AMIA ARCHIVE • View topic

IronAngel wrote:

Greater Sanctuary
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The default description of Greater Sanctuary clashes with how it actually works ingame, which often confuses the roleplay surrounding Greater Sanctuary users. So please ignore the description entirely.

An Amia the spell is considered, for RP purposes, to be a save-less version of the level 1 Cleric spell Sanctuary. You are not on (or partially on) the ethereal plane; what the spell does is penetrate any magical or inate supernatural barrier to mind-affects and makes all individuals incapable of choosing to hurt the caster directly. They can still be seen, smelt and heard, but direct hostile action is impossible.

Note that this does not allow you to escape from all roleplayed conflicts: for example city guards can still detain you by other means than physical assault. Locking the city gate, for example.

Furthermore, when in battle(in game mechanics terms, set to Hostile) the spell affects your senses too, making them incapable of detecting the caster unless they have the powerful magical senses of a dragon or Umber Hulk. Even if they have such eyes, they cannot choose to hurt the caster directly.

On an intellectual level, any semi-intelligent character with experience of mages will be able to deduce a GS'd caster is probably in the general area from in-character clues like the existence of summons, or from having seen them cast it in the first place, or from having a friend or summons with 'real' True Seeing, so using area-of-effect spells/feats in PvP is not considered cheating, provided the various purely out-of-character means of locating someone have not been used.

For example, if you have set a Weapon Master to Hostile during a roleplayed conflict and then cast Greater Sanctuary, you are legitimately vulnerable to Whirlwind Attack being spammed while you buff in 'safety.' The WM has 13 INT. He will know you are around somewhere, even if some part of his brain is ignoring the fact his eyes/ears/nose are telling him exactly where that is.

Forgive me for making the bazillionth post on this topic, but I had a couple of situations and questions in regards to the rules as outlined by IronAngel:

"Furthermore, when in battle(in game mechanics terms, set to Hostile) the spell affects your senses too, making them incapable of detecting the caster unless they have the powerful magical senses of a dragon or Umber Hulk."

I've seen this part interpreted by people in GS as "you can only see me when I want you to see me." This is usually done without setting to hostile, which means that I have to read their mind to know when I can see them and when I can't, which is hard and I don't like doing it. It get's troublesome when they go from not wanting to be involved in whatever RP is happening, to wanting to get involved, and then start talking, at which point I'm usually annoyed enough to say "//Sorry I can't see you," and they say "// now you can."

My question in regards to the rule is whether or not it's the GS'd person or the non-GS'd person who is on control of how hostile their intentions are. I'd like to think it's the non-GS'd person's choice whether or not their intentions are hostile enough for the GS'd person to become undetectable to them, but if a DM could clarify that I'd appreciate it.

And on a final note, is it wrong of me, if someone in GS is being a nuisance, trying to initiate a fight I may not want to be involved in, to set them to hostile and just pretend they're not there? Because if I can't see them, they can't go through the necessary RP to initiate PvP, so any out-of-the-blue attack on their part would be against the rules. It pretty much forces people to drop their GS if they want to RP. Cheap? Maybe. Satisfying? Oh yea.

Interesting point. However, I still maintain that GS must be utterly destroyed.

Question: "Who determines hostility? Caster or Environment?"

Answer: "Caster, because it's the caster's spell, so they set the conditions for hostility."

Quote:

And on a final note, is it wrong of me, if someone in GS is being a nuisance, trying to initiate a fight I may not want to be involved in, to set them to hostile and just pretend they're not there? Because if I can't see them, they can't go through the necessary RP to initiate PvP, so any out-of-the-blue attack on their part would be against the rules. It pretty much forces people to drop their GS if they want to RP. Cheap? Maybe. Satisfying? Oh yea.

*smack* Don't do this, I will hurt you.

TormakSaber wrote:

Question: "Who determines hostility? Caster or Environment?"

Answer: "Caster, because it's the caster's spell, so they set the conditions for hostility."

Quote:

And on a final note, is it wrong of me, if someone in GS is being a nuisance, trying to initiate a fight I may not want to be involved in, to set them to hostile and just pretend they're not there? Because if I can't see them, they can't go through the necessary RP to initiate PvP, so any out-of-the-blue attack on their part would be against the rules. It pretty much forces people to drop their GS if they want to RP. Cheap? Maybe. Satisfying? Oh yea.

