Hi all. I've written this question in another thread earlier, haven't had any replies, so I'm trying one last time on a seperate thread.
If I use Shadow Projection (to make sure my body is in a safe and guarded place)
Then, when I meet the vampire BBEG, is it possible for me to Magic Jar from my shadow form, into a focus carried by my familiar (or a team mate)
Then try to possess the vampire?
In short..
Shadow projection -----> Magic Jar
Is that legal?/a working combo?
(The group is very limited in divine magic, so we only have 2 death ward spells. Since I'm immune to level drain in my shadow form, I won't need a death ward to protect me against the vampire's level drain attacks.)
Our next session is in less than 24 hours, so I would love some replies on this asap.
Hrm. I'm going to go with No. You require a focus to be in your possession to cast Magic Jar and I don't believe you can hold stuff while incorporeal.
Related text.
Components wrote: A spell's components explain what you must do or possess to cast the spell. EDIT: Shadow Projection is a cool spell.
I'm not sure, IIRC the shadow demon is incorporeal and can cast Magic Jar. I believe it bypasses the receptacle completely I'm not sure if that unwritten rule is a feature of it being incorporeal or specific to the creature.
Rikkan wrote: I'm not sure, IIRC the shadow demon is incorporeal and can cast Magic Jar. I believe it bypasses the receptacle completely I'm not sure if that unwritten rule is a feature of it being incorporeal or specific to the creature. It's a spell like ability for them and therefore doesn't require components.
You won't be able to carry or use the focus component of magic jar, since you'll be incorporeal and thus unable to touch it.
Core Rulebook: Magic wrote: To cast a spell, you must be able to speak (if the spell has a verbal component), gesture (if it has a somatic component), and manipulate the material components or focus (if any). Additionally, you must concentrate to cast a spell.
So I'll need a ghost touch gauntlet/glove to get around that hurdle?
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DaedalusV wrote: So I'll need a ghost touch gauntlet/glove to get around that hurdle? Seems like it. Cool combo though. I dig the imagery of a single spectral gauntlet.
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The Magic Jar gem focus does not have to be in your possession. In fact, the spell specifically states you do not even have to have line-of-effect to it, only that it has to be within range.
Technically no, since all a ghost touch weapon does is allow you to deal full damage to incorporeal creatures, or allow an incorporeal creature to move it and attack with it normally, but as a GM I'd allow it. You'll need to talk with yours.
EDIT: Brf is right. I can't believe I missed that sentence. Yeah, you're fine.
Rikkan wrote: I'm not sure, IIRC the shadow demon is incorporeal and can cast Magic Jar. I believe it bypasses the receptacle completely I'm not sure if that unwritten rule is a feature of it being incorporeal or specific to the creature. Spell like abilities do not require components.
Brf wrote: The Magic Jar gem focus does not have to be in your possession. In fact, the spell specifically states you do not even have to have line-of-effect to it, only that it has to be within range. "To cast the spell, the magic jar must be within spell range and you must know where it is, though you do not need line of sight or line of effect to it. "
Yeah, seems like you're right. So it looks like it's possible, doable and quite legal...
Man... My DM won't know what hit him...
There would have to be a focus, even for a SLA. Otherwise, where would the victim's soul go?
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Thank you all for the feedback and helpfulness. It seems like I'm safe on this one...
I'm going to enjoy solving the ingame dilemma our GM has put our group into (no one believes us when we tell people that vampires are trying to take over the kingdom/city-state we're in. At the moment we're gathered with the ruling body of the different races in the alliance that has made the kingdom.) I'm going to possess a vampire and walk it straight into the meeting in full daylight. Nothing says vampires exist like a burning vampire in the sun...
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Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber; Starfinder Charter Superscriber
DaedalusV wrote: Man... My DM won't know what hit him... I know you probably mean this well and I am not lecturing you, but I have found as both a player and a DM it does not go well when you try and "surprise the DM." I always run these scenarios past the DM if I feel it is a little out there. You may be 100% in the right, but it wastes table time for you and him to argue it out there. Just my two cents!
Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Rikkan wrote: I'm not sure, IIRC the shadow demon is incorporeal and can cast Magic Jar. I believe it bypasses the receptacle completely I'm not sure if that unwritten rule is a feature of it being incorporeal or specific to the creature. It's a specific abilities to the creatures who have that trick, like ghosts. The other problem is that since vampires, like all undead, don't have a life force, you don't have any way of targeting it with the spell from the Jar. Life forces are the only thing you can sense from the jar so there's no way of distinguishing friend from foe.
