communicating with other worlds from RL?

[mindcrime]

Here's a question I just thought of, that I don't really remember seeing touched on anywhere:

How realistic is it to think that somebody - possibly either a PC or a Dark Lord - could establish some form of communication with an entity outside of RavenLoft? We know that escape - for the DarkLords - is damn near impossible and very difficult for PCs. But I don't remember seeing anything in any of the rule books that mentioned simply communicating outside of RL.

FWIW, this question came to mind as I am trying to work out an idea for an adventure... it's nowhere near complete yet, but I'm envisioning a scenario where a DarkLord - trying to escape RL, of course - find a way to communicate with a powerful (evil) entity outside of RL and strikes a deal of some sort with said entity.... The other creature helps the Dark Lord escape and gets (???) in return. My vision is that this would somehow involve tricking the PC group into going to RL where they would somehow be part of the Dark Lord's plan to escape. Like I said, not fully fleshed out yet, really it's just a seed of an idea right now... but does anybody think this sounds plausible?

[ScS of the Fraternity]

As a general rule, I'd say no, but I think it has some potential. After all, Hazlik was able to get a glimpse of Thay during the Grand Conjunction.

The act of communication would have to be a major undertaking - one where the very fabric of the demiplane is stressed to the extreme. Perhaps collecting restless spirits so that their ethereal resonance creates a kind of constructive interferance, vibrating the ethereal plane itself and thus sending out a message.

As well, the Dark Powers would surely be aware of the escape attempt and naturally intervene to offer the Dark Lord the hope of escape, only to thwart them at the last moment. Perhaps this is where the PCs come in?
The PCs might trash the ritual where the unnamed Evil Entity tries to pull the Darklord out - thus causing the Entity to be drawn in - where it shows the Darklord its displeasure.

[mindcrime]

The act of communication would have to be a major undertaking - one where the very fabric of the demiplane is stressed to the extreme. Perhaps collecting restless spirits so that their ethereal resonance creates a kind of constructive interferance, vibrating the ethereal plane itself and thus sending out a message.

As well, the Dark Powers would surely be aware of the escape attempt and naturally intervene to offer the Dark Lord the hope of escape, only to thwart them at the last moment. Perhaps this is where the PCs come in?
The PCs might trash the ritual where the unnamed Evil Entity tries to pull the Darklord out - thus causing the Entity to be drawn in - where it shows the Darklord its displeasure.

Yeah, that sounds pretty good. And that could be made to fit the "mood" of RavenLoft perfectly like this: The DarkLord, in the process of acquiring all of these spirits, is having random people from his/her domain kidnapped and killed. And of course the PCs show up in town while this is going on, only to find that everybody is scared sh!tless (more so than usual) to go outside after dark...


Of course this seems a wee bit like the whole Grim Harvest story-line, but different in a subtle way.

[cure]

1. Getting a message out is easy enough. Just find someone undergoing transposition. Of course that is not especially helpful unless you want to send a message to Hell, the Abyss, or the like. Getting a message back in is also not entirely outlandish. The demiplane is in the Deep Ethereal somewhere and it is usually more concerned with keeping people in than keeping them out.

2. More interestingly, an individual undergoing transposition could himself/herself serve as a 'portal' passing messages back and forth.

3. The Mist do permit access in the Near Ethereal and the Shadow Plane, but never beyond the arm's reach. Communication between two beings on either side of the threshold should be possible (and dangerous).

4. A message that propogates through the Ethereal or Shadow Plane is envisionable. A spell or a device could be conceived to that very purpose. But it would only function when brought into the Near Ethereal or the Shadow Plane.

5. The Vistani are strongly hinted to be able to pass beyond the Mists. Thus they could carry messages.

6. Communication with Gothic Earth, especially as we perhaps leant it one of the Dark Powers, would make some sense.

[DeepShadow of FoS]

Actually, if you go strictly by the books, getting a message out is pathetically easy. The sending spell, for example, is unaltered by the DP's and it crosses planes. A DL could use it to contact someone he knew from before being sucked in, or he could ply outlanders for names of like-minded people in their worlds.

[Funk]

I was thinking about this too a couple years back - when I was going to run a campaign based on Gwydion attempting to escape from the Shadow Rift.

Basic premise was -

One group of players in Forgotten Realms, one group in Ravenloft. The first group would have weird stuff happening with the Plane of Shadow there (and the Shadow Weave), such as a BBEG that ultimately they foil and he gets sucked in to some thing (or dissapears). BBEG then appears in the other campaign, but reformed - realizing he was being used as a pawn to a darker power.

Blah blah blah - eventual last moment was going to be big evil groups trying to pry open the portal that Gwydion is stuck in from both ends. The FR end to release Gwydion, and the Ravenloft end to give him his "army" of shadow fey, or something like that.

Never got too far with it, but I thought it'd be fun to have the players in one game realize they had to get a message to the players in the other game - and do things like go to Adam's home, looking for the portal, or striking up deals with Vistani, stuff like that.

- regardless -

One way I came up with that hasn't really been discussed is using the Nightmare Realms. Supposedly dreamers from outside go there when their dreams become nightmares - perhaps your darklord has some ability to affect them, or sends his "Abber Nomad" minion to find the specific dreams.

