Author Topic: I sense a presence...  (Read 2599 times)

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Prime32

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I sense a presence...
« on: October 24, 2010, 12:24:15 PM »
Right now, we have detect good, detect undead, etc. However, have you ever heard the phrase "I could sense his killing intent" come from a non-magical character? Likewise, ascetics can conceal their "presence".


I want to expand auras, and the ability to detect them. I figure this could become a new skill in the vein of Spot/Listen, or be combined with Sense Motive. Maybe a new skill to find them and SM to pick up on details. Anyway, a character's aura could have descriptors you can pick up. A good cleric or an angel would have [Good], a frenzied berserker would have [Rage], a Vow of Peace guy would have [Peace], etc. You can detect powerful auras from far away, but usually need to be closer to tell what kind they are. Your aura can "flare" when you perform certain actions, in the same way that certain actions are louder and easier to notice with Listen checks.

Has anyone done any work on this before?
My work
The tier system in a nutshell:
[spoiler]Tier 6: A cartographer.
Tier 5: An expert cartographer or a decent marksman.
Tier 4: An expert marksman.
Tier 3: An expert marksman, cartographer and chef who can tie strong knots and is trained in hostage negotiation or a marksman so good he can shoot down every bullet fired by a minigun while armed with a rusted single-shot pistol that veers to the left.
Tier 2: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything, or the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.
Tier 1: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything and the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.[/spoiler]

Prime32

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #1 on: October 24, 2010, 12:31:51 PM »
If using these rules, Hide/Move Silently and Search/Spot/Listen should probably be merged.


Detect Presence (Wis)

Check: Your Detect Presence check is either made against a DC that reflects how powerful the aura is that you might sense.

Success indicates that you notice the aura and its rough direction. If you can see the owner of the aura, you recognise it as theirs. Success by 5 or more lets you tell whether the owner's CR is greater than, lower than or equal to yours. For every +1 by which you succed on the DC, you can tell the owner's CR within 1 number of accuracy. For instance, if you roll 6 higher than required, you can tell if your opponent's CR is 2 or more below yours, 1 below yours, equal to yours, 1 above yours, or 2 or more above yours. If you roll 7 above the DC you can tell the CR range within 3 of your own, and so on.

Action: Varies. Every time you have a chance to sense something in a reactive manner (such as when someone casts a spell or you move into a new area), you can make a Detect Presence check without using an action. Trying to detect something you failed to detect previously is a move action.

Try Again: Yes. You can try to detect something that you failed to sense previously with no penalty.

Special: When several characters are training their senses on the same thing, a single 1d20 roll can be used for all the individuals' Detect Presence checks.
A fascinated creature takes a -4 penalty on Detect Presence checks made as reactions.
A ranger gains a bonus on Detect Presence checks when using this skill against a favored enemy.
A sleeping character may make Detect Presence checks at a -10 penalty. A successful check awakens the sleeper.

DCs:
+2Through a door
+5Through a stone wall
+10Through a magical barrier
+1Per 10 feet of distance
+5Listener distracted
-1per CR of the subject
Subject is...
+20Unconscious
+5Surrounded by auras with identical descriptors (for each descriptor not shared by group, the DC bonus is reduced by 1, to a minimum of +0)
-5Moving more than 5ft per round


Conceal Presence (Wis)

Check: Your Conceal Presence check reduces your effective CR for the purposes of Detect Presence checks. This can reduce your CR to a negative figure. You can always take 10 on a Conceal Presence check.

Action: Concealing your presence for 1 round requires a move action.

Special: If you possess the Tranquility feat, concealing your presence requires a swift action and you may make Conceal Presence checks while unconscious.

Modifiers:
+5Concealing one descriptor only
+0Acting normally
-5Thinking about an action reflecting your aura
-10Performing an action reflecting your aura


Sense Motive (Wis)

Additional use: Analyse aura
If you have sensed someone's aura with the Detect Presence skill, you may make a Sense Motive check to determine its qualities. Make Sense Motive checks against each descriptor of the aura, applying the modifiers for the Detect Presence skill. Success indicates that you are aware of that quality of their aura.
« Last Edit: October 24, 2010, 05:40:15 PM by Prime32 »
My work
The tier system in a nutshell:
[spoiler]Tier 6: A cartographer.
Tier 5: An expert cartographer or a decent marksman.
Tier 4: An expert marksman.
Tier 3: An expert marksman, cartographer and chef who can tie strong knots and is trained in hostage negotiation or a marksman so good he can shoot down every bullet fired by a minigun while armed with a rusted single-shot pistol that veers to the left.
Tier 2: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything, or the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.
Tier 1: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything and the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.[/spoiler]

veekie

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #2 on: October 24, 2010, 01:06:37 PM »
Hmm, I had some ideas upon this line as well, obviating the Detect Alignment, Detect Magic effects in favor of a more general aura sight
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Prime32

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #3 on: October 24, 2010, 01:08:17 PM »
Hmm, I had some ideas upon this line as well, obviating the Detect Alignment, Detect Magic effects in favor of a more general aura sight
Perhaps paladins could gain a bonus on Sense Motive checks made to identify an aura as evil?

