I'm currently DMing Tomb of Annihilation and began the adventure with the Cellar of Death AL module. Spoilers for ToA and Cellar of Death ahead:
Cellar of Death has the characters sneak into a lich's lair on a mission for the Harpers. The goal is to take the lich's phylactery and use it as a bargaining chip to learn what she knows about the death curse. In her dungeon, the characters encountered Elonast, a pseudodragon, who formerly served as the lich's familiar but was imprisoned after breaking their bond. The party learned what the lich knew (that it was the product of the Soulmonger and was somewhere in Chult) and returned the phylactery.
The first day afterwards, the lich casts scrying on Elonast to see where he's gone. Since Elonast was her former familiar I reduce Elonast's saving throws by -20 (Familiar with target and body parts). She sees that he's still in the company of the adventurers who snuck into her dungeon and decides to keep tabs on them since ending the death curse will allow her to feed her own phylactery again. I want her to be watching when the party meets their guide for the first time but since my party has chosen Eku, who is secretly a Couatl I'm not sure how the spells will interact.
Both the lich and Eku have truesight. So Eku would be able to see the sensor, but I'm not sure if the lich would be able to see Eku's true form. The couatl stat block also says that she has the Shielded Mind trait:
"Shielded Mind. The couatl is immune to scrying and to any effect that would sense its emotions, read its thoughts, or detect its location."
Since the scrying spell was cast on Elonast, I'm not sure whether the Couatl would be shielded from it or not. Would she be completely invisible and muted to the sensor or would she be perceivable since it wasn't cast on her. Thoughts?
Firstly, a couatl cant be scryed on, it states it under its Shielded Mind ability.
"The couatl is immune to scrying and to any effect that would sense its emotions, read its thoughts, or detect its location."
Which brings to a second point.
Secondly, you may be misinterpreting scrying, its ambiguous with how its written because how I read it is as follows. The spell will only scrying the/a person/creature in question, if you choose the/a person/creature, what they are doing and saying, but nothing outside of that range so is heard or seen since that would also require knowing who they are with and making a separate casting of the spell for each along with the opposed Saving Throws. The first line of the spell tells you this. To watch a whole group of people would require the scryer to be using the location side of the spell since you cant target a full group of people with the spell, only a single person and hear/see that person's actions.
Back to the first point with a Couatl, it would be virtually undetectable should the location be scryed on by the caster, if the person/s responded to the Couatl, then the caster would know something was there, but not what. On top of that, the Couatl is going to notice that lovely luminous orb.
I disagree with Friday’s interpretation. If you can see and hear as normal through the sensor, then you’d normally be able to sense other creatures.
On the other hand, I think there has been some guidance (a tweet, so nothing official) that the rakshasa can walk through a wall of stone while it is still being concentrated on due to limited magic immunity. Following that logic, I would say that the statement in the couatl’s stat block means it is in fact truly invisible to the sensor.
The Couatl is immune to scrying in general, and not just the Scrying spell. So it cannot be targeted by the Scying spell, nor can it be detected by any scrying effect whatsoever. It should therefore be undetected, being off the radar of the sensor, as if it was not there (invisible, silent etc)
There could be clues a creature is undetected by the scrying though. For exemple, if Elonast is having a conversation alone with Eku, the lich will be scrying and think Elonast speak to itself, or to someone nearby that it is not detecting. Also, Eku still leaves traces of it's presence wether through tracks or environment interactions. Lich being very intelligent spellcasters, it wouldn't be improbable that it eventually realises the latter even though it cannot detect the Couatl.
Secondly, you may be misinterpreting scrying, its ambiguous with how its written because how I read it is as follows. The spell will only scrying the/a person/creature in question, if you choose the/a person/creature, what they are doing and saying, but nothing outside of that range so is heard or seen since that would also require knowing who they are with and making a separate casting of the spell for each along with the opposed Saving Throws. The first line of the spell tells you this. To watch a whole group of people would require the scryer to be using the location side of the spell since you cant target a full group of people with the spell, only a single person and hear/see that person's actions.
Scrying actually explicitly reads differently than this interpretation. "You can see and hear a particular creature you choose that is on the same plane of existence as you." reads to me more as flavor text. Or, if anything, it could be interpreted that the spell works on one creature immediately before the Wisdom save resolves. After the Wisdom save though the spell explicitly states one of two things happen:
"On a successful save, the target isn't affected, and you can't use this spell against it again for 24 hours.
On a failed save, the spell creates an invisible sensor within 10 feet of the target. You can see and hear through the sensor as if you were there. The sensor moves with the target, remaining within 10 feet of it for the duration. A creature that can see invisible objects sees the sensor as a luminous orb about the size of your fist."
Casting scrying on a location doesn't change how you see through the sensor. The only differences are that 1) casting Scrying on a location requires no saving throws (non-creatures can't make saves); 2) the sensor made by scrying a location can not move. In both cases - being cast on a creature or a location - you can see and hear through the sensor as if you were there and a creature that can see invisible objects sees the sensor as a luminous orb about the size of your fist.
This was the source of my confusion - since if a lich could see and hear as if it were there, it would be able to sense the Couatl. However,
The Couatl is immune to scrying in general, and not just the Scrying spell.
