Simple Q&A D&D 3.5 (by RAW) XXVI

[Curmudgeon]

A 051

You're overlooking the options for the Tiny or smaller creature to avoid the AoO that movement into another creature's square normally provokes. Those include using their own 5' step, making a successful Tumble check, and not being visually apparent (because you can't make an AoO against a character with total concealment).

Additionally, there's no requirement for very small creatures to enter melee combat. Their size bonuses work fine for ranged attacks also.

[Fitz10019]

Q53
Can Quaal's Feather Token: Bird (DMG 264) be used to pinpoint an invisible creature?

[kkplx]

Q 54

About 5ft steps:

Can you:

5ft step diagonally past an enemy? (H=Hero, E=Enemy, O=Space, O=intended Square)
OHO
OEO
OOO

5ft step around a corner?

OHO
--¬O
__|O

Both examples assume that the line you draw from your square to the intended square crosses the barrier/enemy square while still measuring as 5 feet.

And can you actually 5ft step into an enemy's square if you're small enough? o0

[Andezzar]

Re: A 46

However, for purposes of spells specifically, attacks include any directly offensive action, including spells that do not have attack rolls. This is usually relevant for spells such as sanctuary that end if the caster makes an attack, but it would seem that greater blink uses the same definition, which is more specific than the general glossary definition. As such, it is technically possible.

There is no such general rule. Only certain spells (invisibility etc.) have such a rule, Greater Blink does not. As such only the standard definition of attack applies.

For purposes of this spell, an attack includes any spell targeting a foe or whose area or effect includes a foe.

Contrary to what you and I thought Sanctuary does not use the extended definition:

This spell does not prevent the warded creature from being attacked or affected by area or effect spells. The subject cannot attack without breaking the spell but may use nonattack spells or otherwise act.

A 54

5ft step diagonally past an enemy? (H=Hero, E=Enemy, O=Space, O=intended Square)
OHO
OEO
OOO

5ft step around a corner?

OHO
--¬O
__|O

Both examples assume that the line you draw from your square to the intended square crosses the barrier/enemy square while still measuring as 5 feet.

Yes, but it would take several rounds, unless you are somehow allowed to make more then one 5 ft step.

And can you actually 5ft step into an enemy's square if you're small enough? o0

Only if the creature is or becomes helpless before the end of your movement:

You can’t end your movement in the same square as another creature unless it is helpless.

This by extension means that tiny and smaller creatures can only make standard attacks in melee and can only do so if they have the spring attack feat.

[Sith_Happens]

A 46 dispute to the dispute

Some spell descriptions refer to attacking. All offensive combat actions, even those that don’t damage opponents are considered attacks. Attempts to turn or rebuke undead count as attacks. All spells that opponents resist with saving throws, that deal damage, or that otherwise harm or hamper subjects are attacks. Spells that summon monsters or other allies are not attacks because the spells themselves don’t harm anyone.

[Curmudgeon]

A 053

Maybe, but only in the special case in which you are already able to designate the target. ("An invisible creature nearby" is not a target designation.) You could pinpoint the location of an invisible friend if you specified them as the target to the Bird, and then succeeded in a Spot check to see where the Bird delivered the note.

[Fitz10019]

A 54 correction

...You can't move diagonally past a corner (even by taking a 5-foot step). You can move diagonally past a creature, even an opponent.

...Creatures may occupy the same square if they are three or more size categories different.

Look at that section for some detailed examples including opponents sharing squares while neither is helpless/unconscious.

A 54Only if the creature is or becomes helpless before the end of your movement:This by extension means that tiny and smaller creatures can only make standard attacks in melee and can only do so if they have the spring attack feat.

This reference to 'only if... helpless' is too broad for a question about creature sizes.

This reference to tiny creatures and Spring Attack is simply not true.

[Fitz10019]

A 053

Maybe, but only in the special case in which you are already able to designate the target. ("An invisible creature nearby" is not a target designation.) You could pinpoint the location of an invisible friend if you specified them as the target to the Bird, and then succeeded in a Spot check to see where the Bird delivered the note.

Q53 followup
A If I spend 3 rounds fighting a creature, then see him/her/it disappear (by potion/spell/SLA), and then activate the Bird feather token, will the bird successfully go to the invisible creature that I can only identify from this encounter?
B If I am searching the office of a person I have met before, find a hot cup of tea, suspect that person is in the room invisibly or hiding, and then activate the Bird feather token, will the bird successfully go to the person?

