Detect Enemies as spoiler

[Scorus]

How do other GMs deal with Detect Enemies? Clandestine enemies seem close to impossible for a party that is hip to it. Ogres, Krarsht, Lunar spies, etc. just don't stand a chance if they mean the individual harm.

[svensson]

25 minutes ago, Scorus said:

How do other GMs deal with Detect Enemies? Clandestine enemies seem close to impossible for a party that is hip to it. Ogres, Krarsht, Lunar spies, etc. just don't stand a chance if they mean the individual harm.

Well first things first: Detect [Anything] isn't a silent or stealthy spell. When you invoke a spell, everybody knows it.

Second thing is that you have to discern the intent of the bad guys. If the bad guys have any doubt about their actions, they won't detect as enemies. For example, you're riding through a hostile clan's territory. You're met by one of their patrols. If that patrol doesn't mean to attack you, they're not enemies. If that patrol wants to arrest you, they're not enemies. If they just want to turn you back, they're not enemies. Even if any of these outcomes would be very bad for the PC's, the patrol itself doesn't mean the PC's actual harm, so they're not enemies.

The same goes for the Lunar spies. They're not there to physically hurt the PC's [just gather info on them], so they're not enemies. Assassins are, of course, another thing altogether.

Krarsht beasts... well if you're PC's can't tell a krarshtkid from a spider, they have bigger problems than Detect Enemies spells 🤣 Krarsht cultists can walk among normal people all the time... but unless they specifically want harm the PCs at the time the spell is cast...

[Squaredeal Sten]

If the adventurers routinely cast Detect Enemies whenever they meet someone or something, they will quickly run their magic points down to one.  Remember that spirit magic only lasts two minutes, but this spell is instant, so you can't even keep it up for two minutes.    So after blowing their magic on farmers coming to sell their produce, children playing ball,  a family chihuahua dog behind a fence, and the clan ring who they intend to ask for hospitality,  the Thanatar cultist at the heart of the scenario is going to eat their lunch.  (The chihuahua will be detected: His barking indicates a real intent to harm if you come into his yard.)

 

 

Edited February 4, 2022 by Squaredeal Sten
capitalization

[Godlearner]

1 hour ago, svensson said:

Second thing is that you have to discern the intent of the bad guys.

No, not exactly. You do not need to see them or discern their intent. If they mean you harm, it detects them. Of course, if they do not know you are there they could not possibly mean to harm you, even if it the vilest of Broo. 

Detect Enemies
1 Point 
Ranged, Focused, Instant
This spell gives the approximate direction and distance from the caster of any being intending to harm them, or it detects and locates a specific individual on whom the caster concentrates. The caster of the spell does not have to overcome the POW of potential targets to find them. The sensing effect is stopped by 1 or more meters of a dense substance such as stone, metal, or earth.

Now Find Enemies is a much more interesting spell especially when it is extended. 😁

[French Desperate WindChild]

6 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

If the adventurers routinely cast Detect Enemies whenever they meet someone or something, they will quickly run their magic points down to one.  Remember that spirit magic only lasts two minutes, but this spell is instant, so you can't even keep it up for two minutes.    So after blowing their magic on farmers coming to sell their produce, children playing ball,  a family chihuahua dog behind a fence, and the clan ring who they intend to ask for hospitality,  the Thanatar cultist at the heart of the scenario is going to eat their lunch.  (The chihuahua will be detected: His barking indicates a real intent to harm if you come into his yard.)

 

 

Agree!

and that is exactly the same if they are in a kind of dungeon / cave /wild area

after 2 - 3 -6 ?! ... spells for nothing players may understand they need some warning ("this sound seems weird", "pow x1 roll => there is a danger here", "this guy is attacking us but are there other hidden ennemies ?",  "we are under attack but we don't know from where", etc...) before detecting where is the danger.

Detect Enemies shows where, not when. And the when is managed by the gm .

 

[PhilHibbs]

10 hours ago, svensson said:

Second thing is that you have to discern the intent of the bad guys. If the bad guys have any doubt about their actions, they won't detect as enemies.

8 hours ago, Godlearner said:

No, not exactly. You do not need to see them or discern their intent.

He means the GM has to decide whether they count as enemies or not.

[Akhôrahil]

9 hours ago, Godlearner said:

No, not exactly. You do not need to see them or discern their intent. If they mean you harm, it detects them. Of course, if they do not know you are there they could not possibly mean to harm you, even if it the vilest of Broo. 

It's also likely about some fairly immediate harmful intent - if you run into a bunch of secret Ogres who are still trying to decide whether to attack you or ignore you (perhaps they don't like how heavily armed you are), they are not yet enemies for the purpose of the spell.

