One of the characters in my campaign has an Amulet of the Planes. He used it to get out of a sticky situation (only to get into another one). Here's my conundrum. The description of the amulet is incredibly vague. "While wearing this Amulet, you can use an action to name a location that you are familiar with on another plane of existence. Then make a DC 15 Intelligence check. On a successful check, you cast the Plane Shift spell. On a failure, you and each creature and object within 15 feet of you Travel to a random destination. Roll a d100. On a 1-60, you Travel to a random location on the plane you named. On a 61-100, you Travel to a randomly determined plane of existence."
There's no recharge time listed. There's no limitations as to its use listed. There's nothing listed that could prevent or cancel its use. How would you guys play this? Would you add a recharge time so he couldn't just bop in- bop out of planes? Would you place limitations on it? If so, what kind? Would a magic resistance or magic cancellation circle prevent its use? What would happen to it if it cracked or broke? What would be able to break it?
While I'm thrilled my player used it, I can see it being used so often it would throw off the campaign.
You’re correct, there aren’t any limitations on how often it can be used. But using it requires an ability check, not a skill proficiency check, with a 50% chance of succeeding at best if the PC has an intelligence of 20. Using it too often will eventually result in the PC, together with every creature within 15’, ending up in a pool of fire, or an endless ocean, or face to face with a demon, or something worse!
I would never in a million years give a party something like this. The main reason is, I would then be required to potentially spec out any of the possible planes of existence on a player's whim. I'm sorry but no, the players are not allowed, in the middle of a session, to suddenly force me to come up with rules and descriptions and creatures on any plane of existence they want.
A Antimagic Field or Beholder's central eye will block it, as will any effect that blocks planar travel, such as Mordenkainen's Private Sanctum or Hallow, but those are pretty specialized protections (though I'd probably litter any high level dungeon with them because teleport and dimension door shenanigans). It also causes you to cast a spell, so it is subject to Counterspell. None of those will really prevent abuse, so yes, the main limitation on use is the DM 'randomly' putting you in a place that instantly kills you (if it doesn't immediately kill you, you just use it again on your next turn to escape).
The thing about this is that it has a VERY high chance of killing your player's character. Yes, it can be abused, yes it has no cool down or limitations, however it has a high chance of randomly placing them on any plane of existence.
Plane of fire, can, and does, have some habitable locations, however it's going to be very possible that the denizens will capture and enslave the character.
Plane of Water, unless they have a lot of luck, they'll end up in an endless ocean. Without water breathing, they'll drown.
Plane of Earth, there is about an 80% chance that they will appear inside solid earth and die immediately.
Plane of Wind, there is a severe lack of land, so falling infinitely?
Plane of Limbo, could easily destroy them with the chaotic magics which permeate the entire place.
And so on, if you do some research on the different planes, and understand the dangers that are ever present, you can easily dissuade the user from abusing it.
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The out seems like “location that you are familiar with.” The closest thing I can think of is the rules for teleport which doesn’t quite define “familiar” but there is “very familiar” a place that you’ve studied, and then there’s “seen casually” which means you’ve seen it more than once. I’d put familiar between those two, and say it has to be a place you’ve at least seen once. Basically it would turn it into something like a video game fast travel that lets you go to places you’ve been before, but nothing completely new.
Plane of fire, can, and does, have some habitable locations, however it's going to be very possible that the denizens will capture and enslave the character.
Again, the objection I have to this is, now the DM has to make up the locations, the denizens, the enslavement situation, and a mechanism to allow escape (unless you just want to announce a TPK and end the campaign). Same with the other planes.
Working out the details of the planes takes work. The DMG only gives the vaguest descriptions of these things. Earlier editions had "Manuals of the Planes" and there is some 5e stuff that may or may not be any good on DM's Guild... but even granting these source materials, now the player, by using this item, can force the DM to buy and read/learn all this crap, which maybe the DM was not interested in doing. The ONLY way I would give the amulet to a player is if I wanted to deal with all these planes and either was (a) incredibly good at improving literally everything off the top of my head (which I am not), or (b) very prepared with all kinds of material and info. about the planes.
