Incorporeal
Friggin’ occultists! I had this comic all planned out. There was gonna be ghost busting and spell-slinging and all manner of by-the-books spiritual banishment. I mean, this is a 6th level occult spellcaster we’re talking about! Thematically they’re all about dealing with the unquiet dead. The occultist even gets a planchette as one of its default accessories! It would stand to reason that they’ve got some go-to means for fighting incorporeal critters, right? Well no. Not unless you rely on the always-unexciting cure line of spells. It’s only when you get to 5th level magic and entrap spirit (pictured in today’s comic) that you wind up with purpose-built ghost bustery.
Now I know my audience, so I have no doubt that one of you nerds will pipe up with, “Ha-ha! You missed the obvious solution psychic power in ‘Expanded Occult: The Guide to More Optional Options.'” But let’s be fair. If you’ve got to look it up, it probably isn’t that obvious of a solution.
And that, my friends, is the real point of today’s comic. So often when we’re building characters we wind up checking off the can deal damage box, the respectable saving throw box, and the I have decent AC box. But you’re going to have to fight actual monsters rather than theoretical ones. And that means planning some kind of response to swarms, flying enemies, aquatic critters, and indeed to incorporeals. Even if that response is, “I rely on my buddies in this scenario,” it pays to double-check with the rest of party. If that’s their plan too, then you might want to revise your strategy. Because the last thing you want to do is find yourself face-to-face with the shade of Wicked Uncle, realize that none of your usual tricks work, and go, “Umm… I guess I delay.”
So then! For today’s discussion question, what do you say we run a quick incorporeal safety check? Your character is faced with an obnoxious ghost. It’s phasing through walls, resisting your non-magical attacks, and possessing your big dumb fighter’s big dumb body. What’s your plan for exorcising this repellent revenant? Sound off with all your best ghost busting techniques down in the comments!
THIS COMIC SUCKS! IT NEEDS MORE [INSERT OPINION HERE] Is your favorite class missing from the Handbook of Heroes? Maybe you want to see more dragonborn or aarakocra? Then check out the “Quest Giver” reward level over on the The Handbook of Heroes Patreon. You’ll become part of the monthly vote to see which elements get featured in the comic next!
I tend to default to disrupt undead once I run out of magic missiles, to be honest. ^^; Ghost salts were a fun addition. Holy water sometimes works.
I can never make myself pick holy water over alchemist fire at character gen. You just wind up hitting more enemies with an all-purpose AoE, even if holy water is purpose-built for the much-tougher-and-more-likely-to-TPK encounters.
The solution to hauntings, as with most things, is the precision application of lead and explosives.
Ghosts can’t haunt the building if there’s no building any more.
Ah yes, the Harry Dresden method of ghostbusting.
The scary movie from my childhood is “The Ring.” The reason it messed with me so hard is that it broke the comfortable rules of haunting. Appeasing the ghost didn’t work. It came and killed you anyway, because it’s an evil little shit.
I’m not sure that “destroy its home” is a guarantee. 🙁
At least it didn’t lead to global extinction like “Ju-On”.
In the movie, anyway. The manga goes there as well, if I recall correctly.
My party, by what I’m pretty sure was blind freaking luck, was surprisingly well prepared for incorporeals. One of us was a Psion with all sorts of powers that had a 50% chance to do damage. One of us had bought a fistful of an obscure single use item called a moon-shard based on the name alone during character creation; it’s a ranged force attack, and so completely bypassed incorporeality. And I was playing a Crusader/Rogue (Crusaders have to believe in something, and Smyler was a firm believer in himself) who had picked up a power from the homebrew Falling Star discipline to improve his ranged options… which it turned out, also made that attack do force damage. And we had a little holy water on hand, which it was ruled could be used as an improvised melee weapon against incorporeal monsters without shattering the vial, letting me and our grappler dual wield them.
It very nearly wasn’t enough. So no shit there we were, exploring the undead infested sewers and IIRC mid-fight against ghouls and zombies, when out of the walls comes this wispy, writhing, insanity spewing thing. We didn’t know it at the time, but we were up against an Allip, the most notoriously overpowered for its CR monster in 3.5. First, we all saved against its insane whispers, which very nearly got my character (Smyler) before it was determined that his racial bonus against enchantment effects counted here. It attacked our divine bard, draining their Wisdom and leaving them unable to cast spells, and retreated into the floor. Our bard, by the way, was the only member of the party capable of curing Wisdom drain, so that damage was effectively permanent, as would be all future damage from the undead nightmare.
