Do successful saving throws alert the character?

[IronWill]

Scenario:

A party camps for the night and sets watch in shifts, and all but the watcher fall asleep. During the watcher's shift, a creature that can cast Sleep as a Spell Like Ability at will sneaks within range and casts Sleep on the watcher. And he intends to continue casting Sleep until the watcher succumbs. If the watcher makes a successful save against the spell, is he necessarily alerted in some way, or does he remain unaware of the attack and thus highly likely to eventually fail his save and be put to sleep?

If he is alerted, what is the nature of the alert? Just an awareness that something is awry? A tingling of the skin? The hairs on his neck standing on end? Or something more concrete such as a realization that some magic or even the specific magic which was cast on him?

It seems logical that he would be alerted in some way, but I couldn't find it in the RAW. I found something in D&D 5E, but not in Pathfinder.

As a follow-up question, if the creature succeeds and the watcher falls asleep, is there anything preventing the creature from then performing a coup de grace on the watcher?

[bitter lily]

Core under Magic wrote:

Succeeding on a Saving Throw: A creature that successfully saves against a spell that has no obvious physical effects feels a hostile force or a tingle, but cannot deduce the exact nature of the attack. Likewise, if a creature's saving throw succeeds against a targeted spell, you sense that the spell has failed. You do not sense when creatures succeed on saves against effect and area spells.

As GM, I'd say that he felt oddly sleepy for a second, but threw it off.

[Lintecarka]

Magic Section wrote:

Succeeding on a Saving Throw

A creature that successfully saves against a spell that has no obvious physical effects feels a hostile force or a tingle, but cannot deduce the exact nature of the attack. Likewise, if a creature's saving throw succeeds against a targeted spell, you sense that the spell has failed. You do not sense when creatures succeed on saves against effect and area spells.

So while the watcher doesn't know it was a sleep spell, he DOES know a magical attack took place and if he doesn't raise the alarm at that very moment the party deserves to be ambushed.

As for the follow-up question. The watcher is screwed unless his allies succeed at their perception rolls with a -10 penality for being asleep.

[Franz Lunzer]

*yawn*

[edit]
Which is to say: As GM I'd let the watcher know that he yawned. That alone is pretty much a guarantee to have the player be paranoid about an ambush.

[QuidEst]

Yes, he's alerted to just having made a save. (Might even be an indication of a will save.) Can't really look it up on my phone, but it's there. The guard can then raise the alarm to wake the others and make his perception check (since casting needs line of sight, generally the caster is putting themselves out there a bit).

And no, sleeping targets can be CDG'd without much difficulty. Having an elf or half-elf on guard duty is a good idea.

EDIT: Here it is.

EDIT 2: If the guard does get his throat slit in his sleep, though, that's combat under the rules, and so it's a DC -10 perception check to hear his dying gurgles, barring certain Vigilante talents or not-unreasonable houserules.

[IronWill]

Thank you very much. The link you provided QuidEst is very clear!

Regarding the issue of being asleep and waking sleeping characters, if a character standing guard raises alarm by yelling, does that automatically awake any characters sleeping under normal conditions, or do they need to make perception checks to see if they hear the alarm and wake?

I understand that anyone under the effect of a Sleep spell must be slapped or wounded to be woken and that takes a standard action.

[Khudzlin]

I think they should roll perception with a low DC. I'd put it somewhere between hearing the sounds of a battle (DC -10) and hearing the details of a conversation (DC 0), so DC -5 at most. Even with the penalty for being asleep, it should be quite easy. And a battle is likely to ensue, and that'll wake the sounder sleepers for sure.

By the way, it's usual for the target of such at-will abilities to become immune to them for a duration after succeeding on a save, so the ambusher couldn't simply spam the ability until it succeeds.

[ckdragons]

QuidEst wrote:

And no, sleeping targets can be CDG'd without much difficulty. Having an elf or half-elf on guard duty is a good idea.

OT, elves and half-elves require sleep as much as humans do in Pathfinder. Their "meditative" rest is an old D&D rule.

[ckdragons]

This is how I would run a rest-time surprise encounter. Sleeping characters never act in the surprise round. Only the watching with a successful Perception vs the enemies' Stealth act in surprise. The sleeping characters roll Perception on their initiative. They succeed, then they can act normally, though being prone and such.

[QuidEst]

ckdragons wrote:

QuidEst wrote:

And no, sleeping targets can be CDG'd without much difficulty. Having an elf or half-elf on guard duty is a good idea.

OT, elves and half-elves require sleep as much as humans do in Pathfinder. Their "meditative" rest is an old D&D rule.

Yes, but they're immune to magical sleep, which is the most reliable way to take a guard out of commission quietly.