Quick question regarding the infamous "efreeti wish" loophole...

[Cosi]

Also, Gate doesn't need a revenge clause - the Efreet themselves take care of that. MM 115: "Efreet are infamous for their hatred of servitude, desire for revenge, cruel nature, and ability to beguile and mislead."

I, for one, would live in fear of the devastating revenge of a CR 8 creature when I had wish at-will and +1,000,000,000 to all my stats.

[eggynack]

That's why I find the reasoning disingenuous - "the rules dictate non-interference" when it comes to shopping, but the DM still has to helpfully build you a city to shop in, and make it reachable to boot.

Well, yeah. That's what the DM does. I don't think it's particularly disingenuous, in any case, to say, "If the DM put this in, then the plan works up to this point. If they didn't, then it doesn't, and you need a different plan." They need to put something in the world, and it may or may not fit into the candle plan. Otherwise, well, the starting point of the thread seems to be planar binding, so that.

Also, Gate doesn't need a revenge clause - the Efreet themselves take care of that. MM 115: "Efreet are infamous for their hatred of servitude, desire for revenge, cruel nature, and ability to beguile and mislead."

Fair, though I dunno that it's a massive threat. It's not a crazy powerful creature, and you can always compensate it. Also, you are wish looping, so you'll probably be able to deflect the efreeti difficulty.

[Psyren]

I, for one, would live in fear of the devastating revenge of a CR 8 creature when I had wish at-will and +1,000,000,000 to all my stats.

Putting aside that inherent bonuses only stack up to +5, what makes you think only a single efreeti would be coming after you, and by itself to boot? As an intelligent creature, he'll know if he's outmatched and plan accordingly. More likely he'll go find your rival and offer some wishes in exchange for revenge on the upstart mortal that made demands.

Well, yeah. That's what the DM does. I don't think it's particularly disingenuous, in any case, to say, "If the DM put this in, then the plan works up to this point. If they didn't, then it doesn't, and you need a different plan." They need to put something in the world, and it may or may not fit into the candle plan. Otherwise, well, the starting point of the thread seems to be planar binding, so that.

Starting from Planar Binding already solves this, due to "unreasonable commands." That's why we went to gate/candle in the first place.

Fair, though I dunno that it's a massive threat. It's not a crazy powerful creature, and you can always compensate it. Also, you are wish looping, so you'll probably be able to deflect the efreeti difficulty.

As above, the efreet itself isn't the problem, and he'd be smart enough not to come at you head-on if you've just used his wishes to power yourself up.

Compensating it isn't the problem - they are cruel and hate servitude. Even if you offer payment, any form of calling or binding, as well as forbidding it from misleading you or screwing your wish in some way, is just going to breed resentment.

[Cosi]

Putting aside that inherent bonuses only stack up to +5,

You know what number Belts of Magnificence go up to? Infinity. Well, technically an arbitrarily large finite number, but who's counting?

what makes you think only a single efreeti would be coming after you, and by itself to boot? As an intelligent creature, he'll know if he's outmatched and plan accordingly. More likely he'll go find your rival and offer some wishes in exchange for revenge on the upstart mortal that made demands.

So his plan to punish someone arbitrarily more powerful than he is, who explicitly let him live despite having the opportunity to kill him, is to make someone else even more powerful than that? Bear in mind, this new individual knows that the Efreet might give someone else even more power, so it seems somewhat unlikely he'd be disposed to allow the Efreet to live.

Starting from Planar Binding already solves this, due to "unreasonable commands." That's why we went to gate/candle in the first place.

How is "give me a Candle of Invocation, which I will use to gate in a Noble Djinn (who you hate, and also grant wishes), and I will make two wishes of your choice" an "unreasonable command"?

[eggynack]

Starting from Planar Binding already solves this, due to "unreasonable commands." That's why we went to gate/candle in the first place.

I disagree with the notion that taking from a creature what it can't even use on itself, and which it seems to give naturally, is at all unreasonable. I think it's unreasonable to consider it unreasonable. There's very little you could plausibly ask of a creature that would be less unreasonable.

As above, the efreet itself isn't the problem, and he'd be smart enough not to come at you head-on if you've just used his wishes to power yourself up.

Do efreeti really have some weird organization established? That's weird.

Compensating it isn't the problem - they are cruel and hate servitude. Even if you offer payment, any form of calling or binding, as well as forbidding it from misleading you or screwing your wish in some way, is just going to breed resentment.

I guess. Doesn't seem like such a big deal, servitude-wise. It's like a few rounds.