*smack* Don't do this, I will hurt you.

OK OK! Jeez. But at least tell me that if my character isn't being threatening or hostile at all towards someone in GS, they can't pull the "you can't see me" routine.

perhaps the caster has hostile intent, and just isnt revealing it?

Though, to be safe I think one can only legitimately defend the you cant see me if they are indeed mechanically hostile and in GS.

Quote:

But at least tell me that if my character isn't being threatening or hostile at all towards someone in GS, they can't pull the "you can't see me" routine.

no, because if the CASTER think you are threatening, they can do it.

Dev Disco wrote:

Interesting point. However, I still maintain that GS must be utterly destroyed.

yes please. i will send you a case of your favorite beer. do chickens drink beer? well, whatever.

Yep, the situation is determined hostile by the caster. But, at the same time the "Now you see me. Now you don't. Now you see me. Now you don't." thing doesn't hold water. If you view someone as hostile, your feelings don't flop back and forth.

A successful taunt will get a caster out of GS. At least that's what some people used to do.

Halen_Van wrote:

A successful taunt will get a caster out of GS. At least that's what some people used to do.

I seem to vaguely recall that that's an exploit... any smarterer people out there agree?

Dev Disco wrote:

Interesting point. However, I still maintain that GS must be utterly destroyed.

As usual, I concur.

I thought it was determined to be valid, because it taunts you to attack, and since the person is not on the ethereal plane, there's no reason you can't yell out to them that their mother wears army boots.

Back when it *was* still "sending you to the ethereal plane", I believe at *that* time it was considering a cheeseball exploit.

'course, I may be wrong. But makes sense to me.

If GS is destroyed, can we get rid of dev crit, hips, timestop, and so on. or better yet why not make everyone this, level 5, have the -same, exactly same- stats, spells, everything, ie make us all clones then people can't call class x is unbalanced because we are all clones. or just leave it alone.

Last edited by Silvarus on Wed, Feb 11 2009, 1:08 AM, edited 4 times in total.

herkles wrote:

If GS is destroyed, can we get rid of dev crit, hips, timestop, and so on. or better yet why not make everyone this, level 5, have the -same, exactly same- stats, spells, everything, ie make us all clones then people can't call class x is unbalanced because we are all clones. or just leave it alone.

Dev, Timestop, levels, spells, classes and experience are not broken piles of bad and buggy code implementing an idea that was never thought trough properly.

No need to even think about such useless words as Nerf, PvP, balance, unfair et cetera. They have nothing to do with GS.

EDIT: Oh, just a reminder if someone forgot: GS is not getting removed even if we want it to.

from a balance point of view, clones would be perfect as we are all the same

ainjyll wrote:

Yep, the situation is determined hostile by the caster. But, at the same time the "Now you see me. Now you don't. Now you see me. Now you don't." thing doesn't hold water. If you view someone as hostile, your feelings don't flop back and forth.

I was using "Common Sense".

TormakSaber wrote:

Question: "Who determines hostility? Caster or Environment?"

Answer: "Caster, because it's the caster's spell, so they set the conditions for hostility."

This is the single most helpful assurance I have ever seen on GS rules.

D-Finitiy wrote:

Halen_Van wrote:

A successful taunt will get a caster out of GS. At least that's what some people used to do.

I seem to vaguely recall that that's an exploit... any smarterer people out there agree?

An old GS topic discussed this.
Exploit.
Do Not Do This was what I remember.

TormakSaber wrote:

Quote:

But at least tell me that if my character isn't being threatening or hostile at all towards someone in GS, they can't pull the "you can't see me" routine.

no, because if the CASTER think you are threatening, they can do it.

This would mean, in essence, if you made a character who was about as jittery as a squirrel who was capable of GS; that they could use it in the middle of Cordor and consider everyone Hostile, even those simple passerby's who would never look in the first place.

Yeah?
[[Extreme Case]]

Don'ttriple post. lrn2edit.

And, uh, I guess. In theory. We'll smack you for hostiling the entire server. Oh no, here comes "Common Sense" again.

Quote:

They can still be seen, smelt and heard, but direct hostile action is impossible.

Quote:

...when in battle(in game mechanics terms, set to Hostile) the spell affects your senses too,...they cannot choose to hurt the caster directly

The CASTER believes a person to be hostile.
Game-Mechanics has Hostility off.

