Suggestion and similar spells question

[Kainite101]

Last game, suggestion was cast on on of the party members.

"You suggest a course of action to the target, which must be phrased in such a way as to seem like a logical course of action to the target and can't be self-destructive or obviously against the target's self-interest"

They were fighting multiple shapeshifters (Rakshasa, which they new about, and had done a few recall knowledge checks on). The suggestion was that one of the Rakshasa's that had turned invisible the previous round, had shapeshifted to look like one of the party members and do what he needed to while we were in middle of combat. The party member decided to attack the "enemy", which was the player. One of the other players argued that this would be against self-interest, and other player argued it was was not, as his self-interest would be to protect himself as he saw the player as a shapeshifted enemy, not just suddenly an enemy (since they had lost sight of the original rakshasa the previous round he turned invisible...basically a plausible excuse)

Also for more context these rakshasa's had already ambushed the party pretending to be helpless halflings...

What do you think? I am of the mind that the suggestion was phrased correctly due to the disappearing rakshasa to be reasonable. Had the suggestion simply been, your ally is now your enemy, with no other circumstance then I would say it was against self interest.

[Cordell Kintner]

Suggestion is supposed to be "Run away, you're out numbered" when there's a bunch of illusions, or "Go to that location and you'll find a hidden treasure" when there's a trap. You are supposed to recommend a course of action, not make them believe something is true when it's not. In this case, the course of action of "Attack your teammate because it's actually an enemy" would not be logical, especially if that teammate was never hidden from the target at any point. Also, logically, why would an enemy sell out their own ally? It just seems like the GM misunderstood what the spell does, and thought it similar to a Dominate or Confusion effect.

[Kainite101]

Not sure what you mean by 'why would an enemy sell out their own ally?". Perhaps I am misunderstanding the context. No enemy sold out their ally above unless I misunderstand your context. The suggestion was the enemy that suddenly disappeared, shaped shifted to look like one of the allies, and left it to the player to decide what to do with it, gm did not enforce he had to attack or not...

In your examples I can play devil advocate. Run away and let allies die? Against a teammates nature (especially champion). Go to location and find treasure? What if its a deadly location. What if the character backstory includes not wanting material things. Seems to me to be slippery slope, and therefor context is always a factor vs flat out black and white fits all.

[Themetricsystem]

What you're describing isn't a suggestion at all, you're trying to implant false information and force the PC to act upon it without the needed additional steps and checks such as a Distraction, Dectption, opposed Stealth/Perception Check, and other things.

That would be the whole "sell out their own ally" bit that they're mentioning. This is something no person should just accept/believe at face value. Suggestion does not have the power to make someone think an obvious lie is the truth, it only exists to force them to make an already reasonable course of action (such as running or even possibly surrendering if they think they'll be spared/not-harmed) in leu of whatever else they might be doing.

[Cordell Kintner]

Kainite101 wrote:

Not sure what you mean by 'why would an enemy sell out their own ally?". Perhaps I am misunderstanding the context.

If what the enemy were saying was true, that the player's "ally" was actually an enemy, that means the enemy would be selling out their ally. It would make no sense to tell your enemies that your ally was sneaking up on them like that.

Suggestion tries to make the target think an action is a good idea based on the information available, not implanting false info like "This guy's your enemy!"

If you Suggest someone attack their ally the spell should fail, as that's obviously harmful. It may not harm themselves physically, but harming your allies does social damage, rather than physical.

[Castilliano]

Assuming the other player was attacking Rakshasas/supporting allies, the Suggestion would fail (IMO). As others noted, having no opportunity where the target player lost sight of the other player would also be a barrier.
You kind of have to work with the assumption that the target knows the situation (as per the PC's abilities), and the Suggestion implants a false desire within that context (however rash, foolish, or strategically harmful).

That doesn't mean that a similar ploy couldn't work. It only seems poorly executed in this instance. Now if the other player had been Confused and attacked a party member and the target player had no idea the cause, then there might be room for a Deception which may need to be a separate action before casting Suggestion.

[Qaianna]

I'd say this is outside of what Suggestion can do. The caster is making the suggestion verbally. You even have the Linguistic trait to make sure the victim can understand what you're saying. The description and the traits all suggest that a caster is saying 'Do a thing', and is audible (verbal component). So I could suggest 'Look behind you!' in a battle, as that's a reasonable thing to do. I could suggest 'Surrender!' although that'd take some doing. I can't suggest 'Attack your wizard!'.

[Kainite101]

For the record, it wasn't "attack your wizard" or "attack your ally". It was "the guy that disappeared in plain sight just shapeshifted to look like your ally, do what you think you need to do" (somewhat paraphrased, but that was the jist of it). That ally was next to the creature that disappeared, the one that got suggested had his line of sight obscured by a large creature and 2 medium creatures to view said ally and last known space where enemy disappeared previous round. These shapeshifters had already ambushed them disguised as halflings, they knew what they were (recall knowledge check, shapeshifters).

Now the suggestions that they add another check like deception, seem hollow. "Look behind you" sounds suspiciously like a deception check in particular... Plus one would assume that was what a save was for in the first place. Otherwise the old jedi mind trick would never work most of the time. In the spirit of the knowledge that the player had from the above scenario at the time, in the middle of combat, seemed like a reasonable suggestion (to me anyways), akin to "these are not the droids your looking for". The player had a choice of what he could do. If the suggestion seemed doubtful, but still probable, shouldn't the onus been on the player to make a perception check to see under the above circumstances if he had maintained a clear sight on ally or something similar? Seems in spirit with a suggestion. A suggestion on what happened based on what was observed. Now the player may have gone overboard in attacking, vs investigating (maybe at should have at least wasted an action). But "run away" (especially without any reasoning to run) seems equally OP (course of actions need reasoning, otherwise you are implanting totally false narratives vs suggesting a somewhat reasonable course of events).

To me the set up is equally as important to the suggestion(hence context is important). There needs to be a condition that can lead to some sort of self doubt, with out blatantly being impossible. Now I am all about the reaction from the player maybe being over-zealous, but it was his choice, it wasn't a forced action from the GM, and maybe the GM should have "suggested" a lighter course of action or investigation (or a dispel, or some other form of non-lethal).

In the end, I can see both ways. But another idea struck me, what if the GM had simply suggested the ally had been "possessed" by the one that vanished? Anyways, in the spirit of not wanting to drag this out any longer, there you have it. Thank you for the replies :) and have fun!

[Castilliano]

Suggestion is not a Jedi mind trick. That's a category error. The spell doesn't implant false information. It implants a desire to do a specific action. That's why others are saying it'd take Deception to plant the false information (or doubt). The fact that an enemy who's known to be deceptive can inform a PC who they are fighting about the situation and be believed via Deception is already being generous.

There's no onus on the player/PC to see their ally NOT disappear.
If line of sight had been broken then there'd be a reasonable argument.
Trouble is, if that ally's attacking proper enemies, it's a hard sell because even the duplicate is then being your ally at that moment. Attacking that person measures along the power levels of a Dominate which is an Uncommon spell two levels higher and that gives a save after every round unless it's a critical fail. That's a stark difference IMO.

You're right that the Suggestion should be based on what the PC observed, but you're asking it to change some of the observations too.
The player's willingness to attack doesn't seem relevant unless the other player(s) were just as joyful.