Post/Author/DateTime	Post
FOXDIE 07-25-06, 11:18 AM	hey as a Dm i'm kinda tired of the "ohh i can get us there in no time, i'll just teleport os-party mage" so i was wondering..im gonna make the Teleport spell a kinda Gate spell. to teleport you first need to build a gate of..metal/wood or bone what ever really... the key thing most be that it takes time too make the gate/portal and configuer to the point in space you want the gate too appear on the other side.. (if anyone have ever read the the book's by Ian Irvine, then you should know what im talking about) ps.sorry for bad spelling
Roxlimn 07-25-06, 11:25 AM	If you really wanted to limit it, you could stipulate that the teleport spell only takes the party into the proximity of an Astral Beacon. That is, you can only teleport to the location of one of these things, and you sort of have to know the particular Astral Beacon in question. So you can teleport to Astral Beacons you've already studied, but not to others you have not. For that matter, you can't even tell what's waiting for you when you get there, unless the Astral Beacon in question is in a massively secure location.
Red_Rabbit 07-25-06, 11:30 AM	If they have to build a gate to teleport that would turn it into a Wonderous Magic Item. When they get high enough lvl to teleport you need to just live with it, because your player earned that ability to teleport. If you really wanna stop him/her from teleporting find another way that's not so :rolleye2: sad. I don't mean to sound like this but I can't stand it when people can't handle what they let there players have. If you don't want them to teleport than remove the spell, but this is still sad on DM's part. Yes I DM most of the time for my group I've never found a Character, Tactic, Spell and Magical Item I couldn't beat to make my game fun. Maybe you could remove the lvl 5 teleport spell or tell them they can't teleport to a place they are not familiar with. The Rabbit
Someone 07-25-06, 12:20 PM	Just enforce the existing limits of teleport. It can miss (especially if you don't know exactly where you're going). It can only move small numbers of people (so getting those 100 refugees is going to take a lot of teleports). Its a 5th level spell (which could have gone into monster blasting). The last one doesn't mean as much at higher levels, but its still an expenditure of daily reserves.
tarkin 07-25-06, 12:51 PM	There are several additional ways a DM can screw with telport. First some core methods: 1) Players don't know where they have to go. I.E. They are told to find where someone hid the Item of Unusual Power and told that the last person to have it left this map, showing an overland route. 2) Forbiddance. Learn to love that spell. Second, some none-core methods. Here is something I like: 3) Teleport Trap. This permanent magic item can not be moved. It has a minimum of Hardness 20, 10,000 hitpoints. Anyone that attempts to teleport to any location within 1 mile of the Teleport Trap, uses the following table instead of the normal one. Trap means they appear in the Trap. On Target Similar Area Trap Teleport, Greater 01-59 60-70 71-100 Very familiar 01-39 39-60 61-100 Studied carefully 01-24 25-54 55-100 Seen casually 01-09 10-39 40-100 Viewed once 01-05 06-25 26-100 False destination 01-10 11-100 4) Block teleport by moving mountains onto the Astral Plane.
shruggar 07-25-06, 03:27 PM	If you dont like teleport, ban teleport. It's one of the more-easily-bannable "obviously too powerful in terms of the global economy" spells. Saying "you need to jump through these hoops" and pretending its the same spell is no good, though.
green_yawgmoth 07-25-06, 04:11 PM	tell them they can't teleport to a place they are not familiar with. That's how teleport spells work in my games. The lv 5 version has failure chance based on how familiar you are with the place, the lv 7 version doesn't, but you still have to have been there at least once. None of that "description" crap. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v91/yawgmoth/kittyjig.gif
djbabygod 07-25-06, 04:29 PM	here's my solution teleport and other instantaneous travel techniques only APPEAR to be instantaneous. they are actually only gateways to long and arduous astral journeys that tax the PCs patience. Every time they teleport or dimension door they age a year because thats how long it takes to actually get from any one point on the astral plane to a specific other point. This way the travel still seems instantaneous on the material plane, and if they actually have a time limit and need to be somewhere toot sweet they'll put their pride aside and make the journey via teleport, otherwise they won't bother.
Thane26425 07-25-06, 04:56 PM	I've never really had a problem with teleport. Like I said in another thread, if you teleport somewhere, you can only take a few other people and not things like horses, extra henchmen and hirelings or that golem/bodyguard the mage created. This makes teleporting into a place a little dicey, because if you miss or the enemy escapes, then you have to follow on foot. Teleporting a few party members back with the quest item or news of its success or failure and then coming back to the rest of the party works just fine, though. Teleport generally wouldn't screw up the world economy either. Given the expense of hiring a caster to teleport, only the highest value goods would be worth sending this way, things like magic items, jewelry, etc. In the typical D&D world, the market for such things will be rather small, so it won't have much effect. It would be much cheaper, but slower to send a standard cargo of foodstuffs or normal items by caravan or ship. Also, in the typical D&D world, most merchant activity will only be between towns and over short distances. Teleporting the equivalent of a wagonload or wheat 50 miles would be hugely expensive compared to a mundane wagon. Now, I have had wizards working for merchants using teleport to move items. These were all luxury items moved between large cities or even sometimes between cities on different planes. The point is to bear in mind the cost of the teleport vs. how much the vaster and vrew can carry and its value. The wizards mostly made their money for the spells, not what they were hauling, unless they picked up some of their own items too. But, if that's not your style, then don't allow it. That system operated like what is now the Wayfarer's Guild in Complete Arcane.
