24hr Time Stop

[ChocoSuisse]

People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually, from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint - it's more like a big ball of wibbly wobbly... time-y wimey... stuff.

[Erik Vale]

At DvR 0 you are no longer a mortal [as defined by the divine rules], the only other reasonable defintions are:
-Unable to be Killed
-Unlimited life expectancy.

The Second can be done with spells or by being a Neraph, a LA 0 outsider, that can be native to anywhere with a feat at level 1 to avoid problems. Make it an air one and it actually needs nothing.

Go for the first, I think there is the Curst template from somewhere, which in exchange for crippling penalties, makes you unkillable beyond the measure of most other means, such as vampire lord and ghost [ghosts and vampire lords can both technically be killed, but have resurrection tigers, not sure about curst]... Gaining DvR 0 is trickier though, however I do believe there is a 12 level class for it for dragons... Which is achiveable for a player. I've also heard of a giant variant that gains DvR 0, so you could play a Ogre Mage perhaps.

There is no definition of mortal that keeps a PC out of persisted time stop given sufficient OP threshold. I've gotten it as a party effecting buff using warweaver and the class which allows personal spells to become non-personal. Spellguard of Silvery moon I think.


Of course, actually using 24 hour timestop/infinite timestop loop deserves a visit from pun pun... If your lucky, with a high five before forcing you into a sphere of annihilation or equivalent.

[Fouredged Sword]

This is not a RAW solution, but in my games, I have solved the solution nicely with the following.

When in the effect of a timestop, one becomes aware of other creatures that exist between moments. These creatures are the inevitables that are tasked with the motion of the universe from one moment to the next. They literally spend a near eternity moving everything from one location to the place the object will be in the next moment.

When something steps into their project, they are not happy campers.

They are also 20ft tall metal spiders, dripping with quintessence, with 30 int score, 20 outsider HD, 20 levels of psion manifesting, and disjunction (removes time manipulation effects only) and metacognition as at will psi like abilities.

The good news is that they are inevitable, so they are the definition of predictable. When someone stops time, somewhere in the world, one of the spiders is tasked with fixing the issue. A contingent metacognition goes off and alerts him that he has a task on the first round the . He uses a standard action to use metacognition again to determine where the problem is, and if the problem will still be a problem in 5 rounds. If yes, he teleports to the problem and waits for the 4 more rounds to pass. At the 6th round of the players timestop, the inevitable uses disjunction to end the timestop effect and send the caster back into the normal time stream. If this fails, the inevitable keeps trying, and every 6 rounds another gets assigned to the task of helping the first. If you kill one, two more are immediately assigned with stopping you. If you kill one, their orders switch from disjunct to disintegrate. Timestop has a 1d4+1 round time period as a matter of diplomacy with these extraplaner beings, not magical limit.

It is possible to extend a timestop effect, even persist one. The problem is that doing so end up with you running from the universe's janitors who REALLY want to keep you moving along the normal path of time. Running will simply delay the inevitable, and likely not long. Killing them is a task in futility, as there are literally an infinite number of them, and killing one sets two on your tail.

I have had a player dodge the inevitables for 18 rounds or so, setting up a crazy time stop scheme. It makes time manipulation a fun matter of planning and running/teleporting to stay out of line of effect of the spiders.

[Erik Vale]

Disintigration is a ray. Kill one, walk around laughing with ray deflection. Or mock as your cheesyness has you with infinite expetional reflection [through feats] so the spiders just hurt themselves, or have a +1 Greater Turning shield, which for just over 1 million, gives you immunity to all non-aoe spells, like disintigration, and if you cant break the economy by this point, shame on you... killing the spider may be harder.

Of course, a spellblade [or whatever it's called that gives you immunity to a single spell and the ability to retarget it a round later for 6000gp] attuned to disjunction, so you need not even kill the spider in the first place, which may be trickier. You are the target of the disjunction, so all should be fine.

Of course, at this point the game stops being fun, unless you want to have your character openly mock time. I suggest you don't do it anywhere near a Overdiety or The Lady of Pain.

[DigoDragon]

When in the effect of a timestop, one becomes aware of other creatures that exist between moments.

I take it you borrowed a page from The Twilight Zone as well?

