| 1 person marked this as FAQ candidate. |
Situation is as follows:
Witch level 10, beast bonded.
At 10th-level, if the witch or her familiar is gravely injured or about to die, the soul of the dying one immediately transfers to the other’s body. The two souls share the surviving body peaceably, can communicate freely, and both retain their ability to think and reason. The host may allow the guest soul to take over the body temporarily or reclaim it as a move action. They can persist in this state indefinitely, or the guest can return to its own body (if available) by touch, transfer into a suitable vessel (such as a clone), or take over another body as if using magic jar (with no receptacle).
Witchs original body is reduced to -HP. It's not dead, but incapacitated.
Witch uses Twin Soul to inhabit their familiars body (Both are occupying the same body now).
The Witch remains in the familiars body while the original body is recovering from the sustained wounds.
The familiars body is reduced far enough into -HP that it dies.
My questions are:
1. What happens to the witch? Does the witch immediately return to the original body which is safe and sound? Does the witch get killed and no requires a raise dead?
2. What happens to the familiar? Same as above.
3. If they return to the original body, is there a range limit?
Thanks.
Any thoughts? Reason for asking is I am looking at a PFS Beast Bonded Witch and stashing the Witch's body (in a portable hole with a ring of sustenance, and decanter of endless air), and inhabiting an Improved Familiar. All the tricks I've seen revolve around using Magic Jar for shenanigans, which won't quite work for PFS, and not something as simple as just adventuring as the familiar, with your body stashed safely away.
My thoughts are the Witch/Familiar if killed would be shunted to the Witch's original body which never died.
A funny thing, the familiar lives, and you die.
With the body in the negatives it's still 'alive' sure. But when the witch is in the familiars body your a guest. To transfer back requires you to 'touch' the body.
If it's in a portable hole and your familiar dies (or is about to), it would swap bodies with you and save itself, no choice either it just happens according to the text. (that's all kinds of funny btw)
But you wouldn't be able to, as it's a touch action to set yourself back into your original, and hidden, body.
p.s. it would be VERY wise to have a clone ready, or Magic Jar yourself into a new body immediately. A soul with no where to go is a bad idea.
In this scenario:
1. The Witch dies.
2. The familiar now resides in the Witches body with full control. (and thanks you for it's new Magic Jar ability)
3. There is no written range limit, nor restricting words vrs dimensional space or even planes. So it should work this way no matter where the bodies are.
Disclaimer: I'm not keen on PFS and if anything does affect those rules however.
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A funny thing, the familiar lives, and you die.
With the body in the negatives it's still 'alive' sure. But when the witch is in the familiars body your a guest. To transfer back requires you to 'touch' the body.
If it's in a portable hole and your familiar dies (or is about to), it would swap bodies with you and save itself, no choice either it just happens according to the text. (that's all kinds of funny btw)
But you wouldn't be able to, as it's a touch action to set yourself back into your original, and hidden, body.
p.s. it would be VERY wise to have a clone ready, or Magic Jar yourself into a new body immediately. A soul with no where to go is a bad idea.
In this scenario:
1. The Witch dies.
2. The familiar now resides in the Witches body with full control. (and thanks you for it's new Magic Jar ability)
3. There is no written range limit, nor restricting words vrs dimensional space or even planes. So it should work this way no matter where the bodies are.Disclaimer: I'm not keen on PFS and if anything does affect those rules however.
No. Everything you just said is wrong.
The way twin soul works as written is as long as there is a safe place for EITHER soul to go to avoid death it goes there automatically (ie. no action).
In the OP's question both the witch & the familiar leap out of the familiars dying body and retreat to the witch's recovering body (no matter how far away it is).
From there when this body recovers enough to wake up it has 2 souls in it and can go and restore the original familiar body, clone a copy of it or simply steal a new body from anything else that has a soul.
The only way to kill a twin-soul'd witch is both bodies have to die at about the same time.
A funny thing, the familiar lives, and you die.
