Abuse of Greater Invisibility


Advice


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I have a group that has been playing for over a year and is now getting close to the end of the campaign. And as they are all getting into higher levels they are abusing certain spells Greater invisibility is the worst one.
How do I as the DM make a game a challenge for them if i cant see them to effect them. With out making it look like Im "Trying to Kill" the players. Since not all encounters will have creatures with clerical abilities to Purge it or casters with true seeing even creatures with high sent abilities still will have a high miss chance. Tremor sense doesn't work since they piggy back fly on to there greater invisibility.

Does anyone else see the flaw in the duration of Greater Invisibility? Or have a possible solution that isn't going to make it appear that Im picking on certain players?


blindsense & blindsight both don't particularly care about invisibility.

Sufficiently high Perception equates to the same thing as blindsense.

Things such as sandstorms, area dispels and water-filled terrain reduce or can outright obliterate invisibility.

Very high wind speeds will ground them. Take control winds atop sandy terrain and *voila*, you have a sandstorm of sufficient power that they have to deal with it in some form or fashion.

Water-filled tunnels etc, especially with certain creatures that have the equivalent of tremorsense while underwater will either not care very much or won't care at all. 'ware [water] dragons in such environs...

Creatures that do not see usually don't care.

The Blind-Fight/Improved Blind-Fight/Greater Blind-Fight feat tree.

dust of appearance or, better, cursed dust of sneezing and choking, is always entertaining.


Turin the Mad wrote:

blindsense & blindsight both don't particularly care about invisibility.

Sufficiently high Perception equates to the same thing as blindsense.

Things such as sandstorms, area dispels and water-filled terrain reduce or can outright obliterate invisibility.

Very high wind speeds will ground them. Take control winds atop sandy terrain and *voila*, you have a sandstorm of sufficient power that they have to deal with it in some form or fashion.

Water-filled tunnels etc, especially with certain creatures that have the equivalent of tremorsense while underwater will either not care very much or won't care at all. 'ware [water] dragons in such environs...

Creatures that do not see usually don't care.

The Blind-Fight/Improved Blind-Fight/Greater Blind-Fight feat tree.

dust of appearance or, better, cursed dust of sneezing and choking, is always entertaining.

Thanks for the advice Ill look in to those the only thing is right now the sand trick wont work mainly wooded terrain. Also adding in flying random mobs to make flight more difficult will help.


Glitterdust is a low level spell that will annoy invisible characters.

Some other monsters can be invisible themselves and just sit it out.

Apart from that, area attacks or strategic retreats work as well.

-edit-

Oh, and don't forget you can always delay a creatures action to strike when the character's square is revealed.


It only last rounds per level..

What level is the party, and do the bad guys know who they are yet? If not they why?

Liberty's Edge

Scott Way wrote:
Does anyone else see the flaw in the duration of Greater Invisibility?

I'm not sure that I understand this. The duration is rounds per level. Even at 15th level, that's 90 seconds.

It should be trivial for opponents at higher levels to drink a potion of invisibility (300gp) when attacked in this fashion. Now everyone's invisible, and the potion at CL 3 lasts as long as an Extended greater invisibility at CL 15. Just don't attack, and wait them out.

Also, in games I play in, higher level opponents have a lot of ways around invisibility. You said they're getting to be higher level. What level are they?


Here's a nifty trick for a dungeon crawl or other plane, but would fall under an environmental fix. Probably only usable once.

Have a door/portal or a series of them that can only be activated/opened/trigger the (easy) clue riddle by detecting the site of a creature or humanoid creature. They have to become visible to trigger movement from one area/room to the next. Not an extra ordinary for other planes or a well-defensed/paranoid baddie. This method could be used to do an entire large dungeon-crawl on another plane to take them through several high levels making iimrpoved invis only a temp. benefit and resource depletion.

Add social encounters with weak allies throughout, which will not discuss needed interaction with invisible creatures -- thinks they are ghosts, a witch's curse, a Chexlian devil, etc.

Remember there are a lot of ways other than game mechanics to deal with game mechanics problems.


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Hasn't anybody mentioned scent? It's a very common ability on most beasts and can to a large degree bypass invisibility.


Also, remember that as you reach higher levels (say 10+) the game changes a _LOT_, and unintelligent creatures and creatures without magical abilities start losing their value as opponents by themselves. Good high-level encounters - from what I've heard (rarely play high levels) - consists of, for example, at least one caster supported by a bunch of mooks that can be stupid.

