On the one hand, this is a pretty iconic ability. On the other, it really seems to cause the game world to break down.
First, lots of outsiders are described as carrying equipment that would put them over the 50 lb limit even without picking up anything else, meaning that their stat blocks don't really make much sense.
Second, and more problematic, the ability to teleport at will makes outsiders almost impossible to attack, as they can't be located without powerful magic, and further powerful magic is required to act on that information quickly enough to catch up with them and prevent their escape. With no real concerns of being subject to a preemptive strike, outsiders can focus all their efforts on reconnaissance and offense. There are really only a few ways to manage threats from teleporting outsiders, and these approaches all have flaws.
Dimensional lock is in many ways even worse, since the failed teleport immediately alerts the outsider that the area is warded and doesn't even have the potential to trap them.
Forbiddance hedges out teleportation and can also physically block outsiders with the threat of 6d6 or 12d6 points of damage upon entry.
However, every single one of these spells is of 8th level or below, and allows spell resistance. A single casting of greater spell immunity provides two and a half hours of protection from these spells. Teleport trap and dimensional lock become useless, and forbiddance only gives a round or so of warning, as the outsider can teleport to the edge of the effect and enter from there.
So, why do outsiders get at-will teleports? Is it because they are only partially on the Material Plane even if called rather than summoned? The existence of a mutable Extraplanar subtype and spells specifically designed to banish creatures with that subtype lends some credence to this interpretation, but if they weren't fully present on the Material Plane, wouldn't dimensional lock hedge them out completely?
Is there some legacy reason from the old days of the boxed sets that would shed light on this?
Because in AD&D, one of the distinctive things demons and devils got was a lot of at-will abilities.
If I were re-writing the Bestiary, I would change it.
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I'm not sure about OD&D, but in 1e RJGrady has it right - demons/devils got tons of spell-like abilities, as well as psionics. Part of what made fighting them so bad was the teleportation combined with unrestricted summoning (summoned creatures in 1e could use their own summon abilities so you could chain up quite a mess).
In BECMI demons were immortal level foes and were quite the different beast - even the weakest was effectively a demigod.
It was way more useful in 2nd edition. In 2E, outsiders got teleport without error, which could actually teleport across planar boundaries. So basically, it explained how outsiders got around and between the infinite outer planes.
Even though teleport at will is a great ability, I've never seen its use create an unbalanced encounter. The majority of the time, demons just use it to teleport away and end the encounter when severely wounded.
Sure they can use the ability to re-position themselves in combat, but that consumes their action for the turn, which is more often than not, better spent doing something offensive.
Of course they can use the teleport ability to create ambushes as well. But as a GM, technically, you can engineer an ambush out of anything. And if you are constantly ambushing the PCs, regardless of whether it is tactically sound for the demons to do so, the PCs are going to get sick of it real quick.
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However, that didn't explain why outsiders weren't just covertly assassinating other people all the time.
A battle between two armies of teleporters would be amazing to see.
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However, that didn't explain why outsiders weren't just covertly assassinating other people all the time.
A battle between two armies of teleporters would be amazing to see.
Either they are too smart, or they aren't smart enough.
With the big dumb bruisers, it is obvious why they don't- they are more likely to just charge in and wreck main street than assassinate someone.
With the more subtle manipulators and assassins- overuse of teleporting can give them away, or at least clue people into the fact that something magical is happening. That gets the wrong sorts interested- expert wizards, inquisitors, and paladins. They might not know that a demon is causing this yet, but they will start snooping around when there are magical assassins running about. And you definitely want to avoid that.
Plus, you have to be careful since who knows what kind of hidden items, spells, or guards might be at the location.
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A battle between two armies of teleporters would be amazing to see.
That's basically what the Blood War from the D&D universe is about.
Interestingly enough, for some reason, Qlippoth do not share the mobility of their demonic cousins; some of them have dimension door abilities (which are limited, not at will), but no teleport. Another example is the Ceustodaemon, which unlike the rest of his Daemonic brethren gets D-Door but not teleport. I wonder why these specific ones are limited in their mobility more so than all the other outsiders?
I might be missing some, but these are the ones that come to mind.
Agree about the teleporting not being useful in combat; eating up your entire turn just to reposition is rarely a combat effective move, especially when you're competing with four other PCs actions to stay alive. Now, giving outsiders the Dimensional Agility chain... that seems like a way more interesting fight.
If they used this ability intelligently, they wouldn't teleport around the battlefield. They'd teleport a mile away, wait 4 hours and 17 minutes, then reappear suddenly. They would stalk you until you were sleepless and out of spells.
