Spells to Guard a Druid's Cave Lair

[Yolande d'Bar]

I'm looking for 1st to 4th lvl spells a druid could use to guard or ward or set up alarms his lair. He's a deep gnome whose home is a cave system that opens onto the surface. He casts at 11th level but doesn't have access to any spells over 4th level.

What spells have long enough durations to last all day or all night that would be useful for this?

It is a pity that alarm isn't on the druid list.

[avr]

Stone shape to close off the entrance for a start. Hide campsite, snare, grove of respite (alarm!), and the overgrowth effect of plant growth are worth looking at. If he's evil then curse terrain may be useful.

[Yolande d'Bar]

Ooh, grove of respite is a good catch. Since it has to be cast outside, he can't ward the interior of the cave with it, but he could place the area of effect outside.

The entrance to the cave is a ledge about 10' up a hillside. Do you think the ledge would count as open ground? I sort of think it would, even though it's narrower than the 20' radius of the spell area.

[Taenia]

Does the Druid have wild shape into earth elemental?

If yes, stone shape entrance closed and access via earth glide.

[avr]

If it's anything short of the sheerest cliff face then trees can grow around it, sure. I think 'must be cast outside on open ground' mainly means there can't be trees there already.

[Coidzor]

Call Animal can get any nasty critters in the surrounding area to come to them. Up to CR 11 and from up to 11 hours away from them, too.

Then with Wild Empathy or Anthropomorphic Animal + Ranks in Diplomacy they can befriend it.

Over time this can lead to an awful lot of animal friends. Especially if you store them as stauettes using Carry Companion so that you can use Call Animal to get more than one of them or it's one with a pack or what have you that you can get to relocate with them to a location nearby.

Carry Companion could also be combined with some kind of Dispel Magic trap, either an actual trap that casts Dispel Magic or something that goads intruders into casting Dispel Magic as an AoE, thereby causing several statuettes of animals to turn back into said animals.

Expeditious Construction and Expeditious Excavation are both 1st level Druid spells. Between those two and Stone Shape, you should be able to create something in the way of habitats or nesting sites/dens for certain critters.

I suppose those spells would also let a decoy cave be set up somewhere too, to help throw people off if they're going to try to come looking for him.

Oh, you could both set up a decoy AND make it so that the actual entrance just appears to be an animal den that dead-ends, due to using that Stone Shape door idea.

Extended Anthropomorphic Animal would get him an animal person for 22 hours, I suppose, 24 if he can boost his CL by 1 somehow. Could potentially then get them to help stand guard, though that would require several for shifts and at that point that's a not insignificant number of spell slots eaten up in maintaining that from day to day.

Could make a maze using fake ledges and tunnels with Climbing Beanstalk ladders between levels so if they want to find your guy's place, they'll spend a bunch of time going in and out and up and down.

As a bonus, it would make some food for birds and squirrels and such, or the druid, even.

Tar Ball could, over time, and with preparations made to extinguish the burning tar produced by it, be used to get a fair stockpile of tar, which could be used in some manner of trap.

Wood Shape makes me think of wooden lattices and wooden cages and cage traps, though that's trickier to figure out how to pull off mechanically.

Burst of Nettles could maybe potentially be a source of acid or some of them could be harvested to be incorporated into traps. Kind of an iffy construction to that spell.

Create Treasure Map gives me an idea involving using treasure maps created by this spell or fake ones as a fake cache in a decoy cave or the like which will distract people that stumble upon it and possibly get them to leave to pursue the map.

Improve Trap is a Druid spell, so there's that angle.

Iron Stake would seem to create cold iron spikes. Cold Iron is worth 50 gold per pound, so if you ground the end, it'd just look like cold iron bars, and thus would be potentially suitable for a decoy cache of treasure. Estimating 1" diameter, 0.99 feet after filing off the spike, that's about 2.5 pounds per rod or 125 gp by weight, probably further adjusted by some percentage per the whole trade goods and ore thing. Even if not suitable, it could give the appearance of value.

Pocketful of Vipers is a weak trap, but it'd be 11 hours in duration, 22 if extended.

Spike Growth and Spike Stones also last for hours.

Depending upon how your table adjudicates remaining duration on spells while in statuette form from Carry Companion, Atavism could be a buff to slap on them to make them nastier when they come out. Strong Jaw as well.

Baphomet's Blessing could similarly be used to give an animal an extra natural weapon or give back a natural weapon to an Anthropomorphic Animal. Additionally, it could throw people off the scent of a druid and instead get them thinking they need to start looking for lamashtite cultists.

Obsidian Flow can get you difficult terrain where you might want it, as well as create your own form of spikes at the bottom of any pit traps you might make.

Fire Trap is a thing.

Yolande d'Bar wrote:

Ooh, grove of respite is a good catch. Since it has to be cast outside, he can't ward the interior of the cave with it, but he could place the area of effect outside.

The entrance to the cave is a ledge about 10' up a hillside. Do you think the ledge would count as open ground? I sort of think it would, even though it's narrower than the 20' radius of the spell area.

He could enlarge said ledge given enough time, and gnomes are fairly long-lived as I recall.

[Decimus Drake]

Is this a player or NPC?

[Yolande d'Bar]

Wow, Coidzor, that’s a ton of options to consider! Thank you.

This character is a retired PC now being used as an NPC mentor in a new campaign for 1st lvl characters. I’m trying to figure out how his lair is guarded at night when the party’s undead enemy shows up hunting them.

[Tiny Coffee Golem]

Summon big ass bear animal companion.

[Coidzor]

Yolande d'Bar wrote:

Wow, Coidzor, that’s a ton of options to consider! Thank you.

This character is a retired PC now being used as an NPC mentor in a new campaign for 1st lvl characters. I’m trying to figure out how his lair is guarded at night when the party’s undead enemy shows up hunting them.

Well, hopefully some of that helped instead of just cluttering things up.

If it's an obviously undead, corporeal creature, then the druid just having cultivated friendships with the animals in the surrounding area, especially outside his place, that could lead to some critter running in to warn the druid, all frantic-like.

Could be there's a Dire Bear living in the cave entrance or sharing an entrance with his cave and he pays it in game in exchange for keeping an eye out. Or maybe he's got a bat-based security system, where he's able to get himself in and welcome guests without freaking out the bats, but anything else enters and the bats go crazy unless it's super sneaky.

Could also have cultivated there being hornets' nests or something formed on the most obvious entrance, so going in that way would lead to something getting knocked over and those nests coming crashing down and breaking and a swarm forming to noisy effect.

The only thing beyond that which I can think of on that front is that I suppose it's possible he'd be able to make magical traps of some sort ala Craft Wondrous Item, and that opens up any druid spells that blast and cause a big noise as a dual-purpose spell, possibly after one which should spook away casual humanoid intrusion and maybe get larger animals to reconsider lairing there.

[Bearserk]

Thanks to Woodland Stride think of plants with vines and thorns or a cave behind Poison Ivy.
A druid can enter unhindered.

[Decimus Drake]

Maybe a Shrieker or Shrieker Paste could be used in some fashion. He's an NPC could simply have a spell of alarm or warding unavailable to PCs. As the GM you can make up whatever it is you need regardless of preexisting rules.

CRB wrote:

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