3.5e invisibility and collatoral damage

[linklord231]

I'd definitely allow buff spells, like an arcane version of Sanctuary.  It's also in keeping with the original rules. 

[phaedrusxy]

I'd definitely allow buff spells, like an arcane version of Sanctuary.  It's also in keeping with the original rules.

And healing. Some clerics (and archivists) can cast Invisibility after all, and anyone can buy the ring. I guess I think nothing needs to be actually changed about the rules. Just interpret it very strictly if in doubt.

[Eldritch_Lord]

I'd definitely allow buff spells, like an arcane version of Sanctuary.  It's also in keeping with the original rules.

And healing. Some clerics (and archivists) can cast Invisibility after all, and anyone can buy the ring.  I guess I think nothing needs to be actually changed about the rules. Just interpret it very strictly if in doubt.

I think defining an attack spell as "a non-Personal, non-(Harmless) spell that requires an attack roll or forces a saving throw, or inflicts damage, a status effect, or a penalty to any rolls in the round it is cast" would do it.  That resolves the question of whether cloudkill and similar spells count as an attack, and should address most corner cases.

Cast a wall of fire or cloudkill?  If you hurt someone that round, it's an attack, otherwise it's not.  Summon a monster?  It doesn't get to act until the next round, so it's not an attack.  Try to open a pit under someone with stone shape?  They get a Ref save to avoid falling, therefore it's an attack.  The same-round distinction between direct and indirect effects is basically arbitrary, but it allows for summoning/BFC while disallowing blasting like invisibility is "supposed" to.

[Bauglir]

I don't like that "in the round it was cast" wording. It implies the spell is prescient. If an immediate action moves something out of or into the range, it somehow predicts that? And you still have the problem of Fighters throwing themselves into its path just to break invisibility, you just limit it to the first round. And does the invisibility break when you cast, or when it becomes counted as an attack?

No, I think the root of this problem is trying to make this at all dependent on outcomes. Whether or not you break invisibility should be entirely dependent on the action you take, not what consequences it has for other entities. I prefer any spellcasting at all, but did mention those alternatives for people who prefer something a little more flexible and/or hate mundanes just a little more. If nothing else, though, casting cloudkill or wall of fire should either break invisibility, or not, end of story. No mincing about "Well is somebody in its path?"

If you absolutely must tie it to "Did I hurt somebody", have it check as you cast, though. If nobody's in the cloudkill when it's initially conjured, you don't break invisibility, no matter how many people go charging through it later on.

EDIT: And I think letting BFC work with invisibility but not anything else is a terrible design decision, so that's coloring my suggestions a bit. It's not like BFC has gotten the short end of any other stick in the game.

[nijineko]

I don't like that "in the round it was cast" wording. It implies the spell is prescient.

i don't see how that implication holds water. rather, claiming that throwing oneself into a wall of fire canceling the invisibility would be the spells-are-prescient claim. iirc, the original rai on this went something along the lines of 'did the caster do something that revealed an invisible being was present, like attacking someone, or throwing something at someone, or casting an obvious spell at someone. not that those are all definable metrics for the whole am-i-still-invisible concept.



for purposes of simple adjudication, and for purposes of player ingenuity, i like the "in the round it was cast" wording. not that casters really need yet another boost. for me, having to track all the possible lay-in-wait spells a caster might have going against the might-be-cancelled-if effects is too much bookkeeping to be worth it.

[Eldritch_Lord]

If nothing else, though, casting cloudkill or wall of fire should either break invisibility, or not, end of story. No mincing about "Well is somebody in its path?"

If you cast a fireball into the air as a glorified 20-foot-radius flare, would that be an attack?  If you cast a cloudkill over an empty lake and just let it float there until it dissipated, is that an attack?  Defining an attack has to be contextual.

If you absolutely must tie it to "Did I hurt somebody", have it check as you cast, though. If nobody's in the cloudkill when it's initially conjured, you don't break invisibility, no matter how many people go charging through it later on.

The "in the same round" wording ensures that you can't place a wall of fire next to someone or a cloudkill 10 feet from someone so it damages them on their turn and not count it as an attack, in order to avoid the corner cases mentioned upthread.

EDIT: And I think letting BFC work with invisibility but not anything else is a terrible design decision, so that's coloring my suggestions a bit. It's not like BFC has gotten the short end of any other stick in the game.

If the idea is to rebalance the spell, sure.  If it's just to clarify how the spell works, BFC and buffing should continue working as the designers intended (as far as we know).

[taltamir]

I'd definitely allow buff spells, like an arcane version of Sanctuary.  It's also in keeping with the original rules. 