[Graypairofsocks]

People, stopping the Efreet trick doesn't matter. There are other (arguably better) ways to get a wish that doesn't cost XP. Your Mirror Mephit familiar could use it's simulacrum SLA to make an Efreet simulacrum without needing any actual Efreet. You could use shapechange, potentially out of a scroll, to turn into a Zodar and get a supernatural wish. People talk about the planar binding trick because it is simple and core.

You can pull this off at 5th level (rather than 7th) if you use Summon Mirror Mephit and Suggestion.

Note that there is a racial progression for efreeti in "Savage Species" and they get wish at their 9th Racial HD.
That is 4 levels after the HD of a Simulacrum of an average efreeti (10 HD of the base creature is halved and becomes 5 HD).
So you may have to find a work around for it.

[Beheld]

Starting from Planar Binding already solves this, due to "unreasonable commands." That's why we went to gate/candle in the first place.

Except for that whole thing where it is completely unreasonable for him to refuse to grant you a Wish, because his actual choices are literal death (and being devoured by a Barghest) or Imprisonment, or, in the alternative, the super terrible "unreasonable" granting of a wish, and then getting two for himself.

Something so unreasonable that apparently he goes and does it three times as soon as he can to the nearest stranger as part of an incredibly dumb plan to thwart you.

Damn, now I know why the Wish and Word use Steal SLA, because people are so unfathomably filled with spite that they will make literally the dumbest possible thing as an excuse to explain why CR 8 monsters that exist for the express purpose of granting wishes never grant wishes.

[Psyren]

How is "give me a Candle of Invocation, which I will use to gate in a Noble Djinn (who you hate, and also grant wishes), and I will make two wishes of your choice" an "unreasonable command"?

It's unreasonable because you're an uppity mortal who has the temerity to even speak to them, never mind the fact that you forcibly yanked them away from whatever they were doing too. Their second wish is going to be to undo yours, if you're lucky. Also, you appear to be wishing for custom magic items, which is another justification for "unreasonable."

And you're right, they absolutely hate djinn, so why would they want to participate in any scheme involving one?

Do efreeti really have some weird organization established? That's weird.

Hey, don't look at me, I didn't write the Monster Manual.

[Cosi]

It's unreasonable because you're an uppity mortal who has the temerity to even speak to them, never mind the fact that you forcibly yanked them away from whatever they were doing too. Their second wish is going to be to undo yours, if you're lucky. Also, you appear to be wishing for custom magic items, which is another justification for "unreasonable."

And you're right, they absolutely hate djinn, so why would they want to participate in any scheme involving one?

Oh, so binding an Efreet and asking it to do anything at all is unreasonable. Sure.

And again, it doesn't matter, because you could just buy a scroll of shapechange and turn into a Zodar for your XP free wish.

[squiggit]

I feel like the best solution in an actual game is to just talk to your players ahead of time and have everyone agree not to be a ****, because that's ultimately the only real way to keep things balanced and fair.

Many of the 'solutions' in this thread (like declaring that gate doesn't do anything at all because every request is unreasonable, or that every efreet you gate has already used all their wishes or that random NPCs should show up and blow up the players) are just the sort of things that create animosity and eventually culminate in someone posting about you in a "horrible DM" thread.

It encourages cycles where players exploit something and a DM hamfistedly smashes it down which just encourages players to find something else to exploit as a counter-offensive and so on and so forth and while some people enjoy those sorts of arms races I don't think that's always necessarily the goal and if it isn't, approaching the problem like this is just awful and dumb and doesn't satisfy anyone.

[Psyren]

Oh, so binding an Efreet and asking it to do anything at all is unreasonable. Sure.

And again, it doesn't matter, because you could just buy a scroll of shapechange and turn into a Zodar for your XP free wish.

Asking it to go against its fundamental nature to screw over and mislead mortals would be, indeed.

Zodar are 3.0, so they require "minor adjustments" by your DM to be used in 3.5. One such minor adjustment would be replacing a single letter ("u") in their wish ability (with"p"), thereby making it inaccessible via Shapechange.

[Beheld]

Asking it to go against its fundamental nature to screw over and mislead mortals would be, indeed.

Zodar are 3.0, so they require "minor adjustments" by your DM to be used in 3.5. One such minor adjustment would be replacing a single letter ("u") in their wish ability (with"p"), thereby making it inaccessible via Shapechange.

It's like you are in a one person competition to prove you can be the most unreasonable person in the world. Congratulations, you are winning.

