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Scarlet-Devil
2010-12-12, 02:33 PM
What it says on the tin, I want to hear some stories of your favorite, least favorite :smalleek:, most creative, best hypothetical etc uses for the suggestion spell or any of its variants (like the delicious 'Devil's Whispers').

jguy
2010-12-12, 03:08 PM
Well from the OoTs comic you can use it like a mini-dominate person. "I Suggest you take no actions other than the ones I give you"

I like to cast it on fighter and say, "I suggest you drop your weapon and gives your (wizard) friend a tight hug and don't let go." Bonus points if they are wearing spiked armor

For casters "I suggest you toss me your Divine Spellfocus/spell component bag"

If you have a fighter next to the person you are casting it on, go, "I suggest you close your eyes and take no actions in self defense." then the fighter coup de grace them

mucat
2010-12-12, 03:23 PM
Well from the OoTs comic you can use it like a mini-dominate person. "I Suggest you take no actions other than the ones I give you"

I like to cast it on fighter and say, "I suggest you drop your weapon and gives your (wizard) friend a tight hug and don't let go." Bonus points if they are wearing spiked armor

For casters "I suggest you toss me your Divine Spellfocus/spell component bag"

If you have a fighter next to the person you are casting it on, go, "I suggest you close your eyes and take no actions in self defense." then the fighter coup de grace them

Except that none of those would actually work.


The suggestion must be worded in such a manner as to make the activity sound reasonable. Asking the creature to do some obviously harmful act automatically negates the effect of the spell.

Saying "I suggest" at the beginning of a sentence doesn't suddenly make it sound reasonable. And the spell doesn't reduce the target's mental stats, so they will still recognize lowering their defenses before obvious enemies, or impaling their wizard friend on armor spikes, as obviously harmful.

(EDIT: So V's mini-Dominate Person use against the Black Dragon worked great as a scene in a comic, but shouldn't work in an actual game...)

Pink
2010-12-12, 03:47 PM
Except that none of those would actually work.



Saying "I suggest" at the beginning of a sentence doesn't suddenly make it sound reasonable. And the spell doesn't reduce the target's mental stats, so they will still recognize lowering their defenses before obvious enemies, or impaling their wizard friend on armor spikes, as obviously harmful.

(EDIT: So V's mini-Dominate Person use against the Black Dragon worked great as a scene in a comic, but shouldn't work in an actual game...)

This depends on how you're going to define harmful, and in what context. First, does harmful apply solely to the person effected by the suggestion, or include people around them as well?

I'm inclined to say that the harmful in the wording of the spell applies only to the effected person. so, "Hit yourself until you lose consciousness." or "jump off that cliff." are obviously harmful to that person, however, "Hit the person beside you." isn't. My argument why this is the intended way, is that if you interpret it otherwise, then suggestion could not be used even to have the effected target try to attack one of his enemies, which they'd already be more than willing to do.

Next is the context of the situation. Assuming that you still disagree about the harmful definition, and that suggestion can only force nonviolent suggestions, then we must take into consideration whether or not the effected target gets a chance to take context of their situation relevant to the suggestion. Being commanded to drop your weapon or spell components or even "I Suggest you take no actions other than the ones I give you" are not in and of themselves harmful actions. However doing so definitely does put you in a more vulnerable situation. Now, if you're giving an effected character the ability to consider the situation and whether the end result will put them in a better or worse situation, to determine whether this future action might cause them hard, characters effected would never do anything that might put themselves in a vulnerable situation, which means you've basically turned something of fairly decent magic (third level spell isn't anything to scoff at) and turned it into the actual act of just verbally suggestion something. Again, I hardly think that's in the meaning of the spell, and makes it become quite useless.

Personally, all those suggested (heh) by jguy seem fairly reasonable, except maybe the part about no self defense, cause that's kinda on the line of harmful action IMO. Anyway, rant off.

I'm mostly a DM myself, and in one case, the party was infiltratin a temple to collect a rare book that was locked away in a private library. Beside the locked door to the private Library was a gong and hammer, the party didn't give it much thought at first. Anyway, concerning the lock, magically trapped with a suggestion, that if opened without the key, would suggest that they stand there and hammer the gong alarm.

