So, I recently noticed the coolness of the spell "enter image". By placing a bunch of "images" of your surveillance person around your compound, they can cast the spell and see from all of them at once (at +10 on perception DCs). Imagine taking a cleric (with maxed perception & wisdom) to serve as your security. All you need to do is create small coins with the watcher's image in discreet spots all over your compound, and VOILA! Magical security system.
And I've been wondering... what other clever, magical security systems have poeple worked out? I'm curious to know...
I have kept my magic power generator machine a secret and built it under the City in the hope that no one will come there. So that is Security by secrecy.
Still interested in this. I'm especially looking for notable methods of locking down teleportation/plane shift and other kinds of dimensional travel. I know about "teleport trap", but I'm looking for other inhibitors as well.
Build a maze with transmutation spells. Have a hidden corridor behind one of the walls that can only be accessed by passwall and similar magic and is undetectable by perception. Place your stash there, shielding it with lead and anti-scrying spells. Make the rest of the dungeon into a labirynthine complex with a fake treasure chest at the end. Put a scroll with explosive runes inside. And another with "Nice try, but my treasure is in another dungeon."
Symbols are a standard way of security and so are magical traps. These work OK in conjunction with constructs and undead.
Have a door that looks like a riddle. Place a sepii snake sigil there along with something that can kill a helpless person. Basically anything that reduces mobility (such as irresistible dance) combines well with something that kills. You can even use this concept to close off several hundreds meters of a corridor and submerge it in dirty water, making escape all but impossible.
Make a smooth corridor with a trap that reverses gravity into a prismatic wall. Stack a dazzling firewall trap on top of it. Oh and drop stone walls on both ends for good measure.
Prismatic wall or prismatic sphere make for a nice defensive wall. You and only you can pass them easily.
Bind some outsiders in such a way that entering their room breaks their summoning circles. Make them angry.
Place a lot of illusions everywhere. A silent image can hide a trap or a door.
Cultivate those oozes and gelatinous cubes. They double up as good garbage disposal.
williamoak wrote: Still interested in this. I'm especially looking for notable methods of locking down teleportation/plane shift and other kinds of dimensional travel. I know about "teleport trap", but I'm looking for other inhibitors as well. False Vision (1 hour/level) Scrying sees what you want them to see as per Major Image. Further while the spell is ongoing you may concentrate to change the image. For those scrying there is no save or SR they'll see your illusion. Really makes folks reluctant to Teleport if they think it into a safe area to teleport and it's really not.
Screen (24 hours) a False Vision that fools direct observation as well. Only direct viewing allows even a chance for a save.
Secrecy (as Cap. Darling points out) is your friend. If the folks trying to divine/scry the interior do not know the layout then using things like clairvoyance becomes very problematic. Trying to clairvoy beyond the "obvious" location of the other side of the gate at the entrance won't work if the area is magically darkened. Thick or lead lined/inpregnated walls block most 'Detect' spells and many divinations as well as things like Passwall or Phase Doors. A Magic Mouth could be set in the darkened area to be triggered if the darkness goes away (and Magic Mouth is permanent until triggered). Spells such as Mage's Private Sanctum, of course, block spells of the scrying subschool. All this makes any attempt at "Scry and Fry" or just plain teleporting to a quiet local inside the area difficult and dangerous if not outright impossible. Note that both Deeper Darkness and Invisibility Purge can be 'companion' spells linked to Hallow/Unhallow areas. As a GM I also tend to assume the PC's can and will find a way in even if it is by brute force multiple Disintegrates or simply digging ... and try to focus as much if not more effort on my inhabitants learning of the PCs entry/breaching and successfully getting the alarm out (and bringing all heck to bear on them as a result). And mix the defenses up using both mundane things like passwords and thick walls as well as the various magical things mentioned so as to avoid the PCs using one or two spells to negate all the defense. For example, casting True Sight or Greater Prying Eyes and simply blowing right past all the illusory defenses. False doors over walls with Symbols or Glyphs. Keep in mind that most scry type spells create magical sensors and those sensors can be seen with successful perception checks (DC=20+spell level of scrying spell) nevermind things like Detect Scrying.
Quicklings make for an interesting guard ... insanely fast, natural invisibility, evasion. Have it avoid combat to focus on getting the alarm spread while teaming it with some hulking brute(s) meant to SMASH anything trying to stop it from moving off and maybe you'll get to see the APL 15+ party use their nastiest high level magics trying to stop the CR 3, 18 hp Quickling rather than the Hulk in the room. I know when I ran into this we pretty much tried to ignore the Mountain Giant breathing down on us to keep that Quickling from getting out the door to alert the entire dungeon full of Giants that they had unannounced guests.
I've also started building the ultimate security chief. I'm making them full power (level 20, MR 10) and I've been seeing how high I can get their charisma (now at +85).
