Last session I had an npc caster counter a pc's fireball with disple magic.
-he beat the init and readied the action of disple magic
- the way the seneiro has been playing out in game the sorcerer with fire elemental bloodlines has been using lots of fireball spells and the npc knows this, he is expecting it, and again readied the action for it.
-the problem/question up for debate-
The npc could not get line of sight on the pc so I gave him a negative on the identification of the spell. He passed the check with more than enough to spare, dispelling the attempt (-10). Meshed with a (+5) because the npc has followed several other battles between the pcs and his thieves guild. The final result was a (-5).
Note the only area the npc can see is the place the fireball will be landing.
Is this still terms to counter the fireball or must you achieve line of sight.
This extends to countering spells from casters that are invisible too. Are there set modifiers? I could not get a concrete answer from the core.
Your thoughts
Thanks
My opinion, if the npc can hear the PC caster, he can identify the spell with Spellcraft. If that succeeds, he should be able to counterspell the fireball, since the spell does not complete until it explodes at the point designated by the caster, which was visible to the NPC. As far as invisible casters, again if the opponent can hear, and the spell has a verbal component (and the caster is not using Silent Spell metamagic), you should be able to counterspell.
+ "You can usually use dispel magic to counterspell another spell being cast without needing to identify the spell being cast."
so no spellcraft check needed. all the NPC needs to know that your pc is casting a spell.
But the NPC had readied the dispel magic to specifically dispel the fireball he was expecting. So Spellcraft so he doesn't waste the Dispel on a casting of some other spell.
And also so (in the case of the invisible caster) they know that a spell is being cast, and not the caster mumbling something in an unknown language.
Cool thanks that is what I thought it would be. There was no argument over the rule it was agreed we'd look it up and play it corrected on going.
I love my easy going group!
Thanks again.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
+ rember rule 0. the Dm is right, if you say the spell was dispelled, it was dispelled. pediod, no debating the dm is right your guiding the story and you wanted to dispell the spell, it was dispelled. the PCs should say aww crap that didnt work... whats next ??
I hate rules lawers, Players who tell the dm " your cheating cause the book says..." just pisses me off.
I hate dictatorial DMs, DMs who tell the players "I can never cheat because the book says rule zero...." just cheeses me off.
It's not about rule zero and can you or can't you it's about fairness. If you rule that the NPC doesn't need line-of-sight that's fine, that is what rule zero is about. Just remember this works both ways, in the future the players will rightly expect to be able to spellcraft a spell that can't see being cast.
As for "it works because I say it works, it's my story," I suggest you gather up all the dice and books and put them in a pile in the corner. Then have your friends sit back and enjoy the story you are going to tell them. You essentially just said the rules don't matter and the dice don't matter. That's fine, dice-less role-playing and interactive storying telling can be a blast. It just not Pathfinder anymore.
Don't get me wrong, there are times when you may need to invoke rule zero, but to use that power over such a relatively minor issue will just alienate the players. When your players trust that you're fair and even-handed and you would only apply GM fiat when absolutely necessary they will be satisfied when you wink and say, "this is a special case."
Just my opinion, your mileage my vary.
my overall point is that a on the fly call is the GMs call. rule 0 on the spot and maybe a disscousion ( wow i cant spell) later.
Totally agree there. The last thing you want to do stop the action to have a rules debate (that's what these forum's are for).
my overall point is that a on the fly call is the GMs call. rule 0 on the spot and maybe a disscousion ( wow i cant spell) later.Totally agree there. The last thing you want to do stop the action to have a rules debate (that's what these forum's are for).
+1
Just to clarify everyone at the table accepted the ruling and as always we look up the rule to be used by everyone correctly afterwards so the game does not come to a hault. This is just to see if my call at the time was correct and if it should continue to be played this way by both pcs and npcs. There was no dm rule nazi-ism :-)
It's perfectly fine to identify a spell just by hearing it. Perception is, after all, the sum total of all of your senses, not just sight, and spells have verbal and somatic components. Obviously, if a spell is silent or somatic only, you would need to see it to identify it.
That said, you need line of effect to the caster in order to counter a spell.
Counterspell: When dispel magic is used in this way, the spell targets a spellcaster and is cast as a counterspell. Unlike a true counterspell, however, dispel magic may not work; you must make a dispel check to counter the other spellcaster's spell.