In my longest running campaign, at one point the PCs had gotten ahold of a minor artifact that can, once per day, mimic Time Stop. You can get the artifact to work it's ability more times per day by feeding "spell levels" into it to equal to time Stop's 9th level slot. The downside is that when recharged this way, there's a chance you can get shunted perminately into a Time Stop. At that point no mortal magic can unstuck you from your trap.

Killed two spellcasters this way because they developed "Time Stop Addiction", feeding their habbit 4-5 times a day at the worst point before they got stuck.
Thankfully the rest of the party (eventually) destroyed the artifact like they were asked to.

[Chronos]

There's yet another interpretation of persisted timestop, that I favor. The actual duration is changed from a blink of an eye to 24 hours, and the time stretching factor remains unchanged, so you'll die of old age before you ever get a chance to affect anything again.

Actually, what I really favor is a houserule on metamagic that prevents you from using metamagic cost reducers unless you have spell slots high enough to use the metamagic without any reducers. Among many other effects, this means that it's impossible to persist Time Stop until pretty deep into epic when you can take Improved Spell Capacity six times. But that's a houserule, not what the rules say right now.

[Erik Vale]

There are several ageless races and templates to get around ageing. Against the second rule though, how does that ruling work with Ultimate Magus [Cost isn't reduced, you just use other spell slots to pay for it if you so desire]?

[Rubik]

You forgot the epic level handbook demarcation, "no mortal magic can stop time for longer than 1d4+1 rounds" or whatever. Some folks like to ignore that. Others don't

Even Time Stop isn't stopping time. It's just speeding your time frame up.

Otherwise, psionics, the Planar Bubble spell, flowing-time planes, and the planar shepherd all pretty much prove that statement entirely wrong.

[HaikenEdge]

Even Time Stop isn't stopping time.

Another in a line of spells that don't actually do what their name suggests.

[dascarletm]

This is not a RAW solution, but in my games, I have solved the solution nicely with the following.

When in the effect of a timestop, one becomes aware of other creatures that exist between moments. These creatures are the inevitables that are tasked with the motion of the universe from one moment to the next. They literally spend a near eternity moving everything from one location to the place the object will be in the next moment.

When something steps into their project, they are not happy campers.

They are also 20ft tall metal spiders, dripping with quintessence, with 30 int score, 20 outsider HD, 20 levels of psion manifesting, and disjunction (removes time manipulation effects only) and metacognition as at will psi like abilities.

The good news is that they are inevitable, so they are the definition of predictable. When someone stops time, somewhere in the world, one of the spiders is tasked with fixing the issue. A contingent metacognition goes off and alerts him that he has a task on the first round the . He uses a standard action to use metacognition again to determine where the problem is, and if the problem will still be a problem in 5 rounds. If yes, he teleports to the problem and waits for the 4 more rounds to pass. At the 6th round of the players timestop, the inevitable uses disjunction to end the timestop effect and send the caster back into the normal time stream. If this fails, the inevitable keeps trying, and every 6 rounds another gets assigned to the task of helping the first. If you kill one, two more are immediately assigned with stopping you. If you kill one, their orders switch from disjunct to disintegrate. Timestop has a 1d4+1 round time period as a matter of diplomacy with these extraplaner beings, not magical limit.

It is possible to extend a timestop effect, even persist one. The problem is that doing so end up with you running from the universe's janitors who REALLY want to keep you moving along the normal path of time. Running will simply delay the inevitable, and likely not long. Killing them is a task in futility, as there are literally an infinite number of them, and killing one sets two on your tail.

I have had a player dodge the inevitables for 18 rounds or so, setting up a crazy time stop scheme. It makes time manipulation a fun matter of planning and running/teleporting to stay out of line of effect of the spiders.

I had a similar Idea:

One does not persist Time Stop because of what lurks within the "null time." Of all the powerful casters throughout the ages not one has gone more than 30 seconds of apparent time in the null time. All those who have tried have never returned, and are never heard of again. For what lurks their is more terrifying than anything you can imagine...

Enter my next high-level campaign plot

Thank you OP for helping me in this.

[Chronos]

Quoth Eric Vale:

Against the second rule though, how does that ruling work with Ultimate Magus [Cost isn't reduced, you just use other spell slots to pay for it if you so desire]?

