1) If I choose the Time trait to halve the time, does that mean I can travel there and regain spells with material plane equivalent of 4 hours rest?
2) Can I halve the time again by casting it again?
3) Say I choose timeless. I understand timeless wouldn't work for resting for spells, but say I travel there to make an item worth 200k. I stay until the item is complete, 200 days. What exactly happens when I come back? Do I immediately starve to death?
Looka like everyone plane shifted to 2nd edition...
I think I understand the answer to #3 actually. If I eat there then I poop there and everything's hunky dorey. But still need input on 1 and 2
Timeless planes are there to represent Rip Van Winkle I think. You party there for years without a break, then come back and suddenly you're an old guy (and all your friends have moved on or died). Starving to death probably shouldn't happen if you're the creator. Unless you're a sorcerer with 5 Int maybe.
Set it up right and you can pop out for 4 hours and get 8 hours rest, yes.
The rate of time passing is considered with respect to the material plane. Casting greater create demiplane twice won't change that, it's still at the same half or twice the rate that time passes on the material plane.
I understand. You cast the spell, choose the Timeless trait so that 8 hours passes on your plane while only 4 hours pass on the material plane. If you cast it again in the same fashion, while inside your plane, like you do if you want to add more space or planer traits, can you split the time again so that now 8 hours passes on your plane while only 2 pass on the material plane?
No, making time flow at half the rate of the material plane is a trait which would overlap rather than stacking.
Also - timeless is one option of the time trait. The time flowing at half or double rate is another option of the time trait, but it's not timeless.
I understand the difference between timeless and half/double. I just read a comment someone made about doubling the time multiple times so that they could effectively craft at like 1/16 the amount of time not something like that. Didn't know if it were legal or not
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I have actually played around a lot with the demiplane spells including creating my own variants so here's my understanding in relation to your questions.
QUESTION ONE
Short Answer
No you need to speed it up and take the 2 times option.
Long Answer
The way these spells work is by altering the relation of time between the two planes. So the default operation is 1:1 meaning that for every hour that passes on the material plane, 1 hour will pass in the pocket dimension.
If you apply the flowing time trait you are speeding up or slowing down the time difference between the two planes. The two options given in the spell are either slowing down or speeding up the flow of time. That is if it flows at 1/2 the normal rate for every hour which passes in the material world only 30 minutes will pass in your plane. If it flows at double the normal time for every hour which passes in the normal plane 2 will pass in the pocket plane. A value of 0.5:1 or 2:1.
What you want is the speeding up option so you go to your pocket plane, experience 8 hours of rest then return to find four hours have passed in the material because time flows twice as fast where you were.
QUESTION TWO
Short answer
Ask your GM
Long Answer
Its a DM judgement call on the flowing time trait. Some DM's treat it as being the equivalent of a set command in coding that is . . ..
Cast spell - Greater Demiplane - flowing time - SET time to 1/2 or SET time to 2.
So no matter how many times you cast it the effect is always the same you either set the time to flow at 1/2 the normal rate or double it. You're just installing that variable but the variable itself is constant.
Other DM's treat it the way it sounds like your person has wherein its treated as a stackable resource. . ..
Cast spell - Greater Demiplane - flowing time - x Time x .5 or x Time x 2.
In this case each casting increases the difference so 3 castings of half time is .5 x .5 x .5 = 1/8 time flow rate.
You need to check with your DM to see which one they're using.
QUESTION THREE
Short Answer
Yes you immediately starve to death and no you couldn't use it in the way you want.
Long Answer
The first thing to understand is that a timeless demi-plane is not timeless in relation to the material one, its timeless inside itself. That is if you go to the astral plane time on the normal plane is still progressing at a 1:1 rate (unless you perform other shenanigans). So 1 hour in the astral plane is 1 hour in the normal plane. You can't go into it, spend 200 day's there then return to the moment you left. However if you were to spend 200 day's there it would be 200 day's of not getting hungry (food isn't digested), not growing older, not healing but only while your there the moment you leave it affects you all at once.
The relevant sections are these in the time description part of the planes book.
The danger of a timeless plane is that once an individual leaves such a plane for one where time flows normally, conditions such as hunger and aging occur retroactively
Note that hunger is specifically called out as one of the conditions that applies retroactively when you leave the plane. It's complicated somewhat by the line in the timeless descriptor saying that affects vary from plane to plane. However most of the planes that are listed as having timeless specify . . .
Timeless: Age, hunger, thirst, afflictions (such as diseases, curses, and poisons), and natural healing don’t function
Some also indicate that magic is timeless so any duration that isn't instantaneous is permanent not x rounds or x hours.
Again different DM's may treat things differently but as mentioned above for me the way it works is in the timeless plane nothing progresses you don't age, don't get hungry or thirsty, disseases can't get worse and so on. However the minute that you leave it all hits you at one instant so if you spent say 25 day's there crafting a sword the moment you leave you'd get hit with it all at once instantly aging 200 days, experience the effects of not eating for nearly a year and so on. It might be possible to try and get round the issue but forcing yourself to eat while there (mean GM's may treat the food as having rotted in your stomach for a couple of months on return) but the timeless trait would keep it from being digested. Meaning your effectively forcing yourself to keep eating on an already full stomach. You couldn't do this long term as your not putting on fat your just eating and eating long after your full.
