A line of effect is a straight, unblocked path that indicates what a spell can affect. A line of effect is canceled by a solid barrier. It's like line of sight for ranged weapons, except that it's not blocked by fog, darkness, and other factors that limit normal sight. A line of effect starts from any corner of your square and extends to the limit of its range or until it strikes a barrier that would block it. A line-shaped spell affects all creatures in squares through which the line passes.
Line of Sight
A line of sight is the same as a Line of Effect but with the additional restriction that that it is blocked by fog, darkness, and other factors that limit normal sight (such as Concealment).
According to the Line of Sight description, all concealment would block Line of Sight. Even though the description of Concealing Amorpha mentions that you are visible, you are still distorted and granted concealment. So that means you would be unable to target someone with Concealing Amorpha if the spell requires Line of Sight.
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From the description of Concealing Amorpha:
You weave a quasi-real membrane around yourself. You remain visible within the translucent, amorphous enclosure. This distortion grants you concealment (opponents have a 20% miss chance), thanks to the rippling membrane encasing your form. You can pick up or drop objects, easily reaching through the film. Anything you hold is enveloped by the amorpha. Likewise, you can engage in melee, make ranged attacks, and manifest powers without hindrance.Line of Effect/Line of Sight:
Line of EffectA line of effect is a straight, unblocked path that indicates what a spell can affect. A line of effect is canceled by a solid barrier. It's like line of sight for ranged weapons, except that it's not blocked by fog, darkness, and other factors that limit normal sight. A line of effect starts from any corner of your square and extends to the limit of its range or until it strikes a barrier that would block it. A line-shaped spell affects all creatures in squares through which the line passes.
Line of Sight
A line of sight is the same as a Line of Effect but with the additional restriction that that it is blocked by fog, darkness, and other factors that limit normal sight (such as Concealment).
According to the Line of Sight description, all concealment would block Line of Sight. Even though the description of Concealing Amorpha mentions that you are visible, you are still distorted and granted concealment. So that means you would be unable to target someone with Concealing Amorpha if the spell requires Line of Sight.
Maybe you should look Concealment for the full rule:
Total Concealment: If you have line of effect to a target but not line of sight, he is considered to have total concealment from you. You can't attack an opponent that has total concealment, though you can attack into a square that you think he occupies. A successful attack into a square occupied by an enemy with total concealment has a 50% miss chance (instead of the normal 20% miss chance for an opponent with concealment).
You need total concealment to block LoS. The membrane only give 20% miss chance, not total concealment.
So in OP's case, with Greater Concealing Amorpha, it would still block LoS in either case.
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@Diego Rossi
Ah, yes. When one reads the description of Total Concealment there is an apparant conjunction to be made. No LoS = Total Concealment.
Should I then have read
"A line of sight is the same as a Line of Effect but with the additional restriction that that it is blocked by fog, darkness, and other factors that limit normal sight (such as Concealment)."
as
"A line of sight is the same as a Line of Effect but with the additional restriction that that it is blocked by fog, darkness, and other factors that limit normal sight (such as Total Concealment)."?
For future reference, is concealment in text always refering to total concealment, or was this case a self-explanatory one?
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Line of sight isn't a subset of line of effect, they are independent. For example:
If a One-Way Window is placed on a door to see into the room beyond, then the user has line of sight, but not line of effect.
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So in OP's case, with Greater Concealing Amorpha, it would still block LoS in either case.
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@Diego Rossi
Ah, yes. When one reads the description of Total Concealment there is an apparant conjunction to be made. No LoS = Total Concealment.
Should I then have read
"A line of sight is the same as a Line of Effect but with the additional restriction that that it is blocked by fog, darkness, and other factors that limit normal sight (such as Concealment)."
as
"A line of sight is the same as a Line of Effect but with the additional restriction that that it is blocked by fog, darkness, and other factors that limit normal sight (such as Total Concealment)."?
For future reference, is concealment in text always refering to total concealment, or was this case a self-explanatory one?
Generally concealment mean all level of concealment, as an example you need concealment to use stealth, but the 20% kind is enough (but look the FAQ about blur, Concealing Amorpha should work the same way, I think).
The above reference probably was meant to be read as (such as concealment [link to the concealment rules where you find the complete text]).Changing it to Total concealment would be a good idea, but it require an errata and a new printing of the rules.
