Is there a ward that causes apathy?

[Dragon lord]

I'm planning to protect a section of dungeon with a permanent illusion, a secret wall behind the illusion and an apathy ward to make people uninterested in investigating the area.  However I can't find an existing spell that would do the apathy, can anyone else think of a way to do it?

[Raineh Daze]

Get a piece of paper, cover it with irrelevant information on breeds of cat. No-one will investigate the area further if it looks like a filing system for the boss's weird hobby.

[phaedrusxy]

This is as close as it gets, as far as I know. It's 1 day/lvl, so you'll have to occasionally refresh it, and it is Illusionary and Mind Affecting (and so lots of things will ignore it). This is one of the most underrated/overlooked spells in the game though, IMO. I saw a thread talking about making giant billboards of it once, but that's about all of the mention I've seen of it, and I've never seen it actually used in a game, sadly.

Edit: Let me elaborate on the "trick" here... you don't actually care about the "hidden" message. You're only going to "abuse" the Suggestion part of the spell. So you make a giant sign that says "GO AWAY" with the Suggestion triggered being "Go away and forget you ever saw this place". (Or if you're opening a new burger joint, and want to drum up business, make a giant sign over the city that says "Eat At Joes!" )

[Reshy]

There is a spell called Antipathy that causes the following effect:

You cause an object or location to emanate magical vibrations that repel either a specific kind of intelligent creature or creatures of a particular alignment, as defined by you. The kind of creature to be affected must be named specifically. A creature subtype is not specific enough. Likewise, the specific alignment to be repelled must be named.

Creatures of the designated kind or alignment feel an overpowering urge to leave the area or to avoid the affected item.

A compulsion forces them to abandon the area or item, shunning it and never willingly returning to it while the spell is in effect. A creature that makes a successful saving throw can stay in the area or touch the item but feels uncomfortable doing so. This distracting discomfort reduces the creature’s Dexterity score by 4 points.

Doesn't sound quite like what you are interested in, but it's something I could find.

[faeryn]

Have the area warded with Suggestion... and have the suggestion be "nothing interesting here"... there you go... you have successfully created an Apathy Ward...

[SolEiji]

There is, but I don't care to find it again.

[Raineh Daze]

Yes, let's just go with fancy magical solutions rather than making people think it's unimportant.

[faeryn]

yes... well an elaborate treatise on bird watching can be deciphered... also... if you tell a player that there is something there that could be even remotely interesting to someone... then they are guaranteed to investigate it... however if you use magical means to convince them that it is unimportant... then they will have to obey and ignore it... it's far easier to convince players to do what you want through game mechanics than it is through creative description...


For example... if you elaborately describe 3 sides of a room and everything but then skip over the 4th side or say something along the lines of "there's nothing important here" or whatever... you can almost guarantee that your players will spend more time investigating that one blank wall than the 3 other sides of the room combined... now if you had something important to hide in one of those other 3 sides of the room then this is a great strategy... but if that one "unimportant" side had the real secret then they are going to make a b-line straight for it... likewise if you mention something on one side of a room that sounds to you as mundane and uninteresting you will find that it has become the most interesting thing in the entire room to your players and they will of course investigate it...

descriptions can often cause the party to do the exact opposite of what you want them to do... while compulsion effects give you that wonderful tool of "you will do exactly what I want you to do for once"

[Raineh Daze]

yes... well an elaborate treatise on bird watching can be deciphered... also... if you tell a player that there is something there that could be even remotely interesting to someone... then they are guaranteed to investigate it... however if you use magical means to convince them that it is unimportant... then they will have to obey and ignore it...

If someone investigates an elaborate text on cat breeding, and finds that it actually IS a mundane elaborate text on cat breeding, they'll move on, without the warning of 'someone's rolling a d20'. And the numerous ways to ignore mental control can't bypass 'this is what it looks like'.

As for 'one side': I suggested making the whole room filing.

[faeryn]

yes... well an elaborate treatise on bird watching can be deciphered... also... if you tell a player that there is something there that could be even remotely interesting to someone... then they are guaranteed to investigate it... however if you use magical means to convince them that it is unimportant... then they will have to obey and ignore it...

If someone investigates an elaborate text on cat breeding, and finds that it actually IS a mundane elaborate text on cat breeding, they'll move on, without the warning of 'someone's rolling a d20'. And the numerous ways to ignore mental control can't bypass 'this is what it looks like'.

True... but players investigate everything that gets mentioned and everything that gets passed over in description as well... Piles of gold on one side of the room, absolutely nothing on the other... they will search the blank wall for secret doors and traps... then go and loot as much gold as they can...


also I had a DM that liked to "pre-roll" his dice at random points in the campaign... he'd just roll a d20 like 5-10 times write down results and then as we played and things occurred he'd use those results rather than roll another d20...

[SolEiji]

A variation on what Raineh suggests is the decoy of interest.  Instead of text on cat breeding, it's very interesting text about the password to the secret safe on the other side of the room.  The safe filled with a few dozen gold.  A minor reward, but who would suspect that after they have clearly obtained "the reward" a greater reward was right under their nose.

[faeryn]

A variation on what Raineh suggests is the decoy of interest.  Instead of text on cat breeding, it's very interesting text about the password to the secret safe on the other side of the room.  The safe filled with a few dozen gold.  A minor reward, but who would suspect that after they have clearly obtained "the reward" a greater reward was right under their nose.

Ok... that would most certainly work on the vast majority of players...