This has been my line of thinking since making the post. At the time I was expecting the text to make a reference to magical sensors, similar to nondetection. But it makes more sense to interpret lowercase scrying in the Couatl's stat block as all magical means of perception, not just the Scrying spell. Ty everyone :)
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I'm currently DMing Tomb of Annihilation and began the adventure with the Cellar of Death AL module. Spoilers for ToA and Cellar of Death ahead:
Cellar of Death has the characters sneak into a lich's lair on a mission for the Harpers. The goal is to take the lich's phylactery and use it as a bargaining chip to learn what she knows about the death curse. In her dungeon, the characters encountered Elonast, a pseudodragon, who formerly served as the lich's familiar but was imprisoned after breaking their bond. The party learned what the lich knew (that it was the product of the Soulmonger and was somewhere in Chult) and returned the phylactery.
The first day afterwards, the lich casts scrying on Elonast to see where he's gone. Since Elonast was her former familiar I reduce Elonast's saving throws by -20 (Familiar with target and body parts). She sees that he's still in the company of the adventurers who snuck into her dungeon and decides to keep tabs on them since ending the death curse will allow her to feed her own phylactery again. I want her to be watching when the party meets their guide for the first time but since my party has chosen Eku, who is secretly a Couatl I'm not sure how the spells will interact.
Both the lich and Eku have truesight. So Eku would be able to see the sensor, but I'm not sure if the lich would be able to see Eku's true form. The couatl stat block also says that she has the Shielded Mind trait:
"Shielded Mind. The couatl is immune to scrying and to any effect that would sense its emotions, read its thoughts, or detect its location."
Since the scrying spell was cast on Elonast, I'm not sure whether the Couatl would be shielded from it or not. Would she be completely invisible and muted to the sensor or would she be perceivable since it wasn't cast on her. Thoughts?
So TL;DR and spoilerfree: a lich is scrying the party when the party encounter a couatl, what does the lich see?
I'm pretty sure there was a sage advice that monsters that can't be scryed on are invisible to the sensors scrying other creatures as well.
[Edit]Maybe it wasn't a sage advice. I'll keep looking.
[Edit2]Nope, can't find any official answers to this... Up to you.
Firstly, a couatl cant be scryed on, it states it under its Shielded Mind ability.
"The couatl is immune to scrying and to any effect that would sense its emotions, read its thoughts, or detect its location."
Which brings to a second point.
Secondly, you may be misinterpreting scrying, its ambiguous with how its written because how I read it is as follows. The spell will only scrying the/a person/creature in question, if you choose the/a person/creature, what they are doing and saying, but nothing outside of that range so is heard or seen since that would also require knowing who they are with and making a separate casting of the spell for each along with the opposed Saving Throws. The first line of the spell tells you this. To watch a whole group of people would require the scryer to be using the location side of the spell since you cant target a full group of people with the spell, only a single person and hear/see that person's actions.
Back to the first point with a Couatl, it would be virtually undetectable should the location be scryed on by the caster, if the person/s responded to the Couatl, then the caster would know something was there, but not what. On top of that, the Couatl is going to notice that lovely luminous orb.
I would have it that the couatl is invisible to the scrying, but the scrying sees all other things around it.
I disagree with Friday’s interpretation. If you can see and hear as normal through the sensor, then you’d normally be able to sense other creatures.
On the other hand, I think there has been some guidance (a tweet, so nothing official) that the rakshasa can walk through a wall of stone while it is still being concentrated on due to limited magic immunity. Following that logic, I would say that the statement in the couatl’s stat block means it is in fact truly invisible to the sensor.
The Couatl is immune to scrying in general, and not just the Scrying spell. So it cannot be targeted by the Scying spell, nor can it be detected by any scrying effect whatsoever. It should therefore be undetected, being off the radar of the sensor, as if it was not there (invisible, silent etc)
There could be clues a creature is undetected by the scrying though. For exemple, if Elonast is having a conversation alone with Eku, the lich will be scrying and think Elonast speak to itself, or to someone nearby that it is not detecting. Also, Eku still leaves traces of it's presence wether through tracks or environment interactions. Lich being very intelligent spellcasters, it wouldn't be improbable that it eventually realises the latter even though it cannot detect the Couatl.
Scrying actually explicitly reads differently than this interpretation. "You can see and hear a particular creature you choose that is on the same plane of existence as you." reads to me more as flavor text. Or, if anything, it could be interpreted that the spell works on one creature immediately before the Wisdom save resolves. After the Wisdom save though the spell explicitly states one of two things happen:
"On a successful save, the target isn't affected, and you can't use this spell against it again for 24 hours.
On a failed save, the spell creates an invisible sensor within 10 feet of the target. You can see and hear through the sensor as if you were there. The sensor moves with the target, remaining within 10 feet of it for the duration. A creature that can see invisible objects sees the sensor as a luminous orb about the size of your fist."
Casting scrying on a location doesn't change how you see through the sensor. The only differences are that 1) casting Scrying on a location requires no saving throws (non-creatures can't make saves); 2) the sensor made by scrying a location can not move. In both cases - being cast on a creature or a location - you can see and hear through the sensor as if you were there and a creature that can see invisible objects sees the sensor as a luminous orb about the size of your fist.
This was the source of my confusion - since if a lich could see and hear as if it were there, it would be able to sense the Couatl. However,
This has been my line of thinking since making the post. At the time I was expecting the text to make a reference to magical sensors, similar to nondetection. But it makes more sense to interpret lowercase scrying in the Couatl's stat block as all magical means of perception, not just the Scrying spell. Ty everyone :)