Does a druid know when wildshape is about to end or is it 1 moment animal, next moment base race?
How would you run it in your game?
I don't have a rule to back it, bit I would go partially with the latter. They might feel their time is growing short bit unless they are actively tracking their time wouldn't know when it was about to end. Maybe they could get a feel that the magic was going to wear off, but I'm a pretty messed up gm, and would tell them that in their last round at most.
That kind of thing I always leave up to player agency.
Can understand why others would want to "real" it up a bit though.
Yeah, pcs dont have wrist watches or cell phones to consult.
My couple of thoughts would be either a caster level check or maybe a spellcraft roll.
Survival check is probably the closest skill to determining passage of time.
I wouldn't bother though, it doesn't sound fun or cool and doesn't really add drama. If done badly I can see it feeling a bit too much like the GM going "rocks fall...".
I think it is also wrong in principle to assume that a spellcaster is NOT going to keep track of their spell durations. No self respecting caster is going to lose track of that, and expecting your players to tell you every time is just going to slow down game play.
Best just to assume that there is sufficient sensation of the magic fading to warn the player before negative effects occur.
Do you require Fighters to use a time piece of some sort to track their use of Boots of Speed?
As dragonhunter said, I don't think doing this would add any fun to the game. I wouldn't do it.
Players know when the effects of something like this are going to end (typically). There's no reason for the characters not to know, either.
There is an official statement within the rules that says static times (such as "1 minute" or "1/round per level") are known, whereas variable times are not (such as "1d4 rounds") are not.
I believe that was in the context of spells though. Makes sense to me to also apply it elsewhere though.
Timed Durations: Many durations are measured in rounds, minutes, hours, or other increments. When the time is up, the magic goes away and the spell ends. If a spell's duration is variable, the duration is rolled secretly so the caster doesn't know how long the spell will last.
Been playing it that way so long I forgot it was actually written out somewhere. Thanks for posting the rule.
Keeping track of a short term effect is much easier than keeping track, down to 6 seconds, of something that lasts hours. I can be pretty accurate if I have an outside reference like a show or mile markers. But down to 6 second accuracy? And while you may not find it cool or fun, it does heighten the drama and realism.
Now I do like rules quotes. You could read "Timed Duration" to give the implication that the caster knows when the spell will end. Because if it is random, they don't know when it will end. So therefore, if it isn't random they do. However, all it says is that the caster knows what the duration is. It says nothing about the caster knowing when that duration is to expire. And knowing that a given event (spell, movie, whatever) is X time long is different than knowing when X time has past.
Normally it doesn't matter that a given spell expires, but there are circumstances where it might be dramatic and appropriate. Thank you for your input.