You are targeting the spellcaster, not the spell, and so you need line of effect. Invisibility does not break line of effect, so long as you know what square they are in, you can target it. However, if the caster is on the other side of a wall, or the dispeler is hiding down an alley or something (as I suspect was the case here) and cannot see the caster's location, then they cannot send a counterspell.
(this remains true for general counterspells as well, using the spell being cast, not just for dispel magic counterspells. Counterspells target the caster, not the spell, so you need line of effect to the caster).
Counterspell: When dispel magic is used in this way, the spell targets a spellcaster and is cast as a counterspell. Unlike a true counterspell, however, dispel magic may not work; you must make a dispel check to counter the other spellcaster's spell.You are targeting the spellcaster, not the spell, and so you need line of effect. ... (this remains true for general counterspells as well, using the spell being cast, not just for dispel magic counterspells. Counterspells target the caster, not the spell, so you need line of effect to the caster).
This notion tickled the back of my head when I read the first several posts, but I was distracted by the idea that counterspelling the un-exploded pip that fireball starts as before it reaches its intended target was not particularly unreasonable. I forgot that by the time the pip (that starts in front of the caster and moves to the designated point to explode (and can detonate early) ) comes into existence, the spell has been completely and 100% cast, and therefore cannot be counterspelled (per the counterspell rules).
That is, the pip is just as much a part of the effects of the spell as the explosion for fire damage is, and by definition a spell that is counterspelled produces none of its effects; contrariwise, a spell that has produced an effect cannot be counterspelled, because the only way for a spell to produce an effect is for the spell to be sucessfully cast.
This is clear from a detailed reading of the counterspell rules; if the issue seems fuzzy, consider the case of Lightning Bolt, which has only one effect, a line of lightning. If the would-be counterspeller is behind a corner and only has line of effect to the actual lightning bolt, clearly the lightning bolt can't be used as a target to counterspell, since if Lightning Bolt were counterspelled, there would be no line of lightning (and hence nothing to counterspell).
Edit: an interesting side question that occurs to me: Instead of Counterspelling the Fireball, could the NPC caster ready an action to just straight up Dispel the pip before it explodes? Or throw up a wall effect to cause the pip to detonate prematurely? Or throw a dagger to accomplish the same end?
To me, while seeming like a reasonable premise on the one hand, the Fireball duration is given as instantaneous ("The spell energy comes and goes the instant the spell is cast, though the consequences might be long-lasting"). However, "To [ready an action], specify the action you will take and the conditions under which you will take it. Then, anytime before your next action, you may take the readied action in response to that condition. The action occurs just before the action that triggers it."
The way I see it, there are two ways to interpret the interaction of a readied action and an instantaneous effect. One is a literal application of the mechanics that arrives at the conclusion that either the readied action occurs before the spell effect (and thus cannot interact with it as it does not yet exist) or after the spell effect (and thus cannot interact with it since it has happened and no longer exists). Thus, a wall effect could be placed, but presumably this would still allow the Fireball caster to ditch the spell to no effect.
The other interpretation takes the mechanics as presented as an abstraction representing a more densely populated continuum, and as such conceives of the possibility of an ordering of events possessing smaller divisions than action-blocks. By virtue of the possibility of divisions of time being possible within actions, one could reason that a readied action should be capable of execution at any point in time during an action rather than being restricted to points in time before (or after) an action. If one then also assumes that the Fireball spell effect is a literal description of the effects of the spell, it should be obvious that the pip must take some measure of time to traverse the distance between the caster and the designated detonation point (otherwise the pip would be unobservable), and that therefore the pip could potentially be exploded prematurely via the interference of a readied action. The latter interpretation makes more sense, and is the interpretation I prefer, but it is not supported by the unvarnished RAW (as explained in the first interpretation, above).
I am kind of a stickler in this area. The PF rules are vague on what constitutes "observing" the spellcast, and have an addendum that normal perception penalties apply. That is just vague enough to cause problems.
I would be inclined to give a penalty to the spellcraft roll, but the spell still can be identified.
I am kind of a stickler in this area. The PF rules are vague on what constitutes "observing" the spellcast, and have an addendum that normal perception penalties apply. That is just vague enough to cause problems.
I would be inclined to give a penalty to the spellcraft roll, but the spell still can be identified.
Oh, sure, identification is just a matter of perception, but it has no bearing on the need for Line of Effect to the caster you want to counterspell.