I don't have the text of the greater version of that spell, but does it still say that you're visible? If that's the case, it might be more like Displacement, which is just a miss chance and doesn't stop targeting.
Maybe.
Crimeo...
magic chapter under aiming spell
Target or Targets: Some spells have a target or targets. You cast these spells on creatures or objects, as defined by the spell itself. You must be able to see or touch the target, and you must specifically choose that target. You do not have to select your target until you finish casting the spell.
"Targets with total concealment" is undeniably a more specific group than "all targets in general." Specific > General.Crimeo...
magic chapter under aiming spell
Target or Targets: Some spells have a target or targets. You cast these spells on creatures or objects, as defined by the spell itself. You must be able to see or touch the target, and you must specifically choose that target. You do not have to select your target until you finish casting the spell.
An outright statement from the rules > an agument put together from different sections of the rules. You explicitly need to see someone to target them with a spell, whereas attacks are being used in two entirely different contexts in different places in the rules.
An outright statement from the rules > an argument put together from different sections of the rules.Says who?
You have an argument that the rules say the exact opposite of what the rules say. Its not a bad argument, but its still a question of who am I going to believe, your or my own eyes.
(The answer is my own eyes)
So do you. You're arguing the rules say you need LOS which is the exact opposite of other rules that say you don't.
No.
You must be able to see or touch the target, and you must specifically choose that target
is what the rules say. It is not what I'm arguing the rules say, its not what I'm concluding the rules say, its not what I'm paraphrasing it as. It actually IS what the rules say.
all such spells are eligible to be launched blindly into a square you guess has an opponent, and can hit if you guessed right + passed 50% flip is YOUR conclussion. Not the rules. Those are vastly different things and you need to accept that.
For the amount of time you spend on the rules forum, I'm a bit surprised you haven't noticed this happening in like, 1 out of 3 threads ever.
It has been noticed. I call it the assumption of perfection and its usually only a problem when there are two competing arguments from the rules. Argument vs argument is a legitimate rules discussion. Argument vs statement from the rules is bambi vs godsillia.
(You do not get to be the reptile in that analogy. Rar.)
Luckily, by the the fundamental logical nature of RPG exceptions-based rulesets
The rules are not written that tightly. Far, far, far from it. This simply doesn't work.
specific rules MUST trump general ones for anything to make sense, and in this case, one of the two equally black and white rules is more general: the one about needing LOS. So the situation is solved. It loses.
You do not have two black and white rules in opposition to each other. You have a black and white rule that says you're wrong, and an argument relying on a possible case of equivocation in order to have an irreconcilable contradiction. If the choices are that the rules are borked or the person arguing made a mistake in their reasoning, go with the latter.
(Whereas "things written in one place > two" I've not heard before in my life and is definitely not fundamentally logically required for the system)
Thats not what I said. And sorry, but people claiming things I didn't say seems to be this weeks theme. What I said was that things written explicitly are > things you interpret. My entire point is that things you interpret is NOT the same as things written in two places because its entirely possible that your interpretation is wrong.
Even though thats not what i said, you HAVE heard "things written in one place > two" before and its usually refereed to as context. In this case the word attack has different meanings in different places. A section describing combat uses it one way, the invisibility spell uses it another. For example, shooting an arrow at a rope bridge while invisible is an attack but not an attack. (Ohmmmmm)
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Crimeo is wrong (again), BigNorseWolf is correct. To cast an on-target spell you must have line of sight, not "line of sight to where they are concealed" (which means you don't have line of sight to them, simply whatever is concealing them).
(Core 197) Total Concealment: If you have line of effect to a target but not line of sight, he is considered to have total concealment from you. You can’t attack an opponent that has total concealment, though you can attack into a square that you think he occupies. A successful attack into a square occupied by an enemy with total concealment has a 50% miss chance (instead of the normal 20% miss chance for an opponent with concealment).
So you can shoot your ray at where you think they are, but not your magic missile or charm person. I hope this is where we are here. Spells with attack rolls work like weapons with regard to concealment.
(Core 214 Rays) As with a ranged weapon, you can fire into the dark or at an invisible creature and hope you hit something.
