I'm running a campaign where the party is currently at L3 and I'd like to briefly waylay them with a side hook while on their way to investigate their main arc. The road they are on will have them pass through a small Gnomish city (80-90% Gnomes) that is relatively off the beaten path, where the residents don't really trust outsiders. The Gnomes aren't necessarily hostile to outsiders, they just would rather keep to their own. I let my players go crazy in character creation because there were some races that they really wanted to play, and I ended up with a party consisting of a Loxodon, a Goliath, a Kalashtar, and an Aasimar. Needless to say, they stick out like a sore thumb wherever they go, leading to some really fun RP opportunities.
I'd like to frame them for a murder. I figure that someone in this Gnomish city with an axe to grind with another person (maybe a law enforcement officer or maybe just a personal grudge) would see this strange group of obvious outsiders pass through and see it as the perfect opportunity to set them up for murder and get away free. After all, who is going to believe the word of these strange people, especially if our killer has one or two paid Gnomish witnesses on their side. The plan is to have the killer commit the crime and then use mage hand to drop an item belonging to the victim on the party. Witnesses will report the party, and law enforcement will surround them and take them into custody.
On to my problem: Why should the party be allowed to prove their innocence? If perception checks go well, there is an opening for the party to notice the key item being placed on their person, and possibly to see the person who did it scoot around an alley corner or something. I'm also considering having law enforcement have a caster with access to zone of truth get the ball rolling so that the party reveals under magical interrogation that they didn't do it, but I'd like some other possible explanations. I need a reliable reason why the party should be given, say a 24-hour window (under surveillance of course) in which they're allowed to investigate on their own behalf.
Is there anything in any of the character backgrounds that might lend itself to handling tricky political situations? If there's a way to use this, or hint to the players to use this, to create dialogue and plead for a way to prove their innocence.
You could also have another NPC show up who claims to have seen something that causes doubt in the players' guilt. A witness in the form of an outsider that the Gnomes do trust that vouches for the players. A Gnome who happened to be in the right place at the wrong time claiming that they are innocent.
Have a soothsayer that is always present with the leader of the Gnomes that spoke of a dark omen, the players plight happens to coincide with that prophecy. If you go the route of the more tinker Gnome, they could have some sort of surveillance that caught something strange which doesn't quite line up with the players being the perpetrators but there's just enough doubt that they are given leave to prove they're innocent.
I think a less xenophobic gnome convincing the town leaders to give the PCs a chance would play well. Think a Bilbo Baggins-type. He's left the town before, maybe was befriended/helped by someone of one of the party's represented races. He's viewed as a nut by the other gnomes, but they hold him in juuuuust enough respect (maybe he came back again Bilbo-like with some treasure) that they listen to him...this time. But if the PCs can't prove their innocence, there goes his reputation :)
I would go political. There's a Gnomish, or Gnomish Party that feel extending trade agreements to the outer world would be very lucrative, and if they intercede on your players behalf, then they could help to make those beneficial connections, particularly if your party has anyone with Noble(ish) backgrounds.
If there's a cleric in the town, there is really one (completely broken) way for the players to prove their innocence: Zone of Truth, and say they're not guilty. Boom, they're free to go
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"What do you mean I get disadvantage on persuasion?"
I don't know, Sneet, maybe because your argument is "Submit and become our pet"?
I’ve always liked the idea of a campaign or story arc based on Xenophon’s Anabasis (or Sol Yurick’s “The Warriors”) where a group of people far from home must escape back to safe turf through a hostile land where they are perceived by all to be the enemies.
If there's a cleric in the town, there is really one (completely broken) way for the players to prove their innocence: Zone of Truth, and say they're not guilty. Boom, they're free to go
Depends on who the cleric is a cleric of, and what gnomish law is. The murder rap is a legal issue, and it's entirely possible that a gnomish court of law doesn't accept magical evidence from non-gnomish religious sources :) Or that the gnomish law is somewhat vague on the issue, and the judge has a personal grudge against the local temple (he worships a different gnomish god), so he is unwilling to admit magical results from the competing temple into evidence. They won't even let the cleric into the courtroom to cast the spell. :)
If there's a cleric in the town, there is really one (completely broken) way for the players to prove their innocence: Zone of Truth, and say they're not guilty. Boom, they're free to go
This situation popped up in Critical Role a few years back. The party was accused of a falsehood and brought before the judge. One of the players was like, "Look, just cast a spell on us and you'll know the truth" and Matt Mercer had to kind of dance around it for the sake of the story.
Just as a sideways alternative, keep in mind that the PCs don't have to be "allowed" to do anything. If they are framed for murder, they might just flee the law rather than profess their innocence. You can see examples of that in AL DDEX2-10 Cloaks and Shadows, or in movies like The Fugitive.
Thank you all for the responses so far! You've definitely given me some good ideas. A few responses:
- I love the idea of a credible but slightly oddball gnome witness taking their side, or possibly the idea of a powerful ally within the city taking their side sensing something to gain from the party as allies down the road
- I think I can get around zone of truth issues by leaning on the gnomes' xenophobia. basically they presume the party's guilt and don't bother with trusting their word, even under potential magic influence, taking it to such extremes as seeing it as a waste of their time to go retrieve the cleric for such obviously guilty and untrustworthy foreigners. They will however trust a fellow gnome who vouches for the party.
- the party can totally flee. the consequences would be minimal given how i've placed the city within the world, although I'd make the actual escape a challenge as they would be under direct surveillance during the time they were trying to talk to witnesses and prove their innocence
I'd like this arc to only take a few sessions since it's really just a distraction on their main story, a way to break up the action and prevent them from just barging through the major arcs, and i think this is all a pretty good start. any other input welcome if you've got thoughts
- I think I can get around zone of truth issues by leaning on the gnomes' xenophobia. basically they presume the party's guilt and don't bother with trusting their word, even under potential magic influence, taking it to such extremes as seeing it as a waste of their time to go retrieve the cleric for such obviously guilty and untrustworthy foreigners. They will however trust a fellow gnome who vouches for the party.
Exactly. There's no need, just because it's a world with magic, for everyone to automatically trust all magic. As players, we see the backend of magic--we see behind the stage, right? But people in that world don't see "Oh, I get it, every cleric has access to all the same spells, and they are broken down nicely into 'levels'." What people who are in the world, PCs and NPCs, see are clerics calling forth light and magic shows. There is absolutely no reason for anyone to automatically trust any other spell caster, cleric or not.
