Altering memories

[Crichael]

I'm working on a character concept that I need a bit of help with working out mechanically. Basically the character writes books about his glorious endeavors and feats. About how he single handedly saves entire villages, defeats menacing horrors, prevents catastrophes from befalling nations. Of course, he doesn't actually do these things by himself, the party he travels with does them, but he wants the world to believe otherwise through his books.

So this is where I need help, altering the minds of the other player's chararters to believe differently what happened on the last few minutes of key events. I've found a few spells that work somewhat like what I'm looking for, such as Memory Lapse and Modify Memory. The only problem with these is that they affect a single target, so it will be difficult to get the entire party believing that I stepped in when they were in grave peril and rescued them, and the townsfolk, from the lich lord just in time to save their souls from eternal damnation and servitude to the undead.

Are there other spells/abilities I have missed that could affect multiple targets? Or are there ways to increase these spells to affect more than a single target? Or perhaps some way to you guys can think of to get this to work, to change the memories of the whole party?

Thanks in advance.

[Khuldar]

Crichael wrote:

I'm working on a character concept that I need a bit of help with working out mechanically. Basically the character writes books about his glorious endeavors and feats. About how he single handedly saves entire villages, defeats menacing horrors, prevents catastrophes from befalling nations. Of course, he doesn't actually do these things by himself, the party he travels with does them, but he wants the world to believe otherwise through his books.

So this is where I need help, altering the minds of the other player's chararters to believe differently what happened on the last few minutes of key events. I've found a few spells that work somewhat like what I'm looking for, such as Memory Lapse and Modify Memory. The only problem with these is that they affect a single target, so it will be difficult to get the entire party believing that I stepped in when they were in grave peril and rescued them, and the townsfolk, from the lich lord just in time to save their souls from eternal damnation and servitude to the undead.

Are there other spells/abilities I have missed that could affect multiple targets? Or are there ways to increase these spells to affect more than a single target? Or perhaps some way to you guys can think of to get this to work, to change the memories of the whole party?

Thanks in advance.

Bluff. Lots of Bluff. Possibly with some illusions and forgery thrown in. Become such a good con-artist that they trust your words over reality. Impossible lies are -20 on the check. But if they want to believe you, are drunk, or you can produce some sort of "proof" you can offset those. And that's just for "impossible" lies; "far-fetched" or simply "unlikely" lies are a lot easier to pull off.

In the heat of combat, did the fighter plunge his sword into the heart of the dragon before or after your magic felled the beast? YOU are sure you know what happened, and with enough bluff, he will remember it the same as you.

[Magicdealer]

Be careful about "altering the minds" of player characters. Players often get grumpy at things like that, and an angry player can create all sorts of problems for you. The mind boggles...

[Tilnar]

Crichael wrote:

I'm working on a character concept that I need a bit of help with working out mechanically. Basically the character writes books about his glorious endeavors and feats. About how he single handedly saves entire villages, defeats menacing horrors, prevents catastrophes from befalling nations. Of course, he doesn't actually do these things by himself, the party he travels with does them, but he wants the world to believe otherwise through his books.

So this is where I need help, altering the minds of the other player's chararters to believe differently what happened on the last few minutes of key events. I've found a few spells that work somewhat like what I'm looking for, such as Memory Lapse and Modify Memory. The only problem with these is that they affect a single target, so it will be difficult to get the entire party believing that I stepped in when they were in grave peril and rescued them, and the townsfolk, from the lich lord just in time to save their souls from eternal damnation and servitude to the undead.

Are there other spells/abilities I have missed that could affect multiple targets? Or are there ways to increase these spells to affect more than a single target? Or perhaps some way to you guys can think of to get this to work, to change the memories of the whole party?

Thanks in advance.

Well, the easy way to handle this, especially at low-levels, is to give the character an ally who's a sailor (or similar) who takes the books and sells them far away -- effectively, pulling a Hasselhoff and becoming popular in Germany while not being super-famous locally. By the time the stories get back here, they'll have traveled so far, the party won't know if the tale was embellished as it traveled or what.

Also, at low level, you could theoretically get by on Hypnotism and convincing the party (while they're fascinated) that the area needs a single strong hero, and thus letting you take the credit.

Beyond that, yeah... the current mechanical way to do that is Modify Memory, which is small enough to fit into a wand -- just do it to the party while they're sleeping and you're on watch.