Are we running by Line 1 [as the true hostility is not mechanic present]
or
Are we running by Line 2 [as it is RP'ed hostility perception]

:: Promise this is my last question :: Double Apology on failing to use Edit

Seems quite simple if you bothered to read. If you are not Hostile, it's line 1, and if you are Hostile, it's line 2.

TormakSaber wrote:

Seems quite simple if you bothered to read. If you are not Hostile, it's line 1, and if you are Hostile, it's line 2.

I wish it was simple, but with some recent RP, this is actually a fine-line question by my understanding. But if I'm being let to common sense it, then I'll say it's running by RP hostility perception by the caster and hold to Line 2.

herkles wrote:

If GS is destroyed, can we get rid of dev crit, hips, timestop, and so on. or better yet why not make everyone this, level 5, have the -same, exactly same- stats, spells, everything, ie make us all clones then people can't call class x is unbalanced because we are all clones. or just leave it alone.

Any decent mage doesn't even need any GS, time stop, or bigby's line of spell to deal with Dev Crit, HiPS, and so on. Anyways I'm not here to argue that point but here just to wonder what's so wrong with discussing and implementing class changes if it is indeed warranted.

I'm new here but when the devs first started changing classes in Amia did they meet with the same hyperbole crazy defensiveness?

RDD getting nerfed?! Why we should limit everyone to level 3!
Monk getting wisdom ac at level 3?! No more dev crit!
HiPS at SD 6?! We might as well all play PNP!
BG getting goodies?! Give HiPS to rogues and rangers!

Last edited by ainjyll on Wed, Feb 11 2009, 4:26 AM, edited 1 time in total.

TormakSaber wrote:

I was using "Common Sense". :(

TormakSaber wrote:

And, uh, I guess. In theory. We'll smack you for hostiling the entire server. Oh no, here comes "Common Sense" again.

What is this "Common Sense" you keep referring to? *dumps bucket of sarcasm on the sentence and continues on* Surely it can't be that thing that is expected of players when dealing within situations that are not completely black and white.

Oh, regarding the ruling on GS, I thought Amia has a WYSIWYG kind of policy.

If you can see the mage in GS, then your char can see it. It should be up to the mage to hostile you if he wants to be hidden.

It's simpler than mages saying "//Can't see me," & "//Can see me now!"

I'd like to see GS replaced by the protection domain's version of it (that is, its still a roll but lasts a long time and is much harder to resist that auto GS we get now).

ticket wrote:

Oh, regarding the ruling on GS, I thought Amia has a WYSIWYG kind of policy.

Can't do wysiwyg with current GS rule.
- mage 1 and 2 in GS;
mage 1 conciders mage 2 hostile, but not the other way around => mechanically it's both hostile or both not.

- afaik you can still kick and beat the mage in GS if you have true seeing, just not target him with spells? I could be wrong here, mind.

And attacking floor below/around mage in order to locate him by his bloodspatter, but without intent to hurt the mage has never been explained to me in a way that I am happy with, but that's a personal thing.

I find the rules on GS somehow illogical or I just did not get it.

1) If someone is in GS, I can not set him hostile because that would make him dissapear and only he decides who is hostile to him?

2) What is the difference in forcing someone in GS to attack with taunt vs. someone not in GS?

3) And why is taunt not allowed but whirlwind attacks and AoE spells are?

I think only the WYSIWYG works. I think even with taunt, whirlwind attack and AoE spells, GS is a very decent spell.

Gotta say. It would pretty damned hard to RP a secert meeting, if you can clearly see someone standing near you, spying in GS, whom you can't do anything about. This person would likely be prancing around rubbing it in your face to...(Yes I think the worst of people)

Selvec Darkon wrote:

Gotta say. It would pretty damned hard to RP a secert meeting, if you can clearly see someone standing near you, spying in GS, whom you can't do anything about. This person would likely be prancing around rubbing it in your face to...(Yes I think the worst of people)

You can set the meeting room on fire, hoping to get him to leave without getting hurt.
(that is if you see him with the eyes of a dragon/raksasha/...)

Or alternatively you just shut up untill he leaves/starves/...

GS debates just get beaten to death and then resurrected several months later. It is not a spell that you have to like, but it is a spell that you have to accept. If you need clarification on it, do a search through the forums and you'll dig up a bunch of these debates that cover virtually every angle of it.