Before having my party go to the Astral Plane, I bought the 4e book about the Astral Sea, watched some of Coleville's Chain of Acheron where they go to the Astral Sea, and spent hours working out the rules of how it works and what it looks like. I came up with various concepts like, whether food is available there (it isn't, at least not for mortals), whether water is available (it is -- in the form of a mist that can be "harvested" if you know how), and things like this. As a DM, I was happy to take them to the Astral once I had designed it and figured it out. But I wouldn't have let them go anywhere else, because I haven't worked out the details of my other planes yet.
And until I do, they don't get to decide when they go to those other planes, or even when I have to pick a random one to send them to. I get to decide that.
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It's in your signature: "Dungeons and Dragons is the most fun you can have with your brain." -- Matt Colville, Running the Game.
Whether or not you are prepared for what the players do, whether or not you have every pdf, Dragon Magazine, splat book, YouTube video, and/or even Gary Gygax himself sitting next to you, you're going to have to make stuff up and do the work if you are a DM. This is the cornerstone of being a DM. Your players do something and you, as the DM, have the game change due to those choices.
Saying "...they don't get to decide when they go to those other planes, or even when I have to pick a random one to send them to. I get to decide that" takes player agency away in this situation.
You began by saying that you object to the idea that there has to be work put into this because of the amulet. You did the work, you did the research, and set everything up for when your players went to the Astral Plane. This is the best advice for the OP.
It's one thing to expect a DM to prepare for things that could be reasonably expected. But in the D&D canon omniverse (not in mine, but in the canon one), there are something like 27 planes, hardly any of which have been described or spec'ed out for the DM other than a spare page of generic text in the DMG (if that). It is not reasonable to say to a DM, "You must be prepared that your players could randomly and on any whim go to any one of these 27 planes, plus anywhere else in the prime material plane they may wish to go, including in the middle of a session with no prep time."
If you wanna DM that way, go for it. I can't, and won't. If my players objected that I won't, I'd hand the screen across the table and say, "You DM."
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WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
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Saying "...they don't get to decide when they go to those other planes, or even when I have to pick a random one to send them to. I get to decide that" takes player agency away in this situation.
Not necessarily, players can't decide to go to any plane on a whim, at least until they get quite a few levels under the belt. They can't teleport anywhere they please either. The DM has some control, without taking away player agency.
In this situation they can choose to go to a plane on a whim, the amulet allows it.
You began by saying that you object to the idea that there has to be work put into this because of the amulet. You did the work, you did the research, and set everything up for when your players went to the Astral Plane. This is the best advice for the OP.
There are many styles of DM, BioWiz is clearly the preparing kind rather than the improvising one, and see the other thread about preparation that gets thrown in the bin, that does not make him an inferior DM to want to prepare, I'm sure his prepared locations are amazing.
I have no doubt that BioWiz puts together some interesting games. Heck they've gone and dropped players in the Astral plane before and I don't know a lot of DMs who've done that (including myself). I was simply observing that the comment about doing research was the best advice. Even if it's skimming over a wiki, or the very limited information provided in the DMG to get inspiration. The OP has something they're unfamiliar with, it's a good idea to get some information to work with.
As a DM, one has to be comfortable running the game in whatever setting takes place. I would not be comfortable running a Game of Thrones style political intrigue. Therefore, I honestly don't care how much my players might want to do it, such a thing will NOT happen in my game. As I have said before, if a player wants to do it, here's the DM screen, they can take a turn at running something. If they're not willing to do that, then they play a game I'm comfortable running. And I am not comfortable plane-hopping to places I know hardly anything about, especially mid-session, any plane you want, at random, any time, without restriction. Such a circumstance will never happen in my game. Call disallowing it taking player agency away if you want. I call doing plane-hopping without warning and on a whim taking away DM agency -- the agency to work on areas, maps, NPCs, and monsters that interest me, as the DM. The DM gets to have fun too.. or the game will fall apart.