Our grappler focuses on the other enemies; the rest of us ready our actions and wait for it to pop back up. Lucky me, I actually had access to my force arrow maneuver that round, and I fired away! And completely missed, meaning I had about 3 turns to wait before I’d have access to that maneuver again. Our druid fires her moon-shard at it, which definitely seems to upset it but doesn’t noticeably injure the damn thing. Our cat psion fires away with a blast that fails the 50% chance to connect.
This goes on for another turn or so before we decide that we’re outmatched. Smyler has the best touch AC and the best movement speed, so he stays put and keeps its attention while everyone else beats a hasty retreat. I approach, weapon in-hand, and make the fateful decision to attack defensively, taking -4 to-hit in exchange for a +3 bonus to AC (higher than normal thanks to a synergy bonus from my tumble skill). This, incidentally, makes me the only person I’ve even heard of to use the fighting defensively rules. But it proved to be the right decision, as the Allip swings at me… and misses by 1. At this point, everyone else is far enough away, so I put my 40ft movement speed to use and bolt out of there. It takes one last opportunity attack against me against my now lower AC, which also misses by one.
We regrouped in the town, found an NPC capable of curing our bard, and started to plan.
Generous ruling. I could see coating a monk’s hands in holy water and letting holy punches work for 1dX rounds or something… But on the other hand, when you’re dealing with patently unfair monsters, it makes sense to give the players a freebie. That’s not exactly a comfortable heuristic when you’re trying to play an RAW game, but damned if it isn’t occasionally the right one.
I mean, since it’s incorporeal, wouldn’t the glass go straight through the ghost? Leading to it being in direct contact with holy water, which itself wasn’t exposed to air in a way that it could evaporate? Just thinking out loud.
Yeah that was our thinking. IIRC, we also ruled that the holy water itself is still used up (for the same reason it doesn’t indefinitely burn undead it sprays onto, the positive energy and negative energy cancelling each other), but since I had the Quick Draw feat that wasn’t a problem for me.
From the 3.5 SRD:
That’s pretty clear RAW. Using “engineering thinking” to gain an advantage in the game is a grand tradition, but it is gaming the system.
If you want an in-game explanation for why it doesn’t work, you could always use “narrative thinking” to explain the weirdness: “The holy water itself is only part of the equation. This is a gesture of faith, meaning that you must go through the motions of physically anointing the creature.”
Most of the stuff Rock mentioned, and I might buy an Amulet of Mighty Fists – ghost touch for my brawler. My kineticist tank throws Cold blasts (and does half damage). My kineticist healer will have Force blast. My cleric could channel energy. My Dragonfire Adapt/Wu Jen/Chameleon… would really depend on what she has prepared.
A repeatable source of force damage is a godsend in any party. I think your kineticist might be MVP in incorporeal fights.
For dealing with possession a pinch of prevention is worth a pound of cure, in my opinion.
Get that Protection from Evil (or preferably a magic circle against, for the longer duration) going, and your days of worrying about a forthcoming possession is over. If you didn’t predict that predicament it can also help throwing them out, but now it’s only an extra save with +2-4 depending on whether the possessor actually is evil and on whether you already have a resistance bonus.
There’s a few other techniques that can be used if that didn’t work.
If you can prevent the victim from being able to move away, then various effects that force someone to flee can be used to force the possessor to leave, which can be very flavorful.
“The power of Pelor commands you! Flee this body foul demon!” (Command spell, flee command against a shadow demon in a held/stuck body, or the Turn Undead feat against a ghost).
Your own general purpose mind-control (of a kind that works against the possessor) also works wonders. If you take the possessor over you can then just order them to leave your buddy alone.
Ironically, after all my bitching about the occultist, it does come with a built-in protection from evil:
https://www.d20pfsrd.com/alternative-rule-systems/occult-adventures/occult-classes/OCCULTIST/#Magic_Circles_Su
I hate to be that nerd, but you don’t have to look very far for earlier Occultist answers to incorporeal creatures.
Going to the spell list there’s Purge Spirit – a 2nd level necromancy spell that deals full damage to undead.