Furthermore, there's no reason to expect that clerics of two different gods will even cast the same spell in the same way. They will say different prayers, make different hand motions. The visual effects will also likely look different, if the power is coming from two different gods. It's actually a bit silly to think that someone could walk into the courtroom and say "It's okay, I'm a cleric", and then cast Zone of Truth, have everyone automatically believe them, have other clerics present automatically know what spell is being cast, and have the results of the spell be obvious to all.
From the perspective of the NPCs, here's what it would look like:
Players are on trial, in the courtroom.
One PC says "I'm a cleric, let me cast Zone of Truth!"
PC mumbles some words, waves a hand, and maybe some lights surround the PCs.
Judge asks PCs "did you kill the man?"
PCs say "no".
Now...why would the judge accept that the PC is in fact a cleric? My trickster rogue or my high-CHA bard could stand up and say the exact same thing. And then, why would they automatically accept that the spell being cast is a 'truth-telling spell' at all? My Tomb Warlock could cast Thaumaturgy, or minor illusion, and get effects that would sure look super clericy and cool, right? The NPCs have no access to character sheets or rules about spell levels, they haven't read the description of thaumaturgy. They see a guy waving his hands and a light show.
If the cleric who's brought in is an NPC, same questions--why would the gnomes, who worship another god, automatically accept the word of this cleric? He said he cast a truth spell. But what if they think his god is a trickster, or a liar?
Even if it's a cleric of their own god, why would the legal system automatically be assumed to include magical evidence as admissible? Compare it to a lie-detector test, which aren't admissible in US courts. Are there ways to cheat magic? Sure there are. So it's entirely plausible that gnomish law in this community says "that's not good enough".
There's no reason for the GM to have to dance around this issue at all. We as players shouldn't think that the characters in the world see the world the same way the players do at all.
Brotherbock, it honestly sounds to me like you have never lived through this scenario, and are just theorizing here. Spells have a defined effect. Regardless of what the spell looks like while it is being cast, the end result is the same. Two clerics of different gods both cause a 15' radius zone to force saving throws on everyone inside. On a failed save, the same truth-compelling effect takes hold. But really, it's the AoE / non-targetting nature of the spell that causes your supposition to break down.
Once the zone is up, the results are testable. The judge doesn't have to take the PC's word for it. He can test it himself by entering the zone. He simply submits to the spell (meaning voluntarily fail a saving throw, which I understand is a separate and debatable point itself), then attempts to tell a lie and fails, causing him to witness firsthand the effects of the spell.
The idea that another spellcaster can decieve others into believing that zone of truth has been cast only holds up if no one besides the deceiver knows how the spell is supposed to work. That's certainly possible in a low-magic world, but in a high-magic world I would consider it an unnecessarily obstruction.
Brotherbock, it honestly sounds to me like you have never lived through this scenario, and are just theorizing here. Spells have a defined effect. Regardless of what the spell looks like while it is being cast, the end result is the same. Two clerics of different gods both cause a 15' radius zone to force saving throws on everyone inside. On a failed save, the same truth-compelling effect takes hold. But really, it's the AoE / non-targetting nature of the spell that causes your supposition to break down.
Once the zone is up, the results are testable. The judge doesn't have to take the PC's word for it. He can test it himself by entering the zone. He simply submits to the spell (meaning voluntarily fail a saving throw, which I understand is a separate and debatable point itself), then attempts to tell a lie and fails, causing him to witness firsthand the effects of the spell.
The idea that another spellcaster can decieve others into believing that zone of truth has been cast only holds up if no one besides the deceiver knows how the spell is supposed to work. That's certainly possible in a low-magic world, but in a high-magic world I would consider it an unnecessarily obstruction.
Have I ever had a party on trial for murder in a city of gnomes? No. I have not. Busted. :) But I've seen very similar situations. PCs upset because an NPC duped them into thinking he'd cast a spell he hadn't, for example.
What I have had are players who try to claim that, because the effects of a spell are given, the appearance of the spell must therefore be the same. Go ahead and re-read that spell description--the caster knows who has failed or made their save. Neither the spell, nor the rules for magic overall, say anything at all about what anyone else watching knows or sees. You are making assumptions about what anyone other than the caster will see. If there's no visual description of the spell, guess who makes the decision about what the spell looks like when cast? The DM :)
There are no visual, audible, or other sensory descriptions of the effects of that spell. So if your character is watching a cleric cast zone of truth, what does your character see? You see the cleric cast a spell--and as a DM I would require a skill check to see if you are able to identify what spell is being cast. And, if someone is trying to fool you (say via a performance or deception check and an illusion spell), I'd have a roll for them as well. And if you make the check, then you would see--what, exactly? The spell, as written, says nothing about what you would see. There's an 'area of force'. Is it visible? Can anyone but the caster see it? The people inside who fail their save have to tell the truth. How do you know, the bystander, that they have failed or not? How do you know that they are telling the truth? How do you know they weren't in the zone of truth but made their save?
In short, how do you, the bystander, know any of the following:
What spell was cast?
Who saved?
Who is telling the truth or not?
If you miss the role to tell what spell is cast, you the bystander have no idea what the truth is. You would have the cleric saying "I cast this spell, and he is telling the truth." Okay, fine. Do you believe the cleric? But your idea for the judge is a good one--test the zone out yourself.
The zone of force is not described as a visible zone. How do you know where the zone was centered? Did the cleric include all of the people he claimed to include? Did he include any of them? So you the judge walk down to test it out. How do you know where to stand? How do you know where the zone is? Maybe you just stand between the party members. Does that mean the guy on the end was inside the zone...the zone you cannot see? You can walk around, trying to lie, and test the exact limits of the zone. Okay, good idea. Do you remember exactly where everyone was standing when it was cast?