A purple worm will be a walkover as a CR12 encounter (if the mission is simply to kill it) since it can't fly, but a nalfeshnee with two purple worms can be a good CR16 encounter. A better CR12 encounter would be for example an adult black dragon and it's vampire pal.

EDIT: And when it comes to intelligent enemies that don't have any ability on their own to beat invisibility, remember that they could still use their wealth for stuff, including potions and wands.


If all else fails, just have your monsters carpet-bomb the area ... or ready an action with the trigger 'I get attacked' then unload that direction.

Grand Lodge

SEe invisibility works too doesn't it?


Turn it around on the players. They want to use invisibility to make it difficult for you to attack, pull out a smokestick (cost 20gp) or Fog Cloud, Obscuring Mist, or Pyrotechnics. Suddenly they can't attack either because they can't see the enemy. Throw in a black tentacles spell amongst the foggy mess if you can and laugh as they get grapples moving through the mess.

And, if you want you could also throw in a lantern of revealing. I mean, somebody has to have figured out their tactics by now and are anticipating invisible adventurers. Also, keep strict track of the rounds they have because they shouldn't make it invisible through 2 battles. And greater invisibility is going to eat up a lot of spell slots (especially since it's only one person per casting) or they're spending a lot of money on scrolls.


Oh, about smokesticks, one nice thing you could make is a custom item that we have in our games and that could first be used by an NPC in an encounter in a cool way, and secondly become interesting loot for the martials!

We call it "the spring-loaded lighter", and is based on this:
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment---final/weapons/weapon-and-armor-accessor ies#TOC-Wrist-Sheath-spring-loaded

The lighter is like this though:

Spring-loaded Lighter, cost 250 gp (Rare)

This item works like a standard wrist sheath, but releasing an item from it is an swift action. Preparing the sheath for this use requires cranking the sheath’s tiny gears and springs into place (a full-round action that provokes an attack of opportunity). When preparing it, you may spend another full-round action to also load it with five tindertwigs. When the item is released, the tindertwigs will light it up the object in question, whether oil, a smokestick or anything else.

So the NPC, as soon as it realizes invisible enemies are in the area, quickly presses out a burning smokestick in her hand and drops it on the floor as a free action, evening out the blindness. When they've finally beaten the encounter, it's a cool non-magic item that can be useful for a fighter, rogue or similar class.

Shadow Lodge

Just have the enemies cast rope trick and climb up into the extra dimensional space. Its a 2nd level spell, which you should have plenty of at High levels, it lasts 1 hour/level, and its great for fighting creatures that are to powerful. When the rope gets pulled up, you have to fly up in every square around it to find your way inside and by the time you're done, greater invisibility has worn off.

Silver Crusade

I too am confused on the complaint of duration... it's rounds per level and it only effects one target.

So, are they casting it 4-6 times to effect the entire group? If so by the time they get to the last person they've already eaten through several rounds. It can be extended... but are they really extending 4-6 castings of greater invisibility before every combat (or frequent enough for it to be considered, by you, "abuse")?

Please relate HOW they are abusing the spell.

There are a multitude of ways to defeat invisibility.


I'm confused by this entire thread, to be honest. How are the players abusing an established, core spell that has a low duration. By actually casting it?

I don't see actually using a spell to be abusing it.

Grand Lodge

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Is this like abusing Haste, by casting it, and using a Full Attack, to gain an extra attack?

Not exactly sure how "abuse" falls into play here.

Did I miss something?

Shadow Lodge

I can see the problem with abuse that Scott has because the ninja trick that lets you be invisible as if greater invisibility will be nasty at 10th and beyond because if the campaign is built with more straightforward combat than 13 rounds of 10d6 attacks with no dex mod applied is nasty, but for the whole party its harder than for the ninja because they have less spells than you have ki sometimes


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"Abuse of Greater Invisibility"

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.


ArmouredMonk13, when using Rope Trick you cannot pull the rope up into the Rope Trick. You could do that back in 3.5 but not PF. :)

CRB p335 Rope Trick wrote:
The rope cannot be removed or hidden.

- Gauss

Shadow Lodge

Thanks for telling me Gauss


Yeah, nothing says you can't loop and tie it up so that just anybody can't walk up and shimmy up it, but that bundle of rope is still hanging off the point in space where the dimensional portal is.

Shadow Lodge

Thanks also Quandary


permanency see invisibility costs around 5k and blindsense/tremorsense should not be too uncommon


Four years.

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