The same way it works for anything else: You can't use the metamagic unless you have a high enough slot. So for instance, if you have 5th-level slots, you can extend a 4th-level spell. You can either do it the old-fashioned way by using the 5th-level slot, or you can use a 4th-level slot with a metamagic rod, DMM, the Ultimate Magus ability, or whatever, but you can't do it at all unless you have a 5th-level slot.

[Jack_Simth]

There's yet another interpretation of persisted timestop, that I favor. The actual duration is changed from a blink of an eye to 24 hours, and the time stretching factor remains unchanged, so you'll die of old age before you ever get a chance to affect anything again.

There's a very easy way to get around that. It's a 3rd level spell (alternately a 6th) that a rather lot of casters prepare regularly anyway: (Greater) Dispel Magic. No roll required when it's your own spell.

The same way it works for anything else: You can't use the metamagic unless you have a high enough slot. So for instance, if you have 5th-level slots, you can extend a 4th-level spell. You can either do it the old-fashioned way by using the 5th-level slot, or you can use a 4th-level slot with a metamagic rod, DMM, the Ultimate Magus ability, or whatever, but you can't do it at all unless you have a 5th-level slot.

Do be warned: I know of at least one method by which to gain a spell slot well above 9th level pre-Epic - and it only requires one item outside of Core, the Extra Slot feat from Complete Arcane. With a bit of work, it could be done by 12th level.

[Rubik]

There's a very easy way to get around that. It's a 3rd level spell (alternately a 6th) that a rather lot of casters prepare regularly anyway: (Greater) Dispel Magic. No roll required when it's your own spell.


Do be warned: I know of at least one method by which to gain a spell slot well above 9th level pre-Epic - and it only requires one item outside of Core, the Extra Slot feat from Complete Arcane. With a bit of work, it could be done by 12th level.

Don't forget Versatile Spellcaster, too. That lets you cast post-9ths the moment you gain enough spell slots to convert that high.

Also, StP erudites with manifester level boosts.

In short, there are plenty of ways to do this. Far more than what we've mentioned already.

[Loxagn]

Okay. So, from the SRD:

Time Stop
Duration: 1d4+1 rounds (apparent time); see text

Persistent Spell
A persistent spell has a duration of 24 hours. The persistent spell must have a personal range or a fixed range. Spells of instantaneous duration cannot be affected by this feat, nor can spells whose effects are discharged.

From this text alone, since Time Stop has a listed duration that is not instantaneous, I would say that, RAW, it is a valid target for Persistent Spell.
RAI, however, I think would not allow it to be applied to something like Time Stop. And I'm not sure that abusing Time Stop in such a way would really be wise, given the attention it's likely to garner. But yes, based off of what I can see of the rules text alone, Time Stop is a valid target for Persistent Spell, if you can gather together a way to apply it (there are many.)

It is also a valid target for Extend, Empower, Maximize, and Intensify, if that floats your boat.

[Rubik]

Okay. So, from the SRD:

Time Stop
Duration: 1d4+1 rounds (apparent time); see text

Persistent Spell
A persistent spell has a duration of 24 hours. The persistent spell must have a personal range or a fixed range. Spells of instantaneous duration cannot be affected by this feat, nor can spells whose effects are discharged.

From this text alone, since Time Stop has a listed duration that is not instantaneous, I would say that, RAW, it is a valid target for Persistent Spell.
RAI, however, I think would not allow it to be applied to something like Time Stop. And I'm not sure that abusing Time Stop in such a way would really be wise, given the attention it's likely to garner. But yes, based off of what I can see of the rules text alone, Time Stop is a valid target for Persistent Spell, if you can gather together a way to apply it (there are many.)

It is also a valid target for Extend, Empower, Maximize, and Intensify, if that floats your boat.

Yep. That's exactly why I say that Time Stop is Persistable, because it totally is. And since the Duration becomes "24 hours," and the time is measured in subjective time, that's what you get out of it. Anything else is either indefensible or houserules. It's right there in the text.

[Loxagn]

Mhm. But just like Wish lets you Wish for a Ring of Three Wishes RAW, it's still up to DM discretion as to whether or not this works.

