I am running an NPC Level 14 Warlock that has the spell soul cage. They think that the character is unconscious after taking massive damage from one of the warlock's spells when, in actuality, the character is pretending to be unconscious. If two attacks hit the character, the character will be playing dead making the warlock think that he has died. Would the warlock be able to cast soul cage on the character since the warlock believes this is happening or would the reaction not even occur since the character isn't actually dead? In either case, the character will not get their soul captured since they need to be dead. I just want to see if the casting is wasted and soul cage is used up for the day (which would be unfortunate for the warlock if that is the case).
1) as the character pretending to be dead takes damage they have to make deception or concentration checks to keep up the ruse with a DC equal to the damage taken. The reason for this would be it's very hard to act as if you are dead when you take a lot of damage, pain can cause a body to react even if you don't want it to and the more damage the body takes the harder it is to remain composed and keep up a ruse or, regardless of the damage taken, have the character unable to keep up the ruse without using the Feign Death spell.
2) allow the NPC to use a contested passive inisght or medicine checks with a DC equal to the characters passive deception score as part of the Soul Cage spell, if they succeed then they know the body is still alive, if they fail you can cast the spell and have it fail.
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Assuming the decption is successful, the warlock casts soul cage but the spell can't find a target and therefore fails. The reaction and spell slot are both spent.
I am running an NPC Level 14 Warlock that has the spell soul cage. They think that the character is unconscious after taking massive damage from one of the warlock's spells when, in actuality, the character is pretending to be unconscious. If two attacks hit the character, the character will be playing dead making the warlock think that he has died. Would the warlock be able to cast soul cage on the character since the warlock believes this is happening or would the reaction not even occur since the character isn't actually dead? In either case, the character will not get their soul captured since they need to be dead. I just want to see if the casting is wasted and soul cage is used up for the day (which would be unfortunate for the warlock if that is the case).
I'd go with one of the following:
1) as the character pretending to be dead takes damage they have to make deception or concentration checks to keep up the ruse with a DC equal to the damage taken. The reason for this would be it's very hard to act as if you are dead when you take a lot of damage, pain can cause a body to react even if you don't want it to and the more damage the body takes the harder it is to remain composed and keep up a ruse or, regardless of the damage taken, have the character unable to keep up the ruse without using the Feign Death spell.
2) allow the NPC to use a contested passive inisght or medicine checks with a DC equal to the characters passive deception score as part of the Soul Cage spell, if they succeed then they know the body is still alive, if they fail you can cast the spell and have it fail.
Assuming the decption is successful, the warlock casts soul cage but the spell can't find a target and therefore fails. The reaction and spell slot are both spent.