Look, I'm not criticizing your way of playing the game. If you want to have a world where all spells have very well delineated effects, everyone knows what they are, and there's no plausible (and sometimes even easy) way to deceive people about what spell is cast, that's fine. Basically, everyone who knows magic has access to the PHB. Not only do they all know magic, but they all know that all magic is similar. Everyone in that world knows that all clerics can pretty much cast all the same spells. If that's what you want, cool. If you want to have a world where all the spells appear exactly the same way, that's fine. (For example, does eldritch blast look the same for every warlock casting it? If so, that's fine. If not--if the blast from a Fiend Warlock will look different from the blast from a Fey Warlock, then you open the door to possibly not knowing what spell that was that just got cast.) If you want a world in which a cleric of a gnome god will meet a cleric of an elf god and say "Oh, you must have access to such and such spells and have so and so special abilities, nice to meet you", that's fine. To me, that's a very mechanistic, meta-gaming sort of world.
You are giving the characters in that world knowledge about the mechanics of the world that the game does not specify that they have. Does the game, for example, specify that your warlock is aware that the spells he has available are just like what all other warlocks have (patron spells excluded)? Does your warlock, just by being a warlock, know all the possible spells that any other warlock has available? Think about it from your character's perspective. How would you know that a warlock serving another patron has access to any of the spells you do? Is there a convention you all attend? :)
To me, the gnome judge--a legal profession, not a wizard--has no reason to trust the cleric casting the spell (for reasons I've explained), and in fact if being skeptical the way a judge should be, has in fact good reasons to not accept the word of any old spellcaster that walks into the courtroom.
It comes down to this (and again, play the way you want, by all means): you have decided to give the judge access to certain pieces of knowledge that the rules do not say the judge would have access to. I as DM would (and have in the past) decide not to give the judge that access. The rules don't say the judge won't know what's going on. But they do not say that he will. So my point remains as simply this: it is actually relatively easy for Zone of Truth to not be an easy fix to this situation. That is a spell that is designed to give the caster knowledge. Whether or not anyone else believes the caster is entirely a different issue, and not one the spell is concerned with.
Yes, the spells all have the same effect. That's it. That's all the rules specify.
After all of that, there's still the gnomish law. Law is strange, man. :) What is allowed in a courtroom in any country, state, or city is often just downright odd. Why would it be automatic that the law would accept something like zone of truth as evidence? Again, the caster finds things out from the spell. No one else does. If I'm writing laws, I'm going to be very aware of that fact.
Now I’m imagining an inept, overworked and quirky Gnomish public defender and ridiculously complex laws. I’m going to call them Erroneous Twiddlethumbs.
It's amazing that all of your comment was answered by a single word in my previous response: testable. I have nothing more to add, really.
Well, it's not amazing, given that I addressed how a test could be cheated on. I mean, if you really don't want to go through my whole post, that's fine. It was a long one. But do me the courtesy of not just blowing off my main points.
Look, here's the situation.
You: a cleric allied with a party of other PCs
The other PCs: on trial for murder
The Judge: not a cleric
Pretty simple scenario. The PCs are before the judge. You walk in, introduce yourself as the cleric of God X. (Q1:How does the judge know that's true?) You tell the judge "I have magic that can determine if they are telling the truth." (Q2: How does the judge, not a cleric, know what magic you actually have?) The judge says "Okay, let's do it." You say "My spell will cause the people I specifically point at to tell the truth." (Q3: How does the judge know that the zone of truth spell doesn't work that way?)
The judge would only know the answer to Question 1 if the judge looked at your character sheet. But the judge is a character, not a player. Thus, to have the judge know this to be true is giving the judge player knowledge. The judge may believe this to be true. He may even have good evidence, if he knows you from somewhere else. But I'm currently playing a changeling with a bunch of personas. My character has lots of people believing that he is lots of things that he is not.
The judge would only know the answer to Question 2 if the judge looked at the PHB. But the judge is a character, not a player.
The judge would only know the answer to Question 3 if the judge looked at the PHB. But the judge is a character, not a player.
There is nothing in the rules that specifies that the judge would know any of these things. Nothing in the rules say that all clerics know what all other clerics can do. All players of clerics know what all clerics can do. But that's player knowledge, not character knowledge.
The judge might easily know other clerics, and might easily know how their zone of truth spells work. But how in the world would the judge have access to the information that all zones of truth cast by all clerics work exactly the same? Is the judge the wisest sage in the known world? Has he spent years studying the magic of all the clerical orders in the world? He wouldn't know that fact, because that's player knowledge.
In short, you are comfortable giving characters lots of player knowledge. Your characters know a lot about how the mechanics of the game work. Mine do not. And there is nothing in the rules that say they have to. Again, if you want to play the game that way, that's fine. I'm certainly not telling you how your world should work. But you are acting as if the way you run the game is the only way. And it's just not.
To me, it is far more plausible that characters do not know what other people can do, by and large. If I was the DM, and you told me that the non-cleric judge should know exactly how a cleric spell works, I simply will say that this judge in fact doesn't know that at all.
Now I’m imagining an inept, overworked and quirky Gnomish public defender and ridiculously complex laws.
Exactly :) "Wait, wait. It says here that the cleric must be bonded in the kingdom in order for his spells to be admissible as evidence...that's a 2 month licensing process!"
Pretty simple scenario. The PCs are before the judge. You walk in, introduce yourself as the cleric of God X. (Q1:How does the judge know that's true?) You tell the judge "I have magic that can determine if they are telling the truth." (Q2: How does the judge, not a cleric, know what magic you actually have?) The judge says "Okay, let's do it." You say "My spell will cause the people I specifically point at to tell the truth." (Q3: How does the judge know that the zone of truth spell doesn't work that way?)
The judge would only know the answer to Question 1 if the judge looked at your character sheet. But the judge is a character, not a player. Thus, to have the judge know this to be true is giving the judge player knowledge. The judge may believe this to be true. He may even have good evidence, if he knows you from somewhere else. But I'm currently playing a changeling with a bunch of personas. My character has lots of people believing that he is lots of things that he is not.
The judge would only know the answer to Question 2 if the judge looked at the PHB. But the judge is a character, not a player.
The judge would only know the answer to Question 3 if the judge looked at the PHB. But the judge is a character, not a player.
More ridiculousness.
Q2: How does the judge, not a cleric, know what magic you actually have? He would test it.
Q3: How does the judge know that the zone of truth spell doesn't work that way? He would test it.