They party was indeed caught by the trap, and they did fail the willsave. Fortunately for them, they were a smart party, and were under a silence spell whilst sneaking, so no sound from the gong was heard.

Gamer Girl
2010-12-12, 03:52 PM
Some of the best suggestions are tiny ones. The trick is you don't need to go all 'change the world', just a bit can be a great help.

Asking someone to give you their weapons or such, (should) not work.

But you can suggest that stand in a spot to be a good target.

Even better is when you suggest someone do something that they would normally do..just have them do it at a time and place of your choosing.

Flickerdart
2010-12-12, 03:55 PM
Suggesting to animal handlers that their pet is dangerous is always fun - whether they flee in fear of the dinosaurs they control or try to put them down.

WarrenZig
2010-12-12, 04:00 PM
In my personal experience i find that suggestion is used to do things it shouldn't be able to do, for one it says that the action has to sound reasonable and doesn't make them blindly obey everything you say asking someone in spiked armor to go hug a friend isn't reasonable so the spell would fizzle.

Asking an enemy caster to give up their focus/components is also unreasonable since they would be left dry in their fight.

If you asked an enemy in the middle of a fight to just close their eyes and not protect them selves it would fizzle for obvious reasons.

Now the spell specifically states in needs to be worded in a way that makes it sound like a good idea, so say you were fighting someone who was put in a position that they hated and ended up fighting you, you could suggest that he's really got no reason to be fighting since he was forced to be here and that he should go get a drink instead would work because it was a reasonable suggestion.

WinWin
2010-12-12, 04:07 PM
Great for bargaining. Dropping the price by 5-10% might be reasonable depending on how high the mark up on goods and services is.

Good for all kinds of negotiations, from basic diplomacy to terms of surrender. It could even be used to influence a captive to give more helpful information during an interrogation (as long as the guy casting suggestion is playing 'good cop').

It could be used to put an enemy off guard, make them relax or suspect their allies of betrayal.

Think of the Jedi Mind Trick. Subtlety can be powerful.

Pink
2010-12-12, 04:10 PM
Now the spell specifically states in needs to be worded in a way that makes it sound like a good idea, so say you were fighting someone who was put in a position that they hated and ended up fighting you, you could suggest that he's really got no reason to be fighting since he was forced to be here and that he should go get a drink instead would work because it was a reasonable suggestion.

Nothing says it has to be worded to be a good idea, however if it is,

A very reasonable suggestion causes the save to be made with a penalty (such as -1 or -2).

Also note, that dropping a spell bag or weapon isn't necessarily unreasonable, cause it can just as easily be picked back up. The actual phrasing would probably be something like, "I suggest you put down your weapon/spell components as a sign of surrender so you won't be harmed." to sound reasonable but the effect should certainly be possible.

Aharon
2010-12-12, 05:04 PM
"These are not the Warforged you are looking for."

Come on, someone had to do it. No thread about the spell is complete without it :smalltongue:

Elric VIII
2010-12-12, 05:05 PM
I was affected by a trap that made me attack my allies. As the fighter was attempting to kill me (I was a Cleric-tank, so that was not an easy task) and I cast suggestion on him to make him think that the other 2 party members were the ones affected by the trap and we had to kill them or else we would die.

Dalek-K
2010-12-12, 06:18 PM
I was affected by a trap that made me attack my allies. As the fighter was attempting to kill me (I was a Cleric-tank, so that was not an easy task) and I cast suggestion on him to make him think that the other 2 party members were the ones affected by the trap and we had to kill them or else we would die.

Perfect

One that I liked... "Your wizard friend is using magic to manipulate you into hurting me, you should help me stop him/her by using deadly force against them"

GoodbyeSoberDay
2010-12-12, 06:43 PM
I find that Glibness goes very well with Suggestion. Many, many more things sound reasonable when your bluff results approach epic levels.