With the body in the negatives it's still 'alive' sure. But when the witch is in the familiars body your a guest. To transfer back requires you to 'touch' the body.
If it's in a portable hole and your familiar dies (or is about to), it would swap bodies with you and save itself, no choice either it just happens according to the text. (that's all kinds of funny btw)
But you wouldn't be able to, as it's a touch action to set yourself back into your original, and hidden, body.
p.s. it would be VERY wise to have a clone ready, or Magic Jar yourself into a new body immediately. A soul with no where to go is a bad idea.
In this scenario:
1. The Witch dies.
2. The familiar now resides in the Witches body with full control. (and thanks you for it's new Magic Jar ability)
3. There is no written range limit, nor restricting words vrs dimensional space or even planes. So it should work this way no matter where the bodies are.Disclaimer: I'm not keen on PFS and if anything does affect those rules however.
No. Everything you just said is wrong.
The way twin soul works as written is as long as there is a safe place for EITHER soul to go to avoid death it goes there automatically (ie. no action).
In the OP's question both the witch & the familiar leap out of the familiars dying body and retreat to the witch's recovering body (no matter how far away it is).
From there when this body recovers enough to wake up it has 2 souls in it and can go and restore the original familiar body, clone a copy of it or simply steal a new body from anything else that has a soul.The only way to kill a twin-soul'd witch is both bodies have to die at about the same time.
p.s. I don't see this "EITHER" soul business you are talking about what it says is:
"At 10th-level, if the witch or her familiar is gravely injured or about to die, the soul of the dying one immediately transfers to the other’s body."
The soul of the familiar would indeed go to the 'dying witch body shoved in a portable hole', but the witch is going to die. It's already in the 'other' body, and now has no where to go.
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A funny thing, the familiar lives, and you die.
With the body in the negatives it's still 'alive' sure. But when the witch is in the familiars body your a guest. To transfer back requires you to 'touch' the body.
If it's in a portable hole and your familiar dies (or is about to), it would swap bodies with you and save itself, no choice either it just happens according to the text. (that's all kinds of funny btw)
But you wouldn't be able to, as it's a touch action to set yourself back into your original, and hidden, body.
p.s. it would be VERY wise to have a clone ready, or Magic Jar yourself into a new body immediately. A soul with no where to go is a bad idea.
In this scenario:
1. The Witch dies.
2. The familiar now resides in the Witches body with full control. (and thanks you for it's new Magic Jar ability)
3. There is no written range limit, nor restricting words vrs dimensional space or even planes. So it should work this way no matter where the bodies are.Disclaimer: I'm not keen on PFS and if anything does affect those rules however.
No. Everything you just said is wrong.
The way twin soul works as written is as long as there is a safe place for EITHER soul to go to avoid death it goes there automatically (ie. no action).
In the OP's question both the witch & the familiar leap out of the familiars dying body and retreat to the witch's recovering body (no matter how far away it is).
From there when this body recovers enough to wake up it has 2 souls in it and can go and restore the original familiar body, clone a copy of it or simply steal a new body from anything else that has a soul.The only way to kill a twin-soul'd witch is both bodies have to die at about the same time.
p.s. I don't see this "EITHER" soul business you are talking about what it says is:
"At 10th-level, if the witch or her familiar is gravely injured or about to die, the soul of the dying one...
Read it again, here I'll quote the relevant part for you.
if the witch or her familiar is gravely injured or about to die
Now in the example above the witch is in a body that is about to die (which will kill the witch) the twin soul ability clicks in and the witch's soul flees from the dying body to join the familiar in it's NEW body (the witch's old body).
Remember this is NOT the magic jar spell it's a different ability and it doesn't control that new body it OWNS it. The steps of this change goes like this:
1.the familiars current body takes enough damage to trigger Twin Soul and the familiar starts to flee the witches soul is stuck in the body since it has nowhere to go.
2. the familiar flees to the witches living but empty meatsuit and takes ownership of it.