Thanks Kayerloth. I'm just building a demiplane fortress and I was wondering how to best secure it. You've given me some nice stuff.
williamoak wrote: I've also started building the ultimate security chief. I'm making them full power (level 20, MR 10) and I've been seeing how high I can get their charisma (now at +85).
Thanks Kayerloth. I'm just building a demiplane fortress and I was wondering how to best secure it. You've given me some nice stuff.
The best defense for a Demiplane? That's simple, create 2 different, but linked, demiplanes.
First, you should note that if you permanency a Lesser Demiplane, you can cast Create Demiplane and Greater Create Demiplane to add effects to the lesser plane. Doing so changes the duration to instantaneous, and therefore, permanent.
What you do, is cast Lesser Create and Permanency for your 'entryway'. Then use Greater Create to add two different portals, one to the material (or whatever plane you're from) and the second to the the other demiplane. Then, you use a third casting of Greater Create to make it a dead magic plane. Now no magic functions here other than artifacts.
After you've made it a dead magic plane, fill it with CR 3 shadows.
Why shadows? Well, they are incorporeal, that means non-magical weapons deal no damage to them. You see the evil right? Since they invaders are in a dead magic zone, their weapons are no longer magical and they can't hurt the shadows. The cleric can't channel. The Wizard can't cast.
The CR 3 Shadows will annihilate even level 20/MT 10 enemies as long as they aren't wielding artifacts.
Seriously, it's a f*%#ed up scenario and guaranteed to piss off a party. They party's only hope is to simply run to the other portal and hope they survive it.
There are also some spells I've found :
Forbiddance: to block planar travel (permanent)
Teleport trap: to take in anybody who tries to teleport in (must be permanencied)
Dimensional lock: for an 8th level spell, kinda dissapointing.
I have a mythic character who built himself a sanctuary, except he did it on the Material. Hang on, I have a list of stuff I used:
1. Carve out the rock using stone shape and disintegrate. Way underground, surrounded by solid rock for several miles in any direction (makes a regular teleport difficult, since if you miss you'll materialise in the middle of solid rock).
2. Put lead around the edge of the open space.
3. Cast Forbiddance [passworded].
4. Cast Hallow [linked to mind blank].
5. Resilient Permanent Mage's Private Sanctum everywhere.
6. Resilient Permanent Teleport Traps.
7. Resilient Permanent Runes of Jandelay extending beyond the border that inhibit tunneling into it. (It was ruled that since it functions similarly to a Symbol spell, it can be permanencied.)
8. Resilient Permanent Prismatic Walls face outwards at the edge of the sphere, spaced to give total coverage. Just in case they get past the Runes of Jandelay, they'll have to deal with the prismatic walls.
9. Mythic Augmented Dimensional Lock. Redirects people to a different location on the same plane. Which happens to be somewhere inside the sun. Suckers. The dimensional lock blocks Gate spells, since the wording of the Gate spell text implies that the gate could get around a teleport trap.
10. Mythic Augmented Guards and Wards. It sends out an Alarm spell if it's broken into regardless of where you are on the same plane, so you'll immediately know if somebody has broken in.
11. Screen (shows solid rock), firing out of resetting traps so that they maintain it constantly.
(For those wondering, it was made resilient because that means you need to expend a use of mythic power when counterspelling or dispelling.)
It's not completely impregnable, and some defenses have redundancies (a good thing!), but then, nothing will stop a Wishport. You can't really stop somebody from getting in - they'll find a way if they really, really want to - but you can make it an absolute pain in their behind to try. Hilariously enough, I didn't even stash any wealth there, I just wanted to see how it could be broken into.
Cool stuf Alleran! Way to go!
One problem I see with Tels idea for Shadows and a dead magic plane ... their special abilities are (Su) and hence won't work for them in a dead magic area anymore than the parties items, spells, etc., so no Strength Drain, no spawn creation. It'll be a standoff at best not Shadows squash APL 30 (or whatever) party. Otherwise definitely ups the difficulty of getting to the inner most demi-plane fortress.
Can't normally link or use Mind Blank as a companion to Hallow ... though given that's a list of Mythic beyond 20th type stuff I'm not sure how pertinent that is. You can normally link Dimensional Anchor to Hallow however.
Or rather than go with Planar trait Dead Magic go with Sentient plus Morphic to the will of the plane itself.
Sequester is a very potent 'lets hide this' spell (from either remote or direct observation). One could debate whether even Discern Location defeats Sequester and even if you say yes you still need to have physically touched the object previously for Discern Object to work. Build a front door over your portal to the plane letting no one else see or touch it ... then hit it with Sequester. Bonus points for your Sentient Plane keeping access to the door/portal always walled away for "Maaasster".
I can't find "Runes of Jandelay".
Edit because I got ninja'd: Other than shadows, most other stat drain abilities I can think of, like the ecorche and allip, are also supernatural.