How much of testing do I have to explain to you? I'm going to assume all of it. A test is taking measurement to check the quality, performance, or reliability of something. A test has (at least) two groups, the test group, and the control group. Results are compared between the groups. In this scenario, the judge is the control group.
Picking up where your scenario bizarrely ends, the cleric says "My spell will cause the people I specifically point at to tell the truth." The judge says "Point at your friend," thereby ensuring that he's not about to eat a fireball to the face. The other PCs say something that is irrelevant for the purpose of the test. Then the judge says "Point at me." Lastly, he attempts to lie. He knows to do this, not because he has any out of game knowledge, in game knowledge, or any of the other nonsensical things you've proposed. He knows to do this because he knows how to correctly construct a test. As you mentioned earlier, he is skeptical, but also, he's capable of understanding one way in which skepticism is resolved: by testing.
If he can't lie, the spell works! As mentioned, the effect was the important thing, and the effect is in place. He can now believe the things that were said by the PCs, whatever it was they said. Conversely, if he can lie, the spell failed, and he has reason to suspect everyone.
Please note that the way the cleric describes the spell working is also irrelevant for the purposes of constructing a test. You said point, but it works equally well if the cleric does the sensible thing and describes the actual spell area. Whatever the PC describes, the judge adjusts his method to make sure he is excluded when the other PCs are going, and that they are excluded when he is going. Broadly speaking, this is described as the parameters of a test.
Any other clarifications necessary? Do you need me to write more about testing?
Pretty simple scenario. The PCs are before the judge. You walk in, introduce yourself as the cleric of God X. (Q1:How does the judge know that's true?) You tell the judge "I have magic that can determine if they are telling the truth." (Q2: How does the judge, not a cleric, know what magic you actually have?) The judge says "Okay, let's do it." You say "My spell will cause the people I specifically point at to tell the truth." (Q3: How does the judge know that the zone of truth spell doesn't work that way?)
The judge would only know the answer to Question 1 if the judge looked at your character sheet. But the judge is a character, not a player. Thus, to have the judge know this to be true is giving the judge player knowledge. The judge may believe this to be true. He may even have good evidence, if he knows you from somewhere else. But I'm currently playing a changeling with a bunch of personas. My character has lots of people believing that he is lots of things that he is not.
The judge would only know the answer to Question 2 if the judge looked at the PHB. But the judge is a character, not a player.
The judge would only know the answer to Question 3 if the judge looked at the PHB. But the judge is a character, not a player.
More ridiculousness.
Q2: How does the judge, not a cleric, know what magic you actually have? He would test it.
Q3: How does the judge know that the zone of truth spell doesn't work that way? He would test it.
Gee, thanks for the civil tone of your posts. 'Ridiculousness', huh? Can't just go with "I disagree"? Hmm. I'm going to try my hardest here to keep this a civil discussion. You're making some good points, but you're still missing my points. Do me the favor of not reading my post like I'm upset, like I think you're being dumb, anything like that. I'm trying to have a civil discussion with you.
Anyway, let's take your first statement. I asked "how would the judge know what spells your cleric has", and you said "He would test it."
So you walk in, announce yourself as the cleric, and the judge would test what spells you have access to. What would that look like? "Please cast all the spells you know." Even if you did that, you cast all your spells, how would he know that you have cast all your spells? Does he consult the Manual of Cleric Spells of the Realm that he has sitting next to him?
Then I asked, given the scenario where you lie to him and say your ZoT spell works on targets and not areas, how he would know it doesn't really work that way. You said "he would test it." Okay. How exactly does he do that? You say "it works only on individual targets". What, exactly, would he want to test? Would he believe, for some reason, that it's actually an area of effect spell? Why would he believe that? Because he has a PHB handy? Because he, a non cleric, knows about cleric spells? He might know about cleric spells. If so, deceiving him will be harder. But still perfectly possible. So let's look at your example, because you're making some good points there.
You said (with my additions): "Picking up where your scenario bizarrely ends, the cleric says "My spell will cause the people I specifically point at to tell the truth." The judge says "Point at your friend," thereby ensuring that he's not about to eat a fireball to the face. The other PCs say something that is irrelevant for the purpose of the test. No. The other PC, being on trial, will pretend to be forced to tell the truth. He will say something very relevant to the test. He will pretend to be affected by the spell. You, being in league with the other PC, will not have cast the spell on your friend. Then the judge says "Point at me." When you do that, you cast the spell on the judge, including him in the spell radius, but not your friends. Lastly, he attempts to lie. He knows to do this, not because he has any out of game knowledge, in game knowledge, or any of the other nonsensical things you've proposed. He knows to do this because he knows how to correctly construct a test. As you mentioned earlier, he is skeptical, but also, he's capable of understanding one way in which skepticism is resolved: by testing. He does know these things. But because you didn't include your friend in the spell, and you did include the judge, the judge finds himself unable to lie."
Not really that hard to do. The judge will not know (with a good deception roll from the player, perhaps) that you cast the spell on him and not your friend. Because the judge doesn't know what the spell really looks like. You can wave your hands, chant a phrase, point at your friend, and not cast the spell. And you can wave your hands, chant a phrase, point at the judge, and cast the spell.
Look, you've admitted at this point (it seems) that the judge does not know inherently what spells you know, or what they look like, or how they work. Now we're just discussing whether the judge could be deceived. And he could be. It's a railroading DM who wouldn't give the players a chance to outwit the judge like this. You're right that the judge could try tests. A smart judge would, in fact. And the test you suggest is pretty good. If the law even allowed for magic to be admitted. But that a judge could try to test the spell as you claim it to be doesn't mean that he'll succeed.
And then, we can look at the rest of my argument, which is the very relevant DM-decided issue of gnomish law. Because the gnomes realize that non-magical judges can be deceived, they A) don't allow magic evidence in the courtroom, or B) don't allow non-approved magical evidence in the courtroom, etc. Take your pick. You may decide that any and every court of law in your world would allow this. But there's certainly no obvious reason why every court would have to. The very existence of illusion magic would be a good reason for courts to be skeptical of that. And, illusion magic, and basic deception, gives players the chance to trick their way out of something like this.
So TL/DR, here's my argument:
Zone of Truth is not an auto-solution to this problem. That's because
A judge could be deceived into thinking that a zone of truth was in effect when it wasn't, and therefore
It's easily plausible that the law of that city/state/nation would not accept the findings of the ZoT spell.