Part of this issue here is that, beyond just comfort levels, I have a certain standard to which I hold myself. I might be able to whip something up and run something barely playable on an improv basis if the players suddenly and unexpectedly just showed up in Pandemonium. But it wouldn't be up to what I consider to be my DMing standards. I'm not willing to run a game like that. That's my call, as a DM. Either I run something up to my standards, or I don't DM.
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WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
If I would be limits on the power, 3 times a day. However, one limit you may not have thought of is the pc will need to research each plane to become familiar with a location on the plane. Anti magic field, and others to stop the use. Maybe counterspell if use offensive. If your breaking it it broken. Call it AC 15 HP 10 Threshold 8 to break it.
Well, unless the party have already been plane hopping they definitely won't comply with "name a location that you are familiar with on another plane of existence".
I would note that many of the problems BioWizard points out are not specific to this item, they're true for any method of using Plane Shift. "Teleport to anywhere, and you don't even have to give an accurate description, just a general description" is pretty much guaranteed to be a headache for the DM. The fact that the amulet requires you to be 'familiar' (details undefined) makes it less abusable than the spell.
* - (a forked, metal rod worth at least 250 gp, attuned to a particular plane of existence)
Yeah, good luck finding that in my world without me having prepped for it.
Look, I am not saying that I won't, as a DM, try to give the players what they want if possible. One of my players in fact loves planar adventures and the reason I brought them to the Astral Plane so early (6th level) was to give him a taste of it, and more importantly, to make the PCs aware, in character, that there are other planes and potential ways to get there.
But they only way they're going to be able to use Plane Shift to get to, say, the plane of Arcadia, is when I'm ready for them to go there. Then they'll find the tuning fork (or perhaps be able to make one, depending on how things go).
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WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
Great inghts here. Lots for me to work with. Thanks for all your help. The plane they teleported to is a lawful good plane, and he brought in three zombies and a cursed dwarf. I can use that to my advantage with some of the anti-magic ideas in keeping him in the plane and the price of leaving it is the amulet. I really appreciate all your help.
As a player that hijacked a campaign because of this item... man, it was a great ride... I am certain that I was the least likely character to steal this item... and probably still am. But the DM's NPC character kept appearing to help us out of difficult situations and my companions kept owing more and more favors... and one day, I snapped. I was the last of our party to enter the summoned portal, and reached out and swiped the amulet and rolled a natural 20. The eyes at the table were incredible. No one imagined doing something like that... and now we had an item in our low level grubby hands that was worth more than our miserable lives. I think we were level 3. And yes, it should have killed us several times... but we got some lucky rolls. We did visit the Plane of Fire, the Plane of Air, the Astral Sea... the Plane of Water was pretty scary... but each time we would almost die and make it out, but we knew we were eventually going to do something fatal and stupid so we only used it in emergency. I think it was finally at Level 10 that I found the person we originally took it from and gave it back (while shoving him through the portal we summoned). It was the most amazing adventure and the scariest thing to roll for every. single. freaking. time.
10/10 would allow players to get one if they were bold enough... and have a few things ready (you really don't need much, just some scenario that they appear in that they immediately want out of). In no time, they will wish they never had it. It's like the saying, "The first one's free..." and then you make them pay and pay and regret ever having the item. It's such a temptation to use. Especially if you have a relatively low Int party like we did.