If you can’t wait that long (4th level) you can use the Magic Weapon spell, or the Legacy Weapon focus power to give yourself a magic weapon (which lets you deal half damage to undead) right from level 1. If you combine them you can turn your non-magic club into a +1 Ghost Touch weapon and deal full damage to undead with your weapons … at level 1.
If either of those sounds like an “expanded occult” option, then … well they came from the same book as the Occultist class.
(Sorry, I’m being that nerd)
My irritation is matched only by my disappointment. 😛
Irritation + Disappointment = Dissipation
… is this how you become incorporeal?
If you become incorporeal then you can deal damage to incorporeal creatures!!
We did it!
You ever read any Robert Ranking? That style of nonsense had me flashing back pretty hard:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Garden_of_Unearthly_Delights
Haha no I haven’t read it, but I’ll definitely check it out.
Stealing from the paizo forums: a +1 ghost touch net. Sure you’re probably not proficient, but it’s a touch attack anyway to entangle the spook up and keep it from jumping into any terrain/objects/people.
Admittedly incorporeals was one area my inquisitor had trouble with. Party ran into a nest of phase spiders, and thanks to not rolling over a 3 for several turns in a row he was in serious trouble of ‘death by 0 con’. And that was including chugging the entire supply of potions of remove disease from the party loot locker.
Heh. Now I’m imagining your inquisitor at the other end of the table:
https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/heroes-feast
That mental image is probably extremely accurate.
Flying and swimming enemies aren’t a problem for my current party… half of us are amphibious, and my ranger can make life difficult for anything in the air. We don’t have anything specific for incorporeal foes, though we’ve got pretty good divine-firepower against undead ones.
Swarms… yeah, we hate swarms. This particular party are pretty formidable in most respects, but lacking a dedicated arcane-type, we’re very short on the kind of area-attacks that are most effective for swarms. And even in parties that have been well equipped for such, we still hate swarms.
What? Who doesn’t love being nauseated and unable to participate in the game for multiple turns in a row?
Snark aside, swarms are the reason I make sure to start play with alchemist’s fire and acid vials. I hate not being able to contribute to combat.
Swarms are terrible at 1st level.
I remember encountering a mosquito swarm in Skull & Shackles. My character and the sorcerer were the only ones who could theoretically harm it, so we stuck behind while the rest of the party ran off. Both died, and so did the sorcerer’s next character (who still holds the record for fastest character death in our group).
Swarms are a neat idea, but I’m not sure how best to use them. Half the party is going to be either useless or burning consumables they only bought in case they encountered a swarm, which strikes me as a sign that the swarms’ monster design doesn’t line up with the rest of the game design.
A swarm of tiny spiders has CR 1/2… a venomous giant spider the size of a horse has CR 1. Guess which one we’d rather be fighting?
Folks love to point out that you can inflict 1 point of fire damage on that mosquito swarm with a bit of burning driftwood. That means it’ll only have time to TPK you thrice over before you whittle it down. :/
A little obscure (Arms & Equipment Guide), but Insectbane Candles are dirt cheap and will keep a lot of swarms at bay (and I think that includes all the swarms immune to weapon damage, except for the really obscure ones like Grave Dust Swarm). From there you can pelt them with flaming logs to your heart’s content, beat a hasty retreat to buy some scrolls of fireball or whatever, or just continue the adventure and pretend this never happened.
Plus, they’ll keep mosquitos off of you while you’re sleeping. No in-game benefit, but your characters will appreciate it!
But yeah, swarms are badly designed.
On the subject of flying enemies, I feel like raging myself whenever a barbarian on a D&D podcast spends their turn staring helplessly at an enemy flying 15′ off the ground, as if the standard 5E barbarian starting equipment didn’t include four javelins.
I know, right? It’s like, look at your friggin’ inventory!
https://www.handbookofheroes.com/archives/comic/dig-deep
never fought ghosts before, but have encountered a couple in the game I am in right now.
one wanted revenge on his father, and we said we would… look into it…
we eventually did, but ended up actually resurrecting the person that was a ghost and with some help from a regent we knew, got some reconciliation going!
so, solution? talk, and therapy! (sort of… )
the other ghost we met was just pissed at us being in an area but instead of fighting it, we told it we were leaving just as soon as we took a cursed item from the area. When I say “we” told it, our extra high charisma, persuasion expertise bard did the talking (and rolled REAL well, with advantage from a magic item she wears), so we got the item and left. The ghost disappeared after we took the item. Turns out, we did not know it was cursed, we were just lying to get past the situation (our bard also has high expertise in deception… intimidation too. She is our “talker”), but it was cursed and the curse on the area was lifted when we took it, so we helped without actually trying!
so, again, solution, talking!
