I have been thinking about this topic a lot recently due an Aasimar character I have that took the Celestial Servant feat. She has a Celestial horse and the feat actually changes it's type to Magical Beast.
So the Knowledge skill rules tell us that we use Knowledge: Arcana to identify Magical Beasts. It does seem a bit odd in this circumstance as you would think a Celestial critter would be identified with Knowledge: Planes but such is not the case.
So, does that mean it is no longer identifiable as a horse? I am torn on this. I know the rules say that things are identifiable by their type. So by RAW I would think it really isn't identifiable as a horse anymore because it isn't even an animal.
I could see a Commoner with a rank in Knowledge: Nature saying, "Nope. Definitely not a horse er even an animal. See the light comin outta it's nostrils and from behind it's eyes? Yep, that thar critter ain't natural. Don't know what it is but it certainly aint no horse."
I could also see the reverse. Take a Dwarf Zombie as an example. It is no longer identified with Knowledge: Local. It is identified with Knowledge: Religion. But are you telling me that when you see a stocky humanoid Zombie with a long beard that it is unreasonable to make a Knowledge: Local check to know that it was once a Dwarf?
There is obviously some gray area here. We all know about the Vampires that like to masquerade as ... not Vampires. If it were possible to know that they definitely are no longer identifiable as a humanoid because they don't ping on your Knowledge: Local meter anymore then how do they do this? Same goes for any number of other fantasy races trying to pass themselves off as human. Like Aasimar, Tiefling, Undine or any of the other elemental races.
I know that the Disguise skill exists for when you want your X to look like a Y. But what if you aren't trying to disguise anything and are just trying to gauge NPC reactions? In other words: would I need to use disguise on my Celestial horse to avoid people from knowing it is Celestial if I don't want them to? What if I DO want it to look different? I know it must look somewhat different or it wouldn't require a different Knowledge skill to identify it.
Please keep in mind that my particular conundrum is with a PFS character. While I am interested in personal opinions on this topic I would appreciate it if you tagging which things you are saying is your personal opinion on how you would rule on something and which you believe is the RAW interpretation and why.
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I'm with N N 959. The Knowledge rules are oversimplified in this respect, and my group house-rules in things like letting people identify the base creature of templated creatures like vampire dwarves or celestial horses, or letting someone know that it looks like a particular creature type but isn't. This won't work in PFS, and you'll need Disguise to pass. Unless...
There is obviously some gray area here. We all know about the Vampires that like to masquerade as ... not Vampires. If it were possible to know that they definitely are no longer identifiable as a humanoid because they don't ping on your Knowledge: Local meter anymore then how do they do this? Same goes for any number of other fantasy races trying to pass themselves off as human. Like Aasimar, Tiefling, Undine or any of the other elemental races.
These races do all now have a racial trait that, among other things, allows them to pass for human without the disguise skill. The original was for Aasimar, but they all got their own versions in Inner Sea Races.
Note the wording on the genie is slightly different but I'm pretty sure it should work the same way:
Weirdo: I dunno, with all of the talk about sending PCs to the stables I'm not certain that many DMs think the text you posted is anything more than fluff.
See, the reason I am asking is because Tonya said that "KN:Nature says its a funky horse. KN:Arcana says its a magical horse."
Part of me can understand the reason why she would say that. But part of me that bothers because I know that the rules say that isn't how it works. Knowledge skills say you have to use the appropriate Knowledge skill to identify a creature according to it's Type (Magical Beast). If that wasn't the case not only would Knowledge skills be broken down by Type but there wouldn't be Disguise skill modifiers to trying to look like a different Type.
But, like I said, I can see some things being known without the appropriate Knowledge skills. Like knowing that the stout bearded Zombie used to be a Dwarf.
As an example:
If an enemy Druid identified the Celestial horse with "KN:Nature says its a funky horse." would they know not to try casting Charm Animal on it? I mean would they be thinking, "Wait... that isn't a horse at all." Or would the know right away because they do not have the appropriate Knowledge skill to identify it and would be more like, "Hm, I don't know WHAT that thing is but with the amount I know about animals I can be assured it sure isn't one of them. So I'm not even going to try my Charm Animal on it."
Likewise with an enemy Wizard using Knowledge: Arcana. He would surely be able to identify it as a Magical Beast but would he know about any of the horse aspects of it? Other than basic equine aesthetic features does it even possess horse aspects? Would he be able to tell the Druid not to waste his spell on it? Or would he not quite know because it looks sorta horseish?
