Controlled condition

[The Total Package]

If I have my enemy Controlled for 1 round, what type of knowledge am I privy to? Would I be able to know what 1 action, two action and three action abilities I can do? Would I know its Athletics modifier for Trip attacks? Intimidation modifier? Thanks.

[shroudb]

inherently, nothing gives you said information by default just because someone has that condition.

but narratively wise, for my tables, it will depend how he got the condition.

As an example, if you are possessing someone, you probably can tell how athletic the body you are controlling is. but if you simply casted dominate on someone, then you wouldn't know except from what you've noticed yourself.

that said, you can always command someone to do something like "use your most powerful offensive spell", "try to do maximum damage to this one" and etc, and they should comply with the directions you gave them.

worst case scenario, since talking is free, you can always command them to tell you what they can do ("what's your most powerful spell", "are you good at tripping enemies" and etc)

[Claxon]

Yeah, it's going to depend on what gave the controlled condition.

If it was something like the Command spell (although it's not a great example because it doesn't actually cause the controlled condition) then you'd know basically nothing. And not because the spell limits you to only a few commands you can issue, but because it just doesn't do that.

Most spells that grant control probably don't tell you much about what that character can do.

For possession, I would rule that you have a general awareness of the things the body can do, although not necessarily an exact understanding of "how much". Which means narratively the character wouldn't know exact values. For ease of play, I would give the player the values, but would instruct them to decide as though they didn't know the exact values when deciding how to act.

[The Raven Black]

Recall Knowledge.

[Claxon]

The Raven Black wrote:

Recall Knowledge.

That would work on creatures, I don't think there's been any frame work that would allow you to know a "class level type" character's abilities. And it's kind of awkward because NPCs aren't generally built like PCs, but can be built to mimic certain PC classes, and what abilities they might have can vary a lot. As a GM, against humanoid NPCs you're probably not getting a lot of information about what a specific character can do without doing some investigation about that character specifically.

[Tridus]

Claxon wrote:

The Raven Black wrote:

Recall Knowledge.

That would work on creatures, I don't think there's been any frame work that would allow you to know a "class level type" character's abilities. And it's kind of awkward because NPCs aren't generally built like PCs, but can be built to mimic certain PC classes, and what abilities they might have can vary a lot. As a GM, against humanoid NPCs you're probably not getting a lot of information about what a specific character can do without doing some investigation about that character specifically.

Well, NPC descriptions are effectively "classes". "Human Bandit" isn't that different from "Human Rogue."

So it's reasonable to assume you could use RK on a PC and discover "that's an Orc Alchemist" with a reasonable chance of success. Of course, you can only get generic info about Orcs and Alchemists that way. Knowing that it's "Bob the level 5 Orc Bomber Alchemist who can do X" is a different story because Bob is effectively Unique* with that +10 DC, and few NPCs are actually making that without extenuating circumstances.

Usually when NPCs know what PCs can do it, it's because it's either a recurring NPC and has seen the PCs in action, the PCs have been fighting that NPCs minions and the NPC has learned something, or scouting has been going on. But the recently reawakened Undead who has been slumbering for centuries in a tomb has no reasonable way to know anything about the PCs if the PCs stumble in there and wake them up.

*Barring special cases like Kingmaker where past a certain point the PCs are famous/infamous and thus the RK rules about famous people making it easier kick in. In a campaign like that, it's pretty safe to assume past a certain point that NPCs from other kingdoms know about them and have at least a basic idea of what they can do because rival kingdoms will want their forces to know that and it won't really be a secret. Much like how almost everyone in their own kingdom will know basic info and rumors about them, some of which are probably false, because the monarch adventurers are going to be very well known in their own kingdom.

[Claxon]

Tridus wrote:

Well, NPC descriptions are effectively "classes". "Human Bandit" isn't that different from "Human Rogue."

So it's reasonable to assume you could use RK on a PC and discover "that's an Orc Alchemist" with a reasonable chance of success. Of course, you can only get generic info about Orcs and Alchemists that way. Knowing that it's "Bob the level 5 Orc Bomber Alchemist who can do X" is a different story because Bob is effectively Unique* with that +10 DC, and few NPCs are actually making that without extenuating circumstances.

Yeah, that's exactly what I'm trying to say.

Tridus wrote:

Usually when NPCs know what PCs can do it, it's because it's either a recurring NPC and has seen the PCs in action, the PCs have been fighting that NPCs minions and the NPC has learned something, or scouting has been going on. But the recently reawakened Undead who has been slumbering for centuries in a tomb has no reasonable way to know anything about the PCs if the PCs stumble in there and wake them up.

*Barring special cases like Kingmaker where past a certain point the PCs are famous/infamous and thus the RK rules about famous people making it easier kick in. In a campaign like that, it's pretty safe to assume past a certain point that NPCs from other kingdoms know about them and have at least a basic idea of what they can do because rival kingdoms will want their forces to know that and it won't really be a secret. Much like how almost everyone in their own kingdom will know basic info and rumors about...

100%, it sounds like we view this the same way.