[mindcrime]

I was thinking about this too a couple years back - when I was going to ru

One way I came up with that hasn't really been discussed is using the Nightmare Realms. Supposedly dreamers from outside go there when their dreams become nightmares - perhaps your darklord has some ability to affect them, or sends his "Abber Nomad" minion to find the specific dreams.

Heh, I guess "great minds think alike" and all that.. I thought of using the
Nightmare Lands as a bridge to communicate with, last night after posting my original message. That I think could work out real well... that might be how the PCs get involved, by having mysterious messages show up in their dreams.

[Jester of the FoS]

Well, the canon ruling would be "no". And rules ruling would be ""no". The story ruling is "do whatever makes the cooler story".

Can other planes be contacted? Possibly, but the idea of false contacts or people only thinking they made contact when it is really demons/dark powers/ dakrlords/ etc is far more evil...

[mindcrime]

Well, the canon ruling would be "no". And rules ruling would be ""no". The story ruling is "do whatever makes the cooler story".

Interesting. What in the canon / rules makes you say the answer would be no? I don't claim to have the RL rules memorized, but I don't recall offhand any specific prohibition against this.


But of course, as you say, you do whatever makes the story work.

Can other planes be contacted? Possibly, but the idea of false contacts or people only thinking they made contact when it is really demons/dark powers/ dakrlords/ etc is far more evil...

In this case, I think the way I picture this story evolving, it would be necessary for actual contact across planes to work. That is, if I wanted to use this mechanic to pull some characters into the story who aren't already in RavenLoft. I guess that's not strictly necessary, but it seems like a cool hook to me.

[Malus Black]

Well, the canon ruling would be "no". And rules ruling would be ""no". The story ruling is "do whatever makes the cooler story".

Interesting. What in the canon / rules makes you say the answer would be no? I don't claim to have the RL rules memorized, but I don't recall offhand any specific prohibition against this.

While I can't find the exact statement in the RLCS (oddly enough, since I seem to recall having seen it before), the Commune spell "simply does not function in Ravenloft," and Contact Other Plane "opens a mental conduit to the darklord." Even Gate, arguably the most powerful non-epic spell in the game, "is one-way only, leading into but not out of Ravenloft." You'll need something fairly unique, like an artifact or some Ravenloftian equivalent of Howler's Crag, to communicate with someone on another plane.

[DeepShadow of FoS]

Once again, strictly speaking, the canon ruling depends upon the spell. The spell sending works across planes and thereby allows brief communication.

Contact Other Plane and Commune are for contacting genuine outsiders, if not deities--that is, denizens of the upper and lower planes. The rules appear to be against these in part because it would allow PC's to pierce the fog of moral ambiguity that is RL. Sending, OTOH, is limited to human beings, unless you are on a first-name basis with an outsider. The advice you'd get from a sending is therefore not trustworthy enough to destroy moral ambiguity.

Either that, or the rules designers missed this spell when they went through the list. Your call.

[Jester of the FoS]

The clear intent of the altered spells is to cut off the plane.
Every single spell cannot be listed and the editors of the book probably failed to account for new spells introduced after 3.5. If contact other plane, a spell designed to work across planer boundries fails, why should a spell designed only for local use that has a chance of failure when used extraplaner work?

[DeepShadow of FoS]

The clear intent of the altered spells is to cut off the plane.

I'm fine if that's how you want to rule, but sending is not the only such blind spot. Based on similar blind spots with scrying spells (scrying outside of RL is not prohibited), one could argue that the clear intent of the altered spells is to prohibit extraplanar travel, not mere observation or even the sending of messages.

Let's be clear, I like your ruling, I'm just not sure if it's fair to call it official. Is there an errata for the spell list?

Every single spell cannot be listed and the editors of the book probably failed to account for new spells introduced after 3.5.

Sending and scry were both around in 3.0, and the book tries to list every altered spell, if only by reference ot a category. The fact that there's no listing for sending might easily have been an oversight, but what about scrying? The divination section says that scrying into another domain is like scrying into another plane, but it says nothing to prohibit scrying outside of RL.

If contact other plane, a spell designed to work across planer boundries fails, why should a spell designed only for local use that has a chance of failure when used extraplaner work?

Perhaps because of an oversight. Perhaps because the former violates the Unspoken Pact, while the latter (usually) does not. I don't know. All I'm saying is that if I were to try and contact people outside RL, this is where I'd start.

[Malus Black]

Contact Other Plane and Commune are for contacting genuine outsiders, if not deities--that is, denizens of the upper and lower planes.

Yes, I know. I was in something of a hurry and couldn't find a better example.

Once again, strictly speaking, the canon ruling depends upon the spell. The spell sending works across planes and thereby allows brief communication.

This, however, I completely missed. (Actually, now that you mention it, I remember being somewhat surprised by it the first time I failed to find it in the list of altered spells.) Now, I would say that, because all spells designed to actually get you to another plane transport you to another domain, sending and scrying have the same limitations. There's no reason for Hazlik not to scry on his Thayan enemies if they don't, after all, but Gaz I seems to imply that it was only during the Grand Conjunction that he saw their prosperity.

Incidentally, was there a similar spell in earlier editions that was mentioned as being blocked in any of the boxed sets?

[Bluebomber4evr]

To my knowledge, the only being capable of contacting someone outside of the demiplane was Vecna, and I think he should be the only exception to that rule.