I bet Casting Planar Binding on a Glabrezu at all is per se unreasonable becaouse are unreasonably preventing it from murdering people that very second, and it's nature is to murder people every second of every day.

[eggynack]

It's unreasonable because you're an uppity mortal who has the temerity to even speak to them, never mind the fact that you forcibly yanked them away from whatever they were doing too. Their second wish is going to be to undo yours, if you're lucky. Also, you appear to be wishing for custom magic items, which is another justification for "unreasonable."

It doesn't seem like the modifier is creature-centric, but rather request-centric. Either the request is reasonable or it isn't. If it isn't, then it doesn't matter who you are. And here, your claim isn't that you're making a request that isn't reasonable, but that you're making a claim that the efreet doesn't want to fulfill. As for the custom magic items, first, it's not a strictly necessary thing if you know the item that does the job, and there exists an item that does the job, and I don't see why it's any skin off the efreet's nose that my item is custom. It's a really minimal amount of effort, all in all.

Hey, don't look at me, I didn't write the Monster Manual.

Well, they apparently kinda hang out in the same place, but I don't see much implication that they team up for that sorta thing. Sure, the efreet might be peeved that you made it serve you, but I don't see why other efreeti would be peeved on its behalf.

[Cosi]

Asking it to go against its fundamental nature to screw over and mislead mortals would be, indeed.

Yes, because offering to let it screw over people it hates for the "price" of letting it use wish twice is absolutely something it is going to reject because it hates mortals. That's totally not an ex post facto justification for pretending XP free wish is balanced.

Zodar are 3.0, so they require "minor adjustments" by your DM to be used in 3.5. One such minor adjustment would be replacing a single letter ("u") in their wish ability (with"p"), thereby making it inaccessible via Shapechange.

Oberoni Fallacy. The DM is changing the rules such that they are not broken, implying that they were broken to begin with. Also, it is 100% clear that the "change minor things" text was supposed to apply to errors where mechanical stuff changed between editions (i.e. size rules changing), not allow DMs to unilaterally rewrite stat blocks. Are we meant to believe that all monsters from 3.0 books are horribly under-CRed because the DM could change them to be CR 1/8? Finally, there is a 3.0 -> 3.5 update for Fiend Folio. Guess what it doesn't change?

And don't forget Mirror Mephits, simulacrum, ice assassin, Planar Shepard Outsider Wild Shape, Supernatural Spell, Archmage SLA + Supernatural Transformation, and dominate monster. All of which give you XP free wish.

[Graypairofsocks]

It's unreasonable because you're an uppity mortal who has the temerity to even speak to them, never mind the fact that you forcibly yanked them away from whatever they were doing too. Their second wish is going to be to undo yours, if you're lucky. Also, you appear to be wishing for custom magic items, which is another justification for "unreasonable."

And you're right, they absolutely hate djinn, so why would they want to participate in any scheme involving one?

What if you got them their wishes first?

Dumb bonus question:
What if you just gave them all three wishes?

[Beheld]

Bonus Bonus Dumb Bonus question:

I create a fake rivalry with some *******, and then he Planar Binds an Efferti, how many free wishes does the Efferti give me because he just hates that guy so much?

[TiaC]

So, I gate an efreeti and get a Ring of Infinite Wishes. Since it now hates me and desires vengeance, I order it not to resist and then I wish for some spell that will knock it unconscious, then for a Modify Memory, then for a few scrolls of Unname and proceed to remove it entirely from existence.

[yellowrocket]

The reason no one else is suggesting "have OP NPCs smack the PCs around" is because it is a stupid and terrible solution. Also, while it is in fact impossible for the DM to lose an arms race with the PCs, that does not mean that threatening one causes them to deescalate their power. If you don't want PCs to abuse wish, don't pretend it's allowed then go "rocks fall, everyone dies" when they try it. Just ban it and be done.

I'm nor suggesting that you dump the book on them, but they have changed the fundamental operation of the game. If you remove the XP cost for wish the material plane is going to change and you have accessed power way beyond what a mortal should have. So you change the challenges they face. Let's face it, any cr 11-15 isn't going to challenge someone with a ring of unlimited wishes. And that power would eventually come to the attention of beings with the power to challenge you. You can give them any power their heart desires, but where is it out of line to respond with an appropriate level challenge to their increase in power.?

[Segev]

I know that I, personally, tend to extend - and I admit that this may be a "house rule" - the 25,000 gp limit to magic items as well as mundane ones, which eliminates a lot of the "safe" wishes for stupid infinity-plus-two items.