Similar question, I was running a one shot where the hidden evil character (a warlock in disguise) used the amulet to escape an impending detonation of city wide destruction. It was not used offensively but one of the PCs used counter spell on it. The argument was the amulet was activated previously as a spell then released at the time of the plane shift, one of the PCs said in order for counter spell to work they would have had to go back in time to when it was actually cast, kind of like holding an action in a sense. The other question was at what level is the plane shift cast at? The warlock that used it was a 5th level caster where the Wizard that counter spelled it was at a 3. In the description of counter spell anything above your level you have to roll a 10+ cast to beat the spell. I got sick of the arguing and stated he could cast it and he beat the spell causing the warlock, wizard and every other player to die in the explosion. Thoughts on how I should have handled it? What would have been a better solution? Other than the obvious "don't kill all the PCs".
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One of the characters in my campaign has an Amulet of the Planes. He used it to get out of a sticky situation (only to get into another one). Here's my conundrum. The description of the amulet is incredibly vague. "While wearing this Amulet, you can use an action to name a location that you are familiar with on another plane of existence. Then make a DC 15 Intelligence check. On a successful check, you cast the Plane Shift spell. On a failure, you and each creature and object within 15 feet of you Travel to a random destination. Roll a d100. On a 1-60, you Travel to a random location on the plane you named. On a 61-100, you Travel to a randomly determined plane of existence."
There's no recharge time listed. There's no limitations as to its use listed. There's nothing listed that could prevent or cancel its use. How would you guys play this? Would you add a recharge time so he couldn't just bop in- bop out of planes? Would you place limitations on it? If so, what kind? Would a magic resistance or magic cancellation circle prevent its use? What would happen to it if it cracked or broke? What would be able to break it?
While I'm thrilled my player used it, I can see it being used so often it would throw off the campaign.
Thanks for the feedback.
You’re correct, there aren’t any limitations on how often it can be used. But using it requires an ability check, not a skill proficiency check, with a 50% chance of succeeding at best if the PC has an intelligence of 20. Using it too often will eventually result in the PC, together with every creature within 15’, ending up in a pool of fire, or an endless ocean, or face to face with a demon, or something worse!
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I would never in a million years give a party something like this. The main reason is, I would then be required to potentially spec out any of the possible planes of existence on a player's whim. I'm sorry but no, the players are not allowed, in the middle of a session, to suddenly force me to come up with rules and descriptions and creatures on any plane of existence they want.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
A Antimagic Field or Beholder's central eye will block it, as will any effect that blocks planar travel, such as Mordenkainen's Private Sanctum or Hallow, but those are pretty specialized protections (though I'd probably litter any high level dungeon with them because teleport and dimension door shenanigans). It also causes you to cast a spell, so it is subject to Counterspell. None of those will really prevent abuse, so yes, the main limitation on use is the DM 'randomly' putting you in a place that instantly kills you (if it doesn't immediately kill you, you just use it again on your next turn to escape).
The thing about this is that it has a VERY high chance of killing your player's character. Yes, it can be abused, yes it has no cool down or limitations, however it has a high chance of randomly placing them on any plane of existence.
Plane of fire, can, and does, have some habitable locations, however it's going to be very possible that the denizens will capture and enslave the character.
Plane of Water, unless they have a lot of luck, they'll end up in an endless ocean. Without water breathing, they'll drown.
Plane of Earth, there is about an 80% chance that they will appear inside solid earth and die immediately.
Plane of Wind, there is a severe lack of land, so falling infinitely?
Plane of Limbo, could easily destroy them with the chaotic magics which permeate the entire place.
And so on, if you do some research on the different planes, and understand the dangers that are ever present, you can easily dissuade the user from abusing it.
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The out seems like “location that you are familiar with.” The closest thing I can think of is the rules for teleport which doesn’t quite define “familiar” but there is “very familiar” a place that you’ve studied, and then there’s “seen casually” which means you’ve seen it more than once. I’d put familiar between those two, and say it has to be a place you’ve at least seen once. Basically it would turn it into something like a video game fast travel that lets you go to places you’ve been before, but nothing completely new.
Again, the objection I have to this is, now the DM has to make up the locations, the denizens, the enslavement situation, and a mechanism to allow escape (unless you just want to announce a TPK and end the campaign). Same with the other planes.
