Fantasy Trip Illusions

[BrotherBill]

I play disbelief as a charm, a small, cantrip type spell that even nonwizards can learn. (nonwizards can know up to 3, wizards and priests up to their IQ as a count beside spells/talents.) Most charms concern banking the fire, calling the cows home, keeping the milk from going sour and such, but "Light" (about one candle's worth), "Fire" (one wooden match's worth) and others are useful on adventures.

[JLV]

Originally Posted by BrotherBill

I play disbelief as a charm, a small, cantrip type spell that even nonwizards can learn. (nonwizards can know up to 3, wizards and priests up to their IQ as a count beside spells/talents.) Most charms concern banking the fire, calling the cows home, keeping the milk from going sour and such, but "Light" (about one candle's worth), "Fire" (one wooden match's worth) and others are useful on adventures.

I did something very similar -- had about 15 or 20 cantrips...

I got the idea from an old Gygax article or two in Dragon Magazine.

[Dave Crowell]

Im playing Wizard as an arena game there are three possibilities when something new pops up out of thin air on the arena floor. It might be an image, an illusion, or a real summoning. If it is an exact duplicate of yourself you know it is not a real summoning, you can't be in two places at once. I don't see a priori that this would force a succesful disbelief. It is there in front of you after all, all your senses are telling you it is real. Disbelieving is mustering the mental effort to overcome the spell.

Two points about illusions. First an illusion has enough "reality" that will dispell an image on contact. Second "Illusions Work just like the real thing until disbelieved or destroyed by a spell." This suggests that an illusion of a board would be able to keep a torch above and out of a keg of gunpowder as long as the illusion was maintained. You could also walk across an illusionary bridge.

I would give a bonus to trying to disbelieve an illusion of yourself, and would force a disbelief check if you were walking onto a bridge you knew was an illusion

[JLV]

Originally Posted by Dave Crowell

Im playing Wizard as an arena game there are three possibilities when something new pops up out of thin air on the arena floor. It might be an image, an illusion, or a real summoning. If it is an exact duplicate of yourself you know it is not a real summoning, you can't be in two places at once. I don't see a priori that this would force a succesful disbelief. It is there in front of you after all, all your senses are telling you it is real. Disbelieving is mustering the mental effort to overcome the spell.

Which, if you will recall, I suggested you still had to do -- the only difference is that you don't have to roll for success, because if you take the time to muster that mental effort, and add to that your complete assurance that the thing is an Image or Illusion, then you will obviously succeed in the effort.

Originally Posted by Dave Crowell

Two points about illusions. First an illusion has enough "reality" that will dispell an image on contact. Second "Illusions Work just like the real thing until disbelieved or destroyed by a spell." This suggests that an illusion of a board would be able to keep a torch above and out of a keg of gunpowder as long as the illusion was maintained. You could also walk across an illusionary bridge.

I would give a bonus to trying to disbelieve an illusion of yourself, and would force a disbelief check if you were walking onto a bridge you knew was an illusion

Those both sound reasonable to me as alternates; though I still think in the case of an illusion/image of YOURSELF, disbelief should be automatic if you take the time to make the effort.

It appears from many of the comments that people are conflating "'knowing' something is an illusion/image" with "seeing an obvious illusion/image of YOURSELF ("obvious" because it cannot be a summoned you)." I'm discussing the latter case, while many people seem to be focused on the former case. IMHO, the latter case is pretty cut and dried, while the former case has a lot of wiggle room in it.

And if, your guaranteed disbelief of an image/illusion of yourself fails, then it must be something like a Doppelganger, because it isn't you, it isn't an image, and it isn't an illusion, QED, it must be something else. And then you have to fight it. Which is precisely the same procedure as for a regular disbelief effort, except that you don't have to roll a die to determine the success of your disbelief effort, even though you still have to MAKE the effort. So it seems to me that I've addressed all the possibilities inherent in an image/illusion/summoning of something that looks like YOURSELF in a reasonable and logical way. Note also that YOU are the only one who gets an automatic success to disbelieve an image/illusion of YOURSELF -- everyone else has to do it the normal way, and you have to disbelieve an image/illusion of Fred the Fighter the normal way, even if he's standing right next to you...

[David Bofinger]

Originally Posted by JLV

That's an interesting idea. But if it's a learnable talent or spell taught to everyone for safety reasons (which is certainly what it sounds like), then isn't it already "taken" by the time the character reaches late teens and thus enters the game?

I think it's instinctive, rather than deliberately taught. Even animals disbelieve, though the mechanics are a little different. The fact it's technically a spell is more a curiosity.

[David Bofinger]

It's always bothered me that wizards can see through the eyes of an illusion. I think they should see only what the wizard knows to be there. It seems more in the spirit of how they work otherwise.

[BrotherBill]

Originally Posted by Dave Crowell

Im playing Wizard as an arena game there are three possibilities when something new pops up out of thin air on the arena floor. It might be an image, an illusion, or a real summoning. If it is an exact duplicate of yourself you know it is not a real summoning, you can't be in two places at once. I don't see a priori that this would force a succesful disbelief. It is there in front of you after all, all your senses are telling you it is real. Disbelieving is mustering the mental effort to overcome the spell.

Two points about illusions. First an illusion has enough "reality" that will dispell an image on contact. Second "Illusions Work just like the real thing until disbelieved or destroyed by a spell." This suggests that an illusion of a board would be able to keep a torch above and out of a keg of gunpowder as long as the illusion was maintained. You could also walk across an illusionary bridge.

I would give a bonus to trying to disbelieve an illusion of yourself, and would force a disbelief check if you were walking onto a bridge you knew was an illusion

I would play this as an exposed illusion--as when a wizard created an ilusion of himself and then one of them DIDN"T just have a fireball fly out of it's finger--you know it is illusory but you have to make the effort to disbelieve it. I play this as automatic but requiring the use of an action. I suppose I would not argue too much against a 2d vs IQ roll instead of automatic success.

[BrotherBill]

Originally Posted by David Bofinger

It's always bothered me that wizards can see through the eyes of an illusion. I think they should see only what the wizard knows to be there. It seems more in the spirit of how they work otherwise.

Then if you lose sight of an illusion (say, around a corner) it would be blind. It would no longer able to behave the way the thing it appears to be would behave, and thus it would stop being an illusion. It is easier to assume illusions have a temporary (and breakable) reality.

[Dave Crowell]

Originally Posted by BrotherBill

I would play this as an exposed illusion--as when a wizard created an ilusion of himself and then one of them DIDN"T just have a fireball fly out of it's finger--you know it is illusory but you have to make the effort to disbelieve it. I play this as automatic but requiring the use of an action. I suppose I would not argue too much against a 2d vs IQ roll instead of automatic success.

You could always cast an Illusion of a fireball springing from the fingertips of the illusory you. Although tere comes a point where it's just not worth keeping up the pretense.

[Chris Rice]

Originally Posted by Dave Crowell

You could always cast an Illusion of a fireball springing from the fingertips of the illusory you. Although tere comes a point where it's just not worth keeping up the pretense.

Basic (1-hex) illusion would be no good for that, as the illusion would only reach to an adjacent hex and could go no further. Illusions of missile spells are pretty useless really