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The DM digs in and refuses because now the players know about the ambush and will act differently.Wow, I'm glad my group doesn't respond that far out there. We take back misunderstanding actions all the time, and try to not meta-game. That sounds like a stubborn GM and very meta-gamey players.No, it is usually more of a misunderstanding that ruins a well planned DM encounter.
The DM is watching hours of prep work get ruined or lost.
The players are worried about losing months of character development.It ends up generating a lose/lose situation. Someone is going to walk away unhappy and thanks to ambiguously written rules, both sides think they are right.
Any decent GM spending such a ridiculous amount of time on something will plan ahead for if the PCs get lucky and saw it coming in game, and any player who is that bad at meta gaming needs slapped upside the head for ruining it for everyone else. Besides if you are doing anything not specificly stated in the book then you be stating your intent and asking if it will work before completeing the action, to do otherwise is your own fault. Learn from it and move on and most importantly quit being a baby about it.(directed at those that actually do that, not those simply stating it happens)
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The DM digs in and refuses because now the players know about the ambush and will act differently.Wow, I'm glad my group doesn't respond that far out there. We take back misunderstanding actions all the time, and try to not meta-game. That sounds like a stubborn GM and very meta-gamey players.No, it is usually more of a misunderstanding that ruins a well planned DM encounter.
The DM is watching hours of prep work get ruined or lost.
The players are worried about losing months of character development.It ends up generating a lose/lose situation. Someone is going to walk away unhappy and thanks to ambiguously written rules, both sides think they are right.
Oh by the way, if its ambiguous, then the GM is right, period. Says so at the front of the book that the rules are guildlines and that what the GM says goes.
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You can't have everything expressly written in the book, at some point you need to step back and let the GM make calls based on common sense. Therefore why make all these minute details when they are better left alone for the GM to embellish as desired, this isn't rocket science, it does not need to be exacting, if the book does not specify then ask the GM and whatever ruleing he gives is what you follow for that GM. You shouldn't need the book to specify, that's what the GM is for.
Part of being the GM is making the world work ,completly and consistantly.
Having everything written in the book is not something I support either. What I do support is that whatever is written should be as clear as possible especially if the devs had a certain reason to write it.
Knowing the reason/intent behind X is never a bad thing,Just to be clear am not saying a dev should have to step in for every corner case or possible combination of the rules.
Oh by the way, if its ambiguous, then the GM is right, period. Says so at the front of the book that the rules are guildlines and that what the GM says goes.The DM digs in and refuses because now the players know about the ambush and will act differently.Wow, I'm glad my group doesn't respond that far out there. We take back misunderstanding actions all the time, and try to not meta-game. That sounds like a stubborn GM and very meta-gamey players.No, it is usually more of a misunderstanding that ruins a well planned DM encounter.
The DM is watching hours of prep work get ruined or lost.
The players are worried about losing months of character development.It ends up generating a lose/lose situation. Someone is going to walk away unhappy and thanks to ambiguously written rules, both sides think they are right.
That is not what rule 0 means. The intent is to change the rules so they fit his group. It does not mean he is always right if he interprets it correctly. It just means he is in charge, and has the last say, and the players should respect that even if they disagree.
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My 5 cents:
1- Most important : eschew Material is NOT a metamagic feat
(or all sorcerer spells would be a full-round action)
2- Metamagic not rendering the counterspell more difficult has nothing to do with the identification, just that a fireball can counter a maximized fireball.
3- spellcraft to ID a spell has the same penalties then perception (distance, obscurement, ...) so a GM circumstance malus for still/silenced/eschewed is valid. you could apply the "terrible condition : +5 DC
4- the feat "spellsong" allows you to hide a spell inside a performance check (it's your performance check VS sense motive or perception of opponent to hide it into your performance)
that's leading to the supposition that there is not external visual elements (floating runes, energy halo, ...)
otoh, I agree that a feat from another book (ultimate magic) is not proof enough of a rule.
so I'm strongly against a visual effect, but for the counterspell in any cases (albeit a penalysed spellcraft check)
Count out six seconds with me:
Mississippi one,
Mississippi two,
Mississippi three,
Mississippi four,
Mississippi five,
Mississippi six.
And in that amount of time, you can only get one (non-quickened) spell off. Meanwhile a fighter can get several attacks off.
Also worth noting, removing the somatic, verbal, and material components of a spell do not make it take any less time to cast.
So something is happening in that time period. Some sort of gathering energy, or the forming of the visuals of the spell... Something that could be identified (albeit likely at a penalty).
Fireball for instance: Instead of the little bead of fire forming at the caster's fingertip, he or she just stands still and the little bead of fire just forms in front of them. Point is, that little bead is still forming in some identifiable way.
As for the Spellsong feat, I would argue the opposite. If there weren't visual and/or audible cues to a spell, then why does it take a feat to hide the spell in the performance check in the first place? If there weren't cues, you wouldn't need a feat.
Edit - Now if we were to add Quicken Spell into the mix, then I might agree that it would be near impossible to identify a spell in order to counter it. Not for any RAW reason, by the way, but simply because any good GM will stack enough circumstance penalties on that Spellcraft check that it would take a roll of epic proportions in order to ID it.
I imagined distictive floating runes for spells (like in much of the PF art) even when spells are stilled, silent, etc. Swirling lights at the very least. An unmodified spell might include lights, sounds, smells, tremors, and so forth---borrowing from the old XPH psionics descriptions.
A local grants a +2 to DC per Metamagic feat that disguises the spell. No idea how that'l work, but the players don't seem to mind.
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Since my day-job involves designing game-mechanics (video games), I'd like to weigh in on this one by looking at the main purpose of those three metamagic feats and the issues they are (probably) meant to counter.
Still spell allows a mage to cast a spell when they are unable to move their arms or body, such as when tied up or buried up to their neck in sand. This seems to be the primary purpose of the feat.
Silent spell allows a mage to cast when they cannot speak, such as when they are silenced or gagged. In many cases, they may also be unable to move their body (such as Hold Person or bound and gagged) and need both of these feats. This seems to be the primary purpose of the feat.
Eschew materials allows a mage to cast when they don't have access to their normal (cheap) spell-materials. Stuck in a prison cell, they are likely to need this feat. When they have emptied their spell-component pouches, they will need this feat. This is the purpose of the feat.
As to using all three together... Anyone who thought to bind and gag a mage probably knows enough to take away their spell-component pouches too. This makes a perfectly-normal case for using all three together.
Since there are strong justifications for using the three feats together and in pairs, I don't see that 'stealth casting' adds anything to the game except unbalancing the counter-spell rules.
Also, I second the idea that there will be other visible signs of spell-casting going on; magic in pathfinder is tearing at the walls of reality to create effects which break the normal laws of physics, so glowing lights, strange smells and odd noises would be quite likely.
Finally, the rules say nothing about any of these feats making a spellcraft check harder. Normally, the rules will tell you if a certain mechanic affects another one in this way - look at how they explicitly tell you that you cannot hide while holding an uncovered light-source, even though it should be obvious - and so I would rule that the feats are designed to allow spell-casting under difficult circumstances, not to make it invisible. That is, until we get some errata from the development team...