I'm also inclined to re-price Candles of Invocation to have the XP cost for the gate spell they can cast properly incorporated into their market price, or to strip that function from them.

It doesn't close every loophole, but these seem reasonable (to me), seem to address the worst of the broken bits involved in these infinite-resource loops, and don't require a lot of re-thinking chain-reaction consequences based on said changes.

(Obviously, this doesn't even touch the shapechange-into-a-Zodar problem.)

[daremetoidareyo]

I'm nor suggesting that you dump the book on them, but they have changed the fundamental operation of the game. If you remove the XP cost for wish the material plane is going to change and you have accessed power way beyond what a mortal should have. So you change the challenges they face. Let's face it, any cr 11-15 isn't going to challenge someone with a ring of unlimited wishes. And that power would eventually come to the attention of beings with the power to challenge you. You can give them any power their heart desires, but where is it out of line to respond with an appropriate level challenge to their increase in power.?

No, but I'm right!

[Psyren]

It doesn't seem like the modifier is creature-centric, but rather request-centric. Either the request is reasonable or it isn't. If it isn't, then it doesn't matter who you are.

That's exactly right. And "give me a wish for something that doesn't exist which can't be used to screw with me after having bound you into subservience" seems to be the request here.

Well, they apparently kinda hang out in the same place, but I don't see much implication that they team up for that sorta thing. Sure, the efreet might be peeved that you made it serve you, but I don't see why other efreeti would be peeved on its behalf.

The 6 pasha, who are themselves cruel beings who delight in misleading mortals (because, efreet) "oversee all their dealings," so whether the individual efreeti you've bound is able or even willing to retaliate may not be relevant. (This also addresses latter posts that suggest murdering the efreeti after getting what you want.)

Yes, because offering to let it screw over people it hates for the "price" of letting it use wish twice is absolutely something it is going to reject because it hates mortals. That's totally not an ex post facto justification for pretending XP free wish is balanced.

I actually agree with you - I don't think it's balanced at all, which is why I'm pointing out the textual safeguards the designers put in place to prevent that very thing. If they had wanted to write "efreet delight in granting straightforward and beneficial wishes to any mortal with the ability to bind them" they could have easily done so. They didn't.

Oberoni Fallacy. The DM is changing the rules such that they are not broken, implying that they were broken to begin with. Also, it is 100% clear that the "change minor things" text was supposed to apply to errors where mechanical stuff changed between editions (i.e. size rules changing), not allow DMs to unilaterally rewrite stat blocks. Are we meant to believe that all monsters from 3.0 books are horribly under-CRed because the DM could change them to be CR 1/8? Finally, there is a 3.0 -> 3.5 update for Fiend Folio. Guess what it doesn't change?

The trouble with invoking the fallacy here is that the DM is mandated to make adjustments to 3.0 material, per the 3.5 DMG. Also, the Fiend Folio update starts with this sentence: "The purpose of this booklet is not to provide a comprehensive list of everything that has changed with the 3.5 revision. The changes are too large in number and varied in scope to be able to provide an all-inclusive inventory." So it is an inclusive update, not an exclusive one.

And don't forget Mirror Mephits, simulacrum, ice assassin, Planar Shepard Outsider Wild Shape, Supernatural Spell, Archmage SLA + Supernatural Transformation, and dominate monster. All of which give you XP free wish.

Every single one of these has been addressed in past discussions. Simulacrum has the "appropriate special abilities" clause. Ice Assassin has the "all-consuming" clause. Planar Shepherd is setting-specific, and the setting in question has more restrictive variant cosmology rules to boot. Supernatural Transformation specifies "innate", which PrCs are not since it's impossible for anyone to be born with them. Dominate Monster is even more likely to open you up to revenge. Et cetera.

[Fizban]

It's like you are in a one person competition to prove you can be the most unreasonable person in the world. Congratulations, you are winning.

Popped in to check on the last page of the thread on a whim: I'd just like to point out that Psyren is not alone. He simply has the patience to continue while I dropped the thread on page 1.

