problem with my dm and shadowcraft mage.

[morkendi]

In game tonight, we get attacked by hordes of shadows. That's fine, but it eliminated most my save or else spells. Comes my turn and I see a nice group I decide to shadow evocation a fireball. Dm says they are immune to illusion ie mind effecting spells so it doesn't effect them. I point out that the discriptor is now shadow, not illusion, and being partially real that it should effect them somehow. Group starts falling after priest tried to turn and every mob mauled him. I was able to pull through with summon undead 5 by getting a bunch of ogre zombies out. They are immune to the stat drain. I hid in a rope trick to aviod the strength drain while the ogres slowly tried to kill the mobs. Eventually my pets cleared them, but run like this, I will never be truly effective vs undead.

In order to keep going, i accept it. Now my character has a knowm weakness .
Now I know i need to chand this. Thinking 2 levels ur-priest, then mystic thurge. This would give me tools against undead.

Charter us lvl 10 now, need advice.

[Keld Denar]

Shadow spells are not mind affecting. They are quasi-real, consisting of shadow matter from the plane of shadows. Your DM is wrong, and you should discuss it with him between sessions. Its right there in the magic overview chapter of the PHB. Just show him and make sure he fully understand. It's an easy mistake to make. A ruling made when he has time to sit and ponder the rules will often reverse an in the moment snap decision. If I don't know something as a DM, I'll make up a rule that I think is fair, then look it up after the session so as to not slow down play. My guess is that your DM did the same. Confronted with the rules, he should change his mind.

Also, even as a focused specialist illusionist, you should still have a couple non illusions prepped. Conjurations are generally effective, even when shadow conjurations aren't. Also, some illusion spells like legion of sentinals are not mind affecting.

[Soren Hero]

In game tonight, we get attacked by hordes of shadows. That's fine, but it eliminated most my save or else spells. Comes my turn and I see a nice group I decide to shadow evocation a fireball. Dm says they are immune to illusion ie mind effecting spells so it doesn't effect them. I point out that the discriptor is now shadow, not illusion, and being partially real that it should effect them somehow. Group starts falling after priest tried to turn and every mob mauled him. I was able to pull through with summon undead 5 by getting a bunch of ogre zombies out. They are immune to the stat drain. I hid in a rope trick to aviod the strength drain while the ogres slowly tried to kill the mobs. Eventually my pets cleared them, but run like this, I will never be truly effective vs undead.

In order to keep going, i accept it. Now my character has a knowm weakness .
Now I know i need to chand this. Thinking 2 levels ur-priest, then mystic thurge. This would give me tools against undead.

Charter us lvl 10 now, need advice.

well, first off i would talk to the DM right away as this conflicts with RAW. according to the SRD, undead types have "Immunity to all mind-affecting effects (charms, compulsions, phantasms, patterns, and morale effects)", and as you correctly pointed out, Shadow Evocation is Illusion (shadow), and contains no mind-affecting tag. Shadow Evocation is only 20% as effective when the target "disbelieves/makes will save".

RAW-wise, a shadow has a +4 will save, so it could save against the effect, and only suffer 20% damage. it can be argued that illusions affect the mind, however, and i could see your DM applying an autosave against the Shadow Evocation, because they are "immune to mind-affecting effects", even though this isn't RAW. you have to establish a base-line with your DM.

[Fates]

Gah. Far too many people see "immunity to mind-affecting effects" and see it as "Huzzah! I never need to roll another will save!"

You are, in fact, right. Shadow spells do work on undead just fine. If your DM wants to apply realism, as they are immune to phantasms, he should at least have made it 20% effective, as it is partially real.


As far as dealing with undead goes? I wouldn't bother straying from your primary casting classes- just choose a few reliable spells that can hurt undead. After all, illusions won't always work, so you should keep a fireball or something up your sleeve just in case.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Chiming in with another round of "your DM was just plain wrong"

Not only was he wrong about the illusion not being negated for being a shadow, he's wrong about undead autopassing the save against illusions in general.

Figments, glamers, and shadows work against undead just as well as they do against the living. They even work better against mindless undead than they do against the living since mindless creatures don't get to make the save at all. It's patterns and phantasms that undead don't have to worry about from the illusion school.

At the same time, however, shadowcraft mage is one of the more powerful PrC options around, so I'm not really suprised he's looking for a way to nerf you a little.

[icefractal]

It's not an uncommon thing to run into - GM's see "Will Save" and think it's Mind Affecting. I recently ran into it myself (using Silent Image on some skeletons), but luckily the GM was willing to listen and went with the actual rules.

Shadowcraft Mage is admittedly powerful, but "stealth houseruling" is a terrible way to balance anything. Also, they're not super powerful unless you have feats/abilities that crank up your shadow reality percentage and/or pumped-up metamagic.

[morkendi]

To this point, my scm has dominated everything tossed at us. He started as a diviner with dropping evocation, going scm was thought of later, but it is working well so far. Not the optimal build, but adding prescience against opponents will saves has gotten us out of some stuff fairly often. It has gotten to a point that if I can't show up to play, things go bad for the group. They depend on my wizard being there. It could be a nerf, but I can find a way around it I think.

[Randomguy]

Wait a sec, you've still got conjuration? Just hit them with Acid Breath or another of the conjuration blasting spells. You've even got Orb of Force, so no miss chance against incorporeal undead, and there are a bunch of abjurations that keep out incorporeal undead as well, plus a few spells to make incorporeal undead corporeal, so the rest of the party can hit them.
And you didn't ban necromancy either, right? That means you can still cast Command Undead or Halt Undead, which stops mindless undead with no save.


I mean, it sucks that the DM's not following the rules, but you've already got one of the most powerful classes in the game in a prestige class that makes it even more powerful. It's a nerf, sure, but you can deal with it.