Edited February 4, 2022 by Akhôrahil

[svensson]

9 hours ago, Godlearner said:

Now Find Enemies is a much more interesting spell especially when it is extended. 😁

Yeah, it's been my experience that PC's are VERY loath to spend their Rune Points, especially on information spells. They'd MUCH rather keep them hoarded for True Weapon, Shield, and Heal Wounds spells.

[svensson]

1 hour ago, PhilHibbs said:

He means the GM has to decide whether they count as enemies or not.

Yep, that's what I meant. Thanks.

[Godlearner]

26 minutes ago, svensson said:

Yeah, it's been my experience that PC's are VERY loath to spend their Rune Points, especially on information spells. They'd MUCH rather keep them hoarded for True Weapon, Shield, and Heal Wounds spells.

Sure, but that does not hold for NPC. Anyone on guard duty is likely to have one of these up. Good luck to PCs trying to sneak up on that.

[Kloster]

3 hours ago, Godlearner said:

Good luck to PCs trying to sneak up on that.

Not automatically. If you want to sneak to enter discreetly in the temple, you are not an enemy, because you want no harm. The matter would of course be different if you want to kill said guard.

[Godlearner]

1 hour ago, Kloster said:

Not automatically. If you want to sneak to enter discreetly in the temple, you are not an enemy, because you want no harm. The matter would of course be different if you want to kill said guard.

Harm does not imply kill; theft would qualify as well. But you are right in that it would depend as to why they are trying to sneak in. 

[svensson]

6 hours ago, Godlearner said:

Sure, but that does not hold for NPC. Anyone on guard duty is likely to have one of these up. Good luck to PCs trying to sneak up on that.

 

Not likely. Rune Points can only be replaced with a worship ceremony and a successful Worship roll. This means either seasonally or if there is a convenient priest able to conduct the ceremony on hand. And while most Gloranthans are sincere in their reverence of the Gods, they're not not Templars going to Mass every day. And Find Enemy only works for 15 minutes. To make it useful for a full guard shift, you'd have to add Extension to it. Most NPCs will have at most 3 RP dedicated to their cult, and that's a VERY limited supply for such generous expenditures of RPs.

 

2 hours ago, Godlearner said:

Harm does not imply kill; theft would qualify as well. But you are right in that it would depend as to why they are trying to sneak in. 

 

That depends on the referee. I'm fairly strict about 'harm' being an attack. Obviously you have a more liberal interpretation. YMMV and all that.

[Godlearner]

15 minutes ago, svensson said:

This means either seasonally or if there is a convenient priest able to conduct the ceremony on hand

If you are temple guard these will happen often enough. Yes, to be useful it needs extension, but the spell can affect multiple people so each time a different person would cast it. 

 

17 minutes ago, svensson said:

Obviously you have a more liberal interpretation. YMMV and all that.

Not obviously, I am just reading it as written. They did not specify threat of physical violence, it say harm. If you steal from me, that harms me, if you wish to malign me, that harms me as well, even if you want to tell the truth about my misdeeds, that will also bring me harm.

[Kloster]

2 hours ago, Godlearner said:

Harm does not imply kill; theft would qualify as well.

I think the same.

8 minutes ago, Godlearner said:

Not obviously, I am just reading it as written. They did not specify threat of physical violence, it say harm.

Ditto.

9 minutes ago, Godlearner said:

If you steal from me, that harms me,

Yes.

9 minutes ago, Godlearner said:

if you wish to malign me, that harms me as well,

Yes, but I am not sure it would qualify.

10 minutes ago, Godlearner said:

even if you want to tell the truth about my misdeeds, that will also bring me harm.

Yes, but I am almost sure it would not qualify. At the very least, as a GM, I would not rule it automatically. It would depend on the motivation.

[HreshtIronBorne]

If someone wants to spend a boat-load of RP on Emulating thier God/Bringing them to the World to help them Defend the Stead or be the Dutiful Watchmen then more Power to them. 

Humakti and Babeester Gori can throw down huge power spikes in Truesword/Slash and Sword/Axe Trance and other spells. Orlanthi can Extend a number of their spells for all sorts of shenanigans. 1-2 points of Leap or Darkwalk extended til next Holy Day means all sorts of fun. 

Why shouldn't someone be able to dedicate their RP to being a DAMN GOOD watchman? There are spells and techniques to circumvent these detections in the Rules and the Lore. So what if the average roaming band of broo or whatever is detectable? The crafty opponents might not show up due to your finicky magic, their intent to not harm, or their magically concealed malice. Who knows?