All I'm seeing here is a pile of false dichotomies and the continued assumption that somehow yanking someone out of their home and demanding they do what you say under pain of death is somehow reasonable, which Eggy has excused on the grounds that an Efreet can't use their innate wish ability on themselves and they should be happy for the privilege? I can't remember the exact term, but there's a legal definition that states no one is allowed to mess with your body without your permission. Doesn't matter if you can spare the blood that will save that guy's life, it is 100% against the law to try and take it from you (at least around here). There's also these things called property rights? Where it doesn't matter if I have no idea how to use this thing I bought, because it's mine, and your putting a gun to my head and demanding I sell it to you because I can't use it is also rather against the law. Yanking someone out of their home and holding them prisoner would be kidnapping and false imprisonment. And so on.

There's a continuum of shades of reasonable-ness, and every single one of them stops dead once you start threatening life or demanding something for free. Just because you "offer" to "let" the efreet use some of the wishes they already own does not make it reasonable. Reasonable would be offering to pay the standard book price for your wish, with an apology for interrupting their day. You can argue all you want about weather or not the rules prohibit this or that, but you can't escape the fact that you're the ones being unreasonable.

I'd also point out that any sort of loop or mass extortion is going to rather quickly garner the attention of the majority of the population, who happen to live in a city with a ruler an everything. They tend to be Lawful, they don't like being messed with, and you (all applicable) have the gall to claim they'll refuse to work together to kill you? The City of Brass has 200,000 efreet who have been alive much longer than your supposedly genius spellcaster. Oh you've discovered this loophole through experimentation? Before the creatures who have it as a natural ability discovered it and set their own plans to counter it? Hey, here's a reasonable offer: how about every single efreet in the city of dis offers one of their slaves two wishes that last up to a day, in exchange for their third wish being "kill the uppity wizard?" Rather, a distributed series of forced transports and attacks designed to strip any and all possible protections, executed near simultaneously with redundancies and in such high volume it's flat impossible to resist unless you're literally immune to wish. And they know as soon as or even before it happens because several of the efreet in leadership positions have slaves who have wished to be informed as soon as some uppity wizard calls up two efreet in a span of less than a year. Or millenium. Except all of that is DM construct which is somehow invalid when your player construct of having figured out some unbeatable loophole isn't. But it's Psyren who's being unreasonable

[Psyren]

It's a very familiar dance for me Fizban, so no worries, but I definitely appreciate the support

[Cosi]

@"But X group will be super pissed off": Can someone explain why I am supposed to care about the reprisals of people with finite power when I have infinite (arbitrarily large) power?

I know that I, personally, tend to extend - and I admit that this may be a "house rule" - the 25,000 gp limit to magic items as well as mundane ones, which eliminates a lot of the "safe" wishes for stupid infinity-plus-two items.

That fixes the problem. If wish can only produce items up to a certain power ceiling, it is simply another wealth trick. And while that is broken, other things (wall of iron, flesh to salt, ladders, and having a job) are broken in the exact same way, so that's a problem which already needed fixing. wish is even the least broken instance of that, because as a 9th level spell it becomes available after every other trick.

It does leave Chain Binding to be dealt with, but that planar binding is broken even if you just use all your spell slots, so wish makes a quantitative rather than qualitative difference there.

(Obviously, this doesn't even touch the shapechange-into-a-Zodar problem.)

It stops the wish abuse bit, which is the relevant part for this thread. There are other problems with Zodar shapechange (for example, turning into a Zodar gives you immunity to non-bludgeoning damage, which you keep when turning into a Ocean Giant gives you immunity to bludgeoning damage), but those are shapechange problems, not wish problems.

That's exactly right. And "give me a wish for something that doesn't exist which can't be used to screw with me after having bound you into subservience" seems to be the request here.

You mean a Candle of Invocation which both exists and can't be used to screw with him? Because that is the plan that is apparently super unreasonable.

I actually agree with you - I don't think it's balanced at all, which is why I'm pointing out the textual safeguards the designers put in place to prevent that very thing. If they had wanted to write "efreet delight in granting straightforward and beneficial wishes to any mortal with the ability to bind them" they could have easily done so. They didn't.

That's a load of bull. If the designers didn't want this wish abuse to happen, they would have left the text from 3.0 wish that 100% prevents this type of abuse, not included a line that maybe sort of implies that Efreet don't grant wishes at all if you look at it funny.

The trouble with invoking the fallacy here is that the DM is mandated to make adjustments to 3.0 material, per the 3.5 DMG.

First of all, to even apply that text you have to assume that "minor adjustments" means "change something that works in the rules of either edition" rather than "change something that doesn't work in 3.5", a claim for which you have presented zero evidence.

Secondly, that's still Oberoni. Even if the DM is mandated to make "changes", that doesn't imply that he's mandated to make this specific change (if he was, it would have been included in the 3.0 -> 3.5 update). As such, the game is broken barring this specific DM action. So, Oberoni.

