Ending Some Spells When the Caster Dies

HaHaCharade

It's always a pain when an enemy mage casts "Web" or "Stinking Cloud" and you take them out and the spell goes on for what seems like an eternity, not letting you save your game unless you leave the area because there's still a spell effect going on. How about terminating AoE spells when the caster dies? It's more annoying then anything. Web lasts FOREVER lol. Maybe this is an unsolvable problem because I can see those spells being pretty worthless if you take out the mages right away... Just a thought anyway. Not something I'm sold on but figured I'd bring it up and see what folks think.

Cheesebelly

Nah, they should just add "Zone of soft silk" along with "Zone of Sweet Air" and "Death Spell"
No webbie spell is then gonna harm the PC, HA!

They might as well add "Zone of ungreasing detergent" *nods wisely*

More seriously though - what do the rules say about spells when a caster dies?

ARKdeEREH

I think a better idea might be to allow saving the game while spells are still active or while a battle is still going on. This would solve a lot of other problems too, since it can be really annoying to fight a long multi-part battle, always lose in one of the later parts, yet have to re-play the earlier parts time and again. If it were possible to save part way through (like you can do in the Doom games for example), it would be possible to focus your attention on that one part.

It would also be possible to just leave the game for another time if you genuinly need to quit because of time constraints. I've had to choose between losing a lengthy epic battle and leaving my computer on for several hours while I'm at work or school simply because I cannot save in the middle of it. Being able to do so would likely solve both this problem and the one you described.

HaHaCharade

Cheesebelly said:

Nah, they should just add "Zone of soft silk" along with "Zone of Sweet Air" and "Death Spell"
No webbie spell is then gonna harm the PC, HA!

They might as well add "Zone of ungreasing detergent" *nods wisely*

More seriously though - what do the rules say about spells when a caster dies?

Heh, yeah we used to play in my old Pen and Paper days where they would terminate when the mage or cleric died (ex. Half your party is Hold Personed? Kill the cleric, quick!) but I don't think there's a precedent for it in the rules... at least that I've found.

Brude

This annoyed me with the sirines on the coast. Tank gets charmed. Party kills sirine. Spend the next several minutes as tank chases party around in circles. Fun fact: that charm spell they cast lasts longer than hold person

mlnevese

If we go by the rules once a spell is cast it does not depend on the caster to work anymore and will work until its duration is over. Some spells allowed the caster to end it at will.

ego1ste

It would help a lot if spells like hold person, charm, web etc ended when we kill every hostile in sight.
Killing just caster might be way too easy. We could go out of combat after eliminating all enemies which will result in ending spell effects. Then we can continue our journey, save our game or go to sleep right away.

Mortianna

Is arcane magic sustained by the will of the caster or is the caster drawing forces that are impersonal (i.e., "The Weave")? If the former, then I can see how killing the caster would end the spell, as the conduit between the effect of the spell and the Weave is sustained through the caster.

If the latter, then all the caster is doing is setting magical forces in motion; the spell continues to run its duration independently of whether or not the caster is still alive.

I would say the former, but I can see it being more complex than that. Since sorcerers tap into "The Weave" (I cannot help but think about hair extensions every time I read that word--lol) in a more direct manner than wizards, I would think that their spells would be canceled when they die. As for wizards, their link is more impersonal. It's more of a tool than anything, so a Web spell cast by an Invoker would continue through its duration even after the Invoker dies. Same thing goes for animated dead: if the wizard who animated them dies, they continue to do whatever they were initially commanded to do, such as "Guard the door!" or "Attack!"--which would explain why adventurers occasionally run into skeletons and zombies without any living masters commanding them.

If all this is true, then kill the sorcerer! But how can you tell the difference between a sorcerer and a wizard?

mlnevese

@Mortianna In the Realms there is no way of working magic but by tapping the Weave so your first theory is correct. The mage/sorcerer just sets things in motion and then the spell runs its course. The previous Mystra did it so that mortals could no longer access unlimited magical power, as it was what killed the Mystra before her.

The Wild Mages were very close to discovering a way of bypassing the weave, but we never hear about them in later editions so I don't know if they were ever successful. They actually developed spells considered impossible by other mages such as one that allowed them to absorb a spell cast at them, reshape the magic energies and cast one of their own spellls without losing it from memory, for instance.

ajwz

I thought this was going to mention aganaaz' scrocher which looks really weird when the caster dies halfway through because it carries on going.

SAs for yor suggestons, my Idea was be able to have a skip forward in time a few minutes button, so that the effects would wear off natrually.

Mortianna

ajwz said:

I thought this was going to mention aganaaz' scrocher which looks really weird when the caster dies halfway through because it carries on going.

Especially with Fire Mephits that continue to toast your party after you kill them.