Sanctuary actually has the same issue. And improved invisibility is a thing. Let the basic invisibility be limited to run away, sneaking, etc. While improved invisibility for combat (be it healing, buffing, or slaying).

Actually, throw martial's a bone and just say "casting a spell disrupt invisibility, attacks do not".... no that was silly, a caster could just invisibility themselves and then out martial the martials

[X-Codes]

If nothing else, though, casting cloudkill or wall of fire should either break invisibility, or not, end of story. No mincing about "Well is somebody in its path?"

If you cast a fireball into the air as a glorified 20-foot-radius flare, would that be an attack?  If you cast a cloudkill over an empty lake and just let it float there until it dissipated, is that an attack?  Defining an attack has to be contextual.

Not really, you just need a target.  Even though the enemies in the OP's scenario aren't in the initial AoE, they are still being subjected to the horrible poison fog of death because the OP DID cast it on them, there's just some travel time involved.

[spacemonkey555]

If you cast a fireball into the air as a glorified 20-foot-radius flare, would that be an attack?  If you cast a cloudkill over an empty lake and just let it float there until it dissipated, is that an attack?  Defining an attack has to be contextual.

No, it doesn't. It works perfectly fine as a boolean in plenty of games, it has to since they're computer games, but it neatly eliminates the problem of context, intent and perception. Eliminate context and assign a true/false value to each type of action as far as breaking invis goes. It's not really redefining "attack" for 3.5 dnd, it's redefining the failure mechanism of invisibility for 3.5 dnd.

The only thing I'd do other than barring spells and such is let npc creatures use racial abilities while using racial invis if imo they aren't attacks. Some of them need every little thing to justify their cr and make for a fun encounter, while pc casters don't need strong invis to rule the game.

[Eldritch_Lord]

If you cast a fireball into the air as a glorified 20-foot-radius flare, would that be an attack?  If you cast a cloudkill over an empty lake and just let it float there until it dissipated, is that an attack?  Defining an attack has to be contextual.

No, it doesn't. It works perfectly fine as a boolean in plenty of games, it has to since they're computer games, but it neatly eliminates the problem of context, intent and perception. Eliminate context and assign a true/false value to each type of action as far as breaking invis goes.

It's much easier to enumerate every legal action in a cRPG and assign a boolean value to it than to do so in a tabletop RPG, because you can control the possible actions in a cRPG much more easily.  Unless you want to write out a stupidly long list for every spell or effect ("Fireball used to burn one or more creatures: Attack.  Fireball used as a signal flare: Not an attack.  Fireball used to make a hole in a wall: Not an attack.  Fireball used to make a hole in a wall that secretly contains an incorporeal undead: Attack" and so on), it's much better to define invisibility-breaking conditions taking context into account and let the players' brains do the heavy lifting rather than the rules.

[spacemonkey555]

It's much easier to enumerate every legal action in a cRPG and assign a boolean value to it than to do so in a tabletop RPG, because you can control the possible actions in a cRPG much more easily.  Unless you want to write out a stupidly long list for every spell or effect ("Fireball used to burn one or more creatures: Attack.  Fireball used as a signal flare: Not an attack.  Fireball used to make a hole in a wall: Not an attack.  Fireball used to make a hole in a wall that secretly contains an incorporeal undead: Attack" and so on), it's much better to define invisibility-breaking conditions taking context into account and let the players' brains do the heavy lifting rather than the rules.

That would be silly. I meant banning entire classes of actions, like all spellcasting, maneuvers, etc.

You're saying the definition of attack has to be contextual, I'm saying it can be simplified to be noncontextual since context complicates the issue. I played several games back in the day that modeled their invis on dnd, they couldn't spend the months of coding and server resources on figuring out context, so they made the action break invis regardless of result. Invis was a sneaking and ambush power, you could set something up with it, or get somewhere, but once there you knew it would drop the instant you clicked a spell or started your attack. Worked fine. For them an attack (wrt invis) was turning on attack or spellcasting.

[Bauglir]

I'd rather just say "Fireball: Attack". It's much better to choose break conditions based on easily identifiable game mechanics than to make players' brains do the heavy lifting, when it comes to interpreting your intent as a designer. If you cast Fireball as a signal flare and there happens to be a bird you didn't see in the area, does that break invisibility? If so, how is that dependent on the character's intent? If not, does that mean there's a valid optimization reason to blind yourself? If you cast a Wall of Fire and somebody charges through it to break your invisibility, does that mean that whether your spell counts as an attack is up to other creatures as much as you?

EDIT: And I'd consider firing an arrow into the air an "attack" for similar reasons. An action's qualities can't depend on consequences that haven't happened yet, which the context you're insisting on requires. If I push a button, whether it's an attack or not shouldn't depend on whether I know what it does.