Chain Binding Nightmare

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Fri Oct 19, 2012 8:34 am

So there exists a way to chain planer binding with nightmares; those evil horse things in the monster manual, not bad dreams. Anyway, nightmares are 6 HD outsiders that can be bound with lesser planer binding or can be picked up as a cohort for a 12th level character (7th level in Tome), and who can cast astral projection (CL 20) as a spell like ability at will.

Astral projection makes a copies of you, your 8-10 closest friends, and all of your group's equipment.

Lesser planer bind a nightmare, Xerox your group N times, planer bind N genies (you do have 6th level spells right? When you run out of 6th level slots, end the current astral projection and return to a previous copy that has not expended their 6th level slots), get N wishes, ???, and profit.

I'm calling this the Nightmare Chain.

K · Post by K » Fri Oct 19, 2012 8:42 am

The problem is that spells don't stack like that according to the Same Effect set of rules.

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Fri Oct 19, 2012 9:05 am

d20 SRD wrote: Same Effect with Differing Results
The same spell can sometimes produce varying effects if applied to the same recipient more than once. Usually the last spell in the series trumps the others. None of the previous spells are actually removed or dispelled, but their effects become irrelevant while the final spell in the series lasts.

Astral Projection casted multiple times works like polymorph when casted multiple times, and totally works.

Even if it didn't (and it does), nothing is stopping you from having a Nightmare cohort in liew of enslaving an extrplaner entity and doing the same thing by only casting astral projection once before you blow through your copy's 6th level spells, and doing it over and over and over and over... And over and over and over... Again. And then do it over again. And rinse/repeat/???/profit. Again.

K · Post by K » Fri Oct 19, 2012 9:33 am

SRD wrote:Same Effect More than Once in Different Strengths

In cases when two or more identical spells are operating in the same area or on the same target, but at different strengths, only the best one applies.

See above.

In this case, no Astral Projections are the best effect since even their durations are the same and so it doesn't matter which one trumps the rest. This means it's like casting Blink on yourself four times in one round.... you still only get a single chance to avoid damage per attack and not a chance per spell on you.

The issue would be clearer if there was a Same Effect and Same Strength section, but I think they assumed that it was obvious.

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Fri Oct 19, 2012 10:28 am

Well, it would be clearer if they had wrote the same effect rules to cover the instance where a spell with non-numerical benefits is stacked. Astral projection doesn't really have a measurable strength, and it only varies in the context of the casting.

But the main thing to take away from both those sections: they don't actually terminate previous castings. They only dictate which effect is active at any given time. If the active effect disappears, an inactive effect takes over the role. Those sections provide rules on how to determine which of those many effects is active and which isn't. The others are still there, just inactive in the background.

Which, I suppose, raises a separate problem:
1) X0 casts astral projection (Y0), creating X1.
2) X1 casts astral projection (Y1), creating X2.
3) Only one effect can be active at a time, no matter which section we refer. Either Y1 or Y0 must be inactive.
4a) If Y0 is inactive, X1 'dies.' If X1 dies, Y1 fails and X2 dies.
4b) If Y1 is inactive, X2 dies.

Astral projection requires that every individual effect remain active simultaneously, or else someone along the chain dies. Which, going back to the polymorph example, is sort of like casting polymorph to turn into a wolf, then casting polymorph again to turn into a giant, and claiming that your type is both animal and giant.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Fri Oct 19, 2012 11:19 am

Okay... That is not even a chain.

You are getting as many wishes as times you cast Planar Binding... exactly like before.

Since you are not using wishes to get more wishes, it is not a chain.

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Fri Oct 19, 2012 11:51 am

Kaelik wrote:That is not even a chain.

There's totally a chain. The original version (legal or not) chains astral projections ad infinitum.

Joking aside, that seems like a really petty thing to get a stick up your bum about. It's a method for accelerated planar binding. It is not a big enough class of problems to warrant subdivisions and giving more than 1.5 shits about legacy misnomers just isn't worth it.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Fri Oct 19, 2012 6:26 pm

No, I mean, you aren't using Wish to get access to more Wishes. it is not a chain. You get exactly as many wishes as times you cast Planar Binding. So, that is already the way it works.

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Fri Oct 19, 2012 7:30 pm

It removes the /day limit on spell slots. It still takes a little over 10 minutes to get each wish, but it is your copy's spells which were expended; when astral projection ends your original body still has all its spells from before. It increases an 11th level conjurer's 6th level spell slots from 3~4 per day to slightly less than 144.