Thane26425 07-25-06, 05:03 PM	Now, the teleport trap idea is a good one. There was a series of novel, can't remember the name of it though, where two world were at war. One was low magic and the other high magic, with the high magic coming to the low via gates. In the high magic world, teleportation did exist, but they had a sort of enchantment on their homes, the powerful folks that is, that allowed teleporation into only one room. It also had the equivalent of a delay teleport spell that sounded a gong before anyone arrived. That gave them time to prepare for whoever might be coming. Such an enchantment could protect a stronghold and would place all incoming people in the same location each time. That location could be guarded and/or trapped. I used this myself and upgraded the traps from time to time to keep any opposition guessing as to what they might find. My favorite, though very expensive, was the dispell magic followed by plane shift to the negative energy plane. Golems, repeating fireball traps, etc. can all work.
shruggar 07-25-06, 07:04 PM	wasnt that an episode of Sliders? :)
MarkB 07-25-06, 07:13 PM	Check out the anticipate teleportation spells in Spell Compendium. They do some of what Thrane describes.
Thane26425 07-25-06, 08:32 PM	Check out the anticipate teleportation spells in Spell Compendium. They do some of what Thrane describes. Those were the spells I was thinking of. Making those permanant would give some advanced warning that someone was coming, but not who. That's why an enchantment funneling all incoming teleports into one place would be so helpful. Regardless of who it is, you know where they are going to arrive and will have to find a way out of that particular room before they can do anything else.
Juzzman 07-26-06, 12:08 AM	One of the dm's i play with came up with an interesting option. Higher level wizzards/entities have ways to trace teleport signiatures. This means that teleporting anywhere can attract the attention of gor or possibly bad npc's of note, and the more remote/dangerous the destination the more likely it is to be a nasty npc who will send someone to investigate or deal with the situation Juz
DIESCUMDIE 07-26-06, 04:42 AM	Whatever the ingredients for teleport are a poweful mage has ruthlessly outlawed that ingredient out of paranoia and will execute (or merely punish if your nice) any with it in their possesion. I think you can use locate to find it. Have your campaign take place over several planes (always recomended at this level anyway). You cant teleport across planes (right?) Traps that activate when anyone teleports into or out of the vacinity. Instead teleporter ends up in a rope trick with antimagic zone and a few monsters. Just say that spell doesn't work on this plane.
Mordent_Sage 07-26-06, 04:59 AM	There was a series of novel, can't remember the name of it though, where two world were at war. One was low magic and the other high magic, with the high magic coming to the low via gates. In the high magic world, teleportation did exist, but they had a sort of enchantment on their homes, the powerful folks that is, that allowed teleporation into only one room. It also had the equivalent of a delay teleport spell that sounded a gong before anyone arrived. That gave them time to prepare for whoever might be coming. I recon that was (or is damn similar to) the Riftwar books (and the series that follow it) by R.E. Fiest. Goes into more detail in his Empire series. Thing is, the gong sound and delay was optonal, and was only polite. Luckily, it was in a Japanise type setting, so manners were very important. They use highly destinctive patterns to teleport to. That could be a solution for D&D - you can only teleport to set patterns, no where else. These patterns could be easy to make (and hence easy to fake and draw telporting parties to the wrong place), strictly regulated (making it possible for the DM to say where they are) or even illegal (making teleporting very risky, unless you want to go to jail). There's always a way...
DIESCUMDIE 07-26-06, 05:04 AM	double
DIESCUMDIE 07-26-06, 05:04 AM	You could say that since the planet moved since the spell was cast you land in a random location. According to one of the smart channels the earth moves pretty damn zippy
Despana 07-26-06, 08:44 AM	You could say that since the planet moved since the spell was cast you land in a random location. According to one of the smart channels the earth moves pretty damn zippy According to Wikipedia's figures and my own (granted possibly flawed) math, about 67,000 MPH. Yeah, that's fast. :P And that's only the speed around the sun, there's also rotational speed and orbital speed of the solar system within the galaxy. Granted, that's on earth. How many D&D games do you know of that take place on earth? ;)
Psychoticpsymon 07-26-06, 09:01 AM	I thought that all teleport spells required that you knew the area to even cast?
Thiez 07-26-06, 09:32 AM	The duration of teleport is 'Instantaneous', so the optional movement of the world is irrelevant.
