Darkness and Psi-crystals [Archive] - Wizards Community

Darkness and Psi-crystals [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
lastknightleft
09-20-07, 10:20 AM Hi, in our game last week the DM cast Darkness and the player of a psion with a crystal said that the crystal could see normally because it can see in supernatural darkness and because it could mentally tell the psion what it say in essence the psion was able to see..., I was just double checking that since no one was 100% certain. If you could back it up with page # references that would help too.
Sysane
09-20-07, 10:28 AM From the SDR:
Sighted (Ex): Although it has no physical sensory organs, a psicrystal can telepathically sense its environment as well as a creature with normal vision and hearing. Darkness (even supernatural darkness) is irrelevant, as are areas of supernatural silence, though a psicrystal still can’t discern invisible or ethereal beings. A psicrystal’s sighted range is 40 feet.
The psicrystal can see not its master.
PhaedrusXY
09-20-07, 10:56 AM At best the crystal could tell the Psion what was going on. The Psion would still suffer 20% miss chances when targetting powers, and all the other effects of concealment.
jbsaff
09-20-07, 11:25 AM I had a DM misunderstand this ability too in a game. It was his first time with Psionics and he had set up a sneaky trap using darkness and short distances. My Nimble Psicrystal got "scared" all the sudden and refused to look down the hole. Not really a big deal, but annoying none the less. The DM could have simply had the psicrystal describe things in such a way as to leave some abiguity about what was down the hole. Oh well.
InkBlot
09-20-07, 11:38 AM Your DM knows that the darkness spell only creates shadowy illumination, right? Everybody in the darkness can still see. The only difference is that the psicrystal doesn't have 20% miss chance on it's attacks, but the psicrystal doesn't have any attack so that's a moot point.
PhaedrusXY
09-20-07, 11:42 AM Your DM knows that the darkness spell only creates shadowy illumination, right? Everybody in the darkness can still see. The only difference is that the psicrystal doesn't have 20% miss chance on it's attacks, but the psicrystal doesn't have any attack so that's a moot point.It can deliver touch spells. I also like to coat mine in contact poison. ;)
InkBlot
09-20-07, 11:54 AM In order to deliver touch powers it has to enter into another creature's square and provoke an attack of opportunity. Once it does that it has to scurry back to you before you can use it to deliver another power. This isn't generally a good tactic. It has it's niches, but dealing with darkness isn't one of them.

Meanwhile, you could have just manifested a power that doesn't require an attack roll (or touchsight/psionic true seeing).
jbsaff
09-20-07, 12:09 PM Your DM knows that the darkness spell only creates shadowy illumination, right? Everybody in the darkness can still see.

Add this to the list of things done wrong in that game... My 60ft of Darkvision would have broken the trap anyway. Gah. It's finding things like this that make me wonder how I ever got into this game, given the gross rules violations that occurred (rarely benefitting the players, I might add).
Bacris
09-20-07, 12:20 PM Darkness - when you're really looking for mood lighting.
Ra-Tiel
09-20-07, 02:41 PM Darkness - when you're really looking for mood lighting.
No, no, no Bacris.

http://imageupload.com/out.php/i24479_motivator5146271.jpg

:D ;)
AntiDjinn
09-20-07, 02:46 PM A psicrystal can "see" even in total darkness because it doesn't use light to sense its surroundings. The crystal can describe what it is seeing through the telepathic link, but you can't actually see what it sees until you have the Sight Link ability at level 13+. Using just the telepathic link is like trying to direct a blind or blindfolded person with voice instructions; it is better than no direction at all, but hardly substitutes for sight.

Even with Sight Link, you are going to suffer from parallax and PoV error unless the crystal is stuck to your forehead. Imagine your eyes being blind, but you are getting visual input from a camera that is across the room. Now imagine that you are trying to fight, aim a ray, or whatnot based on this input. Remember that if the camera is facing you, the left side of its visual field corresponds to your right. Not such a problem if the camera is mounted on you, the viewpoint would then more or less correspond to what your eyes would be seeing.
CrimsonDeath
09-20-07, 03:02 PM Darkness - when you're really looking for mood lighting.
My group likes to joke about casting Darkness in a pitch-black room so that you can use the shadowy illumination it creates in order to navigate. (Partial concealment is better than total concealment, after all.)
McPoyo
09-21-07, 01:44 PM Clarification: Deeper Darkness, in an area with no natural light, underground, at midnight, during a new moon.

lastknightleft: Page 22 is the page number in the actual EPH that that ability is referenced on, if you still want a non-SRD reference. Sight-link, the ability that would actually allow Kaleden to see through the psicrystal, is on page 23.