That a given judge might be able to keep from being deceived is beside the point. That a given judge might know what ZoT does, and how it works, and might even know that it works that way for this particular cleric (which seems far-fetched to me, but whatever) is beside the point. Because it's perfectly plausible that a cleric says "Let's try ZoT!" and the judge responds with "outsider magic is not admissible in a court of law". And if the PCs say "get the local cleric!", it's perfectly plausible that the judge says "That old trickster?! Not in my court."
So yes, you are correct about how the judge might see through the ruse. But he also might not, because as a realistic character in a fantasy world (at least the kind of world I like), he won't have encyclopedic knowledge of what everyone else is capable of, or what all the spells in the world are, or how they work. And the possibility of the ruse working is the key.
That's it. That's the argument. Your original reply to me was that deception can't work if anyone other than the caster knows how the spell is 'supposed to work'. My claim, given the rules as written, is that it's perfectly acceptable (and in my opinion preferable) that even other clerics of other orders not know what a cleric of a different order is capable of. A cleric of God X can cast ZoT. He sees a cleric of God Y cast it once, and it seems to work just like his spell. Later, another cleric of God Y says he's casting similar magic, but says he's casting it differently. Why would the cleric of God X know that this new cleric cannot cast the spell a different way?
Again, the world you seem to prefer is a world where the inhabitants are well aware that magic is very regular, very homogeneous, and once you learn the rules, unsurprising. And if you like a world like that, fine. I'm not telling you how to enjoy this game. But the RAW does not mandate a world like that, nor even suggest it. In fact, if you read really any fantasy novel (including D&D novels), they are full of experienced spell casters who really don't know exactly what other spell casters are capable of, not specifically.
So. Please realize we're talking about a game, and try to be civil. We're just disagreeing about a game here, we're not trading yo mamma insults. :)
Hi there,
I'm running a campaign where the party is currently at L3 and I'd like to briefly waylay them with a side hook while on their way to investigate their main arc. The road they are on will have them pass through a small Gnomish city (80-90% Gnomes) that is relatively off the beaten path, where the residents don't really trust outsiders. The Gnomes aren't necessarily hostile to outsiders, they just would rather keep to their own. I let my players go crazy in character creation because there were some races that they really wanted to play, and I ended up with a party consisting of a Loxodon, a Goliath, a Kalashtar, and an Aasimar. Needless to say, they stick out like a sore thumb wherever they go, leading to some really fun RP opportunities.
I'd like to frame them for a murder. I figure that someone in this Gnomish city with an axe to grind with another person (maybe a law enforcement officer or maybe just a personal grudge) would see this strange group of obvious outsiders pass through and see it as the perfect opportunity to set them up for murder and get away free. After all, who is going to believe the word of these strange people, especially if our killer has one or two paid Gnomish witnesses on their side. The plan is to have the killer commit the crime and then use mage hand to drop an item belonging to the victim on the party. Witnesses will report the party, and law enforcement will surround them and take them into custody.
On to my problem: Why should the party be allowed to prove their innocence? If perception checks go well, there is an opening for the party to notice the key item being placed on their person, and possibly to see the person who did it scoot around an alley corner or something. I'm also considering having law enforcement have a caster with access to zone of truth get the ball rolling so that the party reveals under magical interrogation that they didn't do it, but I'd like some other possible explanations. I need a reliable reason why the party should be given, say a 24-hour window (under surveillance of course) in which they're allowed to investigate on their own behalf.
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
"To die would be an awfully big adventure"
Is there anything in any of the character backgrounds that might lend itself to handling tricky political situations? If there's a way to use this, or hint to the players to use this, to create dialogue and plead for a way to prove their innocence.
You could also have another NPC show up who claims to have seen something that causes doubt in the players' guilt. A witness in the form of an outsider that the Gnomes do trust that vouches for the players. A Gnome who happened to be in the right place at the wrong time claiming that they are innocent.
Have a soothsayer that is always present with the leader of the Gnomes that spoke of a dark omen, the players plight happens to coincide with that prophecy. If you go the route of the more tinker Gnome, they could have some sort of surveillance that caught something strange which doesn't quite line up with the players being the perpetrators but there's just enough doubt that they are given leave to prove they're innocent.
I think a less xenophobic gnome convincing the town leaders to give the PCs a chance would play well. Think a Bilbo Baggins-type. He's left the town before, maybe was befriended/helped by someone of one of the party's represented races. He's viewed as a nut by the other gnomes, but they hold him in juuuuust enough respect (maybe he came back again Bilbo-like with some treasure) that they listen to him...this time. But if the PCs can't prove their innocence, there goes his reputation :)
Looking for new subclasses, spells, magic items, feats, and races? Opinions welcome :)
I would go political. There's a Gnomish, or Gnomish Party that feel extending trade agreements to the outer world would be very lucrative, and if they intercede on your players behalf, then they could help to make those beneficial connections, particularly if your party has anyone with Noble(ish) backgrounds.
If there's a cleric in the town, there is really one (completely broken) way for the players to prove their innocence: Zone of Truth, and say they're not guilty. Boom, they're free to go
"What do you mean I get disadvantage on persuasion?"
I don't know, Sneet, maybe because your argument is "Submit and become our pet"?
-Actual conversation in a game.
I’ve always liked the idea of a campaign or story arc based on Xenophon’s Anabasis (or Sol Yurick’s “The Warriors”) where a group of people far from home must escape back to safe turf through a hostile land where they are perceived by all to be the enemies.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
Depends on who the cleric is a cleric of, and what gnomish law is. The murder rap is a legal issue, and it's entirely possible that a gnomish court of law doesn't accept magical evidence from non-gnomish religious sources :) Or that the gnomish law is somewhat vague on the issue, and the judge has a personal grudge against the local temple (he worships a different gnomish god), so he is unwilling to admit magical results from the competing temple into evidence. They won't even let the cleric into the courtroom to cast the spell. :)
Looking for new subclasses, spells, magic items, feats, and races? Opinions welcome :)
This situation popped up in Critical Role a few years back. The party was accused of a falsehood and brought before the judge. One of the players was like, "Look, just cast a spell on us and you'll know the truth" and Matt Mercer had to kind of dance around it for the sake of the story.
