#ghost sound

[singular-ghost-sound]

*ghost sound*

[hammy-the-hamiest-hamster-of-all]

*spooky month ghost sound*

@live-laugh-love-the-archivists YOU

[stardivingsea]

*holiday ghost sound*

boo who?

[divuki]

*ghost sound*

(That are in the WALLLLS)

[we-are-a-dragon]

DM: The mindflayer - because I can call it that now! - calls loudly, "Yes, my kind are not usually trusted. I will work hard to gain your trust. I am done with grave tidings; onto happier news! The witch hunter presence in Suda will be growing in the next few weeks, cracking down harder on the corruption in this city." The crowd grows more restless.

Hamish (playing Thaddeus): I thought you said we were past the grave tidings...

Adam (playing Billie): I use ghost sound to make my voice come from the other side of the square. "How will more witch hunters help??"

DM: He goes on, "The prophecy foretells that a stranger from a distant land will bring death and destruction to Suda. It also foretells that Suda will be saved by one 'from the deep'." He gives a significant pause.

Tati (playing Seraph): *ticking on fingers* List of people we know 'from the deep' just off the top of my head. Telchal, Glatur, Alwel maybe, that Queen Davalith...

DM: Seraph.

Tati: Shit, yeah. Huh. *thinks*

DM: He says, "Suda will prevail with the witch hunters to protect us. Join the witch hunters-"

Adam: *incredulous* It's a recruitment drive! I can't believe it!

[wearesorcerer]

Spell: Sending -- or “On School Distinctions“

5e players might be wondering why I’m talking about a spell which isn’t on the Sorcerer spell list (it’s a Bard, Cleric, and Wizard spell in 5e and a Warlock invocation [though much better than the 3.5 invocation, which allowed an unwilling recipient to roll Will and, on a success, deal 1d10 damage to the invoker]). The answer is simple: Sorcerers and Wizards in 3.x (including Pathfinder 1e) share a spell list and it is on that list.

I’m also not going to be talking about why you should take this spell. After all, it has infinite range and can only fail 5% of the time (= rolling a Nat 1) if the recipient is on another plane. That’s quite handy, even if you only get 25 words out of each casting.

So, why talk about it at all?

Simple: the school doesn’t make sense.

The wording for sending hasn’t changed much in 5e from its 3.5 form save for the addition of one important clause: “The creature hears the message in its mind.” This was completely absent from the 3.5 version of the spell, which didn’t describe in any fashion what was transpiring. Were you appearing before someone a la Obi-Wan before Luke in The Empire Strikes Back? Were you communicating telepathically? Was the effect similar to whispering wind in that it transmitted sound? We were given no details on the subject.

5e’s clarification is somewhat helpful, but there’s a glaring problem with it: why on Earth is it an Evocation spell?

The school of Evocation is complementary to the school of Conjuration: while Conjuration creates or moves matter, Evocation does the same with...well, it’s called energy in D&D, but most of the time it isn’t:

Fire is a chemical reaction (combustion) and a not-quite plasma. Thermal energy is heat, but fire spells don’t usually create just heat, but flames.

Fun fact: a flame is a gas that emits light, but there aren’t enough ionized molecules in most flames for them to become true plasmas (generally, only the hottest flames are plasmas).

Cold effects typically conjure actual ice or snow, though they could theoretically conjure areas of intense cold (draining the heat from that area, I suppose).

Electricity effects resemble lightning, which can also be plasma, and in general electricity is the flow of matter that possesses electrical charge (though electromagnetic energy is a thing).

Force effects are highly debatable in what they represent.

When telekinetic effects are treated as Evocation (Force) effects, they could be an actual example of Evocation manipulating energy.

Really, the only damage type which is unequivocally “energy” damage is sound. This would allow sending to work as an Evocation effect if it generated sound (as is possible in 3.5).

Here’s the thing, though: the cantrip ghost sound (3.5)/minor illusion (5e) creates a sound exactly as sending might, but is considered an Illusion. Since subschools went away in 5e, it’s helpful to note that ghost sound is specifically a figment -- an illusion that “creates a false sensation,” which is a poorly worded way of saying that it creates an external stimulus. Holograms are figments: the light is real, but the object the light seems to make isn’t. (I’ve discussed this issue previously.)

If sending created a sound or image, it really should be an Illusion, shouldn’t it?

Oh, but it gets better.

Sending can be seen as a higher level version of message,¹ which is a Transmutation effect for some reason. (Transmutation has long been treated as the “miscellaneous” school, even though there’s been a Universal one since at least 3.0.)

If sending is telepathic, as it is in 5e, one would think it would be an Enchantment effect or possibly an Illusion (Phantasm).

So there we are: it’s reasonable to classify sending (without 5e’s clarification) as one of four schools and two subschools. With 5e’s clarification, it could still be three schools, since it still occupies one that doesn’t otherwise make sense.

There are many such corner cases where the school of magic doesn’t really make sense, but this is largely because of how D&D has chosen to classify magical effects -- largely, though not entirely, by what they do rather than how they work.

¹ Incidentally, the 3.5 version of message is overall better than the 5e version save that the 5e version doesn’t specify if an observer can read your lips.

[zoeflake]

air - ghost sound

[singular-ghost-sound]

If anyone is interested in what I’m doing today. I am digging a giant fucking hole in my backyard. :D