Personally, I would ask that my players not attempt it in-game, although it's fun for a thought exercise.

[Rubik]

Mhm. But just like Wish lets you Wish for a Ring of Three Wishes RAW, it's still up to DM discretion as to whether or not this works.

Personally, I would ask that my players not attempt it in-game, although it's fun for a thought exercise.

Yeah. It shouldn't be that way, but you can't argue within the RAW that it's not doable.

[bekeleven]

ghosts and vampire lords can both technically be killed, but have resurrection tigers

Where do I get one of these tigers

[Socksy]

...What would happen if a cerebremancer or similar build decided to Mass Time Hop themselves while Time Stopped? What would happen if they decided to take others with them?

[Rubik]

...What would happen if a cerebremancer or similar build decided to Mass Time Hop themselves while Time Stopped? What would happen if they decided to take others with them?

The caster would probably use up his subjective time during the Time Stop first, as the duration of Time Hop ticked down. Then the duration would tick down in normal time. At least, that's about the only way to actually adjudicate it that I can think of. Note that there's no way to affect others while you're Time Stopped, so it's self-only.

[Chronos]

Quoth Jack_Simth:

Do be warned: I know of at least one method by which to gain a spell slot well above 9th level pre-Epic - and it only requires one item outside of Core, the Extra Slot feat from Complete Arcane. With a bit of work, it could be done by 12th level.

Do tell. The ways I can think of all involve using metamagic-reducers on Heighten Spell, which would be a no-go here.

[Jack_Simth]

Do tell. The ways I can think of all involve using metamagic-reducers on Heighten Spell, which would be a no-go here.

Red Wizard's Circle Magic. DMG. You have other people sacrifice spell slots to actually change the level of a prepared spell you have to 20th. You can then cast a 20th level spell, so the Extra Slot feat can give you a 19th. Wizard-5/Red Wizard-6 has Circle Leader to get the slot. Next level gives you a level based feat to use for the trick. Not technically a metamagic reducer.

[atemu1234]

I'd say that there's a fundamental difference for this between arcane and divine casters. A divine caster requires a deity's intervention to regain spells. A wizard or sorcerer (or maybe the archivist and favored soul) studies their spells or regains them naturally, rather than requiring outside help to be able to cast spells.

[Mellack]

Not to try to derail the thread, but having divine casters only able to get spells back at a specific time seems like it will cause problems. This situation came up in our groups last adventure (Kingmaker-Thousand Screams). In that realm, it is always twilight. It says time progresses normally, but the time of day does not. This may leave divine casters unable to get new spells if they chose a different time of day. Conversely, I guess if they had chosen twilight they could get all their spells with just an hour of meditation? All this with arcane casters being unaffected. It strikes me as being overly troublesome for what is essentially a flavor effect of the story.

[Gemini476]

While I'm personally of the ~opinion~ that Time Stop either has an actual non-apparent duration of Instantaneous (the See Text part of it, in other words) or that Persisting it would make you take 1d4+1 rounds of actions in 24 hours of real-time, there are other somewhat reliable ways to stop time for a long time.

Layering Time Stop, mostly. I guess Repeating Twin Time Stop would work, but just casting Time Stop within another is enough. I'm pretty sure. Or would they not stack?

I personally love that aspect of the Arcane Swordsage, as broken as it is. Being able to initiate a (Su) Time Stop endlessly at the cost of a Full Action (to ready it) and a Standard Action (to initiate it)? Being able to spend days within layered Time Stops is awesome.

[Loxagn]

I'm not sure whether or not Time Stop can be cast in Time Stop. I should hope not, because there are creatures that can Time Stop as an SLA, and then whether you can persist or not becomes moot, as that's infinite time right there.


I'll say this. Any game of mine, strategies like that will earn you the sort of attention you don't want. First time you try to Persist Time Stop, or Wish for Wishes, or Polymorph yourself up any amount of anti-osmium, your spell fizzles and you get a brief conversation with a servant of a deity politely warning you that the gods have agreed to not allow this sort of chicanery. Second time gets you smote on the spot.

[Chronos]

Shadowcasters also get a variant of Time Stop that's just plain better (IIRC, it lasts for 1d4+4 rounds instead of 1d4+1). Still mortal magic, just weird mortal magic.