Working out the details of the planes takes work. The DMG only gives the vaguest descriptions of these things. Earlier editions had "Manuals of the Planes" and there is some 5e stuff that may or may not be any good on DM's Guild... but even granting these source materials, now the player, by using this item, can force the DM to buy and read/learn all this crap, which maybe the DM was not interested in doing. The ONLY way I would give the amulet to a player is if I wanted to deal with all these planes and either was (a) incredibly good at improving literally everything off the top of my head (which I am not), or (b) very prepared with all kinds of material and info. about the planes.
Before having my party go to the Astral Plane, I bought the 4e book about the Astral Sea, watched some of Coleville's Chain of Acheron where they go to the Astral Sea, and spent hours working out the rules of how it works and what it looks like. I came up with various concepts like, whether food is available there (it isn't, at least not for mortals), whether water is available (it is -- in the form of a mist that can be "harvested" if you know how), and things like this. As a DM, I was happy to take them to the Astral once I had designed it and figured it out. But I wouldn't have let them go anywhere else, because I haven't worked out the details of my other planes yet.
And until I do, they don't get to decide when they go to those other planes, or even when I have to pick a random one to send them to. I get to decide that.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
It's in your signature: "Dungeons and Dragons is the most fun you can have with your brain." -- Matt Colville, Running the Game.
Whether or not you are prepared for what the players do, whether or not you have every pdf, Dragon Magazine, splat book, YouTube video, and/or even Gary Gygax himself sitting next to you, you're going to have to make stuff up and do the work if you are a DM. This is the cornerstone of being a DM. Your players do something and you, as the DM, have the game change due to those choices.
Saying "...they don't get to decide when they go to those other planes, or even when I have to pick a random one to send them to. I get to decide that" takes player agency away in this situation.
You began by saying that you object to the idea that there has to be work put into this because of the amulet. You did the work, you did the research, and set everything up for when your players went to the Astral Plane. This is the best advice for the OP.
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I also said I wouldn't give them the amulet.
It's one thing to expect a DM to prepare for things that could be reasonably expected. But in the D&D canon omniverse (not in mine, but in the canon one), there are something like 27 planes, hardly any of which have been described or spec'ed out for the DM other than a spare page of generic text in the DMG (if that). It is not reasonable to say to a DM, "You must be prepared that your players could randomly and on any whim go to any one of these 27 planes, plus anywhere else in the prime material plane they may wish to go, including in the middle of a session with no prep time."
If you wanna DM that way, go for it. I can't, and won't. If my players objected that I won't, I'd hand the screen across the table and say, "You DM."
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
In this situation they can choose to go to a plane on a whim, the amulet allows it.
I have no doubt that BioWiz puts together some interesting games. Heck they've gone and dropped players in the Astral plane before and I don't know a lot of DMs who've done that (including myself). I was simply observing that the comment about doing research was the best advice. Even if it's skimming over a wiki, or the very limited information provided in the DMG to get inspiration. The OP has something they're unfamiliar with, it's a good idea to get some information to work with.
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As a DM, one has to be comfortable running the game in whatever setting takes place. I would not be comfortable running a Game of Thrones style political intrigue. Therefore, I honestly don't care how much my players might want to do it, such a thing will NOT happen in my game. As I have said before, if a player wants to do it, here's the DM screen, they can take a turn at running something. If they're not willing to do that, then they play a game I'm comfortable running. And I am not comfortable plane-hopping to places I know hardly anything about, especially mid-session, any plane you want, at random, any time, without restriction. Such a circumstance will never happen in my game. Call disallowing it taking player agency away if you want. I call doing plane-hopping without warning and on a whim taking away DM agency -- the agency to work on areas, maps, NPCs, and monsters that interest me, as the DM. The DM gets to have fun too.. or the game will fall apart.
