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    OldWizardGuy

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    Default Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

    From Oriental Adventures, p.141 (as far as I know it hasn't been updated to 3.5).

    For comparison:

    16 potions of CSW, heal 296HPs average, cost 12,000GP vs Mirror of Curing, heals 1100HPs plus status conditions, 11,800GP

    You could get 10 scrolls of Heal for 16,500GP, but you need divine spellcaster levels or a high UMD score to use those reliably. Generally items which are usable by anybody, such as potions, cost double items like scrolls which require caster levels, so our default price for the Mirror of Curing would seem to be 33,000GP.

    I know that often one big item is cheaper than lots of little ones, and also the Mirror has the disadvantage that it's, well, a mirror, and quite a large one at that, so it's not practical to use in combat and would probably require a type I Bag of Holding all of its own to carry it around without breaking it, but even so a nearly 2/3 reduction in the price seems quite generous.

    What price seems fair to you?

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    Default Re: Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

    Seeing as it's a non-combat item that cannot be easily transported and as far as I know could be broken forever using a small rock or even just a single nat 1 in it's vicinity...I don't really see it as all that useful, I'd rather get something portable and not made of glass, even at triple that price

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    Default Re: Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

    Ya it seems like a fairly risky item. Out of combat healing is still better done via wands of lesser vigor or similar cheap items. In combat healing is nice but still probably not worth 11k for something you need to spend a standard action on.

    Also in combat healing has another issue. Enemies can use it. They will hear an ally shout out the command word and then they can issue the command word themselves. Nothing in that item states it only works for set creatures.
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    Question Re: Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

    I was unaware of this item...nice.

    When the command word is spoken, any creature viewing the mirror receives the benefit of a heal spell.

    Probably not RAI, but could multiple creatures, each viewing their reflection, get the benefits of the same activation?

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    Default Re: Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

    Quote Originally Posted by Thurbane View Post
    I was unaware of this item...nice.




    Probably not RAI, but could multiple creatures, each viewing their reflection, get the benefits of the same activation?


    I guess yes, due to the way it's worded. Any creature. And they don't have to view their reflection. Literally just look at the mirror itself. No limit on how many creatures, and it only takes 1 charge from the mirror per activation, not per creature healed:


    When the command word is spoken, any creature viewing the mirror receives the benefit of a heal spell. This requires the use of 1 charge; the mirror has 10 charges when created.

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    Default Re: Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

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    Default Re: Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

    Quote Originally Posted by jintoya View Post
    Seeing as it's a non-combat item that cannot be easily transported and as far as I know could be broken forever using a small rock or even just a single nat 1 in it's vicinity...I don't really see it as all that useful, I'd rather get something portable and not made of glass, even at triple that price
    Quote Originally Posted by Silva Stormrage View Post
    Ya it seems like a fairly risky item. Out of combat healing is still better done via wands of lesser vigor or similar cheap items. In combat healing is nice but still probably not worth 11k for something you need to spend a standard action on.

    Also in combat healing has another issue. Enemies can use it. They will hear an ally shout out the command word and then they can issue the command word themselves. Nothing in that item states it only works for set creatures.
    Hmm, I think you're right, it's only really useful in fairly specific circumstances, so the price tag is probably fair.

    Quote Originally Posted by Thurbane View Post
    Probably not RAI, but could multiple creatures, each viewing their reflection, get the benefits of the same activation?
    I was wondering that, by RAW it's effectively a Mass Heal, the only difference being that as it's CL11 it only heals 110HPs per person in 3.5.
    Last edited by Biggus; 2019-05-18 at 07:39 AM.

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    Default Re: Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

    Quote Originally Posted by Thurbane View Post
    Probably not RAI, but could multiple creatures, each viewing their reflection, get the benefits of the same activation?
    A small rule of thumb is if the object any denotes about is singular, it means a single indiscriminately chosen one. While if it is plural then it doesn't reference an amount. Think of usages like any car vs any vehicles, anyone vs any people, any twenty dollar bill vs any cash, any man vs any men, and so on. There are some exceptions of course, English is a terrible language after all and there are people that try to base their arguments off misconceptions, but it's not very tasteful to use them.