Or is it a little of both? Like the Knowledge: Nature tells you all the horseish stuff including that it definitely isn't a horse while not being entirely unlike a horse while Knowledge: Arcana tells you all the Magical Beastish stuff including that while it looks horseish that is where the similarities end. And then Knowledge: The Planes walks in all jealous talking about how Celestial things belong to it but this is for some reason the weird exception that doesn't apply.
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The link doesn't point to that statement by Tonya, so I can't see context.
You are correct that it is not exactly RAW that Kn:Nature would tell you that a celestial horse is a "funky horse", though it fits the way I think most people would actually handle it at table (my group included) and I would not be surprised if that also happens in PFS. Certainly, I'd expect to see the creature described as "looks like a horse" even if you're not able to identify it.
RAW, if you make a Kn:Nature check to identify a celestial horse, you will fail to identify it. There is no mis-identification, so all you know is "I don't know what that is." If you have a high enough skill/roll, you may be able to infer that it's not an animal. (As you said: "Hm, I don't know WHAT that thing is but with the amount I know about animals I can be assured it sure isn't one of them. So I'm not even going to try my Charm Animal on it.")
I believe the RAW actually would give you horse traits from Kn:Arcana since it tells you about the creature, not just the template. You would also definitely know the creature type so you'd know it's not an animal.
Weirdo: I dunno, with all of the talk about sending PCs to the stables I'm not certain that many DMs think the text you posted is anything more than fluff.
Could you explain? I can't understand the "stables" comment aside from some reference to an eidolon (and the rule that it "appears like a fantastical creature"?).
The text on the aasimar and tiefling versions is quite explicit, and I don't see why a very vague statement about eidolon appearance would influence your interpretation of the much more strongly worded geniekin trait which is also very clearly analagous to the tiefling/aasimar version.
Weirdo: I think your reasoning is much like mine on how it normally should be run.
1. If you don't have the appropriate Knowledge check then you can't identify the creature. ie. any commoner with a single rank in Knowledge: Nature would know what a horse is. But most commoners don't have Knowledge: Arcana so they wouldn't even get a check on a Magical Beast.
2. If you can't make a check on a creature then you don't know what it is.
3. If you can make a check on the creature then you have to use the appropriate Knowledge skill and then you could get info about both it's base creature and it's Type as well as specific information about this creature. A failed Knowledge check might give misinformation about any of this.
4. Using an inappropriate Knowledge skill would give you none of this information.
Regarding sending PCs to the stables there was a comment made in the linked thread about a human looking Eidolon (with Disguise skill and all) masquerading as the PC's wife being denied entry into an inn and told they have to wait in the stables while the Tiefling Alchemist with an extra hand and tentacle was allowed in. It relates to the use of the disguise skill in order to make a creature look more like something else, even a different Type and how that relates to the Knowledge skill to identify it.
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1) Don't forget that Knowledge checks with a DC of 10 or lower can be made untrained, and that the DC for especially common creatures is generally 5 + CR. So a commoner from almost any nation in Avistan shouldn't need ranks to identify a horse.
2) Agreed.
3) For a templated or slightly-altered version of such a common creature, I'd probably let them make a Knowledge check to ID the base form (depending on the template or alteration). They'd get no info about the things that make it different, though. That's how I'd approach it personally - expect table variation.
I'm not sure that there's any rules support for getting misinformation on a failed Knowledge check. If there is, please pass it along; I may have missed it.
4) Also agreed.
It doesn't say anything about a failed check leading to misinformation.
The rules for Skill Checks states, "Some tasks have varying levels of success and failure depending on how much your check is above or below the required DC." With a failure on a Knowledge check what does that mean? I can tell you that many GMs will tell you that if you fail bad enough that you actually have misinformation. I have literally seen it happen hundreds of times.
This isn't RAW, this is the PFS Coordinator trying to make an official ruling. Basically she's telling everyone that if you have a Magical Beast, the "description" of the animal must start with the base creature. The fact that she's allowing K-Nature to bring back info is, once again, not RAW. Per RAW, the K-Nature would bring back nothing. But that isn't sensible, so it's reasonable that K-Nature would tell you that it looks like a horse, but there's something definitely not normal about it. The idea is that you're using K-Nature to tell you that its physical form is closest to a horse.