3. The familiars body starts to die triggering twin soul for the witch (since they now own this body) and looks for a place for the soul to go. The familiar has a living body now so twin soul moves the witches body there and both witch and familiar now share the body with the familiar nominally in control of it.
I think the confusion here is you are looking at these meatsuits as intrinsically special and only the original owner has rights to it.
Look at them like leased cars instead and whoever has a lease on it is the "owner" until they trade it in on a newer model.
Don't truncate the whole line to suit your point of view it says:
"At 10th-level, if the witch or her familiar is gravely injured or about to die, the soul of the immediately transfers to the body."
The witches other body, is not her original body. You're still wrong.
Maybe you can argue about who is really dying, my opinion is that it's the familiar, this is not the witches body after all being killed.
However it also says you go to the 'other' body, not back to your original one if you already did the swap trick once.
Also, for the 'guest' to return to it's body it states it needs to do so via 'touch.' And if that body is in a portable hole, that's not possible.
"the guest can return to its own body (if available) by touch."
The Witch is screwed.
The Familiar is fine.
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"the guest can return to its own body (if available) by touch."
The Witch is screwed.
The Familiar is fine.
You might want to read the ability again.
That line is a separate ability to the one being discussed.That one is an at-will ability that requires an action on the users part. The part being discussed is an automatic ability that occurs whenever the witch/familiar is at risk of dying.
The body is not the witch or the familiar, it's merely the vessel carrying around the REAL them and keeping them anchored to the living world.
Let me ask you this to help clarify the issue. What about reincarnation?
It creates a whole new body with no connection at all to the old one.
Is that really you? By your argument no, it's not the same body so it's not you.
The "YOU" they are referring to is the soul of the witch/familiar and it's death ie. going to the boneyard.
That's what this part of the power is about, keeping the witches soul from going to the great beyond. You all are putting far to much emphasis on the body when the power itself puts nearly no importance to it.
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"the guest can return to its own body (if available) by touch."
The Witch is screwed.
The Familiar is fine.You might want to read the ability again.
That line is a separate ability to the one being discussed.
That one is an at-will ability that requires an action on the users part. The part being discussed is an automatic ability that occurs whenever the witch/familiar is at risk of dying.The body is not the witch or the familiar, it's merely the vessel carrying around the REAL them and keeping them anchored to the living world.
Let me ask you this to help clarify the issue. What about reincarnation?
It creates a whole new body with no connection at all to the old one.
Is that really you? By your argument no, it's not the same body so it's not you.The "YOU" they are referring to is the soul of the witch/familiar and it's death ie. going to the boneyard.
That's what this part of the power is about, keeping the witches soul from going to the great beyond. You all are putting far to much emphasis on the body when the power itself puts nearly no importance to it.
Sounds like you are trying to argue RAI, not RAW. I agree 100% with Urklore as well.
The guest, no matter which side is the guest, per the rules, needs to touch to transfer once they are a guest.
(I actually think RAI is that the witch dies as well.)
I think Mathwei is right in that there is a difference between actively trying to leave a living familiar body when you're locked into it, and being forcibly booted out via death. How does possession work in the situation where you have a living original body and your possessed host dies? Effectively this is a friendly possession type deal.
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I think the issue is ambiguous.
I agree with Mathwei ap Niall that the text indicating that the guest can return to its own body by touch does not necessarily prohibit the guest returning to its own body reflexively via the first "death" condition.
However, I don't think the text about the dying party transferring to the other's body is clear about whether it allows the automatic transfer to one's original body. "The other's body" could either refer to "the other, living body," which would allow it, or "the original body of the non-dying party (the other)" which would disallow it. The latter is slightly more likely because of the possessive "other's body" instead of "other body," and the distinction between guest and host suggests to me that the original ownership of the body is supposed to be important. However, I am not confident in that guess and would like to know what the intent of the ability is.
The intent is to prevent the witch/familiar from dying unless both are killed at the same time.