Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer Creatures
Frozen Sick
D&D Beyond Basic Rules
Basic Rules (2014)
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Monstrous Compendium Vol. 1: Spelljammer CreaturesFrozen SickD&D Beyond Basic RulesBasic Rules (2014)Sign in to view your library & saved favorites.
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1. A wizard with a contingency spell active casts magic jar and possesses another creature. Does the contingency:
2. The wizard, now in the possessed body, casts contingency. Which body can the contingency be cast to trigger based on?
3. Which body needs to keep possession of the statue?
4. If the answer to #1 was B, and the answer to #2 was B, can the wizard now cast a new contingency (with a new statue) on his current body without ending the contingency on his original body? (ie, how are 'you' and 'use' to be understood in: "You can use only one Contingency spell at a time. If you cast this spell again, the effect of another Contingency spell on you ends.")
Please explain your reasoning.
I'll take a crack at this one. I'll go with:
1. B
2. B
3. D
4. No. In this context, "you" includes both bodies.
Reasoning:
A creature is defined as: "any being in the game" (and all creatures have a creature type). Based on various snippets of text throughout the game, I am making a bit of an assumption that a "being" includes a soul and its body and that by default a soul generally always "possesses" its body -- even its original one -- except for situations where the soul is separated from all bodies, such as in death or when under the effects of the Magic Jar spell and so on. As such, when you "possess" a new body, it's the same relationship that you had with your original body, so it also becomes "your" body. Meaning, in certain contexts, it becomes "you". But, as long as no other soul possesses your original body, that original body is still yours as well and is also "you". Basically, you have two bodies.
Meanwhile, for targeting purposes, whenever a spell targets a creature, they are actually targeting a body of a creature. The easiest evidence of this can be found in the resurrection spells. For example, Raise Dead has a range of "Touch" and includes this wording: "With a touch, you revive a dead creature . . . The creature returns to life". In this case, you are targeting the corpse -- the body of the creature. But meanwhile, the soul of that dead creature is generally not located there. See the Rules Glossary / Dead: "The spirit of a dead creature has left the body and departed for the Outer Planes, and reviving the creature requires calling the spirit back." So, the target of such spells must be the body of the creature. As a side note, this means that if you died while in this "other" body (and thus, both bodies are dead) then an ally could actually choose which of your two bodies to target with the Raise Dead spell and you would come back to that body.
So, that brings us back to the wording for the Contingency spell and its various references to "you". First, the Contingency spell itself has a range of Self, so whichever body is actually doing the spellcasting becomes the target for Contingency. Meanwhile, you also must cast the contingent spell at the same time. "Choose a spell . . . that can target you". Again, when casting a spell, you are targeting the body of a creature. In this case, it only makes sense that the target of the spell has to be the same as the target of Contingency. Yes, you could theoretically interpret that differently in a case where you have two bodies, but I think that this is the better interpretation based on how it's written. Therefore, when it says "The contingent spell takes effect only on you" again, that's the body that was targeted by the spell. However, when we get to the bit where it says: "If you cast this spell again, the effect of another Contingency spell on you ends", now, in my opinion, we are talking about the "you" that includes both bodies. This bit isn't about specifying a target. It's simply clarifying the answer to the question of whether or not there is currently an active Contingency spell "on you". To me, that reads as "you, the being" and not "you, the particular body". But also however, in my opinion this also means that you could give the statue to your other body and that statue would still be "on your person". This is also what allows the original Contingency to remain active when you possess a new body. Both bodies are "yours" so the statue can be on either body.
I'm sure that there are a few reasonable ways to interpret this scenario.
There are two possible answers to this, depending on whether you think "You" is the current location of your soul or the current location of your body.
If "You" is the current location of your soul:
If "You" is your body:
I should probably have specified that you can assume no further magic jar shenanigans after the point of possession, so your interpretation 1 #3 answer would be B in that case, i think, as the soul is not moving.
I did not expect to have 3 sets of answers with only two responses!
Pantagruel, which of your two interpretations do you think is the correct one and why?
I think the general expectation is that it's possible to cast a spell with a range of "self" on a body you are possessing, so the item has to move with the soul.