The other option would be to research a new spell that does what you want. Psychological research shows that if you tell someone a story enough times they'll believe it as truth (and, for that matter, even how you ask questions about someone's memory will change how they remember things -- there's a bunch about this under eyewitness testimony).

As such, I would say that it would be possible to make a spell that affects everyone in the area (or at least one per level) which has an effective casting time of 10 minutes or so -- the time in which you tell your embellished version of the story -- and I'd even make it save: partial -- so even a failed save lets you make minor embellishments.

But that's me.

[Tilnar]

Khuldar wrote:

Bluff. Lots of Bluff. Possibly with some illusions and forgery thrown in. Become such a good con-artist that they trust your words over reality. Impossible lies are -20 on the check. But if they want to believe you, are drunk, or you can produce some sort of "proof" you can offset those. And that's just for "impossible" lies; "far-fetched" or simply "unlikely" lies are a lot easier to pull off.

This too. :) I'm actually a little surprised there's not a bardic (performance) ability that lets you do something more like this.

[Dreaming Psion]

Hmm, well, assuming you wanted to retroactively edit memories, if you could find a way to put all of them to sleep at once, a 9th level sorcerer with the dreamspun bloodline (APG) could use his dreamshaping ability on each one of them seperately at his leisure.

I also second the use of discretion on tinkering with PC memories tho, btw.

[Mysterious Stranger]

Why not get the cooperation of the party instead of tricking them. Play a Bard and be the party face. Always be the one to negotiate any rewards using your social skills and bardic abilities to get a better reward. When you are telling the stories emphasize your roll.

To convince the rest of the player to go along will probably not be that hard unless there is a Paladin in the party. You will also act as a diversion for your party. Anything you encounter will be expecting you to be the main challenge and will concentrate on you. This will give them a chance to take down the enemy before he even realizes you are a fraud.

Once your fame starts to grow it will get even easier. Your party will be able to command top wages because of your fame. Take Acting and Oratory for your performance skills and be a story teller.

[Mirrel the Marvelous]

Gilderoy Lockhart? I like it!

[mozgriken]

"he wants the world to believe otherwise through his books"

Ok the degree to which you want your friends to be complicit in your attempt to unilaterally take credit for their combined achievements pretty much dictates that you should never expect this issue/goal to be anything but a thorn in your & their sides.

There is no game-mechanic way to insure your success in this goal, outside of a near-endless string of time-stopping, lim.wishing, mem.modifying etc; it would be way way way more trouble than any fleeting sense of delusional accomplishment you might have at the table. It goes way beyond influencing the memories of the other party members you adv with --- every witness to a battle, every enemy lackey that snuck away mid-fight, every carrion-feeding animal who talks to druids, is a possible witness to countering your boasts about saving the day time and again.

If you really want to move forward with this idea, I would suggest focusing on the reader side of things, placing enchantments on the actual text/books to charm the reader and suggest you are the only real hero in these tales. The reader can still hear contradictory claims from other sources, but will believe, whether openly or not, that your book is the factual account.

There was a bit of talk about how to modify memory, etc...that is the least of your concerns...all it takes is one thought-reading magic-user to eavesdrop on YOUR own pc's mind, to stumble across his never-ending quest of stealing fame for this & that event. This is a far greater hazard to your undoing than any non-compliant adv companion could ever be.

I would expect this to play out with mixed amounts of indulgence & comedic self-effacement, mostly failing and worsening the characters reputation far more often than working in your favor...especially early on, as such attempts would be so easy to disproof, forensically-verify, witness otherwise, etc as to be basically trying to hit way way above your weight class.

In the end, you might end up with a clever repertoire of charm,suggest, blind, deaf, mod.mem, lim.wish to infinity, or say an artifact-level book or unleashed mass-curse of literature which always makes you the focus and protagonist of any tale, somehow achieving an ultimate success in your deception...Who would want to sit at the table for 18+levels of this is beyond me, but most things can be fun when given the right dynamics.

As a gm, it is easy to make such unilateral aims of a solitary player turn in upon themselves, and skip the "prevention" technique in favor of the "acceleration" method... rather than mince about optimizing spell lists and house rules, just move along to forming plots and stories which in fact do put the emphasis of success or failure squarely on that pc's actions in one pressure-filled moment; provide story arcs which make the pc's claim to fame a source of great hostility for another group of rivals, who single him out for plots of ruination and assassination (while underestimating or even ignoring his adv companions)...Constantly put him in conditions where he must "recreate" past exploits (which he never did in the first place), with scores of onlookers or witnesses to complicate the moment.