If they used this ability intelligently, they wouldn't teleport around the battlefield. They'd teleport a mile away, wait 4 hours and 17 minutes, then reappear suddenly. They would stalk you until you were sleepless and out of spells.
I agree this makes sense. But it falls into the category of killing the party in their sleep in not fun for anybody.
If you want to do it against NPCs and harry an army, that's another story.
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Well I do use these abilities like that...sometime. As a DM, I really get into the persona and tactics of my monsters. If a Monster is dumb as nail..I will play him like that but if they are fighting something like assassin fiends (Babau for example), hit and run tactics are quite possible.
But anyway it's legacy, just like how polymorph any objects and freedom of movement are basically still the same.
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If they used this ability intelligently, they wouldn't teleport around the battlefield. They'd teleport a mile away, wait 4 hours and 17 minutes, then reappear suddenly. They would stalk you until you were sleepless and out of spells.I agree this makes sense. But it falls into the category of killing the party in their sleep in not fun for anybody.
If you want to do it against NPCs and harry an army, that's another story.
A few iterations of that and the demon would meet a fed-up party sitting in readied-action mode with outsider-appropriate slaying arrows, bane weapons, and save-or-die spells. Better to do this once or twice, then take a break for a week and hit them when they finally lower their guard.
Every tactic I've read so far in this thread is legitimate, and I'd expect no less from most evil but cunning outsider. They all have countermeasures, too.
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Oh, there are countermeasures. I just strive to make sure my players understand that a vendetta with a fiend is not a vendetta that can be set aside.
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Because they don't like you.
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I'll comment that a group of demons has to be significantly stronger than the people they're harrassing to be able to pull off "teleport in, attack, teleport out" without taking significant damage.
(True scry-and-fry involves a caster warping in a posse of people who then all take separate actions. The demon pack all has to teleport themselves, though, so they all just warp in and do nothing further except for the rare critters with quickened SLAs)
And if they outclass their victims enough to be able to warp in, attack, and warp out without getting seriously hurt, they don't need to bother with the harassment; they just hunker down and kill.
The teleport at will is definitely nice, but in actual play it's not as great a tactical advantage as one would expect.
Now, the rare demon that just has teleport instead of greater teleport, and thus can botch their teleport - those guys can be comedy gold.
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It's a little annoying, honestly, from the narrative standpoint. Doesn't this mean a demon can warp into the king's bedroom at 3:00 AM, perform a Mortal Kombat fatality on him, and then warp out?
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It's easiest to pretend that the Angels and Devils are in such a high level game of cat-and-also-cat that they can't make moves like that solo. Until the party is higher level so they can handle that stuff, at least.
It also helps to never ask the DM questions, lest his brittle fairy tale explodes.
It's a little annoying, honestly, from the narrative standpoint. Doesn't this mean a demon can warp into the king's bedroom at 3:00 AM, perform a Mortal Kombat fatality on him, and then warp out?
Yeah assuming he knows where to teleport to. From a story/narrative(such as a book) point of view many of the games mechanics would cause a lot of problems, but the rules were made for PC based stories more than anything else, and these types of things are not likely to happen due to the nature of the game.
Why yes, a demon can just warp in and kill the king! In fact, I believe that this is the exact reason that Babau's exist in the first place. However, there are certain risks things that somewhat limit the usefulness of such actions.
1). You are never going to be the first being in the world to think of trying this. Millennia of demons/devil/daemons before you have probably taught lessons to monarchs the world over about outsider-driven assassination.
2). Those few seconds you'll have to spend doing nothing after finishing your teleport give your target the time to run away, as well as give the almost certainly present guards the chance to catch you.
3). Not all monarchs are created equal. One might be an aging fop who couldn't fight his way out of a paper bag, and another might be a paladin. And even in the best case scenario, there will be guards. After all, a king without guards probably deserves to be assassinated in the first place.
4). While you may not be able to get the Red Mantis to off a monarch, there's plenty of other assassination organizations out there. And they're probably far more trustworthy than anything you can summon into the job. After all, Demons and Daemons both will probably be quite happy with the idea of causing as many people to die as possible in addition to their target, including the person who summoned them. Remember: Assassins want you to live so they can get payed. Demons and Daemons just want to see things dead. If you're one of them, then that's just more fun for them!
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Isnt that what Dimensional Anchor is for?
There are plenty of ways to block teleportation, my players defeated a certain module's last boss because they learned their mistakes on previous encounters and prepared a dimensional anchor spell just in case the boss also could teleport like the other demons encountered before.