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The Magic Jar spell says you can tell the difference between a Positive lifeforce, and a Negative lifeforce from underdead.
Quote: ... can determine whether a life force is powered by positive or negative energy. (Undead creatures are powered by negative energy. Only sentient undead creatures have, or are, souls.)
Hendelbolaf wrote: DaedalusV wrote: Man... My DM won't know what hit him... I know you probably mean this well and I am not lecturing you, but I have found as both a player and a DM it does not go well when you try and "surprise the DM." I always run these scenarios past the DM if I feel it is a little out there. You may be 100% in the right, but it wastes table time for you and him to argue it out there. Just my two cents! You're quite right, but since he's been actively trying to hinder my character several times throughout the campaign (eg. I took Craft wondrous items, he railroaded me into an arena run by a succubus, stripping me of all my items, I'm still 20k under WBL 5 levels later) I'm going to use every single spell I know to succeed in foiling the vampire-driven nefarious plot...
I know that usually it's better to coordinate with the DM on what you're about to do, but if I tell him I'm about to try for a Magic Jar posession, the vampire WILL be immune to such shenanigans.
He knows my full spell list.
I asked him if it was possible for us to get a hold of a lesser metamagic rod of threnodic spell, he pretty much nixed that right out of the gate.
Same with a sunblade. We have no cleric in the party and no NPC clerics believe our claims about vampires, neither are they inclined to help us investigate.
So I'm thinking waaay outside the box, trying to crack the proverbial nut here :P
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Pathfinder Adventure Path Subscriber; Starfinder Charter Superscriber
Then game on as he seems a little like a jerk to you (just getting one side of the story mind you) and so you ought to be well within your rights to plan your nefarious scheme!
Good luck!
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Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
DaedalusV wrote: You're quite right, but since he's been actively trying to hinder my character several times throughout the campaign If you actually feel that the DM is targetting you specifically, then you might want to have a one on one private talk.
On the other hand, disallowing "I win" buttons against vampires is reasonable. If a vampire knows his territory, he's not going to allow sunblades to be left lying in a shop for some yokel to pick up. In fact in Ravenloft one of the ways to victory is to recreate a sundered anti-vamp sword. But you have to recover the pieces first.
Brf wrote: There would have to be a focus, even for a SLA. Otherwise, where would the victim's soul go? This is a very interesting general question. Consider also shadow conjuration. What happens if you use Shades to cast Trap The Soul?
@Hendelbolaf
- I don't feel like he's being a jerk, he's just not used to being a GM and have a hard time dealing with the shenanigans a well-built wizard brings to the table. I've tried several times to work WITH him on how to progress, but he usually ends up using my attempts at cooperation against me by filling the holes in his tactics pre-emptively ;) This is going to be the first time I'm keeping my plans to myself.
My main focus is getting the NPCs in the world to understand the very real and dangerous threat the vampires pose towards civilization as they know it.
@LazarX
A LESSER metamagic rod of Threnodic spell is NOT an IWIN button. It's just a tool that makes it possible to actually affect undead with mind-affecting spells. If I had known that the campaign would revolve around vampires and undead, I would have taken Threnodic spell as a feat earlier. (I even had Necromancy as an opposed school until lvl 9)
I would have dropped my Craft Wondrous feat and taken Threnodic spell instead, had I known he would take my stuff (essentially making that feat completely useless)
The Sunblade is an IWIN button vs. vampires yes. But I would have hoped he'd let us quest for it at least...
The vampires work 100% behind the scenes, everyone in the world (we've met) except exactly 2 NPCs have an uncanny lack of interest in our claims and actively disbelieve and riddicule our stories about vampires.
I love the story and the challenge though, so I'm not frustrated (even though I may sound like I am)
I just want our party to succeed in revealing the vampires to the world :D :D
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Hendelbolaf wrote: DaedalusV wrote: Man... My DM won't know what hit him... I know you probably mean this well and I am not lecturing you, but I have found as both a player and a DM it does not go well when you try and "surprise the DM." I always run these scenarios past the DM if I feel it is a little out there. You may be 100% in the right, but it wastes table time for you and him to argue it out there. Just my two cents! I have to agree - tell him about it before hand and tell him you want to make it really cool for the other players.
Forget talking to the GM. Just do it! If he plays with gm fiat with this, then grab your dice, stick them in your pocket, fold up your character sheet, then rip it into pieces and shower the table with confeti and walk away...either a gm let's the players help tell the story, or the gm loses players...its that simple. He needs to be able to adapt to what you do as much as you have to adapt to what he does.