[Curmudgeon]

A 053 followup

A You'll have to ask your DM. I don't of any RAW citations which would say if 3 rounds of combat, where you're concentrating on staying alive, would be enough acquaintance to designate a target suitably for a magic device. The spell Locate Creature would fail with such a poorly-known target. Parallels for magical identification exist for "viewed once" to designate a location (for Teleport), but that spell has a built-in degradation of effectiveness for poor targeting.

B Probably.

If they're invisible or nearby is not the issue; the ability to designate a target is. You may succeed in designating a target and have the Bird fly all the way across town when an acquaintance of the target has set down their beverage on the desk.

[unseenmage]

Q55

What happens when a creature stops being a (I hesitate to use the word legal) lets say viable target for a spell?

I don't know of many examples but here are the one's I do know of,
a) A Construct affected by Greater Humanoid Essence is then affected by Telepathic Bond or similar. What happens when the GHE duration expires and the Humanoid is now a Construct immune to mind-affecting?

b) A corpse is affected by Animate Objects but is then brought back to life by Resurrection or similar. What happens to the Animate Objects effect now that the corpse it was cast on is a living thing again?

If there is no RAW on these specific instances that's fine, but I suspect there's some RAW somewhere about spells affecting targets and what happens when those targets sudden;y become immune to those spells.

[TuggyNE]

A55 partial: No discussion has so far turned up any rules on this in the years I've been here, and I am reasonably certain from considerable study that Core has no such rule at all. Therefore I suspect there is no RAW answer, or if there is it is not widely known at all.

[Flame of Anor]

How does "other squares" include the primary one? If this included the first square, this would either mean that one of the surrounding squares is not adjacent to the primary one or that the whole sentence is meaningless because it does not tell us the maximum number of squares each square is adjacent to but just an arbitrary number below that maximum.

The "other" squares don't include the primary one. It's like saying "I have eight brothers in red shirts" doesn't imply that you have no brothers in yellow shirts. Just because there are eight other squares adjacent to the primary square doesn't mean that they are the only adjacent ones: the primary square itself is not "other", so it doesn't count as one of the eight. I claim that the primary square is adjacent to itself, making nine adjacent squares: eight "others", and one "same". If they wrote it out in full, the text would read "A square is adjacent to eight other squares [as well as to itself]."

Granted, this might not be intended. But it is what the rules say: the square itself does meet the criterion of sharing a side or corner, and it is not covered by the "eight other squares" clause.

[unseenmage]

A55 partial: No discussion has so far turned up any rules on this in the years I've been here, and I am reasonably certain from considerable study that Core has no such rule at all. Therefore I suspect there is no RAW answer, or if there is it is not widely known at all.

I was afraid you'd say that.
To my mind it becomes a binary problem then. Either they work and do as much as they can or they don't and stop applying when the target becomes illegal.

Thanks anyway RAW Q&A thread people. Seriously, you guys do not get enough thanks, so thank you for all your help past present and future.

[Chronos]

Q 55 addendum:

If spells stopped functioning when their targets became invalid, then Greater Humanoid Essence all by itself would be dysfunctional: It targets constructs, and then immediately changes their type to humanoid.

[Telonius]

Q 56

If a substitution level (for example, Zhentarim Fighter) grants a new skill as a class skill, is that applicable only at the level indicated, or for all future levels of the class? Taking the Zhentarim Fighter example, would the Fighter have to spend one skill point or two if he wanted to gain a single rank in Bluff at Fighter4?

[_felagund]

Q57

What the heck "Identify does not function when used on an artifact." means at the definition of Identify spell?

[Telonius]

A57
An Artifact is a special class of magical item. You can find a list of them here. They're usually very powerful. The wording of the spell means that if you attempt to cast Identify on an Artifact, the spell doesn't work.

[Andezzar]

The "other" squares don't include the primary one. It's like saying "I have eight brothers in red shirts" doesn't imply that you have no brothers in yellow shirts. Just because there are eight other squares adjacent to the primary square doesn't mean that they are the only adjacent ones: the primary square itself is not "other", so it doesn't count as one of the eight. I claim that the primary square is adjacent to itself, making nine adjacent squares: eight "others", and one "same". If they wrote it out in full, the text would read "A square is adjacent to eight other squares [as well as to itself]."

I disagree that that is the same as what the rules say.

Granted, this might not be intended. But it is what the rules say: the square itself does meet the criterion of sharing a side or corner, and it is not covered by the "eight other squares" clause.