Third, claiming that 3.0 content plus minor adjustments is balanced is an obviously bad plan. Again, are all 3.0 monsters broken because it's a "minor adjustment" to change their CR to 1/8? Here's a fun game for people watching at home: find the best ratio of "game breaking power" to "characters changed" in 3.0 content. Think all 9th level 3.0 spells are clearly supposed to be 0th level? That's exactly as legitimate as Psyren's claim. Obviously, hide life is really a cantrip!

Simulacrum has the "appropriate special abilities" clause.

Actually, this one is correct. Not because the DM gets to unilaterally declare that a 5HD Efreet doesn't have wish (as Psyren was implying)*, but because there's an Efreet advancement table in Savage Species which gives them wish at their 9th HD. This trick still works for creatures with wish but no explicit advancement table, such as the Pit Fiend or the Zodar, but it does not, as I have implied, work for the Efreet.

I was mistaken, and I apologize for misleading people.

*: This would be Oberoni again.

Ice Assassin has the "all-consuming" clause.

It also has an "under your absolute command" clause. But you know, clearly absolute control is obviously supposed to imply "unless you try to make it do something Psyren thinks is broken".

Planar Shepherd is setting-specific, and the setting in question has more restrictive variant cosmology rules to boot.

Which still include Efreet. Perhaps you didn't bother to read that bit? Here's the text (emphasis added, note that Pit Fiends also have wish at no XP cost):

Fernia Inhabitants: Azer, balor (demon), pit fiend (devil), fire elemental (all), efreeti (genie), hell hound, magmin, fire mephit, magma mephit, steam mephit, rast, salamander (all)

Eberron claims that "if it exists in D&D, it has a place in Eberron, but this is proof positive you can get Efreet from Planar Shepherd.

Or maybe maybe you never read the text of Planar Shepherd? I've quote the relevant portion here:

When you attain 9th level, you become able to use wild shape to change into an elemental or outsider native to your chosen plane. ... In addition to the normal effects of wild shape, you gain all the elemental or outsider's extraordinary, supernatural, and spell-like abilities

That seems fairly unambiguous. Obviously, you can claim that's not allowed in the default setting, but that seems like a weak claim. After all, if you're banning it because it's broken, that's just you admitting it's broken.

Supernatural Transformation specifies "innate", which PrCs are not since it's impossible for anyone to be born with them.

That is one definition of innate. Others include "natural" (which I would submit that, as classes rather than items, PrCs are), "inherent", or "intrinsic". Can you point to a page where D&D defines "innate" as meaning "inborn" rather than one of the above definitions?

Dominate Monster is even more likely to open you up to revenge. Et cetera.

Because you are obviously going to leave it alive after dominating it (or for that matter, ever allow dominate monster to expire).

Also, you forgot Supernatural Spell, available to Dweomerkeepers everywhere.

[Segev]

All I'm seeing here is a pile of false dichotomies and the continued assumption that somehow yanking someone out of their home and demanding they do what you say under pain of death is somehow reasonable

That's an argument that makes planar binding literally never work. Planar binding cannot make them agree to "unreasonable demands." If the very casting of planar binding - which "[yanks] someone out of their home" so you can "[demand] they do whatever you say under pain of" some threat (death, imprisonment, pain, etc.) makes the request itself unreasonable, then planar binding literally never works to get you the service it spends a lot of text discussing the negotiation of.

A request can be reasonable even if the means used to make it are not. "Please prepare a delicious lunch for me to eat," is a reasonable request (especially on the scale of services planar binding is usually used to secure). You can just ask somebody you meet to do this, or you could kidnap them and drag them, blindfolded, to your secret underground kitchen and then make that request. The reasonableness of the request itself is unchanged.

In fact, the incentive to agree to it has increased: you've proven that you're willing and able to put this person under your power and imprison them in a location of your choosing; the fact that you're clearly not letting them go until they make for you that tasty meal is going to make the reasonableness of the request compared to the unreasonableness of the alternative strongly encourage them to just comply so they can go the heck home.

[Quertus]

I also love the question of what knowledge about items should the characters have. Although I approach it a bit differently.

Back before MIC came out, you ask a DM for an item that gave you an extra full round action, and you were in custom item territory. You'd get responses varying from, "not at my table" to "that would be an epic item, if it even exists". Now, with the printing of the belt of battle, we have that item - which gives a bonus to initiative to boot - for less than the cost of boots of speed. How do characters who "grew up" pre-MIC know about these "new" items?