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Shimesen wrote: Forget talking to the GM. Just do it! If he plays with gm fiat with this, then grab your dice, stick them in your pocket, fold up your character sheet, then rip it into pieces and shower the table with confeti and walk away...either a gm let's the players help tell the story, or the gm loses players...its that simple. He needs to be able to adapt to what you do as much as you have to adapt to what he does. Some day I hope someone makes a web series about what a gaming table would look like if people followed this sort of forum advice.
Majuba wrote: Hendelbolaf wrote: DaedalusV wrote: Man... My DM won't know what hit him... I know you probably mean this well and I am not lecturing you, but I have found as both a player and a DM it does not go well when you try and "surprise the DM." I always run these scenarios past the DM if I feel it is a little out there. You may be 100% in the right, but it wastes table time for you and him to argue it out there. Just my two cents! I have to agree - tell him about it before hand and tell him you want to make it really cool for the other players. I could give him the benefit of doubt (again) but up until now, if I have revealed my plans pre-game, he has made sure that the monsters we'd be up against were immune/wouldn't bite the bait or similar metagaming shenanigans. This time I'm going to keep it to myself.
Ever since he realized that our Dwarven fighter has taken the dwarven cleave racial tree, he's made sure to only target him with 1 monster at a time (no matter what we're up against.)
Our Ninja with blindfighting and using smoke bombs to his advantage has lost that advantage since everyone and their grandpa has blindfighting now as well.
It's a great game and he's really learning alot as a GM, but he's overdoing the metagaming a bit IMO (I'm their usual GM, so I'm just enjoying the rare feeling of being a player for once)
I hope the GM realizes that it's not us vs him soon.
What happens if your group doesn't stop the vamps and finds a new adventure?
I know that it is probably an evil act to just walk away from a community in need, but when said community doesn't want the help because they don't perceive the threat as real, what's stopping the adventures from just walking away?
That might put the gm on the def and show him that he can't just block you are every turn. If he wants the story to progress the way he wants it to hell have no choice to have someone believe your groups story about vamps...
Shimesen wrote: Forget talking to the GM. Just do it! If he plays with gm fiat with this, then grab your dice, stick them in your pocket, fold up your character sheet, then rip it into pieces and shower the table with confeti and walk away...either a gm let's the players help tell the story, or the gm loses players...its that simple. He needs to be able to adapt to what you do as much as you have to adapt to what he does. I'm a 30 year old man, I'm not prone to adolescent behavior. Our gaming table is a tight knit group and has been for a looong time. He just needs to realize a couple of things to become a great DM. It's one of his first REAL campaigns (as in, not an AP)
Me and him usually have a great big laugh post-session about the shenanigans happening/not happening due to metagaming from him (and me from time to time. No one's perfect you know).
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randomroll wrote: Shimesen wrote: Forget talking to the GM. Just do it! If he plays with gm fiat with this, then grab your dice, stick them in your pocket, fold up your character sheet, then rip it into pieces and shower the table with confeti and walk away...either a gm let's the players help tell the story, or the gm loses players...its that simple. He needs to be able to adapt to what you do as much as you have to adapt to what he does. Some day I hope someone makes a web series about what a gaming table would look like if people followed this sort of forum advice. GMs would be less apt to use gm fiat just to get what they want...
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DaedalusV wrote: Shimesen wrote: Forget talking to the GM. Just do it! If he plays with gm fiat with this, then grab your dice, stick them in your pocket, fold up your character sheet, then rip it into pieces and shower the table with confeti and walk away...either a gm let's the players help tell the story, or the gm loses players...its that simple. He needs to be able to adapt to what you do as much as you have to adapt to what he does. I'm a 30 year old man, I'm not prone to adolescent behavior. Our gaming table is a tight knit group and has been for a looong time. He just needs to realize a couple of things to become a great DM. It's one of his first REAL campaigns (as in, not an AP)
Me and him usually have a great big laugh post-session about the shenanigans happening/not happening due to metagaming from him (and me from time to time. No one's perfect you know). I'm 27 and also am not prone to acting like a child, but that doesn't mean that its not an effective tool to help get your point across sometimes. My group is also very close and usually very fun and all that too, but none of us are scared to call bulls*** on whoever is GMing at the time. I've called pray to the fiat myself as a GM and had to back off a little when my whole group decided to simply stop being adventures and settle down because i wasn't letting them have much freedom. Player refusal is a powerful tool for education of a gm....