Probably not a 100% solution for ghostly spirits, but hey, so far it has worked for us! 😀
Keep an eye out for shadows! Because sometimes, the ghost isn’t an NPC. Sometimes it’s just a monster. And in those situations, you want an effective character.
as a high level monk, I can punch ghosts!
with 4 high level spell slingers in the group, we should have things covered for possession… maybe.
If all else fails, possession is a good opportunity to work out intraparty conflict.
Monk: “And this is for that time you stole from the party!”
bam wham smack!
Ghost: “Careful! This thing is a rental!”
Hmmm… I wonder what would happen if my cleric casted Banishment on the afflicted fighter?
In D&D 5e, Banishment sends the target to another plane of existence for a brief period of time. So how would the DM rule that? Does both the fighter and the ghost go? Or does one stay? If both go, do both come back?
I don’t think you can push the fighter and leave the ghost in the now-empty square. I don’t think you can teleport the fighter away from the ghost. And by this logic, I don’t think banishment works either.
YMMV of course. I could easily picture a GM letting it work if coupled with a difficult arcana check or some such.
That’s part of the point of today’s comic. If you’ve got to rely on corner cases and GM rulings, it might pay to invest in more definitive solutions.
In pathfinder 2e, I would use healing on the ghost, then more healing, then a bit more healing. I am a cleric, so that’s not much of a problem. I also have a decent number of anti undead or alignment based damage options that work good, and my normal buff spells are also ultra effective vs possession. The other party members may have more problems, but as in 2e incorproeal just gives a lot of resistance, they could still do stuff, particularly since both front liners have holy weapons, and one has legendary will saves and thus won’t fail those, while the other is focused on killing undead as his big thing. Our witch meanwhile will just blast the problem, then blast it some more. if we need healing he will just maze it, giving us time to heal and buff more, and they we’ll just blast it again when it’s back.
Not a fun time to be a ghost.
I’m currently playing four characters right now.
Saana, cecaelian witch: Scour my spell list between turns for something that will make up for my mostly-mundane party members’ inability to do anything but jab with magic weapons.
Ollie Hammerstrong, dwarven monk: I’m a second-level monk, I’m running away and dragging the slow party members with.
Aramis Rupan, half-elf bard (5e): See if the restless spirit is open to diplomacy. Otherwise, I’m first level, run away.
Charles Calvin, helicopter pilot: The heck’s a ghost doing in Atomic Highway?!?
I guess Saana’s the only character at real risk of fighting a ghost, so I might as well look a bit harder at those spells.
To my immense disappointment, but not surprise, phantasmal killer isn’t effective against phantoms. Mortal terror is a bit less effective, but still fun to inflict on ghosts.
I think forgetful slumber works on undead, so I could try that. We’re in an oceanic campaign, so hydrophobia has a decent chance of ending the encounter. Overwhelming grief should buy us time to figure something out.
Ah, the wonders of a mid- to high-level spellcaster. I should probably make a cheat sheet of all the cool spells I have so I don’t forget the one that would be fun to use in a given encounter.
Mortal terror has the mind-affecting tag. Not so great against most ghosts. :/
You can always opt for an appropriate metamagic rod:
https://www.d20pfsrd.com/feats/metamagic-feats/threnodic-spell-metamagic/
Let’s see…Xaari would rig some sort of magitech ectoplasmic vacuum cleaner and charge premium rates to remove the problem. “Thing is weird and also is not looking good? Who you are thinking to call? Arclight Industries!”
Churrik would befriend the ghost.
Doktor Krauss would express his annoyance at such a transparent (ha!) ruse, and look around for a b-list villain with a projector and a mirror array and a contemptible plan to fleece the gullible. If the ghost stubbornly persisted in being real, he would assume that years of heavy cognatogen abuse had finally destroyed his brain, and implement the relevant contingency plans.
OK, I need to know more now.
I assume the relevant contingency plans include bombs and AoE damage.