Its the same issue with monsters with Invisibility, which can be countered by See Invisibility, Glitterdust, etc. They are near impossible to fight without the proper means.
As to why most of them can teleport? Teleportation is a quick step into the Astral Plane. The Astral is the medium through which the souls of the departed travel to the afterlife, so you can say they are more connected to the astral than the material plane, as their realms are closer to the astral.
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Wait, are we assuming the party doesn't bother to keep a watch?
A party that's strong enough to merit demonic harassment should be perfectly capable of defending itself by various means, such keeping watches, rope trick, etc.
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The real reason? In planescape (2nd ed dnd) the devils and demons worked together (the one and only time they ever did) and managed to capture a colossal, extremely powerful angelic creature. Then they corrupted it, and basically kept it bathed in the river Skyx so that it couldn't remember what it was or it's own good nature. Then they managed to tie themselves to it and it was what gave demons/devils their teleport abilities. I'm not kidding, there's a published adventure where you mercy kill it, and if you do, for the rest of the campaign, demons/devils can't teleport.
It's a little annoying, honestly, from the narrative standpoint. Doesn't this mean a demon can warp into the king's bedroom at 3:00 AM, perform a Mortal Kombat fatality on him, and then warp out?
Yes. Unlimited teleport abilities were handed out a little too generously, in my opinion.
As for the 10th level fighter king... Honestly, most kings, even rulers of powerful states, are going to be 2nd through 6th level aristocrats. They might be lucky to have a 10th level paladin bodyguard, but honestly, if you had a 10th level paladin on staff, wouldn't it be tempting to send him on missions to do other stuff?
Step 1: Teleport into sleeping monarch's bedchamber.
Step 2: Polymorph any object to turn monarch into vial of alchemist's fire.
Step 3: Throw vial at orphanage.
Step 4: Dance in the ashes.Step 5: Monarch is Resurrected.
Step 6: Hunt down the outsider.Death is temporary and little more than a window if you're important to the world. Assassination requires trap the soul or similar otherwise all you're doing is spitting in the face of the king.
you don't need to trap the soul, all you need to do is burn the body and bam, no raise dead, no reincarnate, no ressurection short of a true ressurection
The real reason? In planescape (2nd ed dnd) the devils and demons worked together (the one and only time they ever did) and managed to capture a colossal, extremely powerful angelic creature. Then they corrupted it, and basically kept it bathed in the river Skyx so that it couldn't remember what it was or it's own good nature. Then they managed to tie themselves to it and it was what gave demons/devils their teleport abilities. I'm not kidding, there's a published adventure where you mercy kill it, and if you do, for the rest of the campaign, demons/devils can't teleport.
Yes indeed. It's called The Blood War. I have it on my shelf. It's a cool adventure.
Actually, per the ISWG, most rulership folks average to be around level 13. Whether that's NPC levels or heroic are up to the GM/story.
That's ... surprising. That implies there are a bunch of 10th level crown princes and princesses running around.
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how many high level clerics can there be? Kill them. :)
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but the Ashes deny raise dead and reincarnate, meaning you need a minimum of a willing 13th level cleric, how many of those things exist?
how many high level clerics can there be? Kill them. :)If .0001% of the population are high level clerics with a population of billions on the material plane and billions in heaven and the positive energy plane (Which the evil outsider don't DARE go to) eliminating everyone who can cast true res/reg res is nigh impossible. If the target you kill is rich (And popular enough to warrant a raise) they're not going down. You'll just anger them. In pathfinder death is cheap and the powerful are rich.
I was thinking more in terms of 13th level clerics who were willing and able to make a house call.
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Retaliation against the outsider is likely to be irrelevant, as is the outsider's motive. In many cases the demon will have been summoned, bound or otherwise constrained into doing the dirty deed, and the guilty party is a caster who's kept his trail clean and cares little for the disposable assassin.
As for castles and so on, kings and princes do have to go outdoors a bit. RL medieval monarchs were on the road most of the time because that was the only way to see what was going on in the kingdom. Comms in Golarion is rather better, but even so they do have to emerge into daylight periodically.
And it's not just kings. There are dukes, counts, barons, merchants, temples, banks, ships and other vulnerable targets aplenty, most of whom will have no way of dealing with this kind of threat.
There are demons running around loose in Kyonin and numerous devils in Cheliax, but for some unexplained reason they don't TP anywhere else to wreak havoc.
Inasmuch as the narrative solution is generally to brush it under the carpet, and the tactical implications of the current rule are unsatisfying, it would seem sensible to change it.