Mind that it's not legit to set and stay Hostile in a situation that doesn't involve an immediate threat of combat. If you set Hostile and disappear, you need to get moving or be suspect to the other guy just setting you back to Neutral if he's not fighting you.

You need to set Hostile in order to do legit PvP. Outside from the intention of immediate PvP from either party, using Hostile with GS is an exploit. It's specifically not for spying or hiding, only protection from aggression.

The aim of the GS rule was to make it as much in-keeping with mechanics and WYSWIG as possible. If there's a situation in which you can use some lore explanation to counter a very possible feature of the game, the rules need to be revised.

belgianbonzai wrote:

afaik you can still kick and beat the mage in GS if you have true seeing, just not target him with spells? I could be wrong here, mind.

Quote:

penetrate any magical or inate supernatural barrier to mind-affects

True Seeing doesn't defeate GS since the protective spell is altering the mind itself, not eyesight. Thats what I'm lead to.

Correct, you can't target them directly. The loophole is how you can use an AoE effect to hit them with luck and logic.

As for the Taunt, it is bioware mechanics that use it as targeting- However; I believe the catch to be against allowing Taunt use on GS'ed people was because it:
1) Forces them to Attack [As I understand it]
2) That Forced Attack would break GS.
3) Thus denying them a chance to RP if the character would resist the taunt.
4) And ultimately being the same as giving Godding RP because you've now determined somebody else's actions for them.

If I'm wrong, I'm wrong.

Torzeng wrote:

As for the Taunt, it is bioware mechanics that use it as targeting- However; I believe the catch to be against allowing Taunt use on GS'ed people was because it:
1) Forces them to Attack [As I understand it]
2) That Forced Attack would break GS.
3) Thus denying them a chance to RP if the character would resist the taunt.
4) And ultimately being the same as giving Godding RP because you've now determined somebody else's actions for them.

If I'm wrong, I'm wrong.

See, I'm just not understanding why taunt would be an exploit.

Unless I'm totally mistaken, it doesn't cause you to attack, unless the taunter wins the roll. And there's mechanics in place for this - taunt skill vs concentration skill, which is automatic.

As to the lore aspect - I don't have to see you to be able to call you an arse. Heck, you don't even have to be present for me to do that. But if you are present, hiding or not, and my taunt is sufficiently annoying/aggravating/insulting enough that you simply cannot stop yourself from turning around and hitting me - aka, if my taunt skill roll beats your concentration skill roll - then so be it. Seems perfectly legitimate to me.

If I'm wrong though, and taunt causes you to attack - thus breaking GS - even on a failed taunt roll, well, then it's pretty obvious as to why it's an exploit, and I heartily agree it should be in this case. BUT - if it's an exploit - it should be in the rules, and preferably it should also be noted in the spell changes link.

So....am I wrong about the mechanics of taunt?

Cori wrote:

As to the lore aspect - I don't have to see you to be able to call you an arse. Heck, you don't even have to be present for me to do that. But if you are present, hiding or not, and my taunt is sufficiently annoying/aggravating/insulting enough that you simply cannot stop yourself from turning around and hitting me - aka, if my taunt skill roll beats your concentration skill roll - then so be it. Seems perfectly legitimate to me.

If I'm wrong though, and taunt causes you to attack - thus breaking GS - even on a failed taunt roll, well, then it's pretty obvious as to why it's an exploit, and I heartily agree it should be in this case. BUT - if it's an exploit - it should be in the rules, and preferably it should also be noted in the spell changes link.

So....am I wrong about the mechanics of taunt?

It causes you to attack even if it's unsuccessful. It's an exploit.

That's all that needed said then.

I agree with it being an exploit in this case. But it should be posted clearly, because obviously not everyone knows this. I didn't realise it caused the attack on a fail. I've never really used taunt.

It shouldn't trigger an attack even on a successful taunt - it should only do what it's designed to do, which is lower AC. The only reason it counts as an attack is lazy programming on the part of BioWare. Nothing new there!

I'll decide when my characters are sufficiently aggravated to deliberately break GS.

It lowers ac because it makes you mad, and you attack in anger, not paying attention to little things like defending yourself.

It's not magic.

I have no issue with you deciding when you are mad enough to attack, in an rp situation. But once we're in pvp, mechanics are perfectly fair. If you don't want to risk getting taunted out of your hidey-spell (if taunt worked properly and only pulled you out on a successful taunt roll), then do what GS is there for, and get the hell out of dodge after casting it.