IMO, unless your character grew up under a rock, he's already been exposed to all these items. Children play childhood games of, "if I had a candle of invocation, I would use it to..." instead of, "if I had superman's powers, I would..."

but I am not sure if a ring of infinite wishes could exist.

It does. I've made one. Well, 3, really. Moving on.

Starting from Planar Binding already solves this, due to "unreasonable commands." That's why we went to gate/candle in the first place.

I have a deal here on the table: Grant me the wish I have detailed here, under the stipulations I have detailed here, or the barghest eats you. Using planar binding, I command you to choose that the barghest eats you.

I'm pretty sure that would be unreasonable, so the Efreet would agree to the deal.

I know that I, personally, tend to extend - and I admit that this may be a "house rule" - the 25,000 gp limit to magic items as well as mundane ones, which eliminates a lot of the "safe" wishes for stupid infinity-plus-two items.

I'm also inclined to re-price Candles of Invocation to have the XP cost for the gate spell they can cast properly incorporated into their market price, or to strip that function from them.

It doesn't close every loophole, but these seem reasonable (to me), seem to address the worst of the broken bits involved in these infinite-resource loops, and don't require a lot of re-thinking chain-reaction consequences based on said changes.

This is, IMO, the best answer to the problem.

[Cosi]

I just had a thought. The Efreet advancement rules in Savage Species imply that you can't get a wish out of a 5HD Efreet (such as one made by simulacrum). But they also imply that you can just play as an Efreet. So the whole issue of "would a random Efreet do this for you" is moot, because you can be that random Efreet and have your cohort ask you to do it for yourself.

[Psyren]

That's an argument that makes planar binding literally never work. Planar binding cannot make them agree to "unreasonable demands." If the very casting of planar binding - which "[yanks] someone out of their home" so you can "[demand] they do whatever you say under pain of" some threat (death, imprisonment, pain, etc.) makes the request itself unreasonable, then planar binding literally never works to get you the service it spends a lot of text discussing the negotiation of.

Actually, I'd say it's unique to efreet, which explicitly have a "hatred of servitude." So yes, any form of binding/gating would be especially unpalatable. Going to one without a spell giving you the upper hand and prostrating yourself might work, but of course us optimization folk hate that because it gives us no leverage in the negotiations.

@Cosi:

Spoiler

Show

You mean a Candle of Invocation which both exists and can't be used to screw with him? Because that is the plan that is apparently super unreasonable.

I was actually referring to your "Cosi's Belt of +10,000 to everything" as a non-existent item.

That's a load of bull. If the designers didn't want this wish abuse to happen, they would have left the text from 3.0 wish that 100% prevents this type of abuse, not included a line that maybe sort of implies that Efreet don't grant wishes at all if you look at it funny.

Of course they do grant wishes - the PC just has to not be lazy and go find one, and offer market price or something equally valuable, instead of forcing them into servitude (which they explicitly hate.)

First of all, to even apply that text you have to assume that "minor adjustments" means "change something that works in the rules of either edition" rather than "change something that doesn't work in 3.5", a claim for which you have presented zero evidence.

Secondly, that's still Oberoni. Even if the DM is mandated to make "changes", that doesn't imply that he's mandated to make this specific change (if he was, it would have been included in the 3.0 -> 3.5 update). As such, the game is broken barring this specific DM action. So, Oberoni.

Third, claiming that 3.0 content plus minor adjustments is balanced is an obviously bad plan. Again, are all 3.0 monsters broken because it's a "minor adjustment" to change their CR to 1/8? Here's a fun game for people watching at home: find the best ratio of "game breaking power" to "characters changed" in 3.0 content. Think all 9th level 3.0 spells are clearly supposed to be 0th level? That's exactly as legitimate as Psyren's claim. Obviously, hide life is really a cantrip!

I'm comfortable calling a substitution of one letter in a whole statblock "minor." At no point did I call it balanced however, so I'm not sure where that's coming from.

It also has an "under your absolute command" clause. But you know, clearly absolute control is obviously supposed to imply "unless you try to make it do something Psyren thinks is broken".

It's an Unstoppable-Force-Immovable-Object problem, that's all. It's purpose is killing the original, not lollygagging to create belts.

Which still include Efreet. Perhaps you didn't bother to read that bit? Here's the text (emphasis added, note that Pit Fiends also have wish at no XP cost):



Eberron claims that "if it exists in D&D, it has a place in Eberron, but this is proof positive you can get Efreet from Planar Shepherd.

