill you, and worse. That's Woe. But a question like, "Is it good or bad to pull this particular lever that will release a scary-looking creature which we're not sure is friendly or hostile?" definitely has a more direct answer. Is it friendly, and wants to help you defeat the necromancer? That's Weal! Does it want to strip the flesh from your bones? That's Woe. It's all about phrasing the question correctly.
Jiggy: While I'm sorry that you've experienced GMs who are more interested in thwarting your divinations and telling their own story than running an actual game, is there any advice you're trying to give? Maybe: expect table variation, and talk to/don't play with GMs who feel attacked by divination spells?
100% this. You've got to think with spells like this, but also talk to the group and decide what situations translate to which kinds of answers. It's possible that you can come up with a bit of a lexicon of possibilities.
Event leads to a level-appropriate encounter and advances the plot with XP and treasure = Weal
Event leads to a non-level appropriate encounter that does not advance the plot with XP and treasure = Weal
Event leads to a reward that isn't integral to the plot and can be considered onerously challenging = Weal and Woe
Event literally will lead to nothing except a GM that's pissed off about having to role play yet another street urchin that your group has begun accosting for information = Nothing.
I've always joked in my group that the Augury spell is rather useless. Though instead of Weal and Woe, I say that, given that everything adventurers do is a bad idea, the answer is always 'woe.'
Getting out of bed in the morning, strapping on sword and armour or preparing spell and wand, and charging fourth into certain death... What sane person does such things? Just leaving the inn in the morning is Woe. 'Cause you know that SOMETHING bad is about to happen.
I simply describe visions and images, depending on the d% result, how they interpret those is up to them.
I wont tell right away "yes/no/maybe/nothing".
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
It's useful when you're not in a dungeon. If you know you're somewhere where there's monsters and treasure, you'll always get Weal and Woe. But, if you're in between adventures and you don't know if a certain city official is colluding with your enemy, and you want to break into his study to see if there are any incriminating papers, any Augury is great. Because if you hear a "Weal" it probably means there's something useful to find, and a "Woe" means there's gonna be a fight.
So, don't use it for your GM's pre-planned adventures, use it when you're off the railroad and in the sandbox.
|
@Generic Dungeon Master
When you switch words to mean "Yes", "No" and "Maybe" it makes more sense that way. Some gamers in our group don't know what Weal, Woe and Weal & Woe means and instills confusion if you ask me.
Augury can be used to detect immediate danger in the next room, detect traps, detect possible bad income by pressing that red button, etc. It requires imagination in it's use.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
@Generic Dungeon Master
When you switch words to mean "Yes", "No" and "Maybe" it makes more sense that way. Some gamers in our group don't know what Weal, Woe and Weal & Woe means and instills confusion if you ask me.
Augury can be used to detect immediate danger in the next room, detect traps, detect possible bad income by pressing that red button, etc. It requires imagination in it's use.
Actually that isn't what the words mean at all. Weal is well being/healthy/prosperous, Woe is suffering/trouble/affliction.
Sometimes you can specify, pushing a button is likely either good or bad, but proceeding to an encounter almost always mixed and a spell that almost always just lets you know 'adventuring is dangerous business, but can be profitable' isn't really much of a spell.
Even 1st edition had designed encounters and level appropriate challenges. It did tend to have a lot more this room is a monster, this room is treasure style design though.
|
|
Actually that isn't what the words mean at all. Weal is well being/healthy/prosperous, Woe is suffering/trouble/affliction.
I never mentioned their true meaning. I merely stated it makes more sense and it's easier to interpret with common regular word like "Yes" and "No". Not everyone is native english speaker and most of people in my area would be confused with those words.
I think you have a good point, Mecha, but it really doesn't address the bigger picture. How useful even is a direct answer to the party since they are probably going to do what they want to do, regardless of the answer?
If you know opening a door is going to result in something bad happening, you can take additional precautions.