    Also the mirror only heals 1,500hp for 11,800gp, about 8 gold per point, a wand of lesser vigor is several times more efficient. It's additive effect of curing multiple conditions is nice. But dazed, dazzled, nauseated, sickened, stunned, and most confusion & feebleminded effects are sort acting. Fatigued & exhausted can be cured for free and using aid other and heal checks most diseases last less than ten minutes. And it's not like pointing a blind creature's useless eyes at the mirror is the same as looking either and heal doesn't treat any form of energy or ability drain. The short list of what it helps is basically ability damage. But for 6,200gp (a rod of bodily restoration & an orb of mental renewal) you can heal up to 24 points of ability damage each and every day. I think I'd rather have those, and seven wands of lesser vigor, and then try to haggle down the price of a unique drow house insignia (360gp, casts a cl5 1st lvl spell 1/day, let's aim for a paladin's lesser restoration!) to spend the remaining 350gp on. And then my character won't have to carry, or in invest in the protection of, a very breakable mirror either.
    Last edited by Mato; 2019-05-18 at 08:54 AM.

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    Default Re: Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

    Quote Originally Posted by Thurbane View Post
    I was unaware of this item...nice.




    Probably not RAI, but could multiple creatures, each viewing their reflection, get the benefits of the same activation?
    It actually depends how you handle the grammar. Is the person viewing the reflection the one speaking the command word or not? It's hard to tell from context. And if you say "I don't ever have to pay attention to context, only what each individual portion of each sentence says", the entirety of the rules falls apart. And that's not how reading English works either. You can make anyone say almost anything with an out of context quote. And you already know the answer to "What does the context say" any time you figure out "RAI" simply with the surrounding words. From what you said you already know it probably isn't truly what the rules say. This is only RAW if we count silly literal and out of context RAW. At best it's "RAW is unclear and I can't tell what it's saying, probably this, small chance of that."

    Another one of those many cases where RAW doesn't actually exist, and you need to use selective interpretation and ignore context to make it work. i.e., interpret just enough to keep the rules functional, but ignore other interpretation like context. Who is speaking the command word? The person viewing or no?

    Heck why does the literalism have to stop where you set it? Why doesn't it activate when anyone in the world or any of the infinitely sized planes speaks the command word at any distance? What about random inaudible throat noises besides what you are saying audibly. Like when you amplify background noise in a recording, or speed up and/or slow it down to find random words? Can sounds be similar enough to the command word to count as the same word, like that internet cat that says "Johnson"? Or what about any of the infinite creatures in various infinitely sized planes accidentally activating it while saying gibberish to a baby? Wait, what counts as similar enough? Does it have to be a machine-precise recording, such that no one every pronounces a command word right and no magic item is ever activated?

    Now I'm really curious if there's a rule that puts a range limit on command word items or if they need to be in your possession when you speak the word (though that would defeat the mirror). Because if there's not, every time you're over literal with RAW, the cats of the multiverse activate all your magic items.
    Last edited by ericgrau; 2019-05-18 at 10:18 AM.
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    Default Re: Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

    Quote Originally Posted by Mato View Post
    A small rule of thumb is if the object any denotes about is singular, it means a single indiscriminately chosen one. While if it is plural then it doesn't reference an amount. Think of usages like any car vs any vehicles, anyone vs any people, any twenty dollar bill vs any cash, any man vs any men, and so on. There are some exceptions of course, English is a terrible language after all and there are people that try to base their arguments off misconceptions, but it's not very tasteful to use them.

    Also the mirror only heals 1,500hp for 11,800gp, about 8 gold per point, a wand of lesser vigor is several times more efficient. It's additive effect of curing multiple conditions is nice. But dazed, dazzled, nauseated, sickened, stunned, and most confusion & feebleminded effects are sort acting. Fatigued & exhausted can be cured for free and using aid other and heal checks most diseases last less than ten minutes. And it's not like pointing a blind creature's useless eyes at the mirror is the same as looking either and heal doesn't treat any form of energy or ability drain. The short list of what it helps is basically ability damage. But for 6,200gp (a rod of bodily restoration & an orb of mental renewal) you can heal up to 24 points of ability damage each and every day. I think I'd rather have those, and seven wands of lesser vigor, and then try to haggle down the price of a unique drow house insignia (360gp, casts a cl5 1st lvl spell 1/day, let's aim for a paladin's lesser restoration!) to spend the remaining 350gp on. And then my character won't have to carry, or in invest in the protection of, a very breakable mirror either.

    So you're attempting to say that (due to your questionable claim about English Grammar usage) when the command word is spoken, one randomly chosen viewer of the mirror gets the heal spell? That's not at all what it's saying, and it's a really disingenuous reading of the actual text of the item. That might be true if the sentence was structured 'any OF the creatures viewing the mirror' or some such, but it's a completely invalid reading of the text in the sentence in question. You'd have to be going out of your way to find the most restrictive possible meaning of the sentence to come up with it.