To everyone else: Yes, I was the DM of this encounter.

I realize it only reduces visibility to shadowy illumination, but shadowy illumination of zero visibility is still no visibility.

Darkness states "Normal lights (torches, candles, lanterns, and so forth) are incapable of brightening the area, as are light spells of lower level (such as light or dancing lights)."

It also states creatures who can normally see still suffer the penalties of the miss chance, which I've always interpreted as "Darkvision does not work through magical darkness". Call it a throwback to 3.0 darkness, but I've always ruled it that way.

The psicrystal was able to tell him relative locations, not full on sight. The psicrystal was on the ceiling, in the center of the room, "facing" away from the doorway the PCs entered. The psion did not utilize the psicrystal to aim any abilities, purely used it to know numbers and approximate locations of enemies. It gave no benefit whatsoever.

Everyone, and I mean everyone, including the opponents, suffered the 20% miss chance.

I allowed a sunrod and a dancing lights spell to illuminate the adjacent squares with shadowy illumination, even though the darkness spell states they do not function.

Any more clarifications I would be more than glad to provide. I actually house-ruled in the player's favor on this one.
lastknightleft
09-21-07, 03:48 PM Yeah, I knew this and wasn't upset, I just wanted to double check since I thought magical and supernatural were different things. I didn't have a problem with the ruling as it stood, but as a DM too, I need to know these things for my other games. And I should have clarified that it was deeper darkness, and just so you know, 3.5 keeps the stipulation that darkvision doesn't work in a darkness spell, And I knew you ruled in our favor and knew he couldn't see, like I said, I was just clarifying because I'm annoyingly **** retentive about reading the rules for myself and because if it turns out differently, having a page refrence leaves out the possibility of something that players have done in my other game where they said "I read in one of the books that..." and they never read anything of the sort.
lastknightleft
09-21-07, 03:51 PM plus this is my SOP whenever something comes up and I don't own the books to refrence.
McPoyo
09-21-07, 03:53 PM No no, my post was two parts, the part to you and those who were helpful with your question, and the part to the people who were making assumptions :P

I totally understand what you mean, and the difference between Deeper Darkness and normal darkness is only duration and size, I just figured I'd throw it out there too.
Scion of Coldshard
09-21-07, 05:28 PM So Deeper = wider and Darkness = candlelight.. and people complain about psionic naming conventions ;)