"Bob, it's me, Joe the Wizard! The BBEG's evil lieutenant switched his mind with mine in order to fool you!" One arbitrarily large bluff check later... "You must destroy my old body before he betrays us all!"

AshDesert
2010-12-12, 07:04 PM
One of my players played an Enchantment-focused Sorcerer once that was full of moments like these. My favorite was when they were fighting a Bard, and they got into a Suggestion duel. They went back and forth trying to get the BSF on the other's side to quit fighting, while trying to keep their own BSF from quitting the fight. It was quite entertaining, until the Sorcerer went "Wait, I'm still a Sorcerer. Twinimaxed Magic Missile!"

RaveingRonin
2010-12-12, 07:54 PM
"You should drink this" *hands city guard vial of Black Lotus Extract*

I am not a nice player. *Note* Rolled 18 on the whole Con Damage thing. Double his Con score. The DM ruled he melted. From the inside out. I almost blacked out laughing :smallbiggrin:

IthilanorStPete
2010-12-12, 09:12 PM
We were fighting two succubi, and Suggested that one share her love with her sister by kissing her. Made the save though, unfortunately.

Gabe the Bard
2010-12-12, 09:27 PM
Our party was fighting in an arena where a bunch of dual-wielding super orcs had our knight surrounded. So my bard "suggested" to the orcs: Why don't you show us how awesome you are by fighting with your bare hands? They dropped all their weapons and tried to grapple the knight.

But our late Necromancer had one up on me. He used suggestion on a Chimera and convinced it that it was actually a human being who had been transformed into a Chimera, and he was its long-lost brother. Then he polymorphed the Chimera into a person.

Dalek-K
2010-12-12, 09:28 PM
One of my players played an Enchantment-focused Sorcerer once that was full of moments like these. My favorite was when they were fighting a Bard, and they got into a Suggestion duel. They went back and forth trying to get the BSF on the other's side to quit fighting, while trying to keep their own BSF from quitting the fight. It was quite entertaining, until the Sorcerer went "Wait, I'm still a Sorcerer. Twinimaxed Magic Missile!"


HAHAHA :D

Remember kiddies that if you are a boom stick then be a boom stick XD

I was watching some politics on one of the networks that show senate proceedings and I thought... Hmm if only I had suggestion spell....

WeLoveFireballs
2010-12-12, 10:29 PM
Asking an enemy caster to give up their focus/components is also unreasonable since they would be left dry in their fight.


But you could say.
"Do you mind if i admire/use that focus/pouch for just a sec?"
And then use acid splash ASAP.

Halae
2010-12-12, 10:45 PM
I once played as a very attractive sorceress. suggestion was the only thing available to me when we were captured and I had my spell component pouch taken away. The rogue assassin in the party gets himself and my character out of our bonds and we found ourselves looking for an exit.

Then a Guard shows up. My first thought was to use suggestion, and I ended up saying "Kiss me"

the guard starts making out with my character, giving the assassin enough time to death attack. Perhaps not awesome, but a very effective use in and of itself, and it should work in nealry any situation where your target might be sexually attracted to you

Scoot
2010-12-12, 10:51 PM
"Would you kindly ... " :smallannoyed:


The exact spell wasn't suggestion, but the effects were pretty much the same. Our psion had one guard hit on another guard, and through a very low percentage chance, it turned out that the other guard had feelings for the initial guard.

The resulting activities provided a large enough distraction for the party to escape unscathed.

It was awkward for everyone, but it worked.

D Knight
2010-12-12, 10:53 PM
i got one.
"Throw your whips at us for its the only way to defeat us." and low and behold the whip fighter did just that and then realized that was a bad idea as she was defeated.

jguy
2010-12-12, 11:18 PM
Seems like some of my suggestions were too blunt to be "working" suggestions but you can do the same things with different wording. Like:

"Your friend is choking! Give him the Heimlich to save him!" to the fighter in spiked armor against the caster, or "The wizard is your long lost brother! Give him a hug in celebration!" Also, not all fighters wear spiked armor.