So… the veil between worlds is growing thin… and BBEG wants Thief alive and sort-of unspoiled for an unknown purpose… not long after Antipaladin mentioning the Abyssal Blood Covenant at the Fienderson family reunion… and the strip with the Number of the Beast is coming up.
Um.
The only thing about the mouse-over text that isn’t feeding into my paranoia is the slanderous remark about Aristocrat’s prosthetic ear, which is actually very stylish. Also, it’s bad form for the one who ordered the removal of the original ear to make nasty remarks about the prosthetic, Evil Uncle. Go into the corner of your mirror, you’re in time out.
Um indeed.
Dude’s name is Wicked Uncle. Gotta live up to that mess somehow.
Laeller would on-the-fly a spell based on his Obfuscation (level 1) and Flamethrower (level 2) spells combined with his researched Forces spell enhancement to create a roiling cloud of fire that also kills incorporeals.
Alyssa summons her ̶S̶t̶a̶n̶d̶ spirit guardian to throw down on even turns.
Jim Jones Knamish shoots a blast from his lighting revolver.
Incidentally, ghosts and all undead in general in my system are essentially souls whose patterns and structures are based on negative energy. Zombies and lesser undead are basically ripped up scraps of negative infused souls (making them easy to make) and greater undead like vampires and mummies and ghosts are basically whole souls that run totally on negative energy instead of positive energy.
Essentially, souls are basically neutral soulplasm (think basically agar jelly) that is then coded with what it is to become. “Normal” souls are infused with positive energy, demonic souls are infused with chaotic and evil energy, celestial souls are good and lawful, etc. Soul patterns are coded on top of this base plasm, and in general more powerful souls have more intricate and complex patterns, whether they were coded that way or were gained through experience and other enhancements.
Thanks for listening to my worldbuilding BTW 🙂
Also, I’m working on getting the playtest ready!
EDIT: When I say playtest, I mean the playtest for my custom system I am producing.
My new class is based on soul-hacking.
Info pls?
It was a joke. You’re treating souls like programmable computers. Why not create a “soul hacker” class?
Definitely a possibility 🙂
Also (inspired by another aspect of my worldbuilding) I just came up with the idea of making a “soul stealer” type options. A bit like Fallen London’s spirifers.
Also, that is the basic idea of the soul lore, but dumbing it down to a joke would be slightly inaccurate. Souls will definitely be an interactive concept though!
Now that you mention it, I can’t think of any of our PCs particularly suited to ghost-busting. The mages stick to “do my spells hit it?” The rogues tend to stick to Thag & Black Mantha’s “Harry Dresden” solution–if the building and/or corpse is destroyed, that oughtta handle it, right? Everyone else huddles behind magic circles or the like and hopes the tank with the ghost touch, undead bane, or disruption weapon can beat the undead with melee. This is also my game night crew that I once nearly accidentally TPK with a swarm of centipedes: by mid-levels, everyone had switched to magical illumination, and I didn’t realize that nobody carried torches anymore.
Hey, there’s nothing wrong with “ghost touch.” It may not be the most exciting solution, but “hit it until it’s dead again” is always an option.
Based on my experiences with Call of Cthulhu, burn it all down. All of it, including the fighter. Only flame can cleanse it. If fire doesn´t work, draw lots to see which investigator have to shoot themselves sp that we can have their ghost fistfight the other ghost until it leaves.
Based on my experience with DND? Have the other party members distract it, while the wizard continually casts Mold Earth to dig a deep hole. Then push the possessed victim down into the hole and pelt them with rocks and small animals until it decides to leave. If that doesn´t work, then the hole should buy the group time to get ahold of someone able to cast some sort of spell to force the ghost out.
Heh. We kind of tried that in Exalted once. This village was losing its beloved elder. We agreed to murder her so that she could become a ghost and continue dispensing wisdom from beyond the grave.
The luck die was not with us. Our “murder pillow” (which became a running gag in that game) killed her sure enough, bur Grandma’s ghost passed on. The villagers were not happy with us.
Is the Occultist from 3.5e? Or something else?
https://www.d20pfsrd.com/alternative-rule-systems/occult-adventures/occult-classes/occultist/
I keep trying to throw the 5e crowd a bone by putting “Artificer” on the list of options, but the Quest Givers over on Patreon always seem to vote for the Pathfinder options.