Shimesen wrote: What happens if your group doesn't stop the vamps and finds a new adventure?
I know that it is probably an evil act to just walk away from a community in need, but when said community doesn't want the help because they don't perceive the threat as real, what's stopping the adventures from just walking away?
That might put the gm on the def and show him that he can't just block you are every turn. If he wants the story to progress the way he wants it to hell have no choice to have someone believe your groups story about vamps...
Well. The vampires have captured our bard's love interest (after he confessed to us about trying to poison me, he found her severed hand in his bed)
Our Dwarven fighter is the son of a Dwarven king, We went there earlier in the adventure to find the entire clan slaughtered by Giant-kin, some investigation from us gave us enough evidence to suspect vampire involvement (one of the vampires is a dwarf as well) Now our Dwarven fighter speaks for his clan at the meeting, thus giving us *some* leverage at the political tables
Our Druid has fled from his forest, trying to find help since the forest has been infested by evil (yeah, the vampires are putting up lairs there)
The Ninja was hired to help us escape from the Arena by one of the NPCs who knows the vampires exist, he has tagged along ever since
I'm a cast-out elf who's lived in the main city for years, I found acceptance there and won't easily let the city down, especially when it is threatened by a host of Vampires that have actively threatened me, my friends and everything I hold dear in life.
We're all very invested in the storyline.
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My god, if a player of mine had come up with that scheme to "introduce" vampires to a disbelieving population via a burning bloodsucker at high noon...
I don't know, I think I would have stood up and applauded, or thrown xp at him.
Sounds brilliant, hope your GM rolls with it, If not I think you'd need to roll over to a new GM
Shimesen wrote: DaedalusV wrote: Shimesen wrote: Forget talking to the GM. Just do it! If he plays with gm fiat with this, then grab your dice, stick them in your pocket, fold up your character sheet, then rip it into pieces and shower the table with confeti and walk away...either a gm let's the players help tell the story, or the gm loses players...its that simple. He needs to be able to adapt to what you do as much as you have to adapt to what he does. I'm a 30 year old man, I'm not prone to adolescent behavior. Our gaming table is a tight knit group and has been for a looong time. He just needs to realize a couple of things to become a great DM. It's one of his first REAL campaigns (as in, not an AP)
Me and him usually have a great big laugh post-session about the shenanigans happening/not happening due to metagaming from him (and me from time to time. No one's perfect you know). I'm 27 and also am not prone to acting like a child, but that doesn't mean that its not an effective tool to help get your point across sometimes. My group is also very close and usually very fun and all that too, but none of us are scared to call bulls*** on whoever is GMing at the time. I've called pray to the fiat myself as a GM and had to back off a little when my whole group decided to simply stop being adventures and settle down because i wasn't letting them have much freedom. Player refusal is a powerful tool for education of a gm.... I'm not going to refuse to play along quite yet ;) I'm having loads of fun, but I'm sticking to the plan of NOT telling him my plans this time since it wil force his hand just as much as if we just went and did something else. It'll be impossible for him to have the NPCs deny the existence of the vampire threat if every dignitary invited to the big meeting we're having sees a vampire burning up in the sun right in front of them.
The plan's only weakness is that it hinges on one solitary will save. That's why I'm wanting the threnodic spell metamagic rod (so the bard can debuff the vamp's will saves) Our ninja is trying to develop an anti-vampire poison using garlic extract (hoping the GM will let it debuff the vamp's will save as well)
The Magic Jar DC is @ DC 24 atm, I'm hoping we can debuff the vampire with -2 to -4 on it's will save. And I'm hoping the GM will allow a hero point or two to further maximize our chances. (1-2 hero points to spontaneously manifest my magic jar with the persistent spell metamagic would be awesomesauce)
i'm all for your plan. i truely hope it works. but when your GM says "when you walk your vampire into the sun nothing happens" all i can say is told ya so... its not hard to make a vamp immune to sunlight and its really not hard if you just want to ruin a good move by a player.
i've never played with your group, so i cant speak as to what your gm might or might not do, but if it were my GM and i did this and he was intentionally trying to keep the vamps a secret for some storyline purpose and we exposed them like this, he'd probably say the game was over and have to re-write the rest of the campaign or just start a new one. sometimes certain things are a cornerstone of the campaign, and by altering something that must remain a constant, you unravel everything without intending to. perhaps you should ask if this is one of those situations before attempting to do something the GM will ultimately make fail for the sake of the story.