    Quote Originally Posted by ericgrau View Post
    It actually depends how you handle the grammar. Is the person viewing the reflection the one speaking the command word or not? It's hard to tell from context. And if you say "I don't ever have to pay attention to context, only what each individual portion of each sentence says", the entirety of the rules falls apart. And that's not how reading English works either. You can make anyone say almost anything with an out of context quote. And you already know the answer to "What does the context say" any time you figure out "RAI" simply with the surrounding words. From what you said you already know it probably isn't truly what the rules say. This is only RAW if we count silly literal and out of context RAW. At best it's "RAW is unclear and I can't tell what it's saying, probably this, small chance of that."

    Another one of those many cases where RAW doesn't actually exist, and you need to use selective interpretation and ignore context to make it work. i.e., interpret just enough to keep the rules functional, but ignore other interpretation like context. Who is speaking the command word? The person viewing or no?

    Heck why does the literalism have to stop where you set it? Why doesn't it activate when anyone in the world or any of the infinitely sized planes speaks the command word at any distance? What about random inaudible throat noises besides what you are saying audibly. Like when you amplify background noise in a recording, or speed up and/or slow it down to find random words? Can sounds be similar enough to the command word to count as the same word, like that internet cat that says "Johnson"? Or what about any of the infinite creatures in various infinitely sized planes accidentally activating it while saying gibberish to a baby? Wait, what counts as similar enough? Does it have to be a machine-precise recording, such that no one every pronounces a command word right and no magic item is ever activated?

    Now I'm really curious if there's a rule that puts a range limit on command word items or if they need to be in your possession when you speak the word (though that would defeat the mirror). Because if there's not, every time you're over literal with RAW, the cats of the multiverse activate all your magic items.
    What context? There's no context to take this out of? All the relevant parts have been quoted already, but lest you fear you're missing out on some clarifying detail, here ya go, in its entirety:

    Quote Originally Posted by Oriental Adventures pg 141
    Mirror of Curing: Looking like a normal mirror 5 feet tall by 2 feet wide, this item has special therapeutic properties. When the command word is spoken, any creature viewing the mirror receives the benefit of a heal spell. This requires the use of 1 charge; the mirror has 10 charges when created. When all charges are spent, the mirror shatters.
    Caster Level: 11th; Prerequisites: Craft Wondrous Item, heal; Market Price: 11,800 gp;Weight: 40 lb.

    As for whether there's a rule about the range of the command word, or who's allowed to use it and have it still work, I have no idea. But however that particular detail shakes out, the fact remains that when this mirror IS activated, any creature viewing it receives the benefit of a heal spell, and the whole activation only takes 1 charge from the mirror. And again, nobody has to see their reflection in it or anything so specific. They literally just have to "view the mirror." Just be looking at the mirror, from any side, when it's activated.

    As for the wider context of the category of magical healing items as a whole, it's been pointed out above that unless this 'mass heal' effect is used to multiply the number of people healed per charge, this is a very gp inefficient way to get healing. Couple that with the fact that it's large, fragile, and heavy, thus limiting one's ability to tote it around effectively, and I have no problem with this item being used as written. I'd even go so far as to claim that was the RAI. It's not dysfunctional, it's not a questionable reading of the text, it's not taken out of context or broken down into small parts. It's just taking the text of the item at face value, reading it in the most natural sense of the words and grammar.

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    Default Re: Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

    Quote Originally Posted by Drysdan View Post
    What context? There's no context to take this out of? All the relevant parts have been quoted already, but lest you fear you're missing out on some clarifying detail, here ya go, in its entirety:
    It's in regard to can you say the command word and have multiple people view it, or is the viewer the one saying the command word (and the only one affected). It's a little ambiguous if you force it to be ambiguous, but I think most readers knows what it really means. It's more about not being overly literal, which is really just using your own preferred meaning of words. Or if you're going to be overly literal and/or use your preferred meanings, then you better go with what Mato said and use "any" as a single viewer taken at random (or otherwise selected). On top of 10,000 other problems with other rules that will make every character you ever make nonfunctional, if you let them be literal too. You can't twist some words to have certain meanings that you inserted and pretend like "That's not my interpretation, that's what it says, that's RAW", but then complain about the same being done to other words when it's not to your favor.