For the purposes you mentioned you'd be be better off using flowing time and double e.g. 2 hours = 1 in the material and you still age, eat and so on avoiding the dangers of a timeless plane. Just remember you are aging so even if a DM let you speed it up so time was flowing at 8, 16, 32 times the normal rate spending 200 day's to craft an item in there will mean your 200 day's older. It'll also limit the benefit of the plane in other areas as each time you go in your effectively aging at 2, 4, 8, etc times the normal rate.
Hopefully this helps.
Basically everything you said is as I understand it as well. I mostly just wanted to see if stacking the time split/double was RAW or not. I believe AVR is correct in saying its not meant to stack, and would effectively overlap. Unfortunate, but I don't like to break the rules in my favor. Just seems douchey
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Like I said its a DM thing, I've know different DM's to rule differently for different reasons. Lot of different there, anyway some rule that it doesn't stack because they feel it gives mage's too much of an advantage, some rule it doesn't stack because the book say's its 1/2. Others rule that it does stack because at the level your casting you should be getting nice things, others because they remember the original version in 3.5 that allowed you to set a time differnce you liked up to 10 times either way.
Personally I tend to allow it because you can also take erratic time and that to me mucks things up more than a faster or slower consistent demi-plane.
Specific sections are . . .
from the spell
Time: By default, time passes at the normal rate in your demiplane. By selecting this feature, you may make your plane have the erratic time, flowing time (half or double normal time), or timeless trait (see Time).
from planar book
Erratic Time
Some planes have time that slows down and speeds up, so an individual may lose or gain time as he moves between such planes and any others. To the denizens of such a plane, time flows naturally and the shift is unnoticed. The following is provided as an example.
d% Time on Material Plane Time on Erratic Time Plane
01–10 1 day 1 round
11–40 1 day 1 hour
41–60 1 day 1 day
61–90 1 hour 1 day
91–100 1 round 1 day
and
Flowing Time
On some planes, the flow of time is consistently faster or slower. One may travel to another plane, spend a year there, and then return to the Material Plane to find that only 6 seconds have elapsed. Everything on the plane returned to is only a few seconds older. But for that traveler and the items, spells, and effects working on him, that year away was entirely real. When designating how time works on planes with flowing time, put the Material Plane‘s flow of time first, followed by the flow in the other plane.
So if you take erratic time as allowed each time you enter the demiplane you roll on that table and you could potentially get anything from slowing down to the point each round in your plane is a day back home to a round back home being a day in the demiplane. If the player rolls then they know what they're getting and can just hop back and forth till they get the result they want this time which can be a lot more than a 2 times difference. If the DM does it secretly it makes the plane a pain for the player because maybe your 8 hours rest means a couple of years (10 rounds a minute, 60 minutes in an hour, 8 hours rest, 4,800 rounds translating to 4,800 day's or 13 years). Think about that you enter your plane, DM rolls and after 8 hours rest you return to find 13 years have passed there goes the campaign not because you tried to break it but because you just didn't know. Sure you can put an alarm clock by not making it permanent so you get booted back when the spell ends but if your going to make a demiplane a home your going to want to permanent it. The other way allows for potentially the very time shenanigans that is often used an argument against stacking flowing time. Roll low on that table and 1 round in your demi-plane is a full day to rest, recover and prepare to return to face an enemy who's had 1 round to realize its foes just vanished a moment ago before their back at full power. To get the same result by flowing time would take 14 castings (each casting doubles the time difference and 14 castings would get you slightly more than 1 round in the material = 1 day in your plane well actually 1.13). Meanwhile this is a permanent shift so unlike erratic if you do make those 14 castings each your going to be aging a lot faster in your demi-plane compare to back home. On top of which as I as I said you have to cast the spell 14 times to equal 1 casting of erratic time its just that for you the time flow is more reliable unless its a player roll in which case you know each time you enter your demi-plane what your getting this time and can do a lot more time shenanigans with it.
On the other hand if you stack flowing time you as the player know exactly how long is passing in your plane and back home and you as the DM know that too. Plus you can set up plot hooks like magic enemies tracking them to their plane and setting up an ambush or in the rounds the party is resting teleporting to another location to set up a new series of traps where you know roughly what your dealing with in attackers.
I'm not too worried about my character aging. The purpose, for me, is just crafting magic items. Since I'm limited on how much I can create by how much gold I have, I'm effectively limited as to how much rapid aging I'll undergo as well. Even a few years wouldn't matter.
The more I think about it, the more obvious it seems that RAW is overlapping as opposed to stacking. However, your argument is excellent as to why you may as well just allow stacking. I'm going to present it to the GM in hopes shell handwave and give me the thumbs up