"Your spell component bag is on fire! You need to stomp it out!" or "Your divine focus is turning black with evil! Throw it away before it corrupts you!"

"You are so tired, on the edge of blackout. Why don't you lie down on the soft, comfortable floor and take a nap?"

Acanous
2010-12-12, 11:20 PM
I once had a bard who used Mass Suggestion on a party of nobles as a fight between the necromancer BBEG and the party broke out in the middle of the dance floor;
"This illusion is provided for your entertainment. Please keep clear so as not to spoil it for others"

Halae
2010-12-12, 11:27 PM
Seems like some of my suggestions were too blunt to be "working" suggestions but you can do the same things with different wording. Like:

"Your friend is choking! Give him the Heimlich to save him!" to the fighter in spiked armor against the caster, or "The wizard is your long lost brother! Give him a hug in celebration!" Also, not all fighters wear spiked armor.

"Your spell component bag is on fire! You need to stomp it out!" or "Your divine focus is turning black with evil! Throw it away before it corrupts you!"

"You are so tired, on the edge of blackout. Why don't you lie down on the soft, comfortable floor and take a nap?"

unfortunately, these wouldn't work. even with a bluff mixed in, the character you're casting suggestion on knows what he knows. the wizard is not choking, or is not his long lost brother, and he knows this. the spellcaster doesn't see his component pouch on fire, so he wouldn't consider taking it off and stomping on it, and the holy symbol is still of his god and still holy unless something has happened to it, and the NPC doesn't feel tired. You could, of course, use illusions to create these effects, but beyond that a bluff is just that the target believes that you think your telling the truth. He might just think your crazy, in addition to attacking him.

Dr Strangelove
2010-12-12, 11:32 PM
Once, using mass suggestion, I told a group of paladins that there were innocent people trapped in a burning building, and they needed to go rescue them. That covered my party's escape pretty well (we set the building on fire). Only one paladin failed his save, but it took several of his friends to hold him back. Heh.

jguy
2010-12-12, 11:33 PM
How though? Even in the fluff of the spell it says "You can suggest to someone that a pool of acid is actually pure water and a quick dip is another matter" How is what I suggested not in that line of thought?

Halae
2010-12-12, 11:47 PM
How though? Even in the fluff of the spell it says "You can suggest to someone that a pool of acid is actually pure water and a quick dip is another matter" How is what I suggested not in that line of thought?

Where is this fluff? I see it not

tyckspoon
2010-12-12, 11:50 PM
Where is this fluff? I see it not

Actual PHB text, which is where all of the fluff and most of the example uses for spells are. It's a pretty strong indication of the intended usages; something like "your Holy Symbol is cursed, you should give it to me to cleanse it" is well in line.

Halae
2010-12-12, 11:57 PM
Actual PHB text, which is where all of the fluff and most of the example uses for spells are. It's a pretty strong indication of the intended usages; something like "your Holy Symbol is cursed, you should give it to me to cleanse it" is well in line.

Hmm, fair enough. However, these are generally things that are intangible - if the other character doesn't feel tired, or his component pouch doesn't seem to be on fire, I see no reason why these would be considered reasonable suggestions, and wouldn't allow them as a DM. on that note, I would most certainly be willing to attempt to use your logic to argue with a DM that I am playing with :smallamused::smallwink:

jguy
2010-12-13, 12:04 AM
But it is magic. They would believe you if they fail their save since it is messing with their minds. You say that they don't believe their Spell Component bag is on fire because they can see it, but that would just mean they made their save. It is like Charm Person. They are not 'actually' your friend but failing their save means they are for the time being. If you suggest they are tired and they fail, suddenly they would be like "Man...I am really tired. Perhaps I should lay down and sleep"

Noedig
2010-12-13, 12:05 AM
Mass Suggestion: "Would you all kindly stand in a line please? Snap Inspection."

Single Target: "Would you kindly sheathe your weapon? You're frightening my cat."

havocfett
2010-12-13, 12:08 AM
'The bridge is illusionary, we just have overland flight. Order your men not to cross in order to save them.'
I averted the planned end of the campaign with that.
Also, 'Your dominate effect worked and the party's about to bust in, therefore you should give me your phylactery for safe keeping away from where the party will search while faking a defeat and death.'
Easiest BBEG kill ever.