I really don't want to argue over semantics. As is, astral projection is broken not just because it grants a 40 fold increase in spell use, but because it can also Xerox wish economy items.

K · Post by K » Fri Oct 19, 2012 10:39 pm

Even if you allowed multiple casting to work like you say they do (and I don't because if seems exactly like casting blink on yourself multiple times), you still aren't duplicating spells because any astral copy after the first is going to be comatose.

Copying an astral copy is going to make the copy go comatose and any copy of a comatose character is going to produce a comatose character because it's a copy.

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Sat Oct 20, 2012 12:06 am

What? You don't copy the astral copy, but the materialized and awake copy that returns to the original, comatose body on the material plane. Casting the spell again puts makes a second, awake copy on the astral and the first copy goes comatose. Rinse and repeat.

And this tangent is immaterial because it still doesn't stop a character from using a single casting of an at will SLA astral projection from a 6 HD Nightmare to duplicate spells and equipment, end the effect, and then do it over again and again at will because the Nightmare's SLA can be done at will.

K · Post by K » Sat Oct 20, 2012 12:16 am

Hicks wrote:What? You don't copy the astral copy, but the materialized and awake copy that returns to the original, comatose body on the material plane. Casting the spell again puts makes a second, awake copy on the astral and the first copy goes comatose. Rinse and repeat.

You aren't copying spells.

So lets say that the original has four castings of magic missile when fully rested. You make a copy and the original goes to sleep and copy also has four MMs. He then casts one and now has three MMs.

This copy comes back to the original body after manifesting on the plane and you copy him. The first copy with three castings goes to sleep and you get a second copy that has three castings of MM.

Rinse and repeat all you want, but no matter what you do you only get one set of spells.

And this tangent is immaterial because it still doesn't stop a character from using a single casting of an at will SLA astral projection from a 6 HD Nightmare to duplicate spells and equipment, end the effect, and then do it over again and again at will because the Nightmare's SLA can be done at will.

Ending the effect destroys all the copied equipment and the copy body.

Nothing special happens to the astral form when it materializes other than it can affect things on the plane its on. All the other rules of the spell still apply, so when the spell ends the copy vanishes with all the copied stuff.

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Sat Oct 20, 2012 12:49 am

You misunderstand, the last iteration of astral projections expend their spells, ends the duration of the last astral projection, and then the 2nd to last iteration wakes up, expends their spells, ends the duration of the 2nd last astral projection, and then the 3ed last iteration wakes up... And so on.

I'll concede your point about duplicated items disappearing when the spell ends, but for as long as the spell is in effect you can just pick up comatose origional's (I.e. lower iteration physical copies) stuff and have Xeroxed items.

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Sat Oct 20, 2012 1:14 am

Just thought of another way: have a staff of planer binding (24,750gp) with at least one charge left, and dupe it with astral projection. The copy expends the copied staff's charges, ends the effect, the original wakes up (with his unused staff of planer binding), and the nightmare continues on to cast astral projection. Repeat as desired.

K · Post by K » Sat Oct 20, 2012 1:30 am

Read page 49 of the Manual of the Planes. Duped items share one pool of charges with the original.

I don't think that it'd be a stretch to say that spell slots probably work the same way since the only thing that being in an astral/manifested form does protect you from is transferring death and damage back to your body (except if the cord is cut, which is insta-death to your original body).

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Sat Oct 20, 2012 1:52 am

Yeah, no. I cite the primary source rule, and the fact that I don't even have that book. The spell specifically says you form a new physical body and new equipment.

K · Post by K » Sat Oct 20, 2012 2:02 am

Hicks wrote:Yeah, no. I cite the primary source rule, and the fact that I don't even have that book. The spell specifically says you form a new physical body and new equipment.

The spell also doesn't say that it forms a new soul/mind that gets it's own set of spells. You'd have to convince a DM that it works in that incredibly stupid way in a game that strictly divides what a physical body does (3/6 attributes and stuff like natural armor or size) and what a soul does (class features, other stats).

And don't let them see the Manual of the Planes. Actual knowledge of how astral projection or the Astral Plane works will ruin your entire scam.

That's after you convince the DM that stacking the same spell with the same effect will multiply the effect.