"Not all those who wander are lost"
The bad guy could spread rumors that “their kind” can somehow beat the zone of truth.
Just as a sideways alternative, keep in mind that the PCs don't have to be "allowed" to do anything. If they are framed for murder, they might just flee the law rather than profess their innocence. You can see examples of that in AL DDEX2-10 Cloaks and Shadows, or in movies like The Fugitive.
Thank you all for the responses so far! You've definitely given me some good ideas. A few responses:
- I love the idea of a credible but slightly oddball gnome witness taking their side, or possibly the idea of a powerful ally within the city taking their side sensing something to gain from the party as allies down the road
- I think I can get around zone of truth issues by leaning on the gnomes' xenophobia. basically they presume the party's guilt and don't bother with trusting their word, even under potential magic influence, taking it to such extremes as seeing it as a waste of their time to go retrieve the cleric for such obviously guilty and untrustworthy foreigners. They will however trust a fellow gnome who vouches for the party.
- the party can totally flee. the consequences would be minimal given how i've placed the city within the world, although I'd make the actual escape a challenge as they would be under direct surveillance during the time they were trying to talk to witnesses and prove their innocence
I'd like this arc to only take a few sessions since it's really just a distraction on their main story, a way to break up the action and prevent them from just barging through the major arcs, and i think this is all a pretty good start. any other input welcome if you've got thoughts
"To die would be an awfully big adventure"
Exactly. There's no need, just because it's a world with magic, for everyone to automatically trust all magic. As players, we see the backend of magic--we see behind the stage, right? But people in that world don't see "Oh, I get it, every cleric has access to all the same spells, and they are broken down nicely into 'levels'." What people who are in the world, PCs and NPCs, see are clerics calling forth light and magic shows. There is absolutely no reason for anyone to automatically trust any other spell caster, cleric or not.
Furthermore, there's no reason to expect that clerics of two different gods will even cast the same spell in the same way. They will say different prayers, make different hand motions. The visual effects will also likely look different, if the power is coming from two different gods. It's actually a bit silly to think that someone could walk into the courtroom and say "It's okay, I'm a cleric", and then cast Zone of Truth, have everyone automatically believe them, have other clerics present automatically know what spell is being cast, and have the results of the spell be obvious to all.
From the perspective of the NPCs, here's what it would look like:
Now...why would the judge accept that the PC is in fact a cleric? My trickster rogue or my high-CHA bard could stand up and say the exact same thing. And then, why would they automatically accept that the spell being cast is a 'truth-telling spell' at all? My Tomb Warlock could cast Thaumaturgy, or minor illusion, and get effects that would sure look super clericy and cool, right? The NPCs have no access to character sheets or rules about spell levels, they haven't read the description of thaumaturgy. They see a guy waving his hands and a light show.
If the cleric who's brought in is an NPC, same questions--why would the gnomes, who worship another god, automatically accept the word of this cleric? He said he cast a truth spell. But what if they think his god is a trickster, or a liar?
Even if it's a cleric of their own god, why would the legal system automatically be assumed to include magical evidence as admissible? Compare it to a lie-detector test, which aren't admissible in US courts. Are there ways to cheat magic? Sure there are. So it's entirely plausible that gnomish law in this community says "that's not good enough".
There's no reason for the GM to have to dance around this issue at all. We as players shouldn't think that the characters in the world see the world the same way the players do at all.
Looking for new subclasses, spells, magic items, feats, and races? Opinions welcome :)
Brotherbock, it honestly sounds to me like you have never lived through this scenario, and are just theorizing here. Spells have a defined effect. Regardless of what the spell looks like while it is being cast, the end result is the same. Two clerics of different gods both cause a 15' radius zone to force saving throws on everyone inside. On a failed save, the same truth-compelling effect takes hold. But really, it's the AoE / non-targetting nature of the spell that causes your supposition to break down.
Once the zone is up, the results are testable. The judge doesn't have to take the PC's word for it. He can test it himself by entering the zone. He simply submits to the spell (meaning voluntarily fail a saving throw, which I understand is a separate and debatable point itself), then attempts to tell a lie and fails, causing him to witness firsthand the effects of the spell.
The idea that another spellcaster can decieve others into believing that zone of truth has been cast only holds up if no one besides the deceiver knows how the spell is supposed to work. That's certainly possible in a low-magic world, but in a high-magic world I would consider it an unnecessarily obstruction.
Have I ever had a party on trial for murder in a city of gnomes? No. I have not. Busted. :) But I've seen very similar situations. PCs upset because an NPC duped them into thinking he'd cast a spell he hadn't, for example.
What I have had are players who try to claim that, because the effects of a spell are given, the appearance of the spell must therefore be the same. Go ahead and re-read that spell description--the caster knows who has failed or made their save. Neither the spell, nor the rules for magic overall, say anything at all about what anyone else watching knows or sees. You are making assumptions about what anyone other than the caster will see. If there's no visual description of the spell, guess who makes the decision about what the spell looks like when cast? The DM :)
There are no visual, audible, or other sensory descriptions of the effects of that spell. So if your character is watching a cleric cast zone of truth, what does your character see? You see the cleric cast a spell--and as a DM I would require a skill check to see if you are able to identify what spell is being cast. And, if someone is trying to fool you (say via a performance or deception check and an illusion spell), I'd have a roll for them as well. And if you make the check, then you would see--what, exactly? The spell, as written, says nothing about what you would see. There's an 'area of force'. Is it visible? Can anyone but the caster see it? The people inside who fail their save have to tell the truth. How do you know, the bystander, that they have failed or not? How do you know that they are telling the truth? How do you know they weren't in the zone of truth but made their save?
In short, how do you, the bystander, know any of the following:
If you miss the role to tell what spell is cast, you the bystander have no idea what the truth is. You would have the cleric saying "I cast this spell, and he is telling the truth." Okay, fine. Do you believe the cleric? But your idea for the judge is a good one--test the zone out yourself.
The zone of force is not described as a visible zone. How do you know where the zone was centered? Did the cleric include all of the people he claimed to include? Did he include any of them? So you the judge walk down to test it out. How do you know where to stand? How do you know where the zone is? Maybe you just stand between the party members. Does that mean the guy on the end was inside the zone...the zone you cannot see? You can walk around, trying to lie, and test the exact limits of the zone. Okay, good idea. Do you remember exactly where everyone was standing when it was cast?