[PhilHibbs]

1 hour ago, HreshtIronBorne said:

Humakti and Babeester Gori can throw down huge power spikes in Truesword/Slash and Sword/Axe Trance and other spells. Orlanthi can Extend a number of their spells for all sorts of shenanigans. 1-2 points of Leap or Darkwalk extended til next Holy Day means all sorts of fun. 

Why shouldn't someone be able to dedicate their RP to being a DAMN GOOD watchman?

Of course, they can. But 5 Rune Points - one the spell, four for Extension for a season - permanently dedicated to Find Enemy is a lot. Really useful, but a lot! Sure, someone will do it, but it will be rare. There's also the chance that you will succeed in casting the Find Enemy but fail the Extension roll, so you need a spare point for that eventuality. If you regularly put your group up against foes willing to throw 5 RP around all the time, then fine. I don't, maybe the occasional spell to liven things up, more if it's a special occasion. Random guard? 3 RP at most.

[HreshtIronBorne]

As for having an NPC running a fully Extended Find Enemy, I would reserve it only for the dedicated Bodyguards of the most badass NPCs. They can afford to have a guy on retainer that spends a portion of his RP to lock in a solid defense against. I would say 80-90% of encounters wouldn't need to worry about Detect or Find Enemy used from an NPC side, unless they suspected sneaking enemies for some reason. 

The exception would be places of extreme magical power, like an enemy Temple or something where there is a lot of POW and MP dedicated to defending a small area. 

 

My point was mostly from a PC use perspective. I think that 5 RP is a good solid investment in being a badass defender of your people. 

[Scorus]

1 hour ago, PhilHibbs said:

Of course, they can. But 5 Rune Points - one the spell, four for Extension for a season - permanently dedicated to Find Enemy is a lot. Really useful, but a lot!

It is not that bad if you are at full on the day before your holy day.

[Shiningbrow]

On the subject of Find Enemy and Extension... 

The answers is quite simple... Wyters.

Especially since such a spell can be cast on 5 people for the same 1 RP. So, it would make sense to have 5 or 10 guards with Find Enemy Extended for a season or year.

[Joerg]

4 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

On the subject of Find Enemy and Extension... 

The answers is quite simple... Wyters.

Especially since such a spell can be cast on 5 people for the same 1 RP. So, it would make sense to have 5 or 10 guards with Find Enemy Extended for a season or year.

The problem with letting the wyter cast this is that it costs the wyter's permanent POW, which can of course be replenished by the congregation donating that POW. Wyters don't have rune points, their POW acts as one-use RP.

[Shiningbrow]

1 hour ago, Joerg said:

The problem with letting the wyter cast this is that it costs the wyter's permanent POW, which can of course be replenished by the congregation donating that POW.

Very true... but probably totally worth it - no? (certainly from a community perspective)

1 hour ago, Joerg said:

Wyters don't have rune points, their POW acts as one-use RP.

I thought that wasn't 100% definitive, but only generally so... (or maybe it was just thrown into a discussion on here somewhere). Either way, sort of irrelevant (except in very small communities where the POW may be hard to come by)

[Akhôrahil]

1 hour ago, Joerg said:

The problem with letting the wyter cast this is that it costs the wyter's permanent POW, which can of course be replenished by the congregation donating that POW. Wyters don't have rune points, their POW acts as one-use RP.

On the other hand, Wyters are described in many places as being able to detect intruders, so this could be coded as a "natural" (or at least non-Rune Magic) ability (although perhaps also fallibly, because that makes for much better RP).

[PhilHibbs]

4 hours ago, Joerg said:

Wyters don't have rune points, their POW acts as one-use RP.

 

2 hours ago, Shiningbrow said:

I thought that wasn't 100% definitive, but only generally so...

Wyters can have RP but my interpretation is that the special "cast spells on multiple members" thing has to be done with POW. They can use their RP to cast spells at the direction of and in the presence of the community leader.

[Joerg]

31 minutes ago, PhilHibbs said:

 

Wyters can have RP but my interpretation is that the special "cast spells on multiple members" thing has to be done with POW. They can use their RP to cast spells at the direction of and in the presence of the community leader.

In that case, the wyter needs to be an initiate or priest of a greater deity than itself. That's entirely possible - even Orlanth started his questing addressing a higher power.

I don't think that an entity's innate powers would require rune points. Rune points are gained from transferring POW to the deity granting the spell, either from their own list or from one of the locally recognized and worshipped associates.

(One might say that the common rune spells are given through association of the deity with the deities of the Celestial Court.)