It's like saying that a hidden person shouldn't become visible because I rolled a 20 alongside my spot skill, instead of an 18, which might've left you unseen, and then trying to say that "You'll decide when you're hidden character has been seen".

But, it's all irrelevant, because apparently taunt is broken, and thus is an exploit, so what you or I may like or deem fair, doesn't really matter.

But if your taunt succeeds is it then not considered an exploit?

Like a character with 60 Taunt skill (Bard), it would still work within reason.

If it fails, you just stop and RP that GS is still up.

Wouldn't work overly well if it's an actual in-pvp situation, because the gs'd person is presumably in this instance, not running away while in gs, rather hanging out either buffing or preparing to cast on you and re-gs, etc etc etc.

In rp, you could just do opposing rolls, if that was your goal. In pvp, mechanics decide generally, not manual rolls. Exceptions exist of course.

Quote:

It causes you to attack even if it's unsuccessful. It's an exploit.

No it doesn't, it pauses then makes you take an AoO. You can stop it *easily*.

Well, these threads are exactly why I want GS out:

It produces years and years of misunderstandings, whine on bugs, questions, arguments and so on, all for the sake of its bad implementation.

Silvarus wrote:

Well, these threads are exactly why I want GS out:

It produces years and years of misunderstandings, whine on bugs, questions, arguments and so on, all for the sake of its bad implementation.

I would love to see GS go, personally. About as much as I'd love to see Drow made plat coin.

Neither is likely.

But I disagree on it having bad implementation. I think it's implemented just fine. For the single player campaign, which is precisely what nwn was really designed around. We all know that multiplayer and persistant worlds, were afterthoughts.

The only problem I have with Taunt being used to break GS is the fact the taunts used are usually generic and horrible. Also... I don't see a mage attacking a warrior without magic because he's angry.

"You're stupid and your mum is a skunk!"

*Taunt: 19 + 60 = 79 - Success!*

"Oooh you make me so mad!

*The epic wizard decides to forsake magic and attack the armored swordsman with his bare hands*

Que?

Timestop is manytimes worse then GS. In both lameness and buggy code.

The only problem with GS is that we're an RP server, and people insist on coming up with an IC explanation for it. Personally, I'm fine with "it's just magic." There shouldn't be any discussion or confusion as to what's legit with the spell, because it should be allowed to work like it works in game. And the current rules do that pretty well.

IronAngel wrote:

The only problem with GS is that we're an RP server, and people insist on coming up with an IC explanation for it. Personally, I'm fine with "it's just magic." There shouldn't be any discussion or confusion as to what's legit with the spell, because it should be allowed to work like it works in game. And the current rules do that pretty well.

Can't you put that as a rule then?

"It is magic, it works like it works."

Would also "explain" why the spell don't work with summons at HD23+, which the current version doesn't really do.

Would stop the discussions about the spell other then those that "it's too powerful" at least.

Silvarus wrote:

Well, these threads are exactly why I want GS out:

It produces years and years of misunderstandings, whine on bugs, questions, arguments and so on, all for the sake of its bad implementation.

So... can I start a long and tedious argument of everyone who uses HIPS without more than their own shadow around? Or while using the shadow of somebody radiating light White 15m, Orange 10m, and Yellow 10m? [fit in that shadow!]
Or I'll just leave it to that nobody ultimately cares save on the occasion when it comes to be a difference in the RP flow.

Same with GS. There are lots of times when I'm tossing it left and right because nobody cares when we're out hunting and my healer wants to stay alive.

Lets also bring up the Shadow dancers who want to kill mages without setting them to hostile first (and the mage doesn't even know their there, and can't use pvp tool and doesn't know to set hostile via player list because they can't see them ooc or ic)

...which means when the mage is in a gs fighting someone else the sd knows exactly where the mage is at all times and sits right behind them waiting for the mage to cast a spell so they can be backstabbed. (the mage goes into a GS (if they survive),and the sd follows and waits for a repeat.

...heh a little passionate, I know, ..this has happened before.

But this topic got me thinking...

If being as there is a rule where you have to set to hostile before pvp...is the sd breaking the rule? or...

If the caster does not know ic or ooc, does the mage know to show themselves as invisible to the shadowdancer?

..personally I'd like to think ooc server rules supersede(are above) IC logic, but I'm always up for clerification.

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