Look, I'm not criticizing your way of playing the game. If you want to have a world where all spells have very well delineated effects, everyone knows what they are, and there's no plausible (and sometimes even easy) way to deceive people about what spell is cast, that's fine. Basically, everyone who knows magic has access to the PHB. Not only do they all know magic, but they all know that all magic is similar. Everyone in that world knows that all clerics can pretty much cast all the same spells. If that's what you want, cool. If you want to have a world where all the spells appear exactly the same way, that's fine. (For example, does eldritch blast look the same for every warlock casting it? If so, that's fine. If not--if the blast from a Fiend Warlock will look different from the blast from a Fey Warlock, then you open the door to possibly not knowing what spell that was that just got cast.) If you want a world in which a cleric of a gnome god will meet a cleric of an elf god and say "Oh, you must have access to such and such spells and have so and so special abilities, nice to meet you", that's fine. To me, that's a very mechanistic, meta-gaming sort of world.
You are giving the characters in that world knowledge about the mechanics of the world that the game does not specify that they have. Does the game, for example, specify that your warlock is aware that the spells he has available are just like what all other warlocks have (patron spells excluded)? Does your warlock, just by being a warlock, know all the possible spells that any other warlock has available? Think about it from your character's perspective. How would you know that a warlock serving another patron has access to any of the spells you do? Is there a convention you all attend? :)
To me, the gnome judge--a legal profession, not a wizard--has no reason to trust the cleric casting the spell (for reasons I've explained), and in fact if being skeptical the way a judge should be, has in fact good reasons to not accept the word of any old spellcaster that walks into the courtroom.
It comes down to this (and again, play the way you want, by all means): you have decided to give the judge access to certain pieces of knowledge that the rules do not say the judge would have access to. I as DM would (and have in the past) decide not to give the judge that access. The rules don't say the judge won't know what's going on. But they do not say that he will. So my point remains as simply this: it is actually relatively easy for Zone of Truth to not be an easy fix to this situation. That is a spell that is designed to give the caster knowledge. Whether or not anyone else believes the caster is entirely a different issue, and not one the spell is concerned with.
Yes, the spells all have the same effect. That's it. That's all the rules specify.
After all of that, there's still the gnomish law. Law is strange, man. :) What is allowed in a courtroom in any country, state, or city is often just downright odd. Why would it be automatic that the law would accept something like zone of truth as evidence? Again, the caster finds things out from the spell. No one else does. If I'm writing laws, I'm going to be very aware of that fact.
Looking for new subclasses, spells, magic items, feats, and races? Opinions welcome :)
It's amazing that all of your comment was answered by a single word in my previous response: testable. I have nothing more to add, really.
Now I’m imagining an inept, overworked and quirky Gnomish public defender and ridiculously complex laws. I’m going to call them Erroneous Twiddlethumbs.
Well, it's not amazing, given that I addressed how a test could be cheated on. I mean, if you really don't want to go through my whole post, that's fine. It was a long one. But do me the courtesy of not just blowing off my main points.
Look, here's the situation.
Pretty simple scenario. The PCs are before the judge. You walk in, introduce yourself as the cleric of God X. (Q1: How does the judge know that's true?) You tell the judge "I have magic that can determine if they are telling the truth." (Q2: How does the judge, not a cleric, know what magic you actually have?) The judge says "Okay, let's do it." You say "My spell will cause the people I specifically point at to tell the truth." (Q3: How does the judge know that the zone of truth spell doesn't work that way?)
The judge would only know the answer to Question 1 if the judge looked at your character sheet. But the judge is a character, not a player. Thus, to have the judge know this to be true is giving the judge player knowledge. The judge may believe this to be true. He may even have good evidence, if he knows you from somewhere else. But I'm currently playing a changeling with a bunch of personas. My character has lots of people believing that he is lots of things that he is not.
The judge would only know the answer to Question 2 if the judge looked at the PHB. But the judge is a character, not a player.
The judge would only know the answer to Question 3 if the judge looked at the PHB. But the judge is a character, not a player.
There is nothing in the rules that specifies that the judge would know any of these things. Nothing in the rules say that all clerics know what all other clerics can do. All players of clerics know what all clerics can do. But that's player knowledge, not character knowledge.
The judge might easily know other clerics, and might easily know how their zone of truth spells work. But how in the world would the judge have access to the information that all zones of truth cast by all clerics work exactly the same? Is the judge the wisest sage in the known world? Has he spent years studying the magic of all the clerical orders in the world? He wouldn't know that fact, because that's player knowledge.
In short, you are comfortable giving characters lots of player knowledge. Your characters know a lot about how the mechanics of the game work. Mine do not. And there is nothing in the rules that say they have to. Again, if you want to play the game that way, that's fine. I'm certainly not telling you how your world should work. But you are acting as if the way you run the game is the only way. And it's just not.
To me, it is far more plausible that characters do not know what other people can do, by and large. If I was the DM, and you told me that the non-cleric judge should know exactly how a cleric spell works, I simply will say that this judge in fact doesn't know that at all.
Looking for new subclasses, spells, magic items, feats, and races? Opinions welcome :)
Exactly :) "Wait, wait. It says here that the cleric must be bonded in the kingdom in order for his spells to be admissible as evidence...that's a 2 month licensing process!"
Looking for new subclasses, spells, magic items, feats, and races? Opinions welcome :)
More ridiculousness.
Q2: How does the judge, not a cleric, know what magic you actually have?
He would test it.
Q3: How does the judge know that the zone of truth spell doesn't work that way?
He would test it.
How much of testing do I have to explain to you? I'm going to assume all of it. A test is taking measurement to check the quality, performance, or reliability of something. A test has (at least) two groups, the test group, and the control group. Results are compared between the groups. In this scenario, the judge is the control group.
Picking up where your scenario bizarrely ends, the cleric says "My spell will cause the people I specifically point at to tell the truth." The judge says "Point at your friend," thereby ensuring that he's not about to eat a fireball to the face. The other PCs say something that is irrelevant for the purpose of the test. Then the judge says "Point at me." Lastly, he attempts to lie. He knows to do this, not because he has any out of game knowledge, in game knowledge, or any of the other nonsensical things you've proposed. He knows to do this because he knows how to correctly construct a test. As you mentioned earlier, he is skeptical, but also, he's capable of understanding one way in which skepticism is resolved: by testing.