Part of this issue here is that, beyond just comfort levels, I have a certain standard to which I hold myself. I might be able to whip something up and run something barely playable on an improv basis if the players suddenly and unexpectedly just showed up in Pandemonium. But it wouldn't be up to what I consider to be my DMing standards. I'm not willing to run a game like that. That's my call, as a DM. Either I run something up to my standards, or I don't DM.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
If I would be limits on the power, 3 times a day. However, one limit you may not have thought of is the pc will need to research each plane to become familiar with a location on the plane. Anti magic field, and others to stop the use. Maybe counterspell if use offensive. If your breaking it it broken. Call it AC 15 HP 10 Threshold 8 to break it.
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Well, unless the party have already been plane hopping they definitely won't comply with "name a location that you are familiar with on another plane of existence".
I would note that many of the problems BioWizard points out are not specific to this item, they're true for any method of using Plane Shift. "Teleport to anywhere, and you don't even have to give an accurate description, just a general description" is pretty much guaranteed to be a headache for the DM. The fact that the amulet requires you to be 'familiar' (details undefined) makes it less abusable than the spell.
Yeah, good luck finding that in my world without me having prepped for it.
Look, I am not saying that I won't, as a DM, try to give the players what they want if possible. One of my players in fact loves planar adventures and the reason I brought them to the Astral Plane so early (6th level) was to give him a taste of it, and more importantly, to make the PCs aware, in character, that there are other planes and potential ways to get there.
But they only way they're going to be able to use Plane Shift to get to, say, the plane of Arcadia, is when I'm ready for them to go there. Then they'll find the tuning fork (or perhaps be able to make one, depending on how things go).
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
Great inghts here. Lots for me to work with. Thanks for all your help. The plane they teleported to is a lawful good plane, and he brought in three zombies and a cursed dwarf. I can use that to my advantage with some of the anti-magic ideas in keeping him in the plane and the price of leaving it is the amulet. I really appreciate all your help.
As a player that hijacked a campaign because of this item... man, it was a great ride... I am certain that I was the least likely character to steal this item... and probably still am. But the DM's NPC character kept appearing to help us out of difficult situations and my companions kept owing more and more favors... and one day, I snapped. I was the last of our party to enter the summoned portal, and reached out and swiped the amulet and rolled a natural 20. The eyes at the table were incredible. No one imagined doing something like that... and now we had an item in our low level grubby hands that was worth more than our miserable lives. I think we were level 3. And yes, it should have killed us several times... but we got some lucky rolls. We did visit the Plane of Fire, the Plane of Air, the Astral Sea... the Plane of Water was pretty scary... but each time we would almost die and make it out, but we knew we were eventually going to do something fatal and stupid so we only used it in emergency. I think it was finally at Level 10 that I found the person we originally took it from and gave it back (while shoving him through the portal we summoned). It was the most amazing adventure and the scariest thing to roll for every. single. freaking. time.
10/10 would allow players to get one if they were bold enough... and have a few things ready (you really don't need much, just some scenario that they appear in that they immediately want out of). In no time, they will wish they never had it. It's like the saying, "The first one's free..." and then you make them pay and pay and regret ever having the item. It's such a temptation to use. Especially if you have a relatively low Int party like we did.
Similar question, I was running a one shot where the hidden evil character (a warlock in disguise) used the amulet to escape an impending detonation of city wide destruction. It was not used offensively but one of the PCs used counter spell on it. The argument was the amulet was activated previously as a spell then released at the time of the plane shift, one of the PCs said in order for counter spell to work they would have had to go back in time to when it was actually cast, kind of like holding an action in a sense. The other question was at what level is the plane shift cast at? The warlock that used it was a 5th level caster where the Wizard that counter spelled it was at a 3. In the description of counter spell anything above your level you have to roll a 10+ cast to beat the spell. I got sick of the arguing and stated he could cast it and he beat the spell causing the warlock, wizard and every other player to die in the explosion. Thoughts on how I should have handled it? What would have been a better solution? Other than the obvious "don't kill all the PCs".