CatharzGodfoot · Post by **CatharzGodfoot** » Sat Oct 20, 2012 2:43 am

Never thought I'd see K so egregiously invoking the Oberoni Fallacy.

fectin · Post by **fectin** » Sat Oct 20, 2012 2:52 am

It's not oberoni; there's no rules change involved.

Hicks · Post by **Hicks** » Sat Oct 20, 2012 2:57 am

Oh that. You are right that I was wrong about spell slot duplication, each of our positions exist in an area where the rules were too nebulous; but equipment duplication (as in creating new, physical equipment for the duration of the spell) is totally a thing the spell says it does.

Bonus point: the spell dosen't need to stack, so we can also completely bypass the part where we disagree if it can be stacked.

K · Post by K » Sat Oct 20, 2012 3:01 am

fectin wrote:It's not oberoni; there's no rules change involved.

Yeh, I've been pointing to actual rules like the one's in Manual of the Planes that say that the duped magic items with charges share one pool of charges and the effect rules in the Magic Overview section of the Player's Handbook.

When did it become an Oberoni Fallacy to argue for the existing rules? Or to point out that someone's interpretation seems to go well beyond what the actual rules say?

DSMatticus · Post by **DSMatticus** » Sat Oct 20, 2012 3:05 am

If there is any problem at all with stacked astral projection, it is not that you cannot cast astral projection twice. You can be the target of polymorph while polymorphed and it will work. If there is a problem with stacked astral projection (I'm willing to grant this is totally ambiguous), it would be that only one astral projection effect can be active at a time, as per the differing results rules and as per the example of double polymorph not turning you into a freakish crossbreed of X and Y, but rather turning you into X, then turning you into Y. (Honestly, this is in some ways ambiguous, too. Ignoring the same effect rules, parts of polymorph would stack with eachother and parts would overwrite eachother.) And if any astral projection effect is inactive, then the chain breaks.

Now, that's basically irrelevant because the specific example works exactly as well if you just perform it as
1 BEGIN astral projection
2 DO planar bind
3 END astral projection
4 GOTO 1
and that avoids the nasty issue of stacking astral projections when it is ambiguous how many astral projections can be active at any given time. The only real question is what resources does Astral Projection duplicate?

Well, astral projection is a shittily written spell and all it says is it copies you and your equipment. Copies and originals are distinct things with distinct resources. What happens to one is not what happens to the other. Nobody thinks astral projection feeds back damage. And there's really no reason at all beyond wishful thinking to think it feeds back spellslot usage. By RAW and English, it certainly doesn't. Manual of the Planes apparently specifies new rules concerning charged items but not concerning spell slots. Okay. So if you use Manual of the Planes, it feeds back expended charges. That's the only change, apparently.

K · Post by K » Sat Oct 20, 2012 3:10 am

Hicks wrote:Oh that. You are right that I was wrong about spell slot duplication, each of our positions exist in an areawere the rules were too nebulous; but equipment duplication (as in creating new, physical equipment for the duration of the spell) is totally a thing the spell says it does.

I guess there is no point in telling you that the same page on the Manual of the Plane says that taking items from the original body causes the duped ones to vanish, so any dreams of casting the spell over and over and suddenly equipping an army is dead in the water.

Between that and the charges bit, it seems like the Manual of the Planes section was written specifically to derail this kind of thing.

fectin · Post by **fectin** » Sat Oct 20, 2012 3:19 am

What leads you to believe that you get any spells out of physical duplication? If you magic jar into a wizard, you don't suddenly gain access to his spells; why would making a new body for yourself be different?

K · Post by K » Sat Oct 20, 2012 3:24 am

DSMatticus wrote:
Well, astral projection is a shittily written spell and all it says is it copies you and your equipment. Copies and originals are distinct things with distinct resources. What happens to one is not what happens to the other. Nobody thinks astral projection feeds back damage. And there's really no reason at all beyond wishful thinking to think it feeds back spellslot usage. By RAW and English, it certainly doesn't. Manual of the Planes apparently specifies new rules concerning charged items but not concerning spell slots. Okay. So if you use Manual of the Planes, it feeds back expended charges. That's the only change, apparently.

Well, it seems to put your soul into a new body. So by all the spells that do that like magic jar, you can argue that expending spell slots is something would transfer back.

Otherwise, it's kind of like trying to argue that since polymorph or magic jar gives you a new body, you get a new set of spells.

The worst twist for the "nothing transfers back" school of thought is that you don't get XP from adventures because you decided that nothing transfers back.