DaedalusV wrote: Majuba wrote: Hendelbolaf wrote: DaedalusV wrote: Man... My DM won't know what hit him... I know you probably mean this well and I am not lecturing you, but I have found as both a player and a DM it does not go well when you try and "surprise the DM." I always run these scenarios past the DM if I feel it is a little out there. You may be 100% in the right, but it wastes table time for you and him to argue it out there. Just my two cents! I have to agree - tell him about it before hand and tell him you want to make it really cool for the other players. I could give him the benefit of doubt (again) but up until now, if I have revealed my plans pre-game, he has made sure that the monsters we'd be up against were immune/wouldn't bite the bait or similar metagaming shenanigans. This time I'm going to keep it to myself.
Ever since he realized that our Dwarven fighter has taken the dwarven cleave racial tree, he's made sure to only target him with 1 monster at a time (no matter what we're up against.)
Our Ninja with blindfighting and using smoke bombs to his advantage has lost that advantage since everyone and their grandpa has blindfighting now as well.
It's a great game and he's really learning alot as a GM, but he's overdoing the metagaming a bit IMO (I'm their usual GM, so I'm just enjoying the rare feeling of being a player for once)
I hope the GM realizes that it's not us vs him soon. This is fundamentally poor game mastery. As in completely failing to do the job. GM's taking satisfaction from "winning vs. the players" are just as foolish as being proud you beat the three-year-old at tic-tac-toe - the three-year-old literally cannot win. The primary responsibility of a GM is to ensure the players have fun. Engineering every enemy to be immune to all of the PC's abilities seems the exact opposite of fun. If you need to craft an elaborate tactic structure that's so unusual that you need to poll an internet forum to get evidence it's "legal" just to counter the GM's behavior, that game has gone off the rails. Your GM needs a boot to the head or probably better a very direct "this is not how its done" statement from all the players.
Regardless of whether this helps you or not, please come back and let us know how it goes/went.
Dotted because cool combo.
Scavion wrote: Rikkan wrote: I'm not sure, IIRC the shadow demon is incorporeal and can cast Magic Jar. I believe it bypasses the receptacle completely I'm not sure if that unwritten rule is a feature of it being incorporeal or specific to the creature. It's a spell like ability for them and therefore doesn't require components. I wasn't talking about the components. Yes it does not need a gem to cast the spell since it is a SLA, but that doesn't negate the text in the spell that requires you to use a receptacle (which doesn't have to be the same gem as the focus).
*Post Session Update*
Hi all. For those interested..
Our bard had to go to a planned meeting with one of the vampires at night (he had failed at his coherced betrayal of the group, so the vampire wanted to meet with him to give him new orders)
A few hours before the meeting, the party gathered. Before doing anything else, I used Detect Scrying, and we all made some perception checks to make sure we were unobserved by magical and mundane means. I laid out part of the plan, told the others that I would follow the bard closely in shadow form, gliding along the ground, as if I was his shadow.
We had the fighter and druid stay at home, guarding my body while me and the bard would meet the vampire.
Our ninja would shadow us from a distance as well (he's a stealth specialist, and he would drink a potion of invisibility when we got near the destination)
So... The bard walked along, seemingly quite alone, to a planned meeting with the vampire... The vampire somehow spotted me or the ninja and fled the scene before we ever got close enough to roll initiative or even notice him.
Looks like even the best laid plans are foiled by DM fiat induced omniscience.
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This feels like a cornerstone or something he is desperately trying to keep quiet. I would ask if this is a campaign cornerstone as mentioned above. That or being a less than confident GM are the only two reasons I can think of for this kind of thing.
Choon wrote: This feels like a cornerstone or something he is desperately trying to keep quiet. I would ask if this is a campaign cornerstone as mentioned above. That or being a less than confident GM are the only two reasons I can think of for this kind of thing. Well... After the vampire fled, we returned to the encampment, roused as many as we could and went to the vampire's lair where we managed to knock it to 0 hitpoints, get it into it's coffin and got the coffin to the encampment where we could show everyone that the vampires exist.
The thing that annoys me isn't the story as such, it's the railroad through a preset way of doing things he wants us to experience.
It feels like we have to follow a set path, otherwise nothing really works.
Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
You said he's GMd APs before, right?
Sounds to me as though he's got his plotline in place and won't allow anything to disrupt it (see also, The Dummy's Guide to Railroading).
He needs to figure out that adapting to player ingenuity is a necessary skill for GMs.
Rule 1: No plan will survive contact with the players.
He really needs to learn and understand that this is not a bad thing.
(I would write more, now, but my 3-year old wants to play a game on my iPad... back later!)
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