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
lastknightleft 09-20-07, 10:20 AM	Hi, in our game last week the DM cast Darkness and the player of a psion with a crystal said that the crystal could see normally because it can see in supernatural darkness and because it could mentally tell the psion what it say in essence the psion was able to see..., I was just double checking that since no one was 100% certain. If you could back it up with page # references that would help too.
Sysane 09-20-07, 10:28 AM	From the SDR: Sighted (Ex): Although it has no physical sensory organs, a psicrystal can telepathically sense its environment as well as a creature with normal vision and hearing. Darkness (even supernatural darkness) is irrelevant, as are areas of supernatural silence, though a psicrystal still can’t discern invisible or ethereal beings. A psicrystal’s sighted range is 40 feet. The psicrystal can see not its master.
PhaedrusXY 09-20-07, 10:56 AM	At best the crystal could tell the Psion what was going on. The Psion would still suffer 20% miss chances when targetting powers, and all the other effects of concealment.
jbsaff 09-20-07, 11:25 AM	I had a DM misunderstand this ability too in a game. It was his first time with Psionics and he had set up a sneaky trap using darkness and short distances. My Nimble Psicrystal got "scared" all the sudden and refused to look down the hole. Not really a big deal, but annoying none the less. The DM could have simply had the psicrystal describe things in such a way as to leave some abiguity about what was down the hole. Oh well.
InkBlot 09-20-07, 11:38 AM	Your DM knows that the darkness spell only creates shadowy illumination, right? Everybody in the darkness can still see. The only difference is that the psicrystal doesn't have 20% miss chance on it's attacks, but the psicrystal doesn't have any attack so that's a moot point.
PhaedrusXY 09-20-07, 11:42 AM	Your DM knows that the darkness spell only creates shadowy illumination, right? Everybody in the darkness can still see. The only difference is that the psicrystal doesn't have 20% miss chance on it's attacks, but the psicrystal doesn't have any attack so that's a moot point.It can deliver touch spells. I also like to coat mine in contact poison. ;)
InkBlot 09-20-07, 11:54 AM	In order to deliver touch powers it has to enter into another creature's square and provoke an attack of opportunity. Once it does that it has to scurry back to you before you can use it to deliver another power. This isn't generally a good tactic. It has it's niches, but dealing with darkness isn't one of them. Meanwhile, you could have just manifested a power that doesn't require an attack roll (or touchsight/psionic true seeing).
jbsaff 09-20-07, 12:09 PM	Your DM knows that the darkness spell only creates shadowy illumination, right? Everybody in the darkness can still see. Add this to the list of things done wrong in that game... My 60ft of Darkvision would have broken the trap anyway. Gah. It's finding things like this that make me wonder how I ever got into this game, given the gross rules violations that occurred (rarely benefitting the players, I might add).
Bacris 09-20-07, 12:20 PM	Darkness - when you're really looking for mood lighting.
Ra-Tiel 09-20-07, 02:41 PM	Darkness - when you're really looking for mood lighting. No, no, no Bacris. http://imageupload.com/out.php/i24479_motivator5146271.jpg :D ;)
AntiDjinn 09-20-07, 02:46 PM	A psicrystal can "see" even in total darkness because it doesn't use light to sense its surroundings. The crystal can describe what it is seeing through the telepathic link, but you can't actually see what it sees until you have the Sight Link ability at level 13+. Using just the telepathic link is like trying to direct a blind or blindfolded person with voice instructions; it is better than no direction at all, but hardly substitutes for sight. Even with Sight Link, you are going to suffer from parallax and PoV error unless the crystal is stuck to your forehead. Imagine your eyes being blind, but you are getting visual input from a camera that is across the room. Now imagine that you are trying to fight, aim a ray, or whatnot based on this input. Remember that if the camera is facing you, the left side of its visual field corresponds to your right. Not such a problem if the camera is mounted on you, the viewpoint would then more or less correspond to what your eyes would be seeing.
CrimsonDeath 09-20-07, 03:02 PM	Darkness - when you're really looking for mood lighting. My group likes to joke about casting Darkness in a pitch-black room so that you can use the shadowy illumination it creates in order to navigate. (Partial concealment is better than total concealment, after all.)
McPoyo 09-21-07, 01:44 PM	Clarification: Deeper Darkness, in an area with no natural light, underground, at midnight, during a new moon. lastknightleft: Page 22 is the page number in the actual EPH that that ability is referenced on, if you still want a non-SRD reference. Sight-link, the ability that would actually allow Kaleden to see through the psicrystal, is on page 23. To everyone else: Yes, I was the DM of this encounter. I realize it only reduces visibility to shadowy illumination, but shadowy illumination of zero visibility is still no visibility. Darkness states "Normal lights (torches, candles, lanterns, and so forth) are incapable of brightening the area, as are light spells of lower level (such as light or dancing lights)." It also states creatures who can normally see still suffer the penalties of the miss chance, which I've always interpreted as "Darkvision does not work through magical darkness". Call it a throwback to 3.0 darkness, but I've always ruled it that way. The psicrystal was able to tell him relative locations, not full on sight. The psicrystal was on the ceiling, in the center of the room, "facing" away from the doorway the PCs entered. The psion did not utilize the psicrystal to aim any abilities, purely used it to know numbers and approximate locations of enemies. It gave no benefit whatsoever. Everyone, and I mean everyone, including the opponents, suffered the 20% miss chance. I allowed a sunrod and a dancing lights spell to illuminate the adjacent squares with shadowy illumination, even though the darkness spell states they do not function. Any more clarifications I would be more than glad to provide. I actually house-ruled in the player's favor on this one.
lastknightleft 09-21-07, 03:48 PM	Yeah, I knew this and wasn't upset, I just wanted to double check since I thought magical and supernatural were different things. I didn't have a problem with the ruling as it stood, but as a DM too, I need to know these things for my other games. And I should have clarified that it was deeper darkness, and just so you know, 3.5 keeps the stipulation that darkvision doesn't work in a darkness spell, And I knew you ruled in our favor and knew he couldn't see, like I said, I was just clarifying because I'm annoyingly **** retentive about reading the rules for myself and because if it turns out differently, having a page refrence leaves out the possibility of something that players have done in my other game where they said "I read in one of the books that..." and they never read anything of the sort.
lastknightleft 09-21-07, 03:51 PM	plus this is my SOP whenever something comes up and I don't own the books to refrence.
McPoyo 09-21-07, 03:53 PM	No no, my post was two parts, the part to you and those who were helpful with your question, and the part to the people who were making assumptions :P I totally understand what you mean, and the difference between Deeper Darkness and normal darkness is only duration and size, I just figured I'd throw it out there too.
Scion of Coldshard 09-21-07, 05:28 PM	So Deeper = wider and Darkness = candlelight.. and people complain about psionic naming conventions ;)