Or maybe maybe you never read the text of Planar Shepherd? I've quote the relevant portion here:



That seems fairly unambiguous. Obviously, you can claim that's not allowed in the default setting, but that seems like a weak claim. After all, if you're banning it because it's broken, that's just you admitting it's broken.

"D&D stuff belongs in Eberron" does not imply the reverse though. I'm not saying Planar Shepherd -> Efreet doesn't work (it does), I'm saying that you would need DM approval to use it in a non-Eberron campaign, or even in an Eberron campaign where you aren't a member of their order.

That is one definition of innate. Others include "natural" (which I would submit that, as classes rather than items, PrCs are), "inherent", or "intrinsic". Can you point to a page where D&D defines "innate" as meaning "inborn" rather than one of the above definitions?

That's exactly my point - D&D doesn't define it, therefore you need a favorable ruling from your DM instead. Optimization discussions generally don't assume there is a friendly DM you can beg for favors.

Because you are obviously going to leave it alive after dominating it (or for that matter, ever allow dominate monster to expire).

I'm sure their monitoring Pasha will just love mortals pulling that kind of five-finger discount

Also, you forgot Supernatural Spell, available to Dweomerkeepers everywhere.

Technically you forgot it, as I was just responding to what you had listed

This is indeed correct - by the time you have Su Wish from that though, you're so high level (17-18 minimum) that it's hardly as abusive as the candle or PB, which are the subjects of the thread. So, "Dweomerkeeper exists, therefore we might as well allow candle-wishing" rings hollow to me.

I have a deal here on the table: Grant me the wish I have detailed here, under the stipulations I have detailed here, or the barghest eats you. Using planar binding, I command you to choose that the barghest eats you.

I'm pretty sure that would be unreasonable, so the Efreet would agree to the deal.

Why would rejecting A force it to choose B instead? It could (and almost certainly would) find the entire dichotomy unreasonable.

[Cosi]

I was actually referring to your "Cosi's Belt of +10,000 to everything" as a non-existent item.

You seem confused. Also to have not read the things people said. At no point are you asking something with the option to disobey you for custom (not "non-existent", stop being disingenuous) items. You are asking an Efreet for one wish (used to get a Candle to summon a Noble Djinn) in exchange for two wishes.

I'm comfortable calling a substitution of one letter in a whole statblock "minor." At no point did I call it balanced however, so I'm not sure where that's coming from.

If you're going to endorse something as a solution to a balance problem, it should probably not create worse balance problems. Super good job responding to the other points.

It's an Unstoppable-Force-Immovable-Object problem, that's all. It's purpose is killing the original, not lollygagging to create belts.

WTF is at all ambiguous about "absolute control"?

"D&D stuff belongs in Eberron" does not imply the reverse though. I'm not saying Planar Shepherd -> Efreet doesn't work (it does), I'm saying that you would need DM approval to use it in a non-Eberron campaign, or even in an Eberron campaign where you aren't a member of their order.

At what point did I claim that? You need to stop strawmanning people.

That's exactly my point - D&D doesn't define it, therefore you need a favorable ruling from your DM instead. Optimization discussions generally don't assume there is a friendly DM you can beg for favors.

Optimization also doesn't assume the DM redefines words so your tricks don't work.

Technically you forgot it, as I was just responding to what you had listed

And don't forget Mirror Mephits, simulacrum, ice assassin, Planar Shepard Outsider Wild Shape, Supernatural Spell, Archmage SLA + Supernatural Transformation, and dominate monster. All of which give you XP free wish.

Stop lying.

This is indeed correct - by the time you have Su Wish from that though, you're so high level (17-18 minimum) that it's hardly as abusive as the candle or PB, which are the subjects of the thread. So, "Dweomerkeeper exists, therefore we might as well allow candle-wishing" rings hollow to me.

That's stupid. The power you are supposed to have at 17th is "9th level spells", not "infinite power"

Also, exactly zero people are saying we should allow Candle abuse. What's the strawman count in this post? Three? Four?

[eggynack]

Actually, I'd say it's unique to efreet, which explicitly have a "hatred of servitude." So yes, any form of binding/gating would be especially unpalatable. Going to one without a spell giving you the upper hand and prostrating yourself might work, but of course us optimization folk hate that because it gives us no leverage in the negotiations.

I agree that it'd be unpalatable. I just don't think it'd be unreasonable. Those aren't the same thing.