It takes 1d4 hours to use Diplomacy to gather information. Craft checks are (sometimes) made by the week.
Can spells like Eagle's Splendor or Owl's Wisdom, that count their duration in minutes, be used to boost such checks?
It takes 1d4 hours to use Diplomacy to gather information. Craft checks are (sometimes) made by the week.
Can spells like Eagle's Splendor or Owl's Wisdom, that count their duration in minutes, be used to boost such checks?
I don't believe the rules specifically address it. I'm sure someone will correct me if I am mistaken.
As a GM I would not allow such a temporary boost to apply to checks for skills that take significantly longer than the duration to perform.
Likewise I would say no as the check (die roll) is performed at the end of the d4 hrs in the Diplomacy example.
Though I agree with the conclusion that something like Eagle's Splendor shouldn't help with attempts to gather information via diplomacy, I think it's better to say the problem is that the buff doesn't last a significant portion of the task's length rather than that the check is rolled at the end of the task. After all, that justification just leaves open the implication that you should get the bonus if you have Eagle's Splendor cast on you in the last few minutes you spend gathering information.
Although I wouldn't use a specific rule, in a more general sense I would say I'd only allow some sort of buff to apply to a check if that buff lasts at least a significant portion of the time required to complete the action that the check is made for. For example, if you (some how) had an Eagle's Splender spell cast on you that last for 50 minutes, and your attempt to gather information took only 1 hour, I would probably allow you to apply the bonus to the check. If the buff stuck on you for 30 minutes, I might give you half the bonus the spell would normally provide.