Dominate Animal vs. Calm (Charm) Animal

[Alexander Smith 868]

Hello all,

I am planning on running a one-off in a few days and I am fairly certain that we will find ourselves in the following situation:

One of the NPC villains is going to be using a Ring of Spell Storing V to cast Dominate Animal on a Dire Ape. I am fairly certain that the party Druid will want to cast either Calm Animal or Charm Animal in an attempt to "mellow" the Dire Ape and avoid fighting the animal altogether. If that comes up, I don't know exactly how to field it as a GM...

The Dire Ape will clearly have a Will save to negate the spell; however, if that fails, does the druid's Calm Animal break the NPC's control of the animal? Or is there, perhaps, some kind of check that the druid will have to make opposed to the NPC's Caster-Level or Will?

Firing from the hip, it might be fun to have some kind of impromptu mental duel between the two casters in order to control the Ape. Really, though, I am open to any suggestions.

Thanks a million.

-Alex

[David Haller]

The whole idea of dominate is that the creature acts against its will.

So, let's say Mr. White charms a dire ape, and Mr. Black dominates the same ape, and that the ape fails both saves.

The ape, being charmed, likes Mr. White - in fact, he's "friendly" - but it'll attack him anyway if Mr. Black commands it, because Mr. Black dominates it. That's fairly clear-cut.

What's more interesting is if both of them charm or both of them dominate the ape: then, you'd have some kind of opposed check. If they both charmed the ape, I'd probably resolve it with an opposed charisma check: the ape is friendly to both, and must be persuaded; the druid would probably be able to add his level to this check (he an use wild empathy), and so would have the clear advantage. If both dominated the animal, then the animal is basically a puppet, and whoever can win the game of direct control of the their spell will come out ahead: I'd borrow a mechanic from the control construct spell and call it an opposed spellcraft check, with the winner actually controlling the ape.

[Michael Sayre]

You might also see this rule: "Multiple Mental Control Effects: Sometimes magical effects that establish mental control render each other irrelevant, such as spells that remove the subject's ability to act. Mental controls that don't remove the recipient's ability to act usually do not interfere with each other. If a creature is under the mental control of two or more creatures, it tends to obey each to the best of its ability, and to the extent of the control each effect allows. If the controlled creature receives conflicting orders simultaneously, the competing controllers must make opposed Charisma checks to determine which one the creature obeys."