Maybe only your levels in certain classes contribute to descriptors? For instance a CE barbarian 3/cleric 5 would have an aura strength of 8, but his [Rage] aura would be 3 and his [Evil] aura would be 5. Or something like ToB multiclassing for strengths of Rage 5/Evil 6. That breaks separation of fluff and mechanics a little though.
« Last Edit: October 24, 2010, 01:17:44 PM by Prime32 »
My work
The tier system in a nutshell:
[spoiler]Tier 6: A cartographer.
Tier 5: An expert cartographer or a decent marksman.
Tier 4: An expert marksman.
Tier 3: An expert marksman, cartographer and chef who can tie strong knots and is trained in hostage negotiation or a marksman so good he can shoot down every bullet fired by a minigun while armed with a rusted single-shot pistol that veers to the left.
Tier 2: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything, or the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.
Tier 1: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything and the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.[/spoiler]

SiggyDevil

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #4 on: October 24, 2010, 03:26:40 PM »
There was an AD&D Psionics power that could detect killing intent/aggression...


Also, you should fold Conceal Presence into another skill such as Concentration. Most classes don't have the skill points to spare.

Prime32

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #5 on: October 24, 2010, 03:29:41 PM »
Also, you should fold Conceal Presence into another skill such as Concentration. Most classes don't have the skill points to spare.
Good idea. It seems Wis-based though.
My work
The tier system in a nutshell:
[spoiler]Tier 6: A cartographer.
Tier 5: An expert cartographer or a decent marksman.
Tier 4: An expert marksman.
Tier 3: An expert marksman, cartographer and chef who can tie strong knots and is trained in hostage negotiation or a marksman so good he can shoot down every bullet fired by a minigun while armed with a rusted single-shot pistol that veers to the left.
Tier 2: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything, or the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.
Tier 1: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything and the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.[/spoiler]

awaken DM golem

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #6 on: October 24, 2010, 04:53:31 PM »
hmm ... Scrying had a skill check in 3.0e, but it could have been a Lesser Scrying until the spell Scry X became available.

Sure, anything tagged onto "a" or the skill system, suggests strongly a parcel or portion of a 1st or 2nd level spell.
And why not? Casters can't have all the goodies (or shouldn't).


Maybe this is like a new Ethereal Sense type thing, less than Ghost Touch, less than See Invisible.
Clairvoyance/-audience meets Tremorsense, with degrees of skill-system-yness,
Death Sense or Life Sense or Transmutation Sense, etc ...


Shouldn't monsters have evolved by now, into something with Druid Sense ?!

Prime32

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #7 on: October 24, 2010, 05:22:25 PM »
Shouldn't monsters have evolved by now, into something with Druid Sense ?!
Going by fluff, druids should have less of a presence - I suppose that's covered a little by their Wis focus, and the "similar auras" rule.

I sense... TVTropes:
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MySignificanceSenseIsTingling
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheForceIsStrongWithThisOne


I'm unsure whether or not these skills should be Trained Only. I've seen media where a guy blocks his Ki or whatever but normal people can still sense his killing intent when they're close. So maybe you can make (Ex) checks untrained... Maybe a separation between personality-based auras and power-based ones? Or personality-based auras could work entirely with Sense Motive, reserving Detect Presence for supernatural stuff.

Spells could provide bonuses for detecting certain types of aura, or help you conceal yours. Maybe feats for things like that technique in Claymore where you can predict a demon's movements by detecting the flow of energy to a limb.
« Last Edit: October 24, 2010, 05:40:49 PM by Prime32 »
My work
The tier system in a nutshell:
[spoiler]Tier 6: A cartographer.
Tier 5: An expert cartographer or a decent marksman.
Tier 4: An expert marksman.
Tier 3: An expert marksman, cartographer and chef who can tie strong knots and is trained in hostage negotiation or a marksman so good he can shoot down every bullet fired by a minigun while armed with a rusted single-shot pistol that veers to the left.
Tier 2: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything, or the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.
Tier 1: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything and the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.[/spoiler]

oslecamo

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #8 on: October 24, 2010, 06:24:35 PM »
Spells could provide bonuses for detecting certain types of aura, or help you conceal yours. Maybe feats for things like that technique in Claymore where you can predict a demon's movements by detecting the flow of energy to a limb.

With all due respect, I sense that you're overcomplicating this too much.

Sense motive  suposed to do what you want, aka telling the mood of another person.

 If somebody wants to pretend they're weak then they need to Bluff, wich is countered by, you guessed it, sense motive. That's how the one thousand years old demon sorceress pretends she's an harmless high school student. She isn't using fancy spells or tecniques, she just has a massive bluff bonus. Ok, and disguise check/change shape. But again, already covered by the rules.