Crimeo suffers from a bad case of equivocation.
@CampinCarl - I appreciate you.
Oooh, that word is marvelously apt for describing him.
It's always nice to feel appreciated!
Ok, I see now. We had a case of inappropriate rule touching. Ray rules are different from target rules.
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"Targets with total concealment" is undeniably a more specific group than "all targets in general." Specific > General.
crimeo you stopped too early
it goes: all targets < targets with concealment < target of the spell being cast
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you CAN attack without seeing somebody.
Nothing is inferred here, nothing "interpreted" (at least not any less directly than one could say your quote is "interpreted")
This is incorrect.
First off You are assuming that the word attack means the same exact thing in two different chapters in two vastly different contexts and it does not. If that were the case you would lose levels every time you walked down a flight of stairs. More directly, is shooting an arrow at a rope bridge while invisible an attack?
So it's a direct contradiction, and you resolve those first if possible by choosing the more specific one. Which is that you can attack the concealed targets.
Secondly whats more specific is more than a little arbitrary. Specific trumping general is a guideline, not an iron clad guarantee.
Thirdly, there is a perfectly valid way to read the rules if you're wrong, there is NO way for you to be right without some of the rules being total nonsense.
Last and not least, you're assuming that because you can attack a square you can attack the person in it rather than attacking the square granting you a 50 50 chance to hit something inside it. They clearly don't work by the same rules.
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If that were the case you would lose levels every time you walked down a flight of stairs.
Yes of course if you reductively and mindlessly take any cognate in English and equate them, like *Crimeo*, you will get silly results.
Fixed that for you.
Targeted spells require line of sight. It's pretty clear.
Stay classy, rules forum. ;P
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Targeted spells require line of sight. It's pretty clear.Agreed. And attacks that target concealed opponents do not require line of sight. It's also quite clear.
So, to be perfectly clear here, you are of the opinion that it is legal to cast magic missile at an invisible goblin, so long as you take 50% miss chance? And then magic missile works 100% of the time, 50% of the time.
Your reductive argument and logic is good debate fodder, but you're arguing basically that the rules say that that the rules allow you to ignore the rules. The whole thing is kind of like an acid trip in a courtroom. (To be avoided)
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It goes all targets < targets with concealment < targets [with concealment] of the spell being castThis is correct. So if any spell mentions in its own text that it requires LOS, then yes, you need LOS again.
I can't really think of any that do off the top of my head, but I'm sure there are, and if they do, yes.
Maybe you should read the Target line in the spell description?
You know, like:Magic Missile
Targets up to five creatures, no two of which can be more than 15 ft. apart
Oops, it say that it target creatures, not squares.
What say the rule about total concealment?
Total Concealment: If you have line of effect to a target but not line of sight, he is considered to have total concealment from you. You can't attack an opponent that has total concealment, though you can attack into a square that you think he occupies. A successful attack into a square occupied by an enemy with total concealment has a 50% miss chance (instead of the normal 20% miss chance for an opponent with concealment).
So what we have? A generic rule that say that you can't attack a creature with total concealment but you can attack his square and a specific rule that say that with that specific spell you you can only target a creature (or in some instance, an object).
Specific trump general, but the specific is the targeting line of the specific spell.
Selective Channeling: Do I have to be able to see a creature in order to exclude them from the effect of my channeled energy?Just like using a Target: creature spell, you must be able to see or touch a creature to affect it (or, in the case of this feat, select it to be unaffected).
Pinpointing the square of an invisible creature isn't sufficient—you must be able to see or touch the creature.
Although the question is about selective channeling, the answer is pretty clear here.
It goes all targets < targets with concealment < targets [with concealment] of the spell being castMaybe you should read the Target line in the spell description?
You know, like:Magic Missile
Targets up to five creatures, no two of which can be more than 15 ft. apartOops, it say that it target creatures, not squares.
So what we have? A generic rule that say that you can't attack a creature with total concealment but you can attack his square and a specific rule that say that with that specific spell you you can only target a creature (or in some instance, an object).
Specific trump general, but the specific is the targeting line of the specific spell.
This is what i was trying to say Crimeo, the target of the spell is far more specific than the general rule about concealment.
You can't magic missile an invisible person, but you can lob a bomb at the square you think they might be in.