Well, as far as PFS goes what she says goes regardless of how sound her ruling is by RAW. I entirely agree with you that using the wrong Knowledge skill to identify a creature goes against RAW but in PFS it no longer matters. If Tonya says something on a board it is a rule that must be followed.
My personal opinion is that you don't need a Knowledge check to see that it looks like a horse. You got eyes for that. Maybe a Perception check if the lighting is bad. You might also notice some other qualities about it. Like a glow coming from behind it's eyes and inside it's nostrils, a feathered mane, etc. But you wouldn't know what to make of those features without an appropriate Knowledge check. And Knowledge: Nature is not the appropriate Knowledge check to get you anything on a Magic Beast. You get nothing from a Knowledge: Nature check that you can't see with your eyes. Knowledge: Arcana is what you would need to get any info on the critter before you. That skill would tell you what it is. The only thing that Knowledge: Nature might tell you is that you don't have the appropriate Knowledge check to identify this creature.
Let's say you rolled a 20 on K-Nature. The GM should tell you, "It looks like a horse, but you're pretty sure it's not an actual horse and you don't know what it really is." So no, the K-check using the wrong skill won't tell you what it is, just that you can't identify it. Consider that if you rolled a 10 and the DC was 12, the GM might say, "it looks like the horse, but you aren't sure."
Yep. That looks like the slightly shorter way of saying what I just described above. It looks like we agree on this.
Tonya says that in PFS, you must describe the creature based on its base type. That description is independent of any K-check. In other words, a celestial horse cannot be described as a griffon.
First of all, please back off the griffon bit. No one is trying to describe a horse as a griffon. That is clearly against the rules as has been pointed out several times in another thread.
I can agree that the creative description of the critter has to start with the base form. The problem is that with it no longer being identifiable as that base form there has to be visual differences between the two enough to make someone no longer be able to identify it as that base form.
You MUST agree with this as your view is a bit more extreme than mine. You said that even a failed Knowledge check cannot give you misinformation. So that means even if someone used Knowledge: Nature to identify the Celestial horse Magical Beast and failed that there is no way that they could mistake it as a horse. Seriously... how do you reconcile those two points?
1. It has to look exactly like a horse and nothing else.
2. Your failed Knowledge check using the incorrect Knowledge skill to identify it cannot tell you that it is a horse.
One of those two points cannot be correct. Either there has to be visual queues to distinguish it from NOT looking like a horse or a failed Knowledge check using the incorrect Knowledge skill could misidentify it as a horse.
Unless I miss my mark, I think you and I both disagree just as strongly that the limits of describing your Magical Beast Celestial horse stop at "looks like a horse". Am I right? It has to look different enough from a horse to not be mistakenly identified as one with the inappropriate Knowledge skill. We are both on the same page on this?
That is what the discussion about using the Disguise skill is about: to look like a different race than you are. In other words trying to make a Celestial horse look like a horse would require a Disguise check. You would get a -2 for looking like a different race. I would think that being an entirely different creature Type would qualify as at least a different race. IMO a greater negative might be in order.
The only problem with this is that Disguise is opposed to Perception. That would only make you think that it is a horse rather than a Celestial horse that is a Magical Beast. I suppose at that point a character would make a Knowledge check using the incorrect Knowledge skill if they wanted to know more about this creature and they believed it was a horse. Same thing would go for gussying up that Dwarven Zombie and making it look like a normal Dwarf that isn't Undead at all.
The main point of identifying creatures with knowledge skills is to figure out their special abilities. If a creature’s type changes they usually do not retain the original abilities. Perception is what is used to figure out what something looks like.
So in the case of the celestial horse you could make a simple perception roll to determine it looks like a horse. If you have knowledge arcane you realize may that it is a magic horse and may figure out exactly what it is and its abilities. I would also allow a knowledge nature roll vs the difficulty of a horse to realize it is not actually a horse. The last part may not be RAW but it makes sense.
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It doesn't say anything about a failed check leading to misinformation.The rules for Skill Checks states, "Some tasks have varying levels of success and failure depending on how much your check is above or below the required DC." With a failure on a Knowledge check what does that mean? I can tell you that many GMs will tell you that if you fail bad enough that you actually have misinformation. I have literally seen it happen hundreds of times.