    Or in other words accept that texts can have multiple meanings and there isn't a single "RAW". And the most likely meaning is the most sensible one, not the one you picked in the player's favor (nor the one Mato picked against the player's favor).
    Last edited by ericgrau; 2019-05-18 at 12:51 PM.
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    Default Re: Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

    Quote Originally Posted by ericgrau View Post
    It's in regard to can you say the command word and have multiple people view it, or is the viewer the one saying the command word (and the only one affected). It's a little ambiguous if you force it to be ambiguous, but I think most readers knows what it really means. It's more about not being overly literal, which is really just using your own preferred meaning of words. Or if you're going to be overly literal and/or use your preferred meanings, then you better go with what Mato said and use "any" as a single viewer taken at random (or otherwise selected). On top of 10,000 other problems with other rules that will make every character you ever make nonfunctional, if you let them be literal too. You can't twist some words to have certain meanings that you inserted and pretend like "That's not my interpretation, that's what it says, that's RAW", but then complain about the same being done to other words when it's not to your favor.

    Or in other words accept that texts can have multiple meanings and there isn't a single "RAW". And the most likely meaning is the most sensible one, not the one you picked in the player's favor (nor the one Mato picked against the player's favor).
    I admit they did a poor job of wording it. Just not that there's much wiggle room for what the actual words mean. I reject Mato's attempt to make 'any' a restrictive word. That's not what 'any' means, generally, and it's barely grammatically possible as a reading of "When the command word is spoken, any creature viewing the mirror receives the benefit of a heal spell."


    As for whether reading it to mean that all creatures who are viewing the mirror at the time of activation receive the benefit is the most natural, most likely meaning, try replacing the benefit clause with something more generic, and see how many limits there are on what 'any creature viewing the mirror' means:

    Any creature viewing the mirror knows what it looks like.
    Any creature viewing the mirror receives a feeling of warmth in their heart.
    Any creature viewing the mirror sees the truth that mirrors are fragile.
    Any creature viewing the mirror receives the benefit of deep personal insight.


    See? Reading it as not so restrictive is the natural meaning of the sentence in question. It doesn't really matter, grammatically, what the actual benefit is. That part of the sentence isn't relevant to how many people receive it.

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    Default Re: Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

    Quote Originally Posted by Drysdan View Post
    As for whether there's a rule about the range of the command word, or who's allowed to use it and have it still work, I have no idea.
    "You can not activate an item that you do not properly possess, hold, or wear. A rod or wand must be held in your hand , a cloak must be worn on your back, and soon. Some item s merely require tha t you carry them on your person but not specifically worn in a slot or carried in a hand (in a backpack, floating around your head , and so on)."MiC219

    I guess this is the part where you move into your second language debate in a row. So it's time to talk about how you personally think possession of the mirror includes standing it up in front of a crowd. - Even through none of the examples allow that - to try and make this thing work the way you it want it to.
    Last edited by Mato; 2019-05-18 at 02:13 PM.

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    Default Re: Mirror of Curing: underpriced?

    Quote Originally Posted by Mato View Post
    "You can not activate an item that you do not properly possess, hold, or wear. A rod or wand must be held in your hand , a cloak must be worn on your back, and soon. Some item s merely require tha t you carry them on your person but not specifically worn in a slot or carried in a hand (in a backpack, floating around your head , and so on)."MiC219

    I guess this is the part where you move into your second language debate in a row. So it's time to talk about how you personally think possession of the mirror includes standing it up in front of a crowd. - Even through none of the examples allow that - to try and make this thing work the way you it want it to.


    I'm not sure what you're getting at. Nothing in the item description says every person who's affected by it has to be activating it. There could be some debate about how, specifically, the activating character does so, but that's not in any way relevant to whether, once activated, the effect benefits multiple people. I haven't made any comments one way or the other about the method of activation. It's a command word, and perhaps you can put some restrictions on that, but your snarky comment about possession of the mirror misses most of the quote that you posted. There's words like 'hold' and 'merely require that you carry them' in there. So if you want to say that the one who's speaking the command word has to have it held in his hand, sure, go for it.

    That still has no effect on whether 'any creature viewing the mirror receives the benefit of a heal spell' means what it says.


    I'm not sure where your sense of how this should work comes from, nor why you feel the need to be snarky with me for reading it at face value, but the item entry absolutely has the authority to work the way it says it works, even if it's abnormal. That's how an exception based rule system works. General ->Specific->Exceptions. Just like it says in the Rules Compendium.

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