At this point, we’re prisoners of our own naming conventions. Unless we want to create archetypes and prestige classes and similar, we’ve only got so many options remaining.
For corpses found in dungeons and other places, have Disrupt Undead prepared and use it on the corpse. If it’s an undead, it will take damage and spare you a nasty surprise round as you roll initiative. If it isn’t, you don’t damage, disturb or otherwise desecrate the corpse.
If a haunt is noticed before it triggers, using Mage Hand helps loot/search the room without triggering it with ones presence.
If you suspect a Haunt or undead-filled area, buy Soul Candles. They work as candles until you get then near a Haunt/undead, at which point they give you a clear warning that shit is about to go down by sputtering out. Float one into a room with Mage Hand to locate haunts or hidden undead.
Otherwise, for Haunts, you either have a cleric/cure caster or you treat the room as having a trap you can never disarm.
For ghosties, your best bet is either blasting them with force damage (Magic Missile and Battering Blast work wonders), trapping them with force/magic walls, everyone having magic weapons so they don’t end up unable to damage them, and bringing some Ghost Touch abilities/enchants.
You can play Ghostbuster by getting a ghost-touch net and using it to literally net up a ghost. There’s also a specific magic item for that purpose, the Force Net.
The Batman wizard strikes again!
I’m curious: Do you actually implement this stuff on your characters, or is this all part of a theory crafted utility belt?
A bit theory crafting, a bit practice/experience from dealing with all-too-frequent undeads and haunts in official APs – especially undead-filled APs like Mummy’s Mask. Sooner or later you’re forced to deal with every DR type and gimmick creature type (swarms, incorporeal, and such), so better to be prepared than helplessly flailing.
Disrupt undead helped us get the drop on a obvious dormant zombie when I was playing a Wizard in Return of the Runelords, and poke at suspicious corpses later on. In the same AP, I used Mage Hand to snatch an valuable-looking item from a room in a haunted house, negating the need to enter the room and deal with the obvious haunt (stuff was floating around in it). The rest is standard ‘be a wizard with a plan for every situation’ from level 1 to 20. Force spells were fairly reliable and made short work of many encounters, including one with a evil-possessor-ghostie being pummeled by a Mage Sword whilst helplessly stuck inside Force Walls. Battering Blast became my Spell Perfection choice in the endgame.
In Mummy’s Mask, we we’re set up for tomb exploration, so picking Soul Candles seemed like an obvious move on a trap-experienced Gunslinger Kobold. Unfortunately, whilst they did identify that a haunt was happening (preventing a ‘surprise round’), it didn’t make it any easier dealing with their clunky mechanics. It’s a trick that works at any level, but its range means you either already know there’s undead or you’re too late to stop bad stuff happening with the warning you do get – though getting any warning can be lifesaving (e.g. invisible undead).
The Ghost Net was a curiosity I noticed whilst browsing ways to counteract incorporeals, after a bunch of them made my party inconvenienced. I ended up getting Warrior Spirit by multiclassing into Weapon Master levels to have ‘on the fly’ enchants on demand.
Oh, hey! I’ve had my eye on that build. Was it fun in practice, or did it get a bit dull doing the same thing so often?
I think that’s a big part of making “gimmick creatures” an interesting challenge. Find a way to telegraph their presence, then give the party a chance to plan ahead.
Ironically, the popular “legacy weapon” ability on Occultist could do the same thing. Le sigh.
In practice, battering blast was ‘ray of fire, but better’. I discovered it later in the AP, so I only used it through the post-15th levels.
As for gimmick creatures, they turned out to be the bane of our Ascetic Oracle. Enemies with hardness (constructs) and early DR5/DR10 monsters at low levels made them unable to damage/touch/unarmed strike a good chunk of the monsters in that AP. They did crits for 1 damage.
If we had a monk they’d be similarly shafted for two books worth of encounters. There are gimmick monsters, and then there’s encounters that are a middle finger to an entire class.
Swarms also screwed us over in the early encounters, and that was WITH having supplies to deal with them.
I think for Occultists, the Ghostbuster gimmick is that they trap ghosties with their Binding Magic Circles (which they can do for free as a class feature). The problem is that this kind of stuff happens at late levels (12th). An alternative is to be the Haunt Collector archetype.
Does magic circle work on ghosts? I thought it was more about calling planar critters. Or can you call ghosts somehow?