Morbis Meh
2010-12-13, 12:18 AM
The most entertaining use of suggestion in any of the campaigns I have been in occurred in the one I am in now. We were at the time a lvl 6 party and on our way up a mountain to collect mystical stones for profit. On the way we encountered a cave of a less than happy Frost Giant. Our Bard got the first turn and proceeded to fascinate the poor bugger (which he failed) and with that success she attempted a suggestion. The giant failed and was convinced to slide down the mountain on its belly to come up behind us but it wasn't to get up because it had to hide from us. Next my Cleric approach but unfortunately the next perform check was abysmal and the giant passed, I however busted out clutch of orcus and paralyzed the giant (so lucky that it failed the roll). Upon the Bards next turn she walked up to it and placed a portable hole beneath it where it fell headfirst into a 10 x 10 hole. From there we beat the thing to death causing our DM to be deeply saddened that we brutally murdered her poor giant without it getting a single attack...

poignant123
2010-12-13, 11:31 PM
"I'm your best friend..."

Yukitsu
2010-12-13, 11:37 PM
"I suggest you sit in the corner until you have thought about what you've done." :smallannoyed:

Said to an assasssin that had stabbed my character.

cho_j
2010-12-13, 11:38 PM
Going up against very lawful characters, politeness judo mixed with Suggestion can yield some beautiful results. E.g., to a guard at an entrance: "Would you mind terribly stepping aside for just a quick sec? Thanks."

Also, I've only been playing DnD for about a month, but at some point, you can bet I'm making a character with Suggestion just so I can say, "Gullible is written on the ceiling. I bet you're just dying to find out if that's true." No idea what I'd use that for yet...

Any suggestions? -is shot for punnage-

hewhosaysfish
2010-12-14, 07:54 AM
We were fighting two succubi, and Suggested that one share her love with her sister by kissing her. Made the save though, unfortunately.

Why are people still posting to this thread when Ithilanor has clearly already won it? :smallwink:

IthilanorStPete
2010-12-14, 10:38 AM
Why are people still posting to this thread when Ithilanor has clearly already won it? :smallwink:

Yay! :smallbiggrin:

Vladislav
2010-12-14, 10:41 AM
"Hit yourself until you lose consciousness." or "jump off that cliff." are obviously harmful to that person, however, "Hit the person beside you." isn't.Attacking one's allies is so obviously harmful that, if a player tried that, I won't even feel the need to explain why it doesn't work.

Points for trying, of course, but no cigar.

Gabe the Bard
2010-12-14, 10:44 AM
Attacking one's allies is so obviously harmful that, if a player tried that, I won't even feel the need to explain why it doesn't work.

Points for trying, of course, but no cigar.

Anything's possible when the DM fumbles :smalltongue:

Pink
2010-12-14, 11:17 AM
Attacking one's allies is so obviously harmful that, if a player tried that, I won't even feel the need to explain why it doesn't work.

Points for trying, of course, but no cigar.

I don't think you read everything there. Are you saying that, if the suggestion was to attack anything, even the effected's enemies, the suggestion would fail because 'attacking' is a 'harmful act'?

IMO, the 'harmful' aspect is the same as we'll find from something like Dominate, in that the act itself cannot seem to directly harm the effected and the effected only, because it would take very strong magic to effect the core survival instinct of a person.

This is a magical spell that seriously messes with a person's mind for it's duration, as given by above example from PHB that it can make a person think a pool of acid is a hot spring you want to take a bath in. The save is there to determine whether or not it's believed, and more reasonable suggestions do get a bonus in this regard, but something like "The person you thought was your cleric just turned into a bugbear and is about to attack you, defend yourself against it." is rather within the reasons, IMO.

That being said, as DM, it's your call, as long as you can be consistent with your use and your player's use, really no problem, but as for myself, I allow it a fair amount of leeway if it's worded well. That's what the save is for afterall.