If he can't lie, the spell works! As mentioned, the effect was the important thing, and the effect is in place. He can now believe the things that were said by the PCs, whatever it was they said. Conversely, if he can lie, the spell failed, and he has reason to suspect everyone.
Please note that the way the cleric describes the spell working is also irrelevant for the purposes of constructing a test. You said point, but it works equally well if the cleric does the sensible thing and describes the actual spell area. Whatever the PC describes, the judge adjusts his method to make sure he is excluded when the other PCs are going, and that they are excluded when he is going. Broadly speaking, this is described as the parameters of a test.
Any other clarifications necessary? Do you need me to write more about testing?
Gee, thanks for the civil tone of your posts. 'Ridiculousness', huh? Can't just go with "I disagree"? Hmm. I'm going to try my hardest here to keep this a civil discussion. You're making some good points, but you're still missing my points. Do me the favor of not reading my post like I'm upset, like I think you're being dumb, anything like that. I'm trying to have a civil discussion with you.
Anyway, let's take your first statement. I asked "how would the judge know what spells your cleric has", and you said "He would test it."
So you walk in, announce yourself as the cleric, and the judge would test what spells you have access to. What would that look like? "Please cast all the spells you know." Even if you did that, you cast all your spells, how would he know that you have cast all your spells? Does he consult the Manual of Cleric Spells of the Realm that he has sitting next to him?
Then I asked, given the scenario where you lie to him and say your ZoT spell works on targets and not areas, how he would know it doesn't really work that way. You said "he would test it." Okay. How exactly does he do that? You say "it works only on individual targets". What, exactly, would he want to test? Would he believe, for some reason, that it's actually an area of effect spell? Why would he believe that? Because he has a PHB handy? Because he, a non cleric, knows about cleric spells? He might know about cleric spells. If so, deceiving him will be harder. But still perfectly possible. So let's look at your example, because you're making some good points there.
You said (with my additions):
"Picking up where your scenario bizarrely ends, the cleric says "My spell will cause the people I specifically point at to tell the truth." The judge says "Point at your friend," thereby ensuring that he's not about to eat a fireball to the face. The other PCs say something that is irrelevant for the purpose of the test. No. The other PC, being on trial, will pretend to be forced to tell the truth. He will say something very relevant to the test. He will pretend to be affected by the spell. You, being in league with the other PC, will not have cast the spell on your friend. Then the judge says "Point at me." When you do that, you cast the spell on the judge, including him in the spell radius, but not your friends. Lastly, he attempts to lie. He knows to do this, not because he has any out of game knowledge, in game knowledge, or any of the other nonsensical things you've proposed. He knows to do this because he knows how to correctly construct a test. As you mentioned earlier, he is skeptical, but also, he's capable of understanding one way in which skepticism is resolved: by testing. He does know these things. But because you didn't include your friend in the spell, and you did include the judge, the judge finds himself unable to lie."
Not really that hard to do. The judge will not know (with a good deception roll from the player, perhaps) that you cast the spell on him and not your friend. Because the judge doesn't know what the spell really looks like. You can wave your hands, chant a phrase, point at your friend, and not cast the spell. And you can wave your hands, chant a phrase, point at the judge, and cast the spell.
Look, you've admitted at this point (it seems) that the judge does not know inherently what spells you know, or what they look like, or how they work. Now we're just discussing whether the judge could be deceived. And he could be. It's a railroading DM who wouldn't give the players a chance to outwit the judge like this. You're right that the judge could try tests. A smart judge would, in fact. And the test you suggest is pretty good. If the law even allowed for magic to be admitted. But that a judge could try to test the spell as you claim it to be doesn't mean that he'll succeed.
And then, we can look at the rest of my argument, which is the very relevant DM-decided issue of gnomish law. Because the gnomes realize that non-magical judges can be deceived, they A) don't allow magic evidence in the courtroom, or B) don't allow non-approved magical evidence in the courtroom, etc. Take your pick. You may decide that any and every court of law in your world would allow this. But there's certainly no obvious reason why every court would have to. The very existence of illusion magic would be a good reason for courts to be skeptical of that. And, illusion magic, and basic deception, gives players the chance to trick their way out of something like this.
So TL/DR, here's my argument:
That a given judge might be able to keep from being deceived is beside the point. That a given judge might know what ZoT does, and how it works, and might even know that it works that way for this particular cleric (which seems far-fetched to me, but whatever) is beside the point. Because it's perfectly plausible that a cleric says "Let's try ZoT!" and the judge responds with "outsider magic is not admissible in a court of law". And if the PCs say "get the local cleric!", it's perfectly plausible that the judge says "That old trickster?! Not in my court."
So yes, you are correct about how the judge might see through the ruse. But he also might not, because as a realistic character in a fantasy world (at least the kind of world I like), he won't have encyclopedic knowledge of what everyone else is capable of, or what all the spells in the world are, or how they work. And the possibility of the ruse working is the key.
That's it. That's the argument. Your original reply to me was that deception can't work if anyone other than the caster knows how the spell is 'supposed to work'. My claim, given the rules as written, is that it's perfectly acceptable (and in my opinion preferable) that even other clerics of other orders not know what a cleric of a different order is capable of. A cleric of God X can cast ZoT. He sees a cleric of God Y cast it once, and it seems to work just like his spell. Later, another cleric of God Y says he's casting similar magic, but says he's casting it differently. Why would the cleric of God X know that this new cleric cannot cast the spell a different way?
Again, the world you seem to prefer is a world where the inhabitants are well aware that magic is very regular, very homogeneous, and once you learn the rules, unsurprising. And if you like a world like that, fine. I'm not telling you how to enjoy this game. But the RAW does not mandate a world like that, nor even suggest it. In fact, if you read really any fantasy novel (including D&D novels), they are full of experienced spell casters who really don't know exactly what other spell casters are capable of, not specifically.
So. Please realize we're talking about a game, and try to be civil. We're just disagreeing about a game here, we're not trading yo mamma insults. :)
Looking for new subclasses, spells, magic items, feats, and races? Opinions welcome :)