Well, the circle is alignment-specific, so it works on undead by the simple fact they’re all evil-aligned. This lets the binding circle ability trap ghosts and keeps it useful for stuff like demons, devils, and such. The problem is it doesn’t discriminate against targets, so you have to be careful of having it not trigger on the wrong creature.
As far as ‘Outside Contact’ goes, that’s Outsider-specific indeed. Though there’s probably some incorporeal-outsider critters out there.
There’s an important keyword in the circle spell:
You’ve got to look for the “called” tag in the spell description.
I’ll be honest: this is an example of my least-favorite kind of spell design. This overly complicated shit transform spell casting into a game of contract negotiation, where players and GMs have to go through a mountain of text with a fine-toothed comb. Love me some Pathfinder, but this mess drives me nuts.
I think that applies to the base Magic Circle spell. The Occultist’s Binding Circle is a specific class-feature ‘trap’ version of it that you can turn your magic circle into.
“A binding circle is invisible and counts as a trap. If a living creature of the corresponding alignment steps inside it, the trap triggers and binds the creature inside the circle.”
Though the binding circle class feature doesn’t work on ghosts since those aren’t “living” creatures.
Ha-ha! That’s obviously what I meant! I totally remembered to read “binding circles” in addition to “magic circles!” I’m a noted authority!
Well, all of my spontaneous casters take CLW as a spell known. It’s just safer to have it. My various spellcasters would have some kind of energy spell that could work, even if it’s just a cantrip. Some of my martials might have trouble though.
Well hey, even if all you’ve got is a flaming sword and a beefy body, you can still put your 1d6 fire damange and your Con score in the way of danger. Buying time for the actually-effective members of the party never feels great, but it’s occasionally the right play.
True. I should probably get Shock and Flame on Tamarie’s handwraps and scimitar. She does have a level in cleric, but the extra damage is always useful.
A bad performance roll may scare spirits, but i don’t think the party bard botching his roll is the surest way to keep incorporeal things at bay 🙂
On those cases a roleplay solution can be better than a mechanical one. Lets say that a pc doesn’t got any kind of “Circle of protection against…” spell, they don’t even know them. Still if lets say they got chalk they may try with a circle. That isn’t a mechanical solution, they don’t got a spell, but a roleplay one. “My grandmother told me this arrange to keep bad think at bay. Thanks grandma, thanks!!!”, “Wow, the simbol of Saint… eh… i don’t remember his name works. The cleric on the parish of my town wasn’t lying. I own him an apology”. Rules be damn, as long as you can justifies with roleplay you can do what you want. In cases like, things people maybe should but isn’t prepare that is a rewarding solution 🙂
True to a point. You’ve got to be convincing enough to get your GM to buy it though.
For example, when it comes to haunts, I’ve known Pathfinder GMs to stick pretty close to the RAW in terms of “you must do this very specific thing” to cleanse the haunt. For example:
https://www.d20pfsrd.com/gamemastering/haunts/#Insidious_Presence_CR_9
Truly a worthy sacrifice. Too bad death is permanent for adventurers 😛
Gotta get yourself a Gurgi.
https://pa1.narvii.com/6495/cb6cbd6b67f1994faf43b53d6e4e74c904cdd769_hq.gif
Why is the kid pushing the dog to the cauldron? Is the kid gonna work with Witch? 😀
So my best story here is a character from a finished campaign but i still love it and will continue. My character was a kitsune warlord specializing in unarmed combat. We were playing the Jade Regent adventure path and were in the process of traveling from the Crown(or throat i cant remember exactly) of the World to Minkai, we had had some previous ghost problems so I aquired access to the Silver Crane discipline. The ghost of a half fiend that we had previously defeated possessed one of the NPCs we were traveling with but it was not a problem because one of the maneuvers I had readied could deal damage to a possessing creature and leave the possessed unharmed. So when all was said and done, I roundhouse kicked the ghost out of our friend, probably a good thing i was not targeted though.
Otherwise i just make a rule to get at least an oil of magic weapon or two ASAP whenever i play a martial character, just in case.
You know how folks are like, “That’s too specific! Why would you take that? It’s so niche!” You take it so that you can one day write the sentence, “I roundhouse kicked the ghost out of our friend.” Well played!
