Hello! I had a player use Temporal Pulse during a fight that resulted in quite a few Slowed conditions and Quickened conditions being handed out. The wording for this gift is a little unclear, and I wanted to confirm what was maybe RAI:
Activate [two-actions] (concentrate); Frequency once per day; Effect You make time shudder around you, stealing it from enemies and granting it to allies. Creatures of your choice within 30 feet must attempt a Will save. For each creature you render slowed with this gift, you can render one ally within 30 feet, including you, quickened for 1 round.
Success The creature is unaffected.
Failure The creature is slowed 1.
Critical Failure The creature is slowed 2.
The quickened condition granted to allies is defined as 1 round, but the slowed condition doesn't have a duration listed. As slowed is not like Stunned where it decays when it removes the actions, this is as written to state that the Slowed condition is permanent. Which can't be right!
So what's the duration for the Slowed condition? I think RAI, this is intended to last only 1 round like the quickened condition. Was curious if there was an official determination on this, and customer service pointed me this direction to ask. Thanks in advance!
Yeah, there are a few things that I question about this Relic ability.
In addition to the question you proposed, I would question having Quickened with zero restrictions on the action's use. I can't think of anything else that gives Quickened with no restrictions. So having that as early as 9th level seems a bit much.
As for the rulings that I would use:
The duration of Slowed would be the same 1 round duration as the Quickened effect.
For restrictions, I would limit the action gained from Quickened to be single action abilities such as Stride, Strike, Sustain, Bon Mot, Demoralize, Recall Knowledge, etc. I wouldn't allow combining the action with other actions the character has for the round in order to do multi-action activities such as casting a 3-action spell.
As a side note, this is another case where a duration measured in rounds has problems.
If you become Quickened as a result of this ability yourself, you don't immediately gain actions during your turn. And the effect ends at the start of your next turn because of how duration measured in rounds works.
So you can never benefit from the Quickened condition yourself.