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Archives of Nethys

Pathfinder RPG (2nd Edition) Pathfinder RPG (1st Edition) Starfinder RPG

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Mastering Intrigue / Spells of Intrigue / Mid-Level Play (7–12)

Enchantments

Source Ultimate Intrigue pg. 162
In mid-level play, enchantments become more versatile, affecting more creature types, and dominate spells also come into play.

Dominate Person: Unlike suggestion, this spell gives the caster total control over another character, and the demands don’t need to be reasonable. The one saving grace in a game that employs intrigue is that the Sense Motive DC to detect the effect is only 15, so someone is very likely to notice it. Still, the effect is quite powerful, and it can potentially ruin a player’s time if her character becomes dominated, or it can ruin a plot if players dominate a vital NPC. The spell even allows a caster to use the dominated creature as a spy and see through its eyes, though again, the low DC of the Sense Motive check means that there are usually better ways to do so. In addition to other means of protecting against compulsions, dominate person has two special escape clauses.

First, the creature never takes obviously self-destructive actions. The spell doesn’t mention whether this means only bodily harm, but there are many sorts of destruction beyond the physical. For instance, a command to make a king announce something that will obviously irreparably destroy his reputation and tear his kingdom apart likely counts. Even if something isn’t obviously self-destructive, each time a command forces the dominated person to take actions against his nature, he receives another saving throw with a +2 bonus. It’s up to you to determine how often to give these new saving throws if orders result in many successive acts against a character’s nature, but be fair in applying them at the same rate for both PCs and NPCs. Since being dominated can be highly frustrating for PCs, you can consider choosing a particularly fast rate in applying these new saving throws in both cases, though be sure to let the PCs know about this if it looks like they can use a dominate effect before the NPCs do. The advice here also applies to dominate monster.