I’ve… actually never really worried about this sort of thing. I’ve always just made martial combat monsters with decent charisma, which I love playing, and my friends like bringing more niche characters, which I love interacting with. It’s a symbiotic relationship.
Hard to interact with beloved characters when they’ve been spooped to death.
Expeditious Retreat. A tactical choice made all the easier by being the rest of my group’s preferred approach as well.
Can’t be a Batman wizard if you don’t start by getting your ass kicked. That’s the first step of barely surviving, analyzing your own wounds back at the Batman wizard cave, then returning with shark repellant or whatever.
I made a Huge wyvern for a monsters game (3.5) once; super-strong, but he was fairly explicitly weak against swarms, oozes, ghosts, et-cetera. His archnemesis was actually the ghost of an evil ranger killed by his parents.
His reason for getting along with an adventuring party was pretty much because of that; he had territory to defend, and was willing to help the rest of the party defeat their foes if they helped with his.
Wyvern understand strength!
It is a nice point about deliberate weakness though. If you go in knowing that you’re going to be ineffective against specific enemies, that can become an interesting plot point rather than a frustrating mechanical flaw.
In Warhammer fantasy rpg, incorporeal creatures are totally immune to non-magical damage. Of course, being a low magic setting, magic weapons are rather uncommon, the average adventurer being lucky to ever see, let alone own, one. And due to randomised starting careers, spellcasters are quite rare as well (and the nature of magic in the setting means that most see that as a positive). WHFRPG parties are very much afraid of those ghosts.
PTSD Flashbacks to Castle Scarwall
NOPE!!!
OK, in all seriousness, it’s going to depend on how prepared the party is for a given encounter. If they’re expecting to get attacked by incorporeal foes, make sure that everyone has a ghost touch weapon or barring that, has holy water and/or ghost salt weapon blanches. A ranged focus character can get by with the ghost salt, since they can use it on multiple pieces of ammunition and it will be cheaper in the long run than getting them an incorporeally focused weapon unless it’s going to be a LOT of incorporeal undead. Other than that, hope that someone made a character that can channel well or prepared ghostbane dirge.
Additionally, make sure that as many bonuses to AC include things that contribute to touch AC, like deflection bonuses etc. Most likely anything that you really need to worry about is going to have such a high to-hit that it won’t even matter what your AC is. The paladin will probably be fine with their spells and smite evil, but most other melee combatants will need to have accept that they’re going to take a beating while the casters and ranged combatants solve the problem.
One last thing. This is actually a case where the spell cartridges feat would really shine, since the damage is all force damage and (unless the GM decides it needs it for “balance”) doesn’t involve spell resistance, which can neuter an unlucky caster. So an eldritch archer with this feat could be doing a fair bit of damage against incorporeal enemies.
Well, by coincidence my PFS characters actually happen to be very well equipped for dealing with incorporeals, given their level:
Arthur the Paladin has Lay On Hands as a focus spell, which is at least good against undead incorporeals. He also carries holy water as standard equipment.
Darnell the Wizard is the weakest of my PFS characters on that front, but he does usually have a casting of Magic Missile prepared, which is a decent anti-incorporeal shot. Plus he has the Arcane Bond feature, which gives him a second MM casting if he needs it.
And Scefsa the Divine Sorceror was built on the concept of “absolutely no offensive abilities against living targets, but lots of healing, support, and anti-abomination spells”, so she has both Disrupt Undead (anti-undead) and Divine Lance (anti-Evil) as cantrips, plus Heal (does double duty against undead) and Protection (good for defense against possession) as known spells. And she’s a Sorceror, so she can cast both spontaneously.
There’s also Banrae Ledaal (Fire-Aspect Dragon-Blood) who has the Charms to see and hit incorporeal foes, plus a Charm that gives bonus damage against fae or undead.
So yeah, this is something my characters tend to be well-equipped to deal with.
Just had this happen to our 4th level PF1e party. The cleric, not surprisingly, did most of the heavy lifting in killing the thing. Started by casting Magic Weapon on the paladin’s sword. The pally then smote?smited? away. Yes the damage was halved but even so it added up quickly. The cleric kept up a constant barrage of Channels. And the wizard cast their 1 magic missile spell and then spammed acid dart. We nickle-and-dimed that bastid to death… more death. Whatever.
Now here’s the million gp question. What items and spells are you guys picking up to ensure you never have to deal with that mess again?