Teleportation, gates, and the Astral Plane

[AwesomenessDog]

If I attempt to follow a BBEG that opens a gate to his own demiplane with my own planar shift to follow, his plane is incredibly small and it is guaranteed that I will end the shift well outside the limits of the demiplane. Do I end up in the Astral Plane or do I (and my party) take the shunting damage for moving all the way back into the normal limits of the Demiplane (1d6/5ft)?

[Hark]

Been a very long time since I looked into this kind of thing. I would personally rule you arrive safely on the demiplane.

Stuff may have changed but back in ancient times demiplane were located on the ethereal plane. My alternative would be to deposit to group in the ethereal plane.

[AwesomenessDog]

Hark wrote:

Been a very long time since I looked into this kind of thing. I would personally rule you arrive safely on the demiplane.

Stuff may have changed but back in ancient times demiplane were located on the ethereal plane. My alternative would be to deposit to group in the ethereal plane.

From what I remembered, which is more than likely wrong to varying degrees, is that the astral plane connected all planes (like a darkspace for planes) so that's where I figured you would potentially wind up. If it is the ethereal plane or some other plane, then replace astral plane with whatever that would be instead of astral plane.

[Paulicus]

I might just restrict the maximum offset to the plane.

Actually, plane shift requires a focus attuned to that plane. Even though by silly-RAW you have the focus required for every personal demiplane ever in a spell component pouch, I'd rule that you don't have such foci unless you've explicitly created/acquired it.

Keep in mind that ruling would keep baddies from freely invading your own demiplane as well. ;)

Edit: makes for some interesting and thematic loot when you kill a BBEG. Follow-up adventure hook in his personal domain. ;)

[AwesomenessDog]

Paulicus wrote:

I might just restrict the maximum offset to the plane.

Actually, plane shift requires a focus attuned to that plane. Even though by silly-RAW you have the focus required for every personal demiplane ever in a spell component pouch, I'd rule that you don't have such foci unless you've explicitly created/acquired it.

Keep in mind that ruling would keep baddies from freely invading your own demiplane as well. ;)

Edit: makes for some interesting and thematic loot when you kill a BBEG. Follow-up adventure hook in his personal domain. ;)

Counter proposal, party rogue nicked his components pouch which he refreshed from his demiplane.

Should he die from shunting when hunting you to your plane, where does his gear pop up?

Let's hope he made it permanent.

[Paulicus]

That's exactly what I mean by explicitly obtaining the focus. :)

There's no specific line about damage from "shunting" in plane shift (I believe that's teleport). Possibly because of tiny demiplanes specifically.

[AwesomenessDog]

But isn't plane shift a more advanced form of teleportation?Teleportation says you do the same thing except that its limited to the plane you started on and a more confined destination area.

Also from Magic

Magic: Conjuration (Teleportation) wrote:

Teleportation is instantaneous travel through the Astral Plane. Anything that blocks astral travel also blocks teleportation.

That's where I got astral plane from earlier.

[Guru-Meditation]

The shun-damage is specific to those spells.

Not to magically moving from place to place in general.

[.seth]

if plane shift worked like teleport then wouldn't you have needed to scry his demiplane to avoid landing inside terrain obstacles?

[Kayerloth]

I'd say you'd be unable to follow the BBEG unless you had an appropriately tuned Fork (or he created a permanent Gate specifically to access it, a possibility with the Greater version).

Shunting language occurs in the text of Blink (a transmutation school spell). It is also not so much the result of ending up "off target" as having the misfortune to blink into the material plane (from the ethereal) while within a solid area of the material plane while trying to move through the solid area from one open area to another. Note that even with teleportation being off target in and of itself does not incur damage. That happens only on a "mishap" result.

Demiplanes (at least the ones created by the standard family of spells) are within either the astral or ethereal planes when created and must be created while on the ethereal, astral or a plane coexistent with them (usually by not exclusively the Material)

Also note that if the BBEG's demiplane expired while you were on it you are ejected to the nearest plane (usually the astral or ethereal). No mention is made of any damage happening. The BBEG also has the option of attempting to eject a creature as a standard action which may be resisted by a Will save. Follow him and he may very well turn right around and start ejecting the more problematic members of the party.

It's also technically an extradimensional space with all that entails (such as closing off access to extradimensional gear such as Bags or Holding or Handy Haversacks etc. or accidentally creating a rift if it happens to be a Portable Hole :p. I suspect this is a widely overlooked bit of rule (particularly when it's the parties demiplane).

[AwesomenessDog]

Guru, While by RAW yes, but as this is far from a RAW thing to happen, clarification is needed to be made.

.seth, no, because all you need with plane shift is the fork, which for the sake of argument we have since no rule on attuning forks is given. Also it's guaranteed that you ill land outside the demiplane anyway so don't need to scry.

Kayerloth, As mentioned above, we are assuming PCs have the fork since no player otherwise knows how to get one for any plane. Shunting damage isn't only prevalent there, it's used for any for of moving through objects where a magic spell ended with player inside stuff, so that's why I proposed it as a potential substitute should one not exist. When you are ejected, it is similar but not entirely the same as missing the plane, one is a "conscious" moving of something out of the plane through teleportation the other being basically a mishap. And while we all enjoy the fun of Atomic arrows with portable holes and handy haversacks, were going to assume catastrophic failure isn't a worry.

[Kayerloth]

Research (spells/divinations, libraries, sages etc.) is how I'd work what fork is needed for a given plane though finding one as unique as needed for a particular created demiplane is probably a leaning towards the difficult to 'own separate adventure' sort of thing (or the excellent idea of just *cough* borrowing it from the BBEG). And at some point the BBEG themselves had to figure out what Fork was needed.

As for extradimensional, well as I said I'm guessing most folks kind of ignore that particular twist but I'd also hazard that any campaign that doesn't has already dealt with the issue since bumping into extradimensional spaces has been occurring since Rope Trick so hopefully no catastrophic atomic failure is imminent.

If you assume you do Plane Shift and end up 5 to 500 miles outside the demiplane I would personally not inflict any 'shunting' damage but place your party somewhere within the sphere of the appropriate size on whichever plane (astral or ethereal) is appropriate. And from there you'd have to travel/adventure to where the demiplane is coterminous to the astral (or ethereal) and cross the boundary somehow depending on what sort of demiplane the BBEG had and what works story wise. Either way you are in the area of the 'GM gets to make it up' territory.