Predicting enemy movements/Ki it's for what stuff like the monk's Wis to AC is. Some maneuvers kinda cover it as well. And no, not all warriors can see invisible energies. There's also blindsense, tremorsense, metagamesense, mindsight, Knowledge devotion, ect, ect.

Some bigger monsters then have stuff like frightfull presence and other similar abilities to show "Killing intenct", wich can also be granted by numerous already existing Prcs and other stuff. And then there's ways to counter that stuff like fear immunity

Finally, rogues don't really need to be even more screwed on the hiding department by giving everybody yet another way to see them coming.

Prime32

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #9 on: October 24, 2010, 06:43:33 PM »
Spells could provide bonuses for detecting certain types of aura, or help you conceal yours. Maybe feats for things like that technique in Claymore where you can predict a demon's movements by detecting the flow of energy to a limb.

With all due respect, I sense that you're overcomplicating this too much.

Sense motive  suposed to do what you want, aka telling the mood of another person.

 If somebody wants to pretend they're weak then they need to Bluff, wich is countered by, you guessed it, sense motive. That's how the one thousand years old demon sorceress pretends she's an harmless high school student. She isn't using fancy spells or tecniques, she just has a massive bluff bonus. Ok, and disguise check/change shape. But again, already covered by the rules.

Predicting enemy movements/Ki it's for what stuff like the monk's Wis to AC is. Some maneuvers kinda cover it as well. And no, not all warriors can see invisible energies. There's also blindsense, tremorsense, metagamesense, mindsight, Knowledge devotion, ect, ect.

Some bigger monsters then have stuff like frightfull presence and other similar abilities to show "Killing intenct", wich can also be granted by numerous already existing Prcs and other stuff. And then there's ways to counter that stuff like fear immunity

Finally, rogues don't really need to be even more screwed on the hiding department by giving everybody yet another way to see them coming.
What I want is for people to get a bad feeling about what's behind that door without using magic. For especially in-tune people to tell if everyone in the next country over just died.
« Last Edit: October 24, 2010, 06:45:27 PM by Prime32 »
My work
The tier system in a nutshell:
[spoiler]Tier 6: A cartographer.
Tier 5: An expert cartographer or a decent marksman.
Tier 4: An expert marksman.
Tier 3: An expert marksman, cartographer and chef who can tie strong knots and is trained in hostage negotiation or a marksman so good he can shoot down every bullet fired by a minigun while armed with a rusted single-shot pistol that veers to the left.
Tier 2: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything, or the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.
Tier 1: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything and the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.[/spoiler]

oslecamo

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #10 on: October 24, 2010, 06:49:53 PM »
What I want is for people to get a bad feeling about what's behind that door without using magic. For especially in-tune people to tell if everyone in the next country over just died.

From the srd

Sense Motive (Wis)
Check

A successful check lets you avoid being bluffed.


Absolutely nothing in the skill says you need to actualy see or even hear the situation. ;)

In my campaigns I would totally allow a dude who invested heavy in sense motive to sense the ambush on the next corridor and other stuff like that.

The_Mad_Linguist

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #11 on: October 24, 2010, 11:50:21 PM »
Reminds me of the sense danger feat from KoK

[spoiler]
Quote from: Sense Danger [psionic]
Prereq: Some regional nonsense.
You can detect the mental presence of any individual within a 30' radius who's currently in the process of attacking you (nocking an arrow, charging, casting, et cetera).  This cannot read their thoughts; only locate where they are."
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bkdubs123

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #12 on: October 25, 2010, 04:07:11 AM »
Maybe it's because I just watched a few episodes of DBZ, but this definitely feels like, "His power level! It's OVER 9000!!!!!!!"

Prime32

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #13 on: October 25, 2010, 10:00:19 AM »
Maybe it's because I just watched a few episodes of DBZ, but this definitely feels like, "His power level! It's OVER 9000!!!!!!!"
That's in basically every shonen series ever, though usually only some people can do it.

"His reiatsu level! It's TWICE THAT OF A CAPTAIN!!!!!!"
"His chakra level! It's EEEEEEEEVIL!!!!!!"
"Her youki level! She's GOING TO AWAKEN!!!!!!"
"His soul level! He's REALLY A HOMUNCULUS!!!!!!"
« Last Edit: October 25, 2010, 10:02:02 AM by Prime32 »
My work
The tier system in a nutshell:
[spoiler]Tier 6: A cartographer.
Tier 5: An expert cartographer or a decent marksman.
Tier 4: An expert marksman.
Tier 3: An expert marksman, cartographer and chef who can tie strong knots and is trained in hostage negotiation or a marksman so good he can shoot down every bullet fired by a minigun while armed with a rusted single-shot pistol that veers to the left.
Tier 2: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything, or the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.
Tier 1: Someone with teleportation, mind control, time manipulation, intangibility, the ability to turn into an exact duplicate of anything and the ability to see into the future with perfect accuracy.[/spoiler]

RobbyPants

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Re: I sense a presence...
« Reply #14 on: October 25, 2010, 10:17:47 AM »
Shouldn't monsters have evolved by now, into something with Druid Sense ?!
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