Hide it in plain sight. They'll have no idea.
More seriously, put your stash inside a big golem/construct/clockwork thing.
Good point on the Shadows. So use Wraiths or Dread Wraiths instead. The Con drain is Supernatural, but they still deal negative energy damage on a touch, which isn't a part of their Constitution Drain ability. I just chose Shadows because I happened to be reading a Shadow Dancer build before that post.
You can triple layer the Dread Wraiths (one layer above, one layer on the ground, one layer in the ground) to maximize the exposure to the wraiths. Funnily enough, Incorporeality is an Extraordinary ability. This only matters if the GM allows the PCs to 'charge through' the wraiths (since they're incorporeal). Technically, they can't as the monsters are occupying the space, so only the ground layers is really needed to prevent the party from moving.
It basically becomes a fight they can't win. The Wraiths can kill them via negative energy, while the party can't hurt them at all.
Give your hoarde to an ancient dragon, they'll protect it... >_>
Kayerloth wrote: Can't normally link or use Mind Blank as a companion to Hallow ... though given that's a list of Mythic beyond 20th type stuff I'm not sure how pertinent that is. Indeed you can't (I hadn't even noticed). Still, it doesn't create too many problems beyond eliminating one of the redundancies against scrying - so a character will just have to establish a mind blank on themselves some other way.
Ipslore the Red wrote: I can't find "Runes of Jandelay". It's a new spell that came out with the release of Herald of the Ivory Labyrinth. Without C&Ping the text of the entire spell, the most useful things that I used it for:
"You scribe a potent rune of power upon a surface, similar to the way in which a symbol spell is cast. [This is why it was ruled to work for permanency, but it is still a houserule, mind you. ~Alleran]
[...]
When cast, the rune stabilises and reinforces an area in a 120-foot-radius sphere centered on it. Earthquake, transmute rock to mud, stone shape, spike stones, and other spell effects that magically damage or manipulate terrain or structures deal no damage and do not alter anything in the area."
It keeps people from using magic to tunnel into your secret underground lair, or to attack it from without by manipulating terrain. It won't stop non-magical tunneling, of course, but anybody willing to non-magically tunnel through several miles of solid rock frankly deserves a chance to approach your prismatic wall!
Of course, it does go without saying that all of these spells that can't be normally permanencied can instead be loaded into resetting and automatically-triggering traps (the price tag is "+500 gp × caster level × spell level" and you just need Craft Wondrous Item). So you could set it up to the tune where entering your underground hide-away involves a landing zone (target it perfectly with a Wishport), followed by a quick walk down a hallway that triggers every trap in there to cast a host of protective spells on you (the aforementioned mind blank, for example).
Alleran wrote: I have a mythic character who built himself a sanctuary, except he did it on the Material. Hang on, I have a list of stuff I used:
1. Carve out the rock using stone shape and disintegrate. Way underground, surrounded by solid rock for several miles in any direction (makes a regular teleport difficult, since if you miss you'll materialise in the middle of solid rock).
2. Put lead around the edge of the open space.
3. Cast Forbiddance [passworded].
4. Cast Hallow [linked to mind blank].
5. Resilient Permanent Mage's Private Sanctum everywhere.
6. Resilient Permanent Teleport Traps.
7. Resilient Permanent Runes of Jandelay extending beyond the border that inhibit tunneling into it. (It was ruled that since it functions similarly to a Symbol spell, it can be permanencied.)
8. Resilient Permanent Prismatic Walls face outwards at the edge of the sphere, spaced to give total coverage. Just in case they get past the Runes of Jandelay, they'll have to deal with the prismatic walls.
9. Mythic Augmented Dimensional Lock. Redirects people to a different location on the same plane. Which happens to be somewhere inside the sun. Suckers. The dimensional lock blocks Gate spells, since the wording of the Gate spell text implies that the gate could get around a teleport trap.
10. Mythic Augmented Guards and Wards. It sends out an Alarm spell if it's broken into regardless of where you are on the same plane, so you'll immediately know if somebody has broken in.
11. Screen (shows solid rock), firing out of resetting traps so that they maintain it constantly.
(For those wondering, it was made resilient because that means you need to expend a use of mythic power when counterspelling or dispelling.)
It's not completely impregnable, and some defenses have redundancies (a good thing!), but then, nothing will stop a Wishport. You can't really stop somebody from getting in - they'll find a way if they really, really want to - but you can make it an absolute pain in their behind to try. Hilariously enough, I didn't...
I think everything here other than the Prismatic Wall is defeated by Antimagic Field.
Tels- true, but by the time Antimagic Field is viable, you have to be close enough that you'll have to contend with the wall.
Tels wrote: I think everything here other than the Prismatic Wall is defeated by Antimagic Field. If they're willing to go through all that rock after figuring out exactly where your secret base is (somehow you let the information leak?)... well, they probably deserve to get in.
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