Thane26425 07-26-06, 10:21 AM	I recon that was (or is damn similar to) the Riftwar books (and the series that follow it) by R.E. Fiest. Goes into more detail in his Empire series. Thing is, the gong sound and delay was optonal, and was only polite. Luckily, it was in a Japanise type setting, so manners were very important. They use highly destinctive patterns to teleport to. That could be a solution for D&D - you can only teleport to set patterns, no where else. These patterns could be easy to make (and hence easy to fake and draw telporting parties to the wrong place), strictly regulated (making it possible for the DM to say where they are) or even illegal (making teleporting very risky, unless you want to go to jail). There's always a way... That sounds like the series I was talking about. Forgot about the symbol part though. However, in regular D&D that symbol could be translated into a fixed magic item that draws all incoming teleports within its range to itself. Add in Delay Teleport and Alarm and there you go. The distinctive patterns coudl also have another function. They would make it easier for a teleporter to focus on a particular destination, in D&D perhaps counting the area as well known.
Doug_Ervin 07-26-06, 12:46 PM	Teleport and Greater Teleport are minor problems in a game. There are ways to mitigate the effects. Many methods have been presented already. The real problem comes in when dealing with a 18th level sorcerer/wizard and Teleport Circle. 18*10 = 180 minutes or 3 hours. At 10 warriors a minute through the circle I can move nearly 2 full legions accross the planet. Now we are talking about an ability which has the potential to topple kingdoms. No more marching for weeks or months to get an army into position. No supply lines that can be cut. In 3 hours, 1800 warriors could be knocking on your door. Because of the potential for abuse and the high level political implications, DMs (I am not one of them) have banned all of the teleport spells from their campaigns. Bye, Doug
Magicianguy131 07-26-06, 12:57 PM	In Complete Arcane it has ways to deal with teleport. It also has stuff for flying, charm, invis., and scrying. :P
Seerow 07-26-06, 01:07 PM	That sounds like the series I was talking about. Forgot about the symbol part though. However, in regular D&D that symbol could be translated into a fixed magic item that draws all incoming teleports within its range to itself. Add in Delay Teleport and Alarm and there you go. The distinctive patterns coudl also have another function. They would make it easier for a teleporter to focus on a particular destination, in D&D perhaps counting the area as well known. Well, in the Riftwar those patterns weren't some mystical thing, and it didn't HAVE to be a distinctive pattern, that was just for the ease of the Great Ones traveling to some place they may not know. They could go teleport without a pattern, but it was specifically stated to be risky if you didn't know the place very well. Pug, for example, upon his return says that he could easily teleport everyone to the kitchens in Castle Crydee (where he grew up). Any well known place could be done like that as well. I believe later on they got around even this limitation with Miranda's spell. And really, it was just the difference between Teleport and Greater Teleport.
Thane26425 07-26-06, 01:29 PM	Well, in the Riftwar those patterns weren't some mystical thing, and it didn't HAVE to be a distinctive pattern, that was just for the ease of the Great Ones traveling to some place they may not know. They could go teleport without a pattern, but it was specifically stated to be risky if you didn't know the place very well. Pug, for example, upon his return says that he could easily teleport everyone to the kitchens in Castle Crydee (where he grew up). Any well known place could be done like that as well. I believe later on they got around even this limitation with Miranda's spell. And really, it was just the difference between Teleport and Greater Teleport. So their teleport spells basically follow D&D rules. The patterns would qualify as a familiar area for the Great Ones just as the Kitchen would for Pug. Teleporting to nonfamiliar areas is dangerous as per the basic rules since there is a good chance of something bad happening.
SlagMortar 07-26-06, 01:59 PM	In 3 hours, 1800 warriors could be knocking on your door I think in many ways I would be much more concerned about the 18th level wizard/sorcerer knocking on my door than I would be about 1800 warriors arriving over the course of three hours.
Wuggadad 07-26-06, 03:47 PM	How do you get only 1800 people in three hours? 5' radius means at least 6' usable width for marching. At least 2 abreast. I form up troops in columns and have them run through the gate. 2 abreast, probably 5' separation to next rank, so 120' a round means 24 ranks. At 48 people a round, 600 rounds an hour, or 30,000 an hour. And that is without setting up rails or loading up wagons to send through.
BloodSpill 07-26-06, 04:27 PM	Agreed. 18th level characters are close to the end of the game (20th) and should be ultra powerful. To FOXDIE: Your problem isn't with teleport, it's with giving problems of 5th level to characters of 9th level or higher. Anyone with access to teleport faces much harder, trickier or longer quests and in turn teleport is just a way to skip to the interesting part of the plot. If you're not taking advantage of this then start a new campaign with everyone at 1st level.
Thane26425 07-26-06, 05:36 PM	20th level is only the end if you don't play epic campaigns. After level 20, almost every group I have played in has moved on to the planes rather than just their homeworld. In many of those places, you have to be epic just to survive. Then again, there is no reason a level 20 character, especially a mage or cleric, couldn't just retire from regular adventuring and take up interplanar travel and trading. Most Xp then will come from Diplomacy and trading rather than fighting. But then again there is plenty of opportunity to carry on the standard D&D campaign at Epic levels too.