I disagree. All standard definitions of share as a transitive verb require a third party. So a square cannot share a border with itself.

[OMG PONIES]

Re: Adjacent Squares: Time for a separate thread.

Q 56

If a substitution level (for example, Zhentarim Fighter) grants a new skill as a class skill, is that applicable only at the level indicated, or for all future levels of the class? Taking the Zhentarim Fighter example, would the Fighter have to spend one skill point or two if he wanted to gain a single rank in Bluff at Fighter4?

A56: Only at the level indicated. While the example you list is from a Champions of Valor web enhancement, neither the WE nor Champions of Valor has the below text:

When a substitution level changes the standard class’s Hit Die or class skill list, the change applies only to that substitution level, not to any other class levels

[ksbsnowowl]

A 45

Yes, those are four different spells. Not only do you need to prepare them separately, you also have to learn them separately.

A 45, Continuation:

Except for a Nar Demonbinder. They can spontaneously alter a known protection from X spell to any of the other alignments.

[TheG]

Hi everyone

Q58:In Polymorph Any Object Does the HD-Limit from Polymorhp still apply ?

The assumed form can’t have more Hit Dice than your caster level (or the subject’s HD, whichever is lower), to a maximum of 15 HD at 15th level

Q58-A If i (assume 15th level wizard) polymorph a 1hd commoner, could i choose from 1hd-only monsters or any form i choose is downgraded to 1hd (I refeer at the table of examples where a lizard (1/8HD) is transmuted to a Manticore (6HD)
Q58-B Alter self no-template limitation still apply? (In Dragon 324p65 when I was browsing for that druid skin, I came across the actual recommendation of using Polymorph Any Object to turn a squirrel corpse into a templated dragon turtle. Domo Arigato Mr Roboto has been confirmed as RAI.)

[TrueJordan]

Q 59

Let's say I'm a druid 5/Planar Shepherd 6 with the Realm of Dream (so magical beasts are OK no matter what), with a Skin of Keltar (which gives me +4 to my wildshape level, OP, I know) Does that allow me to turn into a huge creature with 15 HD? It's a bit unclear (http://www.scribd.com/doc/108544523/Dragon-Magazine-324 pg 76 or so)

[Curmudgeon]

A 058 Yes.

A 058-A 1 HD creatures only.

The example table does not specify how many HD the Lizard to be turned into a Manticore has. You follow the text of the RAW instead of guessing at how the examples might include some unspecified exceptions.

A 058-B

No templates are allowed with Polymorph Any Object, as it inherits this restriction via Polymorph and Alter Self. A Dragon Turtle is not a templated creature, and the specific mention of Polymorph Any Object you reference does not include any templates:

Of course, your DM might not always present such creatures for your party to slay, but that's why your necromancer has a transmuter ally with access to polymorph any object. The skeleton of a squirrel can become the dead body of a dragon turtle with the casting of a single spell.

Corpses are objects and thus have no HD.


Polymorph Any Object is a problematic spell. Following the RAW, the Marionette to Human transformation would produce the corpse of a Human, because the spell provides no mechanism to create HD.

[AlanBruce]

Q.60

If a Caster is protected by a solid fog and another caster throws an area version of dispel magic, can he attempt to dispel the fog and any 1 buff the hidden caster has on him?

[Curmudgeon]

A 060 Yes.

The operative word here is "try". There is no guarantee that the 20' radius burst of Dispel Magic would catch both the origin point of the Solid Fog spell and the spellcaster who cast the spell. In the worst case you would end up just temporarily dispelling part of the Solid Fog effect, which would immediately spread out again from its origin point.

[Zethex]

Q 061:

Do familiars get their own turn each round or do they share it with their masters? If it is the former, what Initiative do they use? Does their Empathic Link have any mechanical impact on their master regarding Initiative, Flat-Footedness or Surprise Rounds?

[AlanBruce]

Q. 062

Can a targeted spell like dispel magic, go through a cloudy conjuration with a 50% miss chance, or is it completely negated?

[Flame of Anor]

I disagree. All standard definitions of share as a transitive verb require a third party. So a square cannot share a border with itself.

2b: "To have in common." Does not mention a third party.

[Andezzar]

2b: "To have in common." Does not mention a third party.

Can you have something in common with yourself?

[broodax]

Can you have something in common with yourself?

2 a : belonging to or shared by two or more individuals or things or by all members of a group

Yes. The edge/corner belongs to all the members of the group of characters: {you}