Going off on a tangent from my previous thread about SoP illusions, I'm wondering about how a couple of other talents and feats interact.
1) The Solid Illusions feat lets a caster enhance his illusions as though they were real. If the caster has only taken Illusionary Touch once, will an illusory soldier be able to cause damage if its weapon is enhanced with, say, Enhance Equipment or Energy Weapon? Would this damage be non-lethal, even if it is elemental or bleed damage?
2) Can the weapons of illusory creatures be poisoned? In my particular case, I'm interested in the poisons from the Alchemy sphere. Would it...
a) require taking Illusionary Touch once or twice,
b) require the Tactile Illusion feat,
c) require using Shadow Magic to give the creature substance (and attacks in the normal sense) by emulating the Conjuration sphere, or
d) is it just impossible for an illusion to use injury/contact poison?
3) Just what would happen if you try to use Animate Object (and its dependent talents and feats) on an illusory object...?
Just spoke to the author of the Illusion sphere handbook. Here are his answers:
1) You need Illusionary Touch x2 to deal extra damage from an Enhanced Illusion. Unless your illusions are already dealing lethal damage (be it through the Shadow Infusion talent or Tactile Illusion feat), all additional damage will be nonlethal damage (nonlethal fire damage, nonlethal bleed damage, etc).
2) Only illusions that are dealing lethal damage (such as with the Shadow Infusion talent or Tactile Illusions feat) may have their attacks poisoned (be it contact or injury).
3) Illusions of objects are not objects, as such, they are not legal targets of such abilities or effects. Objects created with the Shadow Magic feat however are objects, and as such are legal targets for Animate Object (and similar effects), although they will have reduced stats as normal.
Just spoke to the author of the Illusion sphere handbook. Here are his answers:
1) You need Illusionary Touch x2 to deal extra damage from an Enhanced Illusion. Unless your illusions are already dealing lethal damage (be it through the Shadow Infusion talent or Tactile Illusion feat), all additional damage will be nonlethal damage (nonlethal fire damage, nonlethal bleed damage, etc).
2) Only illusions that are dealing lethal damage (such as with the Shadow Infusion talent or Tactile Illusions feat) may have their attacks poisoned (be it contact or injury).
3) Illusions of objects are not objects, as such, they are not legal targets of such abilities or effects. Objects created with the Shadow Magic feat however are objects, and as such are legal targets for Animate Object (and similar effects), although they will have reduced stats as normal.
Thanks for the answers, which all make a lot of sense. :)
The following is just musing on corner cases for its own sake:
If I'm not mistaken, the Solid Illusions feat predates the Illusion handbook, so my impression is that some of its functions may have been restricted by the new rules in that book (though these functions would have behaved weirdly - see question 3, for example). If a caster has only taken Illusionary Touch once as per the feat's prerequisites and doesn't use Shadow Magic, which enhancements can then actually be used on illusions with the feat?
Magic Sink seems like it would work as protection vs. counterspelling. Could Increase Speed add to the speed at which a figment can be moved?
Unless I am mistaken, the Solid Illusions feat is being errata'd to require Illusionary Touch (twice).
Yes, increase speed would be able to with the Solid Illusions feat be able to increase the speed that you move figments.
Yes, magic sink could with the Solid Illusions feat be used to protect your illusions from counterspelling.
With the potential errata however, I am hesitant to say that you can use these talents without Illusionary Touch (twice).