Those tasks that have varying levels of success or failure specify what those consequences are, for example if you fail by 5 or more when disabling a trap you trigger the trap. The Knowledge skill specifies varying levels of success - you get extra information on a monster for every 5 points by which you beat the DC - but there is no extra consequence for failure. Therefore there isn't one, by RAW. If you've seen it happen then either the GMs misunderstand the rules OR they are using a reasonable houserule.
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In this case I would use knowledge nature because it is still a horse, but it has a template so it should have the augmented tag also.
I would also have a knowledge roll for the template. I tend to use a DC 20 for identifying templates such as half-fiends, and a 15 for cestial templates since they are likely to be more common.
There is no hard rule that I know of. That is just how I do it.
Thanx for providing that clarity, Kalindlara. :)
So, I figured that it might be identifiable as at least looking horselike with Perception. Knowing what you are looking at would require the appropriate Knowledge skill (Arcana) and having the inappropriate Knowledge skill would either give no information or potentially misinformation.
It would have to look (smell? ...sound?) different enough from a horse for it to not be misidentified as a horse (which apparently some believe is completely impossible by RAW). If that is true then I would think that a Disguise check would be required to MAKE it look like a horse.
Is that all correct? Is my head in the wrong place on that?
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It would have to look (smell? ...sound?) different enough from a horse for it to not be misidentified as a horse (which apparently some believe is completely impossible by RAW).You can't misidentify creatures per RAW, so I don't understand this statement.
The reasoning is as such:
1) If there were no significant sensory differences between a horse and a celestial horse, it would be common to misidentify the celestial horse as a normal horse (in the same way it is easy to mistake a jaguar for a leopard and vice versa).
2) Since these misidentifications do not happen, therefore there is a significant sensory difference between the two.
This is reasonable if the rules closely approximate our own experience, at least in places where they are not obviously fantastical.
Unfortunately this is not the case. Misidentification of creatures realistically should happen. Heck, the descriptions of some monsters even suggest that they are commonly misidentified, like the fire drake looking like a young red dragon. But the rules don't generally cover that, whether it's because it would be hard to write those rules or because the devs didn't think that it would be fun for players to misidentify something with a skill check.
How hard something is to identify with a knowledge check has nothing to do, RAW, with its appearance.
However if we feel like it, we can justify the fact that no one will mistake a celestial horse for an actual horse by saying that celestial animals glow faintly or smell like fresh lilacs or whatever.
Weirdo gets the issue that I'm pointing out.
The basic question put in a specific example would go something like:
By RAW can you identify a Celestial horse gained via the Celestial Servant feat (thus making it a Magical Beast) with Knowledge Nature?
The first question is nearly rhetorical as RAW is pretty clear and straightforward on which Knowledge skills are used to identify which creatures. The only real reason I am asking is because something Tonya recently said (linked above) rubs against those rules.
Then the follow up question if you answered "no" to the above:
What physically makes a Celestial horse different enough to not be recognized as a horse?
The same questions could be asked regarding the other examples above like the Dwarf Zombie, etc.
Identify has both a real world meaning and a game mechanics meaning. The problem being is that people seem to be using them interchangeably.
The dictionary definition of Identify is to recognize someone or something and say or prove who or what that person or thing is:
The game definition of identifying a monster is
You can use this skill to identify monsters and their special powers or vulnerabilities. In general, the DC of such a check equals 10 + the monster's CR. For common monsters, such as goblins, the DC of this check equals 5 + the monster's CR. For particularly rare monsters, such as the tarrasque, the DC of this check equals 15 + the monster's CR, or more. A successful check allows you to remember a bit of useful information about that monster. For every 5 points by which your check result exceeds the DC, you recall another piece of useful information. Many of the Knowledge skills have specific uses as noted on Table: Knowledge Skill DCs.
All characters have a basic understanding of the lands they live in including common creatures and their own culture. If the character is from an area where horses are common a simple perception of 0 will allow him to notice a horse and to recognize it looks like a horse. If he has knowledge arcana then if he rolls high enough he “Identifies” it as a celestial horse and knows some of its abilities. If he does not have knowledge arcana or knowledge nature then the only information he gets is it is a horse. If it were a normal horse and he had knowledge nature he would be able to get some information about the horse such as speed or other useful information. If the character was from a land where there are no horses like early America before Columbus than he would not recognize the creature as a horse. While not strictly by the rules I would allow a knowledge nature to recognize that this is not a normal horse, they would get no other information just it is not a horse.
In the game it would probably be better to use the game term for identify and use the phrase recognize for the real world usage.