Dominate Person and Multiple Personalities?

[Iryani Calahan]

I'm running a homebrew game, and there's an NPC traveling with the party that has multiple personality disorder. I'm expecting something to happen where this character will be hit with Dominate Person, and I'm trying to figure out if it would affect the dormant personalities.
There's Adam, Justin, and a yet-to-be-named third one that doesn't show up often.

If Adam gets fails his throw and is Dominated, would the other two personalities be affected at all? If yes, do they use his same result and fail? Or would they each get their own, ether immediately or when they take control?

This one's probably a 'no' but I'm going to ask anyway, just in case: Would each personality get a new saving throw whenever they take control again, if they go back and forth a lot?

Final question so far:
Dominate Person lasts one day per level. What if Adam is affected, let's say it would last 3 days, and then Justin takes over and is in control for five days. When Adam regains control of himself, would he still be under the effects of Dominate Person, because he wasn't there, or would the duration of the spell continue regardless?

[Kileanna]

Have in mind that, if the character has actually a mental disease, that other personalities are not different people in the same body but different manifestations of the same psyche. So the spell should take the three of them as the same target.

It could be different if the character was posessed by three different entities, but for what you're telling this is not the case.

[The Raven Black]

Depends on how you interpret the Mind clause of the spell

Maybe in your world this disorder actually affects spells

For example it could give a bonus to saves against mind-affecting and making the save would entail a personality change

[Iryani Calahan]

Kileanna wrote:

Have in mind that, if the character has actually a mental disease, that other personalities are not different people in the same body but different manifestations of the same psyche. So the spell should take the three of them as the same target.

It could be different if the character was posessed by three different entities, but for what you're telling this is not the case.

Justin is a psyche split, caused by trauma. The unnamed one is kind of different. Part of an artifact merged with Adam when he was a baby, and when he developed Justin, the artifact also split into another identity. Like if Harry Potter had a separate identity for the horcrux, that knew what it was and how it got there.

So in that context, Justin and Adam would be affected the same, and the third one might get its own save?

[Kileanna]

I can see how it could work like that.
If the last personality is not remotely human it might even have immunity to mind affecting.
I definitely take the two personalities with a single save and decide how it affects the third.

[JDLPF]

Since the game doesn't have rules for split personalities, there's no RAW answer.

The game does however have rules for people who have multiple personalities as part of a class feature.

Vigilante

These class features don't typically grant bonuses to saving throws or immunity to charms, compulsions or enchantments. I would recommend spending a feat on your NPC to grant them Iron Will or the like to allow them to mechanically feature this bonus.

[Kalindlara]

JDLPF wrote:

Since the game doesn't have rules for split personalities, there's no RAW answer.

This is not entirely accurate - the GameMastery Guide has something of this sort, in the section on sanity and madness. (There might also be something in the more recent Horror Adventures, but I'm less familiar with that book.)

[Kileanna]

That should cover both split personalities but not the one that is some sort of artifact.

[Kalindlara]

Kileanna wrote:

That should cover both split personalities but not the one that is some sort of artifact.

Perhaps - I was addressing the no-existing-rules claim more than the specifics of the original question.

[Lady-J]

you could roll 3d20(1d20 per personality) drop the lowest and take the average of the top 2

[JDLPF]

Excellent, thanks Kalindlara.

MULTIPLE PERSONALITY DISORDER
Type insanity; Save Will DC 19
Onset 2d6 days
Effect –6 penalty on Will saving throws and Wisdom-based skill checks; multiple personalities (see below)

Thus a person with multiple personalities not only has no bonus to avoid domination but a hefty -6 penalty to his save to do so. Seems appropriate, given that he's fairly used to outside minds seizing control of his body.

[Little Boots]

Multiple personality disorder goes into some strange, unexplained territory. There are case reports where one personality was diabetic, but the others were not, so the personality which is exhibited at any given time can have profound consequences well beyond the mental dimensions. Since those consequences *can* be tied to specific personalities, and only those personalities, I would want to know how the player saw his character. Are the personalities truly separate individuals (one possibility) or fragments of the same personality (essentially only one 'actual' personality but fractured/compartmentalized in order to provide "safe spaces" to adapt to and/or deal with trauma). Ignacia posts above "Justin is a psyche split, caused by trauma. The unnamed one is kind of different. Part of an artifact merged with Adam when he was a baby..." Given that, I would agree with Kileanna and rule that a Dominate Person cast on Justin would also continue with Adam, as at their core they're really still the same person, just fractures of the same personality. But like the real-world diabetic example, I would also rule the third personality would not be impacted (much like Harry Potter might be, but not he-who-must-not-be-named) as this psyche/soul is different that then one the spell was cast on, but as noted be subject